...The author's pre-emptive proclamation that this series is not gay is really getting stretched further and further with each passing chapter. (I mean, to be fair, there was that sort of "no-homo" moment partway through the chapter felt awfully deliberate and forced. But then there was... everything else.)
If this keeps escalating at this rate there's going to be room for legitimate debate as to whether one agrees with the author that this isn't gay. "If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck..."
At the moment it's just at the "wildly homoerotic" level, though.