Library Squid

Posted a new fic. It's going to be Mon-Wed-Fri updates for the next month. We're talking heavy Shen Jiu angst and some very messy relationships. archiveofourown.org/works/801456...

This fic is done now btw and it’s 30k words. Will be posting soon.

Xiu Ya being able to tell the difference instantly because Shen Jiu has really high support needs and relies on his sword for qi regulation and to stop spiraling thoughts while Shen Yuan is just normal.

Meanwhile Shen Jiu doesn’t fully understand that something is wrong in his relationship. It’s better than what he’s had before. Why is Liu Qingge trying to take it away?

He totally would. Moving up in the sect only hurt him in the future and didn’t satisfy the emptiness he has inside like he thought it would.

“Then you’re a fool,” says Shen Jiu.

“Maybe I am,” Mu Qingfang answers. “There are much worse things to be in this world than a fool.”

Shen Jiu watches him leave in silence and then steps out into the night alone. It’s cold and clear and the stars look close enough to touch, if only he tries.

Mu Qingfang stands and looks out into the courtyard beyond the window. The sun is almost set and long shadows reach towards the two of them.

Shen Jiu asks one final question. “Do you believe me?”

“Yes,” Mu Qingfang says. “I believe every word.”

“Why?”

The question doesn’t surprise Mu Qingfang. “I would be a cruel man if I thought less of you because you lived through a nightmare.”

Shen Jiu peers over the top of his fan, suspicion gleaming in his eyes. “All men are cruel.”

“Do you pity me?” Shen Jiu asks. He’s not sure which answer he wants to hear. Maybe he does want pity.

“I feel bad for you.” Mu Qingfang’s words are carefully measured. “Anyone would after hearing what you told me. But I don’t see you as less than me.”

Cat breeding and turn-based strategy combat mostly.

But that’s not telling the whole truth. Shen Jiu doesn’t feel better but it all feels a bit less suffocating, like he’s gone from the bottom of a lake to just below the surface. Like something better is within reach, even if he will never have the strength to reach it.

He doesn’t cry, he doesn’t break down, he just talks in a calm and quiet voice. When he finishes, it’s getting dark outside.

“You lied,” Shen Jiu says. “I don’t feel any better.”

Mu Qingfang takes a beat to answer. “To be entirely honest, I didn’t think it would be this bad.”

Reminder that you can ask for basically anything to be purchased at the public library and there’s like a 90% chance it will actually be bought. We love buying things for patrons. Please ask for more yaoi.

So he tells. It’s a jumbled mess, stopping and starting at dissonant points, riddled with holes, at times too horrible to put into words, but all there. He talks for a very long time and Mu Qingfang sits in silence and listens.

“I’ll kill you if you betray me,” Shen Jiu warns.

“I know.” Mu Qingfang’s voice never wavers, perfectly calm. “I know what you’re capable of, shixiong. I would never dare.”

“Will it truly help?

“I think so.” Mu Qingfang sounds more certain than Shen Jiu has ever felt in his life.

Shen Jiu wants to believe him. Mu Qingfang already holds a few of his secrets after all, the weakness of his cultivation and the scars on his body. He’s never told and he’s never asked what made those scars. Maybe he will listen. Maybe it will help.

“I have no secrets to tell.” He’s made of secrets and if he starts talking, he will unravel until there’s nothing of him left.

“I don’t think that’s true,” Mu Qingfang says. “I won’t force you. I’m just here to listen.”

He jumps when he hears the door open once again, his mind flooded with thoughts of Qiu Jianluo, but it’s just Mu Qingfang. Shen Jiu says nothing as the man sits across from him.

“I keep a great many secrets, Shen-shixiong. You can tell me yours if you like. It might help.”

The meeting ends there, in that awkward silence, and the others leave the room and Shen Jiu stays. He’s never told anyone before, not even the women he pays to hold him at night. But he doesn’t have to tell them, they can read it in his eyes and his scars.

He’s perfectly fine and doesn’t even think about it anymore. And if he does think about it, it doesn’t bother him. And if it does bother him, that’s because he’s pathetic and weak. It was a lifetime ago. He’s a different person now. He’s Shen Qingqiu.

Mu Qingfang looks at him with the sort of gentle expression that Shen Jiu knows will never be genuinely meant for him and says, “Do you think that maybe what happened to you in the past is affecting how you see things now?”

“No,” Shen Jiu says. “It was nothing. Nothing happened to me.”

Shen Yuan transmigrating into a world with Shen Jiu still in it (as an NPC Peak Lord or something) and figuring that something isn’t quite right with him. Shen Jiu isn’t just an asshole, he’s hard to get along with on purpose. He’s hiding something.

Fanfiction doesn’t exist to be “good” it exists because something went horribly wrong with you while you were watching a tv show and you’re gripped by madness

This is your most powerful idea yet. yqy unable to do his head disciple duties because sj needs him to be close enough to hug at all times. He has to carry sj around and can’t figure out why all his ambition is just gone.

In other words, I think it's totally fine if you want to play around with ideas or cultural references or whatever that don't technically fit in the world of SVSSS or other danmei. If you want to write a Christmas fic, write a Christmas fic. Write for yourself and your audience first.

Araki isn't stupid. He does a ton of research for JJBA and will eagerly tell the reader all about it. He knows that $50 million in 1890 is like the GDP of the entire US. But it was more important to him that primarily Japanese readers intuitively understood why the race is such a big deal.

It reminds me of how in Steel Ball Run, Araki wrote the prize money for the titular race as if it were Japanese yen. So it's like $50 million. In 1890. That's an absurd amount of money. But his readers are used to amounts expressed in yen and he wanted to convey a vibe rather than a real number.

I actually did a lot of research on Chinese traditional architecture for that fic too, but I still didn't catch a mistake in the title. And that's okay. I've accepted that I'm going to make historical and cultural mistakes for a history and culture I'm not immersed in.

Why? In part, because I figured changing the title of a published fic would be confusing to readers. But also I was like "You know what? This is a fic written in English and in the Anglophone world, diamonds are the most precious gemstone. It's fine."

A few days after I published Of Diamonds and Glass, I was hit with the realization that historically jade was considered more precious than diamonds in China and in fact, that's the precious stone I should have referenced thematically. But I decided not to change it.