I agree with everything u said I even called it out about his illness gonna be a way to get her back make her dependent on him again. However I can’t really blame the child cuz he hasn’t actually meet the duke as the duke he’s only seen him in like 2-3 chapters not including this current one where they were alone and they child has no idea who he is or that he and his mother are being held by the duke he just see him as “Mr ghost” but I do fully see where ur coming from. Tho I would like to see more father son bonding. Now the second ml already has a flaw that was presented before the duke even showed back up that’s the dead girl that the duke was supposed to wed and she has no idea about their connection as of now when she will find out who knows if there will be more flaws who knows I wonder
What always weirds me out in these stories is that the kid (who usually hasn’t even been raised by the man or established any deep affection or relationship) will pressure the mom to go back to their controlling/abusive/toxic father. I get that the tragic heroine moms don’t usually tell the kid about the gory details, but if you meet someone that your mom who raised you from birth really dislikes or seems fearful of, you’re not going to randomly side with Mr. Ghost who played ball with you like4 times. The mentality is like “I know this guy makes you really uncomfortable and there seems to be a lot of traumatic baggage, but he was nice to me on five different occasions, so I’m going to cry and/or make sad eyes and/or act out if you try to leave, therefore guilting you to stay with the toxic guy so my heart can randomly be fulfilled by a father figure who occasionally interacts with my while viewing you, the woman who worked herself to the bone to raise me well while running/hiding from him as a possession”. Authors who write these kind of dynamics usually won’t be bothered with character development or the legitimate process of atonement, so the fl can’t be too strong willed in the end, have any sense of pride/self worth, or require genuine change from the ml, otherwise the relationship is impossible without blatant confinement or coercion. The insistence of the kid just serves as another pressure point to force the fl back to the ml without addressing issues adequately because he’s “changed now”. The sole purpose of Demian’s illness is to limit her freedom and generate a medical dependency that the ml can exploit to keep her in place but also magically fix since he’s rich and has a lot of resources. The second ml that fl has leaned on during/after drama and trauma caused by the ml will often develop a random severe character flaw that doesn’t really make sense compared to the rest of their behavior, but inevitably pushes the fl back to ml who magically arrived just in time to save/fix everything to prove he’s different now (without genuinely repenting or earning forgiveness)