TGCF Characters If They Lived In Real Life Dynasties

Wei Wuxian using the Wen's attempted public humiliation and subsequent punishment of memorising the Wen rules and reciting them as a way to flirt with Lan Wangji by reciting the Lan rules instead is fucking wild

Wangxian plot bunny I may or may not write, but I encourage people to write as well 🫡

Wei Wuxian: I have an excellent idea for people to leave us alone.

Wen Qing: oh boy...

Wei Wuxian: don't you wanna know what I got?

Wen Qing: stupider?

Wei Wuxian: booo! Anyway. I'm gonna send this message at the Great Sects and they'll be so disgusted they'll leave us alone!

Wen Qing: "if you want to keep the Yilling Laozu from doing horrible, ghost cultivation, then send someone as a sacrifice to have nasty, disrespectful sex with him. Those who exceed his expectations will gain everything he owns".

Wei Wuxian: See? 100% guarantie of success! Nobody will take the offer and if they do, I just say it wasn't good enough! Win-win for me!

Wen Qing: so you got stupider. Alright. Scrape that idea

Wei Wuxian:...

Wen Qing: what. Did. You do.

Wei Wuxian: I already sent it to the major sects...

Wen Qing: I swear tO GOD!!

Meanwhile, at the big sects:

At Yunmeng jiang: the message was ripped apart by Jiang Cheng because he knows Wei Wuxian 's brand of stupid and isn't going to fall for it. Also, not willing to send someone to Yilling, like, think of their reputation!

At Qinghe Nie: the message was also ripped apart by Nie Mingju because he thinks Wei Wuxian is mocking them by calling out their righteousness. They're not sending anyone either, but Nie Huaisang 's brain is going "??.. !"

At Lanling Jing: there's a huge debate about which prostitute to send him, how much they'll have to pay said prostitute to keep the Yilling Laozu content and get their hand on the Yin Tiger Tally without sacrificing too much on their side. Everyone is shooting everyone in the foot. Nothing concrete is done.

At Gusu Lan: the message was ripped apart and everyone is shaking their heads at the shamelessness of the Yilling Laozu, they're too "above" to even consider sending anyone. Lan Qiren, knowing Wei Wuxian 's brand of stupid (same as his mother, hmpf!) is nearly ripping his beard off from how mocking the boy is! Lan Xichen is sighing at yet another proof Wei Wuxian has fallen because of his cultivation. He goes to tell his brother not to do anything rash but Lan Wangji is already gone. Oops.

A month later, Lan Wangji comes back with a gaggle of old people and a child. And the Yilling Laozu, dragging his feet and trying to escape. Lan Wangji says "excuse me." at the sentries before walking to the sides in the forest for.. about 45 minutes? and when he comes back, Wei Wuxian is disheveled and loopy. He looks like he's been mauled by a fierce beast. The rest of the Wen group look exhausted and used to it, wishing they could be set somewhere so they don't have to endure their Yilling Laozu being ravished (enthusiastically) by Hanguang-jun four times a day. Wen Yuan is just happy Wei-gege and Rich-gege made up.

"Why else would Wei Wuxian do what he did for Jiang Cheng if not because of love?"

Jiang Cheng dodged to the side before attacking, “When does not now mean? I’ve had enough of you—get lost right now!” Wei WuXian shouted, “Uncle Jiang and Madam Yu said for me to look after you, for you to be well!”

—Chapt. 59: Poisons, exr

Does Wei Wuxian still care for Jiang Cheng as a friend at this point in time? Yes. Is that friendship the driving force behind his decision-making between the fall of Lotus Pier and his later defection from the Jiang? No. That's why Wei Wuxian can defect with no psychological burden later on in life: he got Jiang Cheng to live and live well. He fulfilled every debt that mattered. Jiang Cheng, unburdened by such a debt to look after Wei Wuxian, in turn places blame on Wei Wuxian:

