Cycles of abuse

I've had a look at the raws and it is only going to get rougher from here on out.

It's sad to see the cycles of abuse in this. Suyeon was so desperate for Gyeol's affection that he developed masochist tendencies at Gyeol's instruction. Even if Suyeon had underlying masochist traits it was Gyeol who weaponised them against him before tossing him aside and moving to America. Gyeol doesn't love Suyeon he just is jealous that his toy has found someone else.

Suyeon has now done to Yunho what Gyeol did to him, drawing out his BDSM tendencies only to abandon him. It's clear that Suyeon is full of self-loathing, at the end of chapter 42 he feels he doesn't deserve Yunho and in 43 he acknowledges that Yunho was his first real relationship which means on some level he knows that what he has with Gyeol is just lust and that Gyeol is using him. Suyeon does love Yunho as was evidenced by his art piece and his feeling of disgust when with Gyeol, but Suyeon only feels alive when he's in pain and he knows that Yunho is averse to being the one to inflict the pain for fear of going too far and seriously hurting Suyeon. I think Suyeon sees himself as corrupting Yunho in the same way that Gyeol corrupted him into associating pain with love.

Unfortunately, Yunho is also trapped in the cycle of abuse because in order to be the master Suyeon wants, he's willing to subject himself to the pain of seeing Gyeol and Yunho sleep together. The worst part is, Gyeol is very affectionate with Suyeon in chapters 53 and 54 which only fucks with Suyeon and Yunho even more because Suyeon is reacting to Gyeol's affection and not just to the BDSM.

I think chapter 1 gives away where the plot is going. Yunho reflects on what his father told him "So even when someone hurts us, we should find a way to forgive and trust the person rather than blaming them" and realises that he has trusted Suyeon too easily. Yunho will continue to hurt and blame himself for not being enough and Suyeon will continue to self-loathe and choose lust over love. It's going to end badly for Suyeon though because he will lose Yunho and once there's no competition Gyeol will leave him again.

The worst part is that if Suyeon had only have been able to convince Yunho that he trusts that Yunho wouldn't truly hurt him and that he had no lingering feelings for Gyeol then things might have turned out well because they were compatible in terms of being masochist and sadist. Unfortunately, Suyeon has never gotten over Gyeol and has fallen into the same old cycle.

I'm interested to see what eventually causes Yunho to break and what his actions are, I don't think he murders anyone as he would be in jail and not a therapist's office, but it must be something pretty bad. I think it's going to get much worse before it gets better and if season 2 is 28 chapters like season 1 was then we are probably coming up on the season 2 cliff hanger in chapter 56.