Episode Summary
Liao Tingyan is alive but has amnesia and believes Shi Qianlv is her father who is pushing her to get revenge on Sima Jiao.She works as a "corpse hider" and helps her friend Hong Luo (who is Ye Ruling) cover up a killing.Sima Jiao arrives in the same city and narrowly misses her, unable to sense her because of a spell Shi Qianlv placed on her.Frustrated, Sima Jiao takes over the city and plans to conquer the next one to force her to reveal herself.
Spoiler Alert
So, About That Amnesia...
Liao Tingyan is alive. The good news ends there. She's been living for centuries with total amnesia, using the name Shi Yan.And get this. She thinks the villain Shi Qianlv is her dear old dad.
For hundreds of years, he's been feeding her a steady diet of lies. He tells her Sima Jiao is their family's greatest enemy. He says she has to get revenge for what he did to their clan. It's a pretty twisted setup.
Even with her memory wiped, Liao Tingyan is still Liao Tingyan. She knows she's no match for a powerhouse like Sima Jiao. So while she nods along to her "father's" revenge plans, she's mostly just trying to survive. Her laid-back, "salty fish" personality is still there.
A New Job in the Demon Domain
To make ends meet, she's taken up a charming new career. She's a corpse hider. People pay her in magic stones to clean up murder scenes and make bodies disappear.
Her latest job comes from a place called the Yanzhi Terrace. A dancer named Hong Luo killed a guy who was harassing her. It was an accident, but she's still in a tough spot. Liao Tingyan shows up and agrees to fix it for eighteen magic stones.
She's a pro at this. She drags two other bodies to the scene and stages a whole brawl. It completely clears Hong Luo of any suspicion. The work is clean and efficient.
A Near Miss in Winter City
Sima Jiao has also arrived in the Demon Domain.He's in a place called Dongcheng, or Winter City, to handle some local troublemakers. He ends up at the exact same restaurant where Liao Tingyan just was.
He immediately spots her personal mark, a little symbol she carves with her dagger. He's ecstatic, thinking he's finally found her. But when he tries to sense her presence, there's nothing. Shi Qianlv put some kind of spell on her to hide her aura from Sima Jiao. It's a deliberate, cruel move to keep them apart.
Friends and Future Plans
It turns out that the dancer, Hong Luo, is actually Ye Ruling.Even in this new life, she and Liao Tingyan are best friends. Hong Luo feels bad for her friend's situation. She suggests Liao Tingyan come work at the Yanzhi Terrace, where life might be a little easier.
But Liao Tingyan has her own plan. She wants to save up enough money to take her "father" and move away. She's heard of a peaceful place called Guyu Wu. She hopes that moving there will finally get him to calm down. Maybe then he'll stop nagging her about a revenge she doesn't even want.
Sima Jiao, meanwhile, is getting impatient. He takes over Winter City from its useless lord, Niu San, with the help of his subordinate Nian Jiu. He figures that if he makes a big enough scene, Liao Tingyan will hear about it and find him. When she doesn't appear, he decides to escalate. His next move is to conquer the neighboring city, Hexiancheng. He's ready to mobilize the entire Demon Domain just to get her back.
