Thousand Years For You Episode 21 Recap
> Thousand Years For You Recap
Dengdeng desperately continued to inject energy into Chieftain Yu, despite Lv Er's attempts to stop her. Lv Er was concerned she would make herself ill, but Dengdeng was resolute, stating that she could not bear to watch her father, whom she had only recently found, die after being helpless when her mother passed away. When Chieftain Yu showed a slight improvement, Dengdeng paused, still heartbroken that she couldn't fully cure him.
Lv Er comforted her, recalling Chieftain Yu's past wisdom: "The hurdles are difficult to pass, but they must be passed. Every step is difficult, but we still have to go step by step." This brought Dengdeng back to a snowy night in her childhood when she had a fever. Her father had risked the heavy snow and injured his leg to get her medicine, constantly tending to her and reminding her to face difficulties head-on.
As she thought of this, Dengdeng quietly vowed that she would not let anything happen to her father, imagining a future where they would hunt rabbits together. Lu Yan entered and sat beside Dengdeng. She quickly turned away to wipe her tears, but Lu Yan gently told her there was no need to pretend in front of him. Dengdeng then asked if she could hug him. Lu Yan responded by drawing her into his embrace.
Dengdeng confessed her profound fear, having never seen her father so vulnerable. She worried they wouldn't have the chance to do many things together, and she dreaded watching him be tormented by the spirit worms while feeling powerless to help, fearing that after finally finding him, she would lose him again. Lu Yan held her, assuring her, "Don't be afraid. I'm here. I'll always be with you." Dengdeng then asked Lu Yan what he had done that day.
He revealed he had found Reporter Shao's diary. After seeing Chieftain Yu's continued struggle, Lu Yan surmised that Reporter Shao was not the King of Worm, or at least not entirely. Dengdeng noted that Reporter Shao, who meticulously recorded his daily life, had abruptly stopped writing a month ago, and the notebook was covered in dust. This led them to believe Reporter Shao had been manipulated or controlled by the King of Worm.
Lu Yan had already checked Reporter Shao's body, finding a fist-sized hole in his chest surrounded by radiating, uneven blood marks, indicating the King of Worm had entered and exited there. He realized that the King of Worm could drastically increase its power by being inside a host and absorbing energy. Dengdeng expressed anger at the King of Worm for using Reporter Shao's body.
They concluded that the King of Worm's real motive was to obtain energy, using the spirit worm trade as a facade. With the King of Worm still alive and injured, they planned to travel to Yingdu the next day to find it, believing there was still hope for Chieftain Yu and other Spirit Clan members. Dengdeng thanked Lu Yan for his unwavering support.
Separately, after Lu Yan provided her with energy, the concubine temporarily regained her human form to meet Chief Bai. She had sent him a letter arranging to meet at the café where they first met, a detail Chief Bai recognized, confirming her as the sender. Despite the tight city-wide search for Spirit Clan members, she came to see him one last time, professing her love and wishing she could be an ordinary person to be his wife.
Chief Bai, though conflicted, admitted his deep feelings for her were "like spilled water," irreversible. He urged her to leave and take care, as he could no longer protect her in the increasingly dangerous Yingdu. As she prepared to depart, a server, despite Chief Bai's dismissal, insisted on bringing a new "garlic pastry" for them to try. The concubine instinctively reached for it, and upon contact with the garlic, she began to transform and collapsed, revealing her Spirit Clan form.
Just then, police outside were chasing another Spirit Clan member, and the server's scream of "Monster!" drew a reporter who rushed in to take photos. Chief Bai, distraught, quickly told the transformed concubine, now a small cat, to flee. Outside, Bai Shiqi encountered the transformed concubine and a young Spirit Clan boy.
When her father, Chief Bai, appeared, Bai Shiqi cleverly deflected his questions, claiming she had merely been out to buy coffee beans and had seen a cat run past. She then brought the concubine and the boy to the shabby temple where Dengdeng was. The boy explained that a "Miss Bai" (Bai Shiqi) had saved him and instructed the Tricolor Cat to lead him to a safe place, specifically mentioning Dengdeng and a handsome man by her side.
He then tearfully recounted that police were going house-to-house, arresting Spirit Clan members. His own parents were killed, rather than simply arrested like others, after they "resisted arrest." He vividly recalled one police officer dismissing the others, after which his parents, usually gentle people, seemed to go mad before suddenly kneeling and begging the officer, then dying shortly after.
Lu Yan examined the parents' bodies and confirmed their death was due to energy depletion, similar to other Spirit Clan members affected by spirit worms. He concluded that the King of Worm had found a new host among the police, using their authority to legally apprehend Spirit Clan members and drain their energy. The incident at the café, with newspaper headlines proclaiming "Police Director's Concubine is a Monster," deeply implicated Chief Bai.
The Magistrate reprimanded him, and the reporter who took the photos testified that Chief Bai had hidden and then released the concubine. To restore his reputation and save his family, Chief Bai vowed to the Magistrate to execute all captured Spirit Clan members at the execution ground that very day. Throughout Yingdu, the police intensified their search, using garlic to force Spirit Clan members to reveal their true forms before apprehending them.
Bai Shiqi overheard a household attendant discussing Chief Bai's plans for a mass execution and rushed to tell Gu Beixi, urging him to warn Dengdeng and Lu Yan. Gu Beixi, prioritizing Bai Shiqi's safety, told her to go home and promised he would deliver the message. Unbeknownst to them, Lu Yan, from his room, had already overheard their conversation about Chief Bai's planned execution. Meanwhile, the King of Worm, now inhabiting a police captain, found its current host's energy insufficient.
It commanded its subordinate to gather all scattered spirit worms, eagerly anticipating the mass execution as an opportunity to absorb a vast amount of energy and prepare for its ultimate revenge against Lu Yan.
