Chapter 131-The Manga Pariah's Guide to Self-Salvation
Li Yixin finished the new chapter with very complicated feelings.
When she saw Percy meet his aunt who had turned into a Fallen Breed and recalled how his aunt had once hoped he could end her life as a monster, she felt pity and tragedy. She even thought that if it were her, she might want someone close to end her if she became a monster too.
Then Sykes showed up and cleanly took care of the monster. It felt overly ruthless, but it saved the soft-hearted Percy who had been threatened because he hesitated.
Sykes's cold approach seemed like the best option at the moment. Things were already like this—sacrifices were inevitable. Fallen Breed were tragic products, but they would also bring tragedy to others. It was a cruel warning.
Having read plenty of works, Li Yixin could vaguely guess where it was headed.
The tormented and conflicted Percy would be forced to kill the women who had become Fallen Breed. That brutal choice would be the trial every protagonist has to go through—his psyche would mature, he would see the cruel world more clearly, and he would face even bigger challenges.
Like the Sei Curia hiding behind the Hope Project, and then revenge for all the innocent women who were sacrificed.
From the earlier plot setup, Li Yixin had always assumed Lucy would turn into a Fallen Breed too. The sacrifice of a companion would further solidify the protagonist Percy's resolve and goal—classic trope.
Li Yixin figured a lot of weekly readers felt the same as her: they had already accepted that the women who became monsters would have a tragic ending. It was inevitable, the most "appropriate" way to handle it.
—And then Ye Zheng appeared.
She didn't care about morality or rationality, about the big picture or compromises—she just wanted them to live!
The moment Ye Zheng showed up, Li Yixin felt like someone had slapped her awake. Why had she thought they were so pitiful yet still deserved to die?
Because they were too pitiful, so death was automatically the "best" ending for them.
Because they might hurt people, so killing them was naturally reasonable and just.
Because they were kind and fragile women, so of course the male lead would get justice for them.
While almost everyone inside and outside the manga looked at them with pity that already contained a death sentence, putting on an absurd performance of "hoping they could be saved" while accepting they were doomed—only Saintess Ye Zheng stuck to her conviction from beginning to end:
She would never give up on saving anyone, even if they were no longer treated as human!
Ye Zheng's existence completely tore this manga in two.
The creator placed her directly opposite the protagonist. Her seemingly willful "So what?" didn't make the protagonist look rational and resolute—it made Percy's complicated, conflicted choice look hypocritical instead.
Especially since at least half the weekly readers were women. When they saw Ye Zheng fighting desperately to protect persecuted women, then looked at Percy and Sykes's attitudes—even the slowest ones could smell something off with the plot.
The forum used to be full of Kiran stans crying about his death being unreasonable and questioning Ye Zheng as "royalty"(Favored and treated specially by creators) or "creator's daughter." After this update, the wind completely changed—now it was all about Percy failing as a protagonist, the plot making no sense, and direct complaints at the creator.
Li Yixin opened Old Uncle's social account. The newest post already had over 10k comments.
[Taking this arc to circle outsiders and asking who the villain is and who the protagonist is—our Percy has splashily become the villain's little sidekick lol (screenshot)]
Li Yixin clicked the screenshot. The OP had summarized the new chapter, attached a few panels, and asked a friend to guess the roles of the three characters.
[This blond guy's villain aura is leaking everywhere—just looks kinda dumb, like a cold-style alpha hegemon from those Korean mangas—can I even say that...]
[Beat-up black-hair guy has the looks, just way too soft—probably the blond guy's underling?]
[Holy shit a real goddess has descended! You can tell at a glance she's the valkyrie who'll protect all the sisters...]
[Where did you find this strong female-lead manga? Eating this good behind my back?]
Li Yixin nearly laughed out loud. That comment was liked to the very front. Outsiders' takes are always the most objective reflection of how the plot actually lands.
[Not even sarcasm—seriously suggest renaming the manga Saintess Legend. Ye Zheng's arc isn't a hundred times more exciting and hot-blooded than your fake big male-lead one?]
[The episode that supports Ye Zheng ascending the throne the most—who even remembers her original positioning was female lead?]
[Ye Zheng straight-up said she has a way to save them. If Percy really pitied those women, how could he stand firmly on Sykes's side? Old Uncle has gone insane from fujoshi bait.]
[I always thought I was a cockroach fujoshi who eats anything, until I met this dogshit plot—turns out I'm picky after all.]
[Nothing to do with fujoshi bait—the truth is Old Uncle just hates women that much. He had to create a world where the male lead can openly step on women's tragedies to climb higher, and it backfired spectacularly lol.]
[Creator so shady. Thought he could ride feminist traffic and not get bitten? Should've killed off Ye Zheng ages ago and there wouldn't be all this trouble.]
Li Yixin was shocked. This time not only were tons of female readers unhappy—tons of male readers exploded too. But their complaint wasn't Percy standing against Ye Zheng; it was that Ye Zheng was too strong.
