Talks about otome games, drama cds, and occasionally provides advice? Running away endlessly from my backlog of hobbies.

Ilinox

Of course you can! To talk about my reading of Jesse requires me to talk a bit about myself though, just to give some context of why I look at his character through a certain lens. So, I was definitely one of those "gifted children" (attended university at 16 kind of gifted) and, combined with being a stereotypical INTJ, Capricorn, and having a fear of stagnation, you can probably imagine how much of a driven, logical, and hard-ass "old soul" I was. There's a reason I say I think the most like Evan, haha.

Now, the childhood friend trope is usually an exploration of dependence, of insecurity, and of growth. All of this is somewhat alien to someone who is naturally independent and analyzes themselves and the world around them, so it takes more examples and effort from a writer to get me to relate to these struggles. If I can't reach a place of understanding for why a childhood friend struggles with these things, then that character is a bust for me. (Note: this is a personal reading and preference and, ultimately, to each their own.)

So, how did the Light and Night writers convince me on these points for Jesse? Well, I roughly went through three stages of appreciation.

1 - RESOLVING THE PROTECTIVE CHILDHOOD FRIEND

As I mentioned above, childhood friends are usually an exploration of dependence. You grew up together, feel that you know each other best, and you can unconditionally rely on each other. This bond gets strained if the childhood friends are separated and then reunited, but there's still this assumption of familiarity that leads to being proprietary. For example, a childhood friend can or will make decisions on your behalf because they supposedly know you best.

This rankles me so bad LMAO. It's usually what turns me off a childhood friend character right at the start. Light and Night avoided this because the moment Jesse tried to pull that shit in Chapter 11, you call him out and argue him into submission. However, Chapter 15 stands out most in my mind because you both rip into each other for all your grievances (real or imagined) and clear the air to reach a new level of honesty. Just as he was overprotective of you, you were equally overprotective of him, but both of you were still seeing each other as that childhood friend in the past.

Chapter 15 led to a permanent change in your relationship with Jesse because, after the fight, you both see each other in a new light. Or more like you see each other as the person you are presently rather than that past childhood friend.

2 - RESOLVING THE INSECURITY OF A CHILDHOOD FRIEND

Moving onto the insecurity of the childhood friend, I get really frustrated when these characters hover around that line they fear crossing because they don't want to risk losing the status quo. However, they still demonstrate jealousy or passive-aggressive actions and this is just very orbiter behavior LOL.

The Light and Night writers convinced me of the legitimacy in Jesse's struggles about this three times though.

First, you are desire itself for Jesse. In his childhood, before he was even conscious of or old enough to understand the concept of romantic and sexual desire he had a dream about you where you nearly kissed him [Chapter 15 Chapter Card]. (If he was older, if it weren't for CN censorship, and if it wasn't a sensitive subject about how far otome game male leads can go in showing sexual needs alone, you bet he would have had a wet dream LOL). I wish I can find the tweet that talked about childhood friends and desire again but, anyway, to Jesse your existence is tied into his concept and understanding of desire. The stakes of risking the status quo are already raised this high.

Second, you are somewhat responsible for the identity Jesse locked himself into, because he felt you liked him best only when he portrays himself in a certain way. I really like the monologue here where you realize how much harm words can cause even if you didn't mean them that way [Chapter 15]. No one is truly at fault here, but his obsession with pleasing you (because you are his desire) drove him to do this.

Third, even if you encourage him to just be him, Jesse himself continues to feel the need to be better for you and gets himself all twisted up in that. After reading the main story and his chapter cards up to this scene in Season 2 Chapter 2, I really understood why Jesse would think these things, because he's barely been in control of his life up until now and haunted by his quest for revenge and the truth. What kind of future can he offer you as a younger person like this? He's driven to be better and even better for you. Fortunately, catharsis is achieved in that scene and your relationship stabilizes pretty well with most of these classic childhood friend hurdles being cleared.

3 - LIGHT AND NIGHT'S TWIST TO THE CHILDHOOD FRIEND

By now, I was already appreciating all the growth Jesse had gone through but what made me really start to get intrigued by him was all his AU roles because the Light and Night writers dug into many different sides of Jesse and basically never brought up any childhood friend tropes in them.

The exploration of a yandere, the exploration of hatred, and most importantly his Journey to the West card, which haunts me because I feel like it'll make my mind explode with epiphanies if I can get around to reading it, because his role there is the Six-Eared Macaque, generally seen as the other half of Sun Wukong. In the event, Jesse is literally your younger twin and obsessed with you LMAO.

The latest main story, Season 3 Chapter 4, was also very interesting because the writers made it a point to emphasize how you and Jesse have something akin to a twin bond and so you're essentially family without actually being family and, in the eyes of society, no one understands why you two are this entangled. You two have such an intimate bond and yet have nothing to justify it.

Intellectually, you and Jesse understand that you're both independent entities, and this is also the case in reality and in the eyes of society, so if the other person wants to separate to head onto their own path then they should be allowed to do that. Emotionally though, if you're two halves of a whole (twins) then why should you be apart? You're bound together no matter what. This was an undercurrent in the main story in your struggle of trying to let Jesse go but also being unable to stop yourself from getting involved in his business and wanting to take care of him.

All in all, the current relationship with Jesse can be summed up as you two both being crazily self-sacrificial for each other and the Light and Night writers got me to understand this extreme degree of attachment by cranking the dial all the way to the allusion of being twins LOL. Thanks to the efforts of Jesse's writers, I like him very, very much now, it's just that I like the tropes of the other men more, haha.

I hope this answered your curiosity of my thoughts for him and if you have any further questions, please don't hesitate to ask them!

