[Recap/Review] Ashes of Love Episode 1

The story starts off in the “past” within the floral realm (basically there’s six realm… human, heavenly, demon, and plant the other 2 is not focus on). The Goddess of Flowers, Zi Fen (Zhang Yan Yan), gives birth to a healthy baby girl. Her followers led by Great Floral Fairy Peony (Peng Yang), Magnolia (Wen Luhan) and Begonia (Ma Jing) and small time flower fairies and elves are understandably happy to meet their next ruler. Zi Fen, though, orders her followers to keep the baby birth a secret and gives her daughter a loveless pill, one that when taken, will make the person never EVER fall in love, to the shock of her followers. Zi Fen tells them that she doesn’t want her daughter to be like her, hurt and broken by love, and this was the greatest gift she can give her daughter before she dies.

At the same time in the heavenly realm, a marriage between the water deity Luo Lin (Wang Ren Jun) and wind deity Lin Xiu (Wang Yuan Ke) is being celebrated as a match made in heaven. HA!. While the Lin Xiu looks please to be the center of everyone attention, Luo Lin looks like he doesn’t want to be here.

They are offer wine, which the couple drinks to complete their ceremony of being husband and wife. The heavenly emperor Tai Wei (He Zhonghua) congratulate his friend while his wife, heavenly empress Tu Yao (Kathy Chow) beseeches the couple to better serve the emperor now that they are married. Tai Wei announces to Luo Lin that he desires for their friendship to move on to the next generation, and that if his first born is a girl she would marry Tai Wei’s first son, otherwise they would be sworn brothers.

Luo Lin agrees, and notice a flower petal on his newly wed wife hair, he brushes it away. While SHE THINKS it’s an affectionate gesture, he, in a voice over as the flower petal flies out of the heavenly palace, says that his heart will always love Zi Fen and never anyone else and while he loves to be with Zi Fen, how can he disobey the emperor’s order? He wishes Zi Fen for eternal peace in the flower realm. Zi Fen finishes his last words to her that runs somewhere along the lines of “get a life as peaceful as water and clouds”. At this Zi Fen names her daughter Jin Mi (I think it is translated to something like “to look for splendor”). She tells her followers that she sees a trial in her daughter life and order the Great Floral Fairy to never let her daughter outside of the flower realm for the next 10000 years (to pass the trial). Zi Fen wishes her daughter to live a simple life and orders Peony, Magnolia, and Begonia to look after the flower realm instead and follow “the rule of the seasons”. With that, Zi Fen dies and for the next 10 years everyone morn, even the heavenly realm. Flowers from all over the realm wither in sorrow, and the colors of the different realm was lost for ten years.

In present day around 4000 years later, Lao Hu (Yu Wen Tong) a carrot sprite who is also an elder of the flower realm, tells the different sprites and elves the history of the floral goddess and taoism how ying and yang established the different realms and all creatures have to cultivate themselves whether they be demons, gods, or humans. Elder Hu also states that the floral realm use to be the same as the heavenly realm, but all the floral fairies decided to establish their own sixth realm after their goddess death (basically IVY LEAGUE, how those six schools just wanted to establish their own division). The young sprites are bore out of their minds save for one named Lian Qiao (Xia Yi Yao) who excitedly ask the elder why the existing books only talk about four of the six realms, floral, human, heavenly and devil what about the other 2??!! Elder Hu dodges the question by saying the Tao (Dao) is hard to explain to the discontent of the young sprites.

They are interrupted by now the grown Jin Mi (of course acted by Yang Zi) snoring in a tree. She is not happy being disturbed in her sleep as her friend Lian Qiao, Elder Hu, and the other sprites try to get her to come down calling her lazy and eats all day. She brushes them off saying today is neither the first or the 15th of the month, in which the Great Floral Fairy Peony comes and test their spiritual cultivation.

Speak of the devil……The Great Floral Fairy Peony shows up and is obviously not happy with Jin Mi, having overheard her say those things. She toss Jin Mi off the tree and go ahead and test her abilities by blasting her with some sort of flowery blast. Jin Mi, in the midst of trying to fend off the Peony’s attack, tells her that today is neither the two days where she comes and test their cultivation. Peony angrily replies that this was a pop quiz, and after Jin Mi’s fail to protect herself from the flower blast, Peony ridicules her calling her lazy and a slacker even though she acknowledge Jin Mi intelligence.

She then ask Jin Mi if she remembers what important day it is…. The girl can’t get a hint and keep muttering to herself that it wasn’t the 1st nor the 15th while her friend Lian Qiao is playing charades to tell her what day it is. Peony scold Lian Qiao asking if she wants to be punish along with Jin Mi. Although the charades paid off, Jin Mi correctly guessing that it was the Floral Goddess death-niversary, she is being punish by being force to watch over the grave for tonight.

Mean while in the heavenly realm, a ritual is being perform by Xu Feng the God of Fire and (acted by none other than Deng Lun) the second son of the heavenly emperor AND the crowned prince (the first son is illegitimate so he has “no claims” to the throne). Xu Feng is trying to strengthen his phoenix powers and achieve nirvana. He is in his final night of this 49 days ritual. Tu Yao orders Liao Yuan (Zhang Jun Ran) to guard the palace tonight and to allow no one in or out because this was a critical juncture.

