History BewareOfChicken / TropesOToZ

* PowerPerversionPotential: Not only does cultivation grant superhuman stamina, Meiling's herbal and medicinal knowledge includes a coffee-like energy drink. And they were InsatiableNewlyweds already...

* PayEvilUntoEvil: Posthumous version. [[spoiler:Before giving Sun Ken's sword to Xiulan to serve as proof of the man's death, Jin had considered turning the weapon into a plow. Her Sect's elders are ''inspired'' by the suggestion, declaring that there could be "no better insult" to the memory of the murderous bandit; [[BrickJoke they even gift the newly-made plow to Jin as a wedding gift]].]]

* SwordsToPlowshares: After Sun Ken the bandit is defeated, his intelligent sword is turned into a plow to insult his memory, then given to Jin as a wedding present. Being a spirit blade, it's very receptive to qi reinforcement, making it supernaturally effective, and Jin is very pleased with the gift. After considering how Sun Ken must be turning over in his grave, Jin decides to call the plow Sunny and paint it a bright cheery yellow.

* SpellMyNameWithAnS: PlayedWith.
** Jin gives all his animals English names, but all of these names are changed when pronounced by others (Big D becomes Bi De, Tigger becomes Tigu'er, etc). Curiously, Chunky (Chun Ke) is the only one who seems to be aware of what the original names are.
** Deliberately invoked in one case by switching his name around on official documents (Jin Rou -> Rou Jin) and changing the characters to keep the Cloudy Sword Sect off his trail.

* RestrainedRevenge: In the alternate timeline where Jin went to the Soaring Heavens Isle, he comes across two close friends, and learns that Seiyu has nicknamed Bailu ''Baka-sama'', [[TrollingTranslator persuading her]] that it means "Great Lady", when actually it means "idiot". However, when he gets to the bottom of things, it turns out that that was revenge for Bailu ''stealing the last of the wine that was Seiyu's late mother's final gift''. Bailu has a WhatHaveIDone moment and recognises that in Seiyu's place, she would have killed the culprit.

* TheReasonYouSuckSpeech: Once Elder Ge learns about the Cloudy Sword sect devolving into a ThugDojo where the Inner Disciples can beat up the Outer Disciples with impunity, he assembles the whole Sect, lambasts both the bullies and those that let it happen, beats up the worst offenders, [[WeHaveBecomeComplacent says that the Sect has grown arrogant]], and declares that it stops now.

* ThugDojo: Although most of the cultivator sects have some guiding wisdom that they are supposed to follow, in practice, some of them simply [[MightMakesRight worship strength]] and allow the strong and skilled to do whatever they like, including violence to the other students and the general public. Shrouded Mountain is a straight example.
** Interestingly, the Cloudy Sword Sect (Jin's old sect and Lu Ri's current one) avert this in principle, and their founders had warned against this exact philosophy: "Kowtow before the mortal that enlightens you, and shun the barbarian who knows only strength of arms." However, the sect had degenerated from its heyday and was becoming one [[spoiler:until the fallout from Jin's departure got the Elders to clean house]].

** After he sees Bi De start practicing Martial Arts, Jin makes a "Beware of Chicken" sign for his farm as a joke. Newcomers tend to laugh, until they see the chicken ''bowing'' to them and opening the door for them, and realise that it's a Spirit Beast.

* TookALevelInKindness: Despite his reservations, Bi De acknowledges that [[spoiler: Tigu's transformation into a human]] has had only good effects on her, helping her relax and get along with others.

** The later half of the [[spoiler: Shrouded Mountain infiltration arc]] has the Rising Fist tournament, an intra-sect competition to see who will advance in their ranks.

** Shen Yu is outwardly calm after hearing about [[spoiler:his grandson Rou beaten into leaving the Cloudy Sword sect]], but is projecting so much fury that even his contemporary Elder Ge is unnerved.
** When questioning [[spoiler:the Shrouded Mountain disciples involved in kidnapping Tigu]], Jin is calm, and polite, and also angry enough that his qi and Intent are pressing down on them like a mountain.

** Master Lishu doesn't raise his voice after he is informed that someone attacked a patient inside his Medical Pavillion, but he is so furious that the air and plants around him start to dry out.

