This story loves throwing curve balls at all the classic clichés. Like you'd expect the classic story of: ex-partners out for blood at the Idol competition because they want to one up each other. But once again Iruma's story says: "Oh, no. Nothing like that." Now it's just about one greedy girl that wants to marry the idol that caught her attention, which of course involves keeping Kuromu for herself.
I'll admit I was also in the camp of not quite being ready or super interested in this arc, but now it has my attention if only because Iruma is also invested. It's good that he's showing a little bit of self-awareness in regards to being insulted. Honestly, he comes across the type that doesn't really care what's said about him, but... I think that, deep down, he does find himself to be rather cute as "Irumi." It's hard to say how he'd feel if someone called his regular self ugly, though.