Fanfic / SV Wishes

First (Left Liu Qingge) and Second Husband (Right Shen Qingqiu). Credit to anfu ^note original source here

Today was the day of Shen Qingqiu’s husband’s wedding.

It was not, of course, the day of Shen Qingqiu’s wedding. That day had come and gone ten years ago, when a youthful Shen Qingqiu had bowed to a kind-hearted and handsome Yue Qingyuan. Shen Yuan recollected skimming over that description in the novel when he’d read it on a rainy Saturday afternoon, before he transmigrated into Shen Qingqiu’s body.

Today, the wedding was for Yue Qingyuan’s newest spouse. The love of his life, the protagonist of the tacky romance novel Shen Yuan had consumed, the skilled and peerlessly beautiful Liu Qingge.

It was an event that had, so far as the original goods was concerned, ruined his life.

— Chapter 1

SV Wishes by Feynite is a The Scum Villain's Self-Saving System: Ren Zha Fanpai Zijiu Xitong fanfic and stealth crossover with MXTX's published works with inspiration from harem intrigue Media Transmigration novel The Dreamer in the Spring Boudoir published in 2019.

Shen Qingqiu has to watch as the love of his life, Yue Qingyuan, takes another spouse as he is demoted to Second Husband for embarrassing his husband in front of the Emperor in the noble house he helped build. At least, that's what he would be feeling if Shen Yuan, a modern Chinese man who fell asleep cursing a harem intrigue gay romance novel, hadn't transmigrated into him on their wedding day.

In the original story, Shen Qingqiu is punished for his sabotage and attempted murder of the protagonist and new First Husband, Liu Qingge, with the order to commit suicide by hanging himself. Now Shen Yuan vows to protect himself by never romantically approaching Yue Qingyuan, ingratiating himself with the protagonist Liu Qingge, and being a good teacher and parental figure to the poor, abused side character Luo Binghe, who turned on Shen Qingqiu in the original novel.

However, choosing not to play the part of the antagonist that drives the lovebirds together drastically changes things. While Shen Qingqiu tries to use his knowledge of the plot to protect the household, he only read the first volume of the series before he died...

That is the plot of first story, I Wish You Were My Husband Which is followed an Anachronic Order sequel More Wishes, a What If? anthology Wishful Thinking and Lower-Deck Episode series focused other MXTX series characters Even More Wishes

I Wish You Were My Husband has a podfic by lunchee, link here which is 13 hours long but a delight. Chapter 2 of More Wishes also received a podfic link here by Vodka112Podfics

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This fanfiction contains examples of:

SV Wish Verse

Tropes Shared By The Entire Series

• Adapted Out: There is no System that Shen Qingqiu or Shang Qinghua have to cater to in order to fulfill some narrative destiny. They only fulfill their roles due to not wanting to draw attention to themselves and circumstance trapping them there.
• Adaptational Heroism:
  • Shen Yuan isn't pushed into throwing anyone under the bus to save himself, unlike in canon where he's forced to toss Luo Binghe into the Abyss. In addition, due to his ignorance of the series' plot, he's kind to Luo Binghe mostly out of sympathy. While he justifies it as insurance against Luo Binghe's betrayal, he's very caring to someone he thinks of as a minor character. Especially compared to his canonical dismissiveness and belittlement of those he considered NPCs.
  • Shang Qinghua is more proactive in his attempts to change the storyline compared to his canon counterpart, who passively went with The Stations of the Canon and had to be forced to act. Wishverse Shang Qinghua goes out of his way to warn people away from their potential dark fates, and is so overcome with remorse that he wrote them horrific futures that he does everything he can to change them.
• Adaptational Jerkass:
  • Yue Qingyuan isn't the overly-forgiving Big Brother Mentor that Shen Yuan sees him as in canon. While still generally kind, before Shen Yuan transmigrated in he had slowly come to take Shen Qingqiu's love for granted and have a lower opinion of him than merited, thanks to a mix of the prejudiced societal influence of the noble court, and deliberate manipulation and gaslighting campaign by the emperor and spies that have infiltrated their household. This, alongside unhealthy relationship patterns, also leads Yue Qingyuan to deliberately break his vow to only have one spouse.
  • Qi Qingqi is notable for being the only female Peak Lord in canon. Here she is Shang Qinghua's neglectful spouse that he lives in fear of. Even though Shang Qinghua knows that she doesn't give a damn about him, he cannot be suspected of cheating on her without being castrated or executed as punishment on principle.
• Adaptational Sexuality:
  • Whereas canon Shen Yuan was deep in the closet and in denial of his sexuality and his romantic feelings toward Luo Binghe, here Shen Yuan has already realized he's gay. Not that it stops him from being oblivious.
  • Bingge in canon had a harem of thousands of women only showing attraction to Shen Qingqiu. Whereas here, Bingge doesn't show any attraction to any female character most notably Liu Mingyan who was one of his wives. Bingge being also attracted to Liu Qingge, whom he viewed as a pest in canon and having a large harem of coerced men.
• Awful Wedded Life: Being married to Yue Qingyuan is awful:
  • Shen Qingqiu spends most of his time trying to avoid having to interact with Yue Qingyuan and passive-aggressively sniping at him whenever he's forced to.
  • Liu Qingge's marriage to Yue Qingyuan becomes this, as neither of them actually feel much toward each other but a general sense of friendliness and obligation, and the duties that come with marriage (like planning events, arranging household finances, and networking) are mind-numbing to him. Ironically, he ends up finding solace and comfort in Shen Qingqiu, Yue Qingyuan's other spouse.
  • Pretty much every marriage in the original timeline. The marriage between Shen Qingqiu, Yue Qingyuan and Liu Qingge ends in disaster for everyone involved. Then Luo Binghe's harem is a hotbed of abuse for everyone who enters it.
• Babies Make Everything Better: Defied, three times in the story:
  • Yue Qingyuan refused to have children due to how miserable he thinks noble life is, despite the original Shen Qingqiu wanting children.
  • In More Wishes, it's revealed that in the original timeline, Yue Qingyuan succumbing to social pressure from the Emperor and trying to have a child with Liu Qingge was what led to the final confrontation where Luo Binghe betrayed his master and Shen Qingqiu was ordered to kill himself.
  • When Yue Qingyuan tries offering Shen Qingqiu a child to fix their failing marriage, all it earns is Shen Qingqiu's disgust. Especially since the transmigrated Shen Qingqiu knows from modern psychology that trying to mend a broken relationship with a baby just leads to resentment and trauma for all parties involved.
  • In the More Wishes sequel, this is Played Straight. With their stable marriages and need for heirs, Shen Qingqiu and Luo Binghe use a magic fruit to have a baby which they both raise and absolutely adore. The resulting baby is Luo Lingxi A.K.A Fruit Baby. Having a child wasn't necessary to fix a relationship but an additional joy to an already stable marriage.
  • Played with in the Wishful Thinking story about Shen Jiu returning to his younger body on his marriage day, where he pulls The Baby Trap on himself by drinking a potion that ensure men can get pregnant so he can get a child from Yue Qingyuan that cannot be easily taken from him. While this hasn't proved on page to make their marriage better by itself, it's implied that the baby's existence helps to solidify Yue Quinyuan's social position, at the price of Shen Jiu becoming utterly obsessed with ensuring the future wellbeing of his baby child, whatever it takes, which makes him less dependent on his husband for his happiness and mental state but makes him more dangerous, judging by the horrified reaction of his baby (a transmigrated Shen Yuan) to his birth parent's ranting.
• Break the Haughty:
  • Yue Qingyuan becomes so assured in his superiority as a noble that he frequently chides his possessive Second Husband, originally his sole husband, for being overdramatic and clingy, and ultimately breaks his most important promise to him. The tables turn when Shen Yuan transmigrates in and suddenly Shen Qingqiu seemingly decides that he isn't worth it, much to his distress. This is even more prominent in the world of the original novel, where Yue Qingyuan ends up hanging himself out of remorse after Shen Qingqiu's death.
  • Liu Qingge married Yue Qingyuan in a whirlwind romance to "rescue" him from his supposed viper of a spouse, Shen Qingqiu. In the original novel, his easy self-assurance and confidence are gradually eroded by the misfortune in his life. Here, Liu Qingge is met with a hard reality check that he has none of the skills nor drive to be an appropriate First Husband and his passion for Yue Qingyuan cools quickly with Shen Qingqiu's acquiescence. Liu Qingge learns that his assumptions were wrong and has to live the consequences.
  • Mobei-Jun is a proud, high-ranking demon lord with a great deal of strength and a long, noble lineage. In timelines where Shen Yuan doesn't transmigrate into Shen Qingqiu, he ends up part of Luo Binghe's harem. Worse, he's there completely unwillingly. Luo Binghe forces his obedience through what was apparently an extended scene of rape and torture in the original novel, and uses a ritual to bind Mobei-Jun to total obedience using qualities unique to his bloodline. The ritual leaves Mobei-Jun unable to disobey Luo Binghe without severe pain, and with low-level chronic pain every time he thinks unkindly on his rapist. He's also forced to kill Shang Qinghua. Which, in timelines where Shang Qinghua is a transmigrator, means killing the man he loves. Needless to say, his pride doesn't hold up well under those circumstances.
• Deconstruction Fic: In Proud Immortal Demon Way and the source material, the original Luo Binghe is treated as a Wish-Fulfillment protagonist who conquers the world and wins a harem of hundreds of women. In Wishverse, Luo Binghe is shown to be a terrifying tyrant who has no concern for the consent of any of his spouses, and whose poor management and unhinged ruthlessness drag the world into ruin.
• Deliberate Values Dissonance: A major theme and plot point.
  • The modern-thinking transmigrators are frequently horrified by the level of classism in the setting. (gender-neutral societal prejudice against anyone not a lord or lady). Not to mention the old-fashioned punishments that are allowed to take place, like the death penalty for infidelity or beating those of lower station without consequence.
  • Yue Qingyuan and Shen Qingqiu's marriage was a thorn in the side of noble society. Yue Qingyuan initially saw himself as only a street rat that got lucky, and saw no issue at all with marrying only the man he loved and no one else. This was made more politically fraught because Shen Qingqiu was a commoner with no noble lineage, a shady past, and at the time, none of the skills expected of even a concubine. Shen Qingqiu becomes an unintentional symbol to other nobles who don't want their children or themselves constantly having to fight to protect themselves in their households and keep the power of spouse solely to themselves regardless of rank and lineage. Once Yue Qingyuan begins being influenced by the emperor, his spies, and social pressure in general, their marriage deteriorates.
  • Although demon society is more open-minded when it comes to doing whatever you want if you're strong enough Luo Binghe and Mobei-Jun both encounter issues because they each choose to marry a single human, and no one else. This angers a portion of demonic nobility, in part because, like Yue Qingyuan's marriage, it throws into question whether multiple subservient spouses are really required by an estate, and in part because demons don't like the idea of their superiors being involved with humans. It isn't infrequent for them to have to deal with rebellions and political factions aligning against them as a result.
  • Due to the multiple methods and means for people to have children, homosexuality is universally accepted since they would just have to pick a way to continue lineages. Heads of households of any gender can have harems consisting of their preferred gender(s). If a Lord/Lady politically marries a spouse that is outside of their gender preferences, that is usually seen as the spouse's problem. So when Shang Qinghua's brother marries him to the lesbian Qi Qingqi, Shang Qinghua is screwed over and has to live with never being able to win Qi Qingqi's affections to improve his status of concubine, which also sees him having most of his possessions sold off and treated like a glorified servant.
  • Stay in the Kitchen applies to the less dominant partners of a marriage regardless of gender. The Lord/Lady/Head of the household is the figurative breadwinner that distributes their income to their financially dependent spouses and concubines. It used to be that a spouse or concubine could keep their dowry as their own independent accounts, but that fell out of favor in the human realm, so the head of household could keep all the power by leaving their spouses dependent on their favor. Shen Qingqiu is hesitant to divorce Yue Qingyuan in part bcause he doesn't have his own money. Shang Qinghua was previously a very wealthy commoner businessman before being forced by his older brother to be a concubine to Qi Qingqi, which forced him to give up his half of the business with no funds to escape Qi Qingqi's household on his own.
  • Yue Qingyuan is considered overly doting and generous for giving his spouse Shen Qingqiu a decade of monogamy before taking another spouse. Shen Qingqiu is seen as entitled for reacting badly to his demotion and spoiled for denying Yue Qingyuan a chance to expand his political influence with a more high-bred spouse. The noble Liu Qingge thought it was strange that Yue Qingyuan would only have one spouse like a commoner instead of strengthening his household with the support of multiple spouses and concubines. Even when Liu Qingge loses faith in Yue Qingyuan, he doesn’t question the system and still believes polygamy is a given for high society. The modern Shen Yuan saw Shen Jiu as being completely reasonable for wanting a faithful husband and views Yue Qingyuan as an unfaithful asshole. The lower-class Luo Binghe sees Yue Qingyuan as The Oathbreaker of his marital vows, abusing his power over a spouse who can’t fight back.
  • Demons view bride-napping as an acceptable way to test enemy Lords' mettle by seeing how well a Lord and their spouse can protect themselves. It is viewed as a less bloody alternative to outright warfare. They also see attacking by day as more insulting than attacking by night, as doing it by day implies that you don't need a handicap to win. Shen Qingqiu wryly notes that this must contribute to a lot of cross-cultural misunderstandings.
  • Due to fact Gender Is No Object in this setting, the social and power dynamics are more strictly divided. The Lord/Lady/Head of the household is the head of house that must be obeyed without question. The spouses, concubines and younger family members are left to their lord/lady's mercy and discretion, and the mercy of higher-ranking spouses.
  • Polygamy where a Lord/Lady marries multiple spouses and concubines is the normal state of affairs for people of high rank or wealth. Polyamory where all members of the marriage have intimate relationships with each other with their informed consent is not. The Lord/Lady can marry as many spouses or concubines they want without needing the permission of their current spouses or from the new person actually marrying into the household, so long as their family consents. The Lord/Lady is socially permitted to sleep with and take as many spouses as they want. If the spouses were get romantically involved with each other without the Lord/Lady that would be considered adultery which is an execution-worthy offense.
  • Monogamy is something only poor people or commoners do. Yue Qingyuan is viewed as strange for only having one spouse for a decade like a commoner to point the Emperor had Yue Qingyuan's spouse discredited and sabotaged to prevent him from inspiring others to follow in his footsteps. As Emperor of the Demon Realm, Luo Binghe is considered a huge romantic and deviant for only having one spouse, and has to be very powerful to not be forced to take anymore. Despite Mobei Jun's Single-Target Sexuality toward Shang Qinghua, he still takes other brides to prevent his own vassals from rebelling against him, though he deliberately chooses wives that are more interested in using him as The Beard while dallying with each other, doesn't consummate those marriages and makes Shang Qinghua First Husband despite the opposition.
  • Shen Jiu is harsh, cynical, snide and vicious, only showing his softer and caring to those close to him. The original Shen Jiu repelled people with his personality, leaving his only friend be his husband and made it more easier to slander. When he is reincarnated, none of those traits changed. However, in the Demon Realm, all of those traits are attractive for a friend or spouse to have. Ironically Shen Jiu is more popular and makes genuine friends among the demons.
• Does Not Like Men: As in canon, the original Shen Qingqiu is far more comfortable around women than men, with Yue Qingyuan being the only exception. He feels uneasy having any male servant with access to his personal space, which is part of why he resents being forced to keep Luo Binghe on as an apprentice so much.
• Domestic Abuse: The setting gives lords and ladies almost complete power over their spouses, with very little their harems can do to protect themselves or retaliate. In fact, it's encouraged for them to punish their spouses in order to keep their harems "harmonious," with spouses and concubines fighting, bullying, abusing or outright killing each other being completely normal. This leads to situations like Shang Qinghua's, where he can be frequently beaten and treated like a servant with no one batting an eye, and Yue Qingyuan's marriage to Shen Qingqiu, who he prefers to "gently" punish with periods of confinement to a special set of rooms. The original Luo Binghe's harem is also eventually revealed to be a hotbed of abuse.
• Double Standard: The Lord/Lady of the Household can take as many spouses and concubines as they want. However, the spouses and concubines must remain faithful and can't have relationships with outsiders or each other. Shen Qingqiu and Liu Qingge are risking a lot by being close to each other, because they could be accused of having an affair, whereas Yue Qingyuan is encouraged to sleep around and take more spouses instead of being content with the two he has.
• Dramatically Missing the Point: There are quite a few miscommunications and misunderstandings that take place over the course of the series. While many of them lean into Comically Missing the Point, sometimes it's played for drama over laughs.
  • Yue Qingyuan is under a lot of misconceptions about what the actual problems were in his marriage to Shen Qingqiu, largely due to not realizing that the servants were participating in a longtime sabotage campaign and deliberately leading him to mistreat Shen Qingqiu with lies. Even when he gets the chance to try remedying his mistakes, like in the Wishful Thinking chapter where he time travels backwards or when he gets the chance to court Shen Jiu's reincarnation in More Wishes, he tends to misread the situation, though he tries his best.
  • As an example of the above, Yue Qingyuan is extra protective of Shen Qingqiu around demons, because the original Shen Qingqiu was kidnapped and traumatized by them. However, that experience prevents him from realizing the extent to which Shen Jiu trusts and loves his demonic servants and companions in More Wishes.
  • There's also a major miscommunication in Yue Qingyuan's Late Great Do-Over, where Yue Qingyuan buys Shen Yuan and gets Mu Qingfang to promise to give him the best possible medical care in order to prevent him from dying and transmigrating back into Shen Qingqiu's body. However, Shen Qingqiu misinterprets this as Yue Qingyuan taking a romantic interest in Shen Yuan, so it strains their relationship more.
  • At first Shang Qinghua's obliviousness toward Mobei-Jun's love for him is played for laughs, but in More Wishes it leads to a somber scene where he realizes that he won't be able to watch Mobei-Jun marry someone else, and quietly leaves in the middle of the night.
• Entitled to Have You: Members of a harem aren't allowed to refuse "marital duties," though not every head of household takes advantage of this.
• Exotic Extended Marriage: The xianxia fantasy novel that Shen Yuan transmigrates to permits high-ranking nobility of both the human and demon realms to take multiple spouses and concubines of any gender. Luo Binghe and Yue Qingyuan are considered deviant for having one spouse, or are rumored to have multiple spouses or mistresses in secret when they don't.
• No Name Given: Shang Qinghua's brother is only referred as Shang Qinghua's brother or "Ge," he is never actually named.
• Single-Target Sexuality: For a harem setting, a lot of people lean towards monogamy with variously tragic consequences.
  • Even if he wound up folding to societal conventions by taking another husband, Yue Qingyuan never loved anyone else but Shen Jiu. It leads him to kill himself in order to be Together in Death in the original storyline and to invoke a Reincarnation Romance in the divergent one.
  • Luo Binghe refuses to entertain the possibility of falling in love with someone not his Shizun. It's not unique to the version of him who ultimately married Shen Yuan, as his first version obsessively sought to recreate Shen Qingqiu by marrying men harboring similarities with him.
  • Mobei-jun marries more people besides Shang Qinghua out of pragmatic strategy (as he's not powerful enough to flaunt his monogamy and live without trouble) and only to serve as The Beard to them.
• Society Is to Blame: What Shang Qinghua actually sought to write in his novel; his characters wouldn't have been so unhappy if only the empire in which they live hadn't ground them into the dust for wanting to stay faithful to their one love or being born a peasant.
• Trauma Conga Line: A few examples, especially in any world or universe that mostly follows the original plot of the novel.
  • Luo Binghe: In every version, Luo Binghe is a kid off the streets who is almost kidnapped to be groomed by the Huan Hua Palace Master. His loyalty toward his rescuer only results in abuse being heaped on him. In the original novel, his final confrontation with his master traumatizes him by awakening his demon blood, leading to him accidentally taking things too far and murdering Shen Qingqiu. He has to claw his way up the social ladder through sheer talent, learning to be colder and crueler, and even once he manages to become a successful demon lord, he becomes so corrupted by Xin Mo's influence that he ends up perpetuating the cycle of abuse and mentally deteriorating to the point he's almost a completely different person. Even when Shen Yuan transmigrates and treats him much better in I Wish You Were My Husband, Luo Binghe still ends up watching Shen Qingqiu almost die and having to fight his way through hell to get back to him. It's only once he returns and marries Shen Qingqiu that his life takes a happier turn again.
  • In the original novel, Liu Qingge's initial qi deviation destabilizes his cultivation and leaves him much more vulnerable in fights. His first marriage is a disaster: not only does Shen Qingqiu constantly sabotage him, he's kidnapped and wounded by demons and "miscarries" a child because the emperor sent him a poisoned vessel. To top it all off, Yue Qingyuan is only truly in love with his Second Husband, the same one that Liu Qingge tried to save him from, and commits suicide after losing him. Then not only does Liu Qingge lose an arm fighting Mobei-Jun, he gets locked into a vicious love-hate relationship with an abusive Luo Binghe, who manipulates and gaslights him until he's only a shadow of the proud, noble warrior he once was.
  • In some Wishful Thinking timelines, Shen Yuan transmigrates into Sha Yuan, a relative of Sha Hualing. He's then tricked into agreeing to marry Luo Binghe before he's ready. On their wedding night, he's crippled by Xin Mo, leaving him unable to continue his hobby of martial fan-dancing and returning him to a state of constant chronic pain, just like his first life. Then Luo Binghe goes from bad to worse, getting increasingly neglectful as time wears on, abandoning him to recover on his own after a traumatic kidnapping, and murdering one of Sha Yuan's closest friends in the harem for rebelling. Currently, the final chapter from Sha Yuan's point of view shows him realizing the extent that Luo Binghe's mental health has deteriorated, to the point that he's outright dangerous, and will flat out rape Sha Yuan if he says no to sex. And he can't leave or rebel, because that could turn Luo Binghe's attention to the child Sha Yuan's been looking after...
• Ungrateful Bastard:
  • The original Shen Qingqiu completely changed himself to become the noble spouse that Yue Qingyuan deserved and worked tirelessly to help him ascend to social ladder and protect him from the cutthroat machinations of the noble court and treacherous servants. How did Yue Qingyuan repay him? Betraying his vow to have Shen Qingqiu be his only spouse and marry someone else!
  • Shang Qinghua helps his brother start a massively successful business despite the latter's hatred of him in hopes of being a fillal brother. How did Shang Qinghua's brother repay him? Forcing him into a miserable Arranged Marriage out of baseless fear that Shang Qinghua will steal the business!

