#more aus

Both of them are a HOT mess of drama.

Corpse Bride (or rather, Corpse Husband) AU isn’t just two-three marriage dramas, but a lot of other major conflicts from scandals, family politics and secrets, classism, secret identities, lots of chaos. Waaaay too many subplots that I’ll make another post later breaking them all down. For now just going over the main gist:: Set sometime in a tbd dynasty in later Imperial China (leaning late Ming or Qing) MK and Mei have a chance encounter that two kids from two very different social standings wouldn’t normally have that leads to them becoming besties forever.

Except forever is tested by societal pressures and such as they get older, and Mei is now being pushed more towards marriage. One of these suitors being Red Son. What starts as MK wanting to protect his girl bestie from yet another pompous jerk, lots of strings being pulled to involve MK in the proceedings to help the two get along, turns into relief that the setup works in Mei actually liking this one and Red Son respects her back (even if he’s a bit tsundere about it). Like Mei, Red’s not particularly ready for marriage either, but it’s out of their hands because of bigger family politics at play (that the kiddos aren’t wholly privy to) and he bonds with her over that. Said politics initially only being the union between the Longs and the Demon Bull families would allow for stronger negotiations to release DBK from his mountain prison. All three start to establish a friendship when uh oh. MK starts to also catch feelings for Red Son. Then double oh no, terrible misunderstanding causes a scandal that causes in-fighting with the Longs/extended Ao family, rushing the marriage arrangements forward in order to save face, and putting MK and his family in hot water when MK becomes the scapegoat for ‘impeding the union’.

As MK goes to a forest to cry and be alone, the Bull family’s advisor finds him and comes to check on him. The same advisor who’d been a surprising ally if not a friend up to this point who gave him pointers on how to befriend Red Son, covered for the trio, and did a lot to have their backs and now doing his best to comfort him here after screwing things up.

So then this madman starts talking big talk about how MK actually has options to turn this into his favor depending on what he wants. A way to resolve everything, the family dramas, the slight against the Longs, his fathers’ dreams, everything without having to stand for letting his heart be broken. MK thinks he’s crazy that a peasant has any chance. The advisor tells him “Well what if you were the successor to the Monkey King?”

The other important part of this scene is the recreation of the “reciting the vows” from the movie, but it’s a combo MK of freaking out how to say the words to confess and Mr. Advisor relenting in helping via demonstration by reciting what he intended to be his vows to his long lost beloved. It hurts but in a way it’s soothing, like giving a proper goodbye. And if it means helping MK, it’s worth it.

MK’s over here, moved and emotional wondering how in the world he’s supposed to top that, yet comes out more determined to find a way.

It also summons a ghost.

The two understandably freak tf out, the spirit is confused and then pissed because he heard the vows, his vows, his and his love’s vows that only they know, yet doesn’t see his husband-to-be. Nor does he take kindly to the idea of anyone stealing something so precious. And you don’t trespass on the spirits in China unless you wanna get fucked all the way up, so now these two have to juggle this new wildcard spanner in the works and find a way to settle the spirit’s grievance for their offense. What none of these three realize is that matters regarding this spirit are the origins for the many conflicts dominos that have piled up now…

As for S6 AU, hoo boy…

To quote the concept summary of it, “After everything with the Pillar, MK wanted a break. No, he NEEDED a break. They all needed a break. And damn it, they were gonna have one.”

MK kicks things off by going to Monkey King and inviting him to hang out in the city for a change as opposed to secluded on FFM. After a lot of back and forth, Wukong relents, but on the condition they do so in disguises so they’re not mobbed by fans. After an awkward start with Wukong and Macaque, both in human disguise not initially aware of the other at first, flirt with one another/hit it off well before realizing who the other is and getting into another fight at Pigsy’s — all this while Wukong was waiting for MK to finish getting ready — Sunburst duo has a blast enjoying a night out.

Until the demon attack.

Except, it’s not a demon. It’s a Celestial. And worse, it’s an enemy from Wukong’s Journey days who wasn’t killed after defeating them now out for revenge, and very firmly at the bottom of the list of old enemies Wukong doesn’t want anywhere near MK. After a tense argument, Wukong takes the fiend on alone, sending MK to handle crowd control.

