Guys, does anyone have any clue where the heck idishia is supposed to be? Cause they named other middle eastern…
Pretty sure it's meant to be a stand-in for Iran.
Idk about South Korea, but in the US, Iran is often grouped together with other non-democratic states with nuclear weapons, or ambitions for nuclear weapons, that are seen as enemy states. In the early 2000s, George Bush called Iran, Iraq and North Korea the "axis of evil". More recently, other American politicians have referred to Iran, North Korea, China and Russia as the "new axis of evil".
Sadly, she ends up with Tushan Jing. There are no secondary couples. This is not a typical romance.
Don't forget, Kokuto, CX ends up with Ah Nian and Xing Yue as his two empresses, plus a full harem. Practically every available noblewoman in the kingdom except the one he loved!
He can't return Ah Nian's feelings, he can't love Xing Yue the way she wants to be loved, and he has to treat Xing Yue as his honourable empress (even after finding out that she tried to murder XY) because of the promise he made to Feng Long when Feng Long was dying in his arms.
Xiang Liu uses poison to train/increase his power. The excerpts below are from a fan translation of the novel…
Another part of chapter 19 very explicitly conjured up the image of XY's poison-making being like "cooking" in her own medicine / poison-making "kitchen"! ^^
-----
Chapter 19:
Zhi Jin Peak, a bright and glorious morning.
Xiao Yao was tending to the fire pit and her face was bright red with sweat dotting her forehead.
She felt the time was right and put on her gloves before opening the cover of the pot to take out the mold. She put it inside a pail of ice water until the mold solidified. Xiao Yao poured the mold out and individual mold pieces tumbled on the table, some pink, others green, and even yellow.
Zhuan Xu walked into this “medicine making room” and saw Xiao Yao intent on her work. He said nothing and stood in the corner to watch quietly. There were colorful molds strewn all over the table but the shapes were odd. Some looked like flower petals, others like leaves, he really couldn’t figure out what she was making.
Xiao Yao took out a rectangular glass plate, it was dark on both ends and white in the middle like the backdrop of an ink portrait with nothing on it.
Xiao Yao used a brush and covered the white part once with a liquid.
Xiao Yao washed her hands and then put it in the ice water for some time before wiping it with a clean cloth. She then picked up the molds from earlier and used a small paring knife to start carving the molds. She finished one and would put it on the plate as if she was painting on it.
Zhuan Xu was curious so walked over and he saw Xiao Yao’s slender fingers expertly at work and gradually the white plate was covered with a green lily frond and there was dew on it that appeared like it was about to slide off. A pink lily appeared and the yellow nectar inside formed. Within the lilies two salmon peeked out from under the water shyly.
The entire morning passed and an entire salmon frolicking in a lily pond tableau was created. Other than having no sound, everything was there, even the scent of the lilies.
Xiao Yao stared at it intently and then smiled in satisfaction.
Zhuan Xu clapped. “Scent, visuals, and taste – it’s all there. Makes me want to take a bite.”
Xiao Yao made a face at him. “It’s all poison.”
Zhuan Xu shook his head. “Can’t figure out what this weird hobby of yours is. Who makes poisons into a delicacy. Your poison making room is pretty much a kitchen.”
Xiao Yao carefully picked up the plate and put it inside a box before shutting it and wrapping it up in a cloth.
Zhuan Xu asked warily, “You can’t be giving that to someone?”
Xiao Yao laughed. “Secret.”
Zhuan Xu sighed. “I can’t decide if you like this person, or hate this person.”
After a morning of sitting Xiao Yao’s back ached and she rubbed her back and asked, “How come you have time to come watch me make poisons?”
Zhuan Xu said, “I have something to discuss with you.”
Xiao Yao got serious. “Go ahead.”
“Feng Long invited you out a couple of times and you turned him down every time?”
“Yup.” Xiao Yao’s eyes twirled and she asked, “You want me to say yes?”
Zhuan Xu nodded. Xiao Yao didn’t understand “Isn’t there Xing Yue? If you want to announce a marriage alliance, it’s enough for you to marry Xing Yue!”
