AU EXCHANGE LETTER

[vagabonddawn]

AU EXCHANGE LETTER

My prompts are a little scrambled between tags and characters, and are simply for ideas — don't feel locked into writing any of them specifically! If I haven't elaborated on a tag/character combo you're interested in, feel free to pick and choose or go off in your own direction!

General likes:

I love long fic but I'd also appreciate any kind of 'one scene of a larger plot' or setup scene, because these are all concepts that tend to sprawl!

• Canon divergences – characters making different decisions at critical points, small changes butterflying to bigger ones, people reacting to slightly changed circumstances, characters meeting earlier or differently.
• Time Travel – all kinds! Time Loops, Groundhog day, Peggy Sue, physical time travel, accidental or purposeful.
• Fix its – any kind of story that leads to characters being better off or happier (or more alive) than unfortunate canon events left them. Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Somebody Lives/Not Everyone Dies AU’s.
• Arranged marriage / marriage of convenience tropes, matchmaking services, political alliances.
• Mission fic/Casefic is great but so are Slice of Life fics and Outside POVs (the more bewildered and misunderstanding the better). Hurt/comfort is great, Canadian Shack/hypothermia/huddling’n’cuddling for warmth fic is great, secret identity tropes are great, found family and team-as-family tropes are excellent. Characters having positive and supportive (and snarky) friendships is amazing.
• Magical power mishaps – transformed into animals! De-aged! Can't move more than ten meters apart!

DNW: Tragic Endings, Bad Guys Win, On screen non-con (including rape roleplay and rape kink),

Fandom Specific DNW: Ships including Luo Binghe (PIDW references are fine, as is LBH's crush/fixation on SQQ, I'd just prefer them not to get together.)

Shipping: my shipping bar is so low. I’m happy to read subtext into anything – if I’ve prompted a / relationship, I’ll read it that way, even if nothing overtly shippy happens. And, honestly, I would also be happy with a & reading (in a lot of places, I have both / and &); I just want characters to interact, or think about it other, or exist relative to each other!

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人渣反派自救系统 - 墨香铜臭 | The Scum Villain's Self-Saving System - Mòxiāng Tóngxiù

Liu Qingge/Shen Yuan | Shen Qingqiu (SVSSS - MXTX)

These two are just great together! I love how quickly LQG flipped to having a deep and abiding loyalty and I love that he's described as reliable. I like that they're actually friends and can rely on each other to help. I like that saving Liu Qingge is one of the first things that Shen Qingqiu managed to do, unprompted, to fix his reputation and change the world.

I am interested in any exploration on how SQQ feels about this transmigration experience — the system forces him to keep thinking of it in terms of plot events (and therefore slightly fictional?) instead of fully immersing into the world. Or any exploration of SQQ insisting he's straight for about 90% of the novel — is he bi? Demi? Just incredibly defensive?

• ALL: Canon Divergence AU

I love canon divergences, this one is a bit of an open ended freebie. There are plenty of places where SVSSS could have gone very differently —

Maybe SQQ and SQH work out that they're both transmigrators earlier than canon, and thus have a much less fraught time period to think about how to change the plot and get themselves out of their respective sticky situation.

Maybe LQG shows up at the Conference Fight and SQQ literally can't complete the plot of throwing LBH into the Abyss. Maybe they end up in the Abyss together.

Maybe SQQ transmigrates years earlier while they're all disciples/LBH isn't in the sect yet.

• ALL: Time Loop
• ALL: Time Travel
• ALL: Character saves their younger self from trauma
• SVSSS: Fix-it; Shen Yuan time travels back to his disciple days

I love time travel and I'm fine with either character (or both!) time travelling or being stuck in a time loop. I'd love to see LQG time travel because he has no meta knowledge and his priorities are definitely not to make sure things happen as per the system! But SQQ having to redo the plot once he's already done it (to 100% the accomplishments? Because his death was counted as a failure and he had to start again?) would also be pretty funny. He'd be so mad about it.

Or, if they physically go back in time, maybe SQQ and LQG go rescue a young SJ? Maybe SQQ has no idea what's going on either because he hasn't unlocked that backstory yet?

• ALL: Accidental marriage through unintentional magically binding action
• ALL: If you owe someone a life debt their name appears on your skin
• All: Soulbond - Accidental/Involuntary

These kinds of tropes honestly seem like something that PIDW had in spades. Having them stumble across a wife-plot like this and having to deal with the resulting fallout sounds hilarious. Does a life-debt go away once you save someone back? Does LQG get rid of his Ling Xi Caves debt only for SQQ to get one from his save? Do they just switch back and forth constantly?

• ALL: Character Journeys To The Underworld to Rescue Their Dead Friend

LQG fought for SQQ's corpse for five years! If this was an option he'd probably do it! Or maybe SQQ doesn't save LQG in the cave but manages to do a really fast retrieval because he doesn't want that plot point on his head.

• ALL: Always A Girl

Maybe SY was a girl and transmigrated into a male SQQ. Maybe a male SY transmigrated into a female SQQ. Maybe LQG is a woman and just as pretty and brutal as ever.

• SVSSS: Shen Yuan transmigrates at a different point in time

The Qiu Estate, with Wu Yanzi, as a disciple… SY could make a lot of different changes depending on when he arrives.

• SVSSS: Shen Yuan transmigrates into a different character

All the different transmigrations! Does SY become a random Qing Jing Peak disciple trying desperately to not get murdered by the protagonist? Ming Fan? Unnamed Peak Lord 12? Does he become random wife 459 and have to deal with literal wife plots happening all over the place? Does he arrive as a new character entirely and just be himself? Does he luck out in the transmigrator roulette and become the protagonist… except is that really lucky when you have to deal with the Eternal Abyss from a very different angle?

