#xu yiduo

[lunarriviera]

Omg thank you for answering my question about shen yi's age it was very helpful 😊

I have another question if you don't mind answering...what about shen yi's backstory like his parents 🤔 or siblings...they don't really reveal anything about his childhood right.....we see du cheng's childhood a bit but not shen yi's...any thoughts also how many eps are left and when are they coming out...is there a S3 ??????(Love your blog ✨️ ☺️ )

HI HEY HELLO well so, the first part of your question is really easy to answer! Because you know what we know about Shen Yi's past?

Nothing! Not a damn thing. Nada. Zilch. Bupkis. Absolutely zero. 零.

We know one thing only: that Xu Yiduo apparently found a very baby Shen Yi OUTSIDE at NIGHT, VANDALIZING a WALL at the bottom of a staircase. May I repeat: BABY. AT NIGHT. (This is s1, ep13, around 27:00.) That's all, just this one scene, maybe four shots altogether.

The good news is, this kind of thing just makes fic writers roll up our sleeves and say, hold my beer. So, you know. You can read a zillion versions of Shen Yi's traumatic childhood all over AO3/Lofter. Whee!

(And it has to be somewhat traumatic, doesn't it? Because not only is baby Shen Yi running around nighttime Beijiang unsupervised, but this scene comes right after he confronts Liu Xiaoye's teacher, who assaulted her, whereupon Shen Yi walks to the window and releases a box of dead butterflies very symbolically. So why does he identify so readily with victims, hm? I wonder. Can't imagine. No idea really.)

As for s2, there are 28 episodes; episodes 25-26 just dropped, and 27-28 will air tonight/tomorrow depending on your time zone. Various unofficial accounts have been posting optimistically about s3 but frankly the odds for that seem slim to none, to me. I've never heard of a cdrama getting a third season with the same storyline/cast; to have gotten a second, with these actors? is already totally wild.

But, as the poet said: one never knows now does one now does one. And the ending certainly—well, I'll write about the ending soon.

Thank you for your question, love you madly!

[beauregardlionett]

my self portrait is a mess (you framed it anyway)

AO3 Link

The surface of his countertop provided a stark, lukewarm contrast beneath Shen Yi’s icy fingers.

Distantly, Shen Yi knew the reason his palms were clammy and fingers frozen was because his body had shifted into fight or flight. His sympathetic nervous system was diverting blood from his extremities to his heart. An instinctive attempt at support as it beat a frantic rhythm against the backside of his sternum. It left Shen Yi’s limbs cold and trembling, his breathing erratic, and his head spinning.

It was such a ridiculously detached and clinical thought that Shen Yi huffed a weak laugh as he leaned his weight wearily against the counter. The sharp edge pressed back, biting against the prominence of his hipbones. Shen Yi pushed a little harder, trying to ground himself in reality.

He looked up at the green, faintly glowing numbers of the clock on the microwave as Shen Yi attempted to wrestle his emotions under control.

02:43

Just over three hours until Shen Yi had to leave for work and he had no shot in hell of going back to sleep. Flashes of the nightmare that woke him struck every time he blinked, the back of his eyelids a canvas for terror. His skin itched from underneath, an impossible desire to crawl out of his existence burning at the back of Shen Yi’s throat.

Hands still shaking, Shen Yi pushed roughly away from the counter and spun on his heel toward his art studio. He needed to draw, or paint, or sculpt, or create something with his hands in any available medium—anything. Whatever kept Shen Yi from digging his fingernails into his palms until he broke skin.

Whenever Shen Yi felt big emotions, things he could not possibly process and file away within mere seconds, he drew. Sometimes his coworkers would find him curled in a corner of his office, a sketchpad tucked so close to his chest it was a miracle Shen Yi could draw at all. When he didn’t have a sketchpad, Shen Yi turned to canvas—something sprawling and blank and bordering on not big enough to contain Shen Yi’s multitudes.

With mindless, frantic motions, Shen Yi flipped open a large sketch pad and propped it on an empty easel. He grabbed at his charcoals and came back with a stick he snapped in half and set to the paper.

Shen Yi’s creation began without thought. The lines of a rough, meaningless sketch bloomed on the paper of their own accord. Shen Yi was merely the vessel for their creation, a blank canvas in his own right as his thoughts quieted. There was no room for terror, no space for roots to catch, when everything was funneled out of his thoughts and into haphazard existence.

It had always been like this for Shen Yi. He picked up graffiti as a child because it was freeing—an endless flow of colors and ideas not bound by the borders of a canvas. It was an escape from the crushing weight of burdens too big for a child to bear. Then, Xu Yiduo had come along and given that outlet direction, meaning…purpose.

And then M had swept into his life with all the force of a typhoon and ruined everything. She set the metaphorical fire and Shen Yi followed suit.

No one knew this, but it had taken Shen Yi a couple of years before he held a pencil to paper again without panicking. He only found the courage to continue drawing at all because he realized the very thing that had been used against him could also catch those responsible.

