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Date: 2025-04-16 05:03 am (UTC)Experience, I think. His world seems very [simple? straight forward?] set on its course. The pieces that move about do so predictably--or the role that he plays is clear enough that ally and enemy never blur. I don't think he's ever had cause to make peace with someone... and I'd like to hope that means he's never suffered betrayals, either.
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Date: 2025-04-20 01:01 am (UTC)"I would begin--traditionally--by laying the foundation of my story with Once Upon a Time. But time has not flown traditionally, and my tale could be both distant or recent by different measures. Instead, I will simply say, that this tale begins on a beach--with a daring young knight and his gentle lady. They find a likeness in each other, in their solitude and in their innocence. Their kingdoms will be at war one day, but that day has not yet dawned. Thus... he invites her home."
Her hand encircles around her cup, but she doesn't lift it to her lips. She only inspects the surface of the liquid with far more intention than she's given to his face. The words shake free a little easier, when she speaks them into a teacup, couched in a fairy-tale. "It is... a pleasant dwelling. Their needs are attended to--food and shelter, and most importantly the company kept. He brushes her hair for her and makes a mess of it, though there's kindness in the trying. A third joins their number, wild-eyed and curious, too feral for knighthood but no less enchanting. I hear, as the story goes, that he prefers wolves to spiders."
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Date: 2025-05-04 02:22 pm (UTC)What, are you not going to take it seriously yourself? You should. They really are dangerous, and unfair, and only a fool would expect differently of tigers.
[No way is Inigo that smart. Neither is Di Feisheng, obviously. They're in this pit full of good advice and tiger wisdom together, availing themselves of neither.]
You should tell Iris I kept up my end of the bargain.
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Date: 2025-05-04 03:36 pm (UTC)The humoring phase is much shorter than the interest phase, anyway. There's clearly more to it than nonsense, where she is taking pains to tell him the too-mutable function of time in it all and the identifying details. The pieces are easy to put together, and he appreciates that; maybe Li Lianhua would only have needed a poem or some tree sap smeared on the door or something, but he's bedridden by his own informational breadcrumbs and not here to gauge Di Feisheng's trail following abilities at this time.
It's the significance that he's caught up on. What he wouldn't mind some help with understanding is why this is such an ordeal for her, why it has to be a story at all, if she isn't having fun. Being cagey is one thing at which so much of their social ecosystem excels, is just common sense and an eye to self preservation. But maybe the gemstones of the soul (he can feel the eyeroll trapped in the muscles of his face even more strongly, thinking this) are easier to come by than he originally imagined and of just as little application as the real sort. Face-changing and identity-obscuring abilities could give poisons a run for their money, after all. He takes a moment to digest and sit with this knowledge while he works out how to feel about it besides the busy-ness of rewriting a few mental records. There isn't any scrutiny for her until he's done so, which may as well have come with a 'ding' of completion to go with looking her way expectantly.
"You made more sense, as a child." So she lives in some kind of disguise. He can only assume she prefers it now, or the dissolution would be too costly somehow. Or she hasn't any especial faith in the solidity of this realm's boundaries, which is very fair; he can't say he would either, if his circumstances hadn't been so thoroughly changed by his own hand. "Are you afraid of being recognized? Captured?"
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Date: 2025-05-04 09:00 pm (UTC)cutedisdain? Isn't that what the panther's inevitable watchful presence is meant to be? A lecture on not allowing some random stupid illness to defeat him in the end, on finding a way to cure himself with force of will alone, on never simply accepting the gains and losses fate hands out? The man is remarkably patient on this, or perhaps just characteristically tenacious, but Li Lianhua remains a poor student. He may know the right things to want these days, but knowing is only half the battle. And Li Lianhua is still so tired of battles.He's also tired of being a disappointment. There does not need to be recrimination in the eyes of a big cat for Li Lianhua to find plenty within himself. His smile curls bitterly, and there's a sharpness underpinning the usual barbed levity between them that is woefully misdirected.
"You must be pretty bored of this by now. Next time I'll find something to die of that's more convenient for you to fight, alright?"
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Date: 2025-05-06 12:27 am (UTC)The questions are expected, and true to his nature he jumps directly to the most strategic ones. The concern would be touching, if she thought it was meant that way, and meant for her. But she doubts it.
