[Zhu Ning] Bamboo Has No Heart

Inspired by watching cuts of Clever Little Fool and Hua Guzi featuring Shen Xiaohai. I've been really into Shen Ningning lately.

Tao Zui and Ning Dian, past and present lives. An archived contribution to the Nie-Shen New Year 36-hour writing event.

I'm new to the fandom, bad at history and naming, and this is an alternate universe with no historical research. There are original elements, and it's unrelated to real history. Everything serves the plot.

OOC warning. I've only watched clips, not the original series. Lately I'm obsessed with Hai Ge and especially love Ning Dian. I'm a Ning Dian stan. This is a short story, so I can't make Ning ascend the throne (I love Nan Gong Yueyi's The Survival of Sun and Moon), but I hope for a happy ending. It incorporates some plot elements from Changhe Luoying's Jiangshan Weinian, though not all of them, so there will be differences. In my version, Ning Dian is Tao Zui's reincarnation after he endured a tribulation to become an immortal.

I was really frustrated by Tao-ge's lovesick-tool-character portrayal, so in my version Tao Zui sees Hua Guzi only as a sworn younger sister (a blend of Ning Dian's ambition and Tao-ge's lovesick nature). Tao-ge only wants to cultivate immortality and isn't interested in romance. He helps the heroine only to repay her kindness (so there's no Tao Zui and Su Qiu pairing here either. Su Qiu and Xiao Kui are both younger sisters with unrequited feelings for him). In my version, Tao-ge's scumbag father is still alive (though he'll definitely die). He doesn't deserve to be called Tao-ge's father. I want Tao-ge to take revenge with his own hands.

Check out my Seven-Gold stories next door:

[Seven-Gold] When the Sect Leader Gets Bound to a Righteousness System

[Seven-Gold] Nirvana

Theme: The bamboo has no heart, yet branches grow beside it.