#sqc

What I like about the story

Complex (and a little sue-ish) protagonist. Jiang Chaoge is a machiavellian business man, always analyzing the situation and trying to find the best deals for himself. He is an orphan street rat who had to learn to be ruthless to survive, and continues to be cynical, suspicious, manipulative, and unapologetically self-centered. He uses his street-smarts, business skills, and high EQ to cultivate useful friendships and quickly build a comfortable life for himself in this new and dangerous world. He also becomes the brain and emotional core among his companions, whom he chose carefully for their talent and usefulness. However, over the course of the story, his band of mutually-beneficial acquaintances become real friends. I don't always like it when a character who is alleged flawed (e.g. calculating and self-centered) but never demonstrate for face any negative consequences for it (e.g. betray or lose the trust of his friends.) However, Jiang Chaoge manages that balance that keeps him both interesting and sympathetic.

Intriguing plot. We start with Jiang Chaoge exploring an alternate world as a transmigrator, learning its rules while trying to make a living and return home. However, only the most powerful beings in this universe have the power to send him back home, and Jiang Chaoge must find and bargain with increasingly powerful and dangerous entities -- from the High Priest of the land to the most powerful of beast spirits. All of them have their own secrets and agendas, which involves finding god-like powers that are only known to the mystical beast spirits, and discovering the terrible truths and bitters betrayals from the ancient battles that killed all the mythical beasts millennia ago.

A dynamic supporting cast. A heroic prince a bit too idealistic for his own good. A teenage trafficked slave-turned-bounty hunter who wants to return home. A feudal lord's illegitimate daughter who wants a free life on her own terms. An introverted genius who, ironically, got tricked into joining the most dangerous journey due to his anxiety and OCD. And a curious local explorer who final leaves home. Each one of them has (or eventually gets) a spirit beast, who are their most important allies in battle, and are also simultaneously their most complicated and most important relationship.

Friendships! The main gang initially only came together due to a web of mutually-beneficial incentives weaved together by Jiang Chaoge. Most of them are loners who do not easily trust people, but the friendship between them develops gradually and organically as they help each other through life-and-death situations. I especially love this development in Jiang Chaoge, who gets to feel missed, loved, and taken care of despite his harsh upbringing, and learns to feel this way for others. We also see the interesting friendships and frenemy-ships between the legendary mythical beasts, who have known each other since the literal dawn of time so their relationships can't be not-complicated.

The implications of spirit weapons and spirits beasts. The high-level spirit weapons wielded by the main cast are made from the souls of mythical beasts who have cultivated human-level sentience. Naturally, they have *feelings* about being killed and made into a weapon for perpetuity. Even if the spirit and wielder can get along, the relationship is inherently unequal on every front: a living human vs a dead beast, a mortal human vs a immortal spirit, the fragile source of power vs the fierce creature who can maximize the power's potential. The more energy a spirit receive from their human wielder, the more powerful they become in battle, and the greater their chance of reversing the relationship -- using the human's spirit energy to return to life and turn the human into a spirit weapon instead.

Further complicating this dynamic is the fact that a spirit weapon can formally bond with its wielder. No one else can use this weapon while the current wielder lives, and the spirit becomes one of the most important relationships that will last for the rest of that human's life. A bonding can be achieved through an exchange of blood or sexual intercourse, and of course the second option is very relevant to the plot and the main couple.

On the other hand

The main relationship is not boring or unpleasant, but it's just not to my taste. The gong is fierce and protective in his love, but also has the temper, maturity, and sometimes the intelligence of a petulant child despite having lived for millennia. This makes for a lot of great comedy and fun interactions with the protagonist, and I really like seeing them gradually becoming friends, but the romantic component didn't feel too compelling to me. However, I love the conflict this couple get into later on in the novel, which is a bit cheesy and cliched but also plays perfectly off the character flaws they already exhibited in the story.

The rushed ending left many loose ends in the plot. I read that the author originally planned for a much longer story, but a host of problems with the platform and censorship hampered her writing. Some characters and couples are left in awkward or unsatisfying places in the narrative, if not downright forgotten, so it feels like their story has not been in explored in full. The climactic battle itself is one shocking reveal after another; and it feels a bit like an info-dump that has dragged on for too long. The ending is technically happy, but I think it's a bit silly and leaves a lot of problems open in the future.

Finally, while SQC is incredibly skilled at crafting emotionally complex stories and character, and the action feels very tight from scene to scene, I feel like the story is still missing several important pieces that keeps it from being super-amazing. So many interesting story elements are left under-explored, like the powerful anti-monarchist secret society, the complicated power dynamics between spirit weapons and their wielders, the other nations/continents in the alternate world, the pseudo-immortality of spirit beasts, and what do you mean we don't have another 50K of extras picking apart Yin Chuan's tragic relationship with Di Jiang and Yuren Shu's complicated dynamic with Tian Rong?!

P.S. This story has no explicit smut scenes, kind of a real shock considering this is SQC's work ...

Overall

This is a story with a refreshing concept/premise, good writing, fun characters, deep relationships, and very creative plot and use of Chinese mythology. However, it leaves me with a "4/5" kind of feeling, because even though there are so many good things about it, I feel like it just left so much unexplored.

It's like looking at a really interesting painting, but with areas that are incomplete and some patches done very roughly compared to the rest. I have high expectations because the artist created such a wonderful sketch and did so well on most of it -- but it's still one of the most best works I have seen recently.

Finally,

I discovered this story through its audiodrama, which is surprisingly very good and unsurprisingly not reaching that many people. Season 1 covered half the novel, and I hope the word spreads so we get a second season to complete the story.

The theme song -- a rock song with Chinese instrumentals -- has also been stuck in my head on and off for weeks now ~~