We have confirmation of Jing Yuan's age range during Quintent era?
According to this post, patch 2.5 confirmed Jing Yuan was <100 years old during Quintet era. ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tanithryudo, can you confirm or deny this claim? Is this a thing? Am I going to have to re-think my fanfic?!
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We already knew these events before the patch:
1. ~700 years ago, Belobog was under attack by the Antimatter Legion. About 30 years later, Alissa Rand made a wish on the Stellaron which flash froze the planet and cut it off from the rest of the cosmos.
2. 721 years ago, the Sedition of Imbibitor Lunae happened on 7379
All that the flashback from the wardance event showed was that:
* Sometime after Belobog was under attack by the Antimatter Legion, and before it was cut off from the cosmos, Igor Haft left the planet and participated in a bunch of fight tournaments under the sponsorship of the IPC. He did this to raise awareness of Belobog's plight and find people/factions willing to help them.
* The last tournament Igor participated in before returning to Belobog and joining the military efforts, was the wardance on the Luofu. At the time Jing Yuan was the ring defender (the role Yanqing took this latest wardance).
* Jing Yuan tells Igor the reason the Xianzhou can't help him is because they recently got reports from the Yaoqing of an Abundance buildup, and they will likely need to go help out there. So this also took place before the start of the Second Abundance War.
* Jing Yuan's appearance in his photo with Igor, he's shorter than his current full grown appearance. That is, not physically full grown yet.
So what this says about Jing Yuan's age at the time of the Second Abundance War would depend on the rate at which Xianzhou people mature physically. Does Jing Yuan being a head shorter mean he's under 100?
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So according to wiki, the Second Abundance War officially started in 5749, so Igor couldn't have possibly been around "pre-Second Abundance War". The event Jing Yuan spoke of regarding the divination most likely is another event at the tail end but pre-Battle of Shuhu. It might even refer to the Battle of Shuhu.
As for ~700 years ago Belobog being under attack, that depends on how the information was stated. Because if the descriptions were "700多年" or "700余年" then any number between 700 and 799 would qualify. Whereas if the description is "大约700年" then the number is actually between 650 to 750.
Presuming the first description, that means the attack on Belobog can't have been earlier than 7301. So the earliest time Igor could have visited the Xianzhou was 7301, 78 years before Sedition. The latest visit would be slightly before 7331, 48 years before Sedition. If it's 7301, then that could still be pre-Quintet era, but if it's 7331, then that's definitely well into Quintet era.
If the description is the second option, that means the earliest time Belobog could be attacked is 7350, 29 years before Sedition, and definitely during Quintet era. It would also mean Belobog got sealed off after Sedition.
So it's kind of important to know the exact wording... But it would seem someone at miHoyo really wants shota!Jing Yuan to be a thing. -_-
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But, let's try calculating it anyways. There's actually a couple of dates given for more recent events, listed when you search for Natasha's, Serval's, and Pela's Resumes. For example, from Natasha's Resume:
In 6█3 AF, graduated from Belobog College of Medicine and entered the Belobog Charice Hospital as a resident.
In 6█4 AF, joined Belobog Scientific Expeditionary Team as a team physician.
In 6█5 AF, entered the Silvermane Guard Field Hospital as a member of the emergency medical team in the Logistics Department.
In 6█6 AF, after completing the required residency, returned to Belobog Underworld and opened an orphanage in Rivet Town.
In 6█4 AF, opened a clinic in Boulder Town in the Belobog Underworld and assisted Wildfire in maintaining stability and providing medical care.
Of these years, the last item is confirmed to be 694, see Notice: Additional Barricades on the Main Road of the Plaza and Notice Under Bridge.
Another confirmed date is the second item in the list: 684, the year Pela was born and her mother passed away during that expedition. Assuming then that Pela is 16 years old as some sources state, that means the "current" year the Astral Express arrived on Belobog is exactly 700 by local calendar.
