This is a story that frustrates me to review because it is both one of the most grounded versions of the "kicked out of the party" story but also one of the least grounded. It's like a zipper where one side is good and the other is bad, and they interlock together.
The MC (main character) gets a new party that, with his inclusion, is more guys than girls. It's not a harem as far as I can tell.
Also, 2 of the girls who were part of the party the MC was kicked out of have actually acted believably, with one of them apologizing but not begging to join the MC and the other leaving the "hero" who was leading the initial party, even saying she realizes the "hero" isn't the person she fell in love with to the "hero's" face.
The other 2 are still attached to the "hero" but even they seem to be more and more worried about his mental state and not blindly trusting him.
The party the MC joins is legitimately strong even without the him. And they figure out how to get stronger on their own.
And the event that causes the original party to start failing was actually thought out ahead of time and isn't just there to humiliate said original party. It does, but it's not the only reason for the scene to exist.
The MC constantly underestimates himself, but
that was something his magic teacher intentionally conditioned him into
, and his lack of confidence actually causes him to falter in a big fight.
There are some great breaths of fresh air here. And then... it kind of falls apart where it shouldn't, and some of them are areas where these kinds of stories are known to fall apart.
There are two ecchi scenes, one of which makes no sense at all and the other which ends up fairly cliche.
Most of the smaller moments are somewhat disconnected from the bigger moments.
The other characters never bother to correct the MC's constant underestimation of himself despite constantly pointing it out in front of him.
The MC never gets a clue about his powers when he should at least have some questions despite his
teacher's conditioning making him that way.
The power scaling is really off, so the fights end up really inconsistent.
There doesn't seem to be any romance (none so far, not tagged), which is an odd choice since romance affects several important characters, including the teacher who
made the MC such a meek person.
I don't get it. And I don't get why the author seems to have enough brains to not write harem trash and still makes it feel like harem trash so often. Not always, but like a zipper.