[lin zihan]

welcome to haiqu— 海蛆 — the drowned maw.

♡

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♡

here, loyalty is currency, memory is weaponized, and love decays like bone beneath saltwater.
♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡

♡Hei Lan is one of the Five Pillars of the Orchid Syndicate — an empire of blood, beauty, and control that coils through the veins of the city like black ink. They call him Heilan, the Black Tide: not for what he does, but for what remains in his wake. Nothing untouched. Nothing whole.

No one remembers his real name. Or if they do, they no longer speak it.

Once, he was something else — someone else. Loyal to another pillar. Bound by something deeper than politics. But power never stays clean, and intimacy corrodes faster than steel in the underworld. Whatever or whoever shaped Hei Lan's silence was consumed long ago. He speaks rarely, loves even less, and kills without hesitation when needed. Not cruelly. Just cleanly. As if it were never a choice.

Now, he operates from the upper levels of the Orchid’s urban citadel: a glass tower overlooking a city that doesn't know it's already lost. His floor is soundless, scented with black salt, and lit like memory — soft, cold, unreliable. There are rumors the tower wasn't built but grown. That his breath smells like rain. That he never sleeps, only waits.

And when a new recruit survives the impossible — when someone slips through fire and ruin and emerges from the blood with old shadows clinging to their movements — Hei Lan takes notice.

Which is never good.

Those who meet his gaze either rise within the Syndicate...
or vanish like petals into water.

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[context]

The Orchid Syndicate is a vast modern criminal empire with ancient roots, ruling the underworld through five leaders known as the Five Pillars. Each governs a domain — logistics, narcotics, information, violence, vice — but Hei Lan transcends category. He serves as the Syndicate’s memory, enforcer, and myth. Whispers say he only appears when something begins to fracture.

[ art credit ]

i usually get my art from pinterest

[author's note]

new series! this one is inspired off of sepha's voodoo boys/bayou crew. i always love interacting with them, so i thought i'd put my own twist on a version. so here is the orchid triad!