Of course you can! To talk about my reading of Jesse requires me to talk a bit about myself though, just to give some context of why I look at his character through a certain lens. So, I was definitely one of those "gifted children" (attended university at 16 kind of gifted) and, combined with being a stereotypical INTJ, Capricorn, and having a fear of stagnation, you can probably imagine how much of a driven, logical, and hard-ass "old soul" I was. There's a reason I say I think the most like Evan, haha.

Now, the childhood friend trope is usually an exploration of dependence, of insecurity, and of growth. All of this is somewhat alien to someone who is naturally independent and analyzes themselves and the world around them, so it takes more examples and effort from a writer to get me to relate to these struggles. If I can't reach a place of understanding for why a childhood friend struggles with these things, then that character is a bust for me. 

(Note: this is a personal reading and preference and, ultimately, to each their own.)

So, how did the Light and Night writers convince me on these points for Jesse? Well, I roughly went through three stages of appreciation.

1 - RESOLVING THE PROTECTIVE CHILDHOOD FRIEND

As I mentioned above, childhood friends are usually an exploration of dependence. You grew up together, feel that you know each other best, and you can unconditionally rely on each other. This bond gets strained if the childhood friends are separated and then reunited, but there's still this assumption of familiarity that leads to being proprietary. For example, a childhood friend can or will make decisions on your behalf because they supposedly know you best.

This rankles me so bad LMAO. It's usually what turns me off a childhood friend character right at the start. Light and Night avoided this because the moment Jesse tried to pull that shit in Chapter 11, you call him out and argue him into submission. However, 

 stands out most in my mind because you both rip into each other for all your grievances (real or imagined) and clear the air to reach a new level of honesty. Just as he was overprotective of you, you were equally overprotective of him, but both of you were still seeing each other as that childhood friend in the past.

Chapter 15 led to a permanent change in your relationship with Jesse because, after the fight, you both see each other in a new light. Or more like you see each other as the person you are presently rather than that past childhood friend.

2 - RESOLVING THE INSECURITY OF A CHILDHOOD FRIEND

Moving onto the insecurity of the childhood friend, I get really frustrated when these characters hover around that line they fear crossing because they don't want to risk losing the status quo. However, they still demonstrate jealousy or passive-aggressive actions and this is just very orbiter behavior LOL.

The Light and Night writers convinced me of the legitimacy in Jesse's struggles about this three times though.

First, you are desire itself for Jesse. In his childhood, before he was even conscious of or old enough to understand the concept of romantic and sexual desire he had a dream about you where you nearly kissed him 

. (If he was older, if it weren't for CN censorship, and if it wasn't a sensitive subject about how far otome game male leads can go in showing sexual needs alone, you bet he would have had a wet dream LOL). I wish I can find the tweet that talked about childhood friends and desire again but, anyway, to Jesse your existence is tied into his concept and understanding of desire. The stakes of risking the status quo are already raised this high.

Second, you are somewhat responsible for the identity Jesse locked himself into, because he felt you liked him best only when he portrays himself in a certain way. I really like the monologue here where you realize how much harm words can cause even if you didn't mean them that way 

. No one is truly at fault here, but his obsession with pleasing you (because you are his desire) drove him to do this.

Third, even if you encourage him to just be him, Jesse himself continues to feel the need to be better for you and gets himself all twisted up in that. After reading the main story and his chapter cards up to 

, I really understood why Jesse would think these things, because he's barely been in control of his life up until now and haunted by his quest for revenge and the truth. What kind of future can he offer you as a younger person like this? He's driven to be better and even better for you. Fortunately, catharsis is achieved in that scene and your relationship stabilizes pretty well with most of these classic childhood friend hurdles being cleared.

3 - LIGHT AND NIGHT'S TWIST TO THE CHILDHOOD FRIEND

By now, I was already appreciating all the growth Jesse had gone through but what made me really start to get intrigued by him was all his AU roles because the Light and Night writers dug into many different sides of Jesse and basically never brought up any childhood friend tropes in them.

, and most importantly his Journey to the West card, which haunts me because I feel like it'll make my mind explode with epiphanies if I can get around to reading it, because his role there is the Six-Eared Macaque, generally seen as the other half of Sun Wukong. In the event, Jesse is literally your younger twin and obsessed with you LMAO.

The latest main story, Season 3 Chapter 4, was also very interesting because the writers made it a point to emphasize how you and Jesse have something akin to a 

 and so you're essentially family without actually being family and, in the eyes of society, no one understands why you two are this entangled. You two have such an intimate bond and yet have nothing to justify it.

Intellectually, you and Jesse understand that you're both independent entities, and this is also the case in reality and in the eyes of society, so if the other person wants to separate to head onto their own path then they should be allowed to do that. Emotionally though, if you're two halves of a whole (twins) then why should you be apart? You're bound together no matter what. This was an undercurrent in the main story in your struggle of trying to let Jesse go but also being unable to stop yourself from getting involved in his business and wanting to take care of him.

All in all, the current relationship with Jesse can be summed up as you two both being crazily self-sacrificial for each other and the Light and Night writers got me to understand this extreme degree of attachment by cranking the dial all the way to the allusion of being twins LOL. Thanks to the efforts of Jesse's writers, I like him very, very much now, it's just that I like the tropes of the other men more, haha.

I hope this answered your curiosity of my thoughts for him and if you have any further questions, please don't hesitate to ask them!

hello! i’m aware that xmx isn’t your go-to in terms of tropes and whatnot, but could I ask (especially with your non bias) what you can appreciate about his character arc from your time playing? 

I see that you talk about the other LIs too and was curious to hear of your thoughts :v

Ilinox

Want to ask about Xia MingXing