Under the grief and the fury, Jiang Cheng had lost his mind. He couldn’t control the strength that he used at all. Wei WuXian pulled at his wrist, “Jiang Cheng...” Holding him on the ground, Jiang Cheng continued to roar, “Why did you save Lan WangJi?! Why did you have to speak up?! How many times have I told you not to stir up trouble! Not to strike! Do you really want to play the hero so much?! Have you seen what happened when you played the hero?! Huh?! Are you happy now?! “Lan WangJi and Jin ZiXuan and those people can just die! Just let them die! What’s their deaths got to do with us?! To do with our sect?! Why did this have to happen?! Why?! “Go die, go die, go die! Everyone!!!” ... In his heart, Jiang Cheng knew clearly that back in the cave of the Xuanwu of Slaughter at Dusk-Creek Mountain, even if Wei WuXian hadn’t saved Lan WangJi, the Wen Sect would have found some reason to come over sooner or later. But he had always felt that, if the whole thing with Wei WuXian didn’t happen, maybe it wouldn’t have been so soon, maybe there would’ve been some way to turn things around. It was this torturing thought that filled his heart with hatred and wrath.

Not every conflict or sacrifice in a work of fiction need be motivated by love. At some point you gotta stop chasing ghosts between the lines and simply read the lines.

Modern AU where Shen Yuan accidentally sugar-daddies everyone.

So for the purposes of this, Shen Yuan's family is basically $10 Bananas levels of cluelessly rich. Shen Yuan has almost never had to look at the prices of anything he wants. He and his siblings all get an allowance from the family's main account, which increases when they reach adulthood, and in the interest of fairness his parents made it all the same size. So Shen Yuan gets the same amount of money for his daily living expenses as his older brothers with their penthouse apartments and vacation homes and private jets, at least from the family account (since he doesn't work, he doesn't actually make as much as them in total because they earn more on top of their allowances).

And the thing is, Shen Yuan genuinely just lives a lot more humbly. He likes people but what would he do with a vacation house? Anything really nice would probably require him to fly to get out there, and he gets sick as hell on planes. Living in the central city is also not great for him, because the air pollution is so bad. Having a whole house to himself would also be ridiculous. So he has a reasonable apartment, in a reasonable area, and he splurges every so often on purchases that make him happy and take-out food that he likes, and of course he pays a cleaning service to come in twice a week. Most people assume he's comfortably middle class and has some tech job he does from home, but he's been getting a lot more than he's been spending in his monthly allowances for years now, and the figures are big.

Enter into this environment author Airplane and his trash novels. Novels, multiple, because in this AU there's no PIDW, and instead after some alternate PIDW prototype got popular in the harem genre, Airplane decided to churn out a series of copy-paste shorter stories rather than recycling the same subplots in one massively long epic.

Shen Yuan of course discovers Airplane's writing and becomes as obsessed with it as ever, except this time he notices that if there are delays between new stories, they seem to clear up faster whenever he throws some cash at the problem. And also that the drops in Airplane's writing quality coincide with times when Shen Yuan was having health issues and not keeping up with his VIP purchases. So, he works out that Airplane's probably doing the writing for the money, and that when Peerless Cucumber isn't paying the most for it, Airplane starts listening to the other buffoons in the comment section more to try and entice them to pay his bills instead.

Peerless Cucumber leaves a comment on one of Airplane's latest stories that kicks off the two of them actually chatting, and Shen Yuan eventually gets to the point of offering to fund all Airplane's writing, in exchange for Airplane not doing his crap sellout stuff to appeal to other readers anymore. Airplane thinks he's joking or maybe mocking him. Shen Yuan asks how much it would cost. Airplane fires off a ridiculous number. Shen Yuan doesn't even blink and wires him the first payment. Then he gets annoyed because Airplane leaves him on read for a while, but that's because Airplane is staring at his account balance in shock.

Of course, it's Airplane who starts referring to Peerless Cucumber as his sugar daddy. Shen Yuan is just like "based on your sex scenes I don't think anyone would pay you for that" and Airplane's all "but you WOULD pay for my sex scenes ^_~" and Shen Yuan's like "technically I am actually paying you not to write that shit" and so on. Usual banter. The quality of Airplane's writing improves dramatically, a lot of his readership drops off but he does get new readers and gradually builds up an even bigger fanbase than before, and so on, it all goes pretty well. He eventually writes a few things that take off to the point of getting physical publications and international translations. Technically Airplane no longer needs Shen Yuan to pay all of his bills by that point but he's not going to tell Shen Yuan that! The contract's still good as long as he keeps writing!

