Master Monk Guan - Tumblr Posts

Chase: What are you writing? Dashi: The government wants to know what kind of weapons we have in the temple, I'm letting them know it's private information. Guan, looking over Dashi's shoulder: This just says 'fuck around and find out' in calligraphy.

Been feeling that absence recently

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Please give us some of your headcannons, all your posts are amazing!!!!

Just some random misc. Xiaolin Showdown headcanons? 

Omi and Chase both have a huge sweet tooth, but most of the fallen warriors don’t share that trait, especially to the extent that Omi and Chase do. Some of them prefer heartier things, some just dislike less saccharine tastes in general. The warrior who comes closest is the Samurai.

Chase gushes about Omi to the warriors whenever he’s not gushing about them to Wuya, and the warriors have each come to have varying levels of interests in Omi, and some have almost as much of a soft spot for Omi as Chase does himself.

Guan comes from a military family back in the day, and designed his signature weapon himself.

Omi is multilingual and can speak all of his friends’ native languages and then some, but he’s got that same formality and clumsiness in every language he knows. He’s even sort of clumsy when trying to be informal in his mother tongue, because he learned so much from ancient scrolls.

Omi regularly sneaks into Chase’s lair just to hang out sometimes on days when there are no missions or Shen Gong Wu. He’s the only person Chase would happily allow to do that.

Kimiko’s best friend Keiko loves making clothes and accessories, and that she's the one who makes most of Kimiko's outfits. She dresses pretty plainly herself, but she's a master seamstress, and she and Kimiko still design outfits together even now that they’re far apart. She loves taking photos and videos of Kimiko modeling her newest outfits. Growing up, they started with making outfits for their dolls and playing with their hairstyles, sometimes with pretty tacky results, but they grew into their fashion skills pretty well. Kimiko’s dad bought Kimiko lots of toys, but his style in clothes for her has always been too traditional for Kimiko’s taste, so most of Kimiko’s clothes come from Keiko.

Keiko is big into the occult and legends (some of which of been directly influenced by Dashi’s travels in Japan, unbeknownst to them), so while some other kids were very offput and scared of Kimiko after her first fiery outburst, Keiko thought it was the coolest thing ever. 

Keiko works as a miko part-time, although she and Kimiko agree that the outfit is a bit too plain and traditional for their tastes. 

Keiko and Kimiko were each other’s first kiss, back in grade school.

Clay refers to his mother as “Momma Bailey”. She’s hard-working and headstrong, a great cook and an even better shot. They’d worked together as farmhands on her daddy’s farm and alternated between flirting and butting heads. The family farm was inherited from her side of the family. She and Daddy Bailey had a literal shotgun wedding once they could out she was pregnant with Clay. They’re still married, but they separated after Jesse ran away from home when she learned Clay was accepted into “monk school”.

Clay was very bookish and nerdy in school. Even though all the sports teams were dying to recruit him, he would have been more inclined to join the chess club. It was a moot point though, since Clay had too many responsibilities at home to ever have time for a club. Jesse wasn’t as good at Clay in classes or with sports, and it bothered her being compared to him both at home and at school when her big brother always seemed so perfect to her.

Jesse became the leader of the Black Vipers by beating them all 1-v-3 in hand-to-hand combat. They had a tendency of running off new people who took control of them this way because despite that being their rule, that doesn’t endear them to their new leader in any way. But Jesse has personally earned a lot of respect and comradery with the girls. 

Jesse and Belle are very obviously crushing on each other, but neither has come out and said it yet. They have even kissed once in the heat of the moment, but both are still somehow in that will-they-or-won’t-they phase.

Raimundo trained in capoeira back home. He comes from a big family and a lot of siblings, and he’s somewhere in the middle, with a lot of younger siblings to look after and a lot of older siblings to look after him. He’s not used to having his own space, so his cubby at the temple is more personal space than he’s used to not having to share, but he’s also used to a lot of fun hustle and bustle, a lot of stuff to keep him occupied, and so many siblings that were just as big troublemakers and pranksters as him that they could often get away with pulling stuff and no one knowing which of them was a fault, which got him out of having to deal with a lot of culpability or punishment. A few of his siblings are already working adults and he even has a few very young nephews and nieces already, but they all still live together or at least in close contact.

I was chatting with @grasshopperdoingdogpaddle about Omi’s whole ‘powers going out of control’ from Wu Got the Power and it reminded me of this headcanon about Dashi…mostly that he is innately very powerful and the world is very lucky he learned to be such a laid back guy.

