APPLICATION (GEOSURGE).

[laozu]

Player
Name: Pax
Contact: forzare

Character
Name: Wei Wuxian*
*His courtesy name; he is also referred to as "Wei Ying" (birthname) and "Yiling Patriarch".
Canon: The Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation ( Mo Dao Zu Shi )
Canon Point: End of Chapter 50; having been wounded while fleeing Koi Tower with Lan Wangji after his identity as Wei Wuxian was exposed before all of the cultivation world.

Age: Not specified; his physical form is in his early twenties, but he's mentally in his thirties.
Appearance: Kawaii af idiot.
Background: Here.

Personality:

If there is order to the world, then Wei Wuxian is the disorder within it.

The social structure of the world, as he understands, is built on philosophical and ethical tradition; it touts filial piety, morality and personal virtue as some of the core pillars through which one not only finds the place in their world, but serves the world. Among those who embrace these teachings are cultivators, a division of immortality-seeking gentleman-scholars and evil-slayers, who take on their own bloodlines ( to be trained as leaders of the sect ) and disciples ( distant relatives, family friends and no-names alike ) to elevate their sociopolitical power. It all sounds very complicated, and all of it factors in to who Wei Wuxian is and how he functions as the antithesis of structure.

Born to a civil servant of the illustrious Yunmeng-Jiang clan and a rogue ( aka. unaffiliated ) cultivator, he already began life as one of the “mean people” who made up the lower-class population. Throughout his life, he would always face discrimination for being the son of a servant, as well as for being an orphan - as he was lost to the streets at six years old, left to fend for himself by fighting dogs for scraps of food and shelter. It was traumatizing enough that he developed a deep and crippling fear of dogs because of it, though eventually he was found by the leader of the Yunmeng-Jiang clan and adopted by him. As kind an act as this was, it lead to further discrimination as the leader of the clan - a married man with a son of his own - was rumored to have harbored romantic feelings for Wei Wuxian’s mother.

Because of his father and the Yunmeng-Jiang leader's friendship, he grew up and was trained among the Yunmeng-Jiang clan, largely at the side of his best friend ( and social superior ): Jiang Cheng. It was there that he learned and whole-heartedly embraced the Yunmeng-Jiant motto: attempt the impossible, which would become the foundation of everything he ever set his gaze upon.

In contrast to his sworn brother, Jiang Cheng, Wei Wuxian was sort of allowed to run wild ( in part because of the affections the clan leader had towards him ), aware that he only existed as part of the cultivation world because of the good graces of the Yunmeng-Jiang sect - a fact he never forgets, in all of his life and the next. Wei Wuxian enjoyed a relatively carefree life, unhindered by the responsibilities that Jiang Cheng was crushed and social structure ( he did respect his “aunt” and “uncle”, but was often reprimanded and heavily punished by the former for various reasons relating to the fact that he was so hedonistic, wild and unashamed of it ) - this lead to him developing a very hedonistic approach to life. Despite becoming the senior disciple of the clan, he would spend his days rising late, hunting pheasants and shooting kits rather than training, and would drag Jiang Cheng into all sorts of trouble.

Sent to the Gusu-Lan sect for further training with a handful of other disciples, Wei Wuxian succeeded in upsetting the “golden child” of the Lan ( "attempting the impossible", yet again ): Lan Wangji, teasing and heckling the well-composed young man with jokes, lies, physical contact and erotic art secreted in to replace a collection of the sect’s founder’s poetry. Yet, it wasn’t just his antics and pranks that gained him a poor reputation - it was his propensity to think outside of structure and ethics, at one time citing that rather than adhering to tradition ( eg. exorcism rites of pacify, then purge ), they ought to think outside of the box. He viewed dark and resentful energy as energy that could and should be manipulated, and that the unwillingness to do so was a failure on their part. The more than Lan Wangji resisted him, the more he wanted to taunt and tease him - revealing Wei Wuxian’s deeply rebellious and impulsive nature, where he acted spoke largely on instinct - inevitably harming, rather than helping. In his new life, he is still impulsive - but, prone to observing a situation before he draws attention to himself.

