This one didn't really make me feel sad, I couldn't get attached to their relationship much because it was obvious Mio had no romantic feelings for Hinata.

My theory for her going missing is Hinata kept on manipulating Mio into thinking what they had was real love, and Mio couldn't escape due to their strong past with each other as friends. On the day she went missing, instead of going to work, she killed herself to escape life and the love she can't find.

What a great one-shot. The moment she said that if you don't like guys you must like girls I was like...no honey, some people are ace/aro. And like, it all progressed really naturally. I'm still really hoping that she's still alive and kicking and maybe finally letting go of the pressure to have a romantic relationship. And that she just needed a strong break from her past top really let loose.

Man, this was rough all the way through. Every cute, couple-y moment they had was just painful because you could tell Mio was never invested in it.

Man, this was rough all the way through. Every cute, couple-y moment they had was just painful because you could tell Mio was never invested in it.

Yeah it was tough to watch it all unfold

This is a rough one. I can sympathize with both characters here, honestly. If you are the type of person who needs a relationship to be at their happiest, while also being a lesbian, the world of romance can be incredibly unkind, especially if you have any other qualities that makes you more unusual or less desirable in the eyes of society. You end up clinging to a relationship that mostly works, ignoring the parts that don't work, just because you want something to not go sideways for once. Just because the happiness from a relationship that almost works is much better than the way you feel when you're alone.

And then there's Mio. Somebody who values her friend highly and questions her own feelings but is willing to sacrifice her own happiness to grant happiness to someone she cares about. She thinks hurting herself this way is noble and does it up until it finally breaks her. I have been at this level of despair a lot.

Reading this manga hurt like hell but reading your comment was on another level.

Grl what the hell was that

This is a rough one. I can sympathize with both characters here, honestly. If you are the type of person who needs a relationship to be at their happiest, while also being a lesbian, the world of romance can be incredibly unkind, especially if you have any other qualities that makes you more unusual or less desirable in the eyes of society. You end up clinging to a relationship that mostly works, ignoring the parts that don't work, just because you want something to not go sideways for once. Just because the happiness from a relationship that almost works is much better than the way you feel when you're alone.

And then there's Mio. Somebody who values her friend highly and questions her own feelings but is willing to sacrifice her own happiness to grant happiness to someone she cares about. She thinks hurting herself this way is noble and does it up until it finally breaks her. I have been at this level of despair a lot.

Reading this manga hurt like hell but reading your comment was on another level.

UR PFP NOOOOOO,, BUT IVE READ THAT TOO

i wonder if it's suicide, accidental death following depression, or if she purposely vanished to cut all ties with her old life

After re-reading this, I think Mio was going to get back to her home to sort things out and perhaps got into an accident due to being too depressed

Oof. Mio tried to get her feelings through too, but Hinata just rewrote her feelings since they didn’t conform to what she wanted. To be fair to Mio, I’d leave if the person who was my best friend forced her feelings on me and ignored mine. Sal Jiang’s usual telling of a relationship starting is flipped on it’s head to be completely one-sided here, an interesting contrast after reading their other works. I really like it and as much as I wanna see what happens next, I feel like this is the end, there isn’t more to the story aside from Mio’s perspective. Is good, much wow. I like that idea of the living room’s clutter being a form of symbolism, I noticed the clutter but not the contrast of it between the other elements, clever analysis.

Dunno where all the mortality stuff came from though. It sounds more like she disappeared then died. She may have been using “going to her parents’” to hide her leaving everything. It’s possible that it’s le death, I severely doubt it though. “Drove her into a corner” can also mean emotionally so that she felt like all she could do to get out of the relationship was to go away without warning. Other than that line there isn’t any implication of death. Hinata may be speaking as if she was dead because their relationship effectively is and she believes she was the one that killed it through her insistence to push her feelings on Mio.

Way-too-long-response over (I was trying to find the correct name of the manga I’m referencing to get the quote right but I couldn’t so there you go :P). Crazy stuff Sal Jiang do huh…

last edited at Feb 19, 2023 8:30PM

considering not even mio's best and closest friend was willing to try and understand her aromanticism, i can see why she would feel driven to a corner. we never saw the pressure from people like her family, her coworkers, and the rest of society, but i'm sure it was there in the background, and hinata insisting she knew what mio felt better than mio herself is what did her in. it's a tragic reality many people have suffered, because the world we live in often expects everyone to end up in a romantic relationship and is completely unwilling to consider that those are not something every single person seeks.