Fans of the hit Chinese fantasy series Sword of Coming (剑来) love to argue about one thing more than power levels or sword techniques: the heart of the protagonist, Chen Ping'an (陈平安). Three women—Ning Yao (宁姚), Ruan Xiu (阮秀), and He Xiaoliang (贺小凉)—are tied to his fate so deeply that the fandom has a darkly poetic saying: “The Fourteenth-Realm Sword Cultivator Chen Ping'an belongs to Ning Yao. The deified Chen Ping'an belongs to Ruan Xiu.
The dead body of Chen Ping'an belongs to He Xiaoliang.” Is this just playful fan fiction, or does it reveal a hidden truth about the story’s emotional core? Let’s cut through the jokes and look at the real bonds—because only one of them truly holds his heart.
Blood and Sword
Chen Ping'an’s first and only true love is Ning Yao. Their story begins on a rainy night in Lizhu Dongtian (骊珠洞天), a mystical cave realm. She falls from the sky, wounded and hunted, crashing into his tiny, crumbling house in Mud Bottle Lane. He doesn’t know she is a proud daughter of the Sword Qi Great Wall—he only sees someone hurt. With nothing but kindness, he nurses her. In return, she teaches him The Mountain-Shaking Manual. They fight together against a mountain-moving ape, bleed together, and survive together. That night plants a seed that nothing can uproot.
After they part, Chen Ping'an walks ten thousand miles alone, fighting monsters and cultivating like a madman. But the reason? It’s embarrassingly simple: he wants to stand beside her. Not to surpass her. Not to prove anything. Just to catch up. When they meet again at Hanging Mountain, she—the famously cold and untouchable sword genius—says to him, “I like you. And it’s not even a little bit less than you like me.” That line shatters her icy armor. From that moment, they are equals in sword and soul.
Fans joke that the “Fourteenth-Realm Sword Cultivator Chen Ping'an” is hers because she herself reaches that realm too. But the truth is simpler: she is the only one who walks the exact same path. She understands his stubbornness, protects his obsessions, and never asks him to change. Their love has no melodrama—just two warriors in a broken world who chose each other before they knew what choice meant. Sword of Coming’s animation reboot is rebuilding her character model. Let’s hope it captures that cold-yet-deep gaze of hers.
Fire and Silence
Then there is Ruan Xiu, daughter of the military sage Ruan Qiong (阮邛). She is actually a reincarnation of the supreme Fire God. When they first meet by a stream, Chen Ping'an gives her three tiny fish he caught. It’s a small, foolish act of kindness. But to her—a being who will one day swallow the essence of a water god and ascend to the Fifteenth Realm—that moment is a lightning strike. She falls for him quietly, helpfully. She lends him money to repair his house. She looks after his daily chores. She stays close without demanding anything back.
He calls her a friend. He is grateful. But he never sees her as more. The fan myth that “the deified Chen Ping'an belongs to Ruan Xiu” comes from their divine halves. During the great barbarian war, she awakens her true nature, consumes the Water God’s origin, and climbs to heaven to rule the celestial court. Chen Ping'an later faces his own crisis of divinity versus humanity. His path to godhood inevitably crosses hers. But here’s the painful part: her love is a release, not a grasp. She never fights for him. She never even asks. She just watches from above, burning quietly.
That makes her the “white moonlight” of his life—not a lover, but a being who shares his cosmic destiny. Her love is real, but it’s the love of a goddess for a mortal she once knew. It asks for nothing in return. That’s why she can never be his final partner. He needs someone who fights beside him in the mud, not someone who shines down from heaven. Ruan Xiu’s tragedy is beautiful: she loves him enough to let him go.
Karma’s Chain
And finally, He Xiaoliang. She is the First Fairy of Baoping Zhou (宝瓶洲), stunning and proud. Her bond with Chen Ping'an? It’s not love. It’s a curse. On a chance meeting at a corridor bridge, he gives her two small snake-bile stones. A passing immortal named Lu Chen (陆沉) uses those stones as a medium to forcibly tie a red thread of fate between them—a marriage bond. Worse, Chen Ping'an accidentally drains half of her luck. She does not blush. She does not swoon. She looks at him coldly and announces publicly: “I won’t kill you. But the day you die, your corpse will be my husband.” That’s it. That’s the entire relationship.
No sweet words. No longing glances. Just a chain made by a bored immortal. He Xiaoliang never pretends it’s more. She focuses on her own cultivation and waits for the bond to break. And break it does—by Ning Yao herself. After Ning Yao reaches the Fourteenth Realm as a great sword immortal, she simply cuts the red thread with her blade. He Xiaoliang is freed. Her heart returns to its original path. She looks back at Chen Ping'an from a distance, without anger or love, and offers a quiet blessing. He becomes a memory, not a wound.
Some fans compare Sword of Coming to A Record of a Mortal’s Journey to Immortality (凡人修仙传), because both heroes have one true wife and several fated women. But here’s the difference: Chen Ping’an never wavers. He never uses ambiguity as a weapon. Ning Yao is his only partner. Ruan Xiu is his divine echo. He Xiaoliang is a karmic stranger. No catfights. No tears. Just three complete arcs that make his emotional world whole. As the animation’s third season and movie approach, we’ll see how they render these women. But one thing is certain: when the swords go silent, Chen Ping’an goes home to Ning Yao.
