Magister of Misery

I've been really busy recently between work and family, so I didn't manage to post about this before creator reveals... but guys!!!! I got 3 (THREE!!!!) gifts in fandom5k! I am Blessed 😍 (I *think* I was double- or triple-assigned??? since they're all 5k+. But that has to mean 3 people liked my prompts so much they gamed for only me to write? I am so incredibly _flattered_ I cannot even)

Title: uncool by TechnicolorRevel
Fandom: Disney's Descendants
Ship: Jane/Uma
Words: 6.5k
Tags: Hair Dyeing, Insecurity, Pining, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Mother-Daughter Relationship, Alternate Universe - Mal and Uma are friends
Summary: Jane has always known she's uncool. So what's she supposed to do when the coolest person she's ever seen comes to Auradon Prep?

I never expected to get this rarepair! That alone made me really excited (I've been shipping this ever since I wrote them as a bit of a joke and then I tricked myself into actually shipping them, they're barely even on screen together during the movies at all, I love them Your Honor). And it's written with such lovely attention to detail! Especially Jane's character development as her relationships with her mother and her crush grow are fantastic. It's very high school first crush vibe, with all that wallflower insecurity on Jane's side and that stand-offish "I've been hurt by the world and I won't let it again" vibe from Uma, it's very Grumpy/Sunshine lesbians in that regard. If you haven't read it yet and you enjoy those tropes, check it out! It should be easy enough to read canon-blind, the references to canon events are lowkey and only important in that they demonstrate Jane's character arc (and her self-image issues).

Title: Syncretization by Trobadora
Fandom: Guardian (TV) x Grimm (TV)
Ship: Shen Wei & Juliette Silverton & Henrietta
Words: 6.5k
Tags: Crossover, outsider pov, Episode: s04e12 Maréchaussée, Canon Divergence (for Grimm), Post-Canon (for Guardian), Hexenbiest Juliette, transformations, Wesen origins, Worldbuilding
Summary: "No," Juliette says again, "no," and then lashes out - wogeing, her Hexenbiest mien coming to the fore on instinct as her emotions surge. Her frustration and fury shake the house.

Shen Wei has planted his feet solidly, standing firm in the shaking. Most who aren't themselves Hexenbiests tend to find their woge both off-putting and frightening, and even those who don't know enough to be afraid have a visceral reaction. A living bog body, Elizabeth had said once, wryly, who wouldn't be frightened? But not this man.

This was such a fantastic crossover! trobadora and I were chatting about how these two world might mix when we both went and nominated this, and I love how we both settled on the same relationship to focus on 😂 I love what she did with Henrietta's PoV and character, she's such a fascinating person in herself and so rarely in fics! And the worldbuilding of how the Guardian world influences how Wesen came to be is A++. Spoiler for season 4 of Grimm, but if you love Shen Wei being sciency and badass, you should check it out canon-blind, too!

Title: Expectancy by tinypinkmouse
Fandom: L'Oreal Time Engraver Commercials x Deja Vu - Dreamcatcher (MV)
Ship: Time Engraver & Jiu & Yoohyeon
Words: 10k
Tags: Time Travel Fix-It, Time Travel, Worldbuilding, Time Loop, Alternate Reality
Summary: He can recognise the signs of his own work, if he closes his eyes, he can still feel the chisel in his hands, the patterns his hand had moved in. But this is not the face these marks belong to. He didn't carve them into this person's skin.

Ngl, didn't expect to get this crossover, either! I was gushing about how these two canons might weave together in a discord tinypinkmouse and I share, and I'm so happy she decided to give it a shot 🥰 It can easily be read canon-blind, and you should give it a shot if you like any sort of time travel or other time shenanigans! As you can see from the tags, all sorts of timey wimey nonsense happens in this fic, and it's so fun to see it develope and evolve :D

Links to Canon: Deja Vu MV (3:46 minutes) and Time Engraver 2019 (3:40 minutes) Time Engraver 2020 (6:28 minutes) commercials

All you need to know is that the Time Engraver character has at least a little bit of control over time, stopping it or winding it back to see what happened so he can then carve wrinkles and other signs of ageing into people's skin. And Deja Vu tells a (nonlinear? very open to interpretation) story of a Royal and her Servant who used to be close but then one of them betrays the other (or they both betray each other). The fun thing is that we see two separate betrayals, one in which Jiu is the princess/queen and is stabbed in the back by her loyal servant!Yoohyeon, and one where the roles are reversed. Tinypinkmouse picked up on the different ways to interpret what is happening in the MV and wove them all together into a single narrative that is fun to discover!

