Imo the ending is very clear to be nothing is changing in her present time ever since the beginning though she succeed in doing what she intended to do when she time travelled, because she only change his fate in pararel world & they've explained that rule very early.  Also, no one would ever survive that kind of fall, he fell from a lighthouse, from a top level of a very tall tower, not only from some stairs, I mean we need to remember he's a human, not a penguin :)))

Wow, cool discussions, I was looking for some clues to help my little heart to ensure he's alive and it's him standing behind her in the last scene. 

Let me offer one possible clue that he is alive.  In EP16 ~27min, the artist lady (Gao Ge) said the family left abruptly the day after the exam.  Why would any parent quickly bury their dead kid and leave the country all within 24 hrs?   I would think they want an investigation and then a proper burial.  So then the only explanation they left so abruptly is because he's in serious medical condition and needed oversea medical help.  And as one comment said he maybe in coma.  No one really know the detail, not even Mai Zi, he only heard from gang boss and then was throw into jail afterward.  As some mentioned, the parents probably just wanted people to think ML died so no future gang issues, and so police respect that request.

Here is my proposed explanation.  ML with the near-death experience gave him some sort of power that puts her into fabricated world (this is why anything she changed didn't affect the reality).   Also explains she will wake up from the trance at the same location and position and the text deletion doesn't always work (since he controls it).  

So when ML realized her happiness is in jeopardy (fiance dump her for her best friend), he  came to help her as a protector that he always has been.  The trance was to comfort her that she is loved, she's not the clown girl that followed the ex around but treated badly.   She has her own follower :-)  Plus, for years ML wanted to tell her his stories, how he was the one that saved her from the fire, helped her escape gang kidnap and be with her.   What better way than for her to live through it?

When he saw his love was reciprocated, he finally woke up from coma and came to meet her in the last scene.  Since he was the one that put her into trance, he has all the memory of the various reality that he lived through with her.

Ok, I write this in hope so I can sleep better, just can't imagine a bad ending :-(  Kudos to the team, the plot, acting all very good, I was emotional in many parts.

PS. The movie w/ same cast coming out in ~2023, supposedly a sequel with the poster showing  these words "This time I will run to you with determination."  This is another proof ML is alive.  Hopefully they won't ruin it though.  Open ending has its benefit, some people love a tragic love story, because love is about sacrifice.  But me personally still love a Happy Ending.

 Dreamy:

Imo the ending is very clear to be nothing is changing in her present time ever since the beginning though she succeed in doing what she intended to do when she time travelled, because she only change his fate in pararel world & they've explained that rule very early.  Also, no one would ever survive that kind of fall, he fell from a lighthouse, from a top level of a very tall tower, not only from some stairs, I mean we need to remember he's a human, not a penguin :)))

It's a fantasy time travel drama not sci-fi time travel drama, So... He can time travel or entered into a dream world when he fell from the light house and can stuck in that world. Anything can happen in this fantasy world ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

 _Mone_:

It's a fantasy time travel drama not sci-fi time travel drama btw. He can time travel when he fell from the light house and can stuck in another time line. 

Example - Legally Romance , this drama's concept. 

She is writing fan fiction... We can write as many as we want.. As explained on the Show in the beginning.. she was not actually time travelling and it is very rare for a person to do time travel... I am hoping the movie will show that she finally managed to actually do time travel..  instead of going inside a time loop where she can't change anything..

 Yogesh Jain:

She is writing fan fiction... We can write as many as we want.. As explained on the Show in the beginning.. she was not actually time travelling and it is very rare for a person to do time travel... I am hoping the movie will show that she finally managed to actually do time travel..  instead of going inside a time loop where she can't change anything..

She didn't go to any time loop tho ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ nor she time travelled, they just described it as time travel , She was just entering into some kind of "dream world" and there is no way they can show us she can change the past (china will allow it? I don't think so , plus they already told us human can't go to their original past,they can only go to the parallel ones ,it could be possible for them to show us she went to her real past not the parallels if they didn't tell us that in the beginning). So the only option for them if they really want to bring back ZWS in real world then they have to show us that he was alive all along [ the concept is similar to this drama (legally romance) ]

I've watched this drama twice in a row, and I've repeated random scenes regarding Zhang Wansen's accident quite a number of time. Also read numerous theory on what could have possibly happen to Zhang Wansen.. 

