"Ooh, yes! I love that -- awesome!!! :D :D :D And ha, it makes DQ wanting a human bathroom AND a cat tower make total sense, too -- reflecting his dual Yao nature. \o/"

Eee, yes, DQ gets in on the metaphor too! :D :D (Which made me think of a twitter 'incorrect quote' that gets put on fandom images, "everybody gets to be a metaphor". xD)

"*dies* I can kind of see ZYL being prepared to live with a zillion portraits of his past lives, LOL! But maybe now that SW has the real thing, he's supposed to put away all the sad substitute-pictures? Idk! I feel like this is something they should discuss!"

Oh, yeah, Shen Wei is gonna need to make a decision about that. I'd say he can ditch the photos, but the paintings were painted by him, so they should still be displayed just for how beautiful they are. Or he can store them somewhere more hidden if he likes that better. :)

"-- is DQ using the royal "we" there, I wonder? Or is he extrapolating from his bad feelings?"

I can definitely see how not being able to remember things makes him feel bad and ashamed, so it's easier for him to say that all yao are like that vs having to face his limitations. And he says "I" too, so at first I was thinking it's not a royal "we" per se, but he only says "I" at the very end, so maybe he got gradually closer to accepting that he's talking about himself.

"I mean, if the stakes were very low, and he wasn't being actively mean, it might be fun? But there's no guarantee of the latter. ;-p"

I was going to say that he's rarely mean for no reason, but his reasons can be flimsy af, so yeah, you never know. xD