Male readers didn't care which side Percy picked; some didn't even understand what the girls were mad about. To them Ye Zheng being the antagonist was fine—the problem was she was antagonizing way too hard.
In a single chapter she either killed or nearly killed every named male character. Male readers watching felt physical discomfort, the same way female readers felt discomfort at Percy choosing to stop Ye Zheng.
[Can't even spray—the creator really drew a T0 little fairy girl(This is usually an incel's derogatory term for women on CN Internet).]
[Lmao the creator is licking this hard and there are still girls dissatisfied with the plot?]
[Tricking male readers in just to slaughter us—reading my manga how did I suddenly get trafficked to Myanmar?]
[First time seeing such a misandrist arc. Did the creator's account get taken over by a woman? Completely giving up on the male market—waiting for cancellation!]
The comment section turned as chaotic as a pot of porridge. Old Uncle was getting roasted from every possible angle. Li Yixin watched with relish—everyone was fighting so beautifully.
Before, she hated when people turned entertainment comment sections into ideological battlegrounds—she read these things to relax, not to attend class. But today she was genuinely enjoying the chaos.
If Ye Zheng didn't exist, there wouldn't be this many people speaking up. Maybe only a tiny minority would notice that the creator was pretending to pity women while actually using female tragedies as stepping stones for the male lead's highlight moments and growth.
When that tiny minority spoke up, the majority would shoot them down. Some would even say Old Uncle was speaking up for women, and that it was rare and precious for a male creator to face and sympathize with female suffering, etc.
"Thank goodness Ye Zheng showed up," Li Yixin thought happily. Otherwise, knowing herself, she probably would've been one of the people defending this plot.
A seemingly perfect, justice-filled handsome male lead would make her love and praise him.
But a deeply flawed yet overwhelmingly powerful female character gave her a completely different emotion, a deeper stir she couldn't name yet. Right now she just wanted to join the comment section in praising the great Saintess!
She scrolled the comments a bit longer, then called Tang Mingxi to share her thoughts on the new chapter. Tang Mingxi was shocked: "Didn't you say once Zhao Mei was gone your love died with her?"
Li Yixin looked awkward and dragged out her reply: "Well... you're still reading it, the algorithm keeps pushing it to me..."
Halfway through the call her phone pinged. Li Yixin glanced—it was the [Steam Empire] account update notification. She guiltily deleted it.
Tang Mingxi heard the creator's comments had been nuked again, hung up with Li Yixin, and immediately brought her dozen alts to the battlefield. To her surprise, the current war didn't need all twelve accounts.
The front page was all either Ye Zheng praise or creator/plot roasting. Even Percy stans couldn't stubborn their necks to defend the creator anymore. Sure, a few were still coping with "Ye Zheng can't 100% guarantee the Fallen Breed won't hurt people" and "Percy's choice protects the majority," but most Percy stans had to admit their fave's plot was cooked.
[Still defending with this plot—I'm starting to suspect the Y chromosome can drop digital poison now...]
Tang Mingxi muttered.
She'd bet over half the manga's revenue came from female readers. Turning the female character who wants to liberate female victims into the antagonist—zero respect for the paying mommies!
Now look—even the most protective baby-boy moms had turned.
But when Tang Mingxi saw what Percy stans were actually focusing on, she almost laughed herself sick.
[Please creator value your one and only Demonic Domain protagonist—stop giving him controversial arcs just to farm black-red heat okay?]
[Protect Percy properly—people are already attacking the character because of the plot. Why blame your own mistakes on this little boy?]
[Focus on shaping the character—stop pinning your single-brain-cell plots on Percy. He's clearly a super upright and empathetic teen—stop OOC!]
Tang Mingxi looked at the screen full of exclamation marks and thought: before you love the character, maybe love yourselves a little more?
Tang Mingxi's lips curved smugly. Ye Zheng really fed the Little Steamers too well. The girl just casually flexes her ability in the manga and half the internet has a meltdown. Ye Zheng stans were handed this W on a silver platter.
[High and low instantly clear—I'm starting to think Ye Zheng and Ye Zheng stans are the real hot-blooded shonen protagonists.]
[Fake hot-blooded shonen protag onist: Percy. Real hot-blooded shonen protagonist: Ye Zheng!]
[Who still remembers the dark days when Ye Zheng debuted and got cursed as “incompetent trash who didn't deserve her position”...]
[Looking back now—the real incompetent trash is someone else huh.]
From the universally despised pendant female lead at the beginning to the current "antagonist" that everyone either loves or hates—Ye Zheng and Ye Zheng stans had pulled off a massive comeback together.
She skillfully switched to another alt. Lately her female idol in real showbiz was fighting her teammates over positioning again—she had comment control duty and rival fights to handle.
Her rival's ugly screenshots were saved in a dedicated album. Suddenly Tang Mingxi felt kinda meh—she didn't really want to fight rivals today.
Deliberately cropped ugly pics were the most common (and relatively mild) rival-fighting tool. More extreme ones involved sex rumors, photoshopped ghost pics, blood pics, etc.
