hate him

Why though? I find him cute in a puppy/kitten way. It's pretty clear that he liked her from the start, but not knowing how to express it he did what most kids do in that situation, pick on/fight the other kid lol.

Then, by the time he realized he was being stupid, their relationship was already rivals and he had no way to fix it. So, he cares for her from the shadows, since he doesn't want to accidentally break off their relationship completely by suddenly changing how he acts around her and scaring her off, which is fair. You'd be freaked too if someone you'd been at your wits end with suddenly started flirting with you. Or you would think it was a joke/some new sick way to torment you.

So now he's had to spend years, from whenever he realized he liked her, lamenting how stupid his younger self was for immediately picking a fight with her. It's also pretty clear that he's got it bad for her, which just means he's suffering even more lol.

You're the kind of person that excuses abusive behaviour by saying "he just likes her but he doesn't know how to show it". He is older than her for fuck's sake he should be able to use the little burnt brain cells he has left to demonstrate it in a nicer way.
I am sick of seeing straight up abusive language and actions being forgiven for the sake of one's definition of love. This is a poorly written romance manga that you should never take as an example of what a good relationship should be.
So don't be stupid and naive, you still have time to do some inner reflexction and let your brain grow, your answer has made me concerned for your values and mental state.

You're clearly the type of person who can't understand others and has trouble with empathy. He hasn't been abusive to her in the slightest. Did he ever curse her out? No. Did he ever emotionally torment her? No. Did he ever emotionally or physically isolate her from others? Hell no. Has he ever threatened her? No. Was there physical violence? Yes, but she never felt threatened by him since it was a competition. They have a friendly rivalry. Frankly, if he had treated her well his fans probably would have bullied her given how rabid they seemed.

I am somewhat forgiving of characters who don't know how to express their feelings well because I had the same issue. I was psychologically bullied, emotionally isolated, and an outcast at an all-girl school, and when I moved to a co-ed school I felt intimidated by even the most nerdy guys. My stupid young brain's answer to this was to just make all the guys I interacted with fear me (or act like they did) instead. I essentially became Taiga from Toradora. I elbowed my boyfriend whenever I felt embarrassed, but he's an M and we're still together years after I got over that phase. We talked about it and he admitted that he would deliberately egg me on to get me to punch him since he knew that was me showing affection, he could have stopped me physically if he wanted to, and now that I don't do it anymore he misses it. We've been together for over half a decade.

I'm not naive, you're just jaded. You're too cynical to understand that being bad at communication doesn't necessarily make you a bad person and that fighting doesn't always mean abuse. All I see from him is an awkward boy who doesn't know how to approach his crush, so he finds a different way to get her attention. I've seen that go poorly for the guy in that situation many times in real life, and in some cases it can develop into bullying, but that's not what's happening here. If you want to be angry at and hate an ML read one where the ML is a yandere or a cheating bastard. I've seen the trauma and personality effects that real abuse can have on people through my mom, who was abused by her father and is extremely paranoid as a result. Any criticism is seen as an attack and any compliment is seen as a trap. This girl is nothing like that.

I don't know what you've been through that's made you like this, but it's not an excuse to treat other people like shit. Stop being condescending to me and have a proper conversation rather than immediately calling the people who don't agree with you stupid like an ignorant asshole.

At this point i just think you're projecting your flaws into him, that's why you're acting like his defense lawyer. Regarding the ml in this story, he has done nothing but undermining her efforts, disrespect her and hurt her, these actions are the formula for abuse, so if your mother was really a victim of it, i suggest you become more informed in this, after all being ignorant would be a slap in the face to your mother.
Also, if you are going to keep giving details about your uninteresting life, please stop doing so for i only care about opinions regarding the manga.

bro chill out this is literally almost every manga trope to exist out there.... it aint that deep and this is fiction. if you are so angry with the story and literally knowing she would never kill ml, why do you still continue to read it...??

dont let yourself suffer just drop and story and find a better one you like.

I initially just wanted to know why you hated him to the point of hoping he would die. All I did was ask why you thought that way and give an analysis of his character, but then you attacked me personally and acted like a know-it-all. I was respectful to you and expected to be treated the same way. Rather than coming up with a rational counter-argument, you decided to insult me repeatedly. You've clearly never been taught how to respect others as human beings or win an argument without just insulting the other person, so I'm just going to ignore your insults.

You wanted to talk about the manga? Sure. Here are several paragraphs on it. Have fun.

I don't see how he disrespected her or undermined her efforts. He's just blunt, which shows more respect to her as his rival because he doesn't sugar-coat things. If she does something that's dangerous and stupid he'll tell her it was dangerous and stupid. That's what friends and people who actually care about you do. If nobody's ever done that for you, you're either not human because you never make mistakes, were a spoiled brat, or any friend you've ever had was fake or thought exactly like you.

