Xiao Yan recalled the story and said:
"Long ago, there was a young man with a calm and detached nature. He lived in seclusion deep in the mountains and forests, fond of cultivating flowers and plants. His courtyard bloomed with every color imaginable. In his spare time, he would recite poetry to the flowers.
Whenever a flower or plant withered, he would burst into tears, as if a close relative had died. Overwhelmed with sorrow, he would carefully gather the dead plants, dig a pit, bury them, and wail in mourning for days on end.
The young man's deep affection for flowers moved a Flower Fairy in the heavens. She secretly descended to the mortal world and became his wife, and the two lived in intimate harmony. But good times never last. When the heavenly gods learned of this, they were furious—mortals and immortals were not meant to be together. The Flower Fairy was taken back to the God Realm.
After losing his wife, the young man spent his days sighing in grief. On every festival, he would burn incense and pray, hoping for a reunion with her. Apart from that, he lived in constant melancholy and no longer tended flowers at all. His once-vibrant courtyard fell into complete ruin.
One day, a white-haired old man arrived from the mountains. He told the young man that the white peony still blooming in the garden was the incarnation of his wife. If he burned the flower, the Flower Fairy would fall from the God Realm and reunite with him as husband and wife—but from then on, he must never again neglect the care of flowers and plants.
After saying this, the old man rode the wind away. The young man suddenly understood everything and began tending the flowers with great care once more. However, though he deeply loved his wife, he could not bear to burn the peony. As it was her incarnation, he cherished it even more, crying and praying to it day and night.
Finally, one day, the young man died beside the flower from lovesickness and heartbreak. At the moment of death, his blood dripped onto the petals, and the flower transformed into an immortal herb known as Lovesick Heartbroken Red."
After finishing the story, Xiao Yan looked at Dugu Bo and his granddaughter, both wearing complicated expressions, and frowned.
"This is such a touching story—shouldn't you be moved? Why do you both look… angry?"
"What kind of story is this?" Dugu Yan snorted coldly. "A Flower Fairy? Falling for the first man she sees? Even the idiots in Tiandou City have better standards than her. Disgusting."
Xiao Yan protested, "Didn't she fall for him because he truly loved flowers?"
This kind of tale was no different from stories like The Snail Maiden—a fairy or spirit falls for a scholar at first sight, they marry immediately, then it turns into a tragedy because humans and immortals cannot be together. Happy endings were rare; it was an old, worn-out formula.
Dugu Bo shook his head.
"The young man has problems too. At first, it says he loved flowers so much that when one died, he mourned as if his parents had passed away. But once his wife was taken, he abandoned the flowers completely.
If he treated flowers as his parents, then neglecting them because his wife was gone makes him utterly unfilial! The story doesn't even say whether his real parents were alive—if they were, they'd probably have been angered to death."
Xiao Yan thought about it carefully and had to admit the old man had a point. There really was something wrong with the guy.
He was a bit like Tang Hao.
Once he had a wife, he abandoned his entire sect. After she died, all he did was drink himself into oblivion.
"Grandfather, there's more," Dugu Yan added. "In the middle of the story, the young man no longer loved flowers at all—he loved only his wife. After the white-bearded old man told him about the peony being her incarnation, logically speaking, if he loved her that much, he should've burned it immediately to reunite with her.
But he didn't. He said he couldn't bear to.
So does he love his wife, or does he love flowers? He's seriously unhinged!"
Xiao Yan suddenly thought of that so-called master—wasn't this the same kind of mental gymnastics?
Talking about 'no useless martial souls, only useless soul masters,' yet hiding in Notting Academy for twenty years, only willing to take in an actual genius as a disciple.
That's textbook split personality.
"Yan'er is right," Dugu Bo nodded firmly. "This young man is clearly sick in the head. Inconsistent and unstable. Xiao Yan, this story doesn't work."
Xiao Yan thought to himself: I didn't write this nonsense. Who knows which old Tang Sect dog made it up?
"I think the story should go like this," Dugu Bo said, stroking his chin and rewriting it on the spot.
"Long ago, there was a young man who loved only flowers and plants. His parents scolded him, telling him to farm properly or study so he could support himself in the future. Enraged, the young man ran away from home and treated flowers as his parents.
But he was still human. After some time, he began wishing—like in storybooks—that flowers could turn into a wife.
Obsessing day and night, unable to sleep, his already unstable mind deteriorated further.
Eventually, he imagined a Flower Fairy wife in his own head and lived in bliss. One day, however, he recalled how his parents had once stopped him from growing flowers. In that moment of mental instability, his imagined Flower Fairy was 'taken away by heavenly gods.'
In reality, those 'heavenly gods' were nothing more than his subconscious memories of his parents.
After that, he lived in endless pain over losing his wife. Flowers and plants meant nothing compared to her. On her 'birthday,' he even held memorial rituals.
But it was all just fantasy. Later, his physical desires grew stronger, and he desperately wished for his wife's return—thus the appearance of the white-bearded old man.
Otherwise, tell me this: if even his parents couldn't find him, how did some random old man suddenly show up?"
Xiao Yan was completely stunned.
This interpretation was… unreal.
Dugu Yan listened with great interest. "Grandfather, then why didn't he imagine his wife back in the end?"
"He died of illness," Dugu Bo replied matter-of-factly.
"Died of illness?" Xiao Yan was baffled. "How does that work?"
"This young man was mentally ill to begin with. After leaving his parents, when he first grew flowers, he survived by eating some of them when he was starving. That's why he didn't starve to death.
That also explains why flowers seemed to 'die' so often around him—spring flowers usually wither in autumn, not randomly. Those 'withered flowers' were just leftovers from what he'd eaten.
Once he started fantasizing about a wife, he stopped caring for flowers entirely. What did he eat then? Add mental illness on top of starvation—of course he died."
"So that's how it was!" Dugu Yan nodded, fully convinced.
Xiao Yan could only give a thumbs-up in admiration.
Thinking it through carefully, Dugu Bo's version was far more realistic and internally consistent.
Of course, that didn't mean the original tale was completely false—after all, the immortal herb Lovesick Heartbroken Red truly did exist.
Perhaps the real person behind the story really was mentally unstable and, by chance, managed to cultivate an immortal herb. The legend simply romanticized him far too much.
.......
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" In Douluo Just Sleeping, and Bibi Dong Exploded (18+) "
" Douluo: Peerless Bull (18+) "
" Douluo: Glazed Sacrifice to Revive the Sect (18+) "
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" Douluo: Prime Minister, I Understand "
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(End of Chapter)