Then one of Airplane's online acquaintances runs into some financial trouble and asks for help.

Liu Mingyan used to beta read for Airplane back when he wrote fanfiction (she was like thirteen, Airplane was unaware because internet and hey free beta), and it seems her family has hit a rough patch. She wants tips on how to go pro, but Airplane explains that it was extremely difficult and he mostly lucked out by finding a single wealthy backer. Mingyan wonders if the same guy would be interested in her writing, Airplane sadly thinks not because Mingyan exclusively writes kinky danmei erotica and Peerless Cucumber seems pretty firmly in the closet still and also generally prefers plotty and world-building heavy stuff.

But like, Airplane has definitely gotten a vibe off of Cucumber-bro, and Mingyan's gorgeous older brother does video streams of himself doing cool martial arts and swordsmanship stuff. So he asks her permission and when she gives it, he recommends Liu Qingge's videos to Shen Yuan, being sure to mention that the guy in question can't really afford to keep up with his hobbies and oh what a shame it would be if he had to stop making art like that.

Haha, Airplane, you're not subtle.

Even so, Shen Yuan watches the videos and immediately agrees that Liu Qingge is beauty in motion, and that it would be criminal to deprive the world of more videos of his sword. Swordsmanship! That is the, the art of, martial arts! Definitely. He clicks the donate button, reasoning out that he'll just send a donation about the size of his usual monthly payments to Airplane and call it his good deed for the day.

Liu Qingge is very confused by this new follower from nowhere who suddenly dumped a little over a month's rent into his account. One thing leads to another, with Mingyan and Airplane conspiring to try and get Shen Yuan as a permanent patron, and then Liu Qingge being let in on it. Except that Airplane keeps referring to Shen Yuan as his sugar daddy, and well... it's not like Liu Qingge doesn't ever get 'those' kinds of comments on his videos. At first he's embarrassed, then offended, then mortified that his own younger sister is apparently setting him up to make premium private videos for what he assumes is some old pervert who is going to want him to do untoward things.

However, their options are pretty bleak at the moment, and Liu Qingge worries that if he doesn't do this then Mingyan might. She even mentions something to the effect of having planned to offer herself, and only didn't because she wasn't this "sugar daddy" guy's type!

Teeth clenched, Liu Qingge asks Airplane stiltedly for advice on how to... appeal, to this wealthy benefactor.

In the end though it's not nearly as bad as Liu Qingge feared. He winds up doing more videos in costumes and cosplay, which ought to have been an untenable expense, but Peerless Cucumber always ends up covering the cost of whatever he invests in plus extra. Sometimes he sends Liu Qingge stuff with a request to wear it, but so far it's just been like, badass warrior-themed or historical costumes. Nothing overtly pervy. He does some LARPing, he makes enough to start doing horseback archery again, convinces some of his good-looking peers from various clubs to spar with him, and ultimately the most risque videos he ends up doing are the ones where he demonstrates how to put on certain kinds of gear. He still locks those ones behind paid subscribers only, mostly because he feels like he's doing something illicit now, even if he used to show more skin on his older videos any time he took his shirt off.

Peerless Cucumber doesn't leave creepy comments, either. In fact he seems genuinely nice and supportive, it's hard not to like him, and so even once his situation levels out Liu Qingge decides there's not really much need to stop making videos for him. (He maybe even gets a little giddy thrill over... well, sometimes he finds it all a bit... just when he thinks about Peerless Cucumber watching him demonstrate his physical prowess and finding that alone worth... ANYWAY--)

So that goes on for a while, before Yue Qi enters the scene.

