Headcanons ; Chongyun - Tumblr Posts

CHARACTER RELATIONSHIPS - XIAO

stares at header. that's it, that's the post.

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In all seriousness, Chongyun has so much respect for Xiao. He considers Xiao a mentor of some sort, a mythical figure that Chongyun worships. Chongyun's drive to be the best exorcist in all of Liyue partially comes from his drive to emulate Xiao and all he does for Liyue. Xiao is hardworking and never tires, so Chongyun is also hard working and does tire out, but they hide it well. Or hope to hide it.

It would mean so much to Chongyun to get attention from Xiao that isn't disparaging remarks, although Chongyun does hope that Xiao might look on them with slightly more favor, on account of their yang energy and vision.

That said, the two canonically work with each other. Whether it's Xiao working with the clan generally, or if they have a personal relationship (which I believe they do!), their knowledge of each other and relationship to whatever extent is in the game, and Chongyun does respect and admire Xiao a great deal.

i haven't written out thoughts about chongyun in such a long time, and i have some thoughts now. especially where spirituality and paranormal are concerned. the game likes to drop some bits of lore, completely ignoring chongyun's existance like it's poisonous, but i digress.

exorcisms, spirituality, and even magic are something that chongyun takes incredibly seriously. to him, they're tools used to cleanse the land of evil, something almost religious to him. or to help him with his faith. anyone else messing with said tools and beliefs irk chongyun.

they will be the most passive aggressive and snarky asshole to someone misusing him. it's not just that they believe any other methods are wrong, chongyun is so confident that other people do not have the proper knowledge to perform a true exorcism.

i recall a story quest from awhile ago. i can't remember if it was an event or a story quest you had to unlock, but it centered around yae miko and something about exorcisms. her claiming that you just needed salt irritated my inner chongyun so much.

to chongyun, salt is a temporary fix. salt can keep spirits and demons at bay, but it doesn't get rid of them. chongyun believes, and has seen proof of, magic and magical infused weapons to actually remove the evil from this plane of existence. and since chongyun is an expert, and highly sought after for their skill, it should stand to reason that chongyun knows exactly what they're talking about in this subject.

yang energy aside, chongyun is sure that even without this 'blessing' (which they are struggling to accept, thanks to xiao's comments about it not being a bad thing), exorcism would still be used with his same tools and knowledge. still with his customized claymore, his use of talismans and thaumaturgy, and even with his vision. chongyun is trusting of his clan who has been around for centuries, and even the adepti knowing of them.

to dismiss chongyun's efforts and to claim that other people know what they're doing just as much will actively piss him off. he's not a passive person and won't take those comments lightly. chongyun takes his work and even history very seriously. at best, you'll get passive aggressive snark in response, and at worst, you'll get a furious guy with a claymore taller than him swinging at you like the weapon is paper. and chongyun knows how to hold grudges.

exorcisms are serious business, to the professional exorcist.

p.s. wuwang hill is their territory. if you go there for funsies, they will skip the snark and go straight to yelling.

(rewrite of an older headcanon:)

So canonically, Chongyun knows martial arts. It’s never specified what sort of martial arts Chongyun knows in game, but I looked more into his character more. Chongyun’s very heavily based in Taoism. We have the yin and yang symbol that’s already heavily associated with Chongyun, and we have this on Chongyun’s pants:

This is the Bagua, or the 8 trigrams. Without going into all of them (which would require a separate post), I have figured out that the martial arts Chongyun practices the most are Tai Chi and Baguazhong.

They are sister schools of martial arts. But Bagua is the one that more focuses on the 8 trigrams – being translated to eight trigram palm. For a reference on what it looks like, reference the air bending in Avatar: The Last Airbender. The movements in both Bagua and Tai Chi are meant to be smooth motions with quick hand movements and footwork.

We don’t see Chongyun use it in game, since he’s a claymore user, but I’d also like to think that the footwork he uses is a part of that school of martial arts.

Chongyun’s very incredibly skilled with his fighting, and is able to maneuver quickly around enemies, and without a weapon, he’s still very strong and able to throw jabs out with expert precision.

He also practices Tai Chi, which is more meditation focused, but it goes hand in hand with Baguazhong, or bagua. Since Chongyun has to meditate often to keep his yang energy under control, these two are the perfect schools of martial arts for Chongyun to practice!

Random headcanon because I see so much of “Chongyun hates Hu Tao” floating around, and I gotta say, if you’re basing that off this voice line:

Where’s the proof?

