InfernalMachinae
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Veils and Mushrooms by Enigmatree
Fandoms: 魔道祖师 - 墨香铜臭 | Módào Zǔshī - Mòxiāng Tóngxiù, 魔道祖师 | Módào Zǔshī (Cartoon), 陈情令 | The Untamed (TV)
24 Aug 2020
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Summary
Wei Wuxian is married off to Wen Qing for political advantages. It's all good and well for most everyone involved until the day of the marriage comes-- only for Wei Wuxian to have the most eventful wedding night in world history, learn that he shares a considerable connection to his new wife in their love of science and research, and accidentally discover an interesting new application of the spiritual lingzhi mushroom.
(Or; grandmaster-of-demonic-cultivation Wei Wuxian and let's-transfer-golden-cores Wen Qing get married politically and completely platonically, which goes about as well as could have been expected, in hindsight.)
Spanish translation on: https://w.tt/3tGIh3N
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Bookmarked by InfernalMachinae
31 Oct 2020
Bookmarker's Notes
“Hmph,” She says, “What do you need ink and paper for?”
“I don’t know, I… Ugh,” Wei Wuxian drags his hand through his hair, wincing when his fingers snag at the many braids and accessories. Right, this is still his wedding night. “I don’t know yet, that’s why I need paper. The lines… It’s familiar…”
Wen Qing raises an incredulous eyebrow. “Familiar?”
“The circuit— the veins of energy.” Wei Wuxian pokes the gel again, showing the lines of light to Wen Qing who clambers close to him to see. “See how they go? You know how some spells and arrays use spiritual nets to arrange the boundary? I want to see if I can draw it down, to see which spell it reminds me off…”
Wen Qing’s eyebrows go even higher. “You can identify which spell it is from the spiritual lines alone? You memorized them?”
Wei Wuxian makes a sound of intense disgust at the sheer gall of someone even asking him whether he’s ever memorised something without being forced to. “I would never,” He says. “It’s not like a geographical map to memorise and more like words forming a sentence that you can read—” Wei Wuxian pokes the gel again, before pointing at some of the more familiar configurations of veins; “See that? That knot there redirects the passage of energy, that cross to the right makes the energy pause and restart, and the one next to it controls the frequency, so it’s more like waves of energy rather than a stream. It’s used more for barriers and less for attack talismans.”
...
“Interesting,” Wen Qing lets out, pinching the gel and making the lines go haywire. “So what you mean is that this thing isn’t a new by-product of some chemical reaction with the lingzhi mushrooms and more like a failed formation.”
“I’ve never heard of a spell having such a physical shape though,” Wei Wuxian says, humming, “I wonder what this thing is made of? Do you think I’ll die if I eat it?”
“Laoshi! Wen-laoshi, I brought your equipment!” Comes a servant’s voice, “I also brought paper and brushes for Young Master Wei!”
Wen Qing glances at him from the corner of her eyes, amusement clear. “Let’s not have any deaths on our wedding night, shall we?” She says, “I’ll analyse the substance, you analyse the spiritual formation.”
Wei Wuxian laughs. “They did say that the night of the marriage would be fun!”
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The envy of the world by vulnerable_bead for joolita
Fandoms: 魔道祖师 - 墨香铜臭 | Módào Zǔshī - Mòxiāng Tóngxiù
02 Jun 2019
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Summary
A report of a minor but inexplicable misfortune brings Wei Wuxian and a troop of six young Lans to a small town. Yet while an outing with their favourite teacher is as enjoyable as always, the juniors are disappointed with the results of their investigation; nothing out of the ordinary seems to be happening. That is, until the arrival of their other favourite teacher.
Wei Wuxian is rather happy to see him, too. He missed him.
***
Their investigation progresses, sometimes along unexpected paths.Series
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Bookmarked by InfernalMachinae
27 Apr 2020
Bookmarker's Notes
‘I’m sorry!’
But it was too late. Irreversible decisions had been taken in anger and despair, and now all that was left of a lifetime of devotion was this one soul, locked in an unending hell of grief, and guilt, and anguish.
Master Wei silenced it with just a small movement of his hand. The shriek broke off as if cut through with a knife. This was one of the things the boys would recall later; the ease.
‘He is searching for his lover in the otherworld. But nothing of that man is in existence any longer.’ And he concluded, quietly, ‘He will never find him.’
They sensed his sadness, so no-one asked for the details of his vision. It would have been better if no-one commented on what he had said, either; but Lan Letian, sixteen and a little full of himself, was notorious for speaking faster than he thought.
‘Na-ah! This is the stuff of epic poems!’ he exclaimed, true to his reputation. ‘These men were peasants, it is not possible.’
This time, however, he got the worst shock of his life when in response he heard, ‘Be silent! This was an ignoble thing to say!’
