Dashing Youth (2024): Rewatch [Episodes 3-4]

Welcome to the second discussion post for a Dashing Youth rewatch.

This post is for Episodes 3-4.

Ep. 1-2

Sorry for the delay, the dreaded real life demanded more attention than predicted.

!!! PLEASE USE SPOILER TAGS FOR ANYTHING BEYOND THE CURRENT EPISODES AND ANYTHING FROM BOTH BLOOD RIVER AND BLOOD OF YOUTH!!!

Infos about the drama can be found in the old masterpost. You can also find a translated relationship chart here. If you download the picture it should be big enough to actually be readable.

Ep. 3:

It’s wedding time! The Gu family’s fifth master (the uncle) welcomes the guests. Still doesn’t get a name. One of the guests is a Lord Huixi, who seems to be a big deal at the imperial court. Our Mu boys are following the whole fuss from a nearby rooftop. As always Su Changhe is the talkative ones, while Su Muyu is noticing Bai Dongjun and Sikong Changfeng arriving (I’lll go with BLDJ and SKCF from now on). They are now very determined to do this whole kidnapping deal as a team-up.

We get a quick glimpse of some kind of creature’s eye opening in a closed of well or some other underground structure before we return to BLDJ and SKCF about to fight there way through the Yan family guards. They are backed up by Lei Mengsha and Luo Xuan.

Yan Bietian and more guards arrive at the actual wedding. Lord Huixi seem to find the obvious (to him) upcoming take over of the Gu family by the Yan quiet amusing. Very much not amused are the bride and groom. Both refuse to take the first bow and the situation gets more and more tense, until BLDJ and SKCF interrupt the whole proceedings. I guess we skip the fight scene. Lord Huixi seems to know BLDJ, who announces himself as a wedding guest – and also as the future bridenapper. Yan Bietian give the order to kill the two unwanted guests and we get some spear action. He is no match for the ‘butcher’ though and wants to sacrifice himself (again, he really has a thing for the noble hero stick) for BLDJ having a chance at escaping.

BLDJ refuses to escape though, the earth rumbles and we get the rather unexpected appearance of Xiao Bai/Bai Liuli, a giant white snake. Because if you don’t fight yourself it’s very practical to have a giant snake pet, that intimidates everyone. The snake has a connection to the Wen family, though BLDJ reveals his full name to be Baili Dongjun (the connection to the Wen family is on his mother’s side), whom Lord Huixi knows to be a part of Marquis Zhenxi’s household. So BLDJ comes with a lot of pedigree and a giant pet snake.

Meanwhile Lei Mengsha and Luo Xuan hold their own against the rest of the Yan fighters, recongnise BLDJ for who he really is (genius pseudonym he choose, but it still takes the giant snake for everyone to recongnise him) and welcome the arrival of Liu Yue and Mo Xiaohei with the conquered carriage and its mysterious cargo, which Lei Mengsha confirms to be a coffin.

At the wedding nobody wants to fight the giant snake. The coffin is brought in and we get a dead Gu Luoli, who is announced by BLDJ to be the real kidnapper of the bride. Yan Liuli proclaims for everyone to hear her plan to still marry him. Her brother isn’t very happy with that and another fight ensues. But team giant snake is hard to beat.

The Tianwaitian crew, including Yue Yao are also here and observing everything. BLDJ seems to be a ‘natural martial artists’, so I guess someone with innate abilities, he is just not trained at all. Yue Yao noticed that at their first meeting. It seems to be a big deal, because elder Chen would love to abduct BLDJ amidst the chaos.

Gu Jianmen confronts his uncle over the betrayal and obvious violent death of his brother. He explodes his wedding clothes of and reveals mourning attire beneath, which is much more fitting for his mindset. He announces that he will step into his brothers role as head of the family and revenge his death. First step is killing his uncle. Second is killing Yan Bietian, who doesn’t get the help of the Tianwaitian faction, he was relying on.

They only appear on scene afterwards to abduct BLDJ. SKCF and the gathered Young masters are tired out by there last fights but BLDJ gets help in form of his uncle Wen Hujiu, who immediately disposes of Elder Chen via fast acting body destroying poison. BoY: >!BLDJ seems to take a lot after his uncle in his later years, they are definitely related.!<. The other Tianwaitian guys flee.

Yan Liuli doesn’t want to revenge her slain brother, becomes the head of her family and will still go forward with marrying her dead lover. Good for her, I guess being a widow in her new position is much better than an unmarried woman. Wen Hujiu takes his leave and his nephew with him. For a moment SKFC looks like a lost puppy, but gets invited to follow along.

