Ok. Enough Suffering Now. I Am Seeking Out Delight

Wanna know what would drive Luo Binghe nuts? If he found out through plot shenanigans that in every universe EXCEPT the svsss one, Shen Yuan gets married to Shang Qinghua and lives happily ever after

I love thinking about how a Shen Yuan reveal would go from Luo Binghe's perspective, maybe even especially in cases where Binghe doesn't actually get to see Shen Yuan's world or understand it very well.

Imagine finding out that your husband is some kind of interdimensional alien spirit/angel who saw your fate and got so upset about it that he died. Then he came to your world, even though he didn't know that was possible, but since it was he immediately set about making your life less shitty and trying to change your fate. Except he couldn't change all of your fate because some kind of godlike being, the same one that brought him here, didn't want to let him. He's haunted by the fact that he couldn't figure out better ways to help you. He never expected any of his regard to be reciprocated, either, in fact he assumed you'd hate him. You never had to convince him to love you or respect you. He has always loved and respected you. There's basically nothing you can do to lose that love and respect either, because the first version of you that he even knew about was your edgelord comphet idiot mirror universe counterpart.

The bar has been at the earth's crust this entire time.

The fluffy parts of this reveal are obviously good, but I also think Luo Binghe deserves to know just how fully terrible his husband's judgment is. Also that Shizun has been dying for him since before they even met.

I think it'd be fun how often that would probably keep him awake at night, quietly trying not to have a crisis over the fact that his husband has made an honest to god habit of dying for him.

I just think Shang Qinghua should get so angry one time that he unconsciously overrides the System and unlocks Admin privileges and just deletes entire clans out of existance in the blink of an eye while going "writing you in was a mistake".

And I also think everyone who saw that refuses to ever talk about it, but they're all scared shitless of the tiny human by Mobei-jun's side now because they realize he's not just really smart and an amazing strategist, he's also a god and can kill them all in 0.5 seconds. And now they all think that Shang Qinghua is actually the one running the show and Mobei-jun is just, like, the face of the Northern kingdom only.

Shang Qinghua is utterly horrified when he snaps out of it and realizes what he's done (somehow??? He doesn't know wtf just happened) and how now everyone is terrified of him except for Mobei-jun who is just looking at him with heart in his eyes lmao

"Your father was justified in his want for justice, but that doesn't excuse the thousands he's slaughtered in his quest to achieve it" - SY (cycle of hands)

[continuation]

There is a lot of potential in exploring Binghe's relationship with his children and the possible abuse he perpetuates. The SY of this universe was a fellow disciple of SQQ ~10 yrs prior who was heavily abused as well. SQQ was jealous of his loving family and the position of power that he was born into. Instead of staying, SY left the sect when he realized it was only causing him pain, after about 2-3 years of being there. He became a rogue cultivator until he hears about the burning of cang qiong and goes into hiding. I also speak the truth that a native sy (that wasn't on QJ at the same time as binghe) would Despise lbh with his whole being. LBH's kids escape the palace and run into SY who secretly teaches them swordplay and musical cultivation for self defense, teaching them the same way he wished sqq did for him. SY was able to break the cycle while binghe keeps it rolling even if he isn't aware of it. SY dresses up as a woman when he goes out bc he notices a pattern of lbh being more trusting of woman and turning the other cheek more. More than once they crossed paths and sy wanted to deck him in the face.

cleaned this one up 🔥

Teenage Liu Qingge time travels to the future. Let’s say The Abyss Years (TM), as any good LiuShen story does. And who does he meet there, SQQ, of course.

Of course, this is SY, and not SJ, but LQG doesn’t know that! He’s amazed at how nice he’s being to him! And SY is just enjoying having a cute baby version of LQG around. SY smiles at him and he gets all red! He’ll never get a girlfriend like that, SY thinks to himself.

LQG goes back to his time with one very important thought- that SJ can be that nice to spend time with if LQG only was able to befriend him! Somehow! Did I say this was LiuShen? I’m sorry, this is LiuJiu!

Meanwhile, while teenaged LQG was hanging around SY, adult LQG was hanging around teenaged SJ, who does not want to have to entertain the peak lord from the future. Unfortunately, social niceties (and his Shizun) are forcing his hand, so here he is, spending the day with him.

And the adult version of LQG is being so nice to him?? Taking his bitchy comments, bringing up monsters for him to lecture about. He never really cared about monsters like that, but it was kinda nice to have someone actually listen to him for once.

So when teenaged LQG gets back, him and SJ just look at each other and think, “Why can’t you be like the other one?”

Man’s then something something, character development, LQG falling in love with SJ and his character traits and not just the ones he saw in SY, blah blah blah. I like time travel and I like stories that force these two to get along for five minutes lol

Also. Adult LQG, after spending a day with teenaged SJ, spends five minutes with SY and in entirety convinced that this is a new person. Clocks it immediately now that he has a fresh reference. Not that he cares or anything! This version of LQG is in love with SY, not SJ after all.

