I also want to point out that Kwon could be a case study in relationships. It gets glossed over because everyone focuses so hard on him being an abuser, but he was a middle schooler when his parents split. He never once had a healthy example of love. I doubt he was ever actually loved. And at such a young and tender age he had homophobia imprinted onto him both by his mother and for being the cause of his broken family. Then his mother's own extreme biased homophobia causes her to take her own life when she even so much as suspects her son might be gay, again, when he is in middle school for which he blames himself.
So of course he doesn't know how to have a healthy relationship. Of course he doesn't recognize his own feelings. Of course he doesn't know how to reconcile his feelings with his trauma cause homophobia. He takes out his own self hatred on the very object (Sooin) that causes all of this emotional confusion and turbulence.
Kwon honestly didn't stand a chance himself. He grew up in such a a toxic and fractured environment, it's no wonder he turned out the way he did. And of course no one ever thought to get the boy child into therapy. I actually can sympathize more with Kwon than I can Joo-whoever (MLs first love).
He's still a piece of shit, but when you really look into his character, his depth is deeper than I think most readers give the author credit for.
Is that it's because the story is actually so incredibly life like that it's frustrating for those seeking escapism. This author isn't good with bdsm, at all. I'll give everyone that. Their other story is complete trash with bdsm, which I said in my comment on that story.
However this piece is so close to the real world that I think it makes a lot of people uncomfortable because theyve come here seeking an escape from that. However in the real world there is abuse without fulfilling endings. There is catastrophic levels of lack of communication. There is quick one sided judgements made by people who will never take the time to learn the real truth. There are cycles of trauma that can be nearly impossible to break and often require great sacrifice to do so.
This is no masterpiece, but the author has a lot more going for this story than the majority of stories out there. People are just having trouble seeing that and appreciating it because they've come to this story expecting it to fulfill their desires for how they wish things to pan out, but what they wish for is fantasy, and this gives us a much more real representation of life and relationships.