Chongyun isn’t saying Hu Tao makes their blood boil, they’re saying Hu tao’s comments make their blood boil. If that’s literally all it takes for Chongyun to ‘hate’ someone, then Chongyun would hate so many people for various reasons, and he doesn’t.

Chongyun is one of the most laid back people, treated as almost naive in game (which I respectfully disregard.). He’s super nice and trusting, but he isn’t spineless. He’s not going to take something that he does have some area of expertise in, and let someone condescend to him over it.

Nowhere that I can find does it actually say “I hate Hu Tao. Even in the same voice line Chongyun states they have nothing but respect for the institution. So why are people reading between the lines to try and find a relationship that doesn’t exist?

I would say Chongyun quite likes Hu Tao and what she does. I don’t think he likes her attitude, but one can call out friends for being rude without damaging the friendship or turning it into something resembling mortal enemies.

one of my favorite headcanons for chongyun is his use of swearing. ive said before that he canonically swears sometimes. one of his voicelines mentions "exorcising the hell" out of an older domain, which tells me he's no stranger to the more impactful language here and there to emphasize a point.

while chongyun doesn't swear OFTEN, it's still really funny and a show of how angry they get when they drop an F-bomb (also in tandem with them drop-kicking someone off a mountainside in dash crack), or any other harsh word. it's rare when chongyun gets pissed, but it's also really fun.

exhibit A:

Your muse has to share something that’s hard for them to talk about. What is the biggest thing they don’t want to say aloud/admit? What makes it hard for them to say it? [for chongyun and kami!]

FOR KAMI

for him it's admitting that he likes living in Sumeru. He enjoys working for Nahida, and he especially loves feeling like he has a purpose again. He doesn't like the feeling of being empty, wandering aimlessly without direction. Nahida giving him orders and letting him live comfortably to do as he pleases has helped him far more than he's willing to admit to her. He does take solace in the fact she can't easily read his mind to find this out. He'd rather keep this to himself to reflect on it even more. But it's been a nice, small warmth inside his still broken heart, mending it piece, by tiny piece.

FOR CHONGYUN

Chongyun-- he loathes admitting aloud that he's insecure about his abilities and prowess because of their pure yang spirit. Chongyun feels useless as an exorcist who can't see the spirits they're meant to exorcise and banish. On one hand, they know it's meant to be something good, especially since Xiao himself basically told Chongyun that it's something more posititve.

STILLl. it doesn't change the fact that Chongyun still feels insecure and doubts his abilities. He feels his small taste of fame is undeserved, and that life would be easier if he didn't have this condition to deal with. AT THE SAME TIME, Chongyun doesn't want to get rid of it. It's such an intricate part of his life that he wouldn't know how to cope without it, either. Explaining this to other people would mean trying to form all these doubts into words, so he keeps it to himself with only the briefest complaints every so often.

I want to talk a moment about the wrist guard Chongyun wears. At first I thought it was a design choice from the devs/artists, y’know, like any other stylistic choice given to any of the characters.

but then I thought it was because he’s left handed. But after playing around with Chongyun a bit and seeing how he holds his claymore, I don’t think that’s the case at all.

I actually think it’s a brace of some sort, because Chongyun has a permanent injury on their wrist, and the wrist guard keeps the hand steady.

Chongyun has a tendency to power through fevers, especially if it’s not that severe, because they’re used to the drawbacks. The same could be said of injuries. Maybe a broken bone that Chongyun never got checked out, or maybe something else. Regardless, it’s probably made their wrist a lot weaker, and harder for him to hold a claymore as a result. So he had a wrist guard made specifically to keep fighting.

Chongyun can handle daily activities well enough without it, it’s not like mundane chores put a massive strain on their wrist. But if Chongyun is going out to fight/perform an exorcism, he never leaves home without it. That kind of strain would probably cause further damage, and Chongyun wouldn’t want to risk that.

back in the early days of my writing chongyun, they had beef with yae miko. not for any in-game reason, it was PURELY because chongyun disagreed with her methods of exorcism, and it was fun to write out.

part of me still wants to keep that beef going, should i ever run into another yae miko writer. it would also make for a really interesting dynamic, what with her being yokai, and chongyun's yang energy passively pushing any creature and spirit away from them. especially since i headcanon that chongyun DOES get outside of liyue and travels not just to mondstadt, but also to sumeru, inazuma, and every other nation (except for natlan so far), chongyun would at least have heard of her in passing, if not met her outright.

with chongyun's brattiness and overall disrespect for most authoritative figures, and her coyness and personality, the two would mix never, and it'd be super stupidly fun to see what kind of relationship they'd end up forming, if they ever made it past the rivalry stage.

