Director wants to steal her!
...Nah, guess he's cool.
Director wants to swing!
...Nah, guess he's cool...
DIRECTOR IS A BUG!!!
... Nah, I guess he really is just cool!
It's actually a pretty solid dramatic set-up: his self-confidence running around on her romantic fantasy of how this reunion "ought" to have gone. The only way to resolve it is for one or both of them to let go of a really important belief, which, execution aside, is how a good plot should go.
+1. Miyahara is a great character but she hasn't been developed the way Yukihira has. I've got a sense that Arima is going to misunderstand her feelings based on Yukihira's insecurities and feel bad about hurting her, only for Miyahara to affirm herself as his bestie and wingman.
@Kosumi.flr Re: Belphagor: I stumbled upon this by complete accident tonight, BUT:
I think "Belphegor's Quest" is a reference to this novella by Machiavelli, which is itself an adaptation of a medieval Slavic folktale in which the demon Belphagor tries to figure out why so many men in hell...
It feels mawkish, or manipulative. The author has gone so far out of their way to make the character sympathetic that they've essentially overdone it. Sure, I feel bad, but I'm not immersed in it anymore; it's eye-rollingly obvious that my heart strings are being pulled and it's getting old.
I went back and counted and the monster in Ch.26 has 8 heads. Good chance that it gains a new head each time someone falls for/is doomed by Hayami; each head represents one of their "suitors".
Yeah, that confused me, too. I can't tell what the "it" is referring to: the ex's "fate", or the ofuda she was holding, which is apparently the "wrong ofuda."
... But I don't know for what, exactly. For warding off spider-lady, I assume, but the dialogue makes it sound like the ofuda and the...