“Xing Yue is Xing Yue, her last name is Sheng Nong. Feng Long is Feng Long, his last name is Chi Sui and he’s the next Chi Sui clan leader. You are you, carrying the bloodlines of the Yellow Emperor and the Grand Emperor.”
Xiao Yao furrowed her brows “You can’t be wanting me to marry Feng Long?”
“What’s wrong with Feng Long?” Zhuan Xu was confused now – Tu Shan Jing was engaged, Fang Feng Bei was a profligate spare son, compared to both guys Feng Long was so much better. He was powerful and talented with a great family background. Yet Xiao Yas would rather spend all her time with Fang Feng Bei wandering the desolate mountainside looking at wild flowers instead of going with Feng Long to regal Sheng Nong mountain to view the famed peonies.
[...]
Xiao Yao pushed Zhuan Xu out the door. “This ‘kitchen’ of mine is full of poison so when I’m not here don’t go in.”
______________________________
A dance hall, a dancer was gracefully dancing.
Xiao Yao smiled and placed a white wrapped box in front of Fang Feng Bei.
Bei glanced over it and drawled, “What’s that?”
Xiao Yao said, “You open it.”
Bei shook his cup, “I’m drinking right now.”
Xiao Yao clenched her fist – be patient, be patient, be patient! She released her fist and opened the cloth cover over the box.
Bei was still uninterested and continued drinking his wine and watching the dancer dancing.
Xiao Yao had no choice but to open the box herself. When she made it, to create the scent of the lilies she spent a lot of time on it. Right now the scent of the lilies were lost in the pungent odor of the food and the perfumes around them so it wasn’t noticeable anymore.
Xiao Yao rushed here excitedly with a whole bellyful of things she wanted to say to him. She wanted to boast about how she made the poison lilies, how she made the leaf covers, but now the entire salmon frolicking in the lilies tableau turned dim and she didn’t feel like saying anything anymore. She picked up her wine and started drinking and pouting.
Bei finally turned his gaze from the dancer to the table and checked out the tableau on the glass plate. It was delicate and full of life, the colors vibrant and the items exquisitely rendered.
Bei stared for some time before picking up a chopstick and eating a lily frond.
One bite after another, one lily frond, one salmon, one lily…..slowly he ate the entire salmon frolicking in lilies tableau.
Xiao Yao gaped at him. “You….don’t stuff yourself silly.”
Bei shot her a look and she immediately shut up.
Bei ate the final bite and put down his chopstick. He took a sip of wine and casually said, “Not bad.”
Xiao Yao stared at the empty plate and her heart soared. “The only person who can make poisons this tasty in the entire world is me!”
Bei laughed back, “And the only person in the entire world who can appreciate your great “cooking” talents is me!”
Xiao Yao sassed back, “It’s enough to have a true [zhi yin (知音)].”
Bei gave her a half-smile but said nothing.
Xiao Yao asked, “Can you continue teaching me archery now?” What she really meant to ask was – are you not angry at me anymore?
Bei finished his wine. “I need to leave for a bit, wait for me to come back.”
Xiao Yao figured he was going back to Qing Shui town. Even if there was no active warfare, he was still the General of the Sheng Nong resistance army and there was much he had to do.
Xiao Yao couldn’t help it and sighed loudly and murmured, “If only you could forever be Fang Feng Bei, that would be so great.”
Bei appeared not to have heard her as he set down his wine cup and got up to leave, his form disappearing in the layers of curtains.
I still don't understand why Xiangliu keeps asking for and eating Xiayao's poison? Is he addicted to the poison…
Xiang Liu uses poison to train/increase his power.
The excerpts below are from a fan translation of the novel that the drama is based on.
---
Chapter 2:
A month later, under Lao Mu’s arrangement, Ma Zhi and the daughter of Butcher Gao got engaged. Everything returned to normal and every day was just like before – it was so calm it was boring, it was so boring it was peaceful, it was so peaceful it was happy.
Except occasionally a mall-white condor would come find Xiao Liu, bringing something and taking away something. Xiao Liu made the poison for Xiang Liu but always held something back. Each poison was beyond deadly and it fit his requirement, but then it would have an odd color or smell. Whatever the reason, it was impossible to use it to kill a powerful person under tight protection.
