Erudite

Laura, this drama it is lighter in tone than those on your list. But FBS is just the first part of perhaps two or three seasons since the original novel is over 5 millions words long.
I think it is quite a fun series - if you have the time perhaps you can invest watching 12 to 15 episodes before you decided whether to continue or not. It does have a happy ending.

@Lullina03:
Yes, his mother/grandmother are played by same person. They are both Warden of the Blood Lotus. Part of their duty is to act as living sacrifice for the cult.
YQY's step-son said the cult has only an catalyst, so this was what YQY used years ago, in a similar manner to Wan Mei, that is to create Catalytic Antibodies for the plague using their own bodies from the catalyst.
This are some real scientific research that show that a single catalytic monoclonal antibody molecule can potentially kill thousands of virus. That's why in the drama their diluted blood can heal people.
The only safe vaccine is very limited in quantity and all lost when bottle carried by Yue Ying was smashed.

@lenje: The drama series should be standalone and obviously they cannot change too drastically what is being written in the script.

@Lilly1008: Gong Zi was not presented at the Apricot Hall - it is obvious that Wan Mei has banned his presence. He was at Bi An Shrine with Yue Ying's umbrella.

If part of the unfinished Vol 2 is indeed from the original author, and they adapted from that - the story in season 2 will take place 6 months after the last scene in BR drama or 1 year after Wan Mei and Gong Zi's last meeting.
However some of the plot in Vol 2 can no longer be used since they have been changed in the drama and the characters died.
Xie Huan (Chang An) however is very much alive...

@Lily, I see your point. Hidden message in Chinese like the one in BR ending can be quite elusive without context.

Now for some interesting things: I watched video of Youku Autumn Drama Preview Lineup on September 20, 2018.
In their presentation of success stories this year, BR got highlighted as a dark horse product, produced at a LOW budget yet performed better than many big-budget period dramas.

On last year's Youku Autumn Drama Preview in late Oct 2017 there's no mention of BR but when it was released in July 2018 it was under the Youku exclusive Super Drama category. So I believe that being acknowledged in the presentation implied that it had made a profit.
So I think as long the BR creators are able to come up with plans for a sequel, Youku should be willing to help it to get Super Drama level of funding next time.

@Lullina03: Xu Ji Zhou purposely went uncredited as co-director of BR so they don't need to pay him as director. He only received credit and pay as a Producer.
For actors, Liu Yitong and everyone listed as 'guest stars' including Zi Feng and the king are paid less than normal scale.
Beside the 3 leads, Puff and Jill has the highest pay scale.
But everyone I mentioned above are not A-list so they won't get a big figure even at normal rate.

For music, Dong Dongdong. being a good friend of Xu would have charged less for BR compared to his fees for Legend of Fuyao and Fight Break Sphere - but BR can only afforded 4 songs, remember famous singers have to be paid too.
Everyone else would have got normal pay.

Yes, we were given a clue in EP15 and 16 when we realized that he and Wan Mei has the same feat of creating antibodies in their blood for the plague. But YQY has Inner Force so didn't suffer like Wan Mei in the process.
'Nine Lives' are the crown jewel panaceas of Blood Lotus Sect. Gong Zi crushed YQY's heart so that it's unusable for himself as an act of flagrant defiance.

@Lily1008: It's pronounced Mei Zhe :) It's part of the novel title.
In EP36, Wan Mei will say the full title: 'Mei Zhe, Wu Jiang? '

Currently we are at an unusual situation where we as an English foreign site is ahead of almost all Chinese drama sites on cast information for this series. They will catch up with us by late September or October 2018 by latest :p

Lenje is correct - Yue Ying lived with him most of his life. In fact close enough to his family to know all the secrets including who has taken the 2nd "Nine Lives" in the drama.
Another trivia on BR:
Which character in BR has a 'Nine Lives' beside Wan Mei?

No, there's no hidden message there :)
Lily, you made a translation error - the last line here should be
"Allurer should be unbounded" spoken by Gong Zi - see my Ep36 sub version

@Laura and Lily
All the scenes in the drama after Wan Mei picked up the fan is newly written and NOT in the novel.

The CGI provider was surprised when the producers wanted to use what little remaining funds they have for a drone flyover shot and then post-rendered the city in CGI for the ending scene. The producer/director explained that it is important to show to the audience that the ending is one of hope.

Obviously the producers cannot committed to anything before post-screening result is out.

Both LYT (Wan Mei) and QCX (Chang An) said in their separate podcasts on Tencent FM radio of the BR series that they believe Xie Huan (Chang An) is alive and waiting in An Ding city even though they are not told of his eventual fate.

The original erotic Wuxia novella (not the 2nd version adapted from the drama screenplay) is so lewd that any attempt to start a discussion forum of the novel in China will get a redirect page informing this is prohibited by law.