Actually unrelated to sinday but I wanted to talk about something. More specifically, Chongyun’s fighting style.

I think the only people they willingly accept criticisms and training from are Zhongli and Xiao, because those are are as old as dirt and have fought in wars before, while Chongyun is a mere mortal and looks up to both of them.

But from anyone else, Chongyun gets a bit miffed if people want to tutor him or offer him any sort of guidance. Because Chongyun is already really good at what they do. While Chongyun isn’t always as self assured as they want to be, they do know they’re good at their craft, being one of the best exorcists to hail from Liyue.

There’s always room for improvement, Chongyun knows. Always. But Chongyun also trains hard every day and studies constantly, and there are probably fighting techniques passed down from generation to generation within the clan. After all, if magic is passed down, along with mantras and talismans and everything needed to become adept at what the clan is known for, then surely fighting techniques are also passed down.

Which is why Chongyun gets irritable if someone offers to teach him how to fight. It’s nothing against the person or their approach, but Chongyun is like “I’m already good, what else can you offer me?” But he’d still take whatever lessons and try to improve somehow.

It’s different if Xiao and/or Zhongli come to offer tips and tricks, especially Xiao, because they’re in the same line of work, so Xiao would definitely have valuable advice.

But TL;DR: unless you’re thousands of years old with valuable insight, Chongyun is not going to take your offer of tutoring them very well, and will get grumpy and pissy about it because they already know what they’re doing.

Acutally to get really serious for a second, I want to talk about something here. I brought this up with Tiff last night right before I fell asleep but like.

Do you see this image? In the video, as he’s walking toward the abyss mage, the claymore is idly swaying around in their hand. So like. Can we talk about how strong Chongyun actually is?

I CAN’T imagine that claymores are lightweight weapons. There’s definitely weight in them, far heavier than the average sword. If I’m to reference weight from other games, I’m gonna bring up Skyrim, where two handed weapons are at least 25lbs starting. I’m sure the weight can only go up from there.

So for Chongyun to not only be able to carry and swing around a claymore with ease, but to walk with it one handed and swing it around—

I mean. do not get on Yun’s bad side, they will probably ruin your day.

every time i think about how exhausted chongyun is over everything they do for liyue and the people in it. the countless work they put in to cleaning the land, how utterly thankless the job is even when people are demanding more.

how draining it is to have to avoid the sunlight and everything involving people. it's isolating and draining

and chongyun is so. so. tired.

an edit I just made because if I want a visual made, I'm gonna make it myself.

quietly reposting these from late last night as headcanons/general information-

CHARACTER HEADCANONS - ALBEDO

Chongyun knows of Albedo, but doesn't know him personally. Chongyun's run into Albedo's camp on Dragonspine a few times, and has seen him from a distance once or twice. Chongyun is impressed weith the knowledge Albedo possesses and has yet to work up the courage to actually say hi.

Chongyun doesn't know a whole lot about alchemy or science in general, since Chongyun comes from a more religious/spiritual background. They'd be willing to learn though. Chongyun's traveled to Mondstadt and has spoken a handful of words to Timaeus, but most of it was more "I'm busy, here's the crafting table." Which...admittedly wasn't helpful, and not the person Chongyun wanted to talk to.

Chongyun probably has some fan tendencies where Albedo is concerned though. This cool mystical alchemist that Chongyun wants to say hi too, but is too awkward and shy to.

i just want to go into a lil bit of yun’s dark side here cause that headcanon i just posted kinda made me sad but.

chongyun has blood on their hands. vangquishing evil isn’t just limited to the abyss or hilichurls or ghosts, but the clan has and will go after people who steal from them or people who threaten those they worship.

chongyun especially can be ruthless. he’s one of the few members of his clan that actually has a vision, the majority of them don’t, so chongyun is very much inclined to put a swift end to anyone who threatens/hurts his family.

it doesn’t require them to go into their yang state, either, because in those moments, chongyun is very focused and driven to protect, so any thoughts he’d have normally are gone. they don’t regret any of it either, always looking back and saying it was for the good of their people/clan.

not very many people in liyue or people who know chongyun know this about him, and it’s not even something he’d talk about with his inner circle of friends. this is something kept only between those who’ve witnessed him in action, so mostly the clan, and probably xiao. but chongyun has killed people, and will kill people in the future. zero regrets.

i've ranted about this before but

Chongyun is not emotionless. Chongyun has a lot of feelings and wears his heart on his sleeve. He feels all the emotions: anger, annoyance, sadness, joy, and so much more. He feels them, he expresses them.

