Full Recaps from Episode One (1) to Episode Ten (10).
DREAM OF CHANG’AN EPISODE 1 TO EPISODE 2.
During Emperor Wenzong’s rule, the court was controlled by powerful eunuchs. After a failed attempt (Morning Dew Rebellion) to remove the sinister eunuch Chou Shiliang, the prime minister Wang Yan’s entire clan was massacred. However, his two granddaughters survived. The younger sister was adopted by Shanggong Yuxi (ChengXi) of the Ziyi Bureau (Purple Palace Guards) and renamed Cheng Ruoyu. Meanwhile, Chou Shiliang adopted the older sister as his god-daughter and renamed her Chou Yanzhi.
The prince who accompanied Chou Shiliang in the slaughters, Li Yan, ascended the throne seven years later and summoned Cheng Ruoyu as his new “Sword Bearer”, the Imperial Purple Guard. Martial art adept but mischievous Ruoyu first met the young emperor in the forest while his entourage was hunting foxes with him at night. The grown up Chou YanZhi appointed as Chess Overseer was also placed in the palace, as Chou Shiliang’s eyes to monitor the new emperor.
Li Yan is suspicious of everyone around him and questioned the loyalty of HuaiZhi, his personal eunuch and ChengXi leader of Imperial Purple Guards, both happened to be the uncle and aunt of Ruoyu. Not contented in having a puppet king, Chou Shiliang instructed Yanzhi to force the king consume the “Carefree Pill” which will render the king losing his martial arts ability for the next six months. This results in Ruoyu’s first feat in protecting Li Yan, resulted in her temporary loss of strength to keep up the pretense of swallowing the pill.
The new monarch goes off for his favorite hunt, skipping the Imperial Court meeting to pacify Chou Shiliang. Agreeing to a bet by Ruoyu, Yanzhi managed to outsmart her by getting her subordinates to snare the rabbits. Fortunately, Li Yan stepped in and cue a scene of him grabbing her hands to hunt a fox, a bigger catch. In the end, cunning Yanzhi still won by purchasing dead wolves.
Next, Yan Li excused himself from the court assembly, supposedly for another hunt. Knowing I am not completely satisfied, the next scene had Li Yan getting her onto a horseback ride. And soon after, Ruoyu landed on top of him as she rescued him from an assassination attempt.
Chou Shiliang’s powerful Shencai Army keeps his position intact. To investigate the source of assasination, both Ruoyu and Yanzhi accompanied Li Yan on an outing. They were led to patronize a restaurant, Cai’s Wine Store which serves the famed “biangbiang” noodles. Despite not liking the sour dish, Li Yan ate it much to the delight of Ruoyu. Second attempt of assassination occurred.
DREAM OF CHANG’AN EPISODE 3 AND EPISODE 4.
The assassination attempt was easily foiled. Chou Shiliang requested for a special dance by the Purple Guards as part of his birthday celebration. He noted Ruoyu’s natural beauty and talents, while lamenting her status and upbringing in Purple Guards. Less one pawn for him. Unfortunately, her fellow purple guard, Zheng Wu sought to kill Chou Shiliang. Risking her pretty hands, Ruoyu stopped the attempt and ensured a place to interrogate her dear friend.
With the ongoing investigation, Aunt ChengXi fretted the possibility of the palace discovering the true identity of Ruoyu who entered the Purple Guard training at the same time. Upon admitting her desire to avenge her family, Zheng Lu clan killed during the Morning Dew Rebellion, Wu committed suicide. Upset that Li Yan closed the case abruptly, Ruoyu contrinued investigating.
The shrewd Yanzhi found several irregularities including the enormous but missing funds, purportedly for the king’s hunt over the years. As the current Purple Guards are only left with 36 members, she speculated that the missing 900 odd girls dismissed after 1000 girls were recruited may have been absorbed into a secret military group.
Like an innocent lamb, Ruoyu was led by Yanzhi to persist in her investigation. Furious over her impudence, Li Yan terminated her service and banished her from the palace. Undeterred, Ruoyu settling in Cai’s Wine Store resumed her nightly activities to clear Wu’s name. She came upon a masked man, Li Yan in disguise. Next day, Li Yan visited her. She served him watered down wine and a group of assassins soon appeared.
Heroic and charming Li Yan saved her but Ruoyu ran off only to return and chased after the last assassin. Not as slow witted as Li Yan claimed, Ruoyu made one of the assassins drunk and followed him to a large mansion, the Shencai Army camp.
DREAM OF CHANG’AN EPISODE 5 AND EPISODE 6.
Her arrival interrupted Li Yan and he escaped after getting hit by her dart. She found Prince An, half brother of Li Yan, who was kidnapped by Chou Shiliang and after pleading with Yanzhi, they escaped through an underground tunnel. The poisoned Prince An was sent to Prince Guang, his father’s younger brother’s secluded place. Ruoyu recognized Prince Guang as her savior and meanwhile, Chou Shiliang cautioned against any attempt to eliminate Prince Guang who is actually under his close observation.
While visting Prince An who was still unconciuous, Ruoyu was surprised to see Li Yan at the same time. After a brief and friendly reunion with his newphew, Prince Guang noted Li Yan’s wounds and surmised that Li Yan sent away Ruoyu to protect her. Despite Li Yan’s attempt in hiding his protective instinct towards his Purple Guard, Prince Guang remarked that Ruoyu’s personality would render her absolute loyalty to Li Yan, even at the expense of her own life.
Desperate to hide their secret warriors, ChengXi silenced Madam Cai who was arrested by Yanzhi. This led to the discovery of Yuzhen Hall, an entertainment center filled with dancing girls. Yanzhi concluded that from the 1000 girls, only 300 were shortlisted and trained vigorously.
