Welp, here we go. Please don't start a serie just to follow the trend if you have no idea where you're headed.
That's such a common occurrence unfortunately. As
@boag said, if this was a serialized romcom we would be at chapter 200 with little to no progression.
Same thing happened with isekais when the trend started booming. A lot of authors decided to make isekais with absolutely no idea as to where their story is headed because it's trendy, and it's an easy thing to do. Laziness at its peak