"If the face says nothing, listen to the heartbeat" - Lan WangJi, Mo Dao Zu Shi (Weeks 3+4)

... those who have read the novel know the real context of this line in the scene BUT taken out of context and used in a completely different (*cough* our) scenario...

"If the face says nothing," translates to "Even if we seem calm on the outside,"

"listen to the heartbeat." translates to "we're so stressed to the point of ventricular fibrillation."

(dunno if that's even a likely story but the overly exaggerated point still stands: we just handed our uni applications in and we're dreading admission tests and awaiting interviews...)

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Quick overview

So aside from school work and university prep, TUP has taken up whatever spare moment either one of us has. However since Zara's Physics coursework began (good luck Zara!!) and both of us prepping for our respective admissions tests, we've decided instead of marching onwards with research on architecture and other food science related stuff, to settle on more relaxed Google seshes on MDZS (and totally not using this as an excuse to read the source text again) and beginning to design the buildings on CAD and paper.

So I'm going to introduce to you the barebones framework of what we plan to include in the design: characters, buildings and effects~ apologies in advance for not including the accents/tones in names (I cba tbh ;-; )

Characters

Because all these little dudes are just going to be cut out gingerbread men, we could include as many characters as possible (we did say we're making a universe are we not?). Those in italics are "maybe" characters depending on the dough remaining (or whether we like them to be part of the universe or not...) or how much gingerbread we're willing to eat ourselves (though huge shout out to everyone thats offered to eat our spare and broken gingerbread during materials testing - which I will get to a bit later :3)

Gusu Lan (the pretty sect)

• Lan XiChen / Lan Huan (Sect Leader - simped so hard for his sworn brothers that both of them ended up dead)

• Lan WangJi / Lan Zhan (repressed gay but we love him still)

• Lan Yuan / Lan Sizhui (he's part of the Lan sect now goddamnit)

• Lan JingYi (the most unLan Lan yet has the highest chance of being the next sect leader lmaoo)

• Lan QiRen

• Lan Yi / Lan An

• QingHeng-Jun (Twin Jades' father)

• Madam Lan (Twin Jades' mother)

Yunmeng Jiang (arguably the only "normal" sect here...)

• Jiang Cheng / Jiang Wanyin (Sect Leader also an "angry grape" as put by Zara)

• Jiang YanLi (OUR QUEEN)

• Jiang FengMian (loved Wei Ying more than Jiang Cheng lol jk xd)

• Yu ZiYuan (BAMF)

Wei Ying not included here since technically he defected from the Sect (; - ;)

Qinghe Nie (fans and sabers my bros)

• Nie HuaiSang (Sect Leader - yeah, I can't believe it either)

• Nie MingJue (noooooooooo)

Honestly, I swear this clan is either "big muscles or big brain?". If you have neither, you can't be part of their clique. I mean sect.

Lanling Jin (rich rich rich rich rich)

• Jin Ling / Jin RuLan (Sect Leader - totally not named after Wei Ying's crush/ husband's family)

• Jin GuangYao / Meng Yao (*smiles*)

• Jin ZiXuan (peacock but JYL's husband nonetheless)

• Jin GuangShan (gross)

• Jin ZiXun (double gross)

• Mo XuanYu (literally did not sign up to any of this. He just wanted to end his suffering at Mo Manor)

We decided against including everyone from Mo Manor since they literally died within the first few chapters of the novel / first episode of the drama so were kinda irrelevant. Also, we don't care about them like we care for the Lan Sect members either.

Off topic side rant, Zara has been on my case whenever I bring up Jin GuangYao. I have to say, he's way more lovable in the drama than in the novel (didn't really leave much of an impression on me in the novel, NHS did a better job at that). I'm here to briefly explain why this boy is misunderstood and deserved more than what he got (and also why you should love him because he deserves love).

JGY is a poor soul who's goal in life was to please others because no one was ever satisfied with him. His mother wasn't satisfied. His father wasn't satisfied. Hell, even his sworn brother NMJ wasn't satisfied with him eventually.

BUT GUESS WHAT Xichen the angel is the only person that showed any love or thanks to JGY that's why he didn't kill him in the end - he wouldn't kill people that actually cared about him. IF ONLY EVERYONE ACTUALLY PAID ATTENTION TO HOW CLEVER AND CUNNING THIS MAN WAS, THERE MAY NOT EVEN BE WENS THREATENING THE WORLD. end of brief rant.