I think a lot of people (reddit, mostly from what I've seen) mistake Chongyun's suppression to mean that he's basically robotic in nature. I agree that he has to keep himself in check in order to manage his yang energy, but that doesn't mean Chongyun's a blank slate.

Chongyun is a ball of energy just waiting to explode. They have so much personality brimming below the surface, and I try to capture more than that in my portrayal. Chongyun is very very passive aggressive when he's trying to keep his anger in check. He makes his disdain very very obvious.

Chongyun is also very happy a lot of times. He shows his joy by wearing large smiles that make his eyes sparkle. He loves spending time with people and he loves sharing, he loves being able to share that bond where he can laugh with someone, or even crack jokes.

Chongyun also gets scared. Scared, nervous, anxious, all the emotions. You can hear them in his voice, see it all in his actions. Just because he's not doing grand emotional acts doesn't mean he's not expressing himself.

Chongyun is so expressive and I do not understand how people miss that.

Whether it's my portrayal or the game portrayal, Chongyun is very clearly your basic average guy with basic average emotions. Calling him emotionless because of his yang energy is wrong.

actually I just had a thought because I'm replaying the story on an alt account.

People in Liyue say at the beginning that the adepti are seen as a myth, that no one's actually seen them. Which doesn't make any sense, because Chongyun + clan actively works alongside Xiao and have been for centuries.

Does this mean that Chongyun themself is a secret keeper? That they knew all along of how sacred Jueyun Karst is because of the adepti? That the adepti never left?

I always headcanoned that the clan holds documents/armor/weapons/etc from Khaenri'ah, but does this mean that they could also hold documents and whatnot from the fallen yaksha themselves if this is a case?

If the clan knew about the adepti from the beginning, then what else do they know?

I've talked about his wrist guard once a few months ago, but I'm having a thought now.

In game, Chongyun mostly uses his right hand with his claymore, barely using his left. I talked about how he sustained an injury, and it's the reason Chongyun wears one in the first place, but now I want to elaborate.

I see Chongyun as ambidextrous. So Chognyun could theoretically use both hands, though for awhile he defaulted to using his left hand for a majority of things. This caused great strain on their wrist, and they've had to start wearing a guard to prevent even more injury.

Unfortunately, Chongyun's wrist never recovered properly, even after resting it, so Chongyun wears the guard when out fighting/training. When they're taking a break or not having to fight, the guard comes off and is replaced with bandages.

There are times when pain will flair up and Chongyun can't do much of anything, which is part of why he isn't supposed to overwork himself, but he still tries anyway.

The same strain is starting to happen to their other wrist, but Chongyun is being more vigilant about it and keeping bandages on for that extra bit of support.

Claymores are heavy, and with how much Chongyun carries them one handed, it's no surprise that Chongyun's injuring himself.

I wouldn't call this a bad take necessarily, more of a misconception. I'm seeing a lot of character redesigns on tiktok, especially for Chongyun which those look awesome!! I'm not knocking those ideas down.

But a lot of people are under the impression that Chongyun should have a tan on account of being in the sun constantly, so I'm gonna step in with some corrections.

1. Chongyun canonically carries a parasol with him to shield himself from the sun. Sun =not his friend.

2. Chongyun works at night. This is canon, especially if you pay attention to his stories. He works from sundown to sunup so the homeowners can get some sleep. Which leads me to

3. Chongyun, as I imagine, would sleep during the day, waking up late afternoon at earliest. This way he'd miss the sunlight of the noon period where the sun is highest, and instead be coming outdoors when it's getting cooler/darker outside.

Chongyun is the opposite of tanned, he is pale. Guy does not like the sun and takes every approach possible to avoid it. Not to mention Chongyun already burns at a hotter temperature, sunlight would exacerbate the fever and slide him right into yang!drunk territory.

Sun and Chongyun do not get along. Boy looks like a popsicle, thank you for coming to my ted talk.

okay honesty but i'm thinking about it right now

just think about how exactly morbid chongyun is. interest in the supernatural is less niche than normal, occult along the same lines. but chongyun not only seeks it out as part of their career, but actively gets a major thrill from it.

where one should exorcise caution and a healthy level of fear, chongyun is kinda like shane madej in that he's just. stomping around the place going "COME OUT DEMONS LET'S TANGO." Chongyun is so eager to see/fight the supernatural that all caution tends to fly out the window.

and it's so funny to me cause you have what looks like a quiet, timid young adult here. and you probably give him a passing wave, and then oops he's swinging his giant claymore and throwing magic all over the place.

in these moments i'm not sure what would be more disturbing. running into the supernatural, or running into an enthusiast who gives almost zero qualms about what they're doing and is just. way too hyped up about it.