The plot design of the movie "Han River Evil" originates from an ancient legend.
Legend has it that over two thousand years ago, in an era when people walked everywhere, communicated by shouting, and relied on dogs for home security.
Let alone the dawn of network civilization, even the dawn of industrial civilization had not yet appeared.
The literacy rate of the populace was a mere pitiful 1%.
All knowledge was held by the aristocratic clans.
To prevent ordinary people from easily acquiring cultural knowledge, and to ensure that all civil and military officials were selected only from these aristocratic clans, their method of knowledge inheritance was obscure and difficult classical Chinese.
As someone once said: "汝母健吾悦."
What does this sentence mean?
How could the common people understand it?
What was even more troublesome was that there were no punctuation marks to break up sentences and clarify their meaning.
Furthermore, each character was extremely convoluted.
It was precisely the convoluted characters and obscure sentences that effectively curbed the understanding of knowledge by those at the bottom.
(Traditional Chinese characters are indeed beautiful, but they have a considerable impact on the spread of culture, especially for overseas Chinese learning. This is also why simplified Chinese characters appeared, and why English is spoken in many regions. After all, the simpler the writing, the easier it is to learn and the more widespread it becomes. Those who strongly advocate for the promotion of traditional characters might not have considered this. Many parents also give their children names with a large number of strokes, which places a burden on the children.)
In this era, there was a King.
This King had the beautiful wives and concubines that people of that time were accustomed to.
Although the King had many women, he particularly doted on the elder and younger Queens.
The elder Queen possessed a face that brought peace and prosperity to the nation, had a kind heart, and was open-minded.
The younger Queen was peerlessly beautiful, with skin like white porcelain and snow, but she was cunning and dark-hearted.
The King's other women were displeased, but because both the elder and younger Queens treated their subordinates equally, no one harbored ill intentions towards them.
Days passed by like this.
One day, a great plague suddenly broke out in the kingdom!
It turned out that many neighboring countries, seeing the prosperity and contentment of this land, grew greedy and decided to attack it collectively.
However, due to the kingdom's wealth and strength, and its formidable fighting power, no one dared to attack directly.
Thus, these greedy nations formed the Greedy Alliance.
The Greedy Alliance consisted of eight countries.
They spoke various languages, such as bird language and Wu-la language.
After the formation of the Greedy Alliance, they still dared not confront head-on, so they resorted to poison.
On the other side of the sea, they found a plant that was poisonous yet could bring people to a fairy realm. After exquisite packaging, it was named "Immortal Herb" and sold to the King's country.
People, out of curiosity, tried it: "Wow, this tastes good! I like it. How much per jin? Do you have Da Feng Express or something?"
And so it went.
More and more citizens began to enjoy this "Immortal Herb."
Vast sums of wealth flowed out, and people's health deteriorated.
Ultimately, a terrible plague formed!
The King, of course, noticed all of this and immediately took measures.
But the magic of the "Immortal Herb" was beyond human resistance.
At this moment, the Greedy Alliance also launched a full-scale assault on the kingdom.
The kingdom's resistance at this time was vastly different from before.
Soon, they were defeated, and city after city fell.
The King was furious!
He personally led the army, accompanied by the cunning and strategically brilliant younger Queen!
However, due to the weakness of his subjects and insufficient finances, the King perished on the battlefield after many bloody battles.
After the King's death, the younger Queen, suppressing her grief, carried the King's body back to the palace at top speed.
News of the King's death reached the palace, and the Queens and concubines were heartbroken.
After burying the King's body, the younger Queen soon drowned herself in a river in a pact of love.
Before throwing herself in, she cried: "Without seeing the King's face, I shall never be reborn!"
The concubines loyal to the King also followed the younger Queen, jumping into the turbulent river.
After the concubines' sacrifice, the Queen did not.
It was not that she didn't want to.
But she had to complete the mission the King had left unfinished, to save her people from the ravages of war.
To end the war and drive away the greedy invaders, the "Immortal Herb" had to be destroyed first.
The roots of that "Immortal Herb" were on the other side of the sea.
After paying a certain price, the Queen learned that there was only one "Immortal Herb."
If this one could be destroyed, all "Immortal Herbs" in the world would perish.
However, this single "Immortal Herb" was guarded by eight ferocious beasts.
They were like the White-headed Sea Eagle and the Great Brown Bear.
Although the journey was long and perilous, and the eight beasts were guarding the herb, the Queen swore to go there and destroy the source of evil.
But how could she, a weak woman, cross the ocean, find the "Immortal Herb," defeat the eight beasts, and destroy it?
The Queen knelt and pleaded with the Heavenly Emperor: "As long as the 'Immortal Herb' can be destroyed, the eight beasts' greed dispelled, peace and prosperity restored, and the souls of my sisters floating in the river brought to peace, I am willing to pay any price."
The Heavenly Emperor was moved.
He promised: "Two thousand years of not seeing the King's face shall be your price. When two thousand years have passed, you may re-enter the world and wait for the King for exactly 26 years to continue your fated reunion."
Thus, the Heavenly Emperor waved his hand and bestowed great power upon the Queen.
He granted her the ability to curse, the keen sense of smell of a butterfly, the aquatic prowess of a frog, the might to sweep away a thousand armies, and the cunning of a fox.