Tropes Unique to I Wish You Were My Husband

A-D

• Abduction Is Love: From the freshly ascended demon lord Luo Binghe's viewpoint, it's not so much stealing Yue Qingyuan's Second Husband in order to thoroughly humiliate the lord than it's rescuing his beloved and long-suffering Shen Qingqiu from a man utterly unable to love and care for him as he deserves to be. Shen Qingqiu happens to agree.
• Achievements in Ignorance: Shen Yuan completely derails the story he's trapped in, mostly by using his incomplete knowledge of the story to try to save his own life. Shen Yuan's intervention alters the very genre of the story from a tragic Dark Fantasy to a Romance.
• Accomplice by Inaction: Shen Qingqiu is mistreated and neglected by the servants, despite serving as Yue Qingyuan's sole spouse for a decade and still ranking quite high as Second Husband. A longterm campaign by the emperor and various other noble factions to manipulate and gaslight Yue Qingyuan into believing the worst of his husband means that he is frequently led into taking their side, believing that Shen Qingqiu is lying, or not noticing anything is wrong in the first place. Luo Binghe's opinion of the Lord sinks once he realizes this.
• After Action Patch Up:
  • Luo Binghe treats Shen Qingqiu's bruises after the latter gets hurt stopping Liu Qingge's qi deviation and getting attacked by Yue Qingyuan as a result. This permanently sours Luo Binghe's opinion of the Lord of the household.
• After-Action Healing Drama:
  • When Shen Qingqiu is nearly fatally poisoned with Without A Cure, Yue Qingyuan realizes how close he was to losing him permanently. Liu Qingge also loses his untested confidence in his strength after nearly losing his friend, which turns into constant vigilance whenever Yue Qingyuan is away.
  • Shen Qingqiu is impaled in the chest during a fight, but is saved thanks to the quick intervention of several medical cultivators at the end of the disastrous tournament where Luo Binghe is kidnapped. While the other cultivators apologize for thinking he was responsible for the demons' interference, he falls apart emotionally due to his own personal loss.
• Age Lift: While their ages were ambiguous in canon, Liu Qingge is explicitly ten years younger than Shen Qingqiu in I Wish You Were My Husband. This only fed into the original Shen Qingqiu's insecurities that he's being replaced with someone younger, prettier and richer.
• All for Nothing: Yue Qingyuan breaks a decade-long promise that was the bedrock of his marriage to give into social pressure and take another spouse. Not only does that earn him further mockery from the court for "not being so perfect after all," it utterly ruins his loving relationship with the original Shen Qingqiu, and he and Liu Qingge rapidly lose interest in each other romantically.
• All Love Is Unrequited: When Shen Yuan transmigrates in, Yue Qingyuan's love for his husband returns but is rebuffed, while Liu Qingge develops feelings for Shen Qingqiu but can never act on them.
• Altar Diplomacy: The high-ranking noble Liu clan allow Liu Qingge to marry the newer, but still high-ranking, noble Yue Qingyuan, due to his favourable position with the emperor. In turn, having the Liu clan as his in-laws gives Yue Qingyuan more connections with the nobility.
• Alternate Personality Punishment: Shen Yuan transmigrates into the body of the villainous rival of a harem novel he was reading. Almost immediately, he is punished for his host body's scheming and attempted sabotage despite having nothing to do with it.
• Anti-Villain: Yue Qingyuan is a very honorable man, who rose his way from poverty to being the Emperor's right hand man, and is famous for his loyalty and kindly temperament. At the same token, his decision to break his vow to Shen Qingqiu ends up completely destroying the lives of both his spouses in the original novel. Even after Shen Yuan changes the plot, being married to him results in both his spouses frequently feeling trapped and unable to act according to their own interests and desires.
• Armor-Piercing Question: In chapter four, Shen Qingqiu asks whether Yue Qingyuan is actually happy being a lord. Yue Qingyuan finally admits to himself that no, he's not happy and becoming a lord wasn't worth it in hindsight. He admits that his unhappiness with being a lord was the true reason he never gave Shen Qingqiu children as well, despite the latter desiring them.
• Armor-Piercing Response:
  • The first real conversation Shen Yuan has with Yue Qingyuan consists of the lord trying to make excuses for himself and justify taking another spouse after promising Shen Qingqiu monogamy. Then Yue Qingyuan switches from trying to apologize to Shen Qingqiu to trying make the latter promise not to bully the new spouse, Liu Qingge. When Shen Qingqiu agrees too easily, Yue Qingyuan believes the latter is not taking it seriously. Offended, Shen Qingqiu pointedly advises him not to make "don't bully the new spouse" a talking point if he ever has to explain to Liu Qingge why he's taking a third spouse.
  Shen Qingqiu: If you end up marrying another man in another ten years, and have a conversation like this with Liu Qingge, perhaps you ought to consider a better talking point than ‘please don’t harass your replacement'. Just as a suggestion. It isn’t really helping your case.
  • Shen Qingqiu has the habit of doing this to Yue Qingyuan quite frequently.
  Yue Qingyuan: I really didn’t plan to… to ever love anyone else.
  (Beat)
  Yue Qingyuan: You don't believe me.
  Shen Qingqiu: I guess it’s more that I wonder why you find that a suitable defense. Should faithfulness really only apply when there’s a lack of temptation to stray? Isn’t the point of making a commitment like that to say ‘even if tempted, I won’t betray you’, rather than ‘I don’t think I’ll ever be tempted’?
  • He then finishes Yue Qingyuan off by telling that not only is he not interested in harassing the new spouse, he's not interested in winning Yue Qingyuan back. This unsettles him and makes him begin to realize that Shen Qingqiu might genuinely not love him anymore.
• Arranged Marriage: Arranged marriages aren't at all uncommon in the setting, and most marriages have at least some political or pragmatic purpose beyond just how well the lord/lady and their spouse will get along. Shen Qingqiu has to carefully analyze Luo Binghe's various marriage options to find him a suitable spouse, as he's the closest thing his student has to family. He weighs what marital ranking his student will get, how wealthy the marriage partner is, what kind of personality the partner has and whether his beloved student would have any independence or freedom.
• Artists Are Attractive: Shen Qingqiu frequently recites stories or plays music to entertain himself and his beloved apprentice. Considering that's something concubines do for their lords, it ends up fueling rumours that he was smitten with Luo Binghe long before his return from hell.
• Beauty Is Never Tarnished: When he gets poisoned with Without-A-Cure, Shen Qingqiu lampshades that he and the other characters only seem to suffer wounds and ailments that either don't harm their looks or enhance them somehow.
• Because You Were Nice to Me: When Shen Qingqiu seemingly has a change of heart, Luo Binghe becomes even more deeply loyal to him. Shen Qingqiu's care and kindness shifts the outcome of their relationship, from Luo Binghe eventually getting fed up of Shen Qingqiu's abuse to Luo Binghe becoming even more obsessed with and devoted to his teacher.
• Becoming the Mask: Shen Qingqiu initially claims he's only taking care of Luo Binghe because he needs an ally, and likewise saves Liu Qingge because he wants to avoid the original Shen Qingqiu's fate. Over time, he grows to deeply care for and be dependent on both of them.
• Beneath the Mask: Despite his aloof and dignified exterior, Shen Qingqiu is a melodramatic, foul-mouthed millennial in his internal monologues.
• Big Fancy House: The Yue estate is massive, with the lord of house and his two spouses each having their own separate wings. The estate is luxurious enough to be in demand with various nobles trying to visit the capital, and hosts several large events and competitions without a problem.
• Blithe Spirit: When Shen Yuan transmigrates into the body of Shen Qingqiu, the villainous rival of the protagonist Liu Qingge, he unintentionally derails the plot by defying social expectations. As opposed to scheming his way into their shared husband's good graces, he instead acts as a Graceful Loser and accepts Liu Qingge into their household while keeping their husband at arm's length. He's completely uninterested in all the original's politicking, preferring to be lazy and curl up with books or good company at home, and generally prefers to stay out of any troublesome melodrama.
• Break the Cutie:
  • Shen Yuan as Shen Qingqiu is a kind and earnest person that tries to act with the dignity and authority of a nobleman. He's so easygoing that he manages to befriend his rival spouse who thought the worst of him and help Liu Qingge accliminate to his new role as First Husband. When his beloved student and first friend seemingly dies, he is so heartbroken and traumatized. The fastidious and image-obsessed man neglects himself and his home and nearly dies from grief. Shen Qingqiu only begins to heal thanks to Liu Qingge's close watch and support and snaps out of his depression when Shang Qinghua reveals that Luo Binghe is still alive.
  • Luo Binghe is a sweet, earnest kid that was forgiving enough to even tolerate the original Shen Qingqiu's abuse without resenting him for it for a long time. He's easily flustered by compliments and gets emotional over even small acts of kindness extended toward him. He's also watches his mentor/crush apparently die during a battle before being kidnapped and confined by Mobei-Jun in the demonic realm. This awakens his demonic heritage, but for a while he goes almost completely feral and is incapable of thinking of anything except revenge. He is only snapped out of it when he's given proof that Shen Qingqiu survived.
  • The original Luo Binghe's plotline also counts. Shen Qingqiu runs through Luo Binghe's almost limitless capacity for forgiveness by abusing him. Then after Luo Binghe accidentally kills Shen Qingqiu, he ends up ostracized from most of society and learns to close himself off and be more selfish to survive.
• Building of Adventure: A good 2/3 of the plot happens at the Yue Estate. Shen Qingqiu loathes that despite being in a fantasy world with monsters and magic, most of his time is spend solely confined at the estate.
• Can't Act Perverted Toward a Love Interest : Enforced as Luo Binghe cannot act on his love for Shen Qingqiu until the divorce rituals are complete. He keeps his relationship with Shen Qinqqiu chaste until the latter is no longer legally married. Similarly, being married to Yue Qingyuan means that Liu Qingge can't do anything to act on his feelings toward Shen Qingqiu, and vice versa.
• Cassandra Truth: When Shang Qinghua and Shen Qingqiu are caught trying to talk to each other in secret, Shen Qingqiu quickly confesses that Shang Qinghua is helping him contact his missing student. As everyone thinks said missing student is dead, everyone assumes that Shang Qinghua is scamming Shen Qingqiu and the former is forced to flee.
• Celibate Hero: Due being in a Sexless Marriage and adultery carrying a literal death sentence, Shen Qingqiu purposely does not act on any sexual desire for most of the fic.
• Cheating with the Milkman: Yue Qingyuan grows suspicious of how close Shen Qingqiu is to his personal servant, Luo Binghe, especially since they’re frequently alone together.
• Closest Thing We Got: Shen Qingqiu really doesn't want to have to rely on the beleaguered Shang Qinghua, but he's literally Shen Qingqiu's only way of communicating with his thankfully-not-dead apprentice.
• Clueless Dude Magnet: While Shen Qingqiu can be oblivious to other people’s feelings, part of it is a genuine survival tactic so he won't be executed. In particular, he's quite careful not to acknowledge any budding feelings for Liu Qingge.
• Commonality Connection: Shen Qingqiu latches onto Luo Binghe during his initial transmigration, in part due to the realization that, despite their social differences, they are both dependent on the whims of those higher up the social ladder to survive.
• The Confidant: Shen Qingqiu has two major ones for the different facets of his personality:
  • Luo Binghe is the only person that Shen Qingqiu willingly shows his feelings to.
  • Shang Qinghua gets to experience Shen Yuan’s unfiltered, internet-denizen gremlin self, without maintaining his façade of being the dignified Shen Qingqiu.
• Contrived Clumsiness: In the original timeline, Shen Qingqiu threw tea on Liu Qingge during the latter's wedding to demonstrate his displeasure with the new spouse and their lord husband. The new Shen Qingqiu, however, ends up genuinely tripping on his wedding robes, and is rather mortified by his clumsiness. Somewhat justified in that he's wearing a lot more layers than he's used to.
• Conveniently Interrupted Document: Shen Yuan decided to take a nap before finishing the last chapters of the novel he was reading. As he died and ended up transmigrating into the novel’s villain, he’s very aware that his limited knowledge of the plot grows increasingly useless over time.
• "Could Have Avoided This!" Plot: Shen Yuan gets increasingly annoyed when he realizes that so many conflicts could have been avoided had Yue Qingyuan and Shen Qingqiu actually talked to each other.
• Courtly Love: Luo Binghe is deeply devoted to his master Shen Qingqiu. He moves heaven and earth to be with him and free him of his miserable marriage, but doesn’t expect any reciprocation, despite it leading to his refusal to marry others.
• Crossing the Burnt Bridge: Shen Qingqiu’s main initial concern is to repair relationships that were destroyed by his predecessor, whether through kindness or bribes.
• Cry into Chest: Liu Qingge lets Shen Qingqiu cry into his chest while he's griefsick.
• Damned by Faint Praise: Shen Qingqiu sometimes reflects on the fact that at least Yue Qingyuan isn't abusive or a rapist. Nor does he have other abusive, jealous spouses like the ones Shang Qinghua has to deal with in his concubinage to Qi Qingqi.
• Dead Sparks: Yue Qingyuan and Liu Qingge take an interest in each other over the course of an adventure and get married shortly afterward. Then their interest in each other rapidly wanes without a villainous Shen Qingqiu's plots pushing them together, not to mention their feelings generally lean more toward friendly admiration than love. They quickly begin to realize how much of a mistake they made by getting married so hastily.
• Death by Despair: People can literally die of heartbreak or "grief sickness," due to the setting being a world of romantic melodrama. Generally this takes the form of an emotionally-driven qi deviation, but Shen Qingqiu also seems to experience a general sense illness during times of emotional distress. This also manifests as severe physical pain when he's trying to convince himself that he doesn't mind rejecting Luo Binghe and pretending he isn't in love with him so that Luo Binghe can marry Liu Qingge instead.
  • Shen Yuan transmigrated into the body of Shen Qingqiu due to the original host dying of heartbreak, unbeknownst to everyone else.
  • After losing his beloved apprentice and Only Friend in the disastrous Immortal Conference, Shen Qingqiu was in such despair that he nearly died from grief. Only through everyone keeping a careful eye on him, a lot of emotional support, and the revelation that Luo Binghe survived does he overcome it.
• Death by Origin Story: Shen Qingqiu died of sheer heartbreak when the love of his life put him aside to marry Trophy Wife Liu Qingge. His death unintentionally allows Shen Yuan, a reader of Shen Qingqiu's story, to transmigrate into his body. But Shen Yuan knows Shen Qingqiu as the villain of the novel who was ordered to commit suicide after his attempts to sabotage Liu Qingge and Yue Qingyuan's relationship come to light. Thus Shen Yuan devotes himself to avoiding Shen Qingqiu's mistakes in the hopes of avoiding death.
• Desperately Craves Affection: Liu Qingge believes Shen Qingqiu needs more physical affection while he's grieving. When Shen Qingqiu realizes that Liu Qingge is being uncharacteristically affectionate, he mistakes him for being the one missing human touch and tries to discreetly reciprocate.
• Dies Differently in Adaptation: In the canon the original Shen Qingqiu is turned into a human stick cand chained in a dungeon until he died. In comparison, the original Shen Qingqiu is ordered to commit a comparatively less gruesome suicide by hanging. The original Shen Qingqiu actually ran away from his ordered suicide and he was killed by Luo Binghe
• Did Not Die That Way: Shen Yuan believed that Shen Qingqiu was ordered to commit suicide after going too far with his Relationship Sabotage and attempted murder of Liu Qingge by Yue Qingyuan. He later finds out that Shen Qingqiu was actually murdered.
• Didn't Think This Through: Liu Qingge and Yue Qingyuan realize their marriage was actually a bad idea in hindsight:
  • Liu Qingge married Lord Yue Qingyuan to rescue him from his scheming, possessive spouse Shen Qingqiu. He didn't consider that he was completely unsuitable for the social and political burden of being First Husband, as he completely lacks the social and financial skills for the position. Liu Qingge's Honor Before Reason attitude, dislike of smalltalk and blunt tongue make him completely unable to handle the court without Shen Qingqiu's active intervention. Over time, Liu Qingge realizes he made a massive mistake with his assumptions about the court, Yue Qingyuan and Shen Qingqiu.
  • Lord Yue Qingyuan wanted Liu Qingge for his high breeding and family connections, to raise his position at court and silence noble gossip over his loyalty to his sole spouse. However, his marriage fails to stop the gossip, as he still only has a mere two spouses, in comparison to the vast number of spouses and concubines most other high-ranking nobles have. Liu Qingge proves to be unsuited to the duties Shen Qingqiu once helped the estate with, and the marriage also destroys his relationship with Shen Qingqiu, the man he actually loves. In the original timeline, this mistake eventually leads ruins the lives of everyone involved.
  • Shen Qingqiu points out the stupidity of Shang Qinghua's brother forcing him into an Arranged Marriage. Shang Qinghua was the creative mind making new products for their businesss...so the brother will screwed over once other businesses start making their own versions of their products and the brother doesn't have anything new to entice customers.
• Differing Priorities Break Up: Shen Yuan tolerated living as Shen Qingqiu and his failing relationship with his husband, Yue Qingyuan for his guaranteed safety in an unfamiliar world. When Shen Qingqiu is finally given the option to leave, Yue Qingyuan begs him to stay. Yue Qingyuan revealing the true reason why he never gave Shen Qingqiu the children he wanted. This forces Shen Yuan to realize that Yue Qingyuan prioritized his own self-doubts and self-hatred over the real Shen Qingqiu's desire to start a family and well-being and Shen Yuan's freedom. Considering Yue Qingyuan's refusal to communicate lead to the real Shen Qingqiu's death and forced Shen Yuan to endure seven years of a failed relationship this infuriates Shen Qingqiu into permanently breaking the relationship. Who vows to leave the first chance he gets.
• Disproportionate Retribution: In punishment for repeatedly sabotaging Liu Qingge, the original Shen Qingqiu is ordered to hang himself. When Shen Yuan initially reads about it in the novel, he thinks it was overly harsh even for the villain and wonders why Shen Qingqiu isn't just banished to another estate.
• Distracted by the Luxury: Subverted. Yue Qingyuan tries to buy Shen Qingqiu gifts to cheer him up while he's in mourning. Shen Qingqiu responds by "accidentally" leaving the ones without too many fiddly bits in range of his new puppy, who's happy to chew on them.
• Driven by Envy: The original Shen Qingqiu was very unhappy about being demoted to Second Husband and jealous of Liu Qingge's noble heritage, to the point of attempting sabotage.

