Around and around the merry-go-round

Tsurune masterpost here 

Book 1

Color Illustration

Prologue

Chapter 1 (Part 1 | Part 2)

Chapter 2 (Part 1 | Part 2)

Chapter 3 (Part 1 | Part 2)

Chapter 4 (Part 1 | Part 2)

Chapter 5 (Part 1 | Part 2)

Chapter 6 (Part 1 | Part 2)

Afterword

Book 2

Color Illustration

Prologue

Chapter 1 (Part 1 | Part 2)

Chapter 2 (Part 1 | Part 2)

Chapter 3 (Part 1 | Part 2)

Chapter 4 (Part 1 | Part 2)

Chapter 5 (Part 1 | Part 2)

Chapter 6 (Part 1 | Part 2)

They’re also displayed on my instagram: sisestitch

Because I will argue for days that Wen Kexing is terribly touch-starved, especially at the beginning of the book. For eight years, as the Valley Master, he’s only allowed Gu Xiang within a meter of him. They have a fairly casual relationship, but they straddle an awkward line between family and master/servant, and as the Ghost Valley Master? Everyone in Ghost Valley, including Gu Xiang, is at least a little frightened of him. He’s affection-starved as much as he is touch-starved, and having one person who cares more than she’s frightened isn’t really enough to overcome that degree of isolation. When a servant woman is combing his hair and accidentally hits a snag, she begs for her life, and his first reaction is to ask if someone forced her to wait on him. He’s been the Valley Master since he was a very young adult, and he’s been in Ghost Valley since he was a child.

And it’s so interesting to me that a lot of cnovels really emphasize that when the leads are in a relationship, it’s their first relationship, and they never wanted anyone else, but Wen Kexing (and jing beiyuan in lord seventh, which is an interesting parallel) really directly subvert that. Gu Xiang almost immediately remarks that Wen Kexing spends plenty of nights with male courtesans, and partway through the book, Wen Kexing uses a handkerchief from a famous courtesan to treat Zhou Zishu’s injury. He left the valley and entered the human world, and immediately threw himself into the arms of other men.

And Zhou Zishu, I would say, is also touch starved and affection starved, but is coping differently from Wen Kexing. No matter how strained and/or political his relationships with the Emperor and the government are, and even though he took charge of the Four Seasons Manor at… fifteen, iirc, he did have at least one close, affectionate (for a zhou zishu value of affectionate), trusting relationship, with Liang Jiuxiao. And where Wen Kexing starts the book with a comfortable relationship with Gu Xiang, Zhou Zishu starts the book knowing that his shidi is dead, and in Lord Seventh, we see the ways that he failed and/or “failed” Liang Jiuxiao, with Jiang Xue, and with staying at his post during the final battle instead of rushing off and trying to find his shidi, and it working out… not well. And I think it’s fascinating that unlike Wen Kexing, when he leaves Tian Chuang to reenter the human world, he’s content to be almost completely solitary, and focuses his attention on seeing the sights and drinking good wine.

A really interesting parallel to me is in the Ye Baiyi extra, where he mentions that it’s only human nature to crave food and sex, and he’s too old to care about sex, so food it is. Because that’s not a thought he ever shares with the other characters, but it’s very interesting to me that in the novel, in that first burst of enjoying their freedom, Wen Kexing is so focused on physical intimacy, first with courtesans, and then with Zhou Zishu, while Zhou Zishu is much more focused on physical pleasure must less dependent on other humans, like sightseeing and wine.

But once Wen Kexing and Zhou Zishu are in action together, and once Wen Kexing definitively gets invested in Zhou Zishu, the physical progression of the relationship is really interesting to me. Wen Kexing gets very handsy and very forward, very quickly. Zhou Zishu tends to either endure or push him away, depending on the situation, but compared to something like, say, svsss, there’s much less ‘but i’m not gay though’ and much more generalized irritation until he (much more slowly) gets invested in return. 

And I probably would have brushed it away except for that one scene where they were about to do it, and get interrupted by the Scorpion King. First, this line, which makes it absolutely clear that as much as Zhou Zishu had given up on living a long, normal human life, Wen Kexing was in exactly the same position. Now, seeing Zhou Zishu potentially get a new lease on life, he’s forced to reckon with the idea that it might be possible for him to live on in the same way, which casts a whole new light on how casually he slept around with courtesans and propositioned Zhou Zishu earlier in the story, versus where he stands now.

They were both lone wolves who had been caught in hunters’ traps, struggling with all of their strength to free themselves to no avail, and thus, were willing to gnaw their own legs off without mercy.

[Wen Kexing] hadn’t been able to help following him, from watching him. Then a revelation had dawned— He’d realized, for the first time, that if Zhou Zishu could live like this, was it also a possible for him to live like this?

And then when Wen Kexing starts to catch a fresh round of feelings, Zhou Zishu’s response says volumes about his prior reactions whenever Wen Kexing got forward with him.

“A-Xu, sleep with me once. This way, we’ll keep each other in our hearts. You won’t die so easily then, and neither will I. What do you think?”

He said it jokingly, yet Zhou Zishu did not reply, only looked at him oddly. A while later, he finally asked, “Are you truly sincere about this?”

Wen Kexing laughed, his body tilting towards Zhou Zishu. He spoke, nearly against Zhou Zishu’s lips, “Can’t you tell if I’m sincere or not?”

Stunned, Zhou Zishu paused, then said in a low voice, “I… truly can’t tell. I haven’t experienced many instances of sincerity over the course of my life, and can’t identify it. Are you?”

Wen Kexing’s fingers drifted up his shoulder, and tugged his hair loose. Dark hair cascaded down, making the tough man before his eyes look a few degrees more fragile in an instant. He dropped his cheeky grin, and in a soft voice, filled with momentous certainty, said, “I am.”

Wen Kexing is most starved for touch, while Zhou Zishu is most starved for sincerity. Zhou Zishu was up to his neck in court politics in Lord Seventh, where a major focus of the story is about how sure, the Crown Prince may be deeply in love, but he’s the future Emperor, and ultimately, his feelings land way down the priority list. Up until this point in the story, with Wen Kexing waxing eloquent about how pretty Zhou Zishu must be, and calling it ‘mariticide’ when Zhou Zishu hits him, and being like ‘no no let’s hear the man out’ when the Scorpion King wants them to put on a sexy show for him, Zhou Zishu hasn’t been able to tell whether  Wen Kexing means it. 

jungkook with his hair tucked behind his ear for anon ♡