The Poppy War (The Poppy War, #1)

by R.F. Kuang

just don’t understand why.” “Because you worry me,” Jiang said. “You have an aptitude for Lore like no one I’ve ever met, not even Altan. But you’re impatient. You’re careless. And you skimp on meditating.”

He cares for her :')

But you want to know why no one takes this class seriously?” “Because you keep farting in faculty meetings?” He didn’t even laugh at that, which meant this was more serious than she’d thought.

That was funny asf tho

“I have met spirits unable to find their bodies again,” said Jiang. He looked very old then. “I have met men who are only halfway to the spirit realm, caught between our world and the next.

That horrifying

That the whole of the world is merely a thought, a butterfly’s dream.” “Rin?”

Lmaooo

“Yes?” “Your elbow is in my porridge.” She blinked. “Oh. Sorry.”

HAaaahahha

“Then consent!” Jiang dipped a toe into the water and pulled it back out gingerly. “Nah.”

Jiang is so funny

But Altan had vanished as if he’d never been at Sinegard. The legend of Altan Trengsin had already begun to fade within their class, and when the next group of first-years came to Sinegard, none of them even knew who Altan was.

Venka stopped wrinkling her nose every time they were both in the women’s dormitory,

Because she terrifed of you, you were the first person to ever beat the shit out of her

Rin was at a loss for words. Something about the Woman was deeply familiar, and it wasn’t just her resemblance to Altan. The shape of her face, the clothes

“You will be asked to do what I refused to do,” said the Woman. “You will be offered power beyond your imagination. But I warn you, little warrior. The price of power is pain.

Is this her real mother maybe

Pantheon controls the fabric of the universe. To deviate from their premeditated order you must give them something in return.

The Phoenix wants suffering. The Phoenix...

The Woman’s tone grew agitated. “The Phoenix doesn’t give. Not permanently. The Phoenix takes, and takes, and takes . . . Fire is insatiable, alone among the elements . . . it will devour you until you are nothing . . .” “I’m not afraid of fire,” said Rin. “You should be,”

Images spun around Rin, brown-skinned bodies dancing around a campfire, mouths open in grotesque leers, shouting words in a language that sounded like something she’d heard in a dream she no longer remembered

The Woman’s grip around Rin’s shoulders tightened; she leaned forward and whispered fiercely in Rin’s ear: “Go back.”

taking the shape of a living god, an animal, a bird . . . The bird lowered its head at them. The Woman burst into flame. Then Rin was floating upward again, flying like an arrow at the sky to the realm of the gods.

but with thirty-two points splitting into sixty-four. And creatures on pedestals all around the circle.” “Plinths,” Jiang corrected.

!!

“You saw the Pantheon,” he said. “You found the gods.”

Dayum

The gods: forces of nature, entities as real and yet ephemeral as wind and fire themselves, things inherent to the existence of the universe.

which she was and become one with the fundamental state of things. The space in limbo where matter and actions were not yet determined, the fluctuating darkness where the physical world had not yet been dreamed into existence.

BrOdie takes shrooms once and thinks she knows thr answer to the universe smdh

She saw now that reality was a facade; a dream conjured by the undulating forces beneath a thin surface. And by meditating, by ingesting the hallucinogen, by forgetting her connection to the material world, she was able to wake up.

She understood, then, that Jiang was very far from mad. He might, in fact, be the sanest person she had ever met.

She couldn’t accept that, though. She wanted power, and she wanted it now—especially if they were on the verge of a war with the Mugenese.

Jfc rin

He had waited a week in the bedroom closet of the Dragon Warlord. He had spent an entire month ensconced under the floorboards beneath the feet of the leaders of the Republic of Hesperia.

Oh shit was he finna murder nezhas fathee

He knew what would happen then. He would become a spouting, unstoppable conduit for the gods, a gate to the spirit realm without a lock.

Tyr’s new lieutenant, the boy sent to him from the Academy, made a far better candidate. The boy was already slated to command the Cike when the time came that Tyr was no longer fit to lead.

Then, as her prey was entranced, the Vipress slammed down into him with her fangs and flooded him with poison.

psychospiritual shock wave across the realm of things unknown. It was felt far away in the peaks of the Wudang Mountains, where the Night Castle stood hidden from the world.

He saw the beginning of a war. “What do you see?” asked Altan Trengsin. The white-haired Seer tilted his head to the sky, exposing long, jagged scars running down the sides of his pale neck. He uttered a harsh, cackling laugh. “He’s gone,” he said. “He’s really gone.”

Altan exhaled slowly. He felt a tremendous sense of both grief and relief. He had no commander. No. He was the commander. Tyr cannot stop me now, he thought.

Soon you will call on me for my power, and when the time comes, you will not be able to resist. Soon you will ignore the warnings

Eighteenth Battalion of the Federation Armed Forces and the Nikara patrol in Horse Province bordering the Hinterlands to the north.

they ordered that all the males in Muriden, children and babies included, be rounded up and shot.

Then Kitay took to them with a slab of wood. When he was done smashing them, he pushed his wiry curls out of his face and whirled on the sweating magistrate, who cringed in his seat as if afraid Kitay might start smashing at him, too.

Oh my god

Children ceased to be children when you put a sword in their hands. When you taught them to fight a war, then you armed them and put them on the front lines, they were not children anymore. They were soldiers.

But that didn’t stop her from going into his garden when she knew he was not on campus, and shoving several handfuls of poppy seeds in her front pocket.

Shes gonna do something so stupid

Fear was impossible to eradicate. But so was the will to survive.

As Rin passed, Niang lifted her face, streaked with tears and blood. The body was Raban’s. Rin felt as if she’d been stabbed in the gut. No—not Raban, no . . .

:(

Nezha met Rin’s eyes, and then wrenched his sword out of the soldier’s back. With his other hand he flung a spare weapon at her.

THE NOISE I JUST MADE AND THE DROP OF MY STOMACH YALL OH MY GODDD

“Thanks,” she said. “On your left,” he responded.

BIG HEART EYES

They were each intimately familiar with the other’s weaknesses: Rin knew Nezha was slow to bring his guard back up after missed blows; Nezha parried from above while Rin ducked in low for close-quarters attacks.

They were a spontaneously coordinated dance. They weren’t two parts of a whole, not quite, but they came close.

I CRY

Rin reached out and grasped Nezha’s wrist. Nezha nodded curtly in response to her unspoken question. Together? Together.

IM GONNA CRY

Jiang stood before them, his white hair hanging still in the air as if he had been struck by lightning. His feet did not touch the ground. Both his arms were flung out, blocking the tremendous force of the general’s halberd with his own iron staff.

“Jiang Ziya,” said the general. “So you live after all.” “Do I know you?” Jiang asked.

I love this man

Jiang seemed an entirely different person—someone younger, someone infinitely more powerful.

Nezha grabbed at Rin’s arm. His eyes were wide. “Look.”

Im truly obsessrd with these two already

“Rin. Nezha.” Jiang didn’t turn around to look at them. “Run.” Then Rin understood. Whatever was being summoned, Jiang couldn’t control them. The gods will not be called willingly into battle. The gods will always demand something in return. He was doing precisely what he had forbidden her to do.

Btw im gonn cry if Jiang dies

Nezha pulled Rin to her feet. Her left leg felt as if white-hot knives had been jammed into her kneecap. She cried out and staggered against him. He steadied her. His eyes were wide with terror. There was no time to run.

Im unwell

Rin opened her mouth to scream just as the general jammed the bladed tip into Nezha’s stomach. Nezha made a high, keening noise. A second thrust silenced him.

Holy fucjjj NO