Strange Tales of Liao Zhai: Xiao Cui
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Ok, I THOUGHT I adored Xiao Qian, but it's no comparison to this one. Of the three Liao Zhai stories, this one is the first "True Love conquers all" story(Xiao Qian was "redemption through true love") It also has some similarities to one of my favorite fairy tales, "The Snow Queen" One day, a man seeking shelter from a storm sees a wounded fox and saves it. Later, he learns that the fox is a female fox-demon, and she promises him that if he ever needs anything, to call her and she will help him in repayment for his kindness. Thirty years later, the man, Wang, is a government official and has a grown son named Yuan Feng, who he loves very much. Yuan Feng is very kind and sweet and good hearted, and very strong and a good fighter, but he is also very, very simple. Wang calls the fox-demon and asks her if she can make Yuan Feng smart, or if not that, help him to gain a good wife who will take care of him and not hold his simplicity against him. The fox-demon has a daughter named Xiao Cui who, while very good with magic, is very childlike and she worries that Xiao Cui will fall prey to one of her enemies, and she sends Xiao Cui to Wang, thinking it will solve both their problems.
Xiao Cui and Yuan Feng are married, and soon fall in love with the love of innocent children who are obviously meant to grow up and make babies, and they are cute on levels that should not be legal. However, Yuan Feng wishes he were smarter so that he could make his father proud and Xiao Cui knows that he wants this and that if Yuan Feng were smarter, it would make her in-laws-who welcomed her like their own daughter-happy. She falls prey to the schemes of a snake demon who is an enemy of her mother, who says she can help Xiao Cui make Yuan Feng smarter.
It does make him smart, but it also makes him cold and cruel, and places him under the control of the snake-demon(it also changes him from adorably cute to absurdly hott, but that's irrelevant). Xiao Cui, though, like any good heroine is far from content to lose him without a fight, and she sets out to break the spell and get him back.
This one is all about the cute and only slightly about the angst:
Angst angst angst when he's under the snake-demon's spell, and memories of True Love getting through to him.
Almost equal parts angst and cute. And I like the way they did this one.
Ok, I THOUGHT I adored Xiao Qian, but it's no comparison to this one. Of the three Liao Zhai stories, this one is the first "True Love conquers all" story(Xiao Qian was "redemption through true love") It also has some similarities to one of my favorite fairy tales, "The Snow Queen" One day, a man seeking shelter from a storm sees a wounded fox and saves it. Later, he learns that the fox is a female fox-demon, and she promises him that if he ever needs anything, to call her and she will help him in repayment for his kindness. Thirty years later, the man, Wang, is a government official and has a grown son named Yuan Feng, who he loves very much. Yuan Feng is very kind and sweet and good hearted, and very strong and a good fighter, but he is also very, very simple. Wang calls the fox-demon and asks her if she can make Yuan Feng smart, or if not that, help him to gain a good wife who will take care of him and not hold his simplicity against him. The fox-demon has a daughter named Xiao Cui who, while very good with magic, is very childlike and she worries that Xiao Cui will fall prey to one of her enemies, and she sends Xiao Cui to Wang, thinking it will solve both their problems.
Xiao Cui and Yuan Feng are married, and soon fall in love with the love of innocent children who are obviously meant to grow up and make babies, and they are cute on levels that should not be legal. However, Yuan Feng wishes he were smarter so that he could make his father proud and Xiao Cui knows that he wants this and that if Yuan Feng were smarter, it would make her in-laws-who welcomed her like their own daughter-happy. She falls prey to the schemes of a snake demon who is an enemy of her mother, who says she can help Xiao Cui make Yuan Feng smarter.
It does make him smart, but it also makes him cold and cruel, and places him under the control of the snake-demon(it also changes him from adorably cute to absurdly hott, but that's irrelevant). Xiao Cui, though, like any good heroine is far from content to lose him without a fight, and she sets out to break the spell and get him back.
This one is all about the cute and only slightly about the angst:
Click to viewAngst angst angst when he's under the snake-demon's spell, and memories of True Love getting through to him.
Almost equal parts angst and cute. And I like the way they did this one.