Now, the question is, what is year 0 on their local calendar system? It couldn't be the day the antimatter legion attacked, as that wouldn't sync up with The Battle of Shuhu 721 years ago. My guess is that is probably the year when the Stellaron was invoked, which is 30 years after the invasion from the Antimatter Legion started. This would make the invasion start 730 years ago, which is 7370 SC by Xianzhou calendar.
So there is a 9 year window in there for Igor to go off doing his fighting tournament rounds. Since Xianzhou was his last stop and there were others before him, then the earliest he could've been attending the wardance was probably 7371 SC.
Hm, going by this then, Jing Yuan would've been not yet fully grown around a few years before the Battle of Shuhu. But how old is that by Xianzhou standards / growth rate we don't know either. I mean, Qingque claims she still has room to grow and she's ~200. So... he could just have had a late growth spurt. *handwaves*
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The numbers make sense. This would mean physically, Jing Yuan would spend a decent chunk of the Quintet era in adolescent/late adolescent form physically. It's questionable how much we can trust the PV, but taking that into account, then Jing Yuan would've shot up about a foot and a half over the course of 9 years...
The only other possibility is that the local years according to each calendar progressed at different rates and time dilation happens between interplanetary travel. But that's probably more math than the writers had in mind.
Basically, I guess I have to resign myself to shota!Jing Yuan...siiigh. Time to go re-consider thr fic timeline.
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Also, if you equate his "teen" height as close to the current height that Dan Heng (who uses the male teen model in game) has right now, it's not that short/shota.
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It looks around early teen-ish based on head-to-shoulder ratio (closer to Yanqing model than Dan Heng model). Given he was in the same role as Yanqing at the time, I suspect the intention was to have them at similar ages, then and now.
But even if I headcanon him to Dan Heng's comparative age, it still means for a good 50+ years of Quintet, Jing Yuan was basically a kid. So unless Dan Feng also was of a similar situation...the canon seems to be catering to the "Jing Yuan was the baby of the group" theory that fans unanimously agreed on somehow...
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Oh god... they're a tragic teen drama.
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😆 I think you're onto something. This is my headcanon now.
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Notably, the 2nd letter is a request from the Preceptors to Jing Yuan demanding to release Dan Heng to them. The contents say that they've already tried writing to the Ten Lords Commission for a long time to no effect. And then, the footnotes from Jing Yuan's advisor say:
这几百年间，持明族递上来的请愿书得有上千份了…属这一封措辞最严厉，他们的耐心是到极限了吧。 青镞 留」「流放令已受十王司允准。既然丹枫已再世为人，不问前愆，为何龙师不能接受他远离这片是非之地…？耐人寻味。」
This "这几百年间" seems to indicate Dan Heng's age in to be at least 200+ years minimum, if not more. Because obviously, the Preceptors obviously couldn't have been demanding him back before hatching, or when he was still Dan Feng.
Secondly, there's a lyric "睁开眼，一人九万余夜" in Dan Heng's character OST《长梦应觉》, which if taken literally, equals ~250 years. Though...I'm not totally sure canon this song is.
Anyway, even just going by the first item, then it's highly unlikely that Yunhua's dosing Dan Heng with the memory recovery drug shouldn't have all that much to do with her exile. I mean, maybe it was old laundry brought up during her trial (under the table-wise, for her student not to know about it). But it shouldn't be anywhere near the primary reason for it.
Actually, maybe it's possible that Jing Yuan also didn't know about it at the time it happened, or at least, didn't know that Yunhua did it. And then it was when she was being attacked by her political rivals 30 years ago, that this matter actual came to light (for JY)?
Of course, there is also the possibility that the writers just forgot (or are retconning) the above lore, and have now decided that Dan Heng's age is in mere decades. *shrug*
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So looked back on the earlier Topaz continuance mission, the IPC records show
Bronya: Topaz shared with me the story of the Stellaron's descent upon Jarilo-VI — how the original outsiders stationed here foresaw the impending disaster and chose to leave in large numbers.
