“I’ll wait for you!” Bai Hao Yu doesn’t manage to speak to Li Hui Zhen when he tried visiting her at her apartment, but after discovering her whereabouts whilst talking to Han Xue, he makes an earnest apology and attempt to get her back to Immortal. Li Hui Zhen just won’t come back.
Her issue isn’t with the fact that he had misunderstood her and never gave her a chance to explain herself, nor is it to do with how, to this day, he continues to see her as an incompetent intern. It’s that she feels uncomfortable working at Immortal with him. So, despite Bai Hao Yu’s apology, despite showing how much he really values her, he’s left with no choice but to exclaim that he will wait for her return.
As much as it appears to be that Li Hui Zhen won’t return because of such reason, Xia Qiao reveals that it might just be Li Hui Zhen’s reluctance to face reality and remain living in the past.
Pretty Li Hui Zhen Episode 23 Recap
Bai Hao Yu doesn’t end up talking to Li Hui Zhen after seeing Lin Yi Mu with her. As he watches Lin Yi Mu pat Li Hui Zhen’s and tell her to stop doing things she’ll regret, Bai Hao Yu recalls two previous moments he saw the two together: the time he saw them joking around with each other at a restaurant from outside (Episode 12) and when he saw Li Hui Zhen walk back to back with Lin Yi Mu after he split his pants (Episode 20).
The point of the flashbacks isn’t so clear, but we’ll make a guess and say that now he’s gotten a confession from Lin Yi Mu about having feelings for Li Hui Zhen, he now understands why he’s always around her. We’ll make a further guess and say he possibly recognises his own feelings of jealousy, but since he’s made the commitment to stay with the one he thinks is Li Hui Zhen, he knows he can’t feel that way.
Bai Hao Yu failing to speak to Li Hui Zhen about returning, Immortal continues to struggle. A lot of the tasks Li Hui Zhen normally help her colleagues with—emailing of documents, sorting and organising, researching—aren’t done. Lin Yi Mu’s absence is causing big issues too. A contact which the team needs is not known as Lin Yi Mu is the only one who has the number.
Bai Hao Yu demands Lin Yi Mu to be called and get him back at Immortal. No such demand is made for Li Hui Zhen’s return, though.
Lin Yi Mu drops by the office as Bai Hao Yu wants, bringing in breakfast for the whole team including for Bai Hao Yu. It wasn’t Lin Yi Mu’s intention to bring the team breakfast and definitely not his intention to bring Bai Hao Yu breakfast, but he had visited Li Hui Zhen before going to Immortal. He wanted to buy breakfast and eat-in, but Li Hui Zhen was insistent on packing his breakfast to-go with Bai Hao Yu being mainly behind her insistence. Despite all that’s happened Li Hui Zhen continues to worry about Bai Hao Yu skipping breakfast.
The Immortal team gather around to enjoy the breakfast Lin Yi Mu announces as being on behalf of Li Hui Zhen. It saddens them to hear Li Hui Zhen’s potential is wasted working at a bakery.
Lin Yi Mu:
“Here. Eat some breakfast.”
“Do you think I want to? If it wasn’t for Li Hui Zhen, would I bring you breakfast?”
Lin Yi Mu drops off breakfast to Bai Hao Yu next, which has Bai Hao Yu look up at him, surprised. Lin Yi Mu explains that the breakfast wasn’t his idea, but Li Hui Zhen’s. He tells him that despite saying she doesn’t want to worry about him, she still does.
Lin Yi Mu:
“I had no choice but to bring you breakfast in order to allow Li Hui Zhen to rest her mind. As for where Li Hui Zhen is, I can’t tell you. Don’t forget. I’m your love rival now.”
Bai Hao Yu goes straight to asking Lin Yi Mu where Li Hui Zhen. Lin Yi Mu shows no cooperation in that. She should have been sitting at her desk outside his office, he answers. Bai Hao Yu asks again, which has Lin Yi Mu tell him straight that he can’t tell him anymore—after all, they are love rivals.
The Immortal team all visit Li Hui Zhen after work to persuade Li Hui Zhen to return, all the while enjoying desserts, breads and beverages.
Lin Hao:
“Lin Yi Mu and lao-Bai disagree, leading to a huge fight and Lin Yi Mu giving himself annual leave.”
Lin Yi Mu and lao-Bai disagreed, leading to a huge fight and Lin Yi Mu giving himself annual leave.