Tang Mingxi usually only used real ugly pics to clap back—she considered her moral bar pretty high, no gender discrimination. Male or female idol, dare invade and you get the Eighteen Dragon Conquering Palms.
She liked Ye Zheng simply because the looks and personality were her type—nothing deeper. Rushing to the front lines for her felt like "pretty big like," but not completely. She was just used to this way of stanning and got a sense of accomplishment from it.
But the deeper she got into Ye Zheng's character—especially after this chapter showing an even sharper, multi-layered Ye Zheng—Tang Mingxi suddenly lost all interest in using those ugly pics to attack a real 3D woman she didn't actually know.
"Whatever—forums are more fun anyway."
All the loud plot warriors had run to the creator's socials. The forum had moved on to calmer topics, which actually felt rare to Tang Mingxi, so she couldn't resist jumping in.
[#1: Serious discussion—time to update the King of the Demonic Domain power rankings yet?]
[#2: When Zhao Mei was still around we had the Four-Second Table, after the Zhao Mei incident only Three-Second Table left. Kiran had a brief moment of hope but flopped at light speed. Now Ye Zheng is quietly becoming the big top.]
[#3: Not every house's fan ranking—official character ranking!]
[#4: Power rankings are more authoritative in Tieba(where male users make up the majority)—forums are only good for fandom wars anyway.]
[#5: These days even combat power gets measured with pee holes?]
[#6: Guessing OP wants to ask—where does Ye Zheng rank now?]
[#7: Spoiling Ye Zheng mom fans a bit—your kid is around fourth or fifth.]
[#8: Teacher that's wrong—my kid scored that high on the latest weekly test, how is she only class fourth/fifth?]
[#9: Ye Zheng suddenly went nuclear—hard to rank accurately, but right now she definitely still loses to Sykes.]
[#10: Nah—our Zheng was clearly holding back against Sykes, she might actually win.]
[#11: Upstairs parent what's wrong—don't even know your own kid? If Ye Zheng could win, Sykes might not have made it out alive.]
[#12: Why is everyone on this floor babying Ye Zheng mom fans so hard?]
[#13: Because the PerSy mom who loves arguing with Ye Zheng mom fans the most went to complain to the principal—her son bombed the latest exam.]
[#14: Died laughing—nobody to fight with and I'm genuinely not used to it, PerSy mom hurry back!]
...
[#57: Ye Zheng's ability is super environment/luck dependent—if there wasn't mist, Percy would've never lost. No water = Ye Zheng useless.]
[#58: Holy shit who performed the ritual and summoned Percy mom?]
[#59: Fair point—Kiran was dual S-rank and still got killed by Ye Zheng in a no-water environment?]
[#60: Kiran was obviously plot-killed!]
[#61: Speaking of Kiran—does anyone actually care what Ye Zheng said to him right before he died?]
[#62: Next thread over is discussing it—probably some Hope Project secret that shattered his faith. Ye Zheng didn't just kill the body, she assassinated the heart lol.
[#63: How do Kiran stans get stabbed the second we open any thread? My poor wife just gets casually stepped on with zero care...]
[#64: Upstairs Kiran stan switch perspectives—this is literally your favorite passerby mop scenario, dinner is served!]
[#65: How is Kiran "zero care"—the dudes over at Tieba care a lot, they've already knighted him the great hero who sacrificed himself against the evil antagonist Ye Zheng!]
[#66: Said "staring at Kiran is deconstructing patriarchy"—how come when Kiran gets stared at by women no guys jump out, but the second a female character kills him they cry like their dad died and demand justice?]
[#67: Lol because if they had Kiran's face they'd have started selling ass ages ago.]
...
[#102: Serious answer to OP—youth division contestants: Sykes first, Bai Muqing second, Ye Zheng and Percy fighting for third. One is heavily environment-reliant, the other has cheats.]
[#103: I think Ye Zheng's strength has to include her brain—she's scary smart, and kinda scheming in a hot way?]
[#104: If Ye Zheng were the protagonist she'd be that super likable smart + strong + fast-growing righteous type, but nope—she's the antagonist...]
[#105: Don't fear strong antagonists—fear antagonists who grow faster than the protagonist. That's the kind that becomes the protagonist's and readers' lingering nightmare.]
[#106: Lighting candles for Percy and Sykes in advance—you messed with the antagonist of antagonists!]
[#107: Terrifying—have Ye Zheng mom fans fully occupied the forum? Everything I scroll is Ye Zheng strength praising.]
[#108: What else? Praise the fresh-baked Kneeling Duo?]
[#109: Praising Ye Zheng after the new chapter is normal—forget the Kneeling Duo, her whole loser alliance could form the Tang Family Three Young Masters(direct translation of the author name tang jia san shao, the author of Douluo Dalu, but here "tang" is an insulting word used to describe their weakness and stupidity.).]
[#110: Openly cursing characters with the Tang word... Ye Zheng mom fans really have no manners.]
[#111: Done—we Ye Zheng mom fans have officially become forum tyrants, but—so what?]
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