BLDJ envies the close relationship he witnessed the Eight Young Masters to have and we get a flashback showing us the one person he regarded as a similar close friend: Ye Yun and him were childhood friends that promised each other to travel the jianghu, but each on their own and to meet up after becoming powerful. That friend died though – SKFC is the new jianghu bestie.

We learn some more about Yue Yao’s background, who seems to belong to the royal family of Beique, that fled to Tianwaitian. The natural gifted martial artist seems to be key component to the plan of bringing the Beique remnants back to power. She didn’t take BLDJ the first time they met because despite having this innate talent he is completely untrained in martial arts and at the moment not fit to learn any of the techniques they would need him to learn.

As a reward for saving BLDJ’s life Wen Hujiu promises SKCF to save his – at least temporary – and prepares a liquor bath, that also contains spiders, scorpions and centipedes. Sound wonderful. The Mu bros have a short meet-up with BLDJ and SCH is very amused that BLDJ actually calls SMY a ghost. I love their dynamic, while BLDJ finds them a bit weird.

Ep. 4:

That is followed by Yue Yao sneaking out of the inn (the whole town seems to have only this one), without BLDJ noticing. A few days later SKCF wakes up, feeling much better and getting a breakfast with his best friend. Wen Hujiu reveals that he poisoned SKCF to battle the injuries already in his body. That’s why this is a temporary measure. There is also no antidote, at least not from Wen Hujiu. But he gives SKFC a map to find Xin Baicao, the King of Medicine, who claims to be able to cure any poison in the world. BR: >!I guess his own niece is not available at this point in time.!< Sounds not like a completely fool proof plan, especially with the time restraint of 10 days. They part ways and SKFC gets some ‘untile we met again’ liquor from BLDJ.

In a remote looking village we get introduced to Ye Xiaofan, who seems to live a lazy life. His type of work is nothing you can find there and so he decides to leave with his sword in hand. At the same time WHJ tries to talk his nephew into returning home while BLDJ would like to see a bit more of the jianghu on their way back. His uncle is not very impressed by BLDJ qinggong skills.

BLDJ admits that he was never interested in learning actual martial art skills but the last few days made him wonder if it would be worth it to protect people close to him. WHJ recalls a duell between five swords men from Nanjue and Li Changsheng, the martial artist he admires the most. BLDJ seems impressed by the story and plans to learn swordsmanship, which the people of Beili pride themselves for.

For that he need a sword and his uncle agrees to take him to the Forrest of Swords, which only opens for visitors every four years, to get one. Ye Xiaofan gets away from being talked into marriage with the sister of his small companion by announcing to him that he is already engaged to a childhood sweetheart he hasn’t seen in years. But now he wants to return to Tianqi, the capital of Beili. He also renames himself into Ye Dingzhi. BoY: >!Wu Xin has a fine looking dad.!<

The uncle-nephew duo arrive at Shenjian Town, were even the dogs carry around their own swords. There BLDJ and Ye Dingzhi have as small meet-cute moment, though only BLDJ notices the other. They enter the Forest of Swords. The whole event seems to be hosted by alternately hosted by the Sword Heart Tomb and the Famous Sword Manor. The latter is in charge this time. In attendance are also people from Wushuang City, of which Song Yanhui is the biggest name.

The sword claiming event is a whole theatrical thing with music. The swords are announced by rank and name. Then people interested in them can battle it out and the winner claims the sword. BLDJ wants one of the best rank. Wang Yixing from Wangcheng Mountain agrees with that approach. He gets a sword (not for himself but for his junior brother) easily, while WHJ wonders if his nephew will be able to claim anything. Not only because of his non-existent martial arts skills, but also because BLDJ got drunk on sword liquor.

The highest ranking celestial level sword, Dustless, is summoned. Song Yanhui and Ye Dingzhi fight over it. For everyone unexpectedly the latter wins over the Wushuang City disciple. BLDJ takes the opportunity to challenge Ye Dingzhi, who obviously recognises him but claims to not know him at all. While BLDJ holds up for a bit via his qinggong, he is not really a match for Ye Dingzhi. At least until he remembers an unrivaled sword technique his master Gu Chen showed him once, while he was also drunk.

In his once again itoxicated state he is able to recall it. That gives us the title song and a perfectly executed technique, which is called Xichu’s Sword Song. Or at least one part of it, the Heaven’s Path, because it seem to be a two people thing. Gu Chen and Gu Mo used that combo to battle 9000 soldiers but nowadays its a lost art. Ye Dingzhi is impressed, both combatants cheer each other with borrowed liquor and continue their fight.

1. Would you prefer to fight one Xiao Bai sized Xiao Bai or one-hundred of Wen Hujiu’s venomous mini-snakes?

2. Which BFF combo do you root for: BLDJ & SKCF or the totally not obvious >!BLDJ & YDZ lost childhood besties!< duo?