I agree and disagree with you. For the other guardians and heirs, backstories seemed kinda warranted because you had seen those characters for a long time and there were actual hints about their pasts.
But Chen and Alex? I havent seen a single person who actually gives 2 shits about Chen. He's prolly gonna be revealed to not be the real bad guy and all (my own prediction not a spoiler) but tbh i couldn't care less about him, he just seems like a dick in general. Alex seems mildly cool ig but he doesn't seem all that interesting.
Hopefully this backstory lasts another 2-3 chapters at most and we get to the main plot soon. More than likely though this backstory will prolly have the most to do with the main plot (why does chen hate xin so much? who roped him into this/ who works with him to make the tattoo?) but at the moment it's not rly making anyone care. Imma choose to trust the author on this one and hope for the best.
Tbh yes it's getting a bit frustrating , we're exploring too much of side characters juicy past while we know very little about Xin and Lau. Like lau has an edgy personality but he deeply cares about Xin More like tsundre so why would he leave him ? Xin and his dynamics with his family ? Why he's Still suffering in this tower alone ? What made him all isolated ? Also I think Xin has a bit darker side when it comes to Lau .
So much to explore but we're still muddling our way through these side characters uhggg , I have no particular problem getting a bit sidetracked but Oh well..
Dont i love when a story just forgets the main characters and spreads out so much that you get to read about everyone and their detailed backstories yet you still know nothing about main characters. I must admit that i absolutely do not care about chen or his guardian and i find it hard to care about their backstory when story gave me no reason to do.
Why we have to get through every character & get burned out until we actually see xin and explore the true plot?