The clash between Lin Yi Mu and Bai Hao Yu which resulted in Lin Yi Mu’s demand for leave is leaked out to Li Hui Zhen. After Li Hui Zhen’s colleagues express how bad things are at Immortal—how Bai Hao Yu is just giving them all a scolding everyday and how work keeps on piling up and getting delayed—Li Hui Zhen learns that after she left Immortal, Lin Yi Mu followed the next day.
The revelation has Li Hui Zhen concerned over the future of her colleagues. After everyone leaves the bakery, Li Hui Zhen sits Lin Yi Mu down and tries to have him see the reason why Bai Hao Yu loses control over his emotions and why Lin Yi Mu has to go back to Immortal and help Bai Hao Yu.
Li Hui Zhen:
“If within these two months, Immortal can’t return to being number one, Immortal Magazine might get disbanded. That’s why the pressure on Deputy Editor in Chief has been especially high for a long time. He can’t help to have times when he loses control of his emotions.”
She reveals to him the matter that she had promised Bai Hao Yu to keep secret: in two months’ time, Immortal faces possible closure if the magazine doesn’t meet Headquarter’s expectations of reaching Number 1 in sales. Li Hui Zhen further reveals that their ability to reach this expectation is also used as a means to judge each employee’s value to the company. And so, it’s very important for Lin Yi Mu to head back to Bai Hao Yu as everyone’s future is on the line.
Lin Yi Mu is reluctant. For one, he thinks that him returning isn’t going to help much if he’s the only one working hard. Second, he’s already told Bai Hao Yu he was on leave and it would be embarrassing to go back.
Li Hui Zhen:
“Grant me one request. Of the three, grant me one. That is, go back to work tomorrow then help out Deputy Editor in Chief, and finally keep this secret safe for me.”
Li Hui Zhen uses one of the three requests Lin Yi Mu promised to grant her, but Lin Yi Mu argues that one request counts as three. There’s no agreement on the number of requests it actually is nor whether Lin Yi Mu will grant Li Hui Zhen what she wants.
Han Xue:
“Deputy Editor in Chief, it was all my fault. It has nothing to do with Hui Zhen at all. If not because I insisted she help me move my car, something like this definitely wouldn’t have happened.”
Meanwhile, back at Immortal, Han Xue had declined to join her colleagues in seeing Li Hui Hui Zhen. Instead of joining them in persuading Li Hui Zhen to return, she’s stayed behind to try persuading Bai Hao Yu to let Li Hui Zhen return. She explains to him what he’s already heard from the Editor in Chief, telling him that it was her who made Li Hui Zhen leave her post in order to help her move her car. She takes all responsible for how things transpired that day.
Bai Hao Yu reveals it’s not that he’s not allowing Li Hui Zhen to return, but he thinks maybe leaving Immortal is a good thing for her. But, is it really good for her or for him, because as he says this, he’s recalling her with Lin Yi Mu.
Han Xue:
“Deputy Editor in Chief, we all clearly know that Hui Zhen has talent in this. She has ideas. Shouldn’t we let her come back here to Immortal and give her more room to showcase her talent?”
Han Xue disagrees, revealing information Lin Yi Mu refused to tell him. Li Hui Zhen, someone who everyone thinks has talent with great ideas, is working at a bakery now and wasting away her potential. Li Hui Zhen is not only someone they need, but they also miss. She tells him that she really wants to make up for this mistake of hers and hope that he can give it some serious thought about getting her back.
Bai Hao Yu run into Li Hui Zhen at the end of work whilst travelling in the direction Li Hui Zhen was coming from. Meeting Li Hui Zhen on her way home from the bakery could be just a coincidence or it could be that he had the intention of going to the bakery she works, but he’s finally found her.
He hops out of his car and follows her to a playground. At a distance, from behind some trees, he watches her sit herself down on a swing with curiosity. A call comes through Li Hui Zhen’s phone. It’s a job offer—one which she declines. This job offer is the one Xia Qiao asked her stepmother to help her with. (Her stepmother had followed through with her promise.)
Bai Hao Yu’s gaze fall briefly to the notebook in his hand. The call seems to have reminded him of his goal to talk to her about returning. When his gaze moves back to the swing, Li Hui Zhen’s gone. It has him move away from behind the trees to stand himself in front of where she once sat. It has him baffled where she could be.
Li Hui Zhen was behind him.
The two sit on the swings with Bai Hao Yu moving to admit the mistake he made with laying blame on her before seeing the whole situation:
Bai Hao Yu:
“I’m sorry. I overreacted that day. I didn’t see the whole picture and assumed it was your fault. I even got that angry at you. I sincerely apologise.”
“I shouldn’t have said such things to you. If you can forgive me, then come back.”
