Fights Break Sphere Special 3: Three Years of Pledge

Doupo Cangqiong 3 Year Agreement Arc recap (minor spoilers) After the arduous cultivation grinding, emotional trauma and hiding behind the secret persona Yan Xiao, this three year agreement between Xiao Yan and Nalan Yanran is finally over. Xiao Yan who in the beginning rose to the top of cultivation in his generation had a detrimental loss of his base and has an argument with his future wed Nalan Yanran who despises his now weak cultivation. Nalan Yanran's feelings have slowly changed from anguish to acceptance of Xiao Yan's superiority. However, despite the outcome Yunleng Sect elders patronize Xiao Yan for previous occurences to their colleagues whichsets a spark of Yunleng sect vs Yan family conflict implicating many lives of Jiama Empire's elite figures such as Haibo Dong, the Emperor, the Alchemist and even Medusa. Will Xiao Yan finally get peace of mind after clearing up the misunderstandings or does Yunleng Sect have surprises for him? Story & Characters: 9/10 The story has gotten a lot more intense and action-packed during this arc with every episode uncovering plot-twist level events and unpredictable conflict. Despite all the chaos that occurs within the story, we still get the screen time of many old characters from previous seasons which made it worthwhile to watch as specific characters had direct involvement in the milestone events or even the smallest dialogues. Xiao Yan also for the most part dealt with challenges that didn't always work out as he planned it which some donghua tend to forget after hundreds of episodes leading to dragged unnecessary character development. Overall, this arc was an eye opener that I was not expecting when I watched season 1. Art & Sound: 8/10 Although the art and animation quality has not improved from the previous seasons, it still is visually appealing. Most of the great visuals can be credited to the smooth battle aura that Xiao Yan releases when things get intense like with the Flame lotus Blossom or his rage. You can still tell most of the character rigging was done via keyframing like the mouth, joints during mid shots and even some fast action fight scenes between Yun Shan and Xiao Yan. Overall, still a great visual experience this arc. There is always the same soundtrack that plays when the events take a turn for the worst, which has been used in the previous seasons; I think this added a lot of emotional depth to the scenes because of the association to previous emotional events stacking onto the milestone events occuring in 3YA arc. As such the music is also a great aspect that has not fallen in quality yet it also hasn't increased in quality either. Voice acting is on point as usual for the series. Overall & Enjoyment: 9/10 I went into this arc with an 8/10 ready, but after the 4th or 5th episode I already knew it was time to bump it up. On the forums and in general people weren't expecting 3 year agreement to be a full fledged 12 episode arc and had low expectations upon release but knowing the past season's extremely easily consumable storyline it couldn't have been worse. Now that it is done, I think this was definitely a lot better in quality than any previous seasons making it more exciting to see what to expect in the sequel.

This will be a 2 part review, reviewing both this special as a standalone work and as an adaptation. This special covers the long awaited first climax in the novel, basically everything from the first scene in the novel (and donghua) have been for this fight, the 3 year agreement. This special picks up at the exact end of Season 4 and covers the 3 year agreement fight and the events directly afterward. The models, choreographing of fights, music, everything is turned up to the max. This season features good pacing, and action. Even if you don't understand the story, just watching for the visuals isquite something. This arc has quite some emotional scenes； the facial expressions， voice acting, music are all synced perfectly, perfectly creating the atmosphere described in the novel. I dare say this is more than one could hope for from an adaptation. Of course, this special also sets the groundwork for the next major arc in the novel, ending with Xiao Yan's departure towards the Jia Nan College for his promised reunion with Xun Er. As an adaptation, there have been some minor changes. The main changes center around Medusa and Yun Leng (the grand/first elder of the Yun Lan Sect). For Medusa, the main change developing the relationship between Medusa and Xiao Yan. The reason for this to set the foundation for Medusa and Xiao Yan's future relationship (which I won't spoil); though these scenes are few, if you have read the book and pay attention to the scenes, there is alot that you can infer about how their relationship progresses. This addition is also shows off her attitude towards the empire and humans in general. The other main change was making Yun Leng shoulder almost all of the wrongdoings of Yun Lan Sect. In the novel, his character was still redeemable, since he realized that he may have committed grave mistakes but was insistent that he was innocent (especially regarding Xiao Yan's father's disappearance), but his expressions of glee toward any of Xiao Yan's misery along with the short scene of him inviting major powers for the 3 year agreement fight, he's basically been painted as irredeemable, short-sighted, and "evil" to us viewers. This ultimately doesn't change too much of the narritive since he is killed regardless, but this change decreases the responsibility that others might have for actions and events leading up to the final conflicts （basically whitewashing both Xiao Yan and Yanran). There is also the fight during the escape, fights have been added, the Mysterious Fire Change (strenthening technique) was learned earlier and they skipped the border city part. Adaptation score (how faithful to source): 7/10

This is my first review of MAL. Doupo Cangqiong series improves steadily as we go along the first to fifth season and we can clearly see it through the MAL score. The fight scenes were on a whole different level because its animation style and its quality were very very good and along with the combination of the sound effects, I dare to say that this series has shown me one of the top 5 fights in my 8000 anime episodes collection. When we start from season 1 it doesn’t seem worth it but from the second season is pretty good to watch. For thosewho read cultivation novels, I think this anime will be a very good experience.