I actually stumbled upon the first few chapters before this was licensed for release in the U.S., and the first chapter behaved a bunch like a typical shounen series, which was what initially put me off.

The disjointedness is intentional on the author’s part, though, and only in later volumes, very slowly, is the past revealed through each character’s perception, so that everything is shown through their own biased eyes until the truth becomes clear. That’s one of the aspects that seems most interesting to me – the differing perceptions of the same truth. It’s a little confusing, but a more long-term, connected sort of story than the first volume makes it seem to be.

That bit you quoted is really scary, though. @_@ It’s horrible when the dialogue is so blatantly playing the part of narration, and that seems to be one of this series’ greatest flaws.