Wei Wuxian is also a deeply selfish and protective person, wherein he could take any insult aimed in his direction ( again, the result of his low-class birth and origins! ) but would never, ever stomach someone insulting or speaking ill of those he cared for, as evidenced by the time when he overheard one of the young leaders of another sect ( Jin Zixuan ) dismissing and speaking ill of Jiang Yanli, who was the adoptive elder sister of Wei Wuxian - someone he adored and admired very greatly. Wei Wuxian demonstrated the awakening of his deep-seated wrathfulness and a vengefulness in assaulting Jin Zixuan, resulting in his being kicked out of training with the Gusu-Lan sect and sent home with his uncle. He does not often, nor deeply, consider the consequences of his actions - and others tend to suffer for them. Jiang Yanli’s betrothal to Jin Zixuan is broken off by her father - a matter which her mother actively and relentlessly blames Wei Wuxian for. The guilt he feels for the act is dwarfed only by the guilt he feels when he is later blamed for the destruction of the Yunmeng-Jiang clan at the hands of the tyrannical Qishan-Wen.

It is a stain that Wei Wuxian carries in his heart as he seeks to fulfill Jiang Cheng’s mother’s final wishes: protect Jiang Cheng with his unworthy life. And he does, to the point where he selflessly gives up his golden core ( the energy cultivated by years of training, and the seat of all power ) to replace Jiang Cheng’s after it is destroyed - though it leaves Wei Wuxian weak and unable to fight, and results in him being captured by the same young master of the Wen clan, Wen Mao, and thrown into the Burial Mounds at Yiling - a site of great battles, corpse-dumping and a horrific place full of resentful energy. Three months after he is thrown in, he walks out unscathed in body and mutilated in heart - able to control the energy and the corpses, and he lays siege to the Qishan-Wen alongside the rebel forces brought under Jiang Cheng’s banner.

The playful wildness and irresponsibility of his young life was always punctuated by a sense of justice and kindness, as he was quick to leap to the defense of his adoptive sister, to protect his brother-in-arms and to easily make friends among the other disciples. However, his sense of justice is perverted after essentially marinating in a sea of corpses and resentful energy, and he becomes vindictive, happily murderous and shameless - pursuing Wen Mao for months, driving him mad and slowly, assuredly, carving him into pieces little by little over that time. He slaughters his enemies, then picks up their corpses and uses them like soldiers during the ensuing civil war.

After the civil war ends, Wei Wuxian does not give up his power. He embraces it, fights his former allies when asked to give it up, and genuinely goes mad with paranoia. When he learned that Wen Ning, a member of the Qishan-Wen that was sympathetic and helpful when Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng were in need, was sent to a prison camp infamous for abusing their inmates, he laid siege to the camp - upon finding out that Wen Ning had been beaten to death, he resurrected the corpses of the inmates killed by the guards and set them upon the camp before taking prisoners back with him to the Yiling Burial Mounds - where they set up a home and he began raising a small child, one of the last living of the Wen lineage. However, Wei Wuxian’s madness, paranoia and blossoming victim-complex caused him to accidentally kill Jin Zixuan when traveling to visit Jin Zixuan’s young son, Jin Ling, for his birthday. The act sparked another civil war, between the sects and the “Yiling Patriarch”, that resulted in thousands dead at his hand and his eventual demise. Betrayed, loathed and utilized for the next thirteen years as an example of what happens when “dogs bite the hands that feed them", the scourge of the orderly world and the pinnacle of what it meant to do the impossible, even if it was evil.

Thirteen years later, he is resurrected in the body of Mo Xuanyu - lacking some memories of his past life, his madness and his demise, he reverts back to his more fun-loving and carefree younger self, running freely - but with a matured sense of justice, demonstrating a wisdom he likely hadn’t shown before. Though he does not seem to protest the idea that the one who summoned him wanted him to take revenge against the local village leaders, who had abused and humiliated Mo Xuanyu to the point of insanity and suicide, nor does he protest when they meet their demise, he also actively protects and shepherds the young disciples of the Gusu-Lan sect that he meets - as well as Jin Ling, whose parents had met their end in part because of Wei Wuxian himself.

Wei Wuxian is an intelligent, outgoing man with a casual ( albeit oddly charming ) dismissal of social morality, resulting in his ability to improvise, overcome and adapt to difficult circumstances and think outside of the box. He correctly reasons that the “beast” plaguing a mountain village is not a restless spirit, but a local goddess who had devoured the souls of those praying to her to fulfill their wishes. He deduces, in the middle of a siege in Yi City, that the respectable Xiao Xingchen - an illustrious and well-loved cultivator - is actually a villain in the guise of Xiao Xingchen; he also is able to uncover, alongside Wan Langji that the perpetrator behind the death and dismembering of another sect leader is the current and most illustrious sect leader, Jin Guangyao. He adapts existing studies to suit his needs ( ie. turning evil-repulsing talismans into evil-attracting talismans ) and innovates new methods base on idle conversation-become-scientific pursuit.