All the juniors shrank back, every one. It was just about the strongest reprimand any of them had ever heard from their self-restrained master. The Han Guang Jun they knew meted out justice swiftly and without emotion; this one was truly angry.
They had never thought his pale eyes could flash fire.
‘This death may or may not have a bearing on the case we are currently investigating,’ he continued. ‘As things are, we will probably never know. But it teaches us what we need to learn about ourselves and as such it deserves respect, not scorn.’
...
Then Han Guang Jun turned to Wei Wuxian, who throughout this scene stood aside, his face expressionless, looking at the soul lost in a despair from which they knew it had no hope of deliverance, in this world or the next.
‘Honoured Yiling Patriarch,’ he said with extreme formality. ‘Do not hesitate. The act you wish to perform is not immoral.’
Wei Wuxian bowed. ‘Thank you.’
Han Guang Jun drew his sword. ‘If this blade serves…?’
Wei Wuxian smiled wanly. ‘Any would. But this one’s clean.’
The boys froze, suddenly aware of how deep were the currents that ran through these exchanges, and how utterly inaccessible to them. At least two of them thought that they would have very much preferred to be elsewhere at this moment.
Wei Wuxian walked up to him, arranged his fingers around the blade and sharply drew his thumb along its edge, cutting it to the bone. Then he approached the soul.
What he was about to do was not a mundane act of eradication. It was an act of usurpation; an encroachment on the mystery of existence. This was what he had promised the Two Jades he would never again do lightly.
So he asked for permission again.
‘Shall I?’ he said.
And Han Guang Jun answered, ‘Do so.’
Wei Wuxian sighed. Then, calmly and gently, he carried out the act of ultimate mercy.
He laid his hand on the hunter’s forehead and drew a hex with his bleeding thumb.
And with this, he destroyed this heartbroken soul for all eternity.
He simply extinguished it, together with its regrets.
***
In his past life, he had done this to thousands of angry souls. And now, having come back from the dead himself, he recognised how inhumanly cruel he had been.
Having fed his powers on their resentment, he could have sent these souls to the otherworld. The simplest of exorcisms would have sufficed. Instead, he destroyed them.
He removed them from the circle of existence and walked on blithely.
Since he came back, he discovered that many things had not been as he had thought them to be. He was given a chance to make up for his past stupidity. He found the happiness that once had been within reach had he been wiser.
But the souls he destroyed had all the chance of atonement, or betterment, in the next incarnation taken away from them. Having performed an act of mercy in freeing them of their anger, he withheld an act of kindness. They were ready to depart; yet he annihilated them.
He performed essentially the same act on the sorrowing soul of the hunter. But now, he did it out of compassion.
Then, out of thoughtlessness.
Therein lay the true crime of the Yiling Patriarch.
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your heartbeat, across the grass by fakeplasticlily
Fandoms: 魔道祖师 - 墨香铜臭 | Módào Zǔshī - Mòxiāng Tóngxiù, 陈情令 | The Untamed (TV)
29 Feb 2020
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To his unbridled horror, Wei Wuxian sees his face up on the giant screen in real time for the entire stadium to see. Still laughing as his face takes a moment to catch up with the sheer mortification he’s feeling, A-Yuan perched on his shoulders as the Lan Wangji cape drapes over them.
There’s also commentary.
“—scenes from the stands here, this dad and his son making for an adorable twosome all decked out in support for local hero Lan Wangji—”
“—Speaking of, our man seems to have taken a little tumble—”
Wei Wuxian finds Lan Wangji on the field. The ball is nowhere near him but he seems to have fallen inexplicably backwards, sitting on the grass as he looks up at the giant screen.
Right up at the footage of him.
(AU where A-Yuan is professional footballer Lan Wangji's biggest fan, and his babysitter Wei Wuxian wants nothing more than to forget his days as the photographer of their school football team, calling out to the captain from the stands just so he'd look around at him.)
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“Have you ever heard the story of Orpheus and Eurydice?”
Aventurine looks up from where he’s testing the critter’s motor functions by waving a stick with a feather attached by a string. One of the critters swats at it, and another eyes it in preparation. “Can’t say I have. I’m all ears, though.”
aventurine, ratio, and the sea of nihility.
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Bookmarked by InfernalMachinae
08 Aug 2024
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Bookmarker's Notes
To love someone is to look back. If he had let himself succumb in that sea, he would have left Ratio alone, grieving and heartbroken. He would have left the cat cakes without their owner. Aventurine understands why Orpheus looked back in that tale. If he were wading through hell itself, how could he possibly stake Ratio’s life on a gamble?
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In the hours after Aventurine had left, after placing that damned gun back into his holster and walking off as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened, Veritas had retreated to his room and pulled up all the information on Avgin Sigonians and immersed himself in it, desperately trying to come to an understanding.
Series
- Part 3 of if i can stop one heart from breaking
Bookmarked by InfernalMachinae
14 Jul 2024