She's also never been hurt by him emotionally. Sure he talks shit to her, but only because he knows she won't take it to heart or feel lesser about herself for it. Instead of being hurt, she gets angry and fights back. And when she fights back she's attempting to win against him, not lashing out in reaction to being emotionally hurt. She's competitive by nature. Different people in her situation might be hurt by what he did, but those other people aren't her so that doesn't matter here. The only effect his egging on has had on her is motivating her to get stronger so she can finally beat him. That is the opposite of a toxic or destructive relationship. He's complimented her for her mental strength multiple times. He doesn't let other people insult her either. He might tease her, but he still respects her.

She's strong, but also a bit dense. She's even admitted to herself that when she looks back on their time at the academy, despite them constantly being at odds with each other, he helped her quite a few times. She just thought he was antagonizing her at the time since she was too caught up in her rivalry with him. Relationships depend on context, and what hurts you might not her someone else. What doesn't hurt you might hurt someone else too. If he let her win against him on purpose to "avoid hurting her", she'd probably feel destroyed and that he wasn't taking her or her efforts seriously. Holding back against her would be undermining her efforts.

Also, even if you ignore all that, what do you mean "he's done nothing but"? Does nearly dying to take down a group targeting her not count as doing something? He wasn't ordered to do that. He volunteered to take on a dangerous job that could get him killed to take out the threat sooner to protect her. And he wasn't trying to guilt her by doing that either, since she wouldn't have found out if she hadn't been called to return the necklace with his protection placed on it so he could recover. He didn't intend to tell her at all. Actual abusers don't take self-sacrificing actions, and to the extent that they do, they make damn sure the one they're abusing knows they "did it for them" and will hold it above their victim's head to guilt them and make it hard for the victim to cut off the relationship. Abusers act like they care about their victim only to manipulate the victim's feelings and make the victim feel like they can't be without the abuser, or that they would be a horrible person for leaving the abuser. They destroy the victim's self-confidence and will to fight against them or leave them and isolate them. They do not do nice things for their victim without the victim's knowledge, because they have nothing to gain. A pop culture example off the top of my head would be Mother Gothel from Tangled as an example of a parent/guardian abuser of this type. More narcissistic examples in a romantic relationship/friendship would be the manwhas "I'm the Ex-Girlfriend of a Soldier" where the pre-transmigration FL was miserable but still in love with the hero or how the original pre-previous life memories FL was treated by her brother in "The Villainess is a Marionette," or any story with a yandere male lead (I'm tired of people claiming yanderes aren't abusers).

This girl on the other hand has boundless self-confidence and doesn't feel danger or get scared because of his presence or interactions with her. She doesn't get discouraged by her repeated losses against him and feels absolutely no guilt when insulting him, until she finds out he risked his life for her. He was upset that she was called and saw him in that state because he didn't want her to feel guilty. She shows zero signs of having been abused psychologically. Whether something is classified as abuse or not is determined by the "victim" and the intentions of the alleged abuser. The question is whether or not the alleged victim has been negatively impacted psychologically by the actions of the alleged abuser, whether the victim realizes it or not. In the case of a victim not being negatively affected (just getting annoyed) but there is clear intent on the part of the abuser to cause harm, that is called harassment.

I recognize that there are other forms of abuse, but this seems to be the one you are attempting to pin on him so the others aren't relevant to my point. Instead of just saying it "follows the formula for abuse" give some examples and evidence. I care more about scientifically supported theories than baseless opinions and hollow advice, and frankly more people should.

All that aside, regardless of how much you wish she'd kill him, that's not going to happen in a shoujo. They're going to end up together. They'll probably have some fake-out Romeo and Juliet tragedy ending before that with the foreshadowing that's happened in the last few chapters. Don't exhaust yourself by being angry at fictional characters.

man this started as a joke, idk why this person is so pressed they wanna be the guardian angel of a shitty manga character

I can't believe i am even saying this but believe this is the last time i answer your bullshit holier than thou, delusional analysis of my words. I want you to put yourself on the female lead shoes, and ask yourself if you would see the male lead in the same light if you had to endure the same treatment she had to go through. Maybe then you would see that the obvious disrespect practised by the ml only works because the fl is a poorly written, one dimensional character that is easy to project yourself into, so in this idiotic context, she would "need" this type of brutish and arogant love interest to "grow" as a person.
Or maybe you won't, because, like you said, you actually relate with this tumor of a character. In that case i am so happy that you found a manga perfectly written for people like you :)
Also, just to be clear, whenever i used offensive language either to the character or to you, it wasn't an insult really, i was simply stating facts, that could be easily inferred if you had actually read the manga or heard yourself talk.
Hope you and the stick up your ass have a lovely time here byeee <3

If you don't like it, don't read it and don't comment about it as if you're better than everyone else. Let the rest of us who actually want to enjoy manga do so. You have zero reading comprehension too since I addressed all of that before. Am I being childish for getting so angry? Probably. You have a skill for infuriating people, and it's impressive. You remind me of bullies that made me want to kill myself. I hope nobody ever loves you and that you go to hell cunt <3.

shii sorry for whatever you're going thru rn.... ig the other party is a little bit too much defending it