A slow novel, kicked hastily into overdrive.

While the progression through the first book was slow, it was promising. Now it feels like the books progression is being unnaturally sped up, leading to issues of pacing and characters becoming unsympathetic in their decisions and reactions.
Feeling less like real people, and more like puppets being guided to a conclusion whose timetable has been pushed up.
One example of this being the unprovoked and downright confusing feud between the main character and the love interest. Aside from being entirely pointless, this feels like it was drummed up to add tension to a lull in the story, but not only was it handled extremely poorly (with the actions of the characters making no sense and feeling inorganic to the extreme) but actively opposed the mood and motivations of the characters recent actions and emotions. This made the scene beyond clunky and almost entirely tone deaf.
At this point, I honestly considered dropping the book completely.

Another issue is that of the main character and his politeness. While it is understandable to show respect to ones elders, and important to show mannerisms like this for world building, it becomes grating when the main character cowtows to every senior and mentally berates himself for every minor slip up.
I mean, it’s like he’s a puppy that someone kicked in passing.
One scene in particular stands out, where he asks for a book at the library and incorrectly assumes they didn’t have it, and is then severely rebuked for his assumption by an elder, and has to bow and scrape to keep the elder calm. He’s like an abuse victim.

It also doesn’t help that despite his clearly above average abilities, everyone constantly tells him that he has little to no talent and is insufficient despite his efforts. Not to mention the near constant and quite harsh “teaching moments” where his every flaw is nitpicked by his seniors and he is once again informed that he is terrible at everything, despite his efforts.
If something like that is said, it needs to be shown to be true for the words to have any real impact or meaning beyond just pointless verbal abuse.

The story was promising at first, but has become downright confusing. The characters no longer seem like people, and are difficult to relate to or understand. This makes suspension of disbelief difficult, and by extension, makes it difficult to enjoy.