The premise of this novel is simple, the heroine with a name Jiujiu was caught by a "system" to cross the worlds and do the tasks, basically solving grievances. As in every 1vs1 novel she meets a person she falls in love with and finds out that she can meet him in other worlds too, which is too good, although he doesn't remember the past, but he always falls in love with Jiujiu. BUT! Again I wonder if I'm just bored that I stuck with it, since it has so many parts that I disliked lol.
DISLIKES:
Writing style or lack of it. The novel spawns a period of 6 years ('16-'22). The initial style of writing is very immature and could be called simple notes with little to no description of the worlds, just the overall situation of why the original host was wronged or what happened and the simple slution of the situation where Jiujiu, our heroine, solves the problem. Those chapters sounded more like a bullet journal (imagine you being fed story that sounded like "went to school, entered university, bankrupted enemy, happy end"). Later chapters do have more development and they do not only count 8-10 average per arc, they start to increase in chapter count to 20, yet the lack of backstory on the world and such is still present. Here it is common to see mostly a short period of time described or it is the start of one connotation being mulled over (not really, but sometimes author describes over and over in the same arc such things like emotional things, for example, if one started to dislike the over then it doesn't matter what you do, you'll be disliked regardless, but it's a bit annoying when same things are repeated endlessly). So worlds seem quite empty and lacking, sometimes you don't understand what you should expect, at other times I could only come to conclusions by myself, but judging by notes left by author it felt like they also took stories/situations described in comments or they could leave to watch and read to get "inspired", but most plots aren't new (due to some stories being very similar to things I've read before). The writing style is a bit unsophisticated too, something that a younger person would write in their first attempt at writing fanfics, but judging by comments left by author they're older, so this surprised me.
Plot makes the relationship confusing. There are plots of arcs themselves and the overall plot of Jiujiu falling in love and collecting her man's soul fragments. But because of this plot, some plots in arcs seem strange and it also casts a shadow on the emotional line. By which I mean. In first worlds Jiujiu and the "system" do tasks before she meets her man and falls in love, after knowing she can find him in other worlds she gets a special bracelet which helps her. In one of the wrolds she used the bracelet to save herself (funnily, I don't remember being mentioned that the guy she saved with herself was her man, but she lived with him afterwards). Later she could only do without the bracelet. Recognition marks changed from time to time, there was a mark on Jiujiu's body that was used for some time, but author forgot about it. Later there was soul resonance, also used for a period of time and forgotten. So during this time she collected fragments of her man, while doing tasks. The "system" is also part of his soul, so it was absorbed. Later a coffin with a person appeared out of nowhere in her space, it was like a dead body, here Jiujiu literally brought his fragments which made him more alive. Later this body disappeared and the captured system Baozi informed her that from now on she can find him, while he will recover his memories, yet she got a bracelet that blocked her perception of him, which I couldn't figure out what for it was done. But by this time the style of the arcs changed, from earlier times when love was fiery and passionate like in romantic novels, to later more or less different relationships (since fragments should have been different emotions, but not delivered well), and at the ending we have more and more worlds where she did the tasks that did not involve dating and falling in love and the task was a center piece. The final arcs brought me confusion where once again it is said she can meet her lover (as if previously she never met him), yet she was deprived of her skills. Why this sudden choice though? Because she worked so hard to upgrade her skills and it was all about meeting her partner when skills are upgraded to a 100, yet she was stripped off it when she entered the world, I can't see the logic. Though logic in this novel shouldn't be sought after, it's a myth which doesn't exist.
Skills and attributes. I can understand that the style may change, but tbh the heroine herself changed, things she uses/doesn't use also change in a strange way that are not explained, so you can only guess half-truths. For example she sometimes has changes in her character, from later things that happened only then I could say with cerainty that she is influenced by the leftover feelings from the host, but at other times, she's not bothered by original owners. When it comes to her skills for some reason e.g. at one time she can practice martial arts, at other times she doesn't, it is explained by weak constitution (while at other times "she doesn't have time"). At one time she can calculate fate, but in another world where it could be come in handy, she doesn't. Her popular talent of Gu worms that were used quite a lot in many arcs at the beginning were basically forgotten later. A lot of picked and dropped things I must say.