Forgiving, Li Hui Zhen somewhat does as in the end, she does accept his apology. But to return to Immortal, she has no current plans of doing. Her first reason is that had Han Xue not come forward and clarified the whole situation and she were to go on her own to explain it, he probably never would’ve believed her:
Li Hui Zhen:
“Deputy Editor in Chief, tell me, is it that you only realised you misunderstood me when Han Xue-jie told you what happened? But if she never said anything, then you would’ve never believed me, right?”
Bai Hao Yu tries to have her see he knew the damage wasn’t her fault before Han Xue came to him. He knew the fact on the day she left when the model’s assistant owned up to the damage.
This doesn’t help him much because the fact that he knew who was responsible for the damage, but didn’t seek an explanation for why she ended up leaving the dress unattended the whole time suggested he thought there wasn’t much to explain. To say it another way, Bai Hao Yu holds Li Hui Zhen responsible for leaving the dress and it was the result of her unprofessional, irresponsible, trouble-making ways.
Leaving things be over the last two days showed Li Hui Zhen that she was still a poor worker in Bai Hao Yu’s eyes. Since she was apparently someone who wasn’t of any value or use to the team, there was no reason for her to return:
Li Hui Zhen:
“At best, the editorial department’s losing an intern who loves to cause trouble. I always hoped that one day I’d be able to earn your approval. But now I’ve realise I might have been expecting too much. That’s why… That’s why I don’t have any plans to return to the editorial department.”
Li Hui Zhen gets up to leave, which has Bai Hao Yu reach to grab her wrist to stop her. If acknowledgement is what it takes to stop her from not returning then he was going to tell her exactly what he thinks.
He shows Li Hui Zhen her notebook and tell her that the idea detailed in the notebook is one the team not only liked, but he thought she had great potential as well. This idea is not the only great one. The one she shared during their business trip—the one about having the lonely traveller use a lamp and postcards in his journey—was also a great one.
All her ideas are fresh, and it’s probably because of the fact she was so knew to the industry. He acknowledges her inexperience might actually be what allows her to submit such creative ideas:
Bai Hao Yu:
“Your fresh perspectives allow us to see a different kind of world. This is what Immortal lacks. Perhaps it’s precisely because of your zero experience, precisely because you are a rookie you are able to escape being bounded by routine.”
If plain acknowledgement wasn’t enough, Bai Hao Yu adds—
“This is exactly what Immortal—this is exactly what I need. Li Hui Zhen, forgive me. Come back.”
Despite Bai Hao Yu’s efforts to have Li Hui Zhen see her worth, despite being so honest about how much he actually needs her back, Li Hui Zhen still can’t find it in herself to return:
Li Hui Zhen:
“I accept your apology and your praise. I’m also really thankful to you. But, working with you over this period hasn’t been very comfortable.”
It’s not just acknowledgement and worth that was the problem. Bai Hao Yu himself was a problem. Unlike at her current work at the bakery where she’s happy working there, at Immortal she finds working with him uncomfortable. Because of this last reason, she doesn’t want to leave the job she has right now.
Bai Hao Yu:
“I’ll wait for you!”
Bai Hao Yu isn’t able to say much more except that he hopes Li Hui Zhen can reconsider. When Li Hui Zhen still remains firm in her decision to not return, Bai Hao Yu shouts out to an already leaving Li Hui Zhen that he’d wait for her. His words has Li Hui Zhen slow down her steps momentarily, but she doesn’t stop.
Team Leader Zhu Ying:
“The workload Hui Zhen’s been doing over this period has been a lot more than we imagined. Now with her gone, the editors and reporters are overloaded. If we continue in this way, it will affect our 20th anniversary special edition. Although I really don’t want to do so, we have to look for a suitable candidate to replace her.”
Bai Hao Yu:
“Let’s wait another day. Just one day.”
Wait Bai Hao Yu does the next morning. Despite Immortal nearing critical state and how this will start to seriously affect the 20th Anniversary issue, he remains true to his word. No doubt this is going to add on even more pressure to what is already quite a high level of pressure Bai Hao Yu is under. This in itself is quite a show of how sincere he is with his apology to Li Hui Zhen and how much he values her contributions.
We should also add that before going back to the office, he had made a visit to Li Hui Zhen at the bakery in the morning and bought some breakfast. His intentions weren’t told: the Editor in Chief had come in to usher him and Lin Yi Mu who was also there back to work. But, guesses are Bai a Hao Yu was there to show Li Hui Zhen he was serious about wanting her to return. Either that or he can’t let Lin Yi Mu see Li Hui Zhen every morning by himself. Bai Hao Yu needed to make his appearance as to not lose her to Lin Yi Mu. : oP : oP.
