I continue to like the themes this mangaka is going for, but absolutely abhor the execution. The concept of a girl entering the picture of an established strong male-female friendship and being worried that the guy is actually into his friend and so dating him is risky is literally the second most critical narrative point of this entire setup after the 'what if the two friends start to catch feelings for each other but are extremely worried about ruining their friendship'. Like what the dude explained in this chapter is supposed to be the very essence of the narrative that's supposed to surround this new girl being introduced into the story. The fact that he just exposition dumps this entire setup and how it's a potential love triangle and being scared of being a home-wrecker are all things that had to be told over the course of MANY chapters by ACTIONS of the characters.
In a better-written story, what the dude was hypothesizing - that she would start the relationship with MC and he would then realize he loves FMC and so the friend is royally fucked is actually a plot point that would actually happen and we would see the writing on the wall how this is going to be a terrible situation for everyone.
Just explaining the whole thing away and having some weird 'ruse' to get the FMC and MC to take action lacks any sophistication on the author's part at all.
The friend clearly has his own agenda, wants all this to blow over so he can have his sweet sweet rejection and move on, but it's such a stupidly forcefully introduced narrative too.
Idk, this story needed to take things slow and go like White Album 2, build everything up step by step while everyone is acutely aware of what is about to happen and how fucked this is all about to get. Not just speed-run the whole narrative as if the author has a checklist and just wants to go through it all with all the in between skipped.
I give this 2 more ch and its a drop from me.