Xiao Liu thought that, as time passed, Xiang Liu would come and raise a fuss but Xiang Liu appeared to not care about “color, smell, and taste” and as long as the poison met his specifications he accepted it all.
Xiao Liu used his haphazard medical and poison skills to deduce that Xiang Liu was a very unique being and his power came from using poison to train. All the poison that Xiao Liu produced was likely consumed by him.
After he figured it out, Xiao Liu breathed a sigh of relief, and then proceeded to make the most horrible tasting poison ever.
---
Eventually, the poison takes on additional meaning, as Xiao Yao puts a great deal of effort and all of her feelings into her poison creations and Xiang Liu is the only person in the world who can appreciate her skills.
---
Chapter 16:
Xiao Yao started spending more time developing her poisons. Late into the night, she would lay on the pallet playing with her poisons and thinking of how to make it even better in terms of prettier and not necessarily more poisonous.
She had memorized the Sheng Nong Herb Manuel left by the Flame Emperor, who the entire world regarded as the progenitor of medicine. She also flipped through all the Gao Xing and Xuan Yuan medical books. She didn’t doubt her poison's ability to be deadly, she just wanted to make it look pretty. She stared at the phoenix flower and researched a few days and worked a few nights and finally created a perfect replica of the small red phoenix flower with the same intoxicating fragrance. She made the poison layered on it like the morning dew.
Every one of her poisons was one of her longing, one of her missing, one of her feelings. She created it and watched it come to life in her hands, and then carefully put it away to send out.
Xiao Yao wondered what Xiang Liu would think when he saw the poisons? Would he call her a weirdo pervert?
Xiao Yao put the finished poisons in boxes and went to the messenger service run by the Tu Shan clan and handed it to them. “Deliver this to the Qing Shui Town brothel.”
Xiao Yao paid the expensive price to deliver it to the edge of Xuan Yuan and didn’t blink an eye since it wasn’t her money.
This was Xiao Yao’s solution to deal with Xiang Liu. The entire world was covered with the Tu Shan messenger network so if Xiao Yao had money then she could send it to Qing Shui Town. She had been sending him poisons every 3-4 months, the last time sent from Gao Xing. She wondered if Xiang Liu got it? He ought to, otherwise with his petty personality, no matter how busy he was he would find time to cause her trouble.
---
Chapter 19:
Bei ate the final bite and put down his chopstick. He took a sip of wine and casually said, “Not bad.”
Xiao Yao stared at the empty plate and her heart soared, “The only person who can make poisons this tasty in the entire world is me!”
Bei laughed back, “And the only person in the entire world who can appreciate your great “cooking” talents is me!”
Xiao Yao sassed back, “It’s enough to have a true [zhi yin (知音)*].”
Bei gave her a half-smile but said nothing.
Xiao Yao asked, “Can you continue teaching me archery now?” What she really meant to ask was – are you not angry at me anymore?
Bei finished his wine. “I need to leave for a bit, wait for me to come back.”
Xiao Yao figured he was going back to Qing Shui town. Even if there was no active warfare, he was still the General of the Sheng Nong resistance army and there was much he had to do.
Xiao Yao couldn’t help it and sighed loudly and murmured, “If only you can forever be Fang Feng Bei, that would be so great.”
Bei appeared not to have heard her as he set down his wine cup and got up to leave, his form disappearing in the layers of curtains.
---
* This phrase alludes to a Chinese fable about Boya and Ziqi. It literally translates as "know sound" but is used to convey a particular kind of relationship between two people, such as soulmates, bosom friends, or people who are completely on the same wavelength.
The translator who translated that word for the subtitles for the corresponding scene in the drama (S1 ep 27) chose to translate it as "confidant". The fan who translated the novel chose to translate that word as "soulmate".
“Xiang Liu’s powers come from ingesting all types of poisons to train. There is no poison in the world that can take him down, so his blood is now the world’s most poisonous thing.”
Zhuan Xu’s heart sank and his face turned ashen.
Feng Long forced a smile at Xiao Yao. “So even you can’t find an antidote for it?”
