When last we left our problematic secondary characters, they completed a water demon quest.
Mu Yao has a question for Fu Yi
Why was he trapped in the illusion the longest despite being the most powerful? We see Fu Yi’s memories of a fire, and a child wailing while clutching something with a bloody hand. He tells her it’s in the past, but while he knows her past she doesn’t know his or his master.
Miao Miao has nearly recovered from whatever but has side effects from the medications. Cui Cui tells her how hard it was for Sheng to track those plant demons down. Miao Miao feels she sees Sheng as a person, not a game character.
Cui Cui hides as a backscratcher before they leave the city, but falls on the ground in front of everyone. Mu Yao advises her to have him change to a hairpin. Sheng confirms his sister has agreed to let Cui Cui come along.
Outside, Mu Yao tells Fu Yi she agreed for Miao Miao’s sake.
They’re off to find clues about Resentful Woman
This takes them to unexplored lands where unexpectedly they come across a little panda statue. Miao Miao thinks it’s broken through the dimensional wall. I don’t know what that means or why she thinks it.
But there’s something odd about the panda and the clearing. They keep walking past it as though stuck in a loop. Miao Miao is the only one who notices and sticks a flower in the statue to mark it. When they walk past it again, the flower is still there and everyone vanishes except Miao Miao.
She’s blasted through time and space to different scenes from the novel’s ending. Fu Yi tells Mu Yao he never loved her. Sheng kills Fu Yi, and Mu Yao cries. Mu Yao asks Lin Yu’s funeral tablet why she wanted her dead. Sheng says it’s because Lin Yu wanted Fu Yi.
Mu Yao learns Sheng is a demon. The Resentful Woman says she’s the only one who cares about her. Mu Yao and Sheng fight.
Miao Miao’s right, this novel is awful.
There’s a glitch. Mu Yao is in a calligraphy world with the panda. The system states she was accidentally transported to the ending sequence but needs to continue her quest. Because she advanced past the demon-catching world she caused an error and needs to get back to the main storyline.
Suddenly, she’s back in the clearing
She frantically hugs Mu Yao and reassures her that everyone loves her. A Messenger Golden Crow arrives with a white “Mu” jade tablet. Mu Yao is summoned to the Imperial Capital by Empress Consort Zhao.
They’re back on the main storyline, headed towards that very Bad Ending. Miao Miao urges them to take the slow route, wanting more happy time together. It’s the opposite of the rush she was to go there before when she just wanted to finish the story and get home.
At night, Miao Miao asks Sheng if he has memories of his parents. He remembers his hair being brushed, and the hair ribbon. But he’s unsure if it’s a real memory or if the woman in it is his mother since he can’t remember what she looks like. He has no memories of his father.
Miao Miao is surprised at his lack of curiosity, but he feels they abandoned him and he doesn’t need them. She wonders what he experienced when he was seven that made him forget everything.
She hopes that if she figures out the story Fu Zhuo didn’t write, she can save Sheng.
Mu Yao thinks Sheng upset Miao Miao
So he has to cheer her up. He makes a flying toy incorrectly and uses a talisman to make it fly. Miao Miao wants to repair it so it can fly without magic, but Sheng wants to control it. Miao Miao argues for the importance of leaving some things up to fate.
I don’t know how that ties into all their bad endings, but I know it does. Miao Miao is trying so hard to encourage the team to work together, hoping to stop them from killing each other. She knows Sheng starts losing control over his demonic powers in the Imperial Capital, but she can’t remember the details from the book.
She vows to rewrite the ending. Yes, I too would like that power.
Traveling montage! Campfires! Beaches! Desserts! Fun in the carriage! Everyone is getting along so we know it’ll all fall apart soon!
Miao Miao gives them a team name, Four Bamboo Masters (Cui Cui is included as the bamboo) with badges and a flag. No one is into it.