In conclusion, Wei Wuxian is an agent of both chaos and rebellion, a free-spirited youth that became a vengeful madman and was given a second chance at happiness thirteen years later. He will come off as cheerful, charismatic and fun while balancing his ease with enacting violent, wicked revenge on those who have done wrong in his eyes. Death has not humbled him, but has mellowed him, as he's far more prone to standing back and observing a situation before impulsively opening his mouth or stepping in to alleviate someone's suffering. Because he was well-loved by the Yunmeng-Jiang, he does not feel shame in being the son of a servant, which leads to his heedlessness in the face of social propriety and structure. He’s dangerous to those who play by the rules, difficult to pin down and driven by a personal justice that is sometimes wrong, sometimes right and sometimes far-reaching.

Canon Abilities:

✦ TRADITIONAL CULTIVATION KNOWLEDGE & TRAINING ; By practicing a set of spiritual rituals, engaging in extensive martial and mystical training involving meditation and the manipulation of qi, human beings are able to prolong their youth and lives. The results of this training include: skills in martial arts ( hand to hand combat ), swordsmanship ( the pairing of cultivator and sentient sword, which can be remotely controlled and flown upon ), heightened strength, agility and speed, as well as the ability to fight and purge powerful evil through the focusing of qi energy through the “golden core” AND channel that energy into healing, etc. Cultivation is some serious shit.

✦ DEMONIC CULTIVATION KNOWLEDGE ; Considered a “fast track to power” by some, Demonic Cultivation is reliant on the manipulation of external “dark” energies; it allows the creation and summoning of skilled corpses, as well as the control of said corpses - typically through a medium ( Wei Wuxian uses the flute and music ). Other dark arts follow, such as the “summoning of painted eyes” which imbues an inanimate object with ghostly essence, turning it into a battle-monster and the ability to use paper dolls imbued with his soul to sneak around.

✦ MARTIAL PROWESS ( LIKE THIS ) ; Expanded upon, as it’s pretty important to the genre he comes from: not only is he combat-skilled and decent with a sword ( though quite out of practice right now! ), he is a skillful archer, strong enough to punch other powerful cultivators across rooms and yards, nimble and agile enough to leap up onto at least one-story rooftops and back down without incurring fall damage and is fast enough to be able to dodge/capture in-flight arrows and use instrument strings to stop swords.

✦ SIX ARTS; He was likely trained in the gentlemanly arts of ancient China, including rites ( ie. tea drinking, knowledge of names and titles, mourning, governance, social morality, history, etc. ), music ( he is a master of the flute and has knowledge of drums, bells and zithers ), horsemanship ( able to stay astride a stubborn donkey without a saddle, at the least! ) and has math skills and fantastic calligraphy - he’s a really good artist!

✦ INTELLIGENCE ; His true abilities do not fully embrace his talents as a cultivator, but in his improvisational genius, his skill as an inventor (eat your heart out MacGuyver) and his ease at adapting orthodox practices and premises to suit his needs, heedless of the morality of it. He basically serves as a detective in canon, using deductive reasoning to determine the root cause of problems, pursue the answers to mysteries and pinpoint true antagonists even when they're in disguise.

✦ TOLERANCE TO SPICY FOODS & ALCOHOL ; He can handle his wine and spices very, very well. THe region he grew up in was known for extremely spicy food, and he’d always add MORE SPICE to it. Do u even spice? Just don’t let him cook, he put a hole in a wok once. Twice. Ehh.

Game Power: N/A

Suitability:

Highly-trained and self-reliant, Wei Wuxian is capable of surviving in the wilderness as readily as he embraces the cities and all of their pleasures ( wine, women and song! ). He’s a competent combatant, and despite coming into the world as the son of a servant, he was trained as the ancient Chinese version of a gentleman-scholar - even if he is a prank-loving idiot, ergo he’s capable in a research and supportive sense as well.

Inventory:

✦Suibian, his sword.
✦ A shoddy bamboo flute.
✦ The clothes on his back.
✦ A qiankun bag, which is basically the Chinese version of a bag of holding that can only hold physical matter. It really only has a money pouch, a spirit-trapping bag ( used to trap ethereal souls! ) and some paper talismans he's prepped.

Sample: https://meadowlarking.dreamwidth.org/3466.html?thread=1686154#cmt1686154