At least now I have one person's math on Jing Yuan's age

[cashew]

The math.

I'm noticing three assumptions:

1. Using modern interpretation of 少年 even though the Chinese used in Xianzhou material is semi-archaic (such as calling domesticated cats 狸奴 and not the modern name 猫). As I've mentioned before, up until 1911, the phrase 少年 was used to refer to people as old as 25-30 years old.

2. Zero regard for appearance and age mis-match, especially when judging age of long lived species. No acknowledgement of the fact that Baiheng is also described as 少女 and thus should be around the same age (appearance-wise) as Jing Yuan.

3. Asserts that Xianzhou Natives long lived species matures at the same rate as short lived species as fact without citation. The only "support" we have is the lore stating 成年后身体不再衰老. Note that for Foxians the wording is 成年后面目不老.

The thing about point three is that for Xianzhou Natives the description is "after maturity the body no longer undergo senescence", while Foxians state "after maturity the appearance no longer ages". This is immensely important difference! This means Foxians age physically, but their appearance don't. In contrast, Xianzhou Natives don't undergo senescence, which does not mean lack of growing, it only means the falling apart aspect of growing stops.

So basically, Xianzhou Natives have lobster biology. Much like lobsters eventually grow too big for their physiology to keep up with the energy cost (2nd law of thermodynamics does not forgive and never forgets!), the Xianzhou Natives' system (in this case their brain) starts breaking down at the 800-1000 year mark due to not being able to process the psychological trauma.

But this still means we have zero clues on the maturation rate of all the long lived species (Xianzhou Natives, Foxians, Vidyadhara) and no way to guess at the actual age.

I notice that the math post once again asserts that Dan Feng was 600-700 years old with no citation. Given 2.5 patch confirming that Vidyadhara do appear old and decrepit toward the end of their cycle (per Dan Heng's own words), Dan Feng's fairly young appearance is pretty good evidence he was nowhere near the end of his cycle. (Edit to add: OTOH, Qingzu's appearance throws that claim out the window, so it's more like the appearance is not a very good estimate for age. We need actual events.)

One thing I am wondering is if the Sword Champion title is something one can get repeatedly. The math post asserts Jingliu got it for the first time and that was the day Yingxing gifted her the sword, but we actually have no clue how the Sword Champion thing works. Previously the assumption was the Wardance might have something to do with it, but we know in 2.5 that traditionally the 龙尊 is actually the one charged with being the ringmaster (that's how they translated 守擂?) and the whole thing has nothing to do with swords Champion competition. So the Sword Champion is something else. (Plus the last time Jing Yuan took the job instead, why?) Anyway, point is, is Sword Champion title that needs defending? Because if so, then it's very likely at the time Jingliu got her sword from Yingxing, that wasn't her first time as Sword Champion.

Comments

[tanithryudo]

Looked over that post, and yeah, I think it makes too many assumptions. In addition to what you mentioned above, I would also argue Yingxing's potential age. Even though he's a short lived species, the Xianzhou is also known for it's advanced medical services, and he works in an important high ranking position. So I don't think it would be surprising if he got the best medical services available, leading to a spry body at even 70-80 years old.

Dan Feng being 600-700 years old seems to have no support. Ok, I've found the reference to Dan Feng being ~600: "靡靡赤龙，森森青松 / 六百余年凡尘中 / 如梦尽是空". But this seems to be talking about his age at the time of death/forced molting. As we discussed before, it's very possible his trial took a long span of time to sort out. Or, it could even be possible that the poet is just using the average age of Vidyadhara and doesn't actually know (or bother to research) Dan Feng's age.

Then regarding the whole appearance thing, I found the image in question, which actually is interesting in that Dan Heng says Taoran looked close to the end of lifespan at the time of Dan Heng's exile. But, this guy is also a peer of Dan Feng and looked old at that time already. This brings up problems with Dan Feng/Dan Heng's timeline again... Did this guy reborn once soon after the Sedition, and then again after Dan Heng's rebirth (within the last century), and still hatched + grew up faster than Dan Heng? Or, did he rebirth several centuries after the Sedition, when Dan Heng was reborn a few centuries ago...and still matured faster than Dan Heng? Ugh... rather, it does successfully prove that we can't use visual cues to identify the age of Vidydhara, because there's a huge variation in the rate of maturation, lifespan, and egg-time.

Wrt to Sword Champion and the Wardance... My understanding is that Sword Champion goes to the person with the best swordsmanship ability on the ship. How that would be determined is likely via a tournament, or possibly also by regularly scheduled challenges by hopefuls seeking to take the title from the reigning champ. From Yanqing's character lore, it sounds like that after Jingliu, there were people who could've have taken this Sword Champion position. But it's just that they didn't want the official title used after her anymore.

As for the Wardance, it seems to be something that *could* potentially be used to determine a new Sword Champ, but doesn't *have* to be. After all, the Wardance has a lot of foreigners and non-sword-wielding participants who obviously wouldn't be competing for a title that's sword-specific and tied to a Xianzhou military position. My take is that if there's a Sword Champion, they could volunteer to defend their title in that tournament. Same with the high elder. So during the Wardance ~700 years ago, it's likely Jingliu and/or Dan Feng foisted the task off to Jing Yuan. My guess is that, if a Xianzhou swordsman wins the Wardance, they would they have the additional right to further challenge the current Sword Champion for that title (possibly ahead of whatever line exists for that challenge rights).

> Because if so, then it's very likely at the time Jingliu got her sword from Yingxing, that wasn't her first time as Sword Champion.

This I would think to be unlikely, unless she lost the position to someone else, and later regained the title. But given Jingliu's reputation and general level of ability that we know from her, that's unlikely to be the case.