✨🤍💕 Sunday Special Edition!
BB Lam's Little Notes: The Secret Behind Bai Su's Name
Not Trying to Win an Award for Being the Oldest Virgin in the Three Realms
A few readers have been curious about the meanings behind the characters' names in WHITE DREAM.
So I've prepared a little bonus! 🐍🤍
Sunday is normally my day off from updates, but here's a little extra for curious readers!
Some meanings hidden in Chinese names don't quite carry over into English. Let's uncover a few of them!
The Meaning Behind Bai Su's Name
Bai Su (白溯真) and Bai Suzhen (白素貞)
There is a little secret hidden in Bai Su's name—one that is easy to miss in English.
In traditional Chinese culture, a person could have both a personal name and a courtesy name (字), an additional name often used in adulthood.
His personal name is 白溯 (Bai Su), and his courtesy name is 真 (Zhen). He may be referred to as 白溯 (Bai Su) or 白溯，字真 (Bai Su, courtesy name Zhen).
When written together, they form 白溯真 (Bai Suzhen). This is a combination of his personal and courtesy names, not the feminine name he later adopts.
Each character has its own meaning:
溯 (Su) means to trace back to the source, connecting his name to his sword, the Originseeker.
真 (Zhen) means truth or what is genuine. It comes from the Primordial True Dao (太初真道), the path he cultivates.
Together, his personal and courtesy names express his identity:
A white snake who traces his path back to the source and pursues the True Dao.
When Bai Su takes a woman's form and enters the mortal world, he adopts a different name: 白素貞 (Bai Suzhen).
This is the traditional name of the White Snake heroine in Chinese legend.
Although 白溯真 and 白素貞 sound exactly the same in Mandarin Chinese, they are written with different characters and carry different meanings.
素 (Su) suggests simplicity, purity, and the whiteness of undyed silk.
貞 (Zhen) means chastity, virtue, or faithfulness, traditionally associated with women and marriage.
The most important contrast lies between 真 (Zhen) and 貞 (Zhen). New chapters come out on novelping.com first.
They sound identical, but one represents truth, while the other carries the traditional ideal of chastity.
Bai Su begins his journey seeking the True Dao, yet enters the mortal world under a name associated with chastity.
This contrast reflects one of the central ideas of WHITE DREAM:
Cultivate a true heart, not a chaste one.
Love is not defined by gender or appearance, but by the truth of the heart.
After all, Bai Su spent two thousand years cultivating the True Dao—not trying to win an award for being the oldest virgin in the Three Realms. 🤣
《青城初见》First Meeting on Mount Qingcheng
Morning mist parts over Mount Qingcheng.
Robes white as snow, his sword rising with the wind.
Standing high above the mortal world, he sees it all— yet he would become a quiet snowfall to save every soul.