But there are moments where he just can’t hide behind that happy-go-lucky personality.

So enjoy a bit of Dashi letting himself unravel. As a treat.

And a bonus mini story (that goes with a much larger full story but that I might not finish for ages)

“Dashi-“ Chase started softly, a gentle hand on his arm. An attempt to hold him back.

“No.” Dashi cut him off, voice just as soft but leaving no room for argument. “I’ll handle this. It’s my fault anyway. You and Guan…” He had to pause, get his voice steady again, rain himself in a little longer. He could break down when this was all over. When he had righted this wrong. “see if you can find an-any survivors.”

“Dashi this isn’t-“ Chase tried again, his grip tightening but this time Dashi pulled out of it, taking a step forward to put distance between them. He didn’t spare Chase a look as he did so. His eyes instead were locked across the blood soaked field at the creature that had caused all of this pain and destruction. At this creature he had so willingly given a chance to.

“Not now Chase.” He told him, planting his feet, “I don’t…can’t hear it now.”

“Come on.” Guan finally spoke up and Dashi could hear him moving, probably taking Chase’s arm to pull him away like Chase had tried to do to him. “The faster we get to people the more likely they are to survive.”

Chase put up no argument, letting himself be pulled away, and leaving Dashi to face his failures alone.

“You plan to take me on without your friends to help?” Jong mocked from across the bloody distance separating them. “You’re friends could hardly contain me when I was divided, and yet you plan to face me like this?! now that I am at my full strength?! You truly are more foolish than I had initially imagined.”

Dashi ignored the mocking. They could hurt him no more than Jong’s betrayal already had. Instead he let himself settle. Let his mind clear as he carefully removed his shirt, unclasping each button with every slow exhale of breath. Around him the very air began to distort. Under his feet the earth began to ripple. Lightning danced along his skin.

He wanted to close his eyes against the sensation. He hated feeling like this. But he didn’t risk taking his eyes off Jong. Not again.

He let his shirt fall to the side.

“Have you nothing to say?” Jong continued to mock, “No last words? Very well. I look forward to ending your pathetic life.”

Jong pulled his arm back, hand wide as if to grab Dashi's head in a crushing fist as he shot himself forward with inhuman speed, his giant body catapulting towards Dashi. Dashi did not move. Just breathed and waited and, finally, moved just a few inches aside at the last second. His own hand met Jong’s in barely a grasp and, between them, Jong’s whole arm glowed then vanished.

Jong stumbled, gaping at the empty air where his arm had been. “What-“ He spun, his wide-eyes falling on Dashi who was carefully folding a sash in his hands. The distortion in the air around him was growing. The blood soaked ground now bubbling and wreathing like it was alive.

“We aren’t done here.” Dashi finally spoke as he let the sash fall. It was blue with white tassels. Jong couldn’t figure out where it had come from. “I gave you your chance. I will not make the same mistake a second time.”

Wow! Is it really from the video game! Or is it something you write! It is amazing! I ask because I want to quote it in my fanfics!

"You may have won this battle, but not the war! Savor the moment, for it will be short-lived! Soon, the Heylin way will rise and blanket the world. You will fail, and your Xiaolin ways will become only a distance memory."

This is a quote from Chase from the video game and I'm brainrotting over it for real...

Like there's definitely some projection in these words right?

You may have won this battle,

but not the war

Savor the moment

For it will be short-lived

Soon, the Heylin way will rise

And blanket the world

You will fail

And your Xiaolin ways will become only a distant memory

Omi getting headpats from all three legendary Xiaolin warriors of the past

Only Chase’s made him this happy, though.

Xiaolin Showdown background aesthetic, “The Return of Master Monk Guan” (part 2/2)

(writerkat) In all flashback scenes and storytelling about Chase Young before he became evil, it's interesting that he always looks the same as he does in the present. Just Nicer. Same armor, same hair, even his complexion is the same in flashbacks, even though he gets visibly pallor after drinking the soup compared to when we actually see him.

I almost wonder if it might not be the recollections of the individual person that colors how Chase was seen and how his story was told.

Guan, who told Chase's tale through a stylized storybook, didn't even mention Hannibal Roy Bean. Just said that Chase used to be on the side of good, before he betrayed the forces of good for power when he became evil. Who or what made the offer didn't matter. To Guan the heavier part was the betrayal. He probably Knew who gave Chase the soup, but the fact of the matter is that Chase sold his soul and betrayed Guan and Dashi. So that heavily colors Guan's recollection of events. Chase Young sold his soul and then he hurt Guan and Dashi. That's it, end of story. The fact it's in a book might even be a personal way to distance himself from that part of the past. The only memories he wants to hold onto now are those where Chase Young is an enemy, Chase Young once being on the side of good was just a thing that happened a long time ago and is no longer.

