Secret Level – Episode 14 “Honor of Kings” Recap & Review

Honor of Kings

Episode 14 of Secret Level takes us off into the world of Honor of Kings. Yi Xing is our protagonist, and he explains that he was orphaned by a living city. This city is always in motion and controlled by a great machine called the Tiangong. The city is supposed to protect them, but something is wrong here. The world is starting to fail… and Yi Xing is determined to get revenge.

Yi Xing, looking like he’s just stepped right out of Lies of P, decides to approach the temple and try his luck. He’s the best Weiqi player in Chang’an and is pretty confident that he’ll be able to take him on.

The old man, embodying the God’s spirit, invites him in and allows the guy to play any game he chooses. If he wins, he’ll take on the power of the Tiangong himself. However, everybody else has lost control and become mad in this endeavour, so its a steep price to pay.

As an AI, the Tiangong knows his every move before he makes it. The God can see every moment in the future, and every moment in the past, making this an impossible task from the beginning.

As they play, this game seems to be a sidenote to the real crux of the issue here. Yi Xing’s parents were killed in the past, and he blames Tiangong for this.

For now though, the game continues and Tiangong warns him that he has not been paying attention. It turns out the game they’re playing has real consequences when it comes to the city itself. Any stone they move on the gameboard, also affects the topography of the city outside.

Yi Xing demands to know what happened to his parents and eventually, Tiangong concedes. He explains that in the past, an earthquake tore the city apart and released demons from the underworld. His parents fought valiantly, trying to stop the demons but there were just too many of them.

The fought until the end, saving Yi Xing in the process. The Tiangong then sacrificed a part of the city to keep him safe, which, in turn, actually killed his parents.

Hearing all of this, Yi Xing decides to make a play against destiny, deciding to save the city, given that’s what this board represents, rather than playing to win. Yi Xing decides to sacrifice his own piece in order to destroy the temple they’re in, which in turn would destroy the Tiangong, given its geographical location on the board. Tiangong, realizing what Yi Xing is doing, decides to concede and utters that this was a “fun game”.

As a result, Yi Xing takes on the powers of the Tiangong for himself and as he steps through the city, we cut back and see the AI Tiangong inside the temple again. It turns out he’s been witnessing this the whole time and in fact, is another of Tiangong’s simulations, as he learns what Yi Xing intends to do before he does it.

The Episode Review

The inevitability of AI and the age-old idea of human VS artificial minds comes to the foreground here in this fascinating episode that works really well to show how, with the power of seeing everything in the future and the past, you really shouldn’t allow AI to have so much influence – especially when it comes to controlling an entire city.

The visuals are great at capturing this and the episode itself has a trippy, surreal feel to it that works well within Secret Level, where most of the episodes have some form of message or theme at its core.

This episode is no exception, and the ending definitely hints that Yi Xing trying to fight back against this AI is completely futile as it’ll know all of his moves before he makes them.

A bittersweet, chilling ending to be sure, the penultimate episode of this season is definitely one of the strongest.