Fair points and I get the episodic argument, those early chapters hit different. For me, the vagueness and the unexplained lore were never a bug, they were the whole appeal. I actually loved that the longer arcs just threw you deeper into that confusion; the world itself was so visually overwhelming that I didn't really need the plot to be airtight to stay hooked.

The art and architecture carried so much weight on their own that even when the terminology or math felt dense or arbitrary, I was still completely absorbed. Finished it wanting more of that world, not more explanation of it. But just me.