Yue Qi is the childhood friend of one of Shen Yuan's older brothers (Shen bros!) and Shen Jiu owes him a big favor for something that he won't talk about. At least he won't talk to Shen Yuan about it. But Yue Qi is also not the type to ask for help, and Shen Jiu is very bad at offering it, so when Shen Jiu gets word that Yue Qi is having some difficulties making ends meet, he tells Shen Yuan to act as the middle man. Go offer Qi-ge money, he knows you're nice he'll just accept it, and then Shen Jiu will pay the actual bill.

Well it turns out that Yue Qi doesn't just accept it, of course he sees right through it, and gently but firmly tells Shen Yuan that he's not interested in burdening Shen Jiu further than he already has. Etc, etc, stoic stiff upper lips and no proper communication all around. Shen Yuan panics because it's not working and he's also genuinely worried about Yue Qi by now, so he tries to figure out how to make it compelling and basically blurts that, well, see, the thing is that sometimes he pays men to entertain him. You know. To like. Do things, for him. So. He could also pay Yue Qi? To do something for him?

Yue Qi gets the wrong idea entirely, and at first is like, oh, no, A'Yuan, you shouldn't be paying people for that! These things should just happen organically! But Shen Yuan is very adamant that he believes in compensating people for what they do for him, it's not like he can't afford to, and it gets awkward but Yue Qi is like well he does have health problems. It's perhaps difficult for him to meet people. So then he starts worrying about Shen Yuan and all these strange men he's apparently paying for "entertainment". Does his brother know about this?

No of course Shen Jiu doesn't know! He'd hate it, and Shen Yuan doesn't want to hear about how he's doing everything wrong with his life again!

Then Shen Yuan mentions that his prior house cleaning service up and quit on him (they didn't), and if Yue Qi would like to earn fair compensation he could just come over sometimes to help instead, and Shen Yuan would pay him just to tidy up and hang out for a few hours! Which Yue Qi thinks is a fantastic idea, actually, even if Shen Yuan is only doing this because of his brother, this will give Yue Qi a chance to keep an eye on him and his so-called entertainers. Even if he sort of... ends up also being one?

Shen Yuan keeps everything above board, though his apartment always seems perfectly clean and he overpays way too much (Shen Jiu is still footing this bill after all), and Yue Qi starts to think maybe he actually is being paid for intimacy. Of a sort that they're maybe still working up to? Shen Yuan usually has a very thin face after all. He's kind of got two minds about this prospect. On the one hand, he's got his situationship with Shen Jiu, so dating his brother would be absurd. But on the other hand, it's not actually dating, and he does like Shen Yuan, and maybe if they can be good company for each other then Yue Qi won't feel so depressed and Shen Yuan won't need to hire strange men so often.

Meanwhile it's come to Shen Yuan's attention, perhaps through an offhand comment he read online somewhere, that people who are struggling financially often also struggle to "treat themselves". Because even when they have enough money to be comfortable there's often the looming specter of deprivation, and etc, so he figures he should start buying some of his dependents more treats and things. Since they might not buy them for themselves? And also he's enjoying doing this but shhh no he isn't, it's a huge hassle, he's only doing it out of basic moral decency, etc.

So like, Airplane starts getting little things that he'd put on some public wish lists, clearly sent by Peerless Cucumber. And he tells Mingyan to make a list for Liu Qingge too, and sure enough, Liu Qingge (bewildered, slightly flustered) tries to figure out what he's supposed to do with an album from a band he likes and some high-end leather polish. Ultimately settles on playing the music and wearing his nicest leather in his next video. Yue Qi starts arriving at Shen Yuan's place to be plied with his favorite coffees and to have scented candles awkwardly foisted onto him (Shen Yuan does not know what Yue Qi likes in gifts) (he buys these presents himself they're not out of Shen Jiu's pocket).

So finally Shen Yuan's parents start to notice that he's been spending a lot more than usual, and start to worry that he's either been taken in by a scam artist or is secretly dating a gold digger or has developed a drug addiction or something. But asking things directly like normal people is basically illegal in the Shen family, so they decide to hire a private investigator.