E-H

• Enlightened Self-Interest: Shen Yuan decides early on to be kind to Shen Qingqiu's put-upon servant/apprentice Luo Binghe. While Shen Yuan does have sympathy for the mistreated boy, he mostly does it to have a loyal ally in an unfamiliar environment and to prevent Luo Binghe from having justification to betray him.
• Entertainingly Wrong: Shen Qingqiu bases his actions on the assumption that Liu Qingge is the protagonist of the story they're in, while Luo Binghe is a minor side character. He turns out to be very wrong about this.
• Establishing Series Moment: Today was the day of Shen Qingqiu’s husband’s wedding.
• Everyone Has Standards: Shen Qingqiu is genuinely disgusted when he is accused of having an affair with his disciple. One, he is his disciple’s sole parental figure, and two, Luo Binghe is still a teenager.
• Even Evil Has Standards: The original Shen Qingqiu was cutthroat and ruthless, but he still intervened when an unscrupulous Huan Hua Palace servant lured and drugged Luo Binghe to be a Sex Slave to the Palace Master when he was still a child.
• Extremely Protective Child: As Luo Binghe's Shizun, Shen Qingqiu serves as the teenager's Parental Substitute. Seeing his beloved master helpless to protect his heart and well-being from Yue Qingyuan's whims and careless neglect infuriates the youth, who keeps a grudge against the lord in his adulthood.
• Failure Is the Only Option: The original Shen Qingqiu attempted to sabotage Liu Qingge and Yue Qingyuan's relationship and failed to do so. Shen Yuan's attempts to matchmake them have an equal amount of success.
• False Friend: Yue Qingyuan considers the emperor his close friend and ally, and therefore is very loyal to him. The emperor has repaid said loyalty by implementing schemes and plots to discredit and humiliate Yue Qingyuan's spouse, Shen Qingqiu.
• False Soulmate: Shen Qingqiu tries to set up Liu Qingge with Yue Qingyuan, and later Luo Binghe, because he knows they are the novel’s main couple and thus destined for each other. It befuddles him that his attempts to matchmake fizzle out without Shen Qingqiu acting as an antagonist.
• Financial Abuse: The heads of household have almost complete control over all finances in the human realm, though their spouses are expected to actually manage expenditures.
  • When Shen Qingqiu falls out of favor with Yue Qingyuan for his heavy opposition against taking Liu Qingge as another spouse, Yue Qingyuan unintentionally cuts him off. By demoting Shen Qingqiu to Second Husband, Yue Qingyuan fails to realize that Shen Qingqiu no longer really has access to their finances. Nor does Yue Qingyuan realize that the servants hate Shen Qingqiu enough to deliberately not feed him or help clean his wing, which leaves Shen Qingqiu destitute in his own home. Shen Yuan takes to selling off his belongings to provide for himself and Luo Binghe until he can make amends with the servants.
  • There's more evidence of this, and likely some of the servants' machinations, in the extra where Bingge transmigrates into Yue Qingyuan. Looking over the ledgers, he notices that Shen Qingqiu's personal household fund has been separated from the fund for servants' payment and contracts, but that means there's been "confusion" with taking money out of Shen Qingqiu's fund to pay for servant necessities, despite it being the smaller pot of money.
• Fire-Forged Friends: Shen Qingqiu and Liu Qingge begin to bond after a Qi Deviation and an attempted Demonic Invasion of their home.
• First Girl After All: While on paper Luo Binghe is Shen Qingqiu's second husband, in actuality he's Shen Yuan's First Love.
• Five Stages of Grief:
  • The original Shen Qingqiu goes through this when he realizes that Yue Qingyuan was breaking their marriage vow to be monogamous. At first Shen Qingqiu was extremely furious (Anger) at Yue Qingyuan and the homewreaker Liu Qingge. Then he attempted to sabotage their relationship and took any and all chances to ruin Liu Qingge (Bargaining.) Shen Qingqiu was filled with extreme self-loathing for not being enough for his high-ranking love of his life (Depression). Shen Qingqiu continued to think that he could fix the situation by getting rid of Liu Qingge or bribing his husband with romantic or sexual favors (Denial). What was unique to Shen Yuan's timeline was that Shen Qingqiu realized that he couldn't change anything and the only person he ever loved has betrayed him (Acceptance). And died from sheer heartbreak as a result.
  • Shen Yuan as Shen Qingqiu also faces this when his beloved student, the first person in that new world he trusted, cared and loved for, apparently dies. At first, Shen Yuan is angry for Yue Qingyuan being too late to help them. Shen Yuan then goes into denial: insisting that because Luo Binghe was a fictional character to him that he wasn't actually sad when he died. He pointedly refused to realize his crippling grief. Then Shen Qingqiu falls into a deep depression, not being able to function at daily life or perform his duties. He's so grief-stricken that he doesn't eat or take care of himself. He slowly begins to get out of his depression when he entered the Bargaining phase. When Shen Qingqiu is told of his student's survival and said student's status as the actual Protagonist, he immediately gives his spirit sword to deliver to Luo Binghe. He finally accepts what happened once delivered proof of Luo Binghe's survival.
• Fool for Love: The original Shen Qingqiu, despite being hardened and cynical due to his past as a slave, completely devoted himself to his Childhood Friend Romance and later husband, Yue Qingyuan, and did everything he could to become a worthy nobleman's spouse. This ends up being his undoing.
• For Want Of A Nail: What differs this timeline from the original in universe novel 'Chrysanthemum Garden'. In 'Chrysanthemum Garden', the original Shen Qingqiu never accepted that Yue Qingyuan irreversibly break their marital vow and took another husband. So Shen Qingqiu fruitlessly attempted to sabotage Yue Qingyuan and Liu Qingge's relationship in hopes of becoming the sole husband. In Shen Yuan's timeline, the original Shen Qingqiu did accept that Yue Qingyuan broke their vow and believed that he didn't love him anyone. Shen Qingqiu accepted that there was nothing he could to change his situation and promptly died of grief. Resulting in Shen Yuan's transmigration into Shen Qingqiu.
• Foreshadowing: Shen Yuan notes that Luo Binghe's good looks, skills and natural charm that he's going break hearts in upcoming tournament. Yes, hearts got broken. Theirs.
• Freudian Excuse: When Shen Yuan has to actually live as the harem novel villain, Shen Jiu/Shen Qingqiu; he realizes how much the man’s situation sucks and why he lashed out. After working together to ascend the social ladder and ten years of a happy marriage, he gets demoted for a richer Trophy Husband. Due to Yue Qingyuan undermining him and disregarding Shen Qingqiu's justified grievances as complaining, Shen Qingqiu gets neglected, belittled and bullied by the servants with no recourse. His husband is so enamored with his new spouse that he forgets to give Shen Qingqiu any money to live off and the servants deliberately starve him. This is on top of being betrayed by the love of his life who promised to be faithful to him when Yue Qingyuan rescued him from slavery. Shen Qingqiu is mocked and demeaned outside his home as bitter possessive harpy with Yue Qingyuan ignoring how Shen Qingqiu protects them from other nobles. Let’s not forget that Shen Qingqiu was an ex-slave that was abused physically and sexually until he was rescued and had to learn cultivation and the noble arts in a short time so he could fit into high society. Shen Yuan acknowledges that the original goods had it really rough.
• Freudian Excuse Is No Excuse: On the other hand, Shen Jiu/Shen Qingqiu was also an awful person. He is a Bad Boss to his staff whenever he can get away with it and outright verbally, mentally and physically abusive to his apprentice, Luo Binghe. Luo Binghe would be made Shen Jiu’s emotional whipping boy and was neglected and abused when Shen Jiu/Shen Qingqiu need to lash out at someone. Shen Qingqiu would rarely feed or teach him despite Luo Binghe being his apprentice, using him as an unpaid servant. Shen Qingqiu goes out of his way to sabotage Liu Qingge and constantly antagonized and fought with him. Shen Qingqiu went out of his way to make the world miserable as he was, which had dire consequences on the whole world. Shen Yuan pities Shen Jiu and sees his complexities, but acknowledges he was a terrible person.
• Fuzz Therapy: Liu Qingge gets Shen Qingqiu a puppy to take care of to help the latter not focus on his grief. Due to Shen Qingqiu being an animal lover, his mood does improve. He names the puppy Ben Ben.
• Gender Is No Object: Anyone can be Lord of the Household, man or woman. Gender of one’s spouses doesn’t matter since the setting has multiple, assessible ways to reproduce.
• Gilded Cage: Most of the story takes place in lavish manors trapped in a horrible marriage.
• Giving Radio to the Romans: Shang Qinghua created non-toxic cosmetics, creative food storage solutions, board games and cold remedies to make a successful business. Then ran into the issue of real-life inventors when his older brother stole the credit from him and cheated him out his share of the profits by marrying him to a Lesbian noble. Shang Qinghua ends forced to give up his business as a noblewoman’s concubine.
• Grand Theft Me: Old Lord Yue tried this on Yue Qinqyan. The original Shen Qingqiu had to rescue Yue Qinqyan after Spotting the Thread.
• Guilt Complex: Yue Qingyuan knows he's doing bad by his husband Shen Qingqiu, but he's so used to live in an unhealthy, unbalanced relationship that he has no idea and no interest whatsoever into finding a way to truly fix the situation.
• Hanlon's Razor: Yue Qingyuan unintentionally cuts off his spouse Shen Qingqiu of any financial support or domestic support. This wasn’t done to punish him. Yue Qingyuan just got used to Shen Qingqiu handling the money and the servants throughout their marriage. He didn’t realize that by demoting Shen Qingqiu, he as the Lord of the Household or the new First Husband, Liu Qingge would have to give him the income to survive on and command the servants on the former’s behalf. The neglectful Yue Qingyuan and the unintentionally ignorant Liu Qingge accidentally leave Shen Qingqiu destitute in own home and allow for the servants to mistreat him. Liu Qingge finally helps Shen Qingqiu when he comes to own his position as First Husband and gave Shen Qingqiu new servants and money. Yue Qingyuan still continued in his neglect and ignorance until it was too late.
• He Is All Grown Up: Shen Qingqiu’s platonic love for his disciple turns romantic when Luo Binghe returns to him as a grown man who made his own destiny as a Demon Lord.
• Help Mistaken for Attack: Liu Qingge enters a Qi Deviation and starts attacking people and everything around him. To protect the servants while his apprentice gets help, Shen Qingqiu fights and manages to tackle Liu Qingge to the ground. When Yue Qingyuan arrives he sees Shen Qingqiu on top of a struggling Liu Qingge. Thinking that Shen Qingqiu attacked Liu Qingge, Yue Qingyuan kicks Shen Qingqiu off him not knowing that Shen Qingqiu was giving Liu Qingge an emergency qi transfusion to stabilize him.
• Hey, You!: The original Shen Qingqiu would never demean himself by actually bothering to call his personal servant, Luo Binghe by his name despite the latter also being his apprentice.
• Heroes Love Dogs: Shen Qingqiu is given a stupid but adorable lapdog which he spoils and name Ben Ben.
• Hopeless Suitor: Liu Qingge falls for Shen Qingqiu knowing there is no chance for them to be together in the way he wants whether due to them being married to Yue Qingyuan and cross polyamory being considered adultery or because Shen Qingqiu is in love with Luo Binghe.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: Most of Yue Qingyuan’s marital problems are his own fault due to his lack of communication and willful ignorance.
• Humiliation Conga: Yue Qinyuan losing his Second Husband plays as this, with Luo Binghe actively making the event as worse as possible for the man. The newly ascended demon lord outright and publically declares he will steal Shen Qingqiu away, in daylight (meaning that Yue Qingyuan is so pathetic a lord he's unable to protect his spouses even without being handicapped by darkness), Shen Qingqiu is actually eager to see his former student, Luo Binghe loudly calls Yue Qingyuan out over his being a shitty husband when he finally comes and the man is forced to see the love of his life willingly leaving him for the demon. And when Yue Qingyuan mourns into his husband's bedroom, he learns said husband threw his courting gifts away a long time ago.