Title: Fractal
Fandom: Guardian (TV) x Grimm (TV)
Ship: Shen Wei/Zhao Yunlan & Juliette Silverton
Words: 5.5k
Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Episode: s04e18 Mishipeshu, Episode 35, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Established Weilan, Juliette Silverton Has A Temper, minor Hexenbiest worldbuilding, Shen Wei is Overpowered what else is new, Mentor Shen Wei (Guardian), dark energy evolution, the evolution of Dixingren and Yashou
Summary: After Zhao Yunlan's trip to the past, he and Shen Wei are spit out of the wormhole in Portland. Waiting for their flight back home, they run into people different from the Yashou and Dixingren they know.

Meanwhile, Juliette is on her downward spiral of losing control when she meets something far more dangerous than a Grimm.

And that ^ is the fusion I wrote for trobadora :D Set a little later in season 4 of Grimm, having Shen Wei and Zhao Yunlan run into a out of control Juliette and offering her a new way out. Spoilers for season 4 of Grimm, please check it out if you'd like!

Personal Life
I've been really busy with work! I meant to update this blog a lot over the last two weeks, but something always came up. But things finally are starting to slow down, so hopefully, I'll be around more <3

Also, on a personal note, I visited my baby niece and she is the cutest baby eVAH. I may have caught baby fever. Looking into potentially signing up for dating apps or similar to get my love life started up again - I work in a women-dominated field and the town I live in is unlikely to provide me with someone of the right age range/same goals for life.

I showed my parents 开端 | Reset, which I'd watched with my brother before - they loved it! Gonna finally write up that review I promised over a year ago soon.

Exchange Scene

FFFX
I'm hard at work editing and rewriting bits of my fffx assignment, and it's starting to come together as a better version than what I originally submitted at deadline. Fingers crossed I'll get the rewrites done before Saturday! My beta's been very helpful in clarifying some things I needed to rethink and is very generous with the tight schedule we now have. If I sign up again, I'm going to do less other exchanges surrounding this one so I can actually get a decent chunk of fic done in November.

Candy Hearts
candyheartsex revealed both fics and authors while I was busy! I got a lovely fic about Shen Wei teasing Zhu Hong about her dating life, which was utterly adorable and a great take on their post-canon dynamic <3

Title: like family by teaotter
Fandom: Guardian (TV)
Ship(s) Shen Wei/Zhao Yunlan & Zhu Hong
Words: 487
Summary: Zhu Hong had long since grown accustomed to hiding her dates from her family.

I also had way too much fun diving back into my original fandom :D I started my fandom life in YGO! (the original run) and Bakura Ryou was something of a blorbo for me back then. So it was really awesome to dip my fingers back into that canon and see what I could come up with. Time travel is always a favourite trope of mine, but I went with the version canon gives us. A lot of dramatic irony which had me giggling while writing! And my recip seems to appreciate all the canon parallels and left an amazing comment, so score :D!

Title: Welcome To My World for seerofrage / TereziMakara
Fandom: Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters
Ship(s) Yami Bakura/Bakura Ryou, Thief King Bakura/Bakura Ryou (note: Thief King Bakura is the ancient Egyptian version of Yami Bakura)
Words: 8.5k
Tags: Memory World (time travel), getting together, possessive Bakura Ryou, BAMF!Ryou, (mutual) protectiveness, Shadow Games
Summary: AKA Memory World Reprise: Tendershipping edition

Bakura Ryou wants his other half back and he's willing to risk everything to do it.

Thief King Bakura has no idea what to do with this pale stranger, whose secrets seem to be the key to his plans' success.

Rare Femslash Exchange
Just 4ish hours ago, rarefemslashexchange revealed! I'm very excited to dive into my gift (possibly tonight, depending on how work allows - I'm on night shift today). Someone tackled a rare canon for me! Excited to see what they did with it :D (I was already flattered by how fast I got snapped up from the pinch hits list, which seems like a good omen imo). Ngggh, I wish I didn't have obligations and could dive right in!

Title: from now on I’ll see nothing but you (from now on I'll love myself instead of you)
Fandom: love4eva by LOONA (Music Video)
Ship(s) Yves/Olivia Hye
Words: 4k
Tags: Abandonment, Angst with a Happy Ending, Friendship/Love, Pining, Reconciliation, Reunions
Summary: From the stone balcony, Olivia watched three figures run from Eden and into the maze that was part of the only place she had ever known.

