schneefink (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
schneefink) wrote2018-07-15 05:14 pm
schneefink) wrote2018-07-15 05:14 pm
Entry tags:
NiF rec: Birthright
Nirvana in Fire fans, go read this fic and then come talk to me about it:
Birthright, by![[archiveofourown.org profile]](https://p.dreamwidth.org/b164c54b26e4/-/archiveofourown.org/favicon.ico)
ancient_moonshine
15k, LS/JY, AU
Summary: Consort Jing watches and waits, Xuanji plots, and Jingyan struggles under the weight of a legacy.
Why I love it: Holy shit. Like. You know the kind of stories that you read and it makes you look at canon differently and gives you so many emotions that you flail around and the sounds in your head are all jumbled because you're so full of feelings? Yeah. This is a fic like that. (Also the emotions are mostly pain and angst, because this is NiF.)
This is the Hua!Jingyan AU I never knew I wanted and it's so, so good. When I first watched NiF and got to the Hua storyline and its background, where the Hua kingdom allied with the Emperor but he broke his promise and destroyed it and that's why the surviving Hua princess plotted against Da Liang, my reaction was along the lines of "huh – their rage is completely understandable, the Emperor is even more of an evil asshole than I thought." But by that point the heroes of the tale were firmly established – MCS and Jingyan, who had not been involved back then – and so were the villains, Prince Yu supported by Qin Banruo and Xia Jiang (who was allied with Princess Xuanji.) I don't remember if we learned of the background before or after the storyline with Tong Lu and Fourth Sister, who loved her family but also the man she had seduced and who was tortured because of her, and in the end she set him free and betrayed her family, and her people, who she maybe hadn't ever known as anything other than refugees.
And here we have Consort Jing who is a Hua princess and who passed the secret on to her son. Jingyan, who has never seen the Hua kingdom, never known their culture except in secret, but is their prince and has a responsibility…
Because what did it mean, if he were both Liang and Hua? Who would he protect? aösldkfjaösldkf between the people he loves and the people who need him who can he choose? JINGYAN. Of course it's been killing him.
I loved the paragraph where he thinks about what he knows of Hua culture, how it's been passed on to him in bits and pieces, how that's all the legacy that's left.
I honestly am not sure if Jingyan would have been able to go through with it all if not for Donghai, and his conversation with Lin Shu. That when Lin Shu, who's known for years and years that his best friend and lover has secrets from him and worries he doesn't tell him about, when Jingyan finally dares to open the door the tiniest bit… That at first he's concerned that Jingyan will be seen as a traitor is logical. But then he switches to "you're just tired, we'll put it behind us," and that must have felt like such a blow, that this is something Lin Shu can sweep away with "you're not thinking straight right now" instead of something that Jingyan has been fighting with almost his entire life. And of course Lin Shu believes that they're in the right, he idolizes his father, he can't think anything else or it would destroy his entire worldview. Still, his first instinct was not even "things should have been done better here, we'll talk to someone," but "you're not thinking straight, we can't be wrong," and my guess is that this is why Jingyan gave up hope on explaining things to Xiao Shu, the person he loves most in the world.
Of course Jingyan fantasizes about running away with Xiao Shu, even proposes it even though of course he knows neither of them would.
I wonder how long it took Lin Shu, after the Chiyan army massacre, to realize that it was Jingyan who betrayed them. That the secret Jingyan had kept the entire time was that he was betraying them, betraying him. It's going to break his heart. He'll find out why, of course, and I wonder what he'll think then, if he'll ever get over the betrayal enough to even think of Jingyan's perspective and be able to understand, even if never forgive. Not that, I think, Jingyan thinks he deserves to be forgiven.
And that last line. Just. Ow.
In just five years – yes, canon saw him rise in two and Xuanji is as capable as MCS, but Jingyan was close with his brother and a family that have just been executed as traitors. But it was prepared well in advance. I wonder what Jingyan will do now? The goal was to get the Hua kingdom back, so maybe he'll separate the kingdoms and be Emperor of both.
I haven't even talked about Jingyi yet, the younger sister who goes away for the good of her country and stays with the Butcher of her people and becomes the concubine of the Emperor who betrayed them, all for her people, and raises her son and knows the burden he carries, knows that they both love the people who hurt them and their people and that they both are going to hurt them in return. Because Jingyi knows firsthand that it’s not that easy to stop loving a person, even when they turn out to be a monster. and (This forgiveness isn’t Jingyi’s alone to give) but she would, if it was her alone, but she can't and it's too late.
