there was never any 19

Meeee

Pedophilia is when the younger one is older than 18. Right.

I'm not saying it's pedophilia I'm saying it feels quite pedophilic, I'm sorry but if you see just barely an adult with someone who's been an adult for about 15 years and you don't see the power imbalance and the dangerous things that can turn out from it I don't know what to tell you. Those people are on a completely different life stages with those particular ages and I don't see a reason why they would want to be together besides because the plot demands it.
Like the 15 year difference is completely different when we're talking about a 30 year old and a 45 year old cause they are on the same life stage, but putting in in our world terms if you see a person who just finished highschool, just enrolled into collage and a person who's been in a workforce for 15 years wouldn't you look a bit more carefully ?

Power imbalance implies that the other person has more influence, status or money than the other.

In this situation, with Fio being one of the potential children of the king who married a wife from the south AND has the ability to use magic, Shagar is actually the one on the losing side. He can't defend himself and has to rely on taking partners he doesn't particularly want to in order to not die.

Just 'cause someone is older doesn't always mean they hold the power over the younger one. My mom is 10 years older than my step dad and has been through a LOT in her life. They met when he was 21 and she was 31. If they divorced my mom would not get to live the lavish life she does now and probably would lose custody of my baby sisters 'cause my step dad makes like $5,000-$8,000 a week from his job.

It's the same case with my nana and her husband who is 15 years younger than her.

This can also go for men who have nothing to their name but date younger women who are the bread winners in the relationship.

Now, if someone was blackmailing or abusing their power over someone who doesn't know any better THEN I'd call that a power imbalance. But that's not what is happening here and that is clear in the first chapter where Shagar has no choice but to sleep with a dude that is rough and borders on nonconsensual in the sex they have.

thank you for being logical cuz age gap isn't even the source of power dynamic imbalance in this case and their first comment being abt how this felt "pedophilic" somehow? even though this is nowhere near anything pedophilic