I-N

• I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: Liu Qingge helps Shen Qingqiu escape when Yue Qingyuan forces them to stay behind when facing Luo Binghe. Despite Liu Qingge being in love with Shen Qingqiu and Yue Qingyuan being willing to turn a blind eye if they were to have an affair as it meant Shen Qingqiu stayed. Liu Qingge knows that Shen Qingqiu would only truly be happy by reuniting and leaving with Luo Binghe.
• I Will Wait for You: Shen Qingqiu writes that he will wait for Luo Binghe no matter how long it took for him to become a Demon Lord.
• Imaginary Love Triangle: Shen Qingqiu sees himself in a Love Triangle with Yue Qingyuan and Liu Qingge which he tries to solve by being a Shipper on Deck. It doesn’t work.
• Inadequate Inheritor: Despite Liu Qingge's lack of skill in diplomacy, intrigue and etiquette, he must attend to the position of First Husband. Liu Qingge can't stand talking to people, is very introverted and prefers violence to polite conversation. The demoted Shen Qingqiu has to hold his hand metaphorically and literally through social events and their husband Yue Qingyuan gets fed up with Liu Qingge's ineptitude.
• Inconvenient Attraction: Shen Yuan finds Liu Qingge extremely attractive as a man and a friend. To avoid both of them getting executed for adultery, he never acts on it.
• Incompatible Orientation: Shang Qinghua was forcibly married off by his older brother to be a concubine to Qi Qingqi. Qi Qingqi is a lesbian with an open preference for her female spouses.
• Inherent in the System: The norm is for noble and elite people to show off their wealth and the connections. Spouses have to constantly fight and compete with each other for attention and sources and abuse the lesser spouses or servants. There is constant jockeying for power and social status. It's telling that Shen Qingqiu and Shang Qinghua ultimately marry people who defy the system.
• It's All About Me: Yue Qingyuan has the superficial appearance of a Nice Guy but he's narcissistic and self-centered. He expects Shen Qingqiu to accept him breaking his heart to marry another spouse. Nor does he notice that he unintentionally cut off Shen Qingqiu from any financial support or that he's being mistreated by their servants.
• It's All Junk: Shen Yuan pawns off all the gifts the original Shen Qingqiu was given by Yue Qingyuan throughout their courtship and marriage to support himself and Luo Binghe. While he doesn't have any attachment to the gifts, it makes a clear statement that he wants nothing to do Yue Qingyuan. Yue Qingyuan is devasted to realize that the gifts he given him are gone.
• Irony: The original Shen Qinqqiu had to rescue Yue Qingyuan from a Grand Theft Me by Old Lord Yue. Shen Qinqqiu immediately noticed the clues that Old Lord Yue was preparing Yue Qinqyuan for spiritual possession. Ten years into their marriage, Yue Qinqyuan completely failed to notice the clues that Shen Qinqqiu himself had died from heartbreak and his body was taken over by a transmigator.
• Locked Out of the Loop: When the newly royal Luo Binghe makes his Declaration of Conflict to Yue Qingyuan, everyone lets Shen Qingqiu assume that Luo Binghe intends to bride-nap Liu Qingge. Yue Qingyuan justitiably assumes that Shen Qingqiu would run off willingly if he knew the truth.
• Love Triangle: In the original timeline, both Liu Qingge and Shen Qingqiu fought over Yue Qingyuan's love and favor. Here, Yue Qingyuan and Liu Qingge try to win the affections of the deliberately oblivious Shen Qingqiu only to be blindsided by the arrival of Luo Binghe.
• Marital Rape License: A present fear of Shen Qingqiu. While it is socially unacceptable to rape or coerce one's spouse or concubines, the Lords and Ladies are still seen as entitled to their spouses' bodies. Shen Qingqiu fears that Yue Qingyuan might get tired of him refusing to put out since they are still technically married despite the dissolution of their relationship. Yue Qingyuan never forces the issue despite his increasingly unsubtle and later blatant hints that he would welcome Second Husband back into their marital bed.
• Media Transmigration: Shen Yuan falls asleep before he could finish the harem drama he was reading and wakes up in the body of the villainous rival, Shen Qingqiu of the protagonist, Liu Qingge. As Liu Qingge marries their shared husband.
• Mentor Occupational Hazard: When Shen Qingqiu is initially poisoned with Without A Cure during the first demon raid, he initially assumes that he become a victim of this trope. After lamenting about dying so un-climatically, he assures himself that he died trying to be good mentor to his student. He then uses the last of his strength to praise Luo Binghe before passing out. Shen Qingqiu didn't die, but that was due to quick medical intervention.
• Men Don't Cry: Shen Qingqiu scolds himself for breaking down in grief in front of Liu Qingge. He tries and fails to regain his composure, but Liu Qingge gently insists that he let it out and hugs him.
• Mess of Woe: After his apprentice's apparent death, Shen Qingqiu is so distraught with grief that he completely neglects his personal maintenance. And because his apprentice was his only servant, Shen Qingqiu's wing in the estate falls into disarray. It took Liu Qingge's intervention by giving new servants to Shen Qingqiu to deal with the cleanliness issue.
• Might Makes Right: Luo Binghe learns the hard way that justice is decided by those who are in power. Despite his beloved teacher being genuinely wronged by his husband, Shen Qingqiu has no power to get any recourse.
  Luo Binghe: It was power that determined justice, in the end.
• Missing Time: In the midst of deep grief, Shen Qingqiu would frequently lose track of time and blank out. During his depressive episodes Shen Qingqiu would stand in front of his late apprentice's sword, Zheng Yang and completely miss the passage of time.
• No Hero to His Valet: While Shen Qingqiu is his teacher and master, technically Yue Qingyuan is Luo Binghe's employer. Luo Binghe has no respect for the Lord of the Household, frequently not bothering to hide how much he despises the man. While Yue Qingyuan is lauded by everyone else for his skill and temperment, Luo Binghe hates him being for an awful husband to his beloved teacher.
• No One Could Survive That!: Luo Binghe gets hit in the head by Mobei Jun with such force that his master, Shen Qingqiu helplessly that he just watched his apprentice die. Because Luo Binghe has demonic healing, he's just knocked out.
  • In reverse, Luo Binghe assumes that he just saw his master die before his kidnapper knocks him out. While Shen Qingqiu gotten impaled in the chest with the icicle, he survives due to quick medical intervention.
• No Sympathy: Nobody gives Shen Qingqiu, the original or the transmigrator, any sympathy for being upset at their husband for cheating on them. To them, its just a fact of life that a lord would take multiple spouses to expand their power and ties and Shen Qingqiu is in the wrong for demanding monogamy.
• Non Human Lover Reveal: It is revealed that Luo Binghe is half demon and is currently going around conquering and making a name for himself in the demon realm.
• Not So Above It All: While Yue Qingyuan comes across as patient and level-headed, he admits to himself that he looked forward to breaking up Liu Qingge and Shen Qingqiu's Cat Fights, punishing his haughty and catty Second Spouse. He especially looked forward to Shen Qingqiu trying to curry favor with sex.

