It’s so messed up how in Love and Redemption, Bai Lin basically promised marriage to the God of War by putting the red string on her life pillar so she won’t feel alone anymore (but luckily it never happened due to Bai Lin having an arranged political marriage with someone else).

??? WHO DID HE HAVE AN ARRANGED MARRIAGE WITH??? is that just in the book? I don’t think I noticed him arranged to have a marriage with anyone in the drama.

Or, if he did, then the storyteller guy kept insisting love would win out and “Bai Lin and the god of war” would be together. That was the extent I remember hearing about “the god of war loving Bai Lin and it not working out in that life” in the drama, from an outsiders perspective anyway.

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(I’m half kidding, but)

Bai Lin - puts red string of fate on god of war’s pillar.

god of war - doesn’t know why, but in her heart feels even more hurt. (what amounts to an ex, who’s trapped her in heaven, and is controlling her life, saying ‘yeah see you’re not alone’ when its so isolating emotionally for her to be living this life, and she’s not really free till she gets tf away from said-ex. lhjd/god of war/xuanji’s journey is like one long path of ‘fell for a man who was actually abusive, by the time i realized i was in too deep, he had me trapped’ and since its magic ‘he had me MEMORY LOST and trapped’ and then ‘eventually i STILL figured it out and fought his ass and tried to leave, someone stood up for me so i’d be banished to mortal lives instead of outright destroyed’ then ‘i lived some mortal lives just TRYING to protect myself and my heart after all THAT, this nice guy <Sifeng> kept showing me examples of actual kindness and love but i wasn’t ready to trust after THAT, so it took me a while to risk trying to meet <Sifeng> halfway. meanwhile, my awful fucking ex eventually fucked with my MORTAL LIFE too while oh Convienient i STILL had no memories, and damn i almost let him win thank goodness i realized even without all my memories what a SHADY person he is and had Sifeng around to contrast as what a good person who treats me better can be like, anyway i’m NEVER GOING BACK SUCKER.’ Then Luohuo Jidu comes back and like, even tho Xuanji got some closure both lhjd and her god of war sides sure didn’t, so they had some more issues to work out. Namely: I am back fucker and i am going to make sure you can NEVER trap me or fuck with me again i am going to END you. Until you know... their concious both starting with old lhjd and ending with newest xuanji, was like ‘we are better than this guy, we don’t have to stoop to his destruction, we’ll finish this on Our Terms.’

Also? I find it quite fascinating how when xuanji gets her other half (star of mosha), luohuo jidu is more like both lhjd AND god of war embodied. Like, i’m not sure how it was technically supposed to be. But how it came off to me, xuanji at that point was identifying as Luohuo Jidu - feeling those emotions most heavily, that viewpoint. But also that viewpoint seemed joined up with her god of war viewpoint. Since often lhjd would bring out that part of the personality - how god of war was hurt, how god of war was betrayed, how god of war feels. And of course, by the end, all three were coming out. Its just interesting to me because like. It seems like the star of mosha lamp is the piece of lhjd ripped out before the rest of him is turned into the ‘god of war puppet.’ So in theory that part wouldn’t have been around for the god of war part, or the later lives, or xuanji. But once its rejoined, i personally interpreted it as that part rejoining to complete xuanji (since she was missing that part of herself). And so, luohuo jidu is xuanji - just overwhelmed by all that newly reacquired anger (from the last time she Was luohuo jidu) that its what was at the forefront. But since its all xuanji at that point, the god of war is also joined up at that now, with its memories, also brought to the forefront because with her reacquired anger and hurt it probably seems more relatable/understandable to lhjd-xuanji than the life of xuanji she’d most recently lived which was probably xuanji at her most healed. I don’t feel like I’m describing this well at all ;-; 

I’m just trying to say, I found it fascinating how like... since its all just xuanji, it feels like its her becoming ‘whole.’ Its just like, the process is a bit rocky so her time as lhjd seems to me like her sort of looking at the last still-hurt parts of herself and learning how to decompartmentalize the pieces of herself she’s forgotten or had taken at some point, and work them into a functional whole. So like... lhjd when he finally ‘appears’ in the present, is still just xuanji. It’s just xuanji finally having that lost bit of herself, the way she slowly reacquired the god of war parts of herself. And i find it cool how that part of her, seems to be more understanding to the god of war part, to that pain, and in a way her time as lhjd probably helps her work out the pain she’s been carrying as god of war, that her time reincarnating while having ‘forgotten’ didn’t totally heal yet. So its like, important that in that final battle xuanji turns into all 3 parts, her lives and experiences managing to heal finally now that she’s in one piece with all her memories, and addressing what she needs to. 

And, as you or at least one anon has mentioned, its lovely also that. While she is luohuo jidu and herself, her lhjd part ends up using that core that was ripped out and apart as star of mosha, to heal Sifeng. Basically putting a piece of lhjd (original xuanji) into sifeng, to make them truly sharers of the same heart. xuanji is the product of someone who was ripped apart, and is what was left free after that. and when she eventually gets all of herself back - she willingly gives a piece of herself to sifeng. Somewhere she wants it - somewhere original her, lhjd, wants it. And just like Bai Lin drinking the poison in the end, there’s a cyclical nature to it. 

A full circle return to what hurt lhjd in the beginning, and that being used in a healing way this time, in a consenting way this time. This final time - there is still a poison cup, but it is given to its victim honestly, and the victim chooses to drink it knowing the consequences (Bai Lin). This final time - xuanji is still not in one complete piece, but its because this time the fractured part of her is willingly given, to help someone she loves and CHOOSES to help, is knowingly given, and is placed somewhere it will be free and with her (in Sifeng, keeping him alive, something she wants) instead of caged up in a bottle and feared. There’s a lot of reasons I liked the end, and part of it is certainly because so much of it parallels what happened to xuanji in her first life as lhjd... but this time, it is all completely her choice, it is honest, it is willing, and it is healing.