 

 

Shang Qinghua & System (SVSSS - MXTX)
Shen Yuan | Shen Qingqiu & System (SVSSS - MXTX)

(I'm fine with inclusion of any non-requested ships, as long as they don't involve LBH.)

I am interested in any exploration on how SQQ and SQH feel about this transmigration experience — they seem very detached most of the time! Is it that the system forces them to keep thinking of it in terms of plot events (and therefore slightly fictional?) instead of fully immersing into the world? Do they just not want to get attached?

• All: Canon Setting But Universe Functions On RPG-style Mechanics Of Hit-Points‚ Leveling-Up‚ Etc.

Really ramp up the system effects! Make it a full on game with resource management and combat scenarios. Become a overpowered, overleveled boss! Save scum to success! I really love it when it's just one character that has Weird Video Game Life, but it being everyone could be really funny too.

• ALL: Character plays a game with Death in exchange for their/somebody else's life

Whether this is literal Death, as an actual novel character from whatever side arc, or just arguing with the system until it gives in and agrees that no a certain character doesn't actually have to die…

• SVSSS: Shen Yuan Transmigrates as System for Airplane!Shang Qinghua
• SVSSS: Shen Yuan Transmigrates as System for Shen Jiu with Manual and Assigned Goal 'Fix the Plot'

SY's snark and brutal criticism of the setting combined with an inability to actually act or suffer the consequences…

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陈情令 | The Untamed

Baoshan Sanren/Lan Yi (The Untamed)
Lan Yi & Wei Wuxian (The Untamed)

• Untamed: Lan Yi survives the Lan Cave

I'd be super interested in seeing what changes happen in canon if a Lan grandmaster with experience with the Yin iron happened to be around. I'd love to see her opinions on the cultivation world and her relationships with the Lan. Does she also go and find Baoshan Sanren's mountain? Does that mean there are two powerful immortal grandmasters around?

• ALL: Canon Divergence AU
• ALL: Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies
• ALL: Time Loop
• ALL: Time Travel

As with Lan Yi surviving, I'd also love to see her enter into any kind of rebirth/time travel situation to fix her past mistakes and make up for what she did — whatever that might have been.

 

 

Jiang Cheng/Nie Huaisang (The Untamed)
Jiang Cheng/Nie Mingjue (The Untamed)
Jiang Yanli/Nie Huaisang (The Untamed)
Jiang Yanli/Nie Mingjue (The Untamed)
Nie Huaisang/Qin Su (The Untamed)
Nie Huaisang/Wei Wuxian (The Untamed)

• All: Arranged Marriage AU
• ALL: Character A Marries B to Save Their Life
• ALL: If you owe someone a life debt their name appears on your skin
• ALL: Marriage of Convenience AU
• ALL: Time Travel Backward To Fix The Past Results In Unexpectedly Getting Married

Okay this is just The Marriage Request. Arranged Marriage, Political Marriage, Marriage of Convenience… these characters are all politically powerful players in their own rights and there are benefits to having their sects aligned. I'd be interested in either feelings-based relationships or pragmatic (leading to feelings later or not).

Maybe a marriage has been arranged for years? Maybe it's something that gets suggested post-Lotus Pier and during the Sunshot campaign? Maybe it's even afterwards, when everyone is trying to rebuild – what better way to rebuild alliances and share resources than by being connected by marriage.

• Untamed: Qin Su lives

Maybe Qin Su's mother tells her the truth earlier. Maybe she works it out during the lead up to the wedding (and then has to work out how to a) cancel the wedding b) protect her child). Maybe she just encounters someone else during the war and never even knows a difference.

(I'm okay with previous JGY/QS but I'd rather it not be a focus)

• ALL: Canon Divergence AU
• ALL: Time Loop
• ALL: Time Travel

I'm fine with any character time travelling and trying to fix things! They would all have such different priorities and knowledge bases and very different skill sets!

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Crossover Fandom

Liǔ Qīnggē (SVSSS) & Nara Shikako (DoS)

Any meeting between these two is bound to be hilariously destructive! Even if they're on the same side and get along well. Maybe Shikako is doing some world hopping — or maybe Liu Qingge is and has to solve problems with his usual skill set of kicking in doors and fighting things!

Nara Shikako (DoS) & Granny Weatherwax (Discworld)

Does Granny Weatherwax approve of the social manipulation or is she just scornful of all the faffing about with shadows and glowing lights? Or does she just not got time to be sitting down to chat with otherworldly eldritch beings?

Nara Shikako (DoS) & Nie Huaisang (The Untamed)

Nie Huaisang is very ninja, and very Nara ninja at that. If you can't fight, get other people to fight for you.

• All: A Is a Ghost Only B Can See
• ALL: Character is the ferryboatman who takes souls to the afterlife
• ALL: Character plays a game with Death in exchange for their/somebody else's life

I'm not sure where these would go, but I do like the imagery of Shikako as (a) Death. Maybe the real Death is taking a holiday and asks Shikabane-hime from a few universes over to fill in for him. Maybe it's totally a case of mistaken identity!

• ALL: Reincarnation
• Crossover: character crosses into different canon
• Crossover: Shared Universe AU

I don't really mind if Shikako gets reincarnated again or if Fantasy Ancient China is a boat ride away from Fantasy Ninja Land. I am really interested in how their different magic systems would intersect and relate to each other though!

I think Discworld being on the same planet is a harder sell – because we know how the Disc looks – but they're also probably used to tears in space randomly connecting to other planets. That's what the Unseen University basement is for.