Shen Yi’s fingers fumbled against the paper. He paused his work to breathe, shaky. Glancing up, his neck screamed in protest of the hunched posture Shen Yi had been sporting. It was still dark out, the heavy blanket of pre-dawn hours still firmly settled on the world. His studio space was a scattering of organized chaos, as per usual.

Golden warmth always bathed the studio Shen Yi grew up painting in. Encompassed by a comforting hue of burnt sienna nostalgia bracketed by the warmth of a compatible palette of colors. Staring out at his dimly lit apartment studio now, he physically ached at the contrast. The room was shrouded with muted grey where scarce light spilled through the window from down the alley. Shen Yi knew the day would highlight it with watered down sunlight and lethargic moonbeams on cloudless nights, a constant cycle of monochrome. It ached with emptiness and echoed with hollow loneliness. There was something fundamental missing from the picture, and Shen Yi couldn’t fill it on his own.

The charcoal slipped from between his fingers and smeared a scar across his unfinished sketch.

Fumbling for his phone, hands only slightly steadier now than they had been earlier, Shen Yi pulled up a familiar contact. He pressed his phone against his ear with more force than necessary as he collapsed into a corner and pushed his head into the wall for stability.

“Hello?” Du Cheng’s sleep thick voice grumbled through the speaker.

Shen Yi said nothing, but his tremulous exhale spoke volumes in the stead of actual words.

“Shen Yi?” Du Cheng called through the phone, distinctly more awake now than a few seconds before. “What’s wrong? Are you hurt?”

“No,” Shen Yi managed, sounding anything except convincing. “I’m sorry to wake you.”

There was a weighted pause over the line before, “why did you call?”

From anyone other than Du Cheng, it would sound irritated. Shen Yi knew him well enough by now to pick up the genuine undercurrent of concern beneath the interrogation.

“I don’t know,” Shen Yi whispered. A bold-faced lie.

“I needed to hear a voice.” Close, but not quite the truth. Shen Yi cleared his throat and pressed a little more into the wall for courage.

Du Cheng was quiet on the other end of the call, giving Shen Yi the space to navigate whatever was happening.

“I needed to hear your voice.”

“Okay,” Du Cheng said, softer and gentler than Shen Yi had ever heard him. “I’m here.”

“I know,” Shen Yi breathed out. “You always are.”

Du Cheng didn’t seem to know how to respond to that as they lapsed into silence. The steady white noise of a call in progress hummed against Shen Yi’s eardrum and he sank into the unwavering quiet. Shen Yi had never been to the mountains before. But he imagined this kind of stillness was what it felt like to be lost among the ancient peaks and aged trees. There was a certain security that came with knowing when silence meant safety.

“Do you want a ride to work?” Du Cheng spoke up, his voice soft with sleep again.

Shen Yi took stock of himself. Pressed into a corner, a messy sketch on an easel, and broken charcoal at his feet, and faintly trembling in the aftermath of nightmare induced tension. He felt mentally anchored but physically unsteady.

Once upon a time, Shen Yi would have packed all this away and let no one know it had ever come to the surface. He would have gotten dressed and rode his bike to work despite the danger and gone on with his day. Shen Yi would have allowed himself to drown in silence beneath the weight of another unresolved night. He would smile pleasantly through the whole unknown ordeal, too.

But now, Du Cheng was tossing him a life preserver. He stood on the sanctuary of a metaphorical ship, a miraculous presence in Shen Yi’s metaphorical storm.

“If you don’t mind,” Shen Yi heard himself whisper.

“Sure,” Du Cheng answered. He grunted softly, the sound accompanied by the distant rustle of movement. Shen Yi glanced at the clock on the wall, startled to find that it was now just past five in the morning.

“I’ll be there in about an hour,” Du Cheng said, words muffled through a yawn. “We’re stopping for coffee on the way and you’re buying.”

Shen Yi sniffed a grin as he stretched out his legs, slowly uncurling. His muscles screamed in protest, but the ache was almost as pleasant as it was uncomfortable.

“Sure,” Shen Yi agreed. He had woken Du Cheng before sunrise, after all. A cup of coffee and maybe something to eat was a small price to pay for his gratitude. Shen Yi could never repay Du Cheng for all that he owed him.

Du Cheng made a noise of acknowledgement as he yawned again. “See you soon.”

Shen Yi was still grinning to himself as they hung up. He took another minute or two to stretch out and regain the feeling in his legs. Pushing to his feet, Shen Yi wandered through his apartment as he got ready for work. Xiao Xuan pushed against his shins and wove through his legs, meowing loudly for breakfast. Shen Yi crouched to pet Xiao Xuan’s back, scratching between his ears.

“I hear you,” Shen Yi murmured with a smile. “I’ll feed you soon, I promise.”

A few minutes later, Shen Yi was putting the cat food can into the fridge when there was a knock at his door. Opening it revealed Du Cheng on the other side, looking tired but put together. Xiao Xuan had abandoned breakfast to stand at Shen Yi’s ankles and meow for attention before Shen Yi could say anything.