But he does wish that the other man would confide in him. He spends the next few years trying to ‘subtly’ hint to SY that he already knows his big secret! Go ahead and tell him the truth!

SY spends those years freaking out over what LQG might know.

SV AU where Shen Qingqiu manages to convey to Luo Binghe, before sending him into the Abyss, that he's not rejecting Binghe it's just that his Heavenly Demon heritage means that he absolutely MUST go into the Abyss and do something (not particularly defined) because Binghe is the only person who could possibly do it and it is related to his destiny and the fate of the whole entire world, somehow.

So naturally Luo Binghe takes this to mean that there is an Extremely Important Mission that he must accomplish in the Abyss, and that he can't come back until he figures out what it is and does it.

It can't just be Binghe's own trial-by-fire training, because how could that be important to the fate of the rest of the world? (Binghe does not know he is the protagonist of a novel.) So it also can't just be making it to Xin Mo and then getting back out again, even though leaving and going home is what Binghe personally desires most, because how could there be any purpose to him going if he just rushes through and does nothing except try to leave?

End result: Binghe takes longer to leave the Abyss because he concludes that his reason for being there is to end the eternal suffering of its inhabitants by changing the nature of the domain to be less rampantly hostile. Which, it turns out, is harder than just escaping.

Genuinely don't know what it's called but there's a particular way of violating reality that doesn't work. For example, I am willing to accept an omegaverse university AU of nearly any fandom you care to name (except, for some reason, Sherlock, because I have an inexplicable hatred for unilock). However, a lot of Star Wars university AUs specifically fail on this aspect: they make Anakin an engineering PhD student and Obi-Wan something like literature or classics, and then they make Anakin his TA or GA.

You can't do that. Absolutely not. Anakin is unqualified for that and a university would not do it in any case. A university would literally hire a junior or senior undergraduate workstudy student to do as much of that work as possible first. They would do NOTHING other than do that and make the prof do all his own grading.

Is there a name for "I will accept [wild fantasy premise] but not [ordinary wrong thing]?" Please tell me there's a name for this. Probably someone who studies lit will know? I'm a systems person I don't know from lit theory just like Anakin

SV Malevolent AU where, due to a system error (Shen Jiu not actually dying from the qi deviation? Mu Qingfang being present and resuscitating him in time maybe?) Shen Yuan ends up only half-possessing SJ by gaining control of his eyes.

SJ, of course, fully believes that he's been possessed by a demon and wants to evict the creature in question as soon as possible. However, he's still a paranoid bastard before anything else, so his first attempt is to just quietly do it himself after chasing Yue Qingyuan and anyone else away from his house. He doesn't want either a reputation for being weak and susceptible to possession, or one for having ties to demonic influence. There's enough grime on his reputation and the ONE thing he has confidently never been at risk of adding to it was consorting with demons, and he'd like to keep it that way.

Except, of course, Shen Yuan's not a demonic spirit, so none of the efforts to "evict" him actually work. Much to Shen Yuan's relief. A blind cultivator is still plenty formidable, but after a few days of deadlock over the issue, and with Shen Yuan fully in control of Shen Jiu's eyesight but otherwise unable to do much, Shen Yuan negotiates with the system (which SJ cannot perceive at all) to be able to tell Shen Jiu some things. Enough to get him to do something other than crack and run out of his house to let the other peak lords try their hands at ousting SY.

He tells Shen Jiu that he's not a demon (not for the first time, not that SJ believed him) but that he IS a spirit from another realm, and that he got turned around somehow on his way to try and warn this world about an impending catastrophe. SJ is naturally still suspicious, but after SY provides him with enough tidbits of information to verify that he's not completely lying, he decides to at least entertain the idea that SY isn't a demon and that a more nuanced approach is called for (also this route is appealing for him because it means he can still avoid telling anyone else that there's anything wrong with him).

Thus, uneasily, the two Shens reach a truce. Shen Yuan offers to help SJ navigate the world by describing things to him (within the privacy of their now-shared mind, of course), and SJ just sort of gives up on destroying him. For now.

Shen Yuan also, of course, tries to stop SJ from abusing Luo Binghe. Both because he would do that regardless, but also because he's now co-piloting SJ's body, which means he has a vested interest in making sure it retains all of its limbs. This has varying degrees of success.

But mainly I think this would be hilarious because Shen Jiu would essentially be held hostage to Shen Yuan's descriptions of things. Flowery, detailed and fascinated descriptions of monsters (at least these are useful because SY also has encyclopedic knowledge of their weak points). Largely vibes-based descriptions of scenery and women. Glowing assessments of Luo Binghe. Constantly bringing up Liu Qingge's beauty. Shen Jiu doesn't need his own shidi described! He knows what the asshole looks like! Go possess his body instead if you like it so much! (SJ was maybe kind of hoping that would happen when the spirit did something during the debacle in Lingxi Caves -- but no, SY just saved Liu Qingge's life, like some kind of not-evil creature. Infuriating!)