COTE is a series that I personally consider terribly written. So color me surprised when I found out that the Volume 0 is pretty readable for a change. The first half of this novel is a welcomed change of pace, with the protagonist being an adult man who has character flaws but they aren’t overcompensated by absurd garystueness. That is instantly an insane improvement over the main series. Now we have a character that feels more like an actual human, despite some peculiar ways of thinking, who is tackling more relatable issues, such as politics, society and dealing with pressure of superiors while still trying toaccomplish own goals. The political side of things is well described and the social commentary on machinations going on there is appreciated. The inner thoughts no longer feel like pretentious or like a chuunibyou poser, unlike with Ayanokouji junior. Turns out that Kinugasa just can’t write believable inner thoughts of younger character, but with character closer to the author’s age the lacking ability to construct a different mind is not so pronounced.

Unfortunately, the narrator switches back to young Ayanokouji later in the novel and this fault is suddenly glaring, as we have the inner monologue of a literal toddler with though process of an adult. You can make in-word excuses as much you want, this is way too overdone and breaks suspension of disbelief. Unless they are injecting some supernatural serum into babies in the White Room, this goes so much against basic children psychology that trying to rationally explain it in the narration hurts the immersion more than handwaving it as rule of cool would.

Another infuriating thing is that the story setting has pretty decent foundation for interesting psychological drama and yet it gets thrown out so a generic self-insert protagonist could be build from them. I don’t think the author actually realizes the consequences the story beats should have on the character. Ayanokouji should not behave like asocial but charismatic person, he should be barely behaving as a human with the procedure that was done to him. He should not feel simply “intelligent” to the other characters, he should feel straight up alien. Even if characters wouldn’t be willing to view him as something separate from fully ensouled humans, they should at least perceive him as weird and turboautistic at *minimum*. No matter how many times you try to lampshade this by having side characters calling Ayanokouji “monster” it doesn’t matter when he doesn’t actually behave like one and when he is able to form form social relationship well enough in the main series.

So rather than fascinating psychological horror describing consequences of abuse beyond comprehension that this franchise could have been we just get nerds fantasy of what being a chad is like. The more background details of the plot get revealed, the more lazy writing of the main story looks, because how do you make a set up so interesting and then fail to properly utilize it at all.

That said, fans of COTE are sure to like this novel, and non-fans might find it interesting as a glimpse of what could have been.