(A story of how Olivia Hye escaped Eden and reunited with Yves and her friends.)

ficinabox just revealed who the creators are, so I can finally share which works are mine! I wrote 3 fics, two of them epistolary, and created a Logic Grid Puzzle for the first time :D!

Title: Gossip Mango for BookKeep
Fandom: Guardian (TV)
Ship: Shen Wei/Zhao Yunlan & Shen Wei's students
Words: 1.9k (though about half of that is coding)
Tags: Social Media, Episode Related, Canon Compliant, Episode 1, Episode 2, Episode 3, Episode 8, mentions of canon suicidal ideation, mentions of canon murders
Summary: Not only does Dragon City university have a great and sophisticated study program for many different majors, it also has a flourishing social media site for students to discuss their studies social activities recent events.

Title: Return To Sender for BookKeep
Fandom: Assassin's Creed
Ship: Desmond Miles/Claudia Auditore, Claudia Auditore & Ezio Auditore
Words: 3.5k
Tags: Epistolary, Time Travel, Marriage, POV Outsider, as in Outsider on the Time Traveller PoV, In-Universe Documents
Summary: Over the years, Ezio and Claudia exchanged many letters. These are the ones concerning Claudia's husband, then-stranger, Desmond.

Title: Adventitious for Bee_4
Fandom: Naruto
Ship: Hatake Kakashi & Uzumaki Naruto & Uchiha Sasuke & Haruno Sakura
Words: 5k
Tags: Team 7 Dynamics, Developing Friendships, set after the Wave mission but before the Chuunin Exams, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, in which Team 7 grows closer and Sasuke doesn't defect, Team 7 Have Issues, (don't worry they're working on it), Mission Fic (sort of), no literal geese were involved in the making of this fic, in which Team 7 accidentally topples several villains' plans
Summary: To keep Team 7 busy, Kakashi-sensei sends his students on a wild goose chase. Much to his dismay, they actually find a golden goose.

And my first attempt at a logic puzzle! Big shout-out to my little brother for helping me tighten up my clues and creating a whole-ass logic map of paths it could be solved. It was an amazing sibling bonding exercise <3

Title: Where In Mentopolis Are The Prefrontal P.I.s? for Brachylagus_fandom
Fandom: Dimension 20 - Mentopolis
Ship: Worldbuilding, gen
Summary: It’s the Grand Opening of Daniel Fucks’ new Emporium of Exquisite Pleasures, but none of the other Prefrontal P.I.s have shown up! However, through his criminal network, Daniel hears some rumours about what they’re each up to. Can you help him find them and drag them away from whatever they’re doing for this most important of all events?

Hi! Haven't gotten around to updating this blog in a while :') time passes quickly when you're busy!

Life Update

I celebrated my birthday at the end of October, the first time I invited the entire (maternal side of the) family to my place since I moved in last November. It was fun, but quite a busy time, between baking cakes and cleaning everything up. I was glad I took a couple days off work before and after, or I would've been *really* stressed.

Among other things, I got the translated Guardian novel Vol. 1, a crotcheted lil dragon and new kitchen towels with a cute black kitten & pumpkin design :D!


(I invited some coworkers and friends for a second party, that's why the buttercream cake shows up twice!)

Work's been busy, too, with two co-workers calling in long-term sick. Hopefully one of them will make it back in December to ease the workload again, especially at this particularly busy time of year. Flu's going around as well - I caught the cold early on but managed to push on for a couple weeks, but finally caught the ear infection the kids are all trading between each other (that's what I get for helping out in the daycare section of the job RIP) so now I'm on sick leave. Fingers crossed I can go back to work on Wednesday, but right now it's not looking too great just yet.

The cases at least are interesting? One of mine is getting to the final stage, in a positive way, which is great to watch. Another of the new cases is a difficult nut to crack, but I'm hopeful to establish a good working relationship with them.

Dreamcatcher

They just put out a new short album! I'm very happy with all the songs on it, even if the fandom seems divided on the title track OOTD (it *is* a departure from their usual style, but in a very imo predictable way. They've been leaning into this style as far back as Odd Eye, with BEcause being the major exception. It's still very clearly uniquely Dreamcatcher in vibe and sound, with experimental mixing of genres into what otherwise might be Just Another Mainstream song. And the BSides have at least two very cool songs with more of a rock/metal vibe for any disappointed fans to make up for it imo.