Back in the floral realm, Peony is out gathering the other young sprite and elves to go pay their respect. This was the one day that the water mirror cracks open (the water mirror is basically a drop of water that serves as a protective barrier to the flower realm) to let other flower beings in so that they can pay respect. Jin Min wonders what is on the other side of the water mirror and expresses her discontent of being trap inside the water mirror. She tells Elder Hu and Lian Qiao that she recently ask Peony permission to see the outside world. Elder Hu and Lian Qiao discourages her from having such thoughts, saying that fruit elves and fairies like them will be eaten once they are outside (so apparently Jin Mi is a grape elf, at least she thinks she is, cultivating to become a grape fairy). Jin Mi tells them that she just want to see the world, the different realms describe in the book that they read. She curses the past Floral Goddess for making this water mirror to restrain the whole floral realm inside a drop of water, and she yells how she was going to become a raisin underneath of all this stress. Elder Hu continue to scold her, reminding her of the disaster LAST TIME she try to go outside on this very same day 900 years ago. This earns elder Hu an arm pinch from Lian Qiao but at least it silence Jin Mi.

The water mirror cracks open as all the other sprites, elves, and fairies go to their deceased floral goddess gravestone. Peony asks Jin Mi to step out and kneel in the front most of the line, while the young sprites thought that she was in trouble, only the older fairies and Elder Hu knew the reason why.

Begonia approaches Peony, telling her that this might be against their laws because Jin Mi spiritual energy is equivalent to that of an elf and not a fairy, but Peony states that it is fine and that their deceased Floral Goddess love every flower being the same way. After wards it rain flower petals and as the other young sprites look on with happiness, Peony looks at the happy Jin Mi with caring worry on her face.

The realm shifts again (now in human?) where the RAT Immortal (Li Xuefeng) rats out events of the heavenly realm to a red clothed woman, whose name is reveal later to be named Su Li the emperor first son mom! He tells her that at midnight today, Xu Feng spiritual powers will be at its lowest. The red clothed woman replies that she understand, and that she will make no mistake in striking tonight to possibly kill Xu Feng because an event like this only comes every 500 years. She commands the rat immortal to pay the floral realm a visit before he bows out of the scene.

Back at the floral realm, everybody has left the gravestone except for Jin Min and her friend Lian Qiao who is having a hard time staying awake. While Jin Min is force to be there after being bounded by Peony’s spell, Lian Qiao is there on her own free will saying that she will stick it through with her friend. A butterfly messages come through though, and Lian Qiao is force to leave when her mother calls her. Jin Min is puzzle by “what is a mother” but she quickly distracts herself by trying to remove the immobilizing spell. She does manage to call a good friend of her, Lord Yan You (Liao Jing Feng) a snake deity who she affectionately calls Pu Chi because there’s a slug in the floral realm that is named Yan You and Pu Chi is a “much cuter name”.

She thinks that her friend is a weak snake spirit with low spiritual energy after he saved her and her friend, a succulent sprite named Qiang Huo or Rou Rou (Fu Rou Mei Qi), 900 years ago after she was chased by the demon named Qiong Qi outside of the water mirror. She tells him that his GRAND ENTRANCE is only an extra waste of spiritual energy which he just laughs at. On the cultivation energy note, Jin Mi gives him her cultivation for these past hundred years, which he accepts only after she nags him. He gives Qiang Huo, now a succulent after she dies in that accident 900 years ago, to Jin Mi to keep and care for so that one day the succulent can BECOME A REAL GIRL again! Yan You tells her to train hard so that she can help her friend, which she happily complies!

Back at the heavenly realm we are introduce to the emperor first son the second male lead Run Yu the God of the Night (Luo Yun Xi). He decides to make a fire tiger constellation for tonight with his pet deer (?).

After he finish making his constellation for tonight, he is attacked by a mask man that looks eerily like the Rat Immortal… Run Yu though manages to fend off the RAT and the Rat Immortal in the palace direction with Run Yu hot in pursuit. Once Run Yu got to the palace though, he sees no sign of the masked man and is greeted by the guard Liao Yuan. He attempts to go into the palace to protect his brother but Liao Yuan said that no body will step inside the palace tonight as decreed by the empress. Run Yu leaves but tell the guards to be on their toes for this masked man has high spiritual energy.

At midnight, Xu Feng unleashes himself from his little eggy thing in his true form of a Phoenix to Nirvana and beyond…. THOT IT WAS, he is attack by the Rat Immortal and begin falling….

Inside the floral realm, Jin Mi is bored out of her mind after her friend left her. She sees a bright shooting star and remembers how the human realm would wish upon a shooting star and get their wish granted. While she thought that this wouldn’t work in the flower realm, she does it anyways and wishes to meet with an immortal that can save her succulent friend. The meteor breaks through the water mirror and lands close by..

