Once again thinking about how much I like Jiang Cheng and Yanli’s relationship. It’s about trust. It’s about being very different people and yet having a mutual understanding. It’s about how every time Wei Wuxian runs away she sends Jiang Cheng after him and one time Jiang Cheng fails but they pick themselves up and scheme about it. It’s about mutual trauma and codependence. It’s about being a reliable presence in each other’s lives, which is a thing no one else manages until Zixuan. It’s about how Jiang Cheng, despite every other thing about him, is genuinely happy about that.
so a couple people either commented or put in the tags of my recent post saying something to the effect of “they’re all lesbians”, and I didn’t want to reply to anyone specific because I didn’t want it to feel mean or like a callout, but I did want to say, just so you guys know - in any and all content I create of Yanli, she is bisexual. obviously feel free to headcanon her as any sexuality you like in your own content! I’m not saying anyone’s headcanons are wrong or bad! but in my content, she will always be bi.
as a bi woman who has been in a relationship with a man for twelve years, and happily married to him for four, making content for Yanli who is both bi and married to Zixuan is very important to me, as there are many people - sadly, often actually within the queer community - who think that bi (or pan) people with partners who are a different gender somehow don’t “count” anymore, or they’re doing queerness “wrong”, or they’ve “settled” for a subpar relationship. obviously this is absolute steaming bullshit!!! we’re still here and we’re still queer
Yanli just wanted to have a cute morning-after with her boyfriend. Yanli did not deserve this. if Yanli’s little brothers don’t stop screaming she is going to rescind their soup privileges for a month.
Modern AU Jiang Yanli finally arrives! People think she’s super straight-laced compared to her brothers, but those people don’t know her.
ID: Jiang Yanli drawn facing forward. She’s smiling with her mouth partially open. She wears a cardigan and shirt in shades of purple. She has dangling earrings and extra lobe piercings. Her left ear has a cartilage piercing. There’s a flower tucked into her partially pulled back hair. ED.
“But…Wei WuXian looked slightly to the side. He saw Lan WangJi, who stood beside him, without any hint of hesitation, any thought of withdrawing. But, this time, he wasn’t alone anymore.”
“As you can imagine, it’s not exactly easy to make a whole family disappear. The Wens needed help with getting out of here as quickly as possible, leaving no trace behind. The Wen siblings had met someone during their studies who had sensed the danger the family was in, and in an attempt to help them, had become a target too. So, he took it upon himself to leave his old life behind in order to help the Wens disappear, but also to protect those who were close to him back then. You know this man as…Xian-gege.”
Sizhui drops the two photographs he was still holding. “You are joking,” he says, incredulous.
In which the first steps to a reunion are being taken.
—–
Chapter 5 is out now! Total chapter count has been updated to seven. ♥
I’m having a lot of thoughts and feelings about Jiang Cheng and Jin Ling’s relationship right now. Jin Ling most likely went through a phase where he called Jiang Cheng ‘A-Die’, because when you’re young, your parent is determined by who takes care of you, not blood relation. The first time Jin Ling does it, Jiang Cheng, for a split second, feels happiness and pride, before being overcome with guilt and devastation. Jiang Cheng should have never had to play such a role in Jin Ling’s life in the first place, and he felt he was never going to do as good as a job as Yanli and Zixuan, yet he was what Jin Ling had. He never wanted them to be replaced or forgotten, so from then on, he does everything he can to make sure Jin Ling knows he is not his A-Die. He also hates the fact that Jin Ling mourning his parents is something that he had to almost be taught, and not something that happened naturally, because Jin Ling never got to know his parents enough to even know what he was missing.
Angst aside though, I also like to imagine that as the years go by, being called 'A-Die’ bothers him less and less. He never gave Jin Ling permission to do so, but Jin Ling still slips up from time to time, and eventually (when Jin Ling is in his 20s or something) Jiang Cheng just stops correcting him, since being called 'A-Die’ doesn’t hurt as much as it once did.
I love the idea of Jiang Cheng and Jin Zixuan becoming besties. Like, it starts off with Jin Ling conning them into “helping” with his different school projects, building solar systems, volcanos, etc… until it becomes a routine that whenever Jin Ling has a school project, they spend hours bonding working on it together (90% of the time Jin ling isn’t even there). When there is a lull in the projects Jin Ling gets assigned, jc and jzx feel like they’ve lost their excuse for hanging out, and are both too awkward to reach out. It comes to a head when Yanli gets tired of seeing jzx mope around the house, sighing at the birdhouse he and jc ‘helped’ a-ling build for his woodshop class, and forces him to reach out to jc. She reassures him that 'yes, jc misses you too, he asks if Jin ling has any school projects every time I talk to him’, jzx finds the courage to invite jc out, and a beautiful friendship is born. They go out multiple times a month and text all the time, jc has even called jzx 'xuan-ge’ and wwx has never felt more betrayed