O-Z

• Oblivious to Love: Shen Qingqiu is the only person in the cast who hasn't noticed that Luo Binghe is in love with him.
• Offscreen Romance: Shang Qinghua's and Mobei-jun's romance happens largely off page as well, though some of it has been detailed in the extras. Their wedding, however, remains off-page.
• Only a Flesh Wound: Shen Qingqiu gets impaled with a giant icicle in the chest. Thankfully while the cavalry was late, the medical intervention certainly wasn't.
• Only Has Same-Sex Admirers: Shen Qingqiu is the "love of my life" of three different men.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Shen Qingqiu normally is passive-aggressive to Yue Qingyuan otherwise just ignoring him outright, not deeming worth his time. So it is a sign how bad things have gotten when Shen Qingqiu becomes openly and hostile to him.
• Ordered to Die: In the original story Shen Yuan read, Shen Qingqiu is ordered by his husband Yue Qingyuan to hang him when he latter hands him a silk rope as punishment for his attempted murder and sabotage of Liu Qingge. Even Shen Yuan thought the punishment was too much for the villain's crimes and bordered on Disproportionate Retribution. The crimes Shen Qingqiu was accused of were much severe than that to warrant a punishment. But Shen Qingqiu was actually innocent.
• Passed in Their Sleep: Shen Yuan died in his sleep before he could finish the novel he was reading.
• Please Spare Him, My Liege!: The reason Shang Qinghua helps Shen Qingqiu is in the hope the latter would convince Luo Binghe to spare his beloved king.
• Poor Communication Kills: Yue Qingyuan's inability to concisely tell people what he feels or of his intentions doom his marriage as both his spouses get sick of him.
• Posthumous Character: The original Shen Qingqiu died from heartbreak to allow Shen Yuan's transmigration. Shen Yuan has to balance Shen Qingqiu's past actions and relationships as he tries to adapt a new world pretending to be him.
• Precocious Crush: Luo Binghe's obsession with Shen Qingqiu begins right when he's employed in Shen Qingqiu's service,when he was around 11-13.
• Privilege Makes You Evil: Yue Qingyuan was once Yue Qi, Shen Jiu's fellow ex-slave. They both worked tirelessly to ascend the social ladder from the original position from the bottom of society. Shen Jiu and Yue Qi, then Shen Qingqiu and Yue Qingyuan reach the highest rank of their society, become respected and cultured immortal cultivators and have a loving and faithful marriage. Then Yue Qingyuan lets the privileges and power of his rank go to his head. He starts to believe in the gossip decrying Shen Qingqiu as a possessive viper and that as a Lord, Yue Qingyuan deserved more. That Yue Qingyuan should act like the Lord he is and get more noble and richer spouses instead of being faithful to the nobody commoner he's with.
• Rags to Royalty: When Shen Qingqiu decides to divorce Yue Qingyuan, he's no longer a nobleman's spouse he's simply a commoner. Then when he marries Luo Binghe, who is functionally Emperor of the Demonic Realm, he ascends to Empress.
• Rebellious Princess: Liu Qingge finds the life of a high-ranking nobleman insufferable, being much happier travelling to fight demons and exotic monsters. While Liu Qingge is a gifted warrior, he lacks the political acumen to be Heir to the Liu Clan and instead is a Trophy Wife fit for marriage alliances. Liu Qingge's blunt nature and disregard for politics and etiquette bite Liu Qingge in the ass. In the original novel, it made his position as First Husband very fragile to the machinations of the jealous and bitter Second Husband. Here Liu Qingge is unable to handle the responsibilities of running the household and has to literally be handheld through his duties by Second Husband which earns the frustration of their shared lord Yue Qingyuan who doesn't understand his new spouse is having so much trouble learning despite being born into nobility.
• Reforged Weapon: Shen Qingqiu has his late apprentice's sword, Zheng Yang, reforged to act as a memorial after it was shattered to pieces. Realistically the sword remained a memorial even after its wielder turned out to be alive.
• Rejected Apology: Several times Yue Qingyuan apologizes to Shen Qingqiu. Several times Shen Qingqiu rejects those apologies because they are terrible apologies that backhanded attempt to gaslight him and don't address the actual wrong.
• Relationship Upgrade: Shen Qingqiu and Luo Binghe finally have a true romance once Shen Qingqiu comes to terms with his feelings.
• Relationship-Salvaging Disaster: Zigzagged. When Shen Qingqiu is nearly poisoned during Sha Hualing's attempted kidnapping of Liu Qingge, Yue Qingyuan is faced that his actual first husband could have died. Yue Qingyuan is reminded how much he loves Shen Qingqiu and dedicates to rekindling their relationship. However Shen Qingqiu sees his regard as flighty and unreliable considering the latter took another spouse despite his promise to be faithful and does not reciprocate. At all.
• Remembered Too Late: Played for Drama as Yue Qingyuan only realizes his wrongs when its already too late to rectify them. When Shen Qingqiu is on his deathbed due to a demon attack, Yue Qingyuan realizes how much he loves him. But when Shen Qingqiu survives, he refuses to acknowledge Yue Qingyuan's attempts to rekindle their relationship due to Yue Qingyuan's previous lack of remorse. Yue Qingyuan unintentionally continues to allow the servants to mistreat and neglect Shen Qingqiu and cut him off financially. It takes Liu Qingge to completely rectify that situation with Yue Qingyuan realizing in hindsight.
• Restrained Revenge: When he decides to willingly leave with Luo Binghe, Shen Yuan purposely gives Yue Qingyuan's love letters to Shen Qingqiu with the message "good memories should still be cherished in the end." Yue Qingyuan takes the left-behind letters as a rather pointed reminder that everything started due to his unfaithfulness.
• Riches to Rags: Shang Qinghua was a Self-Made Man and was considerably wealthy due to reinventing modern cosmetics and board games. Then his older brother backstabs him to take their company by selling him off as a concubine. To a lesbian lord, so there would be no way for him to gain any favor. So he goes from independently wealthy company owner to a glorified servant living in the smallest rooms, most of his possessions sold off.
• Sacred Hospitality: Despite nobles' dislike of the upstart spouse Shen Qingqiu, due to his husband's estate being so close to the Emperor's palace they are forced to be civil with him.
• Sarcastic Confession: Sick of Yue Qingyuan's pleas to not leave him, Shen Qingqiu bluntly tells him the man he knew as "A-Jiu" is dead and has been dead since Yue Qingyuan's wedding of Liu Qingge. Shen Qingqiu means that literally and was tryingto hurt Yue Qingyuan with the truth that his actual husband is dead. Yue Qingyuan thought was he was being metaphorical and telling him that it is Yue Qingyuan's own fault that Shen Qingqiu doesn't love him anymore.
• Safety in Indifference: Ironically, Shen Yuan's biggest advantage as Shen Qingqiu is that he is completely indifferent to Yue Qingyuan and Liu Qingge's supposed love story. He is more than happy to avoid marital strife by getting along with his fellow spouse instead of fighting for Yue Qingyuan's attention.
• Second Love: The world sees Luo Binghe and Shen Qingqiu's marriage as this, not knowing that Shen Qingqiu actually is a transmigrator and Luo Binghe really is his first love.
• Seduction-Proof Marriage: Luo Binghe proudly and openly refused the numerous offers from demons to be his brides and concubines and turned away the offer of getting Professional Sex Ed from Madam Meiyin, the most sought after succubus to save himself for marriage with Shen Qingqiu! He continues to get offers after his marriage as well but his heart is only for Shen Qingqiu.
• Selective Obliviousness: Shen Qingqiu often fails to notice when people are romantically interested in him. In the case of Yue Qingyuan, Shen Qingqiu doesn't want the interest of a faithless adulterer husband who's in the love with the person he accidentally bodyjacked. In the case of Liu Qingge and Luo Binghe, even the suspicion of adultery can get him and them executed. Shen Qingqiu become so used to denial that he's completely blindsided when he realizes his own feelings for Luo Binghe.
• Servile Snarker: As Shen Qingqiu's personal servant and apprentice, Luo Binghe does to find the most find the most polite ways to tell Yue Qingyuan to fuck off.
• Sexless Marriage: Shen Qingqiu refuses to have sex with his cheating husband Yue Qingyuan. Once Yue Qingyuan and Liu Qingge's relationship cools, their sex life terminates as well.
• Sheep in Sheep's Clothing: What Shen Qingqiu comes across to Liu Qingge. Shen Qingqiu was rumored to be a petty schemer with a massive possessive streak towards their shared husband Yue Qingyuan. Shen Qingqiu turns out to be helpful and kind, being the only one to help Liu Qingge adjust to being First Husband.
• Shipper with an Agenda: Shen Qingqiu pushes Yue Qingyuan and Liu Qingge together in hopes of preventing his own death. He is quite frustrated that without him being the villain, their relationship fizzles out.
• Sleeping Single: Per their noble rank, the Lord of the Household and his Spouses don't actually share bedchambers. They all live in seperate wings of the manor with the Lord visiting the Spouse in their wing for company or sex. Shen Qingqiu quite relieved that he has his own private space to himself.
• Spared, but Not Forgiven: Luo Binghe despises Yue Qingyuan for the latter's neglect and abuse of Shen Qingqiu, his inability to actually be helpful and trapping his beloved master in a loveless marriage after breaking his promise to be faithful. Luo Binghe would rather ruin or kill him but decides to spare him due to Shen Qingqiu, the wronged party, interceding on Yue Qingyuan's behalf.
• Social Climber: Shen Qingqiu had to scheme and manovuer his way from ex-slave commoner to respected and feared nobleman's husband and protect their new social rank from others.
• Stealing the Credit: Shang Qinghua's brother stole his brother's ideas and their company before forcing him in an arranged marriage knowing that Shang Qinghua would be forced to give up being a businessman.
• Stress Vomit: The realization of Luo Binghe's romantic devotion to him, his own requited feelings and the fear of Narrative Destiny potentially killing him off drives Shen Qingqiu to lose his lunch in the nearest wastebasket.
• Succession Crisis: The Demon World was left without a king ever since Tianlang Jun died.
• Suddenly Suitable Suitor: As a former street rat and apprentice to Second Husband Shen Qingqiu, Luo Binghe's best prospect was to be a lower-ranking spouse or concubine to a noble family. Then he realizes his heritage as demonic royalty and tops it by becoming head ruler of the Demonic Realm so he could challenge Shen Qingqiu's actual husband for his hand.
• Suicide Watch: Due to his severe depression and self-neglect, Shen Qingqiu was closely watched by Liu Qingge. Liu Qingge goes out of his way for them to do activities together so Shen Qingqiu can take his mind off his grief.
• Sustained Misunderstanding: Shen Qingqiu secretly meets with Shang Qinghua who acts as a messenger to Luo Binghe, who's trapped in the Demon World. Everyone else assumes they had an affair at first and when they heard Shen Qingqiu's botched explanation think that Shang Qinghua is a scammer taking advantage of Shen Qingqiu's grief to steal money and artifacts from him.
• Sympathy for the Devil: Shen Jiu was frankly a horrible person who lashed out at people more powerless than he was, who didn't deserve it. But Shen Jiu is betrayed by the love of his life and demoted in the very house he helped built. Shen Jiu experienced a life of degradation and slavery and thought he finally had his happy ending. The love of his life betrays him by taking a more higher-bred spouse after promising him monogamy. All his attempts to win his husband back seemingly results in him being forced to commit suicide. Shen Yuan finds the original Shen Qingqiu despicable but pitiful.
• Tap on the Head: Mobei Jun hits Luo Binghe’s head with such force that Shen Qingqiu justifiably believes that he died. Unbeknownst to him, Luo Binghe’s demonic Healing Factor only had the punch knock him out.
• Teacher/Student Romance: The heart is Shen Qingqiu, Luo Binghe's shifu, falling in love with his disciple when that latter comes to his own.
• Technical Virgin: Shen Qingqiu who had been happily married for a decade and sexually abused as a slave is definitely not a virgin. Shen Yuan, who transmigrated into him, never had a date in his life and avoided sleeping his "husband" is still a virgin in spite of him being married.
