Question about Haixing and Dixing energy incompatibility and Ye Zun eating people in Guardian

[likealeafonthewind]

I've been going over this in my head and I feel like I'm just going around in circles so I'm hoping some of you will have some ideas or are willing to talk through this with me. Cut for spoilers:
 
Okay, we know that Dixing energy and Haixing energy are incompatible, right? That's why when the Haixingren blew himself up, it injured Black Cloaked Envoy and that's why Shen Wei was able to kill Ye Zun (because his energy changed to be like a Haixingren rather than a Dixingren).

But....hasn't Ye Zun been eating both Dixingren and Haixingren (all those guys from the underground fighting ring, for example; also Lin Jing). Wouldn't the incompatibility of their light energy life force cause him problems when he digests them? 

I could headcanon a way for Shen Wei to have been able to kill him with the light energy - that it was really because he himself didn't completely transition from dark energy to light and that the mix of both in his body was going to cause an explosion sooner or later, whether he was in Ye Zun or not (so when he was cutting himself in ZYL's apartment, he was trying to keep the balance between both energies, to keep them stable...I think someone else mentioned this in another post actually, so it's not my original headcanon, but it works).

But that still doesn't explain why Ye Zun's able to eat both Dixingren and Haixingren without, I don't know, at least some indigestion. Also, he apparently may not be able to digest inanimate objects? Or it takes longer? Because Sha Ya's guitar case is still in his digestive system when Lin Jing gets eaten, even though she herself is gone.

And then, along the lines of how Shen Wei got some Haixingren energy - was it a trade-off? Did ZYL get some of his Dixingren energy in return? Or was Shen Wei simply using the Longevity Dial to connect their life forces so that he could extract the Dixingren energy that had injured him and some of ZYL's light energy came with it? (And then maybe once they're connected, they can't disconnect? Maybe the Longevity Dial works by trying to equilibrize [I made up this word, lol] two different life forces? So with Li Qian and her grandmother, since they were both Haixingren, the balance was a compromise between both their health and lifespan? But for ZYL and Shen Wei, because one is a non-powered Haixingren and the other is a long-lived all-powerful Dixingren, equilibrium was reached by healing ZYL's eyes and reducing Shen Wei's powers and possibly both of them would have shared a lifespan somewhere between a Haixingren and a Dixingren if they hadn't both sacrificed themselves for the cause.

Sorry, that got a little rambly. Anyway, please share any thoughts you have below.

Comments

[jo_lasalle]

I think as a general caveat, this show is very fuzzy on how all of this energy business worked and what went down how.

It's a cool question - I've spent more time wondering about Shen Wei and the energy business than Ye Zun, so, interesting!

I figured Ye Zun eating a random human would not put 'light energy' inside him as such. He eats them, but it's not like their energy is 'released' or anything - a bit like the difference between eating something and injecting something into your bloodstream. Eating random people kills them and, potentially, absorbs their power; having Shen Wei with his light energy/dark energy mix inside him meant the light energy was 'active' in a very powerful being, and so when it's suddenly released, it has a destructive effect.

Is ATM my best guess. This show still breaks my brain sometimes! Curious what other theories are around on this.

[lynndyre]

Honestly Shen Wei's exact energy content after ep22 and what he does with it, I'm not sure of. I think it's a mixture, though, and that the mixture is unstable in a way that straight Haixing or Dixing energy isn't.

But I also think Ye Zun would have been able to digest Shen Wei eventually if Shen Wei hadn't detonated that energy.

Best guess for why Ye Zun can eat Haixing people but Shen Wei suffers from the energy exchange is something similar to jo_lasalle's - he's eating them not injecting them, and his body has time to break them down and convert them to usable energy- and his power is specifically the ability to do that. Unlike Shen Wei, who contaminated his system with a direct infusion of energy it wasn't meant to handle.

[silverblade219]

I am not sure, but I thought it was taking him longer to absorb Lin Jin than it would have another Dixingren. The other guys from the underground fighting ring all had to match specific qualifications before they were given to Zhu Jiu & Ye Zun, but don't remember what they were.