Interesting. This started out as a cozy winter story and turned into something resembling a thriller imo. It actually got increasingly more concerning and dark as the story progressed, in a good way, it kept me on my toes. Say what you will about the character design, but the ML from the start had something unnerving about him and it was drawn well enough for me to notice early on. With each interaction and day, I was wondering if he's truly just careful and considerate or if there's something more beneath the surface, and indeed, color me kinda surprised, he has a neurological condition resembling ASPD to an extent with his lack of empathy (the eye for an eye accident) and impulse control. The garage door left me with some ambiguity - was that the expression of the ML's destructive tendencies? Pent up feelings he couldn't quite process? Just a boar? Someone who was really messing with them? The power outage was due to weather, but it could've been something else. I like how uncertain it all is and how, the more you read, the more you start to wonder. Said uncertainty, in the middle of a snow storm, both underlines the MC's anxiety, and the ML's experience of the world, and additionally, their relationship as two strangers who have yet to find out who they are and what they can expect from each other. That scene with the gun - absolute cinema! The fact we couldn't clearly see the boar also added to the uncertainty. Almost like the ML was the only one who could read the situation through the limited scope of the gun, just like how he sees and feels the world with his own limitation, navigating through a narrow scope. I wouldn't have guessed this story would get that suspenseful, and it did, and it was wonderful.
On a side note, it's nice to see the portrayal of someone with lack of empathy as trying his best to be accommodating and understanding with the tools he has and what he was taught by his grandpa. He has better communication skills than your regular neurotypical ML, and better impulse control, or should I say awareness and boundaries around it, even, despite having an underdeveloped frontal lobe. He tries his best as to not fuck it up and that's what counts. I think the story is way too short given these character backgrounds. I would've liked to see more of the ML's upbringing and how he managed to build his own cognitive moral compass and behavioral code as to function in society without his lack of impulse control and emotional scope harming others, even unintentionally. I would've loved to see how someone so timid and emotionally attuned to himself like the MC would get romantically involved with someone on the ASPD spectrum. Damn, this has so much potential. Side stories won't do it justice imo.
Interesting. This started out as a cozy winter story and turned into something resembling a thriller imo. It actually got increasingly more concerning and dark as the story progressed, in a good way, it kept me on my toes. Say what you will about the character design, but the ML from the start had something unnerving about him and it was drawn well enough for me to notice early on. With each interaction and day, I was wondering if he's truly just careful and considerate or if there's something more beneath the surface, and indeed, color me kinda surprised, he has a neurological condition resembling ASPD to an extent with his lack of empathy (the eye for an eye accident) and impulse control. The garage door left me with some ambiguity - was that the expression of the ML's destructive tendencies? Pent up feelings he couldn't quite process? Just a boar? Someone who was really messing with them? The power outage was due to weather, but it could've been something else. I like how uncertain it all is and how, the more you read, the more you start to wonder. Said uncertainty, in the middle of a snow storm, both underlines the MC's anxiety, and the ML's experience of the world, and additionally, their relationship as two strangers who have yet to find out who they are and what they can expect from each other. That scene with the gun - absolute cinema! The fact we couldn't clearly see the boar also added to the uncertainty. Almost like the ML was the only one who could read the situation through the limited scope of the gun, just like how he sees and feels the world with his own limitation, navigating through a narrow scope. I wouldn't have guessed this story would get that suspenseful, and it did, and it was wonderful.
On a side note, it's nice to see the portrayal of someone with lack of empathy as trying his best to be accommodating and understanding with the tools he has and what he was taught by his grandpa. He has better communication skills than your regular neurotypical ML, and better impulse control, or should I say awareness and boundaries around it, even, despite having an underdeveloped frontal lobe. He tries his best as to not fuck it up and that's what counts. I think the story is way too short given these character backgrounds. I would've liked to see more of the ML's upbringing and how he managed to build his own cognitive moral compass and behavioral code as to function in society without his lack of impulse control and emotional scope harming others, even unintentionally. I would've loved to see how someone so timid and emotionally attuned to himself like the MC would get romantically involved with someone on the ASPD spectrum. Damn, this has so much potential. Side stories won't do it justice imo.