Enter Luo Binghe, a young man of humble background who is struggling to make ends meet after the untimely death of his adoptive mother, and is using his P.I. job and his online cooking videos to help pay his way through school (scholarship student). Usually his cases are more like, cyberstalking someone to find out if they're cheating on their spouse, or helping someone planning a lawsuit accumulate evidence on their corrupt employer, or other things like that. When he gets the Shen Yuan case, the idea that the Shen family's son is paying for "company" is well within his list of probable answers.

Though this one is a little... peculiar?

Mostly because Binghe can't find evidence of Shen Yuan actually getting what he would, presumably, be paying for. At first Luo Binghe just goes through the online paper trails, using the info that the Shen parents give him to figure out that Shen Yuan is paying Airplane and Swordmaster Liu (*cough*) what seem to be exorbitant prices just for trashy fiction and cosplay videos. He assumes this is a cover, that someone's actually delivering drugs or going over for "private meetings" or at least actually sending dirty videos as well, but even when he pays for Liu Qingge's VIP access it's just tutorials and such. Neither of these guys are even on any of the sites that are more lenient towards hosting explicit content. Luo Binghe's aware that kinks aren't always obviously sexual, but people don't usually pay through the nose for the kind of content they can easily find for free all over the place, either.

He digs a little more but keeps coming up empty on evidence to clarify which of the many vices the Shen family's son is actually indulging in. Which is a problem because that's the information they're paying him to find out. Plus his curiosity kind of piques as he reads Shen Yuan's seemingly quite invested comments on Airplane's writing and Liu Qingge's videos, looking to see if there's any kind of clandestine code or pattern. But near as he can tell, whatever else Shen Yuan might be getting out of these arrangements, he does genuinely like the stories and videos too? Well. Sometimes. Sometimes he's actually scathingly vitriolic towards Airplane's writing.

Luo Binghe decides that surveilling Shen Yuan himself is probably the way to go. That gets more complicated in court cases, but since the Shen parents just wants to know what's going on and aren't planning on prosecuting their son for anything, it doesn't matter as much if Luo Binghe gets information in sneaky or underhanded ways.

So, Binghe uses the account he created to access Liu Qingge's videos to chat with Shen Yuan a few times, and then recommends his own cooking channel. Shen Yuan doesn't seem too interested in cooking, so Luo Binghe makes sure to include a video that has an image of himself in his recommendation, and then films a few new videos of himself cooking with his shirtsleeves rolled up to three quarters and a few more buttons than usual unbuttoned, adopting a more flirty persona than he typically does for his shows. He takes his cues from some of Liu Qingge's more popular videos for how to be enticing bait.

It takes a few videos, but eventually Shen Yuan comments. Luo Binghe latches onto the chance to start talking to him, playing up a persona of a vulnerable young man with little means who is trying hard to make it through school, etc, and sure enough Shen Yuan seems interested. Well, most predatory people like vulnerable targets, don't they?

However... Shen Yuan just sends him a chunk of money.

Luo Binghe is confused.

Isn't he supposed to ask for something or create some kind of expectation of repayment first? But, maybe this is his approach to handling new targets. Maybe he's just trying to lull Binghe into a false sense of complacency, before he starts indicating what he wants from all of this. Luo Binghe makes sure to move the money Shen Yuan sends him into a separate account, so that if the Shen parents get angry about it then he can return it as a gesture of good faith.

But Shen Yuan just keeps sending supportive comments and donations. Eventually he leaves a comment that alludes to how badly he'd like to taste Binghe's cooking, and Binghe is like finally, but when he implies that they could perhaps meet in person and Luo Binghe could thank him for his support by making him something, Shen Yuan backs off.

Things eventually progress to the point where Luo Binghe, who is a totally normal person treating this like a totally normal job still thank you very much, is basically camping out in the bushes in front of Shen Yuan's apartment building. At some point he conscripts the aid of his weird cousin (finding his birth family was how he got into this business initially), and then almost immediately regrets it because Shen Yuan helps get Zhuzhi Lang a job doing landscaping for his building.

