#we still get to learn all about xie lian and his past since shi qingxuan is there for most of the reveals anyway

[thisisanmxtxsideblog]

the thing about tgcf, for me, was that yeah the romance was cute, and xie lian was a very compelling character, but hua cheng was so boring to me tbh. his only character traits are Coolness and Obsessed With Xie Lian. like....... that's it.

there's not even really a process of him falling in love he just is from the first moment. and maybe some people find that romantic and that's fair! but personally I do not get it! and then the rest of his backstory ends up ONLY being about how he is In Love With Xie Lian, that's his ONLY motivation through the ENTIRE thing. his whole misfortune/luck thing could have been expanded on as a thing that affected his goals and who he became, as could his experience of spending his formative years fighting in a losing war, or realizing he was gay as a young teen, or the whole mount tonglu ordeal, but instead all those things just ended up only being used as like... ways to show that he loves xie lian so much. no inner conflict or motivations at all from any of it or ANYTHING else that happened in the entire 800 years besides "I love xie lian obsessively."

it's just not interesting to me and it felt like such a shame when at the same time you do have characters like xie lian with all these conflicting goals and desires and the way he views himself is so distanced from the reality of both his past and his present, you have shi qingxuan who is just ABSOLUTELY fascinating and a joy to read about, ling wen of course, rain master yushi who is objectively the actual coolest character...

by the end of the novel it kind of just felt like wasted potential to me.