Do You Have Any Posts About All The Things The People Who Use Demonic Cultivation Have In Common?

Do you have any posts about all the things the people who use demonic cultivation have in common?

I’m not sure I can explain it properly, but I came away from the book thinking that all the people who used demonic cultivation (either directly or through the Yin Tiger Tally) are very similar to one another in terms of their trauma, background, and status as cultivators.

They all have quite traumatic upbringings, either living on the streets for some time or otherwise mistreated as part of the serving class. While they end up with some form of sect alliance, they are only ever half accepted, with their common parentage being brought up quite often. They’re all stuck living on that razor edge of not quite acceptability.

It makes me think that demonic cultivation represents or reflects that sort of traumatic razor’s edge position. (Appropriate when they are literally using resentment).

The major difference between the demonic cultivators is how they decide to use the trauma they’ve been stuck with. Wei Ying does his best to channel it towards protecting people, while trying to minimize harm to the innocent (though some “splash damage” is inevitable), while Xue Yang and Jin Guangyao use it as an excuse to hurt others with impunity (trying to drag the whole world down with them if they must).

Hopefully I’ve made sense.

Hate to say it, but the only demonic cultivator in the text is Xue Yang. Wei Wuxian does not cultivate with mo (living humans) but gui (dead humans), which is why his cultivation is called the ghost path. A better wording would be about who strays from the orthodox path of cultivating, but even then, all of the “righteous” cultivation clans would fall under this because they use Wei Wuxian’s inventions that they stole after his death. Speaking just on the characters listed, though, Xue Yang uses living humans by turning them into living corpse puppets, making him a demonic cultivator, but he also still uses a sword and his golden core, meaning he never left the orthodox cultivation path.

Other than both being street orphans taken in by major clans as kids, Wei Wuxian and Xue Yang have nothing in common. Wei Wuxian had a moral code that he followed even on the street, while Xue Yang didn’t and made a name for himself being a terror before he became a cultivator. When they become cultivators, it is only Wei Wuxian who is disparaged for his background. Nobody ever calls Xue Yang a servant, insults his parentage, or treats him less than courteously, from what we are shown in the text, until he massacres the Chang Clan. He is a guest of the Jin, therefore making him practically untouchable. Now, bringing Jin Guangyao into this, yes he was disparaged in the beginning, but he was definitely accepted once he climbed his way into the clan leader position. People stopped bringing up his past and parentage due to it, because now he was in an accepted and traditional position of power.

The story isn’t about how the type of cultivation one uses represents a theme or says something about the person using it (other than the demonic cultivation because that one says a lot about Xue Yang who created it); it’s about how any cultivation path, orthodox or not, can be used for good or evil and what really matters is to look at the character of the person. Xue Yang and Jin Guangyao are greedy bastards who want to be universally feared (the former) and worshipped (the latter), and will sacrifice anyone or anything that goes against their plans to attain power. They both use sword cultivation to achieve these goals, even if they use other tools to aid. Xue Yang turns to demonic cultivation because he is not clever or powerful enough to use the ghost path as effectively as Wei Wuxian does nor does he have empathy or care for the living or dead which is necessary for the ghost path, so he takes shortcuts with horrific (intended) consequences, instead. Wei Wuxian made his name exclusively with the ghost path and only did so by doing what was right. But only Wei Wuxian was reviled for it until the very end.

In short, mxtx doesn’t write stories where you can use characters’ identities and backgrounds as shorthand for moral lessons. So while all three characters had their traumas and bad encounters with the “righteous” established cultivation clans, Xue Yang and Jin Guangyao are villains because they ultimately believed in the same system that abused them and, thus, strove to uphold it so that they could benefit from that power to oppress others, while Wei Wuxian is the hero for challenging that system and rejecting it for its corruption.

and the winner of the best costume goes too...

*proceeds to shake it like a polaroid picture*

I can’t even blame him, given the root of it. Also the rest of the team themselves aren’t really, that bad. It’s more of a protective reaction then anything else.

Also, Song Qinglan's "homophobia" in regards to what it stems from being played for laughs is a little :/

Politically Charged Gay Chicken AU

People encouraged me to share this so here we go:

Jango escapes spice ship slavery and retakes Mandalore instead of becoming a bounty hunter. He reaches out to the Temple and demands reparations from the Jedi. Through an incredibly stupid series of events, he gets a Kenobi-shaped “blushing bride that is only demure because they’re trying very hard not to kick your ass right now.”

Qui-Gon was involved in reparations negotiation because it’s his job and he’s, for some reason, one of the best at it. He brought along 20yo Obi-Wan for Training Reasons, and between Jango’s consistent vitriol and a dumb comment of “Well I’m not going to demand a spouse out of this, for all that it’s traditional,” getting met with Obi-Wan’s (more politely worded) “why, are you chicken?” a political marriage happens out of SPITE, and it’s Obi-Wan because he’s a sensible age, legally Dooku’s grandson, and volunteering to call Jango’s bluff.

Jango is calling Obi-Wan’s bluff.

As we all can guess, neither of them is going to back down.

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Danny’s Wild Ride

Another week, another prompt.

Batman was out investigating a new weapon energy source while the rest of the Batfam was fighting those smuggling said weapons into Gotham. He took the Batmobile, which hadn’t been moving for the last few hours, and is now racing around the surrounding mountains, like a bat out of hell.

So they call the Batmobile. And instead of Batman, they see an bat-doption bait driving the Batmobile. With explosions going off in the background. And Batman with a bleeding head slumped in the passenger seat.