Qishan Wen (too hot, hot damn)

• Wen RuoHan (Sect Leader - could have taken over the world if his children weren't incompetent)

• Wen Qing (half the reason why included this sect)

• Wen Ning / Wen QiongLin (the other half of the reason)

• Wen Yuan (WE NEED THIS BABIE ALONGSIDE SIZHUI OK)

• Wen Chao (questionable)

• Wen ZhuLiu (also questionable but less annoying than Wen Chao)

Rogue cultivators (including people we didn't really know where to put)

• Wei WuXian / Wei Ying (Can work out how to cultivate resentful energy, fight against the biggest cultivation clans in the world and gain a formidable reputation as the Yiling Patriarch yet can't figure out that Lan Zhan has a crush on him. Makes it look like cultivating resentful energy is easy as pie.)

• CangSe SanRen (Wei Ying's mother)

• Wei ChangZe (Wei Ying's father)

• Xiao XingChen (honestly, the nicest guy ever. Could rival Xichen in terms of kindness. But then again... where did that kindness lead either of them? Moral of story: screw kindness)

• Song Lan (Wen Ning's dead buddy~)

• Xue Yang (he was cool in the novel, a bit questionable in the drama ngl)

• A-Qing (didn't report her situation to the police...)

• Baoshan Sanren (without knowledge of her existence, Jiang Cheng may have given up on life after he lost his golden core)

• Ouyang ZiZhen (I didn't know who he was at all from the novel (ie he left no impression) but since he's technically part of the juniors, we have to include him)

• Wang Ling Jiao / Jiao Jiao (just so Wen Chao has a friend perhaps... I don't know if we're that kind)

• Su She (ew. just. He's not our favourite. The whole thing could have gone smoother if he didn't exist)

• Luo Qingyang / Mian Mian (that one girl that made Wei Ying think Lan Zhan was straight)

Whew! That's all the character's we've considered! We have yet to come up with individual designs for the clothes and what not but at least we know there are going to be straight up cutting them out using the gingerbread man cutters.

Also! let's not forget:

• Li'l Apple (didn't sign up for any of this either)

• Fairy (gift from JGY to JL, also good doggo)

• All the bunnies in Gusu (yes.)

• All the fans and sabers in Qinghe (it's part of their aesthetic)

Locations and Buildings

This section's going to be MUCH shorter than the previous one haha since we've basically come up with 5 main buildings and in 7 locations. We're planning these buildings to be architectural masterpieces (okay, that's a slight exaggeration but that's the point). These buildings will take SIGNIFICANTLY more time than the gingerbread characters and is the reason we've put so much effort into researching what would make the most stable type of building. This is because we've planned to mirror the buildings as close as possible to the drama. We haven't yet drawn 2D sketches as I've left that job mostly to Zara (sorry!) so it's sort of hard to describe in words but by next post, we hope to have these down~ (though please see the mood boards from Zara's post previously)~

Gusu Lan - Cloud Recesses

1. The Wall of Discipline

2. The Courtyard

3. The Orchid Room (the main classroom/hall)

Yunmeng Jiang - Lotus Pier

1. The Main Pier

2. Lotus Pod Lake

Qinghe Nie - The Unclean Realm

1. The Main Courtyard and stairs

Lanling Jin - Koi Tower

1. Koi Tower

Qishan Wen - Nightless City

1. Main building and stairs

Yiling - Burial Grounds

1. The Mountains (and farms/Wen settlements)

2. Demon-Slaughtering Cave

And of course, Yi City.

We don't know if we want to include any more places but we'll let you know if there are any changes to this list. Plus the effects of LEDs and other arts and craft jazz besides gingerbread, we plan to make sure each Sect get's their own spotlight~

Please enjoy our baby Cloud Recesses, they're going to grow up and be a fine specimen of society worthy of the Lan name :D

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The plan going forward

Although unfortunately, things haven't gone totally to plan due to fairly busy circumstances, we still have some major events along the way before starting to build the whole thing (which would probably be around mid-to-end of December) which have indeed started preparing for. Including:

1. Material testing gingerbread and icing (ie finally, bringing our research to the real world) - a lot of gingerbread will be made, so thank you to the willing volunteers who wanted to eat our failed experiments!

2. Finding / creating a suitable recipe for the gingerbread people

3. 2D and 3D sketches of the buildings

4. Designing costumes for the gingerbread people

Another thing that we kinda want to do is to make this project benefit the wider community (we wanted to set up a GoFundMe at some point and raise some money for charity~). But we don't know how to do that as of yet T-T . Any ideas, feel free to contact us and let us know! We want to help others through this project (if at all possible haha)!

Until next time!

Hannah