Dojo's later retelling, on the other hand, is kind of interesting. He includes the detail of Hannibal Roy Bean and his offering the soup to Chase. Though his recollection still paints Chase as clad in armor and looking the same as he does in present. (Guan looks the same too, so maybe that's a bit of a limitation of the medium, but his looks still didn't go through as massive a change as Chase's.) Dojo is sympathetic enough that he may remember Chase's better qualities even through his fear of him, though. Because the flashback over his telling of the story shows a Chase Young that's hesitant and unsure of accepting the soup and listening to Bean, and the implied pain of the transformation after drinking it.

Who knows. Maybe, in the end, it's a little easier on those who knew him back then to think that Chase was always the way he is and there was nothing that could have been done to prevent it. That there was always the Prince Of Darkness lurking under the surface of Chase Young the Xiaolin Dragon, so the betrayal feels a bit more like it had more of a Reason than him so viciously turning on them for seemingly no reason, even after they considered him a friend.

Good catch!

It seems like, even for the people who were around before Chase’s transformation, they remember him back then as he is now, with spikey green hair, pointed ears, slitted eyes, dark armor, and pale skin. We didn’t see the original Chase’s true appearance until Omi went back to see for himself.

In the case of Dojo’s flashback, it’s possible that this is just what the kids are imagining based on what Dojo is telling them, or it’s possible that Dojo’s memory is just being a little fallible, as it often is. But still, forgetting that Guan used to have a braid is a much smaller detail than forgetting that Chase used to look completely different. Guan mostly looks the same as back then, but this isn’t the Chase Young that Dojo grew up with at all.

Maybe it’s because Dojo’s view of Chase changed so dramatically after Chase almost cooked him into soup. So perhaps Dojo’s mental image of Chase is the more monstrous version that probably haunts some of Dojo’s nightmares. But like you said, the weird thing is, despite the fact that this is visually the same as the current Chase, his mannerisms really are kinder. He smiles genuinely at Guan, he looks nervous and anxious about the deal, he frowns and shies away from Hannibal. It looks a little odd to see this personality in that body. He’s so wary and scared of Hannibal, way more so than actual good Chase was back then, when he was willing to talk back and snap at Hannibal and doubt him, argue with him, etc.

So Dojo still remembers a friendly, heroic Chase who would be hesitant to give away his soul like this and enjoyed his friendship with Guan. In fact, he remembers Chase as someone even kinder and more timid than he was back then.

Like you said, Dojo’s memory is still ultimately sympathetic towards Chase. His more positive traits from back then are still intact in Dojo’s memory. There’s just some part of him that’s still… othered, in a way that he wasn’t at the time.

Whatever discrepancies are in Dojo’s recollections, I feel like they’re subconscious.

Guan, however, is very conscious and deliberate in the things he misrepresents about Chase’s past.

Guan has this whole book draw to tell the backstory of Chase. Not to spread the legend for knowledge sake, because this isn’t common knowledge. Omi is very bookish and didn’t know about this, so this isn’t a published book or one that’s widespread. So Guan apparently keeps this on his person in case he has to personally talk about Chase. He might have even made it by himself.

Or maybe Guan just made the book as his way of giving himself closure about Chase’s betrayal and making it make sense in a way that suits his current legacy.

Chase is already in his armor, already has his spiked hair. And even in the part of the book where Chase was a good guy who fought against the forces of evil, in Guan’s version of the events, Chase fought alone.

In Guan’s version of events, Hannibal Roy Bean doesn’t exist, or at least isn’t mentioned as he is. Chase Young traded his soul to a standardly designed Satanic goat figure, and he did it for immortality and nothing else. It’s very unsympathetic and straightforward.

It’s very stylized, simplified, purposely inaccurate. It’s either how Guan is choosing to remember the events or how Guan has decided he’s going to pretend to remember them.

But either way, both Dojo and Guan seem to either purposely or subconscious distance themselves from the real Chase that they both knew growing up. Neither Guan nor Dojo described Chase as a “former friend” in either of their stories, even though that’s what he was. I guess it hurts less after all this time to simply pretend otherwise.

Your analysis' are always fire. 👍🏼 👏 👌

If the Bird of Paradise met these characters, what do you think the Bird of Paradise would call their best qualities?