For the past hundred years she tried every method to fell Xiang Liu with poison, giving him the hardest to find poisons to take him down. If she could counter his blood poison then Xiang Liu would have already been poisoned by her. Xiao Yao’s face was stark white and her voice shook. “I…..I….I’ll do my best!” She claimed to have top medical skills, but who knew the day would come that she would have to watch a friend die.
The scene where KJY sat on the bench and watched YEH scoop JSY up in his arms and twirl her around with both of them smiling at each other was so emotional. I felt like KJY was simultaneously happy and grateful that those two wonderful people were alive and able to love each other and share such joy with each other (thanks to her father's sacrifice), and yet also so painfully reminded of how (because of that sacrifice) she was deprived at such a young age of the opportunity to ever be scooped up in her own father's arms again or to have that kind of close, loving and supportive relationship with him. She'd never get to smile at him ever again. Never get to laugh with him ever again. Never get to feel his love, and give him love in return, ever again. Never get to speak with him or see him at all, ever again. So utterly heartbreaking.
With that intense combination of emotions, I couldn't help but cry. Dramas don't get me like that very often.
Because Xiang Liu IS Xiao Yao's soulmate, in both Western and the Eastern sense. They couldn't have shared the…
You're welcome. Yes, good times. Those discussions added so much to the reading / viewing experience.
As much as I love the term zhiji and the way it recognizes how valuable it is to have a person who gets / understands you, the extra levels of meaning behind zhiyin and the way it fits XY and XL is just... chef's kiss.
Because Xiang Liu IS Xiao Yao's soulmate, in both Western and the Eastern sense. They couldn't have shared the…
A minor point of clarification on that, since it was something that I mixed up too, H19279 pointed out last year that the term that XY used in both the LYF drama and the LYF novel is zhiyin, not zhiji (a very similar term).
did I miss the part in the novel where Xiang Liu had a woman form for that boat scene? or was that something entirely…
You're welcome!
I'm very attached to the novel version of events and for the most part I dislike instances where the drama departs from it, but I really did appreciate that the boat scene gave XL the opportunity to hear WXL say "他很好" about XL in a context where WXL didn't know she was speaking to XL so XL could believe that she genuinely meant what she said and she really did think of him in a positive light.
The main reason the male lead kept his wife's identity hidden was not for "his political stand". It was to protect…
Agreed. The way that was handled in the drama really didn't feel logical or consistent with the build up that happened in the preceding episodes.
Like, HHJ directly told the male lead that him disappearing was her nightmare. And she and the male lead confessed their feelings for each other and agreed to have a real marriage with new terms in their marriage contract. And HIA told the male lead that HHJ knew that he was not the real Baek Sa Eon and that Baek Jang Ho arranged the car crash to keep that secret hidden, and HHJ didn't care about it. She knew everything and still risked her life to save the male lead.
With all of those changes in the drama, it really didn't make sense for the male lead to still run away to Argan (without saying anything to HHJ!) like he did in the novel.
3 
1 
1 
Idk about South Korea, but in the US, Iran is often grouped together with other non-democratic states with nuclear weapons, or ambitions for nuclear weapons, that are seen as enemy states. In the early 2000s, George Bush called Iran, Iraq and North Korea the "axis of evil". More recently, other American politicians have referred to Iran, North Korea, China and Russia as the "new axis of evil".
He can't return Ah Nian's feelings, he can't love Xing Yue the way she wants to be loved, and he has to treat Xing Yue as his honourable empress (even after finding out that she tried to murder XY) because of the promise he made to Feng Long when Feng Long was dying in his arms.
Tragic. Tragic. Tragic.
-----
Chapter 19:
Zhi Jin Peak, a bright and glorious morning.
Xiao Yao was tending to the fire pit and her face was bright red with sweat dotting her forehead.
She felt the time was right and put on her gloves before opening the cover of the pot to take out the mold. She put it inside a pail of ice water until the mold solidified. Xiao Yao poured the mold out and individual mold pieces tumbled on the table, some pink, others green, and even yellow.
Zhuan Xu walked into this “medicine making room” and saw Xiao Yao intent on her work. He said nothing and stood in the corner to watch quietly. There were colorful molds strewn all over the table but the shapes were odd. Some looked like flower petals, others like leaves, he really couldn’t figure out what she was making.
