Here I thought Haru would finally come back into focus--she's been out of focus for so long, despite being the female lead.
I've long been seeing authors exhibit ridiculously rigid adherence to (frequently degenerate--they're obviously meant to favor lolicons and feminists; as hard as associating those two may seem to be, they do have some major things in common) design rules; this includes the authors of some stories I've started reading recently: one example is
Chiyu Mahou no Machigatta Tsukaikata, which has an effeminate MC being a donkan, merciless
tsukkomi (read: retard) to his female friend with a
modest bust but being soft and sweet to every flatchest and little girl he comes across; and also
Legend which, from the start, places a cute, long-haired receptionist girl with good character next to a shallow, clout-chasing catgirl coworker with short hair--and gives the shorthair the large breasts and the cute girl the small ones. If you pay attention, you can see this same pattern (with certain details changed, but never enough to change the underlying idea) repeated across countless manga stretching years back.
(EDIT:
Legend proved me wrong in a BIG way--I couldn't be happier to be so wrong.)
I don't think Tokino Yousuke is one of the ovine authors that follow this rule (
Haru is Ichinojou's main girl, after all--she
absolutely and
completely defies that rule), but that doesn't change the fact that anime and manga are flooded with lolicon bait, androgyny/diminished femininity, and other such things. It's why I've had enough of the Smallbreast/Flatchest/Shorthair Alliance, and can't be bothered to care about them; Carol and Miri are exceptions that I don't count among that group--unlike characters who look like they do, they have
much more going for them than simply being bait for pedophiles. The story wouldn't lose anything if the homunculi and Mareeeeena would simply go out of focus the way Haru did--except permanently, or as much so as possible; the story did start without them after all.
All that being said, at least I got to see Haru's beauty at the end of the chapter (though not in the story proper).