I'm very interested in the whole... "fakeness" of the MV and concept. Like, they took a typical girl crush concept with a very retro vibe rather than high-glam-fashion and then the main dance outfits being those leather-jacket white top combos? It makes for an interesting visual, especially with all the car driving and motorcycle straddling. The "bts"/"editing" style of the MV also gives it a vibe of robotic/in progress - which really leads well into the surprise ending of the members going dead-eyed and killing the camerawoman. I'm excited to find out what the narrative idea of this Villains arc will be! But taken on its own, the message to me seems to read how fake the industry is, how robotic the girl groups, and Dreamcatcher ones more breaking out of expectations (as they have done since they rebranded Minx into Dreamcatcher).

Rising is absolutely my favourite of the songs tho, it's so catchy, and the whole "Ri-ri-ri-ri-ri-rising" is GREAT :D Shatter took me a bit to get used to - I immediately liked the melodic soft parts, but wasn't quite sure of the contrast to the "Bang It On Me" chorus. It's a very metal song in the same vibe of other woman-lead metal bands I love, while still uniquely Dreamcatcher. Definitely looking forward to learning the dance choreo to it and OOTD! (Though I'm still behind, I haven't even touched Bon Voyage and Demian yet *sobs* I need more time in the day!)

Exchanges

I signed up for fandomtrees - here's my tree! I requested three Kpop MV canons (Dreamcatcher's Deja Vu & Vision, and Loona's love4eva), three cdramas (Guardian, GYADL, and Love Between Fairy And Devil), the short (not quite indie) game "Song of Nunu" (a League of Legends story) and the DnD tableplay "A Crown of Candy" from Dimension 20.

I finished my gifts (and now, edits) for the ficinabox exchange, though I have some ideas of how to polish up one of them a bit more. I'm torn between picking up pinch hits, finishing any of the treats I started, or working on my other assignments.

Because I'm also signed up to fffx and yuletide_admin. For the first, I'm 2k into the story and have a strong idea of what I want to do with it; for the latter I just did a canon review to refresh my memories of the canon and am still brainstorming ideas. There's so many options, and I want to do all of them! :( why does the day only have 24hrs (and why do I have to spend so many of them at work, grumbles)

I've also been writing some more on my posted WIP In This, As In All Things, which I hadn't meant to put on pause for so long, but, well. Life happened *shrugs*. I'm gonna get the next three chapters done before posting (chapter 5 is close to done and I got a decent chunk of 6 going already), and then I need to figure out what I need to happen so I can wrap it up. It's always been one of the more vibes-focussed fics I've written, and the things I wanted out of it (confrontations of older!Weilan with Zhao Xinci) don't seem as plausible anymore now that I'm writing it. Or at least, the two different things I have in mind are vastly different in tone so I'll have to pick one over the other, le sigh.

Gonna try and post more again (and share my thoughts on Song of Nunu and Love Between Fairy And Devil, since I finished those two now) and soon!

Now that rarepairexchange revealed the authors, I can finally share the treat I wrote for trobadora! (I was trying to pick up her pinch hit, but funnily enough, china_shop napped it like an hour or two before I was gonna xD)

Title: Back In A Spell
Fandom: Grimm (TV)
Ships: Sean Renard/Juliette Silverton, Nick Burkhardt/Juliette Silverton, pre-Nick Burkhardt/Sean Renard/Juliette Silverton
Words: 7k
Tags: Time Travel Fix-It, POV Juliette Silverton, former Hexenbiest Juliette, Nick is not a Grimm yet, Identity Reveal, Magic Revealed, Dinner Date with Ulterior Motives, Secrets
Summary:

Renard hummed noncommittally. "You're not Wesen," he switched tracks, letting the question of her knowledge hang between them. She'd dropped too many names and hints about his past not to be involved somehow.

"I'm not," she stated, even as the truth felt like ashes in her mouth. But I should be.

Going back in time has a price. Juliette will make damn sure it was worth it.

Thoughts on the Fic

I had such a good time writing this one! Juliette is my blorbo, and Renard is Trobadora's, so the first scene was practically me going "how can I smush these two together" :D Renard is such a deeply distrustful character, he would be hard to convince - and I honestly don't think he's quite convinced by the end of the scene, but willing to let it play out and see where it gets him. Juliette has made some good points and if he can get Nick on his side before he awakens his Grimm heritage, well. It'll be easier to build an alliance on that sturdy basis, and I feel like that's an advantage Renard wouldn't let pass him by. Writing the early seasons Nick who is all bushy-tailed and bright-eyed innocence was fun, too. Juliette was a bit of a guess work, based on what I've seen of her in the first two seasons and extrapolating on her characterisation there - the reason I went looking for the Hexenbiest!Juliette clips on youtube, since I know Dora likes Hexenbiest!Juliette best ;) I left the whole Eve plot vague because I have no idea what's happening there aside from Juliette's death and resurrection, so I figured if anything I say contradicts it, the future is just another canon AU :P

