Probably beating a dead horse at this point, addressing a week-old talk, but I wanted to comment specifically on this. Probably contains spoiler content, so I will spoil it despite ppl following this probably already spoiled.
The huge timeskip and the abnormal circumstances the character went through (2-years of no apology) is not exactly a good start to a story. It left a giant gaping plothole, yea, and the reasoning used to fill the hole is a simplistic handwaving. Missed opportunity.
However, the premise of the story is not about growth and revenge (growth as in getting more powerful guns and becoming quadruple quntiple S-rated adventurer), but more about how to reconcile with the feelings once you have the power to do exactly that revenge. It's not about revenge-driven growth, but about accepting the truth and what to do moving forward. There're differences to both premises, as one would center on this increase of tension as we slowly reaching the power and climax to the revenge while the other is more character-centric and the development of their relationship.
So, it is a poor start of a story, but I don't think it is a poor start of this story. It can be handled better, by elaborating and adding depths to what Sacred did during the timeskip instead of "Sasha went on questing" and Sasha being scaredy cat facing the consequences of her own action: banishing and nearly-killing Hyce.
