So we learned a lot about She Li this past chapter. Most of my assumptions about him have been proven right: he has a social problem and he grew up in a loveless home.
We see his parents fighting and him choosing to stay outside in bad weather rather than go in and listen to the arguing. He instead busys himself with a monotonous task: digging. The repetition of a task is therapeutic and a coping mechanism to quiet the mind and expel pent up energy. That is what he is doing here, trying to drown out the noise and stress with this task.
This shows extreme stress and anxiety in a child who is not equipped emotionally to handle such complex emotions.
On top of this, the mental numbing we see him performing with the digging is metaphorically shown in the physicality of his disorder. The fact that he cannot physically process pain is a metaphor for how he mentally cannot process it either.
So we see that She Li is preoccupied by two ideas: the experience of physical pain and the experience of emotional pain. And this is where Mo comes in:
Look at how Mo is framed here in relation to She Li: elevated in a shaft of light and held tightly in the arms of a parent who loves him while openly showing emotional and physical pain. Mo is She Li's ideal self here, but he is also a solution. If he cannot be Mo, then Mo will be his to control. In that way, She Li will have a filter for his pain, physically and emotionally. His first appearance is him telling Mo he has come to "save him" and afterwards when expecting him to leave school and work fulltime for him, that being with She Li is his "destiny." She Li is practicing complete control over Mo and Mo's life so that Mo will not be able to leave him. It's interesting that the times we see She Li act out against Mo, it's in times that Mo is out of his control. For instance: Mo stands up to She Li and questions his authority, so She Li torments him and pierces his ear; Mo is hurt in the hospital and does not tell She Li, so She Li shows up with a knife; She Li sees Mo and He Tian hanging out at school and throws a can at Mo's head; She Li sees that Mo is growing closer to He Tian and goes to He Tian to try to intimidate him into letting him keep Mo because Mo "owes him."
This lashing out physically towards others, I think, is a way for She Li to process his inner-pain. Mo is She Li's ideal self, so he wants to keep Mo close to him and control him. In a sick and twisted way, She Li cares for Mo as an extension of himself. We see that She Li is focused on an idea of betrayal:
Betrayal seems to mean undermining She Li's control. His upbringing was chaotic, so he has developed a complex in which he must be in control of the situation at all times. If he isn't, he lashes out. The panic that he feels at any sign of chaos manifests in violence. He filters his emotional pain by inflicting it onto others. The problem is, She Li has no empathy when it comes to pain because he has no experience of the feeling. Therefore, he does not care or even know how much pain he inflicts onto others. For She Li, a scar is the only proof of pain there is, and leaving a mark on someone is a constant reminder that he vicariously felt the sensation through his victims and was able to process his emotional chaos by hurting someone. It is a sign of his being in control of himself and those around him.
She Li's character cannot be excused, but it is a complex one. However, losing control and acting out impulsively by approaching He Tian won't go over so well for him. He Tian is a threat to She Li's inner-stability, which is why we see him uncharacteristically engaging with He Tian in the last chapter. He Tian is not someone he can physically hurt, but he can do it emotionally by threatening Mo. What She Li doesn't understand is that He Tian's psychology is just as complex, but it is opposite to his own. Whereas She Li wants to hurt others at all cost, He Tian wants to protect others at all cost. The target of both their trauma is Mo. Mo is She Li's ideal and He Tian's puppy. The fight over him is going to be fierce.
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