Also! The title. I wanted something that felt true to the show, which always involves puns and references to fairytales. "Back In A Spell" was too good to pass up, what with the implications of time travel and magic, but it also being a saying for "be right back"? Idk, it tickled me :D

Title: All Our Memories, They're Haunted
Fandom: Deja Vu - Dreamcatcher (Music Video)
Ships: Yoohyeon-centric, Jiu/Yoohyeon (background)
Words: 1.1k
Tags: Memories, Regret, Grief/Mourning, the Queen is dead; long live the Queen, Dark Yoohyeon, Murder
Summary: There are no witnesses to her ascent. There is no one she trusts not to stab her in the back.

This is the story I wrote when I discovered the fan theory that Yoohyeon kills all her friends and what we see in the MV are their ghosts! I don't usually write creepy horror stuff, but I love writing characters going insane or evil, so writing what amounts to Mad Queen Yoohyeon was *really* fun. Even if the fandom is super small and only my bff ends up reading it, it's a win in my book :)

Exchanges
I've signed up to guardian_wishlist! I'm very excited for another round of my favourite fandom event of the year :D

I'm also signed up to fffx, in which the wordcount minimum is 10k. My assignment is awesome, and I already got 1k of snippets written up and a decent outline. There's more than enough time to write this fic, but I hope I don't lose track of or motivation for writing it midway through. Actually gonna try to finish it by November, just to get done first!

ficinabox is happening soon, too. I nominated a bunch of my favourite fandoms, now I just need to find some requests I can write for. It's also a 10k assignment, but one that can be broken into 1k-10k pieces plus has a lot of interesting variant mediums. The swapping systems sounds confusing but fun. We'll see if I can actually sign up!

Writing
I've fiddled with a gift or two for fandomgiftbasket, but mostly I'm writing Grimm TV fic x'D mostly about my main ship, the OT3 of Nick/Renard/Juliette.

One of them is a kidfic series - I have no idea why, but those always appeal to me, seeing the characters I love navigate parenthood and how the worldbuilding impacts raising children within it. So far I've started on the 1st instalment dealing with Juliette's pregnancy, and one where the kid is in kindergarden :3 I do want Kelly Burkhardt (Nick's mom) to show up and be confused by her son's triad relationship and whose kid is this anyway, that's gonna be another fun instalment.

Another is a fix-it rewrite where I diverge somewhere mid-to-late season 1 with having the OT3 start a triad relationship and revealing several secrets much sooner than in canon, and then go through said canon situations with these changed factors to see how that impacts canon's timeline. It's gonna be a series, too, and I doubt I'll address all plots, but :D

Work
Work's busy but fine, I'm really acclimating well and getting a better handle of my job's duties. We have a new coworker I'm helping getting up to speed, which is really a nice mirror of how far I've grown in the last 8 months. We're having a team-bonding event on Friday, so I'll miss Guardian Rewatch, but I'm looking forward to it!

I managed two gifts in time for fandomtrees reveal today, a Guardian one for china_shop and a Detective L one for mumblemumble

Title: Growing Pains
Fandom: 镇魂 | Guardian (TV)
Ships: pre-Weilan
Words: 2.5k
Tags: early canon (between ep 4 & 5), Haixing-Dixing politics, hurt Zhao Yunlan, protective Shen Wei, casefic for flavour

Summary: During their most recent case Zhao Yunlan's superiors put him in a difficult position: follow orders, or summon Heipaoshi to hand over the Dixingren?

Title: Both Is Good
Fandom: Detective L
Ship: Ben Jieming/Qin Xiaoman/Luo Fei
Words: 1.5k
Tags: pre-poly relationship negotiations, background case flavour, post-canon, insecure character(s), they all love each other very much and show it in their own ways

Summary: The day before the police ball, Ben Jieming and Luo Fei discuss who should accompany Qin Xiaoman.

Unbeknownst to them, she already made her choice.

I meant to start a third one, but time and work kinda conspired against me there. Oh well. Moving on to the next set of fics on my list! Sunday, my Red Pocket will be opened, and I'm excited. It's based on the Romance of the Three Kingdoms novel, so I'm *fingers crossed* hoping for some court intrigue-style stuff... ;) (on that note, really need to update the sid comm about happenings in that event, whoops). I've also picked a Weilan Can't Dance prompt, and I keep going back and forth between making it as cracky as possible or treating it seriously xD the end results should be interesting!