Grandmaster Dashi

Master Monk Guan

Chase

Wuya

Jack

Well, the qualities the Bird of Paradise were their deepest values and most apparent traits that were so strong, they could be a double-edged sword.

Like how Omi's loyalty leads him to keeping his word even in situations where that's disadvantageous. His loyalty is what allowed him to be trapped by the plan in X-ing Omi, and it’s also what gives him his strength and shows how much he cares for his loved ones. His greatest strength and his fatal flaw, all in one. At his best and at his worst, Omi is and strives to be, loyal and honorable.

Similarly, Kimiko's courage often leads to recklessness and she gets especially reckless and defensive if she feels like her bravery is being called into question, like when she lets her temper get the best of her or accidentally let Sibini loose because she was trying to handle the broken Wu on her own. Clay's strength has been "stolen" by others multiple times (such as when Sibini took his body or when Hannibal turned into him), and that strength has weighed so heavily on him that it puts him in tight spots about how best to define and show strength which led to his clashes with his dad and his sister. They always are and always want to be courageous and strong, respectively, even when it’s to their detriment.

It’s also the trait easiest to lead them by. Chase, Hannibal, Jack, Vlad, and others have successfully manipulated Omi using his sense of loyalty. Dyris and Sibini manipulated Kimiko using her sense of courage, and in a way, so did the boys in the episodes where she wanted to prove herself, like with the monkey staff. Daddy Bailey manipulated Clay using his sense of strength.

(Although the “kindness” trait for Raimundo is just... iffy? It sorta breaks the pattern.)

So, with that framework in mind, I think if asked, the Bird of Paradise would say... 

Chase’s is definitely ambition. 

Both good or evil, that’s Chase’s defining trait. He wants to be stronger, wants to be better than he is, always strives to improve and rise above, which was always his greatest strength and brought him a lot of happiness and cockiness. He loves training and takes pride in his skills. He loves to stand above and always seek greater things.

It’s what led him down his dark path though, both because he wanted the power that Hannibal offered and the recognition that Hannibal said Chase would only find on the Heylin side, and because he feared Guan overtaking him and leaving him behind, forgotten to history. Chase threw away every other thing he believed in and everyone he’d grown close to for the deal that Hannibal was offering him, and even now, 1500 years later, he still aspires to greater and greater heights. He clips the wings of his competitors and trusts almost no one.

But it’s also what saved him from staying stuck as Hannibal’s puppet forever. It’s what’s led him to acquire this huge array of skills over the year. It’s a big part of what started him on the path of building a bond with Omi and how they grow so close. So maybe one day, it’ll be the trait that saves him?

Dashi was freedom.

A creative free-spirit, nothing could tie Dashi down. He’s bright, independent, untethered.

He doesn’t get trapped in rigid, pre-existing patterns or tripped up by less obvious solutions. A perpetual outside-the-box thinker who’s able to take a step back and look at a problem from an outside perspective, no matter how involved in it he may be. He’s airy, and has his own goals, marches to his own beat. It’s very difficult for others to understand him or follow his line of logic a lot of the time. Adaptable to the point of seeming unstructured. (Kind of like Clay.)

That free-spirited creativity can often be mistaken for stupidity, or laziness, or even for being uncaring. But that’s not the main problem. Dashi doesn’t really care how he’s seen or perceived by others, he doesn’t let outside opinions tie him down either. He doesn’t even get attached to his reputation as a big hero. He’ll go bum around pigs and hide in town to try not to get recognized.

The problem is that it makes it a little difficult to maintain long-term relationships.

It comes most naturally to him to just... let others go. Chase and Guan both left him, and as wise as Dashi is, he didn’t know how to stop it. And if you lean into DashiWuya headcanons, Dashi had to learn to let her go and choose to protect the world from her instead of being with her. There’s a limit to how deeply he can connect to others and how well they’ll ever really be able to understand him, and no matter how much love is there, neither side can really ever tie the other down.

Even the fact that he’s the only member of the original trio who didn’t seem to be immortal or become immortal in some way. Dashi’s not so attached to his mortal life that he’d cling to it. In fact, he possibly couldn’t really cling to anything that strongly, even if he tried. And in the end, he’s the greatest, most legendary warrior in Xiaolin history, he’s left behind this legacy and all these different Shen Gong Wu, but also, in the end, he was all alone.

Guan is diligence, or maybe focus.

