After a while every "subheroine" gets a bit of a redemtion. Kotaris stepsister, Azusa gets it after he gets dumped and realises that Kotaro always cared for her and was her brother in the truest sense. Kirari, the former best friend after a wake up call from Kotaro, realises that he was a fool trying to self deny herself and with that process what truly is lost. At the moment the childhood friend Yuzukis redemption is still nowhere but I feel like she gonna get one too. And thats fine with me, but till today the only one thats got an acceptable end is Azusa only.

The story in my point of wiev for so far to them is like:

- Azusa: after experiencing the indifference towards her and the broken heart, she gradually recovers thanks to Kotaro and Shiho, then get pulled back to doubts (that sceene really made my heart hurt considering I have siblings to), and in the end she makes a "clean" break with Ryuzaki, and hopefully have a nice life. This is what I think is an acceptable ending for her

- Kirari: after Kotaro wake her up in the cultural festival (forcefull method aside), she finally realized shes not need to cling to Ryuzaki for affection and perfectly fine of how she is both with before and with now. Her merging personality is not a bad idea in my eyes, but theres a fatal flaw. Namely: When she realized that she was enjoyed her time back in middle school because Kotaro is by her side, that hinted more of romantic feelings than simple feelings of friendship. And even the author affirmed this in the "break up" sceene with Kotaro. Thats why I cant accept her saying what she said for Ryuzaki, essentially picking him up. I not have a problem with her helping him, the problem is the sentence she said to him. That "No matter what you do, I will always love you" is feels kind of forced to her. Its like the author trying to sacrifice her just to get somewhere with the characterdevelopment. And honestly that makes your stomach twist. I really feelt her pain when she was ignored back then, and her sadnes when she realised her feelings and came to her "self", but after all that to make her a convinience again is just like saying: okay, thank you, you are great, but time to go back to your original role. It felt that she just got a mashed up personality of how she was in middle and highschool, a bit more matured, but ultimatly she was tossed back to where she was. So I ask then: what was the point of making a redemption to her. Azusa got a clear break of but she not. And I am afraid that the same gonna happen to Yuzuki. The author somehow make her overcome her dependency problem, but still tossing her back to Ryoma.

Speaking of the antagonist Ryuzaki: Hes a total mess. Its interesting seeing her character development, but if the author planning to leave one of the so called subheroines in his side then its a massivly bad idea. Why? Because simply speaking hes not reliable. Thats show exactly when Kotaro tryes to talk to him about the girls, but he refuses to listen because of his pride and superiority complex. When he calls the girls Kotaro's hand-me-downs that was the point where I felt: why the hell did I ever want a normal ending for him to. And that pride shows earlier too. When shiho talks to him to get back on his feet and act like he used to. He always remembers of what Kotaro said to him but only accept them when Shiho is the on that says it to him. The same as when Kirari comfronts him. The inability to listen to anyone, even if the other person is someone he hates for the sake of his "loved" ones is a massive problem. Even when she "helps" Shiho and Kotaro, after realizing what he can do there is a hint of a bit of arrogance in him.

The other thing that irked me in him is: He and Kotaro are essentially the same. Different but albeit the same circumtances (like for example Ryuzaki lost her family members, while Kotaro not get affection from her mother, making them essentially a same without familyal support) but still as I can progressed with the chapters I honestly can only see Kotaro in a far better person than him. Ryuzaki has that superpower like charm that literally make a person change in a split second, while Kotaro has a level of empathy that really made me want to cry sometimes. So yeah sometimes it felt like Ryuzaki is just a convinient excuse.

And speaking of Kotaro: he too is a bit flaved. Theres no "perfect" protagonist, but when he said he had special feelings for the subheroines but not love I actually accepted it, until the Kirari memory part. If her change is shocked him so much that he had a bad feeling then that is clearly like. The same with the Yuzuki part. Azusa is only loved by him as a little sister so in her part its understandable.

