Where’s the romance?

Oh they do have many awww(imo) moments. Ch. 83 for example. But Caesar here is.... Emotionally quite far removed from other human beings due to his shitty upbringing. A bit similar to Ilay but I'd say his is worse. Ilay has a 'normal' human family afaik from the manhwa version. Just Ilay himself is abnormal. Caesar doesn't and could've been normal child otherwise, I feel. (Would be spoilers ro say more than this.) Ah, but they share their monstrous strength and "stamina" though. But my impressions on them could be wrong tho. My memory isn't perfect. I guess you should continue reading...

They have minimal cute moments but they're usually overshadowed by the disgusting shit ML pulls. Just like the recent chapter, the cute stuff comes after his shitty actions so the author can go ''look guys!! they're cute!! it's not rape and MC isn't traumatized!!!''

MC just learns to live with it because if he has his own opinions or goals, he'll get raped until he can't and if he runs away he'll get shot AND raped.

I’ve read those comments where he shot and raped him and that’s why I’m genuinely curious about their “cute” or romantic moments because like I mentioned, I’ve read those other novels and I can’t imagine either Ilay or Zhenya doing something like that to their love interests once they became a couple (all the ugly shit they did was before they realized their feelings). It seems that Ceasar did all this after they were in an established relationship and already “in love”?

Yeah ML does pretty much hurt and rape MC whenever he behaves in a way that he doesn't like and MC never gets a proper conclusion or revenge, it just gets swept under the rug and gets forgiven because consequences? who that?

The cute moments are just ML treating MC like a normal human being or spending some dollars on him.

He does want to get married but he drugs and rapes MC for however long because MC had past lovers.

He loves MC but he has no problem using him as a pawn or letting others hurt him if it benefits him at the end.

He loves him death and slits his own throat to show his ''regret'' but it's more of a manipulation tactic like ''I hurt myself for you, don't you feel bad for me? don't you pity me?''

Ofc all of this gets forgiven and erased because ''ML is sooo tragic guysss he's sooo sad he was never taught loveeeee'' even though he's a grown ass man who knows what he's doing is bad.

Thank you for your reply.

Everything you wrote sounds awful, but I’m not hating.

When I asked about cute moments, I wanted to know if there were any scenes of domesticity between them. The authors of Passion and Codename Anastasia show tender moments between them, not only sex.

From the little I’ve read of the comic, I do think that Lee Won does truly want to be with Ceasar regardless of all the messed up things he’s done to him. I don’t think he’s a complete doormat.

What made me curious is that I keep reading people comment and say they think Ilay and/or Zhenya are worst than Caesar, and I honestly can’t see how? Like those other 2 also did their share of bad $hit, I’m not denying that, but never to the unhinged extremes you mentioned above.

Oh no MC isn't a doormat at all, the problem is that he just doesn't have any other choice than falling in love because again, he'll either get locked up or shot. There are some scenes where he defends himself or he's ready to kill him but with the recent chapters it's implied that he can only hurt Ceasar IF he allows MC to stand up.

That's the horrific part, if he wants he can kill MC but he won't as long as MC behaves exactly like he wants him to. That's why he uses MC as a pawn multiple times risking his life but when MC wants to get away from the mafia suddenly he's baffled and can't understand why MC wants to leave him even though he expressed multiple times that he doesn't want to be his little chess piece.

Basically, it's just repeated dumbassery to stretch the plot. ML already learned his lesson and MC came to terms with his trauma but since we need more drama for s3 the author decided to repeat the same goddamn arc twice and make it even worse this time when the wievers were finally starting to tolerate ML.

Hmm, I would say that you should read for yourself and decide what you think. I came here expecting Caesar and Leewon’s relationship to be batshit insane from the get-go because people were saying he was much worse than a certain Mr. Joo Jaekyung, only to see that their relationship was mostly*** pretty normal and even cute (to me) for 40 chapters. Or, well, as normal as a relationship can be with a mafioso—it’s a complicated relationship, frankly, and they actually spend a while in this sort of “we’re a thing but not really a thing but we want to be a thing” angsty zone. But wowee they sure do have consensual and mutually pleasurable sex, and Caesar does treat and dote on Leewon in normal ways—feeding him, making sure he’s warm, taxing him around and stuff. And then, yeah, the shooting, kidnapping, raping thing. And then later on the neck slicing thing and all Caesar’s fucking crazy man.

I’ll admit that I feel those moments were brushed over too quickly for my tastes…they didn’t go completely ignored! That’s what I disagree with Sex Lord (lol) about a bit. First off, those moments to me feel justified by the narrative (as in, at least to me, I could see them coming—at least the first one…not that what Caesar did was justified by any means lol). At least the first time it happened (that’s the one that I remember most), it felt like I would’ve seen it coming from a mile away if I hadn’t already been spoiled on it because everything in the story built up to it. And when they do happen, Leewon doesn’t take it lying down. I mean he does, but, you know what I mean—he’s angry and resentful of Caesar for how cruel he is to him just as much if not more than he pities him for doing the only thing he knows in those moments. Which I personally find to be more realistic, both for his character and just in terms of like…people have complicated relationships with their trauma and with their abusers, lol.

The only thing is yeah those moments end up being brushed over with one quick apology and/or the next narrative beat in the story…like Leewon is clearly traumatized by Caesar’s shenanigans, he has a whole dream about Caesar shooting him and he brings it up a couple times himself I’m hoping it’ll be addressed more thoroughly at some point or we’ll see Caesar change for the better in response to Leewon. We saw it happen before (Caesar pulls a gun on a kid, Leewon’s like what the fuck, Caesar then goes on to not only Not shoot the next kid he meets but be polite toward her and protect her)…and this more recent moment, Leewon says something like “What you’re doing is wrong, Caesar, you can’t do this to someone you love, I want to be with you but you need to help me” so idk HOPEFULLY…we get there.

So speaking of that, for all of Caesar’s craziness, Leewon can and has matched his freak…ah anyway I’ve rambled a lot already. What I’ll say is their relationship is by no means one I’d classify as normal or healthy BUT to me it feels like there IS underlying love and care there, Caesar’s just fucked in the head but Leewon is willing to put up with some of it. I guess that’s for me why I like their dynamic.

This. You just described what I see/think about their relationship. But my brain wasn't braining during my first reply.