Only one volume of the novella was completed and it has only 16 chapters. This volume is a verified work of the author and is the basis for the drama.
There are a number of additional chapters collected loosely as an unfinished volume 2 and side-stories. There are doubts on how much of the additional work is genuinely from the author or fake chapters written by others.

One of the side-effect form the popularity of the BR drama is the author is finally identified and her author anonymity totally compromised. She has in fact written under several pen-names and is also author of several popular BL novels.

The final drama screenplay is many times the original and is the combined work of the author and at least 3 other screenwriters.
To give context of the scale up, the entire final chapter of volume 1 of novella is used but there's only content enough for a small part of Episode 36 in the drama.

I have an online friend who got some PM from Ms Wu the script developer/supervisor of BR. He shared some of this correspondence with me. Summary: There's difference of opinions on some script details by the team especially changes made by production at the last moment with no qualified screenwriter present on-site to rewrite scenes for the shooting script.

It was around that the time I started to notice a large number of detailed new entries on Shaw Brother era stars and movies. That caught me by surprise because even though I am an avid researcher on Chinese TV and cinema, that era was before I was born so I don't have as much viewing experience on them as I like due to time constraint.
Even then I realized that a 'tall hand' has entered kisskh ;)

@TDevil: Some TV stations are known to shift scenes around if they have enough source material.
For example: https://kisskh.at/9648-legend-of-fragrance had two different cuts - one of them had removed all the prologue story of the leads' parents in the first episode and jumped straight to 'present day' so that audience can see the lead appearing earlier.

@TDevil:
But Thu Ta was referring to this type of relationship on his first comment and you began your follow-up comment with "That trope is typically. of every wuxia...".
Now I know that I had misunderstood you, but you can see my reasoning then. I apologize if I have offended you .

For those who need it I am uploaded a full copy of episode 36 of BR with my full English subtitles below:
This version like Episode 1 of BR I did previously, contained the a translation of the full OST.

Episode 36: https://openload.co/f/ttzyG8JbEls (1080p, 1010MB - new good link)

Episode 01: https://openload.co/f/gXQlEUHhVks (1080p, about 1GB)

Also for the first time, I have translated the actual 4 lines 5-character stanza poem on Wan Mei's fan at the end. For those who do not want to watch Episode 36 again but curious what about it. This is what she would have read when she look at the fan everyday:

1: Playing the Qin alone in the chill of autumn
2: Was a girl abandoned in the Earthly Realm
3: She has no ship to cross the Milky Way
4: So she had to settled at Bi An Shrine

Obviously she would interpret this as referring to herself and not about another person.
Explanation for the actual secret message, as in the previous ending clip I uploaded, is also in this full episode 36.
PS: My YouTube link for Ep 36 was blocked within few hours after just 8 views, so no more full upload on YouTube but new link should be good :p

I think I mentioned this before ;)
According to Ms Wu the script supervisor, if they followed her screenplay Chang An is supposed to lead a force to raid against Gong Zi's ragtag army, defeating him and forced a truce with a pact as a result, giving Chang An the upper hand.
However, they have no more money for a big scene so they did a last-minute improvisation on script and turn it into a brief encounter between Chang An and Gong Zi as we see now in Ep35.

Also, the deleted scenes in the quest of Snake Vine Ep 32 would also show Yue Ying's ability insufficient to help Gong Zi and Wan Mei saves the day. You'll notice that Yue Ying's attitude towards Wan Mei is much better after that.

Chang An did offered Wan Mei to leave with him and attack Gui Hua city with his men as you said.
However, there's one catch and they both knew it, the army of Chu would need to invade into the enemy terrority in a round-trip journey of at least a week even if they don't encounter any resistance.
Cha Luo also would go into a murderous rage against the inhabitants of Gui Hua if Wan Mei ran away.
BTW, Wan Mei's treacherous 2nd shadow was confirmed kill by Cha Luo in one of her rage but that scene was deleted :)

Wan Mei reasoned that she can save lives if she win since she already made a public formal challenge to duel.
If not, she will die in battle after making sure that Chang An will be safely sent away.

The Li Qin we saw in FBS is her in early 2017. The casting decision would have been made in 2016.
I double-checked and principal filming for FBS actually started in January 2017. I think the confusion of some source is due to the fact SART approved production to begin on March 2016. Because there's a lot of outdoor scenes, some locations shots and structures purposely erected for this drama were filmed on camera in 2016.
However the "actual start date" is the one when the producer and crew held a opening ceremony, this is irrespective of whether the main cast members are presented or ready to shoot. In FBS' case they did, but there are extreme cases where all the leads are not ready to shoot even one month after the ceremony...