Xiao Yao took out a rectangular glass plate, it was dark on both ends and white in the middle like the backdrop of an ink portrait with nothing on it.
Xiao Yao used a brush and covered the white part once with a liquid.
Xiao Yao washed her hands and then put it in the ice water for some time before wiping it with a clean cloth. She then picked up the molds from earlier and used a small paring knife to start carving the molds. She finished one and would put it on the plate as if she was painting on it.
Zhuan Xu was curious so walked over and he saw Xiao Yao’s slender fingers expertly at work and gradually the white plate was covered with a green lily frond and there was dew on it that appeared like it was about to slide off. A pink lily appeared and the yellow nectar inside formed. Within the lilies two salmon peeked out from under the water shyly.
The entire morning passed and an entire salmon frolicking in a lily pond tableau was created. Other than having no sound, everything was there, even the scent of the lilies.
Xiao Yao stared at it intently and then smiled in satisfaction.
Zhuan Xu clapped. “Scent, visuals, and taste – it’s all there. Makes me want to take a bite.”
Xiao Yao made a face at him. “It’s all poison.”
Zhuan Xu shook his head. “Can’t figure out what this weird hobby of yours is. Who makes poisons into a delicacy. Your poison making room is pretty much a kitchen.”
Xiao Yao carefully picked up the plate and put it inside a box before shutting it and wrapping it up in a cloth.
Zhuan Xu asked warily, “You can’t be giving that to someone?”
Xiao Yao laughed. “Secret.”
Zhuan Xu sighed. “I can’t decide if you like this person, or hate this person.”
After a morning of sitting Xiao Yao’s back ached and she rubbed her back and asked, “How come you have time to come watch me make poisons?”
Zhuan Xu said, “I have something to discuss with you.”
Xiao Yao got serious. “Go ahead.”
“Feng Long invited you out a couple of times and you turned him down every time?”
“Yup.” Xiao Yao’s eyes twirled and she asked, “You want me to say yes?”
Zhuan Xu nodded. Xiao Yao didn’t understand “Isn’t there Xing Yue? If you want to announce a marriage alliance, it’s enough for you to marry Xing Yue!”
“Xing Yue is Xing Yue, her last name is Sheng Nong. Feng Long is Feng Long, his last name is Chi Sui and he’s the next Chi Sui clan leader. You are you, carrying the bloodlines of the Yellow Emperor and the Grand Emperor.”
Xiao Yao furrowed her brows “You can’t be wanting me to marry Feng Long?”
“What’s wrong with Feng Long?” Zhuan Xu was confused now – Tu Shan Jing was engaged, Fang Feng Bei was a profligate spare son, compared to both guys Feng Long was so much better. He was powerful and talented with a great family background. Yet Xiao Yas would rather spend all her time with Fang Feng Bei wandering the desolate mountainside looking at wild flowers instead of going with Feng Long to regal Sheng Nong mountain to view the famed peonies.
[...]
Xiao Yao pushed Zhuan Xu out the door. “This ‘kitchen’ of mine is full of poison so when I’m not here don’t go in.”
______________________________
A dance hall, a dancer was gracefully dancing.
Xiao Yao smiled and placed a white wrapped box in front of Fang Feng Bei.
Bei glanced over it and drawled, “What’s that?”
Xiao Yao said, “You open it.”
Bei shook his cup, “I’m drinking right now.”
Xiao Yao clenched her fist – be patient, be patient, be patient! She released her fist and opened the cloth cover over the box.
Bei was still uninterested and continued drinking his wine and watching the dancer dancing.
Xiao Yao had no choice but to open the box herself. When she made it, to create the scent of the lilies she spent a lot of time on it. Right now the scent of the lilies were lost in the pungent odor of the food and the perfumes around them so it wasn’t noticeable anymore.
Xiao Yao rushed here excitedly with a whole bellyful of things she wanted to say to him. She wanted to boast about how she made the poison lilies, how she made the leaf covers, but now the entire salmon frolicking in the lilies tableau turned dim and she didn’t feel like saying anything anymore. She picked up her wine and started drinking and pouting.