* UniversallyBelovedLeader: The Patriarch of the Verdant Hill! [[EnlightenedSelfInterest Internally self-centered and self-important, he is still a great ruler out of a pragmatic belief that the best way to get praise and respect is to earn it honestly.]] When he is tired of the yearly floods cutting into his leisure time, he commissions great canals. When he bribes someone it is seen as a prudent investment in the future and it turns out to be just that. When Meiling stops a plague in its tracks, he is suspected to have summoned her. He also makes sure to remember the names of all his staff, because they like him more when he can call them all by name.

** Zang Li, when he talks about his defeat in Verdant Hill, leaves out details like "attempted rape" and "utterly one sided beat down".

* VillainousVow: Sun Ken is a bandit, and the leader of the Whirling Demon Gang. He is an unrepentant murderer, and his gang pillages, kills, and rapes throughout the countryside. After Big D insults him, Sun Ken makes this declaration ([[spoiler: and needless to say, he doesn't live to fulfill it]]):

* WeDoNotKnowEachOther: During [[spoiler:Shen Yu's]] visit to Verdant Hills, he runs into the old crone living there, and immediately recognizes her as [[spoiler:the cultivator and diviner Shiyun of the Heavenly Path, and her cat Laoshi the Tiger's Fury]]. The crone denies this and calls him an old drunk, but [[spoiler:Shen Yu]] can see [[TheCallKnowsWhereYouLive the nervousness and despair inside her at being discovered]], and so decides to correct himself and say that he mistook her for someone else.
* WeirdnessMagnet: Lots of Cultivators tend to be this. Jin is no exception, to the local Lord magistrate's annoyance and horror. And to Jin's as he just wants to farm in peace but keeps getting dragged into cutlivator bullshit in spite of his intentions.
* WeUsedToBeFriends: [[spoiler:The aftermath of the breaking of Tianlan not only threw the Qi balance of the Azure Mountains out of whack, but it reverted all the Spirit Beasts into savage animals and [[LaserGuidedAmnesia removed the memory of Tianlan and the Azure Mountains from all living memory]]. As such, Spirit Beasts and cultivators that once fought shoulder-to-shoulder to defeat the tyrannical Azure Emperor were turned into bitter enemies (such as the adopted human children of "Rumbling" Lord Yao having to kill their now savage Wreckerball brothers) and one of Tianlan's best friends Cai Ruolan going from a opera dancer into a hardened warrior and doing the traditional cultivator acts of draining Tianlan's dragon veins for Qi and power. [[EtTuBrute It's the friends becoming enemies part that hurts Tianlan so much]].]]