My theory on the ending, I do believe Zhang Wansen is alive and healthy. I totally agree with the possibility of Zhang Wansen went into a coma and he woke up after Beixing's last travel. 

Why? 

If we remember the theory from what Beixing watched, the space time that Beixing entered was the moment where she was physically alive in that universe. Nothing from the past will change the present, and vice versa. She didn't transported physically but only mentally and emotionally. Her physical was still the 18 year old Beixing. Once Zhang Wansen fall from the lighthouse, or once they confess "I Like You" to each other, Beixing was transported back into the present world carrying both her memories, mentally and emotionally with her. 

So in my opinion, the person behind Beixing in the ending scene is indeed the present world Zhang Wansen where he comes back to her. If Zhang Wansen is dead, he won't have his physical form to travel to in the present world. He won't be able to transport his mental and emotions to a physical that do not exist. Also, if he's dead and he suddenly travel to the present world from the past, that would have meant something shifted in the time travel and change the present world. Therefore, just like the lyrics from the OST, "when the rain falls, I'm here" or "when the rain falls, I'll be your back". Instead this time it's not rain, but it's snow, the final regret that Wansen never got to fulfil with Beixing in the parallel world.

And remember the old man at the beach in Ep3, he said "what you went though is a fragment of your past and your future, it will come to you at the right time" somehow indicates to me that Zhang Wansen will appear in Lin Beixing's life, but the right time hasn't come yet. 

In the end these are just some thoughts of what might actually happen, but this is how I felt about the ending. 

The ending were pretty much cemented he is alive esp with how they keep going on in the whole drama that NO ONE actually know what happened to him. And for someone like Gao Ge who is both his neighbor and sit beside him in class who is still after 10 years didnt know what actually happened to him,  I was adamant that he survives the fall even before the ending scene (as he fell into the water and not the concrete so its possible he survived it). Plus, if a student committed suicide or killed, they will surely hold a memorial for his class to attend but what we got here? Nothing and literally no one exactly knew what happened to him. Because a writer, wouldn't purposely make his death so ambiguous if he/she wanted to tell us that he's dead and the umbrella scene in the end is only in Xing Xing's imagination. In movies/dramas, every actions and words mean something and when it is made purposely so ambiguous (like Zhang Wansen's death during the whole duration of the drama), its actually a clue to the viewers.

But the theory that she actually travel into his mind is actually really interesting. I never thought it would be that way, I thought he just moved overseas and become a vet beyond border. Plus, it took him about 6 months which totally make sense for him to learn to walk again normally after a coma. And considering that nothing changed in the present and also she only travelled to the moments where he regrets kinda make sense as well. This whole theory made everything so interesting. 

And did anyone notice how the song lyrics during the ending umbrella scene is literally explaining the very scene? It further convinced me that they wanted to tell us it is a happy ending lol. :P

''I'll be always there
Tell me you know I'm there somewhere
You can see your whole world behind you..''

@tsuyoi-hikari  Those very lyrics for me reflects a sad ending... I am there somewhere protecting you secretly.... this is so sad.. meaning they can't be together... 

@tsuyoi-hikari  For me, there are a couple of things that make it a sad ending. 

1) Speech at the reunion

2) What ends the time travel

3) The final song which plays when it starts snowing. For me, that scene doesn't depict the arrival of the male lead.. it rather depicts the sorrow that FL feels when the first snow of the season arrives. For it was the day they promised to meet. 

As to why the writer was ambiguous about whether the ML died or not,. I think it was more for the purpose of building suspense and there are many loopholes in that regard which drops the rating of drama for me.. basically, because How would a neighbour not know whether ML died or not, especially when they are childhood friends who hang out every day. 

 Yogesh Jain:

@tsuyoi-hikari  For me, there are a couple of things that make it a sad ending. 

1) Speech at the reunion

2) What ends the time travel

3) The final song which plays when it starts snowing. For me, that scene doesn't depict the arrival of the male lead.. it rather depicts the sorrow that FL feels when the first snow of the season arrives. For it was the day they promised to meet. 