He works hard and is stable as a rock, and when he wants something, he makes a plan to get it. It’s just, that focus and that diligence is for the goals Guan sets himself. And he’s very narrow in what he plans to do. Plus, anyone to the wayside, he’s fine with using a collateral. Guan is single-minded and devoted in pursuit of a goal or a lifestyle, and he gets results 100% of the time, even if it mean playing the long game.

He wanted his Spear of Guan. He has hundreds just like it, but it’s his, he wants it, so he’ll sacrifice Dojo and even these four random kids to get it done. He wanted to clear his good name after Omi insulted him, so he challenged Chase for the first time in a long time, and he won. He was tasked with retrieving the treasure of the blind swordsman, and if he had to traumatize and put in harm’s way 3/4 of the dragons-in-training in his care to do so, he’ll do it with no remorse. He can be dominating, punishing, demanding, and he won’t hesitate to lie to people’s faces.

He’s very selective about what goals he’s willing to devote any time or focus to, but once he decides, he’s on it. It’s how he’s made his name as a hero and how he’s managed to get this strong and get this far. It’s why he’s easily the greyest morality the Xiaolin side has and why he usually isn’t doing anything to help them.

It also makes it hard to tell where you stand with Guan. He’ll tell people what they want to hear with so much charisma and so little sincerity that even people he does care about end up feeling unable to read him, which is part of what made Chase wary enough to buy Hannibal’s manipulation, and consequently, part of what drove his original trio apart. It’s hard to say if he’s genuinely cared about anyone sense then; he’s only gotten more diligent and single-minded over the years. 

That diligence and focus also comes into play in the alternate timeline, where Guan remains a devout follower of Hannibal, unlike Chase, who sealed Hannibal away to be number one himself.

Wuya’s is power, in a similar way to how Clay’s is strength.

We never truly get to see Wuya at full strength for any length of time. Her powers are always put under a limiter, or stolen from her, or sealed away. But it’s fair to theorize that Wuya was the most powerful entity on Earth in her heyday, and gravitates towards everything she can do to get that power back.

And no matter how much power people take away from her, she’s never quite left helpless or hopeless or even truly powerless. She commands a really interesting soft power, and is opportunistic enough to bounce between how to use it. She uses Jack, then tries to use Katnappe, finds Cyclops to use him, uses Raimundo, etc.

She’s also the most knowledgeable in arcane magic. She knows where to find monsters like Cyclops and how to summon beings like Mala Mala Jong, she can sense all the Shen Gong Wu, she knows all the ancient baddies. She has access to the sort of knowledge that is easy to transform into actual threats.

And even if you take away all her magic, she’s still an excellent fighter. She messes with her opponent’s heads, can take down people twice her weight, can meet most other characters blow-for-blow.

No matter what state she finds herself in, Wuya will always find some sort of power to command. Power’s almost as drawn to her as she is to it, in a way. If the bad end of the timeline is anything to go by, Wuya does eventually manage to get at least some of her rock golems back, somehow.

Jack is tenacity. 

The boy may be cowardly, whiny, and duplicitous, but he sure never gives up, no matter how many times others knock him down or how many times he runs straight into trouble and trips himself up right off a cliff. In fact, he doesn’t know when to give up. He’ll run headfirst into a bad decision and stick to it, and keep doing it. His refusal to quit during the rare moments he’s ahead usually results in it being his own fault that he ends up losing the lead or throwing the match. He never assesses his actual chances and gets in over his head a lot of the time, too.

He is probably the most determined character in the show, considering how many failures he has blow up in his face without faltering to get back up and rebuild.

It’s a good skill in tech and computing, which he works with. Lots of unexpected dead ends and little things that can fall apart there, so Jack’s tenacity is what’s allowed him to manage all this technology and develop so many different things in the first place. A less hard-headed person would never have gotten that far. It’s also probably why in that bad end, Jack eventually managed to take over the world (that, and Omi being gone).

But it’s also what leads Jack to annoying everyone and to sabotaging every bond he could possibly have. He betrays literally every temporary alliance he gets, or tries to at least, whether it’s on the Heylin or the Xiaolin side, so everyone has a really good reason to never trust Jack as far as they can throw him. He’ll never stop trying to get one over on them, even if they’re actively helping him at the moment.

It’s so consistent that even good!Jack is just as tenacious, just like evil!Omi is just as bound by loyalty to whoever he follows. Good!Jack pulls off some pretty ballsy gambits because giving up just isn’t possible for him.

Chase: Can I be frank with you guys?

Guan:Of course!

Dashi:Sure, but can I still be Dashi?

Dojo:Shhh!Let Frank speak!

The ancient crew The og dragons The bois