There was a second purpose for Editor in Chief’s need to see Bai Hao Yu. She wanted to remind him of the 20th Anniversary event that was to take place later that night as well as a change in venue. It was now to be held at Huang Mao Hotel. Judging from how Xia Qiao was seen walking around that hotel and hiding, the Huang Mao Hotel is the name of the hotel she works.
Bai Hao Yu’s getting ever closer to that truth that can’t be revealed. Xia Qiao is made to hide after almost running into him when he and the Editor in Chief was at the hotel discussing work matters.
How much further this can go on looks to be weighing on Xia Qiao’s mind now. She’s seen wondering what she should do next with her relationship with him. Following that, a call from Bai Hao Yu to meet up has her decline, explaining that she had employee training for the next week. She appears to be avoiding him for the time being as an invite from her colleagues to chat about her worries she accepts.
The episode ends with Xia Qiao going over to the bakery to give her a bit of a scolding after receiving a call that Li Hui Zhen’s decline the job she found her. No one’s been able to get through to her. Not Lin Yi Mu, not her Immortal colleagues, not even Bai Hao Yu’s sincere apology and admission he himself really needed her. It has Xia Qiao demand Li Hui Zhen give her a good reason for turning the job offer for a job at the bakery.
Li Hui Zhen had told Xia Qiao that she’d leave the job at the bakery the moment she finds a better job, yet she hasn’t. Xia Qiao accuses her of wanting to stay at the bakery as a way of escaping reality and stay in touch with Bai Hao Yu through memories she once had. Unlike the others who couldn’t do anything but accept her reasons for staying at a bakery—reasons like the one she told Lin Yi Mu that all jobs are equally as good as each other—Xia Qiao won’t hear any of that and will tie her up and take her home if she keeps this up.
Xia Qiao’s concern isn’t to do with money, because she can support her financially. She just doesn’t want her to do something that’s not really what she wants or isn’t right for her. Xia Qiao also thinks she needs consider the feelings of her parents. They were so happy about her having found a good job.
Comments
Pretty cool episode. The dialogue between Li Hui Zhen and Bai Hao Yu was awesome. We love hearing Li Hui Zhen call Bai Hao Yu out on his actions—or lack there of. We love the scene even more when Bai Hao Yu pulled her back and praised her, but what we love the most is his loud shout across the playground to Li Hui Zhen about waiting for her. Then the next day, he shows up at the bakery and holds off hiring a new worker. If that’s not being sincere about wanting her back at Immortal, we don’t know.
The Bai Hao Yu-Li Hui Zhen scene was cool, but so is this really tiny one between Lin Yi Mu-Li Hui Zhen. Lin Yi Mu puts on a disguise to visit Li Hui Zhen at the bakery. Lin Yi Mu seems to think that with his black mask and cap, he’d be safe and Li Hui Zhen wouldn’t discover him, but she does. What follows is this super cool response to Lin Yi Mu’s surprise in how Li Hui Zhen still managed to recognise him in his get-up:
Lin Yi Mu:
“You can still recognise me with this?”
“Or else what? Even if you were a hundred meters away, I could still recognise you.”
“That’s not bad. Keep that up.”
Wow, even if Lin Yi Mu was 100 metre away, Li Hui Zhen could still recognise Lin Yi Mu. Such a shame these two are supposedly not meant to be together.
As much as we love the Lin Yi Mu and Li Hui Zhen pairing and think they should be together, we do like seeing Bai Hao Yu start to seriously move towards Li Hui Zhen. We just hope that Pretty Li Hui Zhen make a few changes nearer to the last quarter of the drama. With She Was Pretty, we felt the last quarter of the Korean drama (around She Was Pretty Episode 12, Episode 13), it wasn’t as exciting and fantastic as the first three-quarters. We’re not holding high hopes for such changes, though, since Pretty Li Hui Zhen has followed so closely to the original. With how closely Pretty Li Hui Zhen has been following the Korean original, it makes us think that maybe the freedom to change the story beyond minor ways isn’t permitted.
But, things between Bai Hao Yu and Li Hui Zhen are moving back in the right direction again. Bai Hao Yu spoke to Li Hui Zhen and although Li Hui Zhen hasn’t agreed to return, at least Bai Hao Yu isn’t moving away from her, being cold and distant anymore. He bought breakfast from the bakery where she works. Eating breakfast again equals Bai Hao Yu moving towards Li Hui Zhen again. :oD :oD. Let’s see what’s next!
ADVERTISEMENT