As to why the writer was ambiguous about whether the ML died or not,. I think it was more for the purpose of building suspense and there are many loopholes in that regard which drops the rating of drama for me.. basically, because How would a neighbour not know whether ML died or not, especially when they are childhood friends who hang out every day. 

Like what tsuyoi-hikari said, the final song lyrics is what convinced me that its the ML behind her.

''I'll be always there, tell me you know I'm there somewhere. 全世界在你的身后." (Your whole world is behind you)
There's so many instances where this line appeared, telling the FL to look behind her, to find her whole world (ML), staying by her all this while.

Hoping the upcoming movie will give me a satisfying happy ending ;-; 

@onioni Agreed! I think the lyrics hint a lot about the man behind the FL. 

 NabilaBella:

@onioni Agreed! I think the lyrics hint a lot about the man behind the FL. 

I thought it was perfectly clear that the man behind was the ML.. The question was whether its an imagination of the FL considering it is the first snow of the year and she is missing him.... or as suggested by the theory, it was the real ML alive. I would go with Imagination..

 Yogesh Jain:

I thought it was perfectly clear that the man behind was the ML.. The question was whether its an imagination of the FL considering it is the first snow of the year and she is missing him.... or as suggested by the theory, it was the real ML alive. I would go with Imagination..

It's up to each of our own theories, at the end none of us will ever know if it's FL imagination or not until they release the movie. But as few other people commented before me, ML's 'death' was very vague. It also consists of holes from when his parent moved all of a sudden, no body found except from the paper report saying a boy jumped from the light house. These holes are the reasons why it become so ambiguous to all of us and for me most of it pointing out to ML being alive. 

 NabilaBella:

It's up to each of our own theories, at the end none of us will ever know if it's FL imagination or not until they release the movie. But as few other people commented before me, ML's 'death' was very vague. It also consists of holes from when his parent moved all of a sudden, no body found except from the paper report saying a boy jumped from the light house. These holes are the reasons why it become so ambiguous to all of us and for me most of it pointing out to ML being alive. 

I would say this is a loophole in the series rather than calling it an open ending... Reason: How in the hell would the school authorities or his neighbour or his BFF next door won't know about what happened to him? Also then there was the guy who would have been in the police station after getting arrested, he could have easily obtained this information from the officers.. afterall he could stand witness to the case..

 Yogesh Jain:

@tsuyoi-hikari  For me, there are a couple of things that make it a sad ending. 

1) Speech at the reunion

2) What ends the time travel

3) The final song which plays when it starts snowing. For me, that scene doesn't depict the arrival of the male lead.. it rather depicts the sorrow that FL feels when the first snow of the season arrives. For it was the day they promised to meet. 

As to why the writer was ambiguous about whether the ML died or not,. I think it was more for the purpose of building suspense and there are many loopholes in that regard which drops the rating of drama for me.. basically, because How would a neighbour not know whether ML died or not, especially when they are childhood friends who hang out every day. 

Your 3 reasons could also be interpreted as he is alive esp the speech she did at the school on 'how the unknown, fears can only be overcome with oneself, to show to the other person that care you the most, that you made it and grew.'

Plus, like I said the ambiguity on his death are made  purposely and not as plotholes or loopholes. I guess I have watch too many dramas lol. There are several times when I thought something is written in stone but turned out to be completely wrong. Like for Gao Ge not knowing, its possible that this will be explored in the movie that she & her father did knew about the fate of Wansen but pretended not to know to strangers such as Beixing to protect the request of Wansen's parents on his safety (since like its written in the drama, the gang problem only managed to be eradicated in year 2012). And again, no one knew the relationship between Maize & Wansen so its possible the police never release the fate of Wansen for his safety to the public so Maize remains ignorant like the rest of people. Thats why the rumour said 'boy jumped from tower' and not 'boy fall accidentally/pushed from the tower' -- all this are clues and not loopholes.

Plus, if he's not alive, why they even bother to release the movie next year with the same casts? They cannot go the same route as her travel to the past AGAIN since its pretty much concluded that nothing will ever change in the present no matter how much she tried to change the past. So, the only possible reason is he is indeed alive that is why their journey continued. And movie poster for this drama has this phrase "This time I will run to you with determination." so it didnt make sense if he is dead.