Chinese animation that got me into chinese animation. I'm just finishing a rewatch of this series and it's spectacular how much the story holds together, and how many things are subtly hinted at or foreshadowed in dialogs that only makes sense once you've seen later events. It really makes me wonder how much the author planned in advance-considering that the first draft for the story was made in 2016 with a promotional music video and a lot of things from the opening didn't even happen yet-but without doubt, A LOT. Needless to say, this story just hits differently. At it's heart, it's a wuxia martial artsaction adventure journey. But it has so much more going on behind the scenes, with hints of tragedy both past and incoming, various characters plotting their own agendas behind the scenes and steady but brilliant worldbuilding. I've seen people compare Feng Ling Yu Xiu to Girl's Last Tour or Made in Abyss, and they aren't necessarily wrong while not being necessarily right, either.

I can only ask you to give this series a try, even if you aren't into chinese animation. The story is far from over-second season is in production-and the plot only thickens. The first couple of episodes had at times a choppy animation(not necessarily bad) which might be discouraging to people who pay a lot of attention to production values, but it's to be expected considering that originally it was a crowdfunded passion project animated by one person. Later the animation quality goes up significantly, especially during the sakuga fight scenes.

Oh the fight scenes! Reminiscent of old Hong Kong's Jackie Chan movies, this is some of the best fight choreography ive seen in animation. The author mixes traditional chinese martial arts with fantasy qi energy and creativity I haven't seen since the times of drunken master. Rather than purely relying relying on literal magic or brute force power ups, our heroes often use cunning and terrain to get advantage over their opponents. And of course, as expected of wuxia/cultivation piece of chinese fantasy, most fighting is unarmed kung fu style-and the author really did his research in this regard! As a (former) practioner of wing chun, I could recognise a lot of familiar stances, guards and moves, such as lap sao or snake crane.

I really don't want to spoil anything about the story itself, other than it's very good and well written. The characters are all likeable- especially the main couple. Yes, it is yuri. Tho the girls never do anything sexual like kissing on screen, it's very strongly implied they are seeing each other as more than good friends through many heartwarming slice of life like moments in between action and fighting typically expected of action-adventure series.

Overall I can't help but reccommend this title. Since I've first seen Feng Ling Yu Xiu, I've seen more chinese series and even started learning chinese language, but none of them hit exactly in the same spot as this one. It's a work of passionate genius, and I can't wait to see what the author has in store for us for second season!