Oh my gosh, some people just don't get what your post means when it's so simple to understand. When I read your post, I understood it right away because that's what I'm also thinking. Having read this long ago up to now, there's really something different with how the characters are drawn now especially Sun Jing. I also have a similar post way back that maybe there's a different illustrator now. It's not because of how the way she dresses because that's how Sun Jing dresses from the very start, it's just there's something different with texture and angles of the MCs face. Oh and just to add, I'm a lesbian btw.
well it seems like i misunderstood you. maybe i got you confused with the other people in this thread. however, i actually do draw, but i really don't see what you're talking about, the lines being more masculine in terms of her physique. i can see that the lines are thicker, but they're the same thickness on qiu tong. what you're describing sounds like a typical change in art style to me. same-face syndrome isn't a good thing, and it's common for artists to slowly change the design of their characters to differentiate them more. i've heard teachers criticizing designs like this: "your characters all have the same face." even to designs with different heights, fashion, hair color and other distinctions. this is especially a problem w/anime-esque art style. it's more believable to me that tan jiu spotted this as a problem and changed it, rather than that they're unconsciously prejudiced.
take for example this webcomic, "always raining here," with a pretty significant artist evolution.
on the first page, http://alwaysraininghere.com/index.php/arh/cover-2/, the two male MCs look almost the same. hairstyle, face shape, eye shape, etc. by the end, http://alwaysraininghere.com/index.php/arh/page-219/, they've changed drastically. one has much softer and feminine features, while the other is more angular w/defined jawline, etc. once again, an extreme example, but i wouldn't say the artist couldn't portray a gay relationship w/o falling to hetero tropes. it's clear this is what the artist always had intended, but simply wasn't at that level in their art yet.
recently, i showed a friend of mine a few of those early drawings and he too thought sun jing was a guy. it seems to me from the concept designs that sun jing was intended to be less feminine than qiu tong. sn't it feasible, then, than tan jiu has simply gotten better at portraying it?
(This comment was a while ago but oh well) As a butch lesbian reading this shit show of a thread I just have to say that even implying that the butch/femme relationship is imitating het relationships in any way is incredibly shitty?? (and homophobic for a thousand reasons) and I can't believe I'm writing this much on this haha but let me say that the author has actually done an amazing job, in my opinion, at portraying an actual lesbian couple that I actually enjoy reading about (aS A LESBIAN WOW) + when I saw that the artist had started drawing her rougher and more masculine I genuinely got really excited and happy because 99.99% of lesbian rep (in various media) are two feminine women (not saying there's anything wrong with femme/femme relationships because that's not what's shown)
I can definitely see where you're coming from, but I don't think it's the author envisioning them in a boy-girl relationship. Some women do become more masculine throughout their relationship, both style-wise and physically (more muscle growth, etc). My (now ex) girlfriend definitely did that. I actually quite like that the author made her a little more masculine since almost every other GL manga has two femme girls (no hate to femme girls, they're great too). That might just be my love for masculine women talking, though. That's just my opinion, though.
Is it just me or did the creator draw the tomboyish roughen the character design for the tomboyish character? (I forgot her name.) In the beginning both girls were drawn as equally cute and feminine, it was just that one wore more pants. But it's as if, now that the romance is acknowledged between them, she accentuates the masculinity of one over the other...?
Idk. But another reader actually asked if one was a guy now lol! And I totally get the reasons behind that question even if it was awkwardly expressed.