Bei finally turned his gaze from the dancer to the table and checked out the tableau on the glass plate. It was delicate and full of life, the colors vibrant and the items exquisitely rendered.
Bei stared for some time before picking up a chopstick and eating a lily frond.
One bite after another, one lily frond, one salmon, one lily…..slowly he ate the entire salmon frolicking in lilies tableau.
Xiao Yao gaped at him. “You….don’t stuff yourself silly.”
Bei shot her a look and she immediately shut up.
Bei ate the final bite and put down his chopstick. He took a sip of wine and casually said, “Not bad.”
Xiao Yao stared at the empty plate and her heart soared. “The only person who can make poisons this tasty in the entire world is me!”
Bei laughed back, “And the only person in the entire world who can appreciate your great “cooking” talents is me!”
Xiao Yao sassed back, “It’s enough to have a true [zhi yin (知音)].”
Bei gave her a half-smile but said nothing.
Xiao Yao asked, “Can you continue teaching me archery now?” What she really meant to ask was – are you not angry at me anymore?
Bei finished his wine. “I need to leave for a bit, wait for me to come back.”
Xiao Yao figured he was going back to Qing Shui town. Even if there was no active warfare, he was still the General of the Sheng Nong resistance army and there was much he had to do.
Xiao Yao couldn’t help it and sighed loudly and murmured, “If only you could forever be Fang Feng Bei, that would be so great.”
Bei appeared not to have heard her as he set down his wine cup and got up to leave, his form disappearing in the layers of curtains.
The excerpts below are from a fan translation of the novel that the drama is based on.
---
Chapter 2:
A month later, under Lao Mu’s arrangement, Ma Zhi and the daughter of Butcher Gao got engaged. Everything returned to normal and every day was just like before – it was so calm it was boring, it was so boring it was peaceful, it was so peaceful it was happy.
Except occasionally a mall-white condor would come find Xiao Liu, bringing something and taking away something. Xiao Liu made the poison for Xiang Liu but always held something back. Each poison was beyond deadly and it fit his requirement, but then it would have an odd color or smell. Whatever the reason, it was impossible to use it to kill a powerful person under tight protection.
Xiao Liu thought that, as time passed, Xiang Liu would come and raise a fuss but Xiang Liu appeared to not care about “color, smell, and taste” and as long as the poison met his specifications he accepted it all.
Xiao Liu used his haphazard medical and poison skills to deduce that Xiang Liu was a very unique being and his power came from using poison to train. All the poison that Xiao Liu produced was likely consumed by him.
After he figured it out, Xiao Liu breathed a sigh of relief, and then proceeded to make the most horrible tasting poison ever.
---
Eventually, the poison takes on additional meaning, as Xiao Yao puts a great deal of effort and all of her feelings into her poison creations and Xiang Liu is the only person in the world who can appreciate her skills.
---
Chapter 16:
Xiao Yao started spending more time developing her poisons. Late into the night, she would lay on the pallet playing with her poisons and thinking of how to make it even better in terms of prettier and not necessarily more poisonous.
She had memorized the Sheng Nong Herb Manuel left by the Flame Emperor, who the entire world regarded as the progenitor of medicine. She also flipped through all the Gao Xing and Xuan Yuan medical books. She didn’t doubt her poison's ability to be deadly, she just wanted to make it look pretty. She stared at the phoenix flower and researched a few days and worked a few nights and finally created a perfect replica of the small red phoenix flower with the same intoxicating fragrance. She made the poison layered on it like the morning dew.
Every one of her poisons was one of her longing, one of her missing, one of her feelings. She created it and watched it come to life in her hands, and then carefully put it away to send out.
Xiao Yao wondered what Xiang Liu would think when he saw the poisons? Would he call her a weirdo pervert?
Xiao Yao put the finished poisons in boxes and went to the messenger service run by the Tu Shan clan and handed it to them. “Deliver this to the Qing Shui Town brothel.”
Xiao Yao paid the expensive price to deliver it to the edge of Xuan Yuan and didn’t blink an eye since it wasn’t her money.
