Tales of Demons and Gods - Ch. 296

Honestly, this is one of the few Chinese novels based comic series whose story I enjoy.
 
Wow. I have really enjoyed this comic and I've been reading it for years. But this?

Slamming in some "new" past-life plot is forgivable, but Xiao Ning and Xiao Ning'er and he didn't put it together? Come the F on, author.

WEAK. This is such bad writing that I'm now concerned about the future of this comic.
 
People seem to forget that Chinese has a ton of characters with the same spelling, but completely different meanings.

For example
小 and 魈 are both Xiao, but mean completely different things. Just because it seems obvious in english doesn't mean it's obvious in Chinese.
 
@jestervae I don't think it's a good reason to be that angry tbh. And if you go read the comments of the other version of this chapter you will find why he didn't realise it sooner. Apparently she changed the way her name is pronounced to hide her identity from Nie Li. So even though it seems similar with our alphabet how it is say in Chinese vary greatly. And also I don't think he had any reason to think it was her in his past life since afaik they didn't talk much or at all before she left for the forest in his past life and he had no reason to think she was alive and that she could have reached the draconic realm where the met. So no I don't think that it's that much of a bad writing from the author.
 
@Mivas That's a fair point, except that we're dealing with Chinese readers here, so it's equally unfair for us non-Chinese to assume that they wouldn't figure it out, especially given other clues (like her unique hair color). I know that her hair color is likely just for the comic, but that's something the comic's author needs to consider, of course.

But her name isn't even the real issue. The real issue is the sudden addition of this "mysterious" woman that Nie Li traveled with in his past life. A good author would have teased this plot in advance, not just dropped it in the second it's necessary to move the story forward. In fact, the author has gone out of his way to have Nie Li repeat that he knows who Ning'er fell in love with in the past, which is why he isn't worried about how much she obviously loves him now. It wasn't even that long ago that he realized his interactions with her in this life might have changed her story, so he should be more considerate of her feelings.

Nah, the more I think about it, the worse this development is, from a writing standpoint.
 
@Mivas @jestervae
If you read the WN, all the more you realize that Mad Snail has a few glaring weaknesses as a writer. I'm sure you've noticed the over-reliance on previous life ass-pulls, except when he needs to stump Nie Li. There's even more of that in WN so no, it's not just coincidence so far.

But Ning Er being unrecognized, I can understand a bit. First, way before, it was said he was never close to her. Recognizing chi readings might be off whack due to to that, her mysterious sickness, and whatever transpired in the Dark Devil Forest.
 

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