Despite learning his new Zhan Hu teammates were plotting to get rid of him, James continued doing his menial chores at camp.  He figured all he could do until the next Tribal Council was make the best out of the situation at hand.

At Fei Long, Todd made a strategic move and revealed to Amanda everything he knew about a hidden Immunity Idol at camp.  He originally wasn’t planning on telling her until after he had secured its location, but he needed her help finding it.  He hoped that by winning the next Reward Challenge, they could get another clue about the idol’s whereabouts.  Assuming they would be temporarily kidnapping someone again from the opposing team, they made a plan to choose James.  They were certain their former Fei Long member would give them the extra scroll needed to finally take control of the game.

The two tribes later reunited for the next Reward Challenge.  The Fei Long team appeared surprised to see that Aaron had been eliminated from Zhan Hu, though I’m not really sure why they thought he would still be around.  Meanwhile, Jaime and Peih-gee tried giving reassuring glances over to their former teammate, Frosti, but only received strange looks in return.  Did he not want to be associated with them anymore?  Was he afraid people would think he was still in cahoots with them?

For the challenge, the competitors had to take turns searching an abandoned Chinese village for colored tribal boards.  Once all eight boards had been recovered, they would then need to be decoded to help solve a puzzle.  The resulting sentence would be a phrase made famous by Confucius.  James and Jean-Robert started the game off for both teams and kept things pretty even before they handed off to Peih-gee and Sherea.  When Peih-gee realized that she and Sherea had a moment alone, she quickly spelled out the plan she and Jaime had cooked up.  She wanted Sherea and Frosti to know that they were still thinking about them.  Unfortunately, it was unclear whether Sherea was listening and/or even caring about what Peih-gee had just told her; she didn’t say anything in return.

From the point Sherea exited the house with her colored board, it seemed as if Zhan Hu was always one step behind in the challenge.  Although the race was kept very close, the Yellow Team never quite recovered.  Fei Long not only won another challenge—they won the right to take James (and his scroll) back again.  For their reward, the team received their best treat to date:  they were all taken to a nearby bathhouse where they access to tubs, a shower and toilets.  Of course, once Jean-Robert eyed Courtney and Amanda sharing the same tub (while fully-clothed) he had to ruin the whole experience with his creepy comments.  Thankfully, seeing a naked James showering out the in the open made the girls feel a bit better.

Back at Zhan Hu, things felt very lonely with only three people remaining.  Bummed by their last two challenges, Erik made it very clear to the ladies that he was getting really tired of losing.  Peih-gee and Jaime then admitted that they were concerned about their new strategy.  Not only did Sherea blow Peih-gee off earlier, but so did Frosti.  If their former teammates weren’t going to respond the way they had hoped, that could change everything.  Having James away at the teahouse didn’t help their positions either.

Not one to sit back and relax while he should be strategizing, Todd took the opportunity to talk to James while he still could.  Todd assured James that he could be saved from elimination if he handed over the secret scroll.  Considering he had nothing to lose (Zhan Hu was going to dump him soon anyway), James agreed to give it to him.  When Fei Long later returned to camp, Todd and Amanda immediately set out to find the hidden idol.  Although they figured out that it was probably on the archway, they had to find a way to take it down without drawing too much attention to themselves.  Unfortunately, a bored Frosti saw them tinkering around and decided to join them.  Although they tried their best to shoo him away, Frosti noticed they had knocked something down with a message written on back.  Realizing they had no choice, Todd and Amanda let Frosti in on their plan:  they were going to give James the idol to take back to Zhan Hu.  Assuming his fellow tribe members threw another challenge and tried voting James off, he would have the ammunition to send one of them home instead.  He could then eventually enter the soon-to-be merged tribe with the idol he had stolen from the Zhan Hu side.

Realizing he still had to ensure another win, Todd also informed Denise and Courtney about the plan.  Since the ladies were scheduled to compete in the next Immunity Challenge, he stressed how important it was for them to do their best.  Although James was planning to throw his game, they still had to do their part to bring him back home.

When the tribes later met for the challenge, they found out the ‘good’ news:  they would be participating in a food-eating competition.  Unfortunately, they’d be eating traditional Chinese delicacies most people outside China would not want to eat.  The team to first reach 4 points would win immunity.  First up were Peih-gee and Frosti; Frosti quickly devoured his 10 chicken hearts scoring the first point for Fei Long.  Next up were Jaime and Courtney.  Although Courtney looked like she could use a few meals, Jaime worked surprisingly fast on her 3 eels.  Almost too fast.  When Erik followed up with a win over Amanda (they had to eat 3 baby turtles), it was clear Zhan Hu had formed a new strategy for themselves:  they now wanted to win.  James and Denise were up next.  Although Zhan Hu was now leading 2-1, James and Denise hoped to stop the bleeding with their next round.  Unfortunately, the 2 chicken fetuses Denise had to eat proved to be too much.  Although James did his best to buy her time, the school lunch lady could not hold up her end of the bargain.  After apologizing to James, she completely gave up and essentially gave him the win.  Erik later took a close match from Frosti and ate a ‘thousand year-old egg’ to seal the win for Zhan Hu.  Needless to say, James and his former teammates were shocked by the surprising turn of events.

Back at Fei Long, Denise made her rounds and apologized for her poor performance.  Meanwhile, Todd was devastated that his ‘perfect plan’ had been smashed.  Although it seemed pretty obvious that they would now vote Sherea off (since Frosti was now part of the alliance), Courtney threw another name into the mix:  Jean-Robert.  Her hatred for him was growing day by day; she also knew he would work hard to get rid of her if given the chance.  Although Amanda said Courtney needed to think of the bigger picture and not just herself, Todd later considered eliminating Jean-Robert as well.  If they didn’t start listening to what the other people in their alliance wanted, they could eventually be eliminated just for becoming the ‘power players’ of the game.  Also, keeping Jean-Robert around could become dangerous if he turned on them as well.

Later at Tribal Council, the two people potentially on the chopping block coincidentally had it out in front of everyone.  When Jeff Probst asked if the game had changed over the past few days, Jean-Robert started spouting off about all the hard work he had been doing around camp lately.  Hearing this nonsense set Sherea off.  Sherea then made it known that Jean-Robert was not a fan favorite around camp (a sentiment Courtney then seconded).  Later when Courtney made a comment about feeling like an ‘outsider’ in her own tribe, Todd took offense to that.  He said he’s liked her from Day Three.  (Gee - thanks.)  Wanting to act like the Fei Long peacemaker, Jean-Robert piped in and said that despite all the in-fighting, the team overall worked very well together.  Luckily for him, the team decided to vote Sherea off after all; otherwise, those would have been his famous last words.  LOSER: Sherea.

(You can review last week’s episode here.)
(You can read next week’s episode here.)