This was Xiao Yao’s solution to deal with Xiang Liu. The entire world was covered with the Tu Shan messenger network so if Xiao Yao had money then she could send it to Qing Shui Town. She had been sending him poisons every 3-4 months, the last time sent from Gao Xing. She wondered if Xiang Liu got it? He ought to, otherwise with his petty personality, no matter how busy he was he would find time to cause her trouble.
---
Chapter 19:
Bei ate the final bite and put down his chopstick. He took a sip of wine and casually said, “Not bad.”
Xiao Yao stared at the empty plate and her heart soared, “The only person who can make poisons this tasty in the entire world is me!”
Bei laughed back, “And the only person in the entire world who can appreciate your great “cooking” talents is me!”
Xiao Yao sassed back, “It’s enough to have a true [zhi yin (知音)*].”
Bei gave her a half-smile but said nothing.
Xiao Yao asked, “Can you continue teaching me archery now?” What she really meant to ask was – are you not angry at me anymore?
Bei finished his wine. “I need to leave for a bit, wait for me to come back.”
Xiao Yao figured he was going back to Qing Shui town. Even if there was no active warfare, he was still the General of the Sheng Nong resistance army and there was much he had to do.
Xiao Yao couldn’t help it and sighed loudly and murmured, “If only you can forever be Fang Feng Bei, that would be so great.”
Bei appeared not to have heard her as he set down his wine cup and got up to leave, his form disappearing in the layers of curtains.
---
* This phrase alludes to a Chinese fable about Boya and Ziqi. It literally translates as "know sound" but is used to convey a particular kind of relationship between two people, such as soulmates, bosom friends, or people who are completely on the same wavelength.
The translator who translated that word for the subtitles for the corresponding scene in the drama (S1 ep 27) chose to translate it as "confidant". The fan who translated the novel chose to translate that word as "soulmate".
Fans have discussed the meaning of this phrase in more detail here: https://kisskh.at/discussions/lost-you-forever/110123-xl-and-xy-story-and-romance-warning-spoilers?pid=2939211&page=453#p2939211
---
Chapter 46:
“Xiang Liu’s powers come from ingesting all types of poisons to train. There is no poison in the world that can take him down, so his blood is now the world’s most poisonous thing.”
Zhuan Xu’s heart sank and his face turned ashen.
Feng Long forced a smile at Xiao Yao. “So even you can’t find an antidote for it?”
For the past hundred years she tried every method to fell Xiang Liu with poison, giving him the hardest to find poisons to take him down. If she could counter his blood poison then Xiang Liu would have already been poisoned by her. Xiao Yao’s face was stark white and her voice shook. “I…..I….I’ll do my best!” She claimed to have top medical skills, but who knew the day would come that she would have to watch a friend die.
With that intense combination of emotions, I couldn't help but cry. Dramas don't get me like that very often.
As much as I love the term zhiji and the way it recognizes how valuable it is to have a person who gets / understands you, the extra levels of meaning behind zhiyin and the way it fits XY and XL is just... chef's kiss.
She posted about it here: https://kisskh.at/discussions/lost-you-forever/110123-xl-and-xy-story-and-romance-warning-spoilers?pid=2938615&page=453#p2938615
And I posted more about it (and the legend of Boya and Ziqi) here: https://kisskh.at/discussions/lost-you-forever/110123-xl-and-xy-story-and-romance-warning-spoilers?pid=2939211&page=453#p2939211
I'm very attached to the novel version of events and for the most part I dislike instances where the drama departs from it, but I really did appreciate that the boat scene gave XL the opportunity to hear WXL say "他很好" about XL in a context where WXL didn't know she was speaking to XL so XL could believe that she genuinely meant what she said and she really did think of him in a positive light.
Like, HHJ directly told the male lead that him disappearing was her nightmare. And she and the male lead confessed their feelings for each other and agreed to have a real marriage with new terms in their marriage contract. And HIA told the male lead that HHJ knew that he was not the real Baek Sa Eon and that Baek Jang Ho arranged the car crash to keep that secret hidden, and HHJ didn't care about it. She knew everything and still risked her life to save the male lead.
With all of those changes in the drama, it really didn't make sense for the male lead to still run away to Argan (without saying anything to HHJ!) like he did in the novel.