My Personal Notes

For one thing... he does admit (almost) immediately to what Shen Jiu had already been working up towards in his own mind and tone, and that they both believe increasingly to be "true" and to some degree is: that Yue Qi's choices left Shen Jiu in the hands of a sadist for years.

(blue for emphasis on YQY's reactions, green for SJ's)

Always gonna wonder what was Yue Qingyuan going to say before Shen Jiu "opened fire". That he was happy to see him? That he'd really tried to save him, only to find a burned down manor, maybe something that would have led to an actual admission of Xuan Su's whole deal? Maybe! We'll never know. :'] weheheh~

But unfortunately for everyone, Shen Jiu's in defense mode. To shield his feelings, he'd already decided that Yue Qi is gone -- and SJ's first reaction to people who aren't Qi-ge is pro-active hostility in order to keep himself safe, an instinct has been turned up to eleven thanks to Qiu Jianluo.

SJ does deserve an answer of course -- but I also think the conversation is set up in this sequence in order to have YQY to "realize" (big air quotes here) that no matter how he explains it, he's not going to be forgiven. So he says the raw truth: Qi-ge let you down.

From there, SJ doesn't want to hear any more apologies because to him they're just guilty words with no substance. But what YQY seems to take away from it is that his apology has been rejected. For him to try and further explain himself would be, in his own eyes and in his view of the angry boy before him, guilt-tripping excuses.

I think in the same moment that SJ was "realizing" that he is poisonous scum, YQY is "realizing" that he is an unreliable failure.

What really gets me is how in his vol 3 confession, there's an implication that he maybe did try to explain himself later on -- and then got rebuffed by SJ in some fashion? It wasn't like SJ interrupted him the first time, he definitely did wait for YQY's response. So what else could "let me finish speaking" mean...

So now he's not just explaining himself but begging Shen Qingqiu to listen. It's not a case of him just refusing to give an explanation or leaving SJ waiting for one, but also believing that he won't be heard even if he does.

Which, if some previous things he says are anything to go off of, probably had some hefty weight of evidence in his mind. 🙃

The fact that he confesses to SY because otherwise "it'll be too late" implies to me at least that he did really want SJ to know what happened to him, maybe that he even did attempt it in the years in-between, but either wasn't given the chance or didn't do it in such a way that SJ would let him finish? But now YQY thinks he's dying, so he has to seize the chance to speak up.

But the readers and Shen Yuan know it's already too late.

That's why it becomes so obvious to Shen Yuan in that moment that the truths he'd believed have led him into the exact same situation, and that he has to turn back now lest he suffer the same fate as qijiu.

If Luo Binghe's foil is his original abuser, Shen Jiu, with both of them working off of assumptions tainted by self-esteem issues and fears of abandonment...

...Then Shen Yuan's foil has to be Yue Qingyuan, where both of them fully believe that they can't and won't be forgiven for the harm they've done to someone they promised to care for, and that anything they say will only make the situation worse.

Really interesting how Yue Qingyuan definitively states that he's been here before, just not why. Did he intentionally say it, with an impulsive urge to have that deeper conversation? Or maybe it just slipped out?

Either way, Shen Jiu doesn't take the narrative bait, reacts predictably snappy given that he was about to qi deviate a few seconds ago, and YQY drops the topic in favor of keeping him calm. One of those moments that make you wanna pull at your hair, aaaaaaa-- It's almost the perfect intro to talking about The Everything. But just like every time before it, YQY's words/behavior hints, SJ snaps, and YQY retreats without defense or explanation. Aaa...

(Side note: it's mentioned way later in the chapter that "Yue Qingyuan wasn't the type to sigh much, but Shen Qingqiu was inevitably capable of wearing him to the bone". So I personally read this as him already emotionally exhausted even though they just started talking. Presumably because of where they are.)

But then you get to SJ commenting on the blood-stained cave around them, and then:

This was, imo, probably the closest they ever got to anything about why YQY didn't come back getting revealed. And I wonder if that tiny convo about YQY being annoying hints was included purposefully to hint at why it didn't happen.

The particular part of the chapter makes great pains to point out that YQY didn't get to see SJ very often as disciples, and that when he did he "chattered nonstop", and that other disciples were watching in apparent surprise/amusement at seeing him act like this. So we get told that YQY was actively seeking out SJ, even when he knows he's being rebuffed. He wants to talk to him about everything going on, something that a YQY who is purposefully lying to him probably wouldn't do imo.

So why the flip to sudden "Oh" from YQY. Besides the obvious Ling Xi Caves PTSD going on. 🙃

I get the feeling that MXTX added the previous mentions and then outright discussion of YQY annoying SJ to lay out the irony in how SJ reacts. A lot of SJ's character arc sets up how he's very much the guy who can't help but press on his own bruises and then get mad that it hurts -- and I think this is another example of it.

The chapter starts with descriptions of YQY talking to SJ as much as possible, then the "I don't care if you've been here before" convo followed by "I find it annoying when you talk to me", before it ends with YQY ending the scene in silence.

Maybe on a good day like a tournament, YQY can handle getting shot down because hey at least SJ is talking to him, right? But here, with SJ describing essentially exactly what happened to him, is setting off an intense trauma response in YQY, sooo I think he just does what he did when he first mentioned the caves: he pulls back and says nothing rather than defend or explain himself.

And the craziest part of all, is that Shen Jiu knows something's wrong too! If we're supposed to wonder why Yue Qingyuan won't talk, then we've gotta also wonder why Shen Jiu doesn't press further? He didn't want to sit in the silence before, he was perfectly willing to keep talking just to fill the silence. He is smart, so I really wish I knew exactly what conclusions he was drawing from YQY's sudden quiet reactions to what he'd been describing, YQY mentions of being in the caves before, and the noticable tremors.

Maybe Shen Jiu doesn't ask because some part of him doesn't want to hear the answer, echoing back on YQY's confession where he begs Shen Yuan!SQQ to listen to him and let him finish.