Ice Fantasy 幻城 - Episode 41 (Recap)

kakashi: Slowly, but surely, we are headed towards Sacred Snow Mountain. Someone else needs to die first though.
JoAnne: Is it me?
SakiVI: Nah, someone else who has been a pain since the beginning.
Hey, wait a minute...

Episode 41

Kasuo, our new Ice King, searches Shi’s Chambers for Lian Ji's Teardrop charm! Because he wants to go and solve the Ancient God riddle (= he needs to get wet). His mother offers to “help” him. But! When she finds it under the blanket, she quickly hides it away … sneaky, sneaky. Only: Kasuo isn’t as dumb as he might seem, he saw it in the mirror.
Kill her! Treason!
Getting Shi's power made Kasuo smarter.

The Black Smoke (sneaky, sneaky!) saw it all and reports this to Lian Ji. Who is furious, since she hates the Ice Queen the most. The Black Smoke tells her to be patient - revenge will be all the more sweet.
I don't get why she hates the Ice Queen the most, though.

Rivalry between the two wives. Also, the Ice Queen's children were favoured while Shi was disfavoured.

Granny finds Kasuo on the swing in the forest - he has been waiting for her. Because he has realized that Granny is hiding things! She refuses to say anything though. Which doesn’t stop him. He’ll go find the answers himself! So there!
Show us, Kasuo. Don't tell us.

This was pointless.

The Ice Queen goes to see the Mermaid Saint on her Island and forbids her to give Kasuo a single Teardrop Charm (while handing her Lian Ji's back). Everybody tries to prevent him from getting wet. And why is she so yellow?
Is there some big secret everyone is trying to keep hidden from the world? Or just from Kasuo?

All is futile anyway - a whirlpool forms in the ocean (which is sometimes called Lake, nice), right next to Prisoner Rock Island. All the mermaids head towards it, to ... I don't know, look at it? Then, Lian Ji appears, looking lovely! She threatens to kill them all! The Ice Queen transforms (she can grow armor, nice) and takes on Lian Ji or rather the Black Smoke. She has decided this is the day she will avenge her children.
Well, you know, better late than never, I guess. Somehow I think it's a pointless effort though.
I was just mesmerized by Lian Ji.  

She indeed manages to wound Lian Ji gravely (with the help of the Mermaids, who do some sound magic). But Yuan Ji aka the Black Smoke won’t let her die. He possesses her  - Golden Armor ftw! ...
Oooh, that's gotta hurt - one final betrayal from the Mermaids.

She looks so cool. It was like a comic book. 

... and after that, it’s a matter of time until the Queen of Ice is vanquished. And dies. Yuan Ji sucks out her soul. At least, she gets to die in her son’s arms. Poor Kasuo, he only has his father left now! Of all people. Yuan Ji jumps into the Whirlpool and yells at Kasuo to follow him if he wants revenge! Neat, so if possessed by Yuan Ji, Lian Ji’s body does not need a Teardrop Charm?
And they're supporting Kasuo? Won't he need a Charm? Is it a trick?

This show has a Teardrop Charm-sized hole in its thinking. Either you need it or you don't.

The Queen of Ice’s funeral is held. Her death changes everything. Going to Snow Mountain to fight now seems like the right thing to do. Luckily for everyone wishing for more excitement, Mr. Dreamer realizes that his magical cube may contain She Mi’s memories (not only his blood). That will be useful intel! He rushes to see Kasuo, but Granny tries to stop him! She really, really does not want Kasuo to know, for obscure reasons.
I'm not at all sure why this woman's death changes anything, except because the author says it does.
Extra incentive for Kasuo to resolve everything.

Dreamer fights her and it’s quite vicious! When all of a sudden, Kasuo appears. Daddy already told him about the memories. See, Granny? No need to be so protective. Kasuo wants to go swimming and swim we will. They go to the Saints’ Platform and Kasuo enters She Mi’s memories. It’s a kind of  virtual reality. Awesome!
This I am curious about.

Kasuo is catapulted into Sacred Snow Mountain, where he meets She Mi, who looks exactly like him, just with much weirder hair. I laughed so much at this.  She Mi was Yuan Ji’s lackey, assisting him in sucking people’s souls out. As soon as Yuan Ji has left the room, She Mi addresses Kasuo directly. He is the first of his descendants to enter his memories. It’s been tens of thousands of years since he put them in the cube. Yuan Ji is the only immortal back then - and he is utterly cruel and horrible.
So back then, when She Mi was the Ice Tribe - or Ice Fire Tribe, right? they were not immortal?  But what ever thing Yuan Ji is, he was immortal? And somehow, now the Ice Tribe is immortal?  Oooh, it sounds like a double-cross.
Yuan Ji is really handsome.
Saki knows her priorities.

All the other tribes demand his death. All the tribes together conspire to get rid of him - with the help of the Veiled Lotus. It can fulfill all wishes - including bringing the dead back to life, as long as a fraction of their souls remain. Hark, hark. She Mi takes him to see the Lotus and tells Kasuo what happened. Yuan Ji found out about their plans to revolt and started punishing them harshly. However, they all managed to band together and She Mi made one crucial wish: to have the power to defeat Yuan Ji amongst themselves and make the Lotus react to his descendants’ blood only.
Wait. To She Mi's descendents only? Even though everyone had to work together to bring Yuan Ji down? That seems greedy.
The Ice Tribe thinks they are holy. 
It might or might not be explained later. 

That brings Kasuo to the Prison Rock Island next, where She Mi tells him that they shattered Yuan Ji’s body and soul and imprisoned him in the Lake. But She Mi is sad… the powers given to all the clans made the Fire Tribe turn bad and greedy, and ever since, there were wars with them. The Ice Cubes and the Six-Leafed Crystal were his ways of ensuring the others would not become bad either.
Well that pretty much worked, though.

That's already the end of She Mi’s memories. And Kasuo realizes that Yuan Ji is going back to Sacred Snow Mountains because the Lotus is about to bloom again. But he cannot get his hands on that Lotus though! Kasuo wants it. He needs it! To resurrect everyone he has lost.
Look, just let people die in peace. 

And we end the episode with Lian Ji awaking in that throne room in Sacred Snow Mountain (it is, indeed, snowing in that room - that's gotta be annoying, who cleans?) and a beautiful man appearing next to to catch her when she falters. It is Yuan Ji, the crazy and vicious god. Hi there.
Oh helloooooooo.
Did I not say back when this was airing?

Comments

Not much new in this ep, or was it? I thought we knew all this She Mi stuff already, but maybe I'm just confused about how much he looks like Kasuo. Anyway, after over 40 eps, we seem to have arrived at the part where the real villain appears. Well done, drama! Better now than never!
I thought She Mi was the ancestory who went crazy and was imprisoned, but that isn't part of the story we got today so now I'm not sure.
Hahaaaa, no! She Mi is HOLY. Kinda. 
I think Yuan Ji is just one of the villains. And gosh, he's dishy!