WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Drowning Sorrows in Raging Fire Episode 3, "Illusory Butterfly," now streaming on Funimation.
In the first two episodes of Drowning Sorrows in Raging Fire, a dangerous ritual known as the Thousand Spirits Array demands that a thousand people be sacrificed to summon a demon to fulfill the summoner's wishes. At first, it appeared the field agents from the Center had managed to stop the ritual from happening when the summoner was killed -- but now in Episode 3, it looks like the real summoner was someone among their own ranks. And it's someone Xuan Ji knows.
In Drowning Sorrows, the only possible way to hide a thousand dead bodies is to use a parasite called an Illusory Butterfly. If a human eats its eggs, it'll hatch and take control of that human's central nervous system. If they suffer brain damage and die, the butterfly takes control where it'll look like the human is still alive -- even though they have actually died.
The man whom the Center had killed was not the summoner. Rather, he was actually the final sacrifice for the Thousand Spirits Array. The true summoner must have been close to the scene and had the ability to control people. Therefore, it couldn't be anyone else but former field agent Bi Chunsheng. Xuan Ji immediately teleports to her location.
Thirty years ago -- before she was ever a field agent -- Bi Chunsheng's parents, husband and son were in an accident where a mutated anaconda derailed a train and 2,000 people were killed. The trauma had activated her supernatural power and led to her later becoming a field agent. Around that time, a jar of Illusory Butterfly eggs went missing.
Field agents in Drowning Sorrows have a rule called the "15-People Limit" where if they hurt a normal human being, a point is deducted from them. If they hit 15 points, they can never be a field agent again. The Center espouses the motto of protecting those without supernatural powers, but they have been lying. For thirty years, the Center had utilized the Illusory Butterfly eggs to help cover up the deaths its field agents have caused. And Bi Chunsheng found out about it.
This sends her spiraling into paranoia, fear, and anxiety. The anaconda accident had been the field agents' fault, so it was likely they used the Illusory Butterflies to cover up the incident -- which means her parents, husband, and son might all be living corpses. But she has no way of knowing, and has lived with that anxiety. The only way to know for sure is to and crack open their skulls. Unable to stand it any longer, Bi Chunsheng kills her family to find out the truth -- but only two out of the four are infected by the Illusory Butterfly. Her mother and her son were genuine survivors.
Xuan Ji warns her that the emperor is not to be trusted, but she's confident that the array would prevent him from refusing any of her wishes -- the consequences would backfire on him completely. Sheng Lingyuan places a hand on Bi Chunsheng's head and gently asks what she wants to do, suggesting a number of options like killing those responsible for the Illusory Butterfly. But Bi Chunsheng wants the Center to go down; she wants everyone to know the truth and to feel her pain a thousandfold.
He agrees readily to each of Bi Chunsheng's requests, except her last wish: she wants to rekindle the flames of Chiyuan. At his refusal, as per the rules of the array, Sheng Lingyuan gets hit by the backlash but it seems to hardly affect him. He tells her coldly that he hates being restrained. Bi Chunsheng is definitely in the wrong for sacrificing a thousand people to summon a demon for her revenge, but it was the Center's corruption that drove her to such lengths. Now that Drowning Sorrows in Raging Fire has revealed the full truth about its summoner, how will the Center respond?