To sum up, this fic is painful and wonderful and I love it.
Birthright, by
15k, LS/JY, AU
Summary: Consort Jing watches and waits, Xuanji plots, and Jingyan struggles under the weight of a legacy.
Why I love it: Holy shit. Like. You know the kind of stories that you read and it makes you look at canon differently and gives you so many emotions that you flail around and the sounds in your head are all jumbled because you're so full of feelings? Yeah. This is a fic like that. (Also the emotions are mostly pain and angst, because this is NiF.)
This is the Hua!Jingyan AU I never knew I wanted and it's so, so good. When I first watched NiF and got to the Hua storyline and its background, where the Hua kingdom allied with the Emperor but he broke his promise and destroyed it and that's why the surviving Hua princess plotted against Da Liang, my reaction was along the lines of "huh – their rage is completely understandable, the Emperor is even more of an evil asshole than I thought." But by that point the heroes of the tale were firmly established – MCS and Jingyan, who had not been involved back then – and so were the villains, Prince Yu supported by Qin Banruo and Xia Jiang (who was allied with Princess Xuanji.) I don't remember if we learned of the background before or after the storyline with Tong Lu and Fourth Sister, who loved her family but also the man she had seduced and who was tortured because of her, and in the end she set him free and betrayed her family, and her people, who she maybe hadn't ever known as anything other than refugees.
And here we have Consort Jing who is a Hua princess and who passed the secret on to her son. Jingyan, who has never seen the Hua kingdom, never known their culture except in secret, but is their prince and has a responsibility…
Because what did it mean, if he were both Liang and Hua? Who would he protect? aösldkfjaösldkf between the people he loves and the people who need him who can he choose? JINGYAN. Of course it's been killing him.
I loved the paragraph where he thinks about what he knows of Hua culture, how it's been passed on to him in bits and pieces, how that's all the legacy that's left.
I honestly am not sure if Jingyan would have been able to go through with it all if not for Donghai, and his conversation with Lin Shu. That when Lin Shu, who's known for years and years that his best friend and lover has secrets from him and worries he doesn't tell him about, when Jingyan finally dares to open the door the tiniest bit… That at first he's concerned that Jingyan will be seen as a traitor is logical. But then he switches to "you're just tired, we'll put it behind us," and that must have felt like such a blow, that this is something Lin Shu can sweep away with "you're not thinking straight right now" instead of something that Jingyan has been fighting with almost his entire life. And of course Lin Shu believes that they're in the right, he idolizes his father, he can't think anything else or it would destroy his entire worldview. Still, his first instinct was not even "things should have been done better here, we'll talk to someone," but "you're not thinking straight, we can't be wrong," and my guess is that this is why Jingyan gave up hope on explaining things to Xiao Shu, the person he loves most in the world.
Of course Jingyan fantasizes about running away with Xiao Shu, even proposes it even though of course he knows neither of them would.
I wonder how long it took Lin Shu, after the Chiyan army massacre, to realize that it was Jingyan who betrayed them. That the secret Jingyan had kept the entire time was that he was betraying them, betraying him. It's going to break his heart. He'll find out why, of course, and I wonder what he'll think then, if he'll ever get over the betrayal enough to even think of Jingyan's perspective and be able to understand, even if never forgive. Not that, I think, Jingyan thinks he deserves to be forgiven.
And that last line. Just. Ow.
In just five years – yes, canon saw him rise in two and Xuanji is as capable as MCS, but Jingyan was close with his brother and a family that have just been executed as traitors. But it was prepared well in advance. I wonder what Jingyan will do now? The goal was to get the Hua kingdom back, so maybe he'll separate the kingdoms and be Emperor of both.
I haven't even talked about Jingyi yet, the younger sister who goes away for the good of her country and stays with the Butcher of her people and becomes the concubine of the Emperor who betrayed them, all for her people, and raises her son and knows the burden he carries, knows that they both love the people who hurt them and their people and that they both are going to hurt them in return. Because Jingyi knows firsthand that it’s not that easy to stop loving a person, even when they turn out to be a monster. and (This forgiveness isn’t Jingyi’s alone to give) but she would, if it was her alone, but she can't and it's too late.
To sum up, this fic is painful and wonderful and I love it.
no subject
no subject