• The Lady's Favour: Shen Qingqiu gives his sword Xiu Ya to Shang Qinghua so he could deliver it to Luo Binghe as proof of Shen Qingqiu's survival. While practically, the sword was meant to be proof that Shang Qinghua couldn't fake so Luo Binghe would stop trying to avenge Shen Qingqiu's death and be a weapon. Shen Qingqiu also gives it so Luo Binghe would not give into the despair of being trapped in Hell and come back to Shen Qingqiu.
• The Matchmaker: Shen Qingqiu attempts to be one for Liu Qingge and Yue Qingyuan to no avail. More seriously he attempts to find a good marriage for his disciple so he won't be stuck in a shitty marriage like he is.
• The Oath-Breaker: Luo Binghe deems Yue Qingyuan to one after finding out that Yue Qingyuan promised his Shizun Shen Qingqiu on paper that he would be faithful and never take on other spouses to convince the latter to marry him. Luo Binghe addresses Yue Qingyuan solely as "Oathbreaker" which spreads to the rest of the Demon Realm when word spreads of Luo Binghe's intended.
• The One That Got Away: Shen Qingqiu becomes this for Liu Qingge and Yue Qingyuan for seperate reasons once the latter goes willingly with Luo Binghe. Liu Qingge grew to love Shen Qingqiu through their marriage to Yue Qingyuan and stepped aside for the latter to find true happiness. Yue Qingyuan laments taking the love of his life for granted until it was too late.
• The Power of Apathy: Shen Yuan as Shen Qingqiu avoids the original's mistakes by lacking any sort of emotional investment in the original Shen Qingqiu's relationships. The original Shen Qingqiu attempted to recapture his husband Yue Qingyuan's attention and frequently sabotaged Trophy Wife Liu Qingge. As it eventually leads to Shen Qingqiu being ordered to commit suicide, Shen Yuan knows that is the path he wants to avoid. Seeing how Yue Qingyuan is a total stranger to him and an adulterous one at that, Shen Yuan doesn't give a damn about their marriage. Instead of seeing the Trophy Wife Liu Qingge as a rival, Shen Yuan's objectivity and self-preservation leads them to becoming dear friends. His total apathy and refusal to act like the histrionic jealous spouse he was supposed to be quickly has things go Off the Rails.
• The Unishment: Shen Qingqiu's first confinement after Liu Qingge and Yue Qingyuan's wedding. It allows the recently transmigrated Shen Yuan time to regain his bearings and formulate a plan of action. More importantly, Shen Yuan uses the enforced isolation to access his situation and gain the loyalty of his most mobile asset, his servant/apprentice Luo Binghe.
• There Is Another: Shen Qingqiu finds that he isn't the only transmigrator in Shang Qinghua.
• Thinks Like a Romance Novel: Luo Binghe is a huge romantic and firm believer in True Love. So he's extremely horrified on his beloved teacher's behalf when said teacher's husband takes other spouses and demotes his teacher in the estate he helped built. Especially since Yue Qingyuan promised Shen Qingqiu in writing that he would be faithful only to him. Luo Binghe very pointedly throws a lavish wedding procession when he rescues Shen Qingqiu and makes sure to properly court him afterwards to strengthen their feelings for each other. He further reconstructs the trope by being aware of the unfair power dynamics and the emotional consequences of past romantic betrayal. Binghe made sure to only start officially courting once Shen Qingqiu was comfortable with it. In defiance of all social expectation and rumor, Luo Binghe remains faithful only to Shen Qingqiu.
• This Is Unforgivable!: Yue Qingyuan's infidelity is this to Shen Yuan and Luo Binghe. No matter how nice Yue Qingyuan seems Shen Yuan never forgets that his predecessor died due to Yue Qingyuan's unfaithfulness. Luo Binghe detests Yue Qingyuan for breaking his marital vows and his neglect forcing Shen Qingqiu to have to fend for himself.
• Through His Stomach: Shen Qingqiu warms up to Luo Binghe quickly after the latter sneaks out and makes a delicious roast chicken after they were deliberately not given any food.
• Top Wife: A source of conflict in the original timeline and the events of the story. The original Shen Qingqiu was Yue Qingyuan's only spouse and had all the power to run his household and protect him. However the Emperor disfavored him and had Shen Qingqiu demoted to Second Husband, which wouldn't have been an issue...hadn't Yue Qingyuan married an another spouse making the new spouse First Husband and demoting Shen Qingqiu despite his seniority. In the original timeline, Shen Qingqiu constantly feuded with Liu Qingge to take back his power. In the new timeline with Shen Yuan transmigrating into Shen Qingqiu, Liu Qingge finds himself unable to handle the social and fiscal responsibilities of being First Husband.
• Trauma Button: Shen Qingqiu attempts to thank Liu Qingge for using his authority to give the former new servants after the loss of his last servant. This triggers the thought of the loss of his beloved servant/apprentice and causes him to start crying.
• Trophy Wife: After decade of marriage with Shen Qingqiu during his rise to power, Yue Qingyuan puts aside his promise of fidelity to marry a more high-born, connected, wealthier, younger and beautiful Liu Qingge. Shen Qingqiu understandably feels betrayed that after his love and hard work to protect and elevate Yue Qingyuan, he's being demoted. Liu Qingge resents that despite his strength and skill in combat, he's a glorified status symbol instead of a master of his own fate.
• Tsundere: The original Shen Qingqiu was the type to act really harsh and cold in public, but otherwise sweet and affectionate in private. So Yue Qingyuan is rather distressed when Shen Qingqiu doesn't flip between hot and cold and instead is geniunely indifferent to the former.
  • The new Shen Qingqiu, the transmigrated Shen Yuan, is rather affectionate by action. He would lather attention unto his student Luo Binghe and be helpful and gently stern with Liu Qingge. Shen Qingqiu is genuinely cold and dismissive to servants who mistreated him and to Yue Qingyuan, who he sees as an unreliable adulterer.
• Uptown Girl:
  • Yue Qi was a street rat revealed to be a nobleman's son while his love Shen Jiu was an ex-slave. The difference between their stations cause considerable tensions as Yue Qingyuan gives into social pressure to take a more wealthier and high-born person as a second spouse.
  • Luo Binghe was a former street urchin turned servant in love with his nobleman teacher Shen Qingqiu. Only for Luo Binghe to come back as the Emperor of the Demon Realm and Shen Qingqiu becoming a commoner after making the decision to divorce his noble husband.
• Unwanted Spouse:
  • Shen Yuan did not ask to be transmigrated into a married man. Especially since Shen Yuan is stuck married to an adulterous husband as a result.
  • While initially thoroughly in love with his A-Jiu, once Yue Qingyuan rose high enough he began to view Shen Jiu as a burden. He saw Shen Jiu as too abrasive, too cutthroat and untrusting. Yue Qingyuan is rather easily manipulated into getting a second spouse, which leads to his downfall regardless of timeline.
  • Over the course of their marriage Liu Qingge and Yue Qingyuan begin to view the other as this. Yue Qingyuan is tired of Liu Qingge's lack of social graces, overly blunt and terse speech and lack of desire to learn anything to be a properly noble spouse. Liu Qingge views Yue Qingyuan as an unreliable, neglectful, distant ditherer. Liu Qingge begins to learn to not expect anything from Yue Qingyuan and to expect him to botch it if he does anything.
• Undying Loyalty: Luo Binghe is so loyal to Shen Qingqiu that not only would he fight Yue Qingyuan, his actual boss on his behalf but he would also take over the Demon Realm in order to come back to him.
• Vicariously Ambitious: Shen Jiu helped his husband Yue Qingyuan ascend the aristocracy for their own protection but also be able to access the privileges and wealth of being nobility.
  • Shen Yuan as Shen Qingqiu becomes this to Luo Binghe, advising him to not alienate potential allies and make him willing to learn from others beside Luo Binghe considering Shen Qingqiu to be his only master. If Luo Binghe ascends to take his birthright as Emperor of the Demon Realm then Luo Binghe would have the power to help the both of them.
• Warts and All: Shen Yuan finds the original Shen Qingqiu to be loathsome but pitiful. Regardless of how the original Shen Qingqiu suffered from snooty and cruel servants, a neglectful husband and a society that looked down him, it didn't excuse the horrific abuse he would put Luo Binghe, his child apprentice. Nor did it excuse his mistreatment of Liu Qingge. But Shen Yuan understood that Shen Qingqiu was a victim of circumstances beyond his control that painted him much worse than he was with all his geninuine kindness ignored, dismissed or crushed.
• We Want Our Jerk Back!: Yue Qingyuan is bewildered by the kinder and more mellow version of his husband Shen Qingqiu. He misses the scheming and resentful version of his husband who would have fought and seduced his way into Yue Qingyuan's attentions. As opposed to the kinder and more graceful version that fell out of love with him and doesn't want anything to do with him.
• Weapon Tombstone: Shen Qingqiu puts his apprentice's sword Zheng Yang under the bamboo in his courtyard to act as a grave marker.
• What the Hell, Hero?: Shen Yuan considers the whole plot of the novel he's trapped in to be Yue Qingyuan's fault. Events of the story just cement this belief even further.
• What You Are in the Dark: Shen Qingqiu saw Luo Binghe as an innocent side-character who was unjustly mistreated and abused by his master lashing out at someone who couldn't fight back. Shen Qingqiu thought Luo Binghe as someone who lacks the protection of a high-ranking family or the Plot Armor of a Protagonist. Knowing that no one else would care if Luo Binghe lived or died, Shen Qingqiu decides to do everything in his limited power to give his disciple a thorough education and good future. This ends up paying off in the long-run as Luo Binghe's better upbringing prevents his dark descent into Villain Protagonist and rapist tyrant.
• What Does She See in Him?:
  • Shen Yuan considered Yue Qingyuan to be an adulterous, self-centered "Nice Guy™" and wondered why Liu Qingge and Shen Qingqiu fought over him.
  • Many nobles wondered why the high-ranking noble and fair Yue Qingyuan stuck with a conniving, manipulative and possessive low-born viper that is Shen Qingqiu. Over time, Liu Qingge and Luo Binghe learn of Shen Qingqiu's kinder and patient side of their personality and realize why Yue Qingyuan fell.
  Liu Qingge: The snake was no coiled viper, but a cobra spreading his hood to shield others from the rain.
• Wife Husbandry: Zigzagged. Shen Qingqiu can tell that his student Luo Binghe is very aesthetically pleasing but still viewed him as a child during the latter's teen years. Its only after not seeing each other for five years when Luo Binghe came of age as the king of his own realm, does he make Shen Qingqiu's heart race.
  • Inverted with Luo Binghe. He pretty much in love with his teacher since the latter's change of heart when he was 15. Luo Binghe is the one who pursues Shen Qingqiu and holds the social power in their relationship.
• World's Most Beautiful Woman: Shen Qingqiu is turned into this as a result of Gossip Evolution and an explanation to why a high-ranking nobleman with the Emperor's favor and the Ruler of Demon World refused any potential spouse and sought a married lowborn human upstart. Both humans and demons reason that Shen Qingqiu must be exceptionally beautiful for the Demon King to take him as his First and only Spouse.
• Wrong Genre Savvy: Shen Yuan taught he was in a conventional Harem drama with consequence that his role was to be the loser as the protagonist ascended. He's actually the backstory of a Dark Fantasy for the Villain Protagonist.
• You Are Worth Hell: Finding out Shen Qingqiu's survival and wishes for Luo Binghe to grow into his own power drives Luo Binghe into the ardous task of taking over the Demon Realm
• You Called Me "X"; It Must Be Serious: Luo Binghe is rather taken aback when his master actually calls him by name instead using Hey, You! or beast. He is unaware that his master actually knew his name.
• You Never Did That for Me: The original Shen Qingqiu resented Yue Qingyuan always taking Liu Qingge's side and giving him unquestioned authority over the household which Shen Qingqiu had to fight for when he was the only spouse. Liu Qingge resents how Yue Qingyuan prefers to be emotionally vulnerable with Shen Qingqiu

