Not to mention Erika is also one of the protagonist. My beloved Aya deserves a better rival than this.

Just curious, but what do you think about Koto then? If you think Aya deserves a better rival than Erika, do you think Aya deserves a girlfriend like Koto? I mean at this point, not in several previous chapters, where we don't have as much information about her character.

Would be hard to care about the love triangle when it's Erika -> Koto <-> Aya.

I feel like it's not what really going on here, when there's a lot of people rooting for Erika over Aya. They dislike Koto, but would love to see Erika dating Koto anyways, and I can't see any reason behind that other than wanting Erika to "win" against Aya.

last edited at Nov 13, 2024 2:58AM

Well, no. Erika might have imagined that the 21 yo Koto would immediately "break up" with the 14 yo Aya on the grounds of being 21 and 14, rather than them going off to live together and try dating.

I don't think so, as when Aya asked if Koto still likes her, Erika was like "the feeling is as strong as ever". She surely expected that they would try dating, then see that things wouldn't work out and break up. I find it pretty hard to believe that she didn't even predict that Koto would be really really miserable over breaking up with Aya, unless she doesn't know any bit about Koto.

And don't forget that Erika's "hidden agenda" was revealed somewhere in chapter 7 or 8 - I don't remember exactly - and it's quite a while after the two started to date and live together.

last edited at Nov 11, 2024 2:26PM

Erika was completely wrong about how Koto would react to Aya. She thought seeing Aya again would help to undo the trauma of her sudden disappearance, and then they could resolve their relationship and Koto could at long last get better and move on.

For Koto to "move on", they must "break up" to begin with. When Erika hoped that Koto would see Aya again and move on, even though it wasn't mentioned exactly, we all understand what must come before that "move on" part, right?

Erika doesn't just want to date Koto, she wants to be happy with her, that's why she turned down Koto asking her out in the past.

Anyone with self respect would turn Koto down in that situation, not necessarily because of her happiness or anything. And in Erika's case, it was explained right after turning Koto down, that she didn't want to be the stand in for Aya.

This is why she so badly failed in her prediction of how Aya x Koto would go, despite her best efforts and best intentions.

How so? It's clearly stated in the manga that she predicted the relationship between Koto and Aya wouldn't work out and then later it went just as what she expected. It's worth to mention that Erika was happy when things between Koto and Aya went "failed in her prediction" like you said. It's not "How is Koto doing after this break up?", but "Finally it happened, now I will have my chance", only to be disappointed that it's still not the right time for her to jump in yet.

Also, I don't think that Erika has "best intentions". She has "bad intentions" but didn't act on it because it doesn't seem right to her. It was shown over and over again in the manga how she feels bad because of her bad intentions.

last edited at Nov 11, 2024 2:01PM

She lacks empathy. She notices Aya hides her pain behind a smile, but she doesn't really care and immediately thinks about how to exploit the opportunity. She comes off as calculative and cold, even though she's racked with guilt. She admits to herself that the breakup made her happy.

It's like the fact that Aya is a 14 year old without any family, who's struggling to survive after losing everything is totally abstract to her. It's like she never considered Aya as a friend, even in middle school. Only as an obstacle she can finally push aside and forget.

Not just Aya, I think the same could be applied to Koto too, Erika's love toward Koto is kind of weird. The idea of Aya coming back to give Koto false hope, then leave her again is incredibly cruel to Koto. Yet why would Erika want that to happen? Because to her, Koto's - the girl she supposed to love - well being is not as important as herself having her damn chance. I feel like to Erika, it's not about Koto, but herself and her chance to win Koto over.

I get that being selfish is very human or reality etc, but it's still bad and Erika feeling guilty about it is not undeserved at all.

last edited at Nov 11, 2024 12:16PM

I can see Koto on her knees apologizes to Aya and promise she won't treat her like a kid again. She would let her do whatever she wants. Aya forgives her and agree to come home.
That's the ending if Erika doing nothing.

That's what I think too. However, despite not having good intentions, Erika did give good advice. Aya should think carefully about whether she still loves the present Koto, rather than maintaining the current state with Koto being more careful, which would destroy both of them from the inside. Let's see what Aya's answer will be.

I've just re-read chapter 13 and noticed that on page 11, when Aya recall hearing what Erika said somewhere before, there is a shadow of someone (the person who said that to her in the past). That shadow doesn't match young Erika or young Koto, but look like adult Erika or adult Koto. Is it just me or something weird going on here too?

I think Aya running away from her is enough to say that that's how she read the situation, even if she did water it down in summarizing it later with Erika.

From ch13, I think Aya read the situation as "Koto is taking me as a child and I don't like it" rather than "Koto is abusing me". But I do see that you don't want to discuss any of that with me, so sorry if this comment is unwanted, just ignore me.

last edited at Aug 4, 2024 3:53AM

“Losing control of one’s emotions” is the explanation of every person who does something abusive in a relationship. This is blaming Aya for asking why Koto was acting strangely.

Talking about putting words in someone's mouth. What if a friend of you said that seeing your cat make them sad, because the cat remind them of their dead cat? Will you say that they are blaming your cat for making them sad?

As I said, I don't think we would ever find an agreement, so I suggest we'd move on, from replying to each other. If you don't, I will do it alone.

Take this explanation and replace the acts of emotional abuse with physical abuse. Maybe that will show you how this attempt at excusing her behavior does not pass the smell test.

Typical way how an abuser might gaslight you into believing "it's not that bad".

Have you ever said something horrible to someone else out of anger, or had a friend do that once? Would you think it is as bad as hitting someone out of anger and cut ties with that friend without giving them a chance?

I never excuse that behavior; as I said, it's bad, it's a horrible thing to say. Koto should really apologize and do a lot to make it up to Aya. But saying someone is abusing someone else just because they said horrible things when losing their composure ONCE is exaggerating. They deserve a chance if they show their remorse and never do it again (I'm talking about "saying something horrible out of anger ONCE", not "abusing", fyi)

last edited at Aug 4, 2024 12:03AM

Does "acting on her selfish desires" have to be to literally lock Aya inside the house? Saying that she is lonely and begging Aya not to interact with anyone else is emotional manipulation.

Of course, it doesn't have to be literally locking Aya inside, but I don't think what she said here is a tactic of emotional manipulation either. As you can see, Koto does have these selfish thoughts, and she is aware of how bad they are; that's why she tried to keep them to herself. However, when Aya kept asking what was wrong, Koto became so emotional that she couldn't hold it in anymore and let everything slip out. I see it as letting your emotions get the better of yourself, and because of that, you said what you weren't supposed to say. Of course it's a different story if Koto keep pulling this shit, but for now, I think saying that she abused Aya just from what she said when losing her composure is a bit unfair to her.

last edited at Aug 3, 2024 2:57PM

It’s totally mincing words to argue that the Aya/Koto relationship hasn’t become abusive because Koto’s abusive desire hasn’t been put into practice yet.

Well, I think everyone has their selfish desires, what matters is whether you act on them. But if you don't think so, we can't come to any agreement, so let's just move on.

Breaking up with an abusive relationship seems like pretty decent advice. Koto was way over the top.

I actually don't see how the relationship between Koto and Aya is abusive. Sure, Koto selfishly WANTED Aya to be hers alone, but