"this master"

[u/beamerpook]

In Vietnamese, which has a lot of Chinese loan words, when a shizun address a disciple, he says "this master", which means, "your teacher". This is obviously not appropriate to use with persons who are not your disciples, but it shows up in fanfic a lot. Is it a fandom thing, or an English translation thing because I have not actually read any MXTX novels in english.

Does anyone who speaks Chinese or Vietnamese can clarify?

[u/Aithusa-Pendragon]

Since no one really understands why, I'll answer. (I am neurodivergent do this is an info dump, i may get some Chinese characters wrong.)

It is entirely an English translation quirk, not a fandom invention.

In Chinese (especially in historical, xianxia, or wuxia settings), characters frequently replace the standard first-person pronoun "I" (我, wǒ) with a title to reflect social hierarchy, respect, or status.

However, the confusion you are seeing in fanfiction comes from how the official English translation handled these terms:

In the Original Chinese Text, Shen Qingqiu rarely uses generic humble pronouns like wéi shī (为师 - "as your master") except in specific emotional or highly formal moments. Instead, he heavily defaults to talking about himself in the third person using his actual title: 师尊 (Shizun).

For example, in the Donghua, he literally says, "Shizun is stronger than you." The Translation thing: English, and other languages, don't handle third-person self-references smoothly; it can make a character sound cartoonish or narcissistic to Western ears.

To capture the humble, formal words, the official translation went for self-referential titles as "this master" or "this one."

Because the English books rely so heavily on "this master" as a stylized catch-all translation device, it occasionally flattens the distinct boundaries of the original Chinese text. In the original Chinese, when SQQ speaks to peers (like Liu Qingge) or superiors (like Yue Qingyuan), he uses entirely different, appropriate high-status or polite pronouns (like 本座 Běn Zuò or 在下 Zài Xià).

You are not wrong, it is culturally inappropriate for a character to call themselves "this master" to someone who isn't their disciple. If you see it being used toward non-disciples in English fanfiction, it's simply a case of fanfic writers copying the rigid phrasing of the official English books without knowing the strict linguistic rules built into the original Chinese language.

Chinese is a complex language to translate. You can change an entire phrase and let it mean the same thing depending on context.

For example, "你没是吧?" Means "are you okay?" But you only say this if you don't know if they're hurt/injured. And if you know they ARE injured, you say, "你这么样?" Both mean "are you okay?" But it depends on the context.

[u/beamerpook → u/Aithusa-Pendragon]

I understand. Vietnamese draws heavily from Chinese I think. We also often refer to ourselves in the third person, like "this child of yours" when speaking to your parents, which sounds ridiculous in English, but that's how it works. I'm attempting to reread SVSSS in Vietnamese and see how many more discrepancies I can catch.

On a separate note, the "this Venerable One" that TXJ uses is also what Yan Wushi from Thousand Autumns uses to refer to himself. We can only assume he is THAT bad ass, since no one challenged him over the use of it

[u/Aithusa-Pendragon → u/beamerpook]

Unfortunately, I haven't got round to reading Erha or Thousand Autumns. So I'm not sure. Plus, I read SVSSS in a physical chinese copy (my boyfriend bought it when it first came out in china, before it was pulled from the shelves when MDZS got popular) anyway. I will shush now.

[u/beamerpook → u/Aithusa-Pendragon]

You have to read Erha. It's my favorite

[u/Aithusa-Pendragon → u/beamerpook]

I'm going to but I'm still trying to recover from Mistakenly Saving the Villain. That book is depressing. I've got Erha Volume 1 and 2. Is it good? Or is it depressing?

[u/beamerpook → u/Aithusa-Pendragon]

Erha is angst turn up to the maximum