WARNING: BELOW ARE UNMARKED SPOILERS FOR 'I WISH YOU WERE MY HUSBAND

Tropes Unique to More Wishes

More Wishes

• Adaptation Species Change: Several entirely human characters in their source material are revealed to be demon-blooded.
  • Wei Wuxian has Heavenly Demon blood, something he finds quite funny as it means Lan Qiren was right to call him a menace to the cultivation world.
  • Mo Xuanyu is half ice demon through his mother, who was a cousin to Mobei-jun.
  • Mu Qingfang's father is a cat demon who hid himself into the human world.
• Adoptive Name Change: Shen Qingqiu offers to adopt his second apprentice and give him his family name. Despite Bai Jiu trying to cover up how touched he was by the gesture by complaining that Shen Qingqiu doesn't have any outside family connection, he changes his name to Shen Jiu.
• Animal Motifs:
  • Mobei-jun compares Shang Qinghua to a spider, the tiny, jumping kind. It's furthered by the human's ability to plot and weave intricate schemes.
  • Shen Jiu is often mistaken for a fox demon, having haughty good looks, a heaping dose of cunning and the habit to hide things in holes.
• Awful Truth: Yue Qingyuan finds out that he broke his beloved Shen Jiu's heart so badly that it killed him and the latter had been dead for nearly two decades. The man he thought was Shen Jiu was an accidental Body Snatcher. Who was not being metaphorical when the latter told him that the man he knew as his husband of ten years was dead. Which he only realizes when he puts together that his real husband reincarnated.
• The Beard: Mobei-jun has a Single-Target Sexuality for Shang Qinghua, but lacks the social clout and power to openly scorn a harem. He solves the problem by marrying a couple of lesbians who are more interested in each other than him, with his husband's blessing.
  • Yue Qingyuan offers to marry a teenaged Luo Binghe who's about to age out of his apprenticeship because he noted how much Shen Qingqiu cared for the youth. Luo Binghe acknowledges it's a pragmatic solution but rejects it because he's too romantic a soul to not Marry for Love, he considers Yue Qingyuan's character repellent and finally, a man already heartbroken by his husband's unfaithfulness having to see said husband marry yet another guy, the man's own apprentice? Not cool at all.
• Big Brother Instinct: Even beaten down by rape and imprisonment into hell, Lan Xichen won't hesitate to ask his demon lord of a husband to release his younger sibling and is implied to have plotted with Wei Wuxian in order to neutralize said demon lord as a threat to said sibling. His devotion is reciprocated, as Lan Zhan refuses to leave Lan Xichen behind when given the opportunity to go away.
  • Wei Wuxian infiltrating Luo Binghe's harem as a concubine in order to rescue Jiang Cheng, because their sister asked him.
• Blaming the Victim: Despite both of his spouses leaving him, people blame Yue Qingyuan’s spouses and view Yue Qingyuan as a victim. Both of his spouses left him for being an emotionally abusive and unsupportive husband but they are blamed by the public as being at fault for their failed marriage. Shen Qingqiu is blamed as an adulterer and a Gold Digger and Liu Qingge for being too frigid.
• Blessed with Suck: Normally Reincarnate in Another World means the protagonist gets to be smarter, stronger and more skilled than normal people. Shang Qinghua's past life knowledge hampered his development growing up and made him unsettling to his mundane family, especially his brother.
• Born from Plants: Luo Binghe and Shen Qingqiu's child is born from a magic fruit that they grow from seed by infusing with their qi.
• Bridezilla: Shang Qinghua is one, entirely unintentionally and without even knowing it's his wedding, in his determination to ensure that Mobei-jun's wedding is perfect as a display of devotion to Mobei-jun and to ensure that his king's as-yet-unknown-to-him bride has no reason to be displeased with Shang Qinghua.
• Comically Missing the Point: When Mobei-jun tells Shang Qinghua to organize a wedding, he fails to recognizes its supposed to be their wedding. Shang Qinghua tries to hold back his tears, wondering who his King is marrying while trying make the best wedding possible.
• Culture Clash: Demons and humans have sufficiently divergent societies to ensure this.
  • Mobei-jun is floored when Shang Qinghua explains to him that no, a human spouse doesn't enjoy to be hit. The ice demon feels very guilty afterwards and does his best to ensure the human won't take another beating.
  • A demon dowry is the spouse's personal property, to ensure a possibility of leaving if one doesn't feel happy with their situation. A human dowry is seized by the lord or lady, leaving the spouse without any ressources.
• Daddy DNA Test: Confused at Shen Qingqiu’s kindness to him, Bai Jiu tries rationalizing it as Bai Jiu being his secret illegitimate son. When he manages to covertly steal some of his teacher’s blood for a paternity test, Bai Jiu is left only more confused when it turns out they aren’t related.
• Deadly Doctor: Mu Qingfang's medical knowledge regarding demon physiology is a precious asset in his work... and a precious asset to his decision to poison Bingge, as he's the only person able to do it and make it stick.
• Dominant Species Genes: Fruit Baby or Luo Lingxi, is born half-demon despite having a half-demon and full human parents. It's due to their Heavenly Demon heritage.
• Entertainingly Wrong: Shang Qinghua's ability to know things he really shouldn't intrigues Mobei-jun, and the ice demon ultimately decides the human is some kind of seer.
• Evil Me Scares Me: Bingmei is horror-struck when he's stranded into the original novel's setting in which he became a bloodthirsty conqueror who abducts, rapes and abuses any pretty young man with the misfortune to stir his lust.
• Florence Nightingale Effect: Mobei-jun grows interested in Shang Qinghua as he comes to the weird little human for being healed from curses, poisons and various injuries.
• Forced to Watch: Luo Binghe, still angry at Mobei Jun for ruining his and Shizun's lives, contemplated having Mobei Jun's trusted subordinate Shang Qinghua beaten black and blue to punish the both of them.
• Forgiven, but Not Forgotten: Even if Mobei-jun swore himself to him as a faithful lieutenant, Luo Binghe is still smarting about the dude stealing him away to Hell, traumatizing him and Shen Qingqiu in the process. So he forces the ice demon out of his ancestral palace, makes clear that he will never leave Shen Qingqiu in the same room than Mobei-jun, and is okay with beating Shang Qinghua as retaliation. Mobei-jun concedes Luo Binghe has justified grounds for a grudge and doesn't protest his overall treatment.
• Guy on Guy Is Hot: Shen Qingqiu implies he and Liu Qingge are together in order to freak Bingge, only for the impostor to be rather excited by the idea.
• His Name Really Is "Barkeep": Mobei-jun's name is Mo Beijun.
• Hoist by Their Own Petard: Shang Qinghua's brother screws over Shang Qinghua to take sole control of the business. He ends up losing said business due to bad business decisions, inability to keep with customer demand by creating new products.
• I Am Not Weasel: A young Bai Jiu is mistaken for a fox demon by the demon children for his good looks, sly nature and habit of digging holes to hide things. They are shocked that he looks and acts so normal for a human.
• I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: Zigzagged. It's Played for Laughs when Shang Qinghua initially finds out that his King is married is to try to organize the best wedding possible while wondering who his King is marrying. Not realizing that he's organizing his own wedding. But Shang Qinghua's mentality is deconstructed as he's suffered from so much rejection and abuse that he didn't realize that Mobei Jun returned his affections.
• Ignored Epiphany: Shang Qinghua's brother felt guilt about forcing his brother into a miserable marriage where the higher-ranking wives bully and mistreat him to the point of suffering nightmares over it....only to dismiss it as rumors and blame sad nightmares as his brother cursing him.
• Internal Reveal: After the Bingge/Bingmei debacle, Shen Yuan reveals his true identity to Luo Binghe as a transmigrator that took over. Luo Binghe is quietly relieved that his abusive and cruel master and his kind and gentle one are separate people instead of the result of a possibly temporary personality change.
• Karma Houdini: After destroying Yue Qingyuan and Shen Qingqiu's marriage and Yue Qingyuan being driven to depression over Shen Qingqiu leaving him, Liu Qingge divorces him as well. With Liu Qingge remaining Shen Qingqiu's friend and a frequent guest.
• Locked into Strangeness: After learning the Awful Truth about Shen Yuan transmigrating into Shen Qingqiu's body without his knowledge, Yue Qingyuan suffers a qi deviation that leaves him with pure white hair.
• My God, What Have I Done?: Not only Yue Qingyuan's husband was replaced and he didn't notice, the substitution was only possible to begin with because Shen Qingqiu died from the grief of his spouse breaking his vow to love no one but him. When he's finally informed of this, Yue Qingyuan suffers such a violent qi deviation he barely survives.
  • Shang Qinghua carries a lot of guilt for making his novel's setting so god-damned awful, but it's mainly apparent when he meets Mobei-jun and remembers exactly how Bingge tortured and broke the ice demon.
• Never My Fault: Shang Qinghua's brother blames him for everything that went wrong in his life from his failing business, his difficulty having children, his wife's illness to his hairloss as Shang Qinghua cursing him. Shang Qinghua never thought of him since the latter forcibly married him off 50 years ago.
• The Nicknamer: Shen Jiu gives his friends nicknames based on their appearances and species, outright refusing to use their real names, Snow Bug ^note Mo Hongwen and Flaming Roach ^note Huo Zhenglang
• No Doubt the Years Have Changed Me: Shang Qinghua can barely recognize his brother: he lose all his hair, has no chin and looks very shabby. While said brother seethes over how Shang Qinghua still looks as young as they last saw each other.
• Parents as People: Shang Qinghua's parents love their children but their affection is tainted by their own problems and lack of understanding of them. Shang Qinghua's father is neglectful and weak-willed drunkard while their mother is the breadwinner that has no time for them who is a Domestic Abuser to their father when she is there. Regardless, Shang Qinghua's father is the only parent that offered unconditional love and support compared to the rest of the family. By modern standards, Shang Qinghua considers them both abusive and neglectful but tries his best to be a fillial son to them.
• Pygmalion Snap Back: While he's happy that his master's personality changed to a more kinder and gentle one. Luo Binghe is afraid that the personality change is temporary and that Shen Qingqiu could potentially snapback into his original, more cruel personality. Shen Qingqiu never does, but that was due to him literally being a different person.
• Oblivious to Love: Shang Qinghua doesn't recognize that Mobei Jun is genuinely in love with and unconditionally trusts and cares for him. This is due to two literal lifetimes of neglect, abuse and manipulation. His families either severely neglected or used him for everything he was worth and then tossed him aside. His attempts to find love with either his family or his arranged marriage either backfired or went ignored. Mobei Jun learns he has to be very upfront and unsubtle with his feelings for Shang Qinghua to learn that his feelings are requited.
• Offscreen Breakup: Liu Qingge divorcing Yue Qingyuan happens off page.
• The One That Got Away: Bingge never truly got over the original Shen Qingqiu's rejection of him, obsessively taking any man reminding him of his former Shizun into his harem, admitting he still fantasizes about him in a sexual way and trying to persuade Shen Yuan to marry him.
• Raise Him Right This Time: The original Shen Jiu ends up being reincarnated. While the reborn Bao Jiu was also a slave, he rescued in Lord Luo Binghe's antislavery sting operations and taken in as an apprentice by Shen Qingqiu. Given the education, opportunity, unconditional love and friendships his original never got results in the reborn Shen Jiu being a more well-adjusted and better person.
• Reincarnation Romance: The reborn Shen Jiu considers Yue Qingyuan as more than acceptable for a potential groom, and Yue Qingyuan is more than happy to be reunited with his only love.
• Refuge in Audacity: Wei Wuxian decides to believe Bing-mei accidentally fell into another world because his story is too ridiculous to not be true.
• Related in the Adaptation:
  • Yu Ziyuan being Yue Qingyuan's older sister through their shared father, it makes him the maternal if estranged uncle to Jiang Cheng and Jiang Yanli.
  • Mo Xuanyu's mother was a demon noblewoman from a minor branch to the Mo clan, so he's a cousin to Mobei-jun.
• Revenge by Proxy: Apparently a staple of the demon society, since Shang Qinghua being beaten by Luo Binghe or Shen Qingqiu for Mobei-jun's offenses against them isn't considered as noteworthy.
• Roadtrip Romance: The reincarnated Shen Jiu and Yue Qingyuan go on a roadtrip adventure with some other people including the fallen god Xie Lian in the extras.
• Shapeshifting Lover: Mu Qingfang's father is a demon who rather enjoys pretending to be the family's pet cat. His children occasionally point how unrealistic his disguise is — a mundane pet cat doesn't reach your knees!
• Slave Liberation: As Demon Lord Luo Binghe illegalized slavery and the trafficking of humans into the Demon Realm. He runs several sting operations on the slavers who went underground in the black market. Luo Binghe would give the option to any surviving slaves to either take reparations and go their own way to the human realm, let Luo Binghe connect them to services to help them find jobs and rebuild their lives with his human allies or the least popular option: stay in the demon realm and become a well-salaried servant to him. He and Shen Qingqiu come across the reincarnated Shen Jiu who gets the option of being the latter's apprentice.
• Sympathy for the Devil: Several years after leaving his household, Luo Binghe still sneers at Yue Qingyuan for being an awful husband who neglected Shen Qingqiu but he doesn't feel particularly happy when the man is utterly broken by the Awful Truth that his behaviour was responsible for his one true love's death by grief.
• Too Kinky to Torture: After learning Bingge is impersonating his husband, Shen Qingqiu implies he's having sex with Liu Qingge, berates and threatens the demon tyrant with bodily harm. He only manages to turn Bingge on, which disgusts him a lot.
• Tragic Villain: Bingge the demon tyrant won't hesitate to slaughter and abuse everyone on his path, but he never truly managed to move on from his horrific childhood and is only repeating the cycle of abuse he witnessed in his former household.
• Violently Protective Girlfriend: Shang Qinghua is rather upset when something or someone threatens his king — he openly votes to kill Bingge (who canonically raped and enthralled Mobei-jun) and burns alive several cultivators having attempted to set a trap for the ice demon. Mobei-jun finds this behaviour adorable if rather baffling since Shang Qinghua is much more squishy than him.
• Windows of the Soul: Yue Qingyuan finally gets a hint about the transmigration when he looks at Shen Jiu's eyes and realizes his former husband is standing right there.
• World's Smallest Violin: A regional variant when Shen Yuan shuts Bingge's attempt to pose as a martyr.
  "Oh boo fucking hoo, I’m Blackened Luo Binghe, I have a harem of thirty and Liu Qingge as my First Husband but I never treat any of my lovers well enough to make them not want to murder me, and now I’m sad because I’m going to have to go back to counting my mountains of gold and sleeping with a different man every night. Someone, please find the world’s tiniest guqin to play a lament for me on!"
• You Remind Me of X: Something that makes Bing-mei extremely uneasy in the original setting.
  • Bingge tends to steal men sharing some characteristics with Shen Qingqiu — showcasing how obsessed he still is by his Shizun and unwilling to move on.
  • Bingge himself uses Yue Qingyuan's tactics when it comes to punish his spouses, locking them away and refusing to hear their pleas.