Why would he want Zhuzhi Lang close but not Binghe? Binghe is much handsomer! He'd make an excellent target for seduction! >:(

Anyway eventually Yue Qi catches Luo Binghe lurking around like a creeper and is like, finally, I have caught one of these suspicious men, whilst Binghe is like oh so he does have a lover, well this guy sucks and is clearly not good enough for him, and they both try and chase one another off and Shen Yuan comes home to a heated passive-aggressive-politeness war being waged in front of his apartment. Eventually he realizes the misunderstanding and calls everyone together (zoom conference? in-person meet-up?) to clarify that he is not paying any of them for "special favors", that was just Airplane being deranged about his sense of humor, and then he has no idea what to do when the prevailing response seems to be disappointment.

“To me, the one basking in infinite glory is you, the one fallen from grace is also you. What matters is you, and not the state of you.”

I believe Hua Cheng came to understand this after the fall of XianLe!

When Xie Lian saved Hong Hong er, he was still just a kid. He didn’t see Xie Lian as a person, but rather his prince or his god, and mainly his savior. This savior of his, in his eyes, was a light that couldn’t be extinguished, an invincible hero (which is expected from a little boy’s perspective). It’s after the fall of XianLe that Hua Cheng probably truly realizes that while his prince is still very much a light, his light, that light could absolutely dim. The illusion faded, and he finally realized: the crown prince of XianLe, the darling of the heavens, his highness who pleased the gods, and the one who saved him is not invincible. His god, now brutally exposed as Xie Lian, also needs protection.

Ghost fire Hua Cheng is when his motive was solidified, since.. he gently tells Xie Lian himself. I’m not a detective. But then “Wu Ming” comes along, and the fact that he sticks around while Xie Lian constantly berates him is the ultimate proof that Hua Cheng only sees Xie Lian now, whether he is a prince, a calamity, or an omen of misfortune. Seeing Xie Lian as “his savior” does not change through his growth, though. It only evolves into something deeper, “his Xie Lian.”

but that’s just me idk

i think i made a post about this already, but i think it's really important to understanding both of them and their relationship that (in the novel) the iconic part of Wei Wuxian's first impression on Wen Ning wasn't being kind and friendly to him, after meeting him practicing alone, and wasn't the mere fact of niceness.

and it wasn't standing up for him to his shitty cousin and talking him up, and making sure he got a chance to show off, either.

it was that after Wen Ning choked under pressure and fumbled that chance and made Wei Wuxian look stupid for championing him, Wei Wuxian was not even a little bit mad at him. it did not even occur to Wei Wuxian to be mad at him. most people would be mad at that point! he clearly expected to get yelled at!

but Wei Wuxian was so far from that kind of insecurity he did not even experience these events as humiliating, and he thereby revealed he had not taken those steps to build up Wen Ning on his own behalf, with any selfish motive, but purely from the unfiltered impulse to help.

Wei Wuxian did not in the least feel that having taken Wen Ning's 'side' (unsolicited, probably almost entirely unwanted) entitled him to anything from Wen Ning.

Wen Ning actually has high standards! it was not the little bit of kindness or the brashness that won him over, it was the fact that that kindness persisted undisturbed after Wen Ning provided the provocation of failure.

wwx saying lwj’s title during his qiongqi dao monologue. not his bosom birth name, lan zhan, or the more formal and distant "lan-er-gongzi" that’s grown more familiar on his mouth during these many months. but the noble and dignified and righteous hanguang-jun. "if am doomed to death, may it be by hanguang-jun’s hand. that would be worth it."

wwx using a name lwj got during the throes of war as he fought and murdered hundreds of wen ruohan’s soldiers and turning it on its head to say, "if you are as good and moral as they all say you are, don’t doom these wens to the same fate." and that’s the thing, wwx does deem lwj as good and moral, more so than all the other gentries he’s met. as his self assigned zhiji, he sees lwj for who he is at the fundamental basis of his being, and indeed that is the bearer of light. wwx, with so many words, is saying, "you are worthy of your title, more than the whole of the jianghu is aware." and for that reason hinges his life and those of some few dozen refugees on his steadfast and unfailing belief of the other’s morality. with a single word, he assigns lwj the role of his judge, jury, and need be, the bringer of his demise. "if you really feel that my defense of the wen remnants is wrong, that i am wrong, draw your sword on me, hanguang-jun. go on, i’ll allow it, i’ll gladly agree to it—if it’s you, for no reason other than it’s your hand that i would meet my end by."

