i should've read the comments first before diving into the story, honestly im disappointed...

The inner vs outer age part wasn't want got me; it's that everyone else ships it but him. The adults around really push it and I really hoped it wasn't endgame. Since you won't be continuing, I will spoil from spoilers I read to fully cement it for you.

Yes, as far as the spoilers we're at the time, they are endgame. Arthur isn't the only one reborn; both (elf princess forgot her name) and his best friend from the academy were in a love triangle in their past lives and best friend turned into a villain for it. And there is a point in this war (I was just checking where it was so it may have already happened or is about to happen) where she asks Arthur to stay with her when he should be somewhere else; he agrees and his father dies because he isn't there. Once I read that spoiler, I lost interest in reading anything else.

I don't like her and he tried his best to reject her as children. If they really wanted the romance, they should have waited until during this war or after fighting together in it. Because who she was as a child will be different from who she is as an adult. That's how anyone works; well, there are people who don't change at all from a part of their childhood or teenage years but that's normally not seen as a good thing. Arthur didn't love her when they were children but with the external pressure, the past life triangle, and their proximity for most of the story, I don't buy Arthur falls in love with her at all.

Sorry for being ranty. No one IRL has attempted to read this and I can't recommend it so I hadn't had the opportunity to get this off my chest.

yes i agree that the external factor especially the adults influenced the idea to arthur when he clearly stated that he doesn't want to date children on his age. but if they really want to push the romance plot they should've atleast made the female lead more likeable. the romance plot could've executed better. i want to see someone who can be at the level of arthur or just strong enough to be an actual help for him. not a selfish and immature one, i understand that the female lead is still young but she's a princess, she should've atleast have the mindset of someone who can make rational decision.

from my perspective, the female characters in the story feels bland and either they're just fillers who doesn't have impact on the story or another romance candidate for the mc. i don't see any old female characters who has an impact on the mc's growth, i could name few ones such as his mother, the twim horns, and the academy headmaster. especially the children on his age, i understand that arthur is a genius and the gap between the other characters are big. but the story could've portrayed the female characters better, so far the storyline always introduce a character just to end up as another romance candidate with no actual personality and a damsel in distress.

i also notice that arthur doesn't really have a friend at all. there's the black haired one, he's strong but not enough to be on par or atleast can be an actual help to the mc to achieve his goal. i don't really feel any special bond between them, especially if the mc keep him as a friend. they could've focus more on the mc's growth and made characters that are really helpful and supportive. instead they only use these characters just to emphasize how different the mc compared to them.

i could've say more but i just want to also get this off my chest. this has been on my mind since i read the story. i realized that the romance plot is not my only issue. tbate is a good story, they could've made it better tho.

Thank you for giving me a sign to drop this manhwa, I do love reading tbate but I can't bring myself to read the part where his father die and his best friend become a villain. Yes I will leave this here and won't continue this anymore.

I agree. The female characters are bland. Unfortunately, that happens a lot in shounen-type storylines. It happens differently in shoujo, where a competent MC suddenly is hit with the dumb-dumb stick because she met the ML. I feel they couldn't redeem the princess at some point (she definitely needed growth off screen and then make a reappearance scenario) but the other female characters who got to show a glimmer of strength could have had a chance to be better.

The whole thing about the romance reminds me of the Artemis Fowl books and the Danny Phantom cartoon (showing my age here.)

The former had a boy protagonist who is super smart and villain turned antihero foiled against an accomplished female cop equivalent who eventually befriends him. Big age gap there due to the latter being an elf but due to pressure on the author, he did make a magic scenario that made them age up and down respectively to be more appropriate and it didn't work. He admitted he had no idea how to write romance before he did it, he satisfied the fans, and he kept the plot moving as if it didn't happen...but still strong friendship so people still ship it, whether he likes it or not.

Danny Phantom was about a boy who turns half ghost and fights ghosts back to the ghostzone. He had a male and female best friend and honestly, the creator shafted them both but, well, he couldn't write a romance either. He shoehorned in Danny with his female best friend before the end when there was another character who he had better chemistry with. This character started off snobby before going into a revenge plot. She didn't figure out he was a half ghost but she really started to open up to him when he was normal. She had adapted to fighting ghosts and contained that strong, equal female feel you were talking about.

So sometimes, we find out too late that an author can't write a romance to save their lives. Just like a romance writer can struggle with action scenes or authors placing characters in a professional setting where the plot doesn't make sense (lawyers and medical dramas are notorious for this; so many laws broken.)

I was kind of hoping Arthur would lean more into the strength and weakness of having a family but we aren't going to get that. Like you pointed out, he doesn't really have friends. I didn't notice because I operate on having a couple close friends and some acquaintances, which is biting me in the *ss a little as an adult, not going to lie. But Arthur was always going to have that problem because of his past life.

The argument could be made that if reincarnation exists, we forget our past lives so we aren't chained to it. It weighs him down, despite the head start it gave him in his second life. He had some life lessons he missed, sure, but he doesn't make as many mistakes growing up, which opens him up to making even bigger ones down the road. It's the same problem "perfect" students have because they don't know how to cope with failure. Arthur knows what to expect with the failures from his past life but not how it will cost him in this one (pointing directly to his father dying.)

And I totally understand rants to get something off the chest. I end up doing a lot of them. So if no one ever responds, I know it was TL; DR. Most of the typing is for me and it serves 80-90% of the purpose just from posting.