Ml isn't particularly a red or black flag. He aint technically toxic either. The wrong thing he did was that he's neglectful. For 5 years he ignored mc. The sex was as transactional as the contract. He specially ignored all the "weird" signs too cause he can't be bothered. Like mc being too skinny, the blindfolds, binds, and more.
And what made me realize why I like the "redemption arc" is that mc did exactly what was done to him unconsciously. He practically ignored every single groveling the ml did, cause heck he can't be bothered feeling sorry for ml. He also just give dry transactional replies with a lil jab here and there.
Lil spoiler here, it also took them atleast 5 years till they finally married. So in a way we got the reverse of what happened to mc in the story
Ml isn't particularly a red or black flag. He aint technically toxic either. The wrong thing he did was that he's neglectful. For 5 years he ignored mc. The sex was as transactional as the contract. He specially ignored all the "weird" signs too cause he can't be bothered. Like mc being too skinny, the blindfolds, binds, and more.
And what made me realize why I like the "redemption arc" is that mc did exactly what was done to him unconsciously. He practically ignored every single groveling the ml did, cause heck he can't be bothered feeling sorry for ml. He also just give dry transactional replies with a lil jab here and there.
Lil spoiler here, it also took them atleast 5 years till they finally married. So in a way we got the reverse of what happened to mc in the story