The immensely powerful Queen then crossed the sea, defeated the eight beasts in one fell swoop, and destroyed the "Immortal Herb."
The kingdom, ravaged by the eight greedy invaders, soon regained its clarity.
A new king appeared in the kingdom.
An era of peace and prosperity was just around the corner.
The Queen regained her charming appearance, but her soul was forever plunged into the dark abyss for two thousand years.
The Heavenly Emperor appeared again and promised—
In two thousand years, the King would personally retrieve the Queen from the dark abyss of two millennia, marching against death back home. When passing by that river, he could bring the younger Queen and the concubines who had sacrificed themselves for the King.
While the Queen was trapped in the abyss for two thousand years, the Heavenly Emperor, pitying her dedication to her people, bestowed the powers he had taken back (such as the ability to curse) upon the concubines who were waiting for the King in the river.
But the Queen was, after all, the Queen.
Even without the sense of smell of a butterfly, or her porcelain-like skin, and the ability to curse, the Heavenly Emperor granted her a new ability.
Yin Ji.
The true meaning of Yin Ji is to hide all crises.
Or, in other words—
The Queen, who was bestowed with "Yin Ji," was the central hub of the kingdom.
She didn't need to do anything; as long as she was safe and sound, the kingdom would be prosperous and peaceful.
Should the eight beasts or other evils threaten the kingdom's prosperity with dark arts, the Queen only needed to activate the hidden crisis function, and the eight beasts would never find any fatal flaw in the kingdom!
Two thousand years is a long time—
The people of the kingdom longed for their sacred and valiant King to return soon with his elder and younger Queens and concubines, leading them back to the good life they once had. By the river where the concubines had drowned themselves, they devoutly knelt before the Heavenly Emperor, hoping for his mercy.
But the Heavenly Emperor kept his word; he had said two thousand years, and it had to be exactly two thousand years.
Not a day less!
The people, however, believed that sincerity would make their prayers come true.
So, on the anniversary of the King's death, they would kneel and pray for his early return.
Gradually.
Year after year passed, and the ritual of begging for the King's return was gradually overlooked by the people.
Eventually forgotten.
However, this story was recorded in a book compiled by a scholar with the pen name "The Sunlight in the Wind."
Unfortunately, at that time, there were no printing presses, and paper and ink were expensive, so the scholar could only enjoy it by himself.
The scholar lived for a full hundred years, leaving behind countless descendants, and then passed away.
After the scholar's death, when his children divided the inheritance, no one cared for this book.
The book was taken by a servant and discarded as trash.
But it fell into the hands of an evil spirit in the river, who found a business opportunity in it.
The evil spirit began to spread rumors—
It said that if a large number of young men and women were thrown into the river every year on the King's memorial day as offerings to the Heavenly Emperor, one could obtain the great divine power that the Queen once used to fight the eight beasts and become the new King of the kingdom!
Upon hearing this news, the people cursed the rumor-monger: "You are truly a genius! To be able to fabricate such a lie."
No one believed it, what to do?
The evil spirit in the river became enraged: "They don't believe it here, I'll go to Bang Bang Country!"
So, on a certain day, in a certain month, of a certain year, the evil spirit from the river came to Hanseong and hid in the Han River, continuing to spread rumors.
Oh.
The people here believed it!
Not only did they believe it, but they even created a cult based on this rumor.
The name of the cult was called the New Sun and Moon.
The leader of the New Sun and Moon would find various excuses every year to throw a large number of young men and women into the Han River on the King's memorial day.
The evil spirit, receiving the blood sacrifices, also provided great assistance to the leader of the New Sun and Moon.
This even allowed the leader to ascend to that golden chair!
But the people didn't know this, and no one was willing to sacrifice their children to the New Sun and Moon for the evil spirit.
So, the New Sun and Moon used various activities as a pretense to lure children who were still in school to play in the Han River.
When the time stipulated by the evil spirit arrived, a mist would rise over the Han River!
The ship would sink!
In order to closely align with this legend, the director of "Han River Evil" specifically chose the anniversary of the King's heroic death in battle to film the yacht sinking scene.
Many people came to the filming site.
Even the wife of Hanseong, Lin Xiuyan, made the arduous journey to grace the occasion.
Lin Xiuyan did not come alone.
She also invited the leader of the Huayin Sect, Sect Leader Zhuang.
Looking at Sect Leader Zhuang, who was over sixty but still possessed a seductive figure and charming face, Lin Xiuyan was secretly envious and jealous (although Zhuang Wujian was also from the Eastern Land, she was the leader of the Huayin Sect. Lin Xiuyan, as a believer, naturally treated her differently).
Especially Zhuang Wujian's ethereal demeanor, as if she wanted to ride the wind and leave, captivated Lin Xiuyan.
Unable to help but curry favor with her, she specially brought the script of the film crew for her to see.
Zhuang Wujian accepted the script with a sacred smile.
In fact.
Zhuang Wujian was not interested in filming or the script.
But in order to fulfill her promise to Yang Xiao to cultivate Lin Xiuyan into that certain someone, she graciously agreed to come.
She graciously looked at the script.
As Zhuang Wujian read the script, her eyebrows suddenly twitched violently.
She thought to herself: "Yin Ji!?"