The novel introduces attributes update system (such as appearance, spirit, force and so on), her goal is that she reaches all 100 and then she can finally meet her man, but how these things are supposed to correlate. From completeing worlds Jiujiu can get points and specialties (such as writing, having a system, gu technique, acting skills, lol even bed skills) etc., which don't matter at times tbh, thus I think it's inconsistent or better to say one of the victims of pick and drop trend (for example, she has three marks from emperors that loved her, they didn't matter in other arcs, while supposed to make emperors fall in love; another example is when she got devination, but never used it, or in another world she got dragon's blessing, also never used). She lived for so long, so there are few things you certainly know she can do, since she's been to ancient times she's profecient in ches/calligraphy/qin, ciltivation taught her fighting and as a modern person.. well, her main point is that she can act, she cooks really well, she can also play games well and write novels (conveniently in many worlds novels aren't that developed :) ), oh and medicine. Also throughout the course of time Jiujiu managed to get several beasts/pets and a system: the first came from world of cultivation and stayed the longest with Jiujiu, evolving to almost unbeattable existence. The second was a captured system from another tasker (also, plots where taskers were present are so wasted). The third came from a future world and was like a ferocious winged dog or smth and the last one came from a beast world. She also has a plant from apocalyptic world, which existed in description not for long and she also got two old koi fish, which were mentioned once, but I don't know if the author forgot about it, she basically has three animals around her, but mostly only two (beast Xiao Bai and the system Baozi) and the rest are forgotten. Sometimes it is explained that beasts of their caliber can't enter the world due to inbalance, but at other times they can easily appear and follow her a lot as her pets. You never know the rules.
ML? And relationships with other men. The one thing that weirds me out a bit is their relationship at the beginning and Jiujiu's attitude. At first Jiujiu fell in love and later found out that she can find her man in those wrodls. Some worlds were really left alone, like what are you going to do about it? She lived in world twice and both times she left ML alone to his devices. BUT! Not all worlds had him, which is weird (I mean some tasks included relationships with men, even if intimacy was blocked). Later she found her man, she was also given a bracelet to recognize him, which she lost in one of the worlds. In some worlds it felt like she lived with other men, because it was unconfirmed if they had part of her man in them or no. At one time the plot tried to develop a second ML, who first was an emperor and a task, fell in love with Jiujiu, but later he traveled worlds, met Jiujiu again, was given a chance to be like her, a tasker, but the plot twisted it into him being part of the main body and absorbed, which felt like flushing second ML. There was a third ML tbh, since he had no further development so far, he was a vampire and it felt like he lived for a long time and she lived through two lifetimes with him in the same world and he fell asleep after she left. So sometimes she felt it was wrong of her to give them hope or use their feelings. BUT. Shouldn't she love her man though? When she meets him she's so happy, but she also has episodes with other men due to tasks. It's all because you can't really tell, it's a part of ML or not, since it's not descibed or pointed out, but at other times it is stated clearly (e.g. "we've been together for a thousand years"). It all started when she was asked to collect his parts, the previous "system" was his avatar, he was absorbed too and disappeared, leaving only a screen with her attributes, later she collected parts and put them in his body that appeared, later the body disappeared, she got bracelet that blocked her from feeling him, this bracelet was mentioned like once or twice only (like what type of shittery is this), thus you can't tell, since she reacts differently to men she is with (I'm not mentioning that sometimes she's alone). Oh yes! Forgot to mention that their relationship wasn't always good, because at the beginning there was an episode where Jiujiu got angry at him for tw: attempted r*, but she asked to leave her alone for a world or two before things were forgiven. In later worlds there was a story where she adopted a son, not related by blood, basically she was a queen mother and he was an emperor, there was r* and she never reacted as strongly (O_O) This was so confusing. Is it because now she's so seasoned she doesn't care ahahaha Anyway, after all these worlds when ML's body disappeared she's supposed to find him on a feeling alone (me, asking at this time: what if she can't lol?), he's supposed to awake his memories he lost. I'm not sure where they will go from here.
All in all this is it so far, I feel like this novel is a long-lasting relationship, it's been so long, feelings aren't fresh, but I've invested so much time, so I refuse to drop it. Maybe author who spent 6 years of their life on this one share the sentiment.
RATE: 2.5/5.
UPDATE:
I've finished it. And to my biggest surprise it's actually unfinished and it was not updated for a year since the last chapter. Although it doesn't really matter on the bigger scale, because the main line ends erlier and afterwards are several worlds that Jiujiu decided to visit as a pass time and when their line was over we switched to Baozi and Xiao Bai leading two people into several worlds. First one went through several worlds and got rid off her obsession and chose love and travel the worlds, the second one decided to return to reality because of her children, also followed by a male partner who will be in her original world too.
The finale of the main line is as always underwhelming. I usually even skip those because it's same old and the end of the journey is a happy end, so I didn't bother with all the cultivation and why this and that happened. I still think there's a lot of loopholes along the stories, they're not perfect in any sense and especially the emotional line and relationships is what got me weirded out the most. But whatever, who am I to judge.
The reason for abandonment is simple actually, throughout the years, if you read notes left by the author, you know basically their main life events and those are: dating on the premise of marriage and the last ones are made during pregnancy. So there's no need to guess more.
