After all those years together, I wonder if Xiao Xun ever loved her at all
ngl WRC's acting makes me feel like there is a teeny tiny sliver of affection... (esp since we got two separate scenes of him shedding a tear over chu zhao) maybe he loved her but he loves power more
i mean she saw him literal minutes after 1) her father's head got sliced off and 2) he personally strangled her to death ahgwjg i don't think she had time to be calm
nope the og novel isn't really that heavily focused on romance
i...can't remember that well now but iirc after chu ling's death it's his second-in-command who steps up bc XYL still has to go back to the palace. at the end of the novel, he and chu zhao leave and wander around pretty much (they don't want anything to do with the capital / imperial family)
yang long's camera eye for romance is sometimes funny and questionable but damn if he doesn't know how to shoot a good family storyline... i'm having feels about uncle zhong :"""""")
it's a sort of "forbidden" romance hah in the novel she even threatened to drop baby a zhao off a cliff if he didn't let her disappear from their lives (this was motivated by her fear of her identity as a bandit leader being used as a threat to chu ling's reputation)
eng subs for the short film from both dudu and yiran's perspectives!!