Here’s a mysterious, rich-looking man
He tells a less rich-looking man to find a way to meet our heroes before the Empress Consort. The end.
Somewhere in the Imperial City, a supreme sword called Crescent is lodged in a stone. Suddenly, it’s moving a little. It belonged to the only Heavenly Demon Catcher/Mu ancestor. It’s in a Sword in the Stone type situation, waiting to be wielded by the next Heavenly Demon Catcher.
Meanwhile, Miao Miao forces modern life on us as she talks about the cost of housing and prices in the big city. She tries to bargain for something like she did earlier, but it doesn’t work. Sheng chases the people who bought it instead and pays double for it.
Miao Miao wanders into a “Treasure Boutique”
It’s a horrifying store with expensive items obtained by being cruel to demons. There’s a child demon? We only kinda see? Miao Miao tries to buy them to rescue them. She doesn’t have enough money but the shop owner thinks she’s rich because of the bamboo demon in her hair.
They want to buy it or take it by force, whatever. Sheng arrives and saves Miao Miao and Cui Cui, destroying bottles of wine. Mu Yao and Fu Yi arrive and the shop owner acts like the victim, demanding exorbitant payment. Our heroes bicker over how to handle this when the not-rich-looking man shows up and takes care of it. He doesn’t tell them who he is.
They walk from the store, and Miao Miao says nothing about the demon she wanted to save.
Sheng can’t work up the courage to give Miao Miao the gift yet. Miao Miao understands why Sheng denies being a demon, it sucks. He claims he’s not a demon, but the victim of a demonic spell. She doesn’t argue.
Fu Yi tells Sheng to be nice to Miao Miao, pissing off Sheng. Miao Miao calms them but remembers Sheng is going to kill Fu Yi. She pushes the “be a team” thing on Sheng, upsetting him again.
Time to meet the Empress Consort Zhao!
Didn’t Miao Miao say she was a minor character? I wonder what they did in the Imperial City in the original story.
Anyway, they’re snuck in through the side gate because the emperor doesn’t like cultivators. The Empress Consort has amazing hair jewelry. She separates our heroes, and once they’re gone remarks on the resemblance of… one of them. To someone. Mysteriously.
The Mu siblings meet Empress Consort’s daughter, the princess, who is raving and hallucinating. But not, our Mu siblings determine, because of a demon. The Empress Consort doesn’t believe them but can’t explain why. She wishes their father were alive, implying that he would help.
Mu Yao is guilted into promising to help.
Meanwhile, Miao Miao sends Fu Yi to the garden to keep him away from women so he remains devoted to Mu Yao. While she’s sitting there, the mysterious rich guy from earlier walks by with the not-rich guy. Our rich guy gets called Your Highness and is supposed to marry the princess we just met.
But he falls in love at first sight with Miao Miao, who sits in the sun with drama-wind blowing through her hair.
We’ve switched back to the game plot!
I’m glad Miao Miao told us she’s seeing Sheng as a person because I’d missed how things changed. She’s no longer scheming different ways to raise his favorability every episode. His favorability has risen anyway, but I’m not sure she knows because the dust demons only showed the camera.
Now she’s scheming to stop the bad ending from happening. I empathize with that goal, but I’m not impressed by her efforts. Does she think she can convince everyone to be nice to each other and that’ll fix it? Miao Miao, that would not be a good story.
These were quieter episodes after the excitement of water demons and collapsing mountains. They feel like setup for an “Imperial City” story arc.
We’re getting more hints that demons may not be the real bad guys, but the victims. I hope they still rescue the demon Miao Miao abandoned at the store. I too care about fictional characters.
In new stuff, we’ve got a sick princess who may or may not be the victim of demons. “His Highness”, which I don’t know what royal title that means but he’s important. There’s a wedding. And an emperor who doesn’t like cultivators.
And while Miao Miao has been focused on stopping Fu Yi from unexpected romance, she may be dragged into one.
Leave a Reply