DefyingDestiny

Ep 14
The face off between Jiang Xue Ning and Xue Shu had the intensity and gravitas of inner palace drama that was juat lacking in any interactions in The Princess Royal.
There is really no greater drama than a classic inner palace harem fight: the most beautiful exquisitely dressed women fighting to the death with the grace and beauty of swan and the deadly venom of a viper.

It should have been a red flag....but red is my favourite colour

Han Ting's drinking can be considered attempted suicide 🤔

Wow! 41 minutes is really short

Screams😱😱

The comment section is filled with arguments and its not about if the director made a mistake or if the character is badly portrayed or if the plot makes sense or people defending their favs.
Actual discussions about the story and the moral and intellectual choices by the character and no side is winning easily and all of this about the biggest modern drama taboo- a break up.
👏👏👏👏👏 screenwriter, director and actors, you did that!!

But why did Zeng Di do that? She doesn't seem like the type to pimp out female employees and if I'm remembering correctly, she hadn't noticed Han Ting's interest by then

I said it before, it would be terrifying to date a man like Han Ting. He's too perfect- attentive to her every mood, cooks for her, mentors her business, his name opens doors she would beg to see! The relationship was too unequal to suffer doubts.
Ji Xing can sense that Han Ting has ulterior motives in "helping" her company but she can't tell what they are.
Han Ting knows they are unequal and is fast tracking her ascension to a place that proves she can be the future Mrs Han Ting. It would be entirely too demeaning to her sense of pride that her business and her achievements are just "girlfriend auditioning" to him and his grandfather. Naturally he looks suspicious as his true intentions can't be explained.

Very much worth it.

Because a boss who bails on the company during a transition is an a**hole and shouldn't been spaming people who have to carry her slack as she leaves suddenly!!
It's not a "little" thing. The problem is Xincheng is a small business and was bound to fail under Ji Xing and SZZ's leadership: niceness does not keep businesses afloat. If Xincheng stayed in the market threatening Hanhai's business without a parent they would have been easily crushed. Even under HT protection she let's the wolf into the house b selling shares to Chang He. After how they used Wei Wei and left her to die, it surprised me she would make that decision even if she was angry with Han Ting.
She made a business decision to allow two corporate giant enemies hold a third each of her shares!!!! She wanted the 2 of them to fight in her tiny Xincheng battleground?
She sold all those employees she is being "nice" to with that decision because they would all be caught in the crossfire.
She didn't stop to make gd decisions, she didn't openly discuss with Li Li and SZZ or her employee s like she usually does. She panicked and made an ill fated emotional decision for her business.
So no don't send me an emotional blackmailing email after that

I'm still not on Ji Xing's side but I get where she is coming from.
She started the business as a small business, if she fails: 😟; if she succeeds:🥳.
But the investment and mentorship by HT put her on a totally different level very quickly. She never predicted or prepared for the pace or pressure it shot Xincheng up to; involving them in corporate sabotage and business enemies and being competion to a business giant within a business year. She had been struggling upwards and she was still slow by his and her "peers'" standard.
She got fired- started a business. She got dumped- became a workaholic. She has been running on rebellion and all that had been keep her going was the love and care of industry giant Han Ting. So the idea of emotional and professional betrayal by him is far above her mental state to bare. She tried to make a decision without him and found she wouldn't know what to do.
After all her hardwork and success with Xincheng, the merger blindsided her and the Chang He incident made her really feel her incompetence- she made the wrong choice, even in hurting Han Ting it failed woefully and he easily reverses it. He can run circles around her. How can they be "in love" when his definition of love is suitable? Is she his pet? How long does he plan to keep her? What exactly did Zeng Di do that made him cut her off? Because Zeng Di was his business "partner" and everyone in his home seem used to her presence, so how is her situation different?

Imagine going through a merger and your leadership bails. She's really not ready to be a business owner. She doesn't take the responsibility seriously enough or she wouldn't sign shares off to a man that had a hand in sabotaging her only recently, and simply to get back at Han Ting.

She wanted more and he said no; so she called it quits! He didn't want to give her what she wanted but wanted to force her to give him what she wanted.
Even a booty call has it's time limit. He wanted to keep her as a mistress and that is very different from a booty call. He first changed the nature of their relationship and she assumed it was to make them more formal with marriage in line. When she realised she was wrong she tried to end it, he kept pulling her back in.
Personally, I dislike him for asking for her heart and then being surprised she asked for his and a commitment. It was cruel

The ring was wild!!! That guy just wanted to use her youth and spark for life like a vampire feeding on blood. For such a "nice guy" it's really sad

It was love he could live without because he wasn't strong enough to fight for it. He always seemed to know he would have to fight for her. Since he started "pursuing" her he has been very careful and anxious because it felt very tenuous and fragile. He's an orphan and a powerful man; he really can't deal with loss like "normal" people and would rather wait till it was a sure win. Ji Xing is probably the first time in a long time he tried getting something he wasn't entirely sure he could win at.

He reminds of the ml from Well- Intended Love S1. That guy was an absolute mad man and would rather gaslight the girl to believe she was dying so she would marry him than risk asking her out and being rejected.

They chose to make it cryptic for tv. If she blatantly said that it might not translate well to a tv audience. After all we still have to root for them to reconcile.

He never put Xincheng in a position to be collateral damage or a smoke screen. It was always her. She was the one that kept making choices that led him to protect her and himself. He makes moves that serve multiple outcomes.
If Xincheng didn't look like his only way to double the stocks, the board wouldn't have signed off on investing in her. He was able to hide Hanhai and help her make her dream come true while being true to his business self-interest.
He didn't need her to agree to Chang He's deal to expose Han Yuan. He was able to extricate himself from Zeng Di and "clear up" his relationship with Han Yuan when SHE sold her shares.

But even if they didn't break up, the utter stupidity of that move would have been the death nail from the grandfather. She wanted to lash out at him and chose to betray him; it could have threatened his position in Donyang. She willing took that step, even knowing that Chang He could also hurt her and Xincheng. (After seeing what happened to Wei Wei, she can't pretend to be unaware).

She doesn't think it but her actions make it so. She tried to lash out at him by selling shares to his enemy; she chose to put him in a comprising position. She didn't know for sure what it meant to sell to Chang Ke but she knew it would be bad for him and his position in Donyang.
He didn't let her do it. He let her make her decision as he always does and protected herself and himself from her decision because he had the foresight to prepare for every possibility. He had already trapped Han Yuan with the insider trading and the pictures. Xincheng involvement pulled Chang Ke out and allowed him to "free" his cousin.

For sure but he already felt guilty once the thought crystallized in his head. If she was anybody else he would have impersonally told them what would happen next but he had been hand holding her through starting Xincheng, so he was thinking how to ever so carefully explain it to her in the best way.
Honestly he had been pandering to her unlike actual business partners; it was bound to implode sooner or later

He's someone that would be scary to be with: he's too smart, too fast and too perfect.

It was easy for Ji Xing to deal with his dominance over her business when they were platonic because he must respect her as a business person but once they became romantic, his choices in taking care of her business have an ulterior connotations. So once Zeng Di asks what would happen when he no longer loves her, the rose coloured glasses cracked.