Li Yan also came to the same conclusion and saddened that Ruoyu might be an accomplice to hide the grand scheme as she is the niece of ChengXi. Li Yan followed her and was pleasantly pleased that Ruoyu has no knowledge of the Yuzhen girls’ existence. Again, Ruoyu crossed path the masked man as they dodged hidden arrows in the Yuzhen Hall. At the nick of time, both fell into the dungeon before Yanzhi’s soldiers came upon them. Ruoyi proved to be a faithful guard as she shielded Li Yan. Again, she ended up in the same awkward swooning position before their narrow escape.
As she begged for a short respite, she fainted from a bullet dart. Despite his own leg injury, Li Yan carried Ruoyu back to the palace. Instead of summoning the imperial doctor to avoid alerting the palace, Li Yan personally took on the task of cleaning her back wounds. Yes, on his bed. To soothe her embarrassment, he claims disinterest teasing her scrawny looks as she groggily awakens.
Chenxi came clean on her exploits which was a royal edict of his late brother. Disappointed that she did not disclose these details, Li Yan commanded her to release her position to Ruoyu. Effectively, Ruoyu will be overseeing the Purple Guards and Yuzhen Warriors.
DREAM OF CHANG’AN EPISODE 7 and EPISODE 8.
Ruoyu was sent to be treated by Prince Guang. Chou Shiliang and Yanzhi are obssesed over the posthumous royal edict that would place Prince Guang as the ruler instead of their not-so-puppet king. Yanzhi’s aide visited Prince Guang only to discover him nurturing herbs and plants, some are lethal or addictive.
Li Yan requested his grandmother, the Queen Dowager, to allow the return of Prince Guang to the palace. Still bitter over Prince Guang’s mother, her former maid who seduced the Emperor when she was pregnant, she protested. However Li Yan was determined to ensure the palace has strong royal allies to limit Chou Shiliang’s excessive control. Perhaps discerning for the first time that her grandson was not completely under the thumb of Chou Shiliang, she relented, noting that Chou Shiliang may have underestimated Li Yan.
After manipulating his way to bring back Prince Guang to organize the Queen Dowager’s birthday, Li Yan visited Ruoyu . Prince Guang excused himself when he found both need some quiet time after their near-death encounter. He presented her new sword, fixing the broken steel and convinced her to return to her new responsibilities.
Ruoyu disturbed by the sounds of flying arrows in Li Yan’s bedroom strolled in. The drama’s favorite theme repeats. For the third time Ruoyu fell upon Li Yan when he frantically grabbed her arm as he slipped. This time kissing him, of more like bumping her lips on him.
Right at this moment, eunuch Huaizhi, Ruoyu’s adopted uncle appeared and chastised her lightly for “disturbing” the emperor late at night. Li Yan’s expression was calm and unreadable as the startled Ruoyu scurried off followed by the speechless eunuch.
Moments later. Not unpleased, he finally smiled.
And rubbed his forehead…..
Insisting she placed first in Purple Guard Competition, she was ordered to shoot moving targets. She failed miserably and Li Yan begins to coach her. Possessing similar frames and features, this OTP has to be the most visually compatible couple, among all in the Chinese wuxias. As if not enough to show that this couple looks identical, the closeup scene showcased his top notched archery skills with Ruoyu acutely aware of the intimacy as the scene lingered over his face gently pressed on her earlobes.
Prince Guang returned safely to the palace and he noted Li Yan’s amusement having a straight talking companion. A light moment featured Ruoyu mistaking him for a maid as he poured tea for her during her late night study. Finally she was introduced to Han Niu, Left Commander of the Qian Niu Guards. Chengxi reports to Prince Guang who also chastised her for not revealing the Yuzhen warriors to the reigning Emperor. At night, both Li Yan and Ruoyu planned to penetrate the Yuzhen warriors which has been relocated.
DREAM OF CHANG’AN EPISODE 9 and EPISODE 10
Fourth time is the charm. Finally in a reverse situation, Li Yan ended on top of Ruoyu. This time he seemed less surprised and didn’t make any move to remove himself.
And of course, a palace guard chose this very moment to break the spell, only to have an angered Li Yan chased him away with an arrow.
That spurred immediate palace gossips. Ruoyu’s uncle was overjoyed, thanking the heavens for bestowing him the blessings to be a potential royal uncle in law.
Li Yan didn’t help much either. Adding to the rumors, he gestured the poor girl to massage his knees in front of the palace attendants. Partly teasing Ruoyu, he took advantage of their nosiness to seemingly instruct her on his next plans.
Uncle eunuch plays Cupid as he gestured Ruoyu to take over feeding the night tonic to Li Yan. She hid his pill and drew the curtains close as he bided. Playing up the act, he pulled Ruoyu to the bed. Poor flustered girl promptly slept.
As a spy eunuch appeared to interrupt them, Li Yan took off his outer garment. The astonished eunuchs gave the duo some time to concoct their plans. Next thing they knew, he kicked her out. Hahaha.
The reprimand was meant as a cover-up for her operation stealth outside the palace. Li Yan secured Prince Guang’s help to enlist Yuzhen warriors. Presented with the martial manual, official badge and medicative help for the the leader of Yuzhen, Ruoyu is now the leader of Yuzhen Warriors.
Upon sending her off to their secret mission, Li Yan has a nightmare and frets over her safety. After accomplishing her quest, Li Yan rode to her rescue from an attempted arrest by Yanzhi. Nonplussed but pleased Ruoyu found herself riding on the same horse with Li Yan, despite a dozen guards riding horses as well.
QTIZEN 