and the weight of that with it being one of only two times that he refers to lwj by his title during his first life. the first that he did so was during a bitter reunion, and laden with animosity. "hanguang-jun" said not with awe and admiration but to deride his standing as if the mere idea of him as a genuine moral authority is a foolish one. but the moment lwj also begins to doubt his role as a marshal of the law—as someone who is able to differentiate between right and wrong—there is a man who is willing to bet his life on his worthiness of fulfilling it.

(don’t mind me i’m fleshing out musings from my burial mounds au)

I love Zu Zhan Jin's portrayal of JGY so much. Like he's so expressive! His face! His body language is so fluid! His voice has so much emotion! And yet his intentions anv emotions are as opaque as a block of solid wood. I love Villains like that

A fun prospect for Superhero-themed SV AU's that I don't often see is genre dissonance. Like, Luo Binghe as this edgy 90's style antihero who just straight up kills his enemies and sleeps around and is driven by selfish motives (revenge, ambition, etc) rather than altruistic morality, vs Shen Qingqiu as this kid-friendly supervillain who is "evil" mostly in terms of aesthetics and his ability to make inconvenient problems that are reasonably safe for child heroes to solve. Something like Punisher vs Team Rocket in terms of vibes.

Maybe the reason they meet is because some big publishing house akin to Marvel or DC just bought up the rights to whole bunch of older, discontinued comics titles, and decided to do a Justice League/Avengers style mash-up with a bunch of nostalgia properties and their most recognizable heroes and villains. Which means lots of crossovers condensing several titles into a handful of series.

Luo Binghe's origin always features him as a teenager, so he reboots as the youngest Avenger-equivalent team member in the new continuity. Even in this reboot, however, the writers still mostly go the gritty and dark route with his plots and stick to the same key developments -- his abandonment as an infant, his adoptive mother's tragic death, his tough life on the streets, abusive mentors and backstabbing "allies", and so on.

But Luo Binghe's life suddenly starts experiencing periods of dramatic change in his life when he's brought in for appearances in the lighter, friendlier world of the Junior Heroes continuity. After all, he's a natural choice for tying the two continuities together thanks to his youthfulness. Luo Binghe isn't consciously aware of the fact that he's moving between different titles and different writers. All he knows is that sometimes, when he hangs out with the bright and talented Ning Yingying, he's drawn into "conflicts" with Shen Qingqiu -- the kind of "villain" who will call for tea breaks, never actually hits anyone when he shoots his ray gun, leaves clues for all of his crimes, and can't seem to stop from imparting genuinely helpful advice in between his witty quips and taunts.

When Luo Binghe fights Shen Qingqiu, somehow he never actually gets hurt. Neither do any of his friends. The world in general seems brighter and lighter, as if there is some secret barrier protecting everyone from all the evils Binghe knows only too well exist in the rest of his life. Luo Binghe is increasingly convinced that Shen Qingqiu is the source of this mystical safety net. After all, for an allegedly powerful genius who is able to fool half the world about his wicked aims, he's never won a single fight against a kindhearted but somewhat ditzy teenager and her ragtag bunch of friends!

So what's he spending his actual energy on?

Luo Binghe is pretty sure it's keeping the real evils at bay. Making himself the biggest bad in town, and in doing that, making it so that the "biggest bad" is nothing worse than a slightly judgmental teacher in a pretty costume.

It's not long before Luo Binghe doesn't want to go back to the Justice League equivalent, to his world of misery and strife, even after his visits with Ning Yingying are supposed to be over. Especially as the global stakes of various heroic activities start getting higher, and it becomes clear that the boundary between Shen Qingqiu's safe world and the grimdark reality of Binghe's usual life are getting thinner...

suguru's bday