"Aren't we captured already?" What is this place but a prison? But she knows he doesn't mean that, and she doesn't want to waste his time (at this moment).
She all but shrugs her next words from her shoulders, less of a burden than the ones she offered before. "I'm not worried. There are those who would like to kill me if they found me here, but I'll deal with them if they come."
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Date: 2025-05-08 03:30 pm (UTC)Though Inigo doesn't see the danger, of course. Despite the other's words. It's why he doesn't push back against the other's suggestion at all, instead quickly sending back: ]
I will.
[ And then, added-- ]
I'll negotiate a reward for you from her.
[un: nolastname.siffrin | early may]
Date: 2025-05-14 03:54 am (UTC)Isabeau is here!!!
[
One less thing to burden Di Feisheng withOne less person to keep track of!]text; un: lovecraft
Date: 2025-05-15 01:53 am (UTC)Hello! How are you doing? Are you enjoying the competitions?
text, un | a.fei
Date: 2025-05-30 03:21 am (UTC)Who wants to know?
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Date: 2025-05-30 03:39 am (UTC)Oh! Sorry! This is Mirabelle. Siffrin gave me your name on this... I hope that's okay?
un: a.fei
Date: 2025-05-30 03:40 am (UTC)Good. I didn't lie, but I wasn't sure, either.
[He would hate to deal in false hopes, at least when it's someone else.]
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Date: 2025-05-30 04:38 am (UTC)What if...they just try to play it cool. This could work.]
It's pretty crowded in the house with three of us now, but we're used to it. It's too bad we're all on different teams. That makes things kinda complicated.
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Date: 2025-05-30 06:00 am (UTC)[It's not against the law to text Di Feisheng, who is almost as good at ignoring messages as Li Lianhua. Weird to have people asking after him out of the blue, but not illegal.]
The competitions are only inconvenient, not fatal. Either is possible, here. What color did you get?
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Date: 2025-05-31 03:53 am (UTC)All different teams here, too. I think complication is the point.
['Too bad,' he says. Either they are gifted with an ability to understate suffering or...no, it's probably that one.]
Or just division. If that's it, your people are doing better than mine. They scattered like cowards.
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Date: 2025-05-31 11:54 pm (UTC)He's here for commiseration. And general worry, and warding off untimely ends through some kind of apotropaic quality, but the commiseration is a big one and it's as compelling as its lack is vexing. Calling it boring just makes him bunch himself up to spring, either away or to wipe the poisoned smile off Li Lianhua's
dearface. In lieu of either argument, escape, or unseemly violence against an invalid he turns the kinetic energy to a very purposeful prowl, tucking his ears and whiskers and ramming the bed with his shoulder. Somewhere between a demanding housecat and a shark looking to sink a raft.TRY AGAIN.no subject
Date: 2025-06-01 12:26 am (UTC)But beyond that, he can't say he understands, if that's what she's looking at him for. Why such a thing weighs on her, if she isn't too on edge about the potential of being captured. Why it's a secret that could threaten her life. He hasn't registered any strain to her breathing, but the sense of being lightened he can read just fine, and that's good, though his noting of it isn't at the forefront.
She doesn't want to waste her time or his, but she's still digging at the hidden parts of something like a stone in wet sand, and whether despite his nature or due to it he is drawn back into the 'story,' tea cooling and forgotten.
"I'm sure you will." He won't even gloat for having been right to suspect her of not being what she claims, instead tipping his head like he's conceding a match rather than taking one. The graciousness isn't even performative. "But then, why? Or am I here to ask how?"
text; un: melancholic.gentleman (sometimes after the Departure but not nearly soon enough)
Date: 2025-06-01 05:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-06-01 05:38 pm (UTC)Don't talk to me about vegetables.
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Date: 2025-06-01 07:12 pm (UTC)[Wonder who that's for. Not him!]
Are you still mad that I've left the chores to you? You should know it's for the best.
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Date: 2025-06-07 04:02 pm (UTC)Really? Fang Duobing didn't seem like the cowardly type.
Maybe...he's trying to spare you?
We all eat on our own in the city because our kitchen might explode if we tried to eat together there.