...
Bronya: According to her account, the repayment period agreed upon by the Architects and the IPC investors was... 280 years. However, less than a century after the loan was taken out, the connection between Jarilo-VI and the rest of the galaxy was completely severed.
So this implies that from the time the Stellaron appeared, to when Belobog was cut off from the cosmos, that timespan wasn't immediate, but took a few decades to happen.
I've seen 70 years after the antimatter legion attacked / 50 years after the stellaron arrived thrown around in some threads, but haven't found the actual resource for it.
Still, if you assume that Igor could've returned at any time before contact was lost, and that the current calendar starts after all contact was lost, I guess you could still squeeze a potential few decades in there wrt to Jing Yuan's age.
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OK, so I'm reading both letters, and the footnote seems to be two fold, seeing as one is cited with "青镞 留" (aka Qingzu's note), while the second comment (quote) has no citation, which...maybe Jing Yuan's response? Based on the format of the first letter, that seems to be the correct interpretation.
Also, the content of the footnote is referring to the entire trial and prison sentence up to exile taking a series of 几百年间, starting with the first letter asking to release Dan Feng into the hands of the Preceptors for trial. Note that in the first letter, the second footnote quote is Jing Yuan's response:
「不递交十王司，而是呈给六御，想来他们也晓得送过去也是有来无回，所以转而求六御来说情了？我没想到上任将军的头一桩难题竟然和军务无关啊……」
This is the lore that is used claim Jing Yuan has basically been dealing with the mess for hundreds of years. So, again, I don't think 几百年 refers to Dan Heng's time in prison but rather the span of time Preceptors have been writing letters to Jing Yuan for help.
Meanwhile, for the lyrics, the previous and following phrases also matters:
尘埃累债皆前缘 牵绊缠身如枷链
睁开眼 一人九万余夜
长梦应已梦遍
终有时醒觉
That seems to suggest the time being talked about is referencing the span between past and current life is "90,000+ nights" rather than time spent in prison. Which probably refers to hatching time.
Anyway, the bigger concern for me here is that if we assume the first letter basically arrived on day 1 of arrest (in close proximity thereof), Qingzu is well over 700+ years old, is 100 years over the high end of expected age for Vidyadhara and should look like a super old person (since patch 2.5 confirmed Vidyadhara ages based on Dan Heng's description of Taoran looking like a decrepit old man). The only way this would make sense is if there's another couple hundred years between arrest and Preceptors reaching out to Jing Yuan, but I doubt Jing Yuan would have zero other military responsibilities during this time.
The only other option is that Qingzu, like Taoran, for some reason kept her name and memories through the reincarnation cycle. Or the average live expectancy given by the sidequest is just straight up wrong.
(Bookmarked.)
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We still can't really get around the issue of the attack is explicitly "about 700 years" ago and there's still the question of the "Abundance buildup" Jing Yuan referenced when telling Igor Xianzhou can't help. If that wasn't referring to Shuhu, then what was that supposed to refer to?
But being able to squeeze a few decades between Igor's visit and Battle of Shuhu still gives the adult!Jing Yuan headcanon some breathing room. Still not as comfortable as I would like, but at least it's more than before. So I'll take it. :p
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So her age is a bug, yeah... maybe she's on the longer side of "average" life expectancy, like Jingliu is for native Xianzhou. I mean, after all, someone has to average out that one gal who rebirths every few months or so.
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The other potential explanation I can think of is the footnotes were added after the fact. Like Jing Yuan just has this giant stack of preceptor letters shoved somewhere and Qingzu is going through them trying to figure out what needs filing vs what gets burned. But it's a bit of a stretch...
I think there's enough normal Vidyadhara to balance out that one girl. Much like the human average life expectancy isn't going to suddenly change due to one case of early infant mortality. Qingzu's age just seems like an oversight on the writer's side.