I generally love cyberpunk style novels with action packed plot. Based on the premise, I had hoped the MC would be logical and pragmatic and will have to spend time juggling his normal daily life while plotting his revenge at night. Instead, what we have is a dumbass who rushes into things based on emotions alone and gets bullied easily.

The characters have no personality - they seem to be walking tropes. ML is stereotypical for these types of novels: obsessed, possessive, good at everything, and so good-looking that girls would... more>> swarm a cafe and line up to ask him out. MC is supposed to be super logical and badass, but is actually a pushover with no spine and needs to be rescued every other chapter.

Their romance is super creepy and is borderline stalking/assault. When MC is working in the café, ML just sits there and stares at him all day and forces him on dates and into physical intimacy despite being declined. And for some reason, the MC put up with it. I guess you can get away with anything if you're hot enough? And while MC and ML have a history together, MC doesn't realize it, so its super f*cked up how fast ML escalates it.

For the main plot, I don't understand why they bothered building MC up to be a super genius hacker, when all he does is f*ck up and take a backseat to ML. The mystery and plot itself takes a backseat to the lovey-dovey romance. At first, I was really intruiged about the world - who is B? Who is the ML? But it ends up everything is the most straightforward variety possible. ML is just nice. The bad guys are just bad. There's no reason for anything. The plot is super unbelievable and the bad guys are all chumps. The mystery and action is poorly paced. There's no sense of suspense, and everything gets resolved in a super straightforward way.

If you're looking for a story with competent characters with a good plot... look somewhere else. <<less