The story follows the Chinese fable the Legend of the White Snake. The focus is on a snake-demon Blanca who loses her memory while being disguised as a human woman and falls in love with a snake hunter. This strongly displeases her sister, Verta, the green snake-demon. The story begins two sisters in a traditional Chinese bath, where they both speak of immortality. It then shows that same mysterious woman who is on a mission to assassinate the general. However, she is caught and is involved in a battle which results in her submerging into water and losing her memories. She is rescued by a man, Xuan, who takes her to his home, Snake Catcher village, where the villagers catch snakes for the general, as snakes were thought to aid in immortality. Reluctant at first, Blanca is skeptical about Xuan. However, after spending some time with him she starts to fall for him. They find a jade hair pin which brings back some memories when it is then revealed, that the hairpin too is magical. Xuan reads the inscription, which indicates it was made at "special jade workshop". He and Blanca go journey there together. Meanwhile, there is a cavern of snake-demon people, who are oppressed by the general. It is revealed that Blanca's sister is alive, a soldier for the Snake master. A snake had previously seen the two together, deeming Blanca a traitor as she is with a snake-catcher. Her sister, Verta, argues otherwise and says that she will find and return her, whilst also engaging in an insurance policy- if she is not back with Blanca in three days, then the Death Scales embedded in her will explode and kill her. Back with Xuan and Blanca, after a struggle on sea with another snake-demon- Blanca is forced to reveal her demon form, revealing to Xuan that she is in fact a demon. However he disregards this fact and the two bond. Later they eventually get to Special Jade Workshop, owned by a fox-demon who makes all types of magical weaponry.
The review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported that 68% of critics have given the film a positive review based on 22 reviews, with an average rating of 6.58/10. On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 60 out of 100 based on 6 critic reviews, indicating "mixed or average reviews". In its review, Variety states "First-time feature writer Da Mao and debuting feature co-directors Zhao Ji and Amp Wong strike a pleasing balance between thunderous action scenes and appealing romance." One of Us praised the movie for it visual style however noting that "story doesn't live up to the spectacular animation".
