It's what had me keep reading, I loved the childhood friend story and her attempts to find her, Nanao is just an annoyancengl, at this point i kinda wish we(author included) all agreed that the whole childhood friend premise was a bad call and just pretended Mai didn't exist. I can't even say i like or dislike Mai since she's barely a character in the first place, hell she's more of a plot device at this point, and the worst part, she's a terrible one too, her existence kneecaps the manga as a whole and severely restricts the scope of the manga, we wouldn't be here setting up a cute romance with an actual character and development if the author didn't want write this, but the looming threat of Mai makes this whole arc and future ones simply frustrating and pointless.
No, I feel exactly the same wayI can't. i'm sorry but i can't get into that ship for the god damn reason that the whole point of the premise was to found Mai and it feel like it become a burden to the author because they keep avoiding the subject more and more after the fake out in earlier chapters. But i never forget and it make harder to like this ship because of that.
If the premise was only what the title said a.k.a she is just interested in lesbian brothels then i wouldn't have trouble but since the premise was "found out my childhood friend who work in a lesbian brothel" i can't get invested despite the massive push. Which bring the problem, that if the end goal is still Mai then this whole situation being for nothing will be frustrating but to me it will be equally frustrating that the Mai plot get forgotten.
Frankly, what was even the point of the childhood friend premise if it didn't go anywhere.
Sorry to be a bit of a party pooper but it's really frustrating to me that a premise get ditched and it really make my reading experience less enjoyable.