Spooked, Jin Mi goes and investigate the scene where she see a charred bird. She realizes that it is still living and bring it back to show her friend Lian Qiao.

She and her friend are excited and thinks that they can raise the bird to be their pet if they manage to get the bird back on its feet. Jin Mi “smartly” identifies the bird as a crow because it is black and only crows are black according to the many books that they read. The two very very smart girls decide to plant the bird in dirt and water it so it will feel better again because the Great Floral Fairy does that with every PLANT in need that she finds…

News of Xu Feng attack and disappearance quickly spreads to the emperor and empress ears. The guard Liao Yuan has no idea what happened while the empress looks like she was going to pass out…..

Jin Mi goes alone back to the garden to check on her little crow. Seeing that the crow have not move, she pulls out honey that she has been making these past years from many different type of flowers and that she has not let anyone else taste.

She gives it to the crow to help it get back on its claws and it seem to work at first….and then the crow just totally “dies” due to the honey. Jin Mi “grief” is short live as she decides that since the crow will die or probably die anyways, she will make a good meal out of it.

Flashback to the cooking shack where Jin Mi is being very very loud, looking for a sharp knife and pot to cook the crow in. She leaves the crow on the table and after a while manage to find the sharpest knife and a big pot.

But when she went back to the table, the crow has turned back into a human, the prince Xu Feng!

She curses that this human can’t be fit in a pot and decides that she was going to find where he stores his spiritual energy instead. If she eats his essence it would be like eating the whole thing, plus it will boost her spiritual energy. She gives him a very nice pat down and touches his HUGE penis.

Thinking that this was where he stores his energy, she prepares to castrate him but luckily due to the gleam of her knife, Xu Feng wakes up and make Jin Mi drop the knife which lands very close to his private part…

Xu Feng demands to know if she was an evil spirit, to which she quickly replies that she was not and is instead a fruit elf. She tells him to be thankful because it was she that discovered him burnt in a crater and planted him and water him and even gave him her honey! Xu Feng angrily question what was the knife for then and Jin Mi shyly replies that she was going to help him remove the bulging “ill part” and she decides to go for his wee wee once more. Xu Feng would have none of it and grabs her hand and tells her that she is a despicable female and that males and females should keep their distance. Jin Mi gets angry for not being able to touch his big penis replies that she has heard of the difference between plants and animals but never before heard this “male” and “female” that he was talking about. He released his grip on her and said that he will reconsider not blaming her since she was young and she was raised in such uncivilized places. She sassily retorts that fruit elf do not really care about what birds think about them, literally ROASTING THE FUC out of him and turning him black and crispy. Xu Feng notice her hair pin which is a magical artifact and wonder why does a lowly elf have such magical item…..

Morning comes and Jin Mi gathers her friend lunch, consisting of big fat juicy worms.

Xu Feng loses his appetite on site, and tell her that she can eat them her self. She wonders why a crow doesn’t like such good delicious worms. Xu Feng decides to flex his wings and armor to show that he was a PHOENIX, not a crow. He ask for some fountain water, to which Jin Mi nods, still mesmerize at the display of his manliness.

Since Xu Feng is a civilize individual, he makes a cup out of thin air to sip the water with. Jin Mi gaps at his magical power, saying only like the Great Floral Fairy can accomplish such feat making something out of nothing. She ask him how many years did it take for him to master such skill, but instead of replying Xu Feng keeps on sipping his water out of the cup. Jin Mi angrily retorts by dunking her feet into the water that he was drinking, whistling while he looks on in absolute horror…….

Reactions:

I just love how everyone in here is technically non human and they are some kind of animals or plants. That being said it is quite hard to get some of the jokes the first time because it is plant based, like everytime Jin Mi calls herself a raisin-BRAN for being too dumb or something. Otherwise this was a pretty good first episode, it isn’t slow nor does it focus a lot on history. It covered quite a bit in 45-ish minutes. It sets up the main couple with a popular trope (boy and girl bicker when they first meet and end up in love later). I don’t like how they make Jin Mi very naive though, like I am sure in the books they read there should be some sex-ed somewhere right? Also it’s not like she have never seen a man before (Elder Hu) even though almost everyone in the flower realm is a girl. Heck, Jin Mi didn’t even know that she was a girl which is sort of confusing because she and every girl in the realm clearly look different than Elder Hu (I mean just check elder Hu with everyone else CHEST? Why does she never ask that question…). I guess it makes room for the “innocence” girl stereotype which does add a bit of humor now and then like when she tries to cut off his tumor, I seriously didn’t get that for a good bit. I hope the other episode doesn’t slow down as much, but as far as I can see we are off to a good start with an introduction of all our main characters (there’s only a few that haven’t been named) and there’s even a central conflict for at least the first part of the show. I just hope them trying to catch the bad guy in mask and his red-clothed lord isn’t what the whole series main conflict….

Comments

  • Evora | Apr 13,2020

    It’s not actually Rat who attacked Xu Feng. You can tell who by the dangly hair, and Su Li said she would send someone other than Rat to attack Xu Feng.

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