The other annoying aspect is the subcharacter Mary. She helped when the MC is in pain, but at least her story is finished. But shes stil get pulled back and I dont se the reason why. Shes not changed after what happened and while the other subcharacter that "planned to be" Kotaros other love interest left to who knows where she is still here.

The protagonist, self-styled "mob", can't spend a whole page without over monologuing, feels like 20 to 30% of the history is him rambling about something he said over three times last five minutes.

His sister/childhood friend/"best friend" couldn't be more caricaturesque bad, they barely exist in the history, the moment they saw the 'MC' they just ghosted the MC and said they would never have any relationship with any other man so the guy could appeal to the guy, his step-sister, in particular, barely ever sleeps in their own house and forbids the MC to talk they are related.

The 'harem-MC' has that plot armor on his for everything except the main heroine and acts like an a**hole

The heroine character and personality are also weak IMO

Mary's arc sucks something fierce and had no right to go on for as long as it did. 20 chapters would have sufficed for this smelly turd of a story. Mary as a character also pissed me off so much, she is one of the few antagonists in a non action story whom I actually wish death upon. She really is that bad.

Kirari and yuzuki eventually still liked Ryoma with Azusa leaving due to her twisted childhood and portrayal of him. She let go and I really Applaud her with that. Now that leaves us with 2 heroines, Yuzuki and Kiraria.

Yuzuki seems fine because she's the least developed character shes the epitome of a hand me down heroine (literally what Ryoma called them). Her past is meh typical sad heroine. Her connection with the MC is superficial at best

Kirari should have deserved better. Her entire character has been wasted because of this. I love her as a character she matured throughout the novel, admitting she changed too much for the sake of one person who can not even reciprocate or tell them. BUT EVEN THAT, she still came back to liking Ryoma like WHAT???. My brain exploded after that.

You know the irony is there is one moment when Shiho confronted the pink hair girl about her superficial feelings with the MC (TLDR this an Arc in itself but pink hair 'liked' koutaro because something is making her like him once ryoma try one good thing about the pink hair she immediately fallen in love with Ryoma making question her feelings with koutaro and is ambushed by Shiho) Shiho literally says to her that Yes Love will be irrational but everyone falls in love with a reason. Human will always rationalise their decision. As such, why did Kirari like Ryoma. Azuda realised her feelings about her brother complex. Yuzuki herself says that she likes Ryomas naivety. But what about kirari. They literally didn't explain it properly. Is it because her personality of being persistent and determined? NO..... author should have just let Kirari leave the harem group as well and find her own love. letting Ryoma with just Yuzuki

Additionally, Koutaros' behaviour during the Mary Arc and afterwards was very much insufferable

The character comparing themselves and their situation to LN romcoms is part of the problem that gets solved later. It was intentional to have the character think that way. Kirari and Azusa arcs were pretty good. Kirari tackles of the issue of being true to yourself while Azusa tackles the idea of replacing a lost loved one and the pain of turndown and moving forward past her heartbreak.

Kotaro's arcs were also pretty nice too, tackling mainly on self-worth and growing out of the romcom perspective and negative viewpoint

Also characters like Yuzuki really needed more fleshing out, I know her character development was brought about by Ryouma (since she is framed as the central heroine for Ryouma's "story", her character development is more or less off-screen which is why Kotaro left it to him to fix her arc/problem), but quite frankly it's still the weakest, just chalking it up to "she has a strong core" in the end, the other two "main" heroine arcs were better. It probably would've been better if she had a big "fall" arc too like the two (probably tackle on that personality of her wanting to be needed but it seems like Ryouma already fixed that during those off-screen moments, at least for now. It would be interesting if Ryouma didn't choose her and chose Kirari though, I can picture the author making scenarios about it). I think Shimotsuki herself could also needs a better fleshing out too. She's a bit too "developed", leaving only little to expect something more from her and whenever there's a development for her, the pace is kind of rushed.