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Title: I cried, I pretended / 我哭了，我装的
Author: 艳归康
Year of realease: 2021
# of chapters: 68
Status: ONGOING
Link to NU: n/a
Tags: knowing the plot, game/tech genius wears the plot, supposed to be a stand-in plot but it's actually not
*all names/titles are an MTL version
Synopsis: Kang Yao, a tech genius, transmigrates to a book, in this plot his character is to be a stand-in and later go to the background. Basically he can't do anything except accepting the task that appeared in his head, but he decided to go his own way. The only part he plans to repeat is the break-up scene to finish the plot. Xu Yao is a president of a media company, he once had a crush on his neighbor and a friend, but before he confessed he heard his crush to confess to his own father, which completely broke his heart and he never mentioned those events since. One evening he notices a beautiful boy who had a small mole at the same place his first crush had, it was the first thing that caught his attention, but the boy was completely different from his first crush, more opened, passionate, broke his boundaries. They started from the agreement and little did he know that this and his past will backfire on him.
Sounds not bad, right? But I post this review before the story is even finished for one simple reason - I HATE IMBALANCE IN CHASE PLOTS.
My problem started in recent chapters where Kang Yao as MC continues to be a power figure in their relationship, but it starts to turn into misery. To understand what I'm talking about I'll start from the beginning.
Kang Yaoi arrives in this world. It's a DO or DIE situation, he either presses agree to he question or he will be obliterated. In this story he is just a stand-in, before the first crush of his target will re-appear. But what he's given is not the full story that happened.
Original host is a ballet dancer, while Kang Yao is a technical genius and an awesoem hacker that lives off technology and developing games. First thing he does is quitting school (while he only enrolled), became friends with one of the school flowers, QiaoQiao, btw. And hooked up with Xu Yao as his target. He of course agreed to play the part, but on his own terms. Their meeting and hooking up was quite calculated by Kang Yao. And throughout their entire relationship sometimes it's hard to say if he has any feelings towards Xu Yao developed or he just enjoys the play. Because everything is quite subtle and is concealed in actions.
They start their relationship with an agreement at first, which to me was understandable, since they barely knew each other. Kang Yao was ok with it too of course. But with time the dynamic of their relationship begins to change, onviously. I must mention how Kang Yao acts with Xu Yao and what attracted me into reading at first. With his words and actions he conveyed that Xu Yao should not act with his status on him or just alwas acting or saying things that are not in accordance with normal routines. And that is how Kang Yao started to mend Xu Yao's bottom line and basically shape him. In their relationship Xu Yao is the one who usually gives in, either it's a small conflict or anything similar, he comes to admit he was wrong. The good thing Kang Yao did to Xu Yao is that he started to break his shackles of being a bit stiff, he made him experience things that he might never do, starting from basic visit to parks and ending with parachuting. Kang Yao also made sure their sex life is full - it was more like him demanding Xu Yao to work for him and not the opposite, he was the one with condition of often sex. Basically his hooks were deep if you look at it. And to no surprise Xu Yao realised that he fell deeply in love. The only resemblance between KY and his first supposed crush was the mole on the upper lip, but that fleeting moment stayed in their first meeting, Xu Yao never treated KY as a stand-in and was very sincere, but on the confession day Kang Yao asked to break up.
For Kang Yao it finally finished the storyline, but for Xu Yao it was a start of devastation.
And here we come to the current chapters that describe the after break-up period and they are making me feel sad. It was such an upbeat beginning, characters didn't follow the routines, but now the balance tilted too hard towards one side.
After KY claimed to break up he did what he did, as per agreement their apartment now belongs to him, he also cut all connection to XY and blocked him. XY couldn't even enter the community he was a resident of, just because he was removed by KY homself. KY was only talking about breaking up, saying that XY put all those conditions himself and when XY apologized about concealing his past it was brushed aside. My last drop of 'wtf' moment was actually a cene where XY waits at the entrance to the community and while they talk KY again manages to spark a bit of inside anger in XY (he previously had ana ngry moment, due to which KY didn't talk to him, so he had to apologize first and even in this moment he felt that he shouldn't say anything bad, since KY is still in his heart). But KY asked if he can't say anything harsh even? And he laughed, laughed harder and left.
This is what I call imbalanced feelings. XY never spoke about his shameful experience of falling with someone who eventually confessed to his own father. It was a shameful episode for him which no one knew about. He forgot about this person all-together and never cared, but he didn't know how to explain that maybe the very first fleeting moment he thought about those things, but not later, to him both are completely different and KY is absolutely dazzling. He never thought it will come to haunt him down later when he saw KY and his first crush together, at first he escaped, but later he came to the door and honestly explained and apologized, he admitted to all his sins, but with no positive result (it's all after break-up period).
But the thing is.
XY's first crush happened to arrive not because of anything, but Kang Yao himself. And this is why it makes me feel how I still can't find a solid ground to justify KY's actions and find the depth of his emotions, because it all becomes feeling like a play and you get lost to what is real and what is not with KY, while XY is steady with his feelings.
Now, remember the part where Kang Yao is a tech genius? Supposedly he came from the future with more developed technology. After he quit the school, he became a NEET. Xu Yao tried to offer for KY to enter any school he'd like to but KY refused, but also never shared his ambitions he had for this world. Part of Kang Yao's arrogance comes from confidence, since KY is his own capital and he doesn't care about money and power. He created a program that became a ground-breaking point in tech world. He sold it to XY's company (Xu Yao never knew about this, he just knew that KY was fascinated with games and such and agreed to any modifications, sets at home etc.), created his own company and started to creat the first holographic game. He patented all his creations with his name and by the current chapters he managed to succeed. But also another things happaned. KY as one who knows part of the plot also knows about the first crush of Xu Yao - Yan Lai. Yan Lai is a painter who is all about his painting, he is more refined, calm etc. KY offered him a job and took him back to the country. And that is why I see this whole thing as a play for KY. Sure thing with arrival of Yan Lai it should progress the plot, but it all happens under KY's meticulous orchestration. Remember I said about his hacking skills? It is mentioned at the beginning how through monitoring and hacking he knows where is XY, how to mett him etc. And in last chapters you feel the deliberate undertones too. Which eventually makes you think - well, if he didn't have ANY feelings, he shouldn't have done all this.
And that's the question I ask myself often now - if he had no feelings, he shouldn't do all this, right? But here's the problem, it's subtle. Like you know that many things were set ups created by KY for the sake of stimulation. And you wanted to answer - he must be doing this with his own idea. But from other side, you see a character like Xu Yao, who managed to fall in love for real, was dumped, was reminded of the conditions he set himself, he apologized for it, he revealed the secret that he considered shameful, he apologized for everything, he time and time again said he doesn't want to break up, he basically lowered himself, and you know why he doesn't even want to say harsh things - because he doesn't want KY to remember those too, he had no idea that his lover had never shared his ambitions with him and at some things was not honest, but in the end laughed at his sincerety and found out that his lover wasn't so simple second-handedly).
I realy-really-really hope this novel will start to rehabilitate from here. Right now to me it starts to become another lost cause in the range of novels where MLs who didn't do anything horrible to the extent, but described as miserable, beaten up dogs, who lost all their pride, just because they loved.
I know many like to read about the 'chasing wife to crematorium', but I hope to see logic in such stories, but often see how the conflicts for such novels are sucked out from the dry finger. They exist only for the sake of making MLs miserable, despite deserving it or not.
[END OF PART 1]
