It's been a few years since I read this and I still dislike the open ending and the fact that Kou's previous lover was the grandpa. It leaves such a bad taste in my mouth. Especially since it feels like he fell for Shirou particularly because of his resemblance to his grandpa. It was most likely a subconscious thing for him. Shirou should at least not have looked like the splitting image of his grandpa to make this less weird.
Poor Shirou also never got the closure that he needed about Kou potentially using him as a replacement to his grandpa.
This should have been longer to show us Kou's perspective after he goes back and breaks it off with the grandpa. That was one of the biggest plot points of the story and it didn't make sense how it was never shown and the manga ended.
The manga should have ended in Kou's perspective and not Shirou's. Kou finding his way back to Kikujirou and cleanly breaking it off with with him by telling him he has found someone to love, who loves him back and trying to find his way back to Shirou. End it there as an open ending and the entire replacement thing is resolved at the very LEAST. That ending was frankly shit. It resolved absolutely nothing.
Open endings are fine but this is TOO open. It essentially glosses over a lot of plot points to resolve nothing for the sake of a 'sad' ending.
It's been a few years since I read this and I still dislike the open ending and the fact that Kou's previous lover was the grandpa. It leaves such a bad taste in my mouth. Especially since it feels like he fell for Shirou particularly because of his resemblance to his grandpa. It was most likely a subconscious thing for him. Shirou should at least not have looked like the splitting image of his grandpa to make this less weird.
Poor Shirou also never got the closure that he needed about Kou potentially using him as a replacement to his grandpa.
This should have been longer to show us Kou's perspective after he goes back and breaks it off with the grandpa. That was one of the biggest plot points of the story and it didn't make sense how it was never shown and the manga ended.
The manga should have ended in Kou's perspective and not Shirou's. Kou finding his way back to Kikujirou and cleanly breaking it off with with him by telling him he has found someone to love, who loves him back and trying to find his way back to Shirou. End it there as an open ending and the entire replacement thing is resolved at the very LEAST. That ending was frankly shit. It resolved absolutely nothing.
Open endings are fine but this is TOO open. It essentially glosses over a lot of plot points to resolve nothing for the sake of a 'sad' ending.