Xiang Liu and Xiao Yao’s Story and Romance

 blabla100:

Oh really? I am confused, I thought the 2013's version doesn't have the "are you willing to marry Jing" question in it or the "it's your fault because you didn't ask". I thought the 2013's version was "blame yourself for being useless" or something, but I think I had it wrong.

Some online versions (e.g. Kanunu8) of the 2013 edition omitted the line "Are you willing to marry Jing", and went directly from the question about Feng Long to Ye Shi Qi.

Likewise, the question about "Blame yourself for being useless" instead of "Blame yourself for not asking."

However, the physical copy I own of the 2013 edition does include the "Are you willing to marry Jing". and has Xiang Liu saying "It was you who did not ask".

I went back to have a quick look through the Kanunu8 text, and this is my theory:

This online version was very likely OCR'ed. It can be seen from various sections where the text was converted properly. e.g. the "...." from the original text ended up being "?????"

4 Questions 

This is the original text - and the two sentences highlighted in green are questions asking whether she would marry Feng Long, and if she would marry Jing:

相柳问：“你愿意嫁给丰隆吗？”

小夭的表情呆滞，软绵绵地回答：“不愿意。”

相柳问：“你愿意嫁给璟吗？”

小夭的表情出现了变化，她好像挣扎着要醒来，相柳的眼睛光芒更甚，声音越发柔和地问：“你愿意嫁给叶十七吗？”

Xiang Liu asked, “Are you willing to marry Feng Long?”

Xiao Yao’s expression grew slack, and her voice was soft. “I don’t want to.”

Xiang Liu asked, “Are you willing to marry Jing?”

Xiao Yao’s expression changed and she appeared to try and snap herself alert. The glow in Xiang Liu’s eyes intensified, his voice even gentler as he asked, “Are you willing to marry Ye Shi Qi?”

The two lines "Are you willing to marry Feng Long" and "Are you willing to marry Jing" are exactly the same except for the name. As such, it is a possibility that when they were transcribing the converted text, they accidentally mistook "Are you willing to marry Jing" as the line already transcribed, and simply move on to the next line about marrying Shi Qi.

Don't Blame Me for Deceiving You

Here is a comparison of the kanunu8 text vs the physical equivalent:

Kanunu8
“不过，你可别怪我骗你，是你没有用！”
“However, don’t blame me for deceiving you. It was you who was of no use!”

2013 physical copy
“不过，你可别怪我骗你，是你没有问！” 
“However, don’t blame me for deceiving you. It was you who did not ask!”

There is only a difference of one word in the two versions, but the meaning was vastly different.

The way I see it, there is a possibility that the OCR wrongly interpreted the word "问" as "用“ since both appear quite similar, resulting in the totally different meaning.

For me, the best way to know whether a version is 2013 or 2019, is still to check the names: 

etc.

There are other clues as well. e.g. the exposition of how the Black Emperor got his title, and how the Eminent Emperor finally changed his title to White Emperor, all of which are removed from the 2019 edition when the characters were renamed to avoid references to actual historical characters.

 blabla100:

Got it, thanks for the explanation! Guess I shouldn't rely on google translator when it comes to plants and flowers, lol. 

Yes. I usually search each name individually as well, since I am no expert on plants or flowers myself. Even then, sometimes I am at a loss as to the actual English name for them too. The most recent one to stump me are the list of plants in the courtyard of Yu Manor when Xiao Liu woke up after being rescued - namely 麝香藤. Gah!

 H19279:

It's a kind of wisteria based on the shape of the flowers in my opinion

Ah that makes sense - thank you!

@liddi

"When she realised that they were the same person, she was both relieved and burdened - relieved possibly because she then remembered his seemingly flippant invitation to travel the world with him earlier; burdened because she was reminded once more why he could not respond in affirmative when she told him to give up everything first"

That's a very interesting interpretation, but I personally don't feel it like that.  To explain my pov, I'd have to quote from a discussion that XY had with yellow emperor, but I don't recall the chapter and I am short on time atm to look for it. Basically she was admiring some jewelries that her grandma wore when she was young and thought how her grandma too, was once a young lady who dreamed of spending her life next to her chosen one. Her ending, as both we and XY's know it, is that the man she wore those jeweliers for was more interested in the jeweliers - the power, than the woman, so he used the woman to gain the jeweleries, while the woman's hair grew white, because she picked the wrong type of man. 

When XY found out for sure that Bei îs XL, she wasn't surprised, but relieved, the heavy burden în one corner of her heart was lifted, so the answer to "who do you want me to be"  was  XL, not Bei, IMO. Why? Because XL being Bei meant that XL actually cares about her, he's not only using her as a blood pack or as a tool (not suitable to enter a girl's dreams, the wrong type of man) She recalled her times with Bei, how he taught her archery, how he took her to enjoy time togheter, how gentle and affectionate he was towards her to emphasize that XL actually cares about her., he actually does. She was relieved. He was, în fact, the right type of man, one who doesn't care about power, gains and losses, but sadly, he was already caught în a path that she has no power to change, and thus another burden weighted down  în another part of hers. When XL killed Bei and pointed out that their relationship was always just a deal (what type of man I am you've always known) she basically blamed herself for foolishly taking Bei as genuine, as someone who actually has feelings for her. 

 Winniewin17:

https://www.wattpad.com/story/375589013?utm_source=android&utm_medium=link&utm_content=share_reading&wp_page=library&wp_uname=Anavrin1907

A story where Xiaoyao and Xiang Liu end up together :)

Thank you for sharing. I'll add it to my TBR list.