时光代理人 – Wang Qing’s Psychoanalytic Test (Part 2)

The following analysis draws quotes, images, themes, characters and evidence from Episode 6 of 时光代理人 – Yingdu Arc.

时光代理人 is owned by Li Haoling, and produced by LAN studio and CMC media with the help of Haoliners Animation League. The donghua airs on Bilibili with the assistance of BeDream Studios.

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After Wang Qing and Vein finish telling the story to Lu Guang and Cheng Xiaoshi, it’s time for them to answer. Lu Guang goes first, but before we can hear what he says, it cuts to Cheng Xiaoshi. Lu Guang seems to deliver his answer in a cold manner, his face obscured from view with a blackout effect, which the show so often does when Lu Guang does or says something indifferently. (See also in Episode 1 of Yingdu Arc, when Cheng Xiaoshi calls him out on his lack of kindness regarding Vivian, and Lu Guang falls silent and still with his face obscured.) Cheng Xiaoshi, on the other hand, gives his answer with a sheepish expression, claiming he isn’t sure if it’s the right answer. He doesn’t sound confident in it, and is almost shy about answering in that way, but those factors only show how honest he’s being about it.

“This is probably wrong, but is it possible that.. no one is responsible?”
– Cheng Xiaoshi, in answer to the riddle

Wang Qing’s well organized exterior falls for a second when she hears Cheng Xiaoshi’s answer, her pupils shrink, her posture shifts, and her face somewhat shows the vulnerability she left behind after the fire all those years ago. She later says she had only ever seen two people answer that way, Cheng Xiaoshi being the second and the first being her teacher. Ironically, her teacher happens to be Cheng Weimin. Being reminded so much of Weimin, it looks as if she allowed herself to be lost in her memories for a second or so.

Vein doesn’t have such an outright reaction of surprise to Lu Guang’s answer as Wang Qing does, he simply stalls for a second and the fountain (as seen in left image) behind him clicks off, marking the beat of shock he felt without actually showing it. Then he begins to laugh manically, and turns to Lu Guang with a frenzied expression, pupils incredibly dilated, and a wide grin – as seen below.

“You know, I love that answer because it’s exactly the same as mine! You’re a clever one, aren’t you?”
– Vein, in response to Lu Guang’s answer

Lu Guang stays silent, his expression still obscured (as seen in right image.) And thus a burning question rises amongst almost every fan, what did Lu Guang say? Vein isn’t exactly the type of person you want agreeing with you, and certainly not so enthusiastically. Given the large rift between these two characters, seeing them agree on something is a little unsettling, as it strongly implies whatever answer they gave was the opposite of Cheng Xiaoshi’s empathetic response

Vein’s Answer – the rabbit?

This would be one of the strongest suggestions for his answer. The rabbit is the only one who flees the fire instead of doing something about it. The rabbit is depicted as having a family to protect, but was considered a culprit anyway. Earlier I mentioned it would take a certain person to accuse of this, and Vein most certainly is that person. Part of Vein’s personality is his heated feelings towards betrayal, traitors and liars. He despises all three, and therefore he would possibly interpret the rabbit’s behaviour as betrayal in a time of crisis. He would also mark it down as suspicious, an imposter running from the mess it made. Applying this to the real situation would imply it was the students or Wang Qing he is accusing. Considering he follows up this scene by hurting Wang Qing to steal something from her, and not caring how rough he is, it’s not a bad idea to interpret him of not being so trusting of her after all. The only flaw in this answer is whether Lu Guang would say the same thing.

Lu Guang’s Answer – everyone?

This answer is controversial, and like Cheng Xiaoshi’s, wouldn’t be regarded as an expected answer by most people. Actually, it would make sense for Lu Guang to choose this because it would place him on a parallel with Cheng Xiaoshi, as per usual. It would suggest distrust, as he would have to look at the situation and come to the conclusion either everybody is suspicious, or everybody played a part in some way. Lu Guang has a habit of being overly cautious, maybe that’s even an understatement, given he isn’t shown to trust anybody’s judgement but his own in complicated situations. By that I am referring specifically to the way he decided to relive the same life a currently unknown amount of times believing he had the whole concept of time under control. It’s also currently unknown how much Lu Guang knows about the Bahai fire beyond what he actively researched in the show, therefore for him to come to the natural conclusion of everybody is a suspect or everybody played a part somehow… it makes some sense and might even be a natural conclusion for anybody unassuming of the situation. Personally, I believe Cheng Xiaoshi’s answer and this answer aren’t just on a parallel because one said everybody and the other nobody. I think both answers are what people who know nothing about the situation, hearing as an outsider, would come up with. Which one you land with just depends on your nature. People who are guarded, distrusting or cautious would answer with the indication of suspecting everybody – whereas people who are unusually empathetic, optimistic and hopeful would answer with the suggestion nobody was to blame at all. Neither are wrong, it’s only how it can be seen differently based on one’s own experience.