** The Spacebattles thread details a dark timeline about [[PointOfDivergence what would've happened if Jin didn't come to Azure Hills]], and it plays the {{Xianxia}} story tragically straight: [[spoiler:The Wicked Blade would've wiped out all of Hong Yaowu, with Hong Xian sacrificing his life to poison the wolf, leaving Meiling, Meihua and the Xong brothers as the {{Sole Survivor}}s. When they go to Verdant Hills, Zang Li/Lu Ban would've taken Meihua, and Gou Ren would've died trying to stop him, after which Meiling and Yun Ren would've [[TraumaticSuperpowerAwakening awakened their cultivation]] and sworn revenge (and gotten the cat that would've been Tigu from the crone, which Meiling would've named Wuyong ("Useless")). During their training, they would've met Xiulan in her pursuit of Sun Ken, and after tracking the bandits down, Meiling would've poisoned the whole camp with toxic gas, tamed the Crimson Demon Tooth into a scalpel, and vivisected Sun Ken while he was still alive, after which Xiulan would've joined them in an attempt to be their MoralityChain. Meiling's subsequent adventures would've included finding and killing Wicked Blade, finding the spirit crystal and accepting its offer to become Azure Empress, seducing Xiulan, winning the Dueling Peaks Tournament, and tracking Zang Li to the Howling Peaks and the Shrouded Mountain sect, finding Nezan and the fox clans in the process. When she learns what had happened to Meihua, Meiling would've started poisoning the innocent surrounding villages and [[WarCrimeSubvertsHeroism committing effective war crimes]] to both weaken the Shrouded Mountain sect and draw out Zang Li/Lu Ban. This culminates in a giant final battle with many deaths on both sides (including Nezan) and Yun Ren scoring a MutualKill on Lu Ban to save Meiling's life, after which Xiulan would've left Meiling for all the atrocities she had committed on innocents. The timeline would've ended with a broken Meiling continuing her training in Raging Waterfall Gorge]]. In the main story, during the backstory of Meiling's mother Liling, it gives a nod to that timeline, describing Jin's arrival as a crossroads where the other road led to [[spoiler:a world drowned in twenty-eight heavenly poisons]].
** It was mentioned that Shen Yu might've dropped off Jin Rou at the Soaring Heaven's Isle sect instead of the Cloudy Sword sect, and some sidestories detail the beginning of this story: he is put on a semi-private island to cultivate, accidentally killed by a couple of AlmightyIdiot disciples carelessly throwing around destructive techniques, nursed back to health by Minyan who has to claim him as her and Shen Yu's son to explain the scrutiny, has the two disciples assigned as his personal servants in recompense, develops a dream for freedom, and slowly unlocks the sect's SecretArt of growing new skyships.
* WhamEpisode: Volume 2, chapter 85, "The Final Day." [[spoiler:After the Dueling Peaks tournament has concluded, Zang Li and his goons from Shrouded Mountain kidnap Tigu, destroy Loud Boy's cultivation, and leave Rags a bloody heap. Xiulan and Ri Zu stage a rescue attempt where they confront Zang Li, but while that's going on additional goons attack Yun Ren and Gou Ren.]]
* WhatIfTheBabyIsLikeMe: Inverted; Bi De has mated and had many chicks with the regular hens, but when none of them show signs of [[UpliftedAnimal gaining sapience like him]], he stops doing so, the idea of only having non-sapient children that would only be good for food not sitting well with him. Chun Ke and Pi Pa share similar concerns; despite both being Spirit Beasts and eventually wanting piglets, they are afraid that Chun Ke's mental damage will mean that their children won't have the spark and will remain mortal animals.
* WhoWantsToLiveForever: Jin chooses to abandon the path of cultivation, becoming immortal and reaching heaven in order to instead live out his days on his farm surrounded by friends and family. [[spoiler:His grandfather Shen Yu, [[LegacySeeker who was hoping to craft a successor to pass on his legacy]] to new generations and then join him in immortality, has some thoughts about it.]]

** When Xianghua decides to [[spoiler:take command of the Misty Lake Sect as the new sectmaster]], she must face the trial of defeating three [[spoiler:Misty Lake elders]] to prove her worthiness. She instead decides to defeat ''all'' of them, and to leave absolutely no doubt as to her strength, does so without the aid of her Steam Furnace. [[spoiler:She succeeds, naturally.]]
** Bi De appears, to the onlookers, to be holding back when he [[spoiler:fights three Shrouded Mountain disciples with his hands behind his back. On the one hand, he was indeed going easy on them, but on the other hand, due to his native form, he is actually more experienced at fighting with his legs. It certainly makes an impression on Zang Fengfeng.]]

'''Meiling''': ''<shakes head>'' Joy helps bring back the sun. Joy, colour, fire. Little sparks that the sun can see, even when it's so deep in its slumber.

** A somewhat stealthy example: After the defeat of [[spoiler:Sun Ken]] Jin suggests, and the Verdant Blade Sect follows through with, [[Literature/TheBible beating his sword into a plowshare]].

* {{Snowlem}}: The General That Commands the Winter started out as a large snowman that Jin built for fun, but it's heavily implied that it became a SnowGolem. [[spoiler:It's later mentioned to have blunted the force of an incoming snowstorm.]]

* RecognitionFailure: To illustrate just how terrified he is, Nezan weaves a bunch of bombastic illusions about grand monsters, threats and accomplishments like the Lord of the Volcano, the Demonic Sect alliance, or the Unrivaled Hidden Realm Tournament, only for his Fa Ram audience to only recognize the epithets of the ones who defeated them, and not that they were all accomplished by the same man, [[spoiler:Shen Yu the Unconquered Blade, [[DidWeJustHaveTeaWithCthulhu whom they just had dinner with]]]].