An enemy who’s targeting Wukong specifically in the most twisted and heinous of ways, made all the darker on account of his new powers gained from when the group shared the Color Stones’ power with everyone in the realms to fix the Pillar. Everyone means everyone, even villains.

Even still living ones like Sai Tai Sui.

With said new powers and one stolen Diamond Snare, STS renders Wukong unconscious and abducts him. MK is having absolutely none of this, starts assembling the adults to stage a rescue asap, including an initially very unwilling Macaque. That is, until they figure out the name of who’s responsible and does an angry 180 declaring he’s doing this solo. MK does not take this well and through tricks strikes out on the rescue anyway, leaving Macaque aggravated about having to rescue “two idiots.”

TW/CW non-con, attempted rape, magic drugging, and talk of past sexual abuse

Lil recap for those of you who don’t know about Sai Tai Sui, this is arguably one of the top worst bastards from the Journey rogues line up. This is a serial sexual predator and sadist who abducted the queen of the Scarlet-Purple Kingdom to take as his own bride. However ran into a bit of a hiccup as an intervening immortal saw and granted the queen a magic robe that would inflict excruciating pain upon whoever touched her while she wore it. Obviously she refused to take it off with STS holding her hostage, so Sai Tai Sui goes back to the kingdom demanding more women under the guise of being servants to his new queen, with the unspoken secondary purpose of being ‘substitutes’ to serve his needs until he can formally consummate his union to the Queen.

The novel doesn’t go into explicit detail, but there’s implications that a great number of women died by STS’s hand or by their own to escape his abuse. That immortal who protected the queen couldn’t be assed to protect any of these other girls, and STS simply kept taking more women from the kingdom to replace them, too. This went on for three years before the Great Companions arrived and Wukong put an end to the atrocities. This was a solo mission for Sun Wukong, he didn’t have any backup from the others with this one.

And he’s alone here in the present with this same monster now intent on making Wukong pay back “all he stole and owed him” while bound in the magic artifact that was used to hold him when he was arrested following his surrender to the Jade Emperor, execution attempts, and to force him inside the Furnace.

Wukong still fights back with all he can muster, especially when MK arrives, but STS traps MK in another room and again uses his new power to make Wukong more ‘cooperative’. It’s here Macaque shows up in a black shadowed inferno of fury, duels a bitch to the death, a deserved graphic gory death, sends MK home through a portal, but takes Wukong in his arms back to his home in the city. The complex with his old S1 dojo.

All well and good, except Macaque failed to untie Wukong, had him wake up somewhere that’s NOT FFM, this after defending his honor against an abductor proclaiming, albeit perverse, courtship intentions that Wukong refused… so it looks like a courtnapping on Macaque’s end.

But the problems don’t end there. No, no, no, no. See, the reason the scum bag that is STS wasn’t butchered into the next reincarnation by Wukong is because Guanyin herself intervened and commanded he be spared. For STS was her steed the Golden Haired Hou and she would deal with him. Macaque killing STS however has created a bureaucratic nightmare for the monkeys and Heaven that’s not going to have a simple resolution with 300+ other things going on post-last two crises rebuilding. Along with the difficult road of Wukong’s recovery from this latest trauma that might finally force him to confront the rest of his issues he’s been ignoring for centuries… Macaque’s too.

Im probably gonna draft this one until I get B.a.t done, but yee.

Heres the au in basic words:

Krogan about to be executed after race to the end. Eret feel bad. Eret and Krogan escape before Krogan be executed. They runaway on stormcutter and go into hiding. They hide deep in archipelago. At first, they argue about certain stuff, but begin to bond over their shared trauma. They eventually heal from trauma and become sort of vigilantes(? I think that's the right word for it), liberating Drago's captive dragons to fuck with his plan.

| A New AU Cruising to a Dash near You... 🏁 🏎️ |

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I agree. Since FOP lasted longer than DP, you would think the fandom would be bigger and the series would be more popular. Though, I love how small the FOP fandom is. There's less drama and everyone seems to get along.