“Good morning,” Du Cheng said, looking down at Xiao Xuan.

Shen Yi scooped his cat into his arms and gestured into his apartment. “Let me grab my things and put Xiao Xuan inside. Then we can go.”

Du Cheng nodded, poorly hiding a yawn behind his hand. Shen Yi smothered the stab of guilt in his chest and turned to head into his apartment. He went to his studio to grab his bag and make sure the necessary supplies were inside. His sketchpad still propped up on the easel made Shen Yi pause mid-stride, gaze pulled toward the haphazard charcoal lines. The paper bowed slightly from the angle and the force Shen Yi had applied, appearing to sag under the weight of the drawing. A confusing coalescence of Shen Yi’s features and M’s stared at him, with a heavily lined human skull transposed over the strange portrait.

Shen Yi walked over and flipped the sketchpad resolutely shut before putting it into his desk, choosing not to examine the drawing further.

When he came back to the front door, bag slung over his shoulder, Du Cheng was standing inside the entrance, leaning against the wall and appearing half awake. 

“Du Cheng,” Shen Yi called softly, stepping up to him and ghosting his fingers over Du Cheng’s arm. “Are you alright?”

Du Cheng blinked, turning his focus to Shen Yi and yawning all in one motion. Shen Yi opened his mouth to ask if Du Cheng was okay again, if he was truly okay to drive. He faltered, however, when Du Cheng raised a hand and cupped Shen Yi’s jaw. Du Cheng squinted sleepily down at him as he traced the pad of his thumb over the skin beneath Shen Yi’s eye.

“You look tired,” Du Cheng muttered.

“You’re one to talk,” Shen Yi whispered, voice unsteady from the sudden proximity. The trail of Du Cheng’s finger against his face burned like fire, a pleasant heat beneath the skin, a reminder that tenderness was an option. Without thinking, Shen Yi leaned into Du Cheng’s palm, holding eye contact as he did.

Du Cheng’s eyes flicked from the skin of Shen Yi’s face to meet his gaze. There was a moment of silence that weighed between them the way the air hung heavy before a storm. Shen Yi exhaled, a shaky and strung out noise. Du Cheng blinked and pulled his phone from his pocket, keeping his hand against Shen Yi’s cheek.

“We’re taking today off,” Du Cheng said, thumbing at his phone. Shen Yi blinked at him, stunned.

“Du Cheng, we can’t take off so suddenly.”

“Sure we can,” Du Cheng said, looking at his phone even as he kept contact with Shen Yi’s face. “Call it a sick day.”

Shen Yi reached out and wrapped his fingers around Du Cheng’s wrist, squeezing lightly. Du Cheng paused, glancing back at him.

“Du Cheng, I’m okay,” Shen Yi said, soft and insistent. “Let’s go to work, and we can rest later.”

Du Cheng blinked at him, slowly putting his phone back in his pocket. He reached up and pulled his fingers through Shen Yi’s hair once, settling his fingers at the base of Shen Yi’s neck. Du Cheng’s other hand was still against Shen Yi’s cheek and he almost melted in the warm sanctuary of Du Cheng’s steady hands. He wavered for a moment, about to give in to Du Cheng’s wish to stay home. But they had a team waiting for them, a city relying on them, and a paycheck to earn.

“I’ll drive you home, too,” Du Cheng said, leaving no room for bargaining. “And you owe me dinner for it.”

Shen Yi smirked and nodded, knowing this was Du Cheng’s not-so-subtle way of inviting himself to spend the night.

“Deal.”

As they left Shen Yi’s home and stepped into the warming dawn, Shen Yi breathed in the fresh air and smiled at Du Cheng as they went to the car. His nightmare and shadowed studio felt like a lifetime ago with Du Cheng at his side.

[sinetheta]

这是一沟绝望的死水， 这里断不是美的所在， 不如让给丑恶来开���， 看它造出个什么世界。 Here is a ditch of hopeless dead water, This cannot be a place where beauty lives, Better let ugliness cultivate it, And see what kind of world comes of it.

Wen Yiduo (闻一多), Dead Water (死水). 1925. 

Poet and scholar Wen Yiduo belonged to the generation of young Chinese writers who grew up during the early Republic era. After completing his undergraduate degree at Tsinghua University, Wen went on to study fine arts and literature at the Art Institute of Chicago where he published his first poetry collection called 紅燭 (Red Candle). In 1928, he joined the Crescent Moon Society (新月社) that was founded by poet Xu Zhimo, Wen’s political activism against the Chinese Communist Party began in 1944 when he joined the China Democratic League that was highly critical of the government. His outspoken nature and popular anti-communist speeches led to his blacklisting by the police. In 1946, while giving a speech for his assassinated friend Li Gongpu whom he served alongside in the China Democratic League, Wen was assassinated by agents of the Kuomintang.