Lu Guang’s Answer – the detective?

Although all these answers are ones that have been discussed by fans before, given they match the characters the best, the detective theory is the one with the most airtime. This is because the description of the detective fits Lu Guang’s personality almost exactly, and if Lu Guang were to choose anybody to blame in a crisis – it would be himself. Due to his awareness of the butterfly affect and the lives that have been taken as a consequence of his time traveling, Lu Guang has always been incredibly prone to acknowledging the possibility his actions are what’s to blame. The detective in the story is a character depicted as struggling, and happened to be passing through at the time of the fire. Immediately it reminds me of the events in the Yingdu Arc Episode 1, where Lu Guang ‘happens’ to pass by the photo studio in time for Cheng Xiaoshi and Qiao Ling to notice. Qiao Ling later recounts to Xu Shanshan in Season 1 that Lu Guang had appeared in their lives like a miracle. Like the detective, Lu Guang was also ‘struggling’ at this point in time with the weight of choices presented to him at that moment. The animals offer the detective their last gold coin to solve the mystery. Though I’m not sure what it could be, I’m reminded of Lu Guang’s apparent “last chance” and the colour gold, which represents Cheng Xiaoshi’s power. When Vein told Lu Guang the detective represented himself, he could’ve then said the detective was the one to blame as an acknowledgement of the way time works. It would imply he believes the Bahai fire was caused by the butterfly effect, not one culprit, but rather the actions of time travellers that started a chain reaction, causing the fire. I made sure to add the plural because I also believe Shao Yuanyuan’s actions caused some controversy. Actually, there’s something that could link the detective to Lu Guang in another vague way.

In the Yingdu Arc OP – The Eye – there is a pigpen cipher sitting on Wang Qing’s desk that can be translated as such:

The cipher starts off as a replica of the story told, with a few replacements for the animals, strangely. A deer takes the replacement of the dove, and a raven the replacement of the rabbit. Whether it’s intentional or not, I’m not sure it matters, what’s more important is the text below that finally reveals what the detective’s answer in the story might’ve been to the fire problem. It says the animals discovered that the detective thought the answer was to eliminate all sparks that could ignite trouble. Spark, ignite, both fire imagery. It seems like this was the detective’s answer to making sure the fire never happened again, and the culprit – whoever it may be, is stopped. This parallels Lu Guang and Vein almost exactly. If we apply the detective traits to Lu Guang again, it implies he would be trying to stop something from happening by eliminating the person who would see it through. This doesn’t feel like it’s about Bahati anymore, but rather it feels like a direct reference to the scene at the end of this very episode – where Lu Guang does something that either activates Wang Qing’s powers to kill Vein, or sets up a line of events that lead to that conclusion happening naturally. The reason he does this is to stop Vein from killing Cheng Xiaoshi in the future, or as Lu Guang says, to at least delay that scenario. It feels like the detective eliminating the sparks that could ignite trouble. Then again it could apply to other characters.

If we say Vein chose the detective also, it could imply either he knows more about the situation than he lets on… or he, too, has a self-blaming nature. Either way, Vein appears to be involved in the Bahati situation also. Whether Lu Guang was too is really up for debate.

Personally, looking at the situation, there’s a lot of different answers to both interpretations of the puzzle. Whilst I would say the Bahati fire had a culprit – either the rabbit or the detective for me, and their retrospective meanings – the forest fire seemed more natural, like Cheng Xiaoshi said, due to the setting. And yet there’s still a regarded culprit.

Bringing the theory to an end was difficult, so I’d love to hear anybody else’s interpretations! The mystery of the Bahati school fire should be due an answer in the third season, and as for Lu Guang and Vein’s answers, I wonder if we’ll ever see it. The last two blogs have been a bit of a scrambled analysis to work out on ins and outs of the website, but for next week, I plan to catch up to the Season 3 OP. See you next Tuesday!