Tropes Unique to Wishful Thinking

Wishful Thinking

• Always Second Best: Liu Qingge laments that he's never first in people's hearts. Both of the most important men in his life wanted Shen Qingqiu. Yue Qingyuan committed suicide when Shen Qingqiu died. Luo Binghe keep making his spouses and concubines take on traits of Shen Qingqiu.
• The Baby Trap: It is heavily implied that Shen Qingqiu did this to himself after being returned to his younger body on the night of his wedding to Yue Qingyuan, using a potion designed to allow for men to carry children in order to ensure that Yue Qingyuan couldn't 'accidentally' terminate the pregnancy without endangering Shen Qingqiu's own life. Surprisingly, it actually works out, and the two become parents to a transmigrated Shen Yuan.
• Big Brother Instinct: Inverted with Liu Mingyan no matter the dimension. She assures the miniaturized Liu Qingge that she will take him home if he's really unhappy as a married man and tries to fight Yue Qingyuan (actually Bingge in the lord's body) because she really misliked the way he looked at her older brother.
• Break the Haughty: Invoked. Taking advantage that he's in Yue Qingyuan's body Bingge deliberately puts Shen Qingqiu in the most poorest and disused wing and gives him the absolute bare-minimum to survive in hope of breaking his pride. Bingge is furious when he finds out that Shen Qingqiu simply adapted to new life and enjoyed being away from him.
• Brought Down to Normal: Transmigrating within Yue Qingyuan leaves Bingge severely worfed since he's now fully human, without access to demonic abilities.
• Demonic Possession: In Bingge Transmigrates, when the original Luo Binghe is killed by Wei Wuxian turning his Power Parasite ritual against him, he wakes up in the past as Yue Qingyuan is getting married to Liu Qingge. Considering his vile personality, he uses the opportunity be a horrible perso—get revenge on his awful master Shen Qingqiu and savor the untouched and more naive version of Liu Qingge.
• Domestic Abuse: Bingge locks Shen Qingqiu into a small set of rooms with the intent to let him suffer from isolation and hunger until he begs. He also physically hurts him in a fit of temper — something he shows a bit of remorse for.
• Early Personality Signs: Four-year-old Liu Qingge tried to fight the sea by punching the waves, and one of his uncles had to rescue him from drowning. The anecdote showcases his recklessness and fight-happy attitude leading him to throw himself into battles he might not be qualified to take on.
• Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: Bingge, all the way. Sometimes the other cast can use it to their benefit, sometimes not.
• Gaslighting:
  • Bingge thoroughly fucked with Liu Qingge's psyche by using his dream power to rewrite his First Husband's memories. He also constantly questioned Liu Qingge's grasp over reality, which is more mundane but no less effective.
  • Shen Yuan accidentally does this in the timelines with regressors such as Liu Qingge and Bingge. As he's behaving extremely differently from Shen Qingqiu, the regressors are left utterly flat-footed when dealing with him and unsure of their own perception.
• I Hate Past Me: Bingge cannot stand his more naive and innocent younger self. He sets up his younger self to continue to be abused by Shen Qingqiu and furious when the latter is completely unscathed.
• Irony: The transmigrated Bingge is looking forwards Shen Qingqiu finally granting him attention, since he now possesses Yue Qingyuan's body. Only for Shen Yuan to be entirely uninterested in winning "his" husband back and lavish care on Bing-mei instead.
• Laser-Guided Karma: Bingge is torn apart by his own protective arrays, turned against him by his twentieth concubine — right as he was about to force said concubine's lover into marriage.
• Not Me This Time: After noticing the discrepancy between Shen Qingqiu from his memories and Shen Qingqiu from his transmigration, Liu Qingge starts to suspect Luo Binghe from rewriting his memories. The tyrant did use his dream powers to gaslight his spouse, but he genuinely didn't make Shen Qingqiu look worse than he actually was — Shen Yuan merely replaced the other man.
• Obfuscating Stupidity: The transmigrated Shen Jiu flies under the Emperor and court's radar by pretending to be too much of a delicate flower utterly enamorated with his husband to be a danger.
• Peggy Sue: A well-used plot is to take a character and having them go back to an earlier moment in time: ignorant of potentional knock-on effects or outside changes without their knowledge
  • Temporal Bingliushen Shenanigans: Liu Qingge, who has been Luo Bingge's First Husband for years and suffered immensely for it only to be killed at his husband's hands to wake up on the day of his first marriage. Rediscovers that Shen Qingqiu wasn't as awful that he remembered him being and horrifed how innocent his monster of a husband once was as a child servant.
  • Shen Jiu's Reincarnation Adventures: Following his canonical demise, Shen Jiu awakens in his own ten-years-younger body, the day of his wedding with Yue Qingyuan. He immediately takes steps to ensure he won't lose his husband this time by ensuring the Liu clan's fall from grace and not taking Luo Binghe as his apprentice, along with using The Baby Trap.
  • Yue Qingyuan's Late Great Do-Over
  • Bingge Transmigrates!
• Riches to Rags: In Shen Jiu's Reincarnation Adventures, thanks to Shen Jiu's machinations he has the Liu clan fall out of favor with the Emperor demoting them to a rural nobility.
• Right for the Wrong Reasons: Liu Qingge immediately notices the discrepancy between his memories and the current timeline. The Shen Qingqiu of his memories and the Shen Qingqiu of the current timeline commit similar actions, with the latter being much kinder than the cruel bitter man of his past. Liu Qingge assumes that Luo Binghe must have re-written his memories to make the murder of his teacher more justified than it actually was.
• Safety in Indifference: Mo Beijun in the Sha Yuan timeline. Not only does refusing to care about anything keep him from suffering more emotional pain, he's genuinely afraid that Luo Bingge will kill anyone who Mo Beijun shows the slightest affection for, just to hurt him. And thanks to his enslavement he can't even lie to Bingge about his own emotions, so being indifferent towards everything and everyone around him is the best way to keep everyone else safe.
• Shoot the Shaggy Dog Story: Bingge ultimately was broken by his former Shizun's utter refusal to grant him the slightest value, desperately trying to have him back through his harem. He relishes in his transmigration within Yue Qingyuan's body as he feels it will finally force Shen Qingqiu to love him — only for Shen Yuan to dote on Bing-mei instead and utterly reject Bingge.
• Together in Death: In the storyline of Bingge's transmigration, Yue Qingyuan dies with Shen Qingqiu because of a soulmate resonance — which leaves both their bodies open to possession.
• Twin Threesome Fantasy: Downplayed with the Twin Jades of Lan — there's actually two years of difference between them, but they have quite the Uncanny Family Resemblance and Luo Bingge was extremely excited about "completing the set".
• Used to Be a Sweet Kid: Liu Qingge is aghast and horrified at what a sweet and loyal disciple Luo Binghe is. The Luo Binghe he knew was an unrepentant monster. Liu Qingge is left bewildered and wondering what the hell happened.
• Violently Protective Girlfriend: Bingge transmigrating was due to his messy demise at the hands of Wei Wuxian, who murdered him right before he could marry Lan Wangji — Wei Wuxian's lover.