Shen Yu

Shen Yu is Shen Tang’s younger brother and a newly debuted junior apprentice whose introduction turns a coincidence of surnames into one of the novel’s most consequential family revelations. His resemblance to Shen Tang prompts the investigation that confirms their blood relationship, after which he embraces her with immediate excitement, invites her to return home, and helps restore the family place that had been waiting for her. He is not only a recovered relative: as a novice gamer streamer, an eager companion, and an outspoken protector, he becomes a lively link between Shen Tang’s professional identity, her gaming community, and her renewed ties to the Shen family.

Identity and Introduction

Shen Yu first appears as a newly debuted junior apprentice. The shared surname between him and Shen Tang is initially presented as a coincidence, but Yuan Yuan notices that their eyes look similar, and Shen Yu confirms the observation with a nod. The resemblance gives the reunion a physical starting point: before either sibling can fully claim the relationship, their faces provide the first visible suggestion that the connection is more than chance.

The uncertainty is resolved medically when a doctor confirms that Shen Tang and Shen Yu do have a blood relationship. This confirmation changes Shen Yu’s position from a coincidentally similar junior figure into Shen Tang’s biological younger brother. The revelation also retroactively gives emotional weight to the earlier details of their shared surname and similar eyes, turning ordinary recognition into evidence of a family bond that had been concealed by separation.

Reunion with Shen Tang

Shen Yu responds to the confirmation with intense excitement rather than hesitation. He tells Shen Tang that he never expected her truly to be his sister and immediately asks whether she would come and live in his house. His invitation is supported by a concrete sign of the family’s continued attachment: the household has always kept both Shen Tang’s room and her aunt’s room. The preserved rooms make the reunion more than a newly announced relationship. They show that the absent sister and aunt still occupy a place in the family’s domestic memory.

Shen Yu therefore becomes one of the first members of the Shen family to welcome Shen Tang through action rather than ceremony. He does not treat her as a stranger who must gradually earn acceptance; he addresses her as his sister and offers her a home. His enthusiasm helps turn the blood test’s abstract result into a lived relationship, while his use of familiar family language gives Shen Tang a form of belonging that her earlier isolated life had denied her.

Gaming and Online Life

After dinner, Shen Yu takes Shen Tang to the study and starts a livestream on his computer, revealing that he is a novice gamer streamer. The discovery gives their relationship an immediate shared activity. Shen Tang is already connected to gaming through her own matches and through Miao Miao, who has asked her to play games, so Shen Yu’s streaming identity provides another route for family intimacy rather than a separate hobby detached from the main plot.

Their gaming session places Shen Yu inside a team-based social environment. The two are matched with two girls who mainly play mage and support roles and with a boy who has three jungler heroes. These details establish Shen Yu as a participant in the structured, collaborative world of online play, where identity is expressed through role selection, teamwork, and public performance. His status as a beginner streamer also contrasts with Shen Tang’s greater experience and confidence, allowing the siblings to interact as partners while revealing different levels of familiarity with the game and its online culture.

Shen Yu’s gaming persona also connects him to the wider network around Shen Tang. Shen Tang has previously played with Miao Miao and reacted sharply to poor teamwork when a match stood at 0–3, asking the jungler to gank the bottom lane. She also discovers that Gu Huaian has reached the King rank, though she cannot tell whether he achieved it himself or had his account boosted. Against this background, Shen Yu’s novice-streamer role situates him within the same competitive and communicative medium that shapes Shen Tang’s friendships, public visibility, and interactions with Gu Huaian.

Protection, Teasing, and Conflict

Shen Yu’s attachment to Shen Tang quickly becomes active and protective. When Shen Tang leaves with Gu Huaian, carrying a suitcase downstairs, Shen Yu suddenly appears in the parking lot and provocatively offers to drive her home while glancing at Gu Huaian. The gesture is both practical and competitive: he presents himself as the brother who will accompany and protect Shen Tang, while deliberately making Gu Huaian aware of his presence.

His protectiveness continues when he rushes into Gu Huaian’s home. In another tense situation, Shen Yu waits outside the Zhou Family Residence while Shen Tang remains inside. He is initially worried, but as time passes without her emerging, his anxiety gradually eases. Waiting outside rather than entering the scene places him in the role of an anxious guardian, monitoring Shen Tang’s safety even when he cannot control events within the house.

Shen Yu also supplies information that affects how Shen Tang understands the people around her. He lowers his voice to tell her that, although everyone knows a certain man’s father has money, the wealth actually comes from his mother, whose own father runs a black market and whose mother is described as a mob princess. The revelation shows Shen Yu as a source of informal intelligence: he does not merely accompany Shen Tang, but helps her navigate hidden family and financial backgrounds that may carry danger.

Family Intimacy and Ending Position

By the later stages of the story, Shen Yu’s relationship with Shen Tang has settled into easy physical and verbal familiarity. When he runs out of the house after hearing the car, Shen Tang flicks his forehead and tells him not to spout nonsense. The gesture is corrective but affectionate, expressing the relaxed sibling dynamic that has replaced the uncertainty of their first meeting.

His teasing then turns toward Shen Tang’s relationship with Gu Huaian. Shen Yu asks whether she likes Michael, offers to connect her with him if she calls him brother-in-law, and finally shouts the requested title himself. He follows this performance by asking Shen Tang to send him Gu Huaian’s WeChat. The sequence compresses his roles as younger brother, protective observer, and mischievous intermediary: he tests Gu Huaian through joking provocation while openly acknowledging the possibility of a marital or romantic bond between Shen Tang and Gu Huaian.

Shen Yu’s final narrative importance lies in the way he makes family recovery concrete. The blood test establishes biology, the preserved bedrooms establish belonging, shared gaming establishes everyday companionship, and his repeated interventions establish loyalty. His character develops from an apparently coincidental junior apprentice into a brother who can welcome Shen Tang home, challenge the man beside her, wait anxiously for her return, share private information, and joke about calling Gu Huaian brother-in-law. Through him, Shen Tang’s reunion with the Shen family is not merely a revelation of ancestry but the beginning of an active, playful, and protective sibling relationship.