* RespectedByTheRespected: How useful does [[spoiler:the Cloudy Sword Sect]] find the Hong Family's Qi-siphoning formation? Useful enough against demons that [[spoiler:they not only agree to put a protective ward around Hong Yaowu, but agree to make the Hong Family and Lin Bao Honored Allies of the Cloudy Sword Sect, which means that if they ever ask for protection, disciples from ''one of the strongest sects in the entire Empire'' would come to their aid]].

* ReducedToRatburgers: Discussed when Tigu starts lining up some of her kills outside Jin's house. The memories of Rou include people eating rats, sometimes even as a delicacy, but Jin doesn't intend to follow suit unless he's somehow starving.

* SimpleYetAwesome: Jin's scroll of sword techniques, received from his "Gramps" contains only basic foundation exercises, but they're the foundation exercises of a master swordsman.

* ThugDojo: Although most of the cultivator sects have some guiding wisdom that they are supposed to follow, in practice, some of them simply [[MightMakesRight worship strength]] and allow the strong and skilled to do whatever they like, including violence to the other students and the general public. Shrouded Mountain is a straight example. Cloudy Sword had degenerated from its heyday and was becoming one [[spoiler:until the fallout from Jin's departure got the Elders to clean house]].
** Interestingly, the Cloudy Sword Sect (Jin's old sect and Lu Ri's current one) avert this (particularly after the reorganization), and had their founders warn against this exact philosophy: "Kowtow before the mortal that enlightens you, and shun the barbarian who knows only strength of arms."

* WorldOfBadass: Even the animals are getting on the cultivating action. It's only a few chapters in that Jin laughingly (but truthfully) tells the village children that his chicken is mightier than all of them.

* WeirdnessMagnet: Lots of Cultivators tend to be this. Jin is no exception, to the local Lord magistrate's annoyance and horror.

* WhatDidIDoLastNight: After trying Jin's spirit-honey-based mead, Bowu wakes up the next morning on the floor, resting against a pig, with the events after his first cup being fuzzy. Everyone else is in similar states of comical dishevelment, with Xiulan choking Jin out with her legs, Gou Ren tied to the ceiling, and Bi De, Ri Zu and Yin lying in an oven pan covered with cut vegetables.

** Gou Ren has no actual combat training and isn't especially agile, but when roused, his qi hardens around him like stone, making him highly resilient and capable of smashing stone with every blow. He wouldn't win any tournaments that way, but he's a threat not to be underestimated.

* {{Sizeshifter}}: Chun Ke can make himself larger at will. He mostly uses it for playing with children; providing them with shade, carrying them around, or letting them slide off his back into a pool.

* OnceMoreWithClarity: On Jin's departure from the Cloudy Sword sect and his journey to the Azure Hills, his narrative emphasizes his comparative weakness and how he runs from trouble, such as hiding behind the counter from a cultivator BarBrawl and fleeing from a monstrous Earth-Crushing Devil Serpent. When Lu Ri retraces Jin's steps to try and find him, he learns that the people Jin met have a much more heroic impression of him that showcases his real strength, such as how he [[ArrowCatch caught a giant errant splinter]] before it could impale the restaurant owner's son (), or how he carried an entire cart and the family in it away from the rampaging serpent.
* OneDegreeOfSeparation: The ''Twilight Cuckoo's Triumph'' technique keeps popping up in extremely significant places. Kongming, in ancient times, was taken over by this technique and caused the ancient Azure Mountains to undergo their cataclysm, with only Xiaoshi keeping it from being worse. The same technique was used to take over Zang Li by demonic cultivator Lu Ban, who was the first stereotypical "Young Master" that Jin fought in the Azure Hills and the arc villain of the Dueling Tournament arc. And finally, Shen Yu reveals that the technique that killed Rou Jin (and kickstarted the story) was a technique specifically designed to disrupt the ''Twilight Cuckoo's Triumph.''

** Liu isn't said to be mute, so she probably does talk occasionally, but it's never seen in the story. She frequently hangs around Xiulan, or later Babe, and weaves flower crowns to cover them in, but without saying a word.

** Shan Yu tells Bi De that all the world will learn to "Beware of Chicken" [[spoiler:after taking him on as a disciple]].

