The Scum Villain's Self-Saving System: Ren Zha Fanpai Zijiu Xitong (Novel) Vol. 3 | 
pick“This time, no matter where you wish to go, this master will accompany you.“
And here they are, at the end of their journey to find one another, at the beginning of a whole lot more.
On reflection, this volume is probably my favourite. There are some fun things in the fourth volume (short stories), but that's much bittier and has a bunch of filler (at least from my POV as a non-fan of Mobei-jun and Shang Qinghua).
And once again, Shen Qingqiu's sect siblings (and his disciples) love him so...
But mostly, it's time for the showdown!
This moment, when Shen Qingqiu tries to embrace the crying Luo Binghe in his memory, feels pretty important for Shen Qingqiu -- especially since when he wakes up he admits to having missed the adult Luo Binghe.
Shen Qingqiu really should connect the dots about “Qi-ge“, too... but not yet.
The only image from this chapter is pretty violent, so let's skip it.
I wish there'd been one for the scene with Yue Qingyuan and Liu Qingge defending Shen Qingqiu. Pretending they're not doing it by saying “My hand slipped“, ahahaha. They love him so much, and in Liu Qingge's case, he's earned that love all by himself. (It's more complicated with Yue Qingyuan of course, though the story hasn't explained why fully yet.)
Their faces, ahahaha.
I don't love that scene in general, and people really need to be nicer to poor Zhuzhi-lang, but it's good that Shen Qingqiu and Luo Binghe are finally getting closer again.
Also, Liu Qingge is back and powered up! I continue to adore his loyalty to Shen Qingqiu, his dedication to his martial family.
This really was an excellent choice for a birthday reread treat. Some fun demon lore, and showcasing of Shen Qingqiu's incredible knowledge of the source text.
And now Luo Binghe and Shen Qingqiu are so much closer to understanding each other!
What is it with MXTX and scenes where the eventual-lovers embrace in a coffin, though?!
The part in the mausoleum is probably a favourite part, honestly. Not so much because of Tianlang-jun (pictured looking pretty fly for a rotting corpse) but because Shen Qingqiu and Luo Binghe begin to work together again.
They should all be so much kinder to poor Zhuzhi-lang.
Back to the reread! No illustrations in the first chapter, but here's one of my favourite of the colour images.
We're not here yet in this chapter, though. Shen Qingqiu has finally figured out not to make assumptions... kinda. He's still so afraid though that he can't accept any of Binghe's words either. Can't wait to be past that stuff tbh.
pickI love time travel fix it fics. This series has a lot of the tropes I enjoy, plus the idea of being transported into a series and having a chance to fix the plot holes and learn more about side characters
It's got a good blend of humour and plot. I like the trope subversion and calling out common tropes in wuxia fiction
This really worked for me but I do like crack fics and unhinged stuff
May #BookSpin @TheAromaofBooks
I took a loooooong bike ride this morning in honour of it probably being the Last Good Day for 2022, and of course I paused at the trail head to eat a granola bar and read a bit. I loved the first two volumes of this story, but I found the first hundred pages or so of this third instalment really hard to follow and I dunno if it was the book‘s fault or a concentration issue on my part. Seems like I‘ve mostly sunk into it now.