Also, I really should get a head-start on my candyheartsex assignment. I already have a decent idea for the two starting scenes, and knowing work is about to get busier, I'd feel better if I had a headstart. On the other hand, I ended up digging an unfinished wishlist fill up instead and added like 400 words on that instead ^^"

Health & Work

I'm still recovering from my cough (turned out to be bronchitis. I'm getting better day by day, but it's been a slow and torturous process). Went back to work on Monday, which was probably a day or two too early but I felt bad for already taking 1.5 weeks of sick leave *shrugs* it's a flaw of mine I'm working on. Next time, hopefully, I'll be able to prioritize my health with less of an internal guilt trip.

Anyway, half my team caught the same cold by now, so we're understaffed af. It's gonna be a couple interesting (read: exhausting) days. I'm just glad we're at half capacity right now or I might very well throw hands.

Watching

Due to my lack of steady internet access (seriously, how hard can it be to connect the damn box?? The cables are set up already! They just need to add the damn box *grumbles*) I've been re-watching Nirvana In Fire since I have a downloaded copy. It's still very gripping despite knowing exactly what's going on! Just got to the Prince Yu rebellion part, and the moment Nihuang shows up with reinforcements had me crying with relief. Just goes to show how well made this drama is, the pacing and tension is impecable. I definitely stayed up later an hour or two because I was at a tense part a couple nights <.<

If I didn't have so many obligations and WIPs right now, I'd probably be writing NiF fic now xD If anyone has recs, I'd love to read more! Especially any court intrigue/politics ones or generally good character pieces. (I have such a yearning for Jingyan being protective of MCS, like divergences where Prince Yu's plot to create a rift between them fails because Jingyan Trusts or Knows... it was such delicious angst, let me have my comfort fantasies :'D)

Writing

I really need to sit down and finish my yuletide fic. I didn't expect things to be quite this busy and complicated. Falling sick definitely set me back on my schedule, and the fact that I don't have decent internet is a pain, too. I've got nearly 1k of the main scene, which might turn out to be the only scene after all, my ambitious goals for this fic are definitely not achievable until the deadline. I'm trying to cram as much worldbuilding goodness into it as I can! Which might actually be for the best, rather than sprawling musings. Much more focussed story-telling, for sure.

Fingers crossed my giftee will like the end result! I'm probably not gonna get around to writing treats though, sadly...

On that note, I just posted this WIP I've been chipping away at for ages:

Title: What Lies In Darkness
Rating: E for smut
Ship: Weilan
Words: 7k
Tags: Eldritch AU, eldritch horror!Shen Wei, monsterfucker!Zhao Yunlan, tentacle sex, worldbuilding, void cat!Da Qing, reincarnation (sort of)

Summary:
While snooping through Shen Wei's apartment, Zhao Yunlan ends up entangled in secrets better left undisturbed.

His curiosity might kill him, but oh, does Shen Wei satisfy him. Multiple times.

Life

Had a work event I reluctantly went to - had a great time hanging out with a couple people and firmly ignoring others (am still bemused by how petty some of these people get but I'm hopefully not stuck here for much longer). Got stuck on the applications which is giving me a case of the nerves since the deadline is July 15 and I really need to sit down and finish all that stuff.

Dancing

Started out pretty well in the beginning of June, then flagged towards the end because heat OTL. Added a tutorial for HIP by Mamamoo and Star by Loona to my practice list, but then found I was too impatient to focus on those most days. Ended up adding Dreamcatcher's Lucky Strike cover, too, which makes me want to dance every time I hear it. The choreo is easy enough and a good power-through song to keep going when I'm getting sweaty.

Current line-up includes the following at 75% speed: Ponzona by Purple Kiss, Lunatic by Moonbyul, Lucky Strike by Dreamcatcher, PTT by Loona, Vivid by Heejin + No Dot by Sua and I'm A B by Hwasa at 100% speed, sometimes with another Lucky Strike at 100% to cap it off.