** Gou Ren has no actual combat training and isn't especially agile, but when roused, his qi hardens around him like stone, making him highly resilient and letting each of his blows smash the street and the surrounding area. He wouldn't win any tournaments that way, but he's a threat not to be underestimated.

* WhatDidIDoLastNight: After trying Jin's spirit-honey-based mead, Bowu wakes up the next morning on the floor, resting against a pig, with the events after his first cup being fuzzy. Everyone else is in similar states of comical dishevelment, with Xiulan choking Jin out with her legs, Gou Ren tied to the ceiling, and Bi De trussed up in the oven covered with cut vegetables.

** After a string of disappointments, Tigu is thrilled to meet [[spoiler:Xiulan's rival, Liu Xianghua]], and bursts out laughing after catching a punch to the gut and being flung to the ground.

* WoundedGazelleGambit: Seems to have been a staple tactic of the DirtyCoward [[spoiler:Zang Zengsheng. After Su Nezuha, a fox spirit, rescued him and nursed him back to health after a demon attack, he took advantage of their resulting RescueRomance to keep coming back and learning from her. And after he tried stealing a precious cultivator resource from her and she kicked his ass for it, he ran to his older brother Zang Yong and claimed that the treacherous foxes almost killed him, prompting him to lead his Lightning Brigade against them to avenge his family]].

** Vajra the queen bee is happy that her Emperor Jin finally knows she is sapient... until the Empress Meiling plucks her up and asks, if she has been sapient this whole time, why she has been constantly sneaking into Jin's bath, causing [[HiveMind Vajra's whole hive]] to tremble.

* OnceMoreWithClarity: On Jin's departure from the Cloudy Sword sect and his journey to the Azure Hills, his narrative emphasizes his comparative weakness and how he runs from trouble, such as hiding behind the counter from a cultivator BarBrawl and fleeing from a monstrous Earth-Crushing Devil Serpent. When Lu Ri retraces Jin's steps to try and find him, he learns that the people Jin met have a much more heroic impression of him that showcases his real strength, such as how he caught a giant errant splinter before it could impale the restaurant owner's son, or how he carried an entire cart and the family in it away from the rampaging serpent.

-->'''Elder Ge:''' What. ''[Crack]'' Are. ''[Crack]'' You. ''[Crack]'' Learning?

** It was mentioned that Shen Yu might've dropped off Jin Rou at the Soaring Heaven's Isle sect instead of the Cloudy Sword sect, and some sidestories detail the beginning of this story: he is put on a semi-private island to cultivate, accidentally killed by a couple of AlmightyIdiot disciples throwing around destructive techniques, nursed back to health by Minyan who has to claim him as her and Shen Yu's son to explain the scrutiny, has the two disciples assigned as his personal servants in recompense, develops a dream for freedom, and slowly unlocks the sect's SecretArt of growing new skyships.

* UniversallyBelovedLeader: The Patriarch of the Verdant Hill! [[EnlightenedSelfInterest Internally self-centered and self-important, who is still a great ruler out of a pragmatic belief that the best way to get praise and respect is to earn it honestly.]] When he is tired of the yearly floods cutting into his leisure time, he commissions great canals. When he bribes someone it is seen as a prudent investment in the future and it turns out to be just that. When Meiling stops a plague in its tracks, he is suspected to have summoned her. He also makes sure to remember the names of all his staff, because they like him more when he can call them all by name.

* UniversallyBelovedLeader: The Patriarch of the Verdant Hill! [[EnlightenedSelfInterest Internally self-centered and self-important, who is still a great ruler out of a pragmatic belief that the best way to get praise and respect is to earn it.]] When he is tired of the yearly floods cutting into his leisure time, he commissions great canals. When he bribes someone it is seen as a prudent investment in the future and it turns out to be just that. When Meiling stops a plague in its tracks, he is suspected to have summoned her. He also makes sure to remember the names of all his staff, because they like him more when he can call them all by name.

** Defied by Jin, who is aware that Xiulan is attractive but intends to be monogamous. [[spoiler:Despite the remnants of Rou asserting that they should go for it.]] Meiling actually seems more open to the idea.