zhao yuanzhou – foregone conclusion up [fate/duty/surrender] down [futile struggle/resignation/cycles]

from the beginning, zyz was maybe the one character who was resigned to his fate. everyone else was struggling against what is "meant to be" and he's struggling with them against their fates but he always believed that he should already be dead. it almost doesn't matter how he gets dead as long as he gets there without more carnage. even when his belief in that is shaken, he immediately pulls himself back into it.

his flower is the night-blooming cereus, its plant is often too big to contain indoors and can go years without making any flowers but when it does, the flowers bloom for one night and start dying by dawn. i felt like that was a fitting image for zyz who spent yeeeears being this untouchable great demon in loneliness then had his "long dream" with the dhb for a tiny fraction of that time before dawn arrived. i also thought its white and red colours went well with the white ape with crimson limbs.

wen xiao – devotion up [dedication/care/gentleness] down [loss of self/heartbreak]

wen xiao is kind of the opposite of zyz in that she surrenders to her fate not out of resignation but out of belief. i think that stems from being the "purest" heart but from the get-go we see her selfless care everywhere, people she knows and people she doesn't know seek her for comfort and this is the source of her joy and her sorrow but she wouldn't give up the former because of the latter. it's her devotion that sees her through to the other side of her helplessness.

her flower is the pink eglantine, it's a flower known for its big blossoms, fragrant leaves and curved prickles. it has a lot of meanings but the one that stuck out to me the most is of enduring love and wounds that will not heal. wen xiao is the kind of character who carries her love for others and the world around with her and the love and heartbreak of it all sustains her. the wound i mean specifically is of her finally taking on the bai ze mantle but at the cost of losing the people she loves.

zhuo yichen – sanctuary up [stability/safety/trust] down [conformity/isolation]

to me, zyc is most defined by his relationship with his brother and then his relationship with bai jiu. he first has this responsibility imposed on him through his name and his inheritance of the dhb and he acts on it out of duty more than anything else. he used to look to his brother for security and now people look to him for security and so he must embody it even if the shoes feel too big for him to fill. and then he comes to better understand this duty via bai jiu, not only does bai jiu remind him of himself but he also gives him clarity by particularising this big indescribable duty into a familiar brotherly relationship, one that shows zyc that he is capable of taking on that role and that allows him to truly become the safe harbour that everyone already saw him as.

his flower is the pansy tricolour, in mythology and literature it's linked mostly to love and romance but it is called heartsease because it is thought to mend a broken heart. it is sometimes linked to other worlds and i found that reflective of zyc who toes a line between demons and humans. other than that, its name comes from the french word to 'think' and has come to mean remembrance of absent friends which is very xiao zhuo :')

pei sijing – sanctioned departures up [faith/maturity/release] down [loneliness/resentment]

the entire project started because the pei siblings reminded me of this quote i saw on here years ago from the archive of alternative endings by lindsey drager

[...] to love a sibling is to anchor your life to a series of sanctioned departures.

and i wanted to draw something with them inspired by it. then i expanded the concept and i thought it works for psj because her story is a lot about leaving and being left, that when she holds on, in keeping her brother as a puppet, there is this sense of wrongness about it. even up to the end when the surviving trio goes their separate ways zyc and wx do the leaving and psj is left behind.

her flower is the meadowsweet, also known as queen or lady of the meadow, this i found to be reflective of her demon-hunting inheritance and reputation. its symbolism of grace and protection is contrasted by its links to death (in its use as a grave flower) and a feeling of purposelessness or uselessness which is where psj is at when we meet her first.

bai jiu – mourning bells up [sacrifice/strength/naivete] down [defeat/confusion/manipulation]

bai jiu is both lost and found because of bells. first he is found when his mother puts his bell in its place so she can always locate him. then lost when he no longer has someone looking out for the sound of his bell and heads down the path of chongwu camp. he is found again when he finds comfort in an older brother with his own bells, both of them looking for each other. then lost again when he loses his new family due to wen zongyu's manipulation of his love for his mother. then found again in friends that will forgive him and always look for him and in his sacrifice, this time with xiao zhuo's bells in his hands. he is then released from this cycle in the bell with no tongue that he gives xiao zhuo, to be remembered but not looked for.

his flower is the white violet, violets in general have a lot of herbal uses which is apt for our little healer but white violets in particular are symbols of innocence and a purity of soul. they are also flowers of grief and mourning, particularly of lives cut too short.

ying lei – entropy up [defiance/freedom/force] down [unpredictability/recklessness/stubbornness]

even though ying lei is not even close to the most powerful character, he is such a force of nature that it feels comfortable to have him on our side. his actions and reactions are kind of unpredictable and he's rarely doing what he's "supposed" to be doing, and when he does, it feels wrong. he is completely in his element when he goes to the human world to cook, and completely out of his element when he stays behind on the mountain when his grandfather dies, completely in his element when he rejoins the team, completely out of it when he sacrifices himself to save bai jiu.

his flower is the spiderwort, it has plenty of buds but the blossoms tend to only last a day which made them symbols of transient happiness and fleeting pleasures. ying lei's chaotic energy and ping-pongging from one thing to the next reminded me of this. in more tragic notes it also means the loss of something as soon as it arrives which feels like how ying lei loses his place as soon as he finds it (e.g. finally being a 'real' mountain god and then losing everything with his grandfather, finally feeling like a part of the group and having to sacrifice himself to save them).

li lun – unending dream up [ambition/hope/heroism] down [delusion/deceit/irrationality]

li lun's whole thing is that he strongly believes that things shouldn't be this way and it's a very emotional belief because we see him than lashing out out of helplessness more than once. he has a dream of a better life for the wilderness and he is always stubbornly acting on it even in those hopeless moments; he possesses bai jiu because he feels he can't possibly die before achieving his goal then when he sacrifices himself, he does so with clarity of resolve because he believes that his death brings the dream closer to reality. i was originally going to title it neverending dream but then i felt that unending has more of a stubborn little shit energy about it that suits li lun.

his flower is the red peony, most red flowers symbolise passionate feelings, red peonies in particular are linked to anger, indignation and unapologetic beauty which are all very li lun imo.

pei sihing – penance up [devotion/strength/overcoming] down [regret/defeat/loss of self]

psh lived his entire life with something to make up to his sister but being incapable of doing it, being too weak to become a hunter, being too naive to realise that becoming a demon was a trap, being too proud to even talk to her about it any of this. it's only after he becomes a puppet whose entire purpose is protecting his sister that we see him at ease because he was finally given the chance to do something to soothe his misplaced guilt.