Watching

• I got stuck on Detective L during episode 4, the introduction of the forensic scientist had too heavy cannibalism vibes (which is a very strong squick for me, verging on trigger on bad days) and I still haven't gotten through the scene. Gonna give it another shot when I feel less like I'm stuck in a pressure cooker
• Ended up watching primarily ChilledChaos stream VoDs over on Twitch/his youtube, my favourite are the Town of Salem games hands down and he had some great ones this month. Very funny and good to relax to.
• Binge-watched the entirety of Exandria Unlimited: Calamity over the last two days and DAMN am I in love. What a poignant show with an incredible cast and DM. I'm already a Critter, though I'm way behind (haven't watched the first ExU yet nor C3), but Calamity is free of needing prior knowledge, which is great! :D
• Watched a bunch of the comedy shows over on CollegeHumour due to Brennan Lee Mulligan being /everywhere/ since his stint with ExU. He's so funny, his monologuing is hilarious and fantastic and *skilled*! Primarily watched Breaking News Network and Game Changer (at least the parts available to public for free)

Writing

I did reasonably well sticking with the WED challenge before dropping out around day 25 due to lack of inspiration/irl shenanigans. Hoping to recapture the muse for July tho :')
I ended up posting 4 of those fics I worked on:

1. Episode 3: Operation Campus Cat, A Covert Investigation By Chief Infiltrator Da Qing (Da Qing & Shen Wei's students)
2. Episode 16: Can't Get Fat With One Mouthful (Da Qing with kittens!)
3. The Fringe Benefits Of Being Family (ZYL & kid OCs, family fluff)
4. Long Night In Longcheng (Weilan smut with dragon!Shen Wei)

Reading

It felt like I didn't get much reading done this month, but going through my bookmarks proves that false lol. Tbf I took a dive into first Assassin's Creed and then Witcher fic around the same time I stopped writing my own Guardian fic, so I think I really needed a break. And I finally got started on going through the SID_comm's meta tag! not that I made it far lol but it was a super fun day and I wanna spent more time in there <3
Here's a couple Guardian recs from those fics I did manage to read! In no particular order:

• The Marvelous (Mis)adventures of Da Qing King of Cats, an on-going event collection of Da Qing-centric fics! :D I need to catch up with the newer ones, but everything's been a delight to read so far!
• midsummer offerings by sasamelons, great Weilan fluff at a Dragon Boat race
• Cradled by Elenothar, soft non-sexual BDSM/collars Weilan fluff
• Listen (it's late, it's late, but listen) by Trobadora, Ya Qing/Ying Chun reconciliation goodness
• Meeting in a Time of Peace by china_shop, in which the Envoy makes contact with the Yashou tribes
• Away From Home by tinypinkmouse, a Star Trek crossover with Outsider PoV by the local empath, Weilanzun
• Where hope dwells by velithya, where dragon!ZYL saves the day during eps 39-40

Goals for July

I started a mini-event with some fellow Guardian fans in discord, Longfic July, wherein we all encourage each other to work on a long WIP for the entire month.

In my case, this is my Arranged Marriage AU, a Canon AU in which Haixing and Dixing have a different sort of treaty and are much more equal neighbouring powers than in canon. When Heipaoshi announces he's looking to marry a Haixingren, the Bureau quickly picks Zhao Yunlan to be his pride. But while Zhao Yunlan will do his duty, his heart is already taken: by one mysterious Shen Wei, whom he seems unable to track down ever since the announcement...

• do research on Chinese marriage customs, both contemporary and ancient
• edit the existing 15k
• rewrite the rooftop flashback/Weilan's first meeting
• write ~15k more words

Other goals:

• get dancing regularity back up to 5/7 days a week
• catch up on Guardian fic, especially Da Qing adventures and Elenothar's dragon fic
• read up and get involved in more Guardian meta posts

Family & Personal
My grandparents came over for Mother's Day (May 8th) and Father's Day (May 26th). I love them to bits, even if they can be exhausting with their quirks. They really loved the veggie mix I baked for dinner (we had BBQ for both days), I'm still proud to have pleased both of them since we're all picky eaters here :3

Kinda sad that cousin and cousin-in-law don't join us on these two days, which tbf they don't since Aunt isn't here either so they visit his parents instead. STILL. :( guess I'll have to wait until my brother's birthday in June until we get together again <3

Food & Health
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Dancing_
Added No Dot by Sua to my practice line-up because I'm obsessed, and I couldn't find a decent mirror of Beauty Full by Dami yet (nor for Honey by Solar, which is this week's obsession, and it BUGS _heh me). Hoping Dreamcatcher will release more dance practices for all the solos! They just posted the MV for Jiu's Cherry (Real Miracle) so I'm hopefull *fingers crossed*

Current practice consists, off and on, as follows:

1. No Dot by Sua


2. Lunatic by Moonbyul


3. Maison by Dreamcatcher


4. PTT by Loona

I've mostly been doing No Dot and Lunatic on 75% on loop 3-4 times before moving on, Maison is on 100% and I'm pretty much done with. Trying to add PTT back in (I can do the first half + chorus at 75% decently) but I realized this is the dance that contributed to me dislocating my ilio-sacral joint back in February, so I'm cautious. Gonna put it at the beginning of the exercise so I'm not too tired and fumbly and make the risky move with the precision it needs to avoid injury 👀😅

I'm also considering adding Hwasa's I'm a B back in as my "break" full-speed song to keep me going when I'm flagging, Maison isn't always doing it for me anymore. But tbf I've been on the high end of histamine this month, which is always counterproductive for my exercise regime. Might add Odd Eye, You & I, and Why Not back in, possibly gonna start on the whole Ponzona choreo soon (I've only learned the chorus part so far). I'm very wishy washy on committing to a concrete list lmao, I tend to throw choreos in and out depending on mood -- the goal is to exercise ideally for an hour (including my muscles reps like sit-ups, etc.), that tends to work best if I'm in the right mood for the songs I have playing.

Watching_
I watched and very much enjoyed the 15-episodes long cdrama "Reset" 开端 (Kai Duan) this month. It's a time-loop "we reset when we die" crime thriller/mystery with really adorable main characters and several good side characters. I might make a post about what I liked (and disliked) about it later, but for now, definitely worth the time! I binged it on a work night like the fool I am ^^" Too much suspense to put down, especially after the episode 8 complication/reveal/twist! If you don't want to get caught in the same trap, I suggest taking a break after episode 7 before things literally explode :'D

Fanfic & Fandom
The 520 Days Reverse Exchange was a lot of fun! I'm always torn on whether I want to participate in this sort of events because my To Write list is so long but the feeling of gifting someone their wish is great? Plus a lot of great works came out of it, and I've been enjoying perusing them! :D Anyway I'm 100% looking forward to doing the wishlist again, fingers crossed I'll manage several shorter fics this time x'D

Writing_
Since Camp NaNo worked out really well for me with a 25k monthly goal, I figured I'd do something similarly for May, but with lower stakes - 25k was doable, but since I'm the type who wants to hit par daily, I was definitely struggling keeping up, especially on busy days. I went for 15k instead which gave me a doable daily goal of not quite 500 words, which I had fun reducing to lower and lower daily goals until I ended up with 23 words a day when I finally breached 15k on May 19th. Decided to up it to 20k, which I hit yesterday :D This way almost felt more productive than April, and I wonder if it's because I'm more inspired this month or the lower word count goal actually helped keep my mood up? *thinks* definitely worth keeping an eye on.

I mainly ended up working on my 520 Days giftfic Keep On Going's last 2-3 scenes and the bingo's May bonus prompt "time travel" in the Zhu Hong-centric fic Unacceptable, plus finishing the last chapter of this is how the war is won. Words also went into an eldritch horror!Shen Wei Weilan smut fic (nicknamed Void Creature for lack of a title), a new addition to my kidfic series WIP titled "The Fringe Benefits of Family" in which ZYL braids everyone's hair, my Da Qing's Adventures entry, and into nearly finishing my first fic in a new series, the Already Married AU (in which, aptly, Weilan are already married pre-canon). This one is also Zhu Hong PoV and was really flowing whenever I wanted to work on Unacceptable. The brain just, uh, no? work on this one instead?? ignore deadline??? OTL

My plan for June is to wrap up the first Already Married fic (and figure out a title RIP) and post one (or maybe more?👀) Da Qing codas for the event. I'm assuming June's bonus prompt will be Pride-related, so I've started working on the sequel to my vampire AU, which is gonna deal with this AU's version of the Wang Yike case. I've been stuck on that one for long enough, and I don't have a good square for it on my card, so maybe this way I can motivate myself to finish *strikes pose*

Long-term I also really want to get back into the rhythm of writing the Arranged Marriage AU because it's been long enough, I'm really excited for it! But the stumbling block of re-reading the 15k I've already written + the editing I'm aware it needs... *flops* wish me luck

Reading_
Aside from making my way through the 520 Days collection, I've also managed to read a couple other fics, all of these are highly recommended:

• ready, set, game on by synonemous


• Nameless by thosch3i


• The Sharpest Lives by Jo_Lasalle


• 宝贝 by nnozomi


• Cycles by ancient_moonshine


• Yearning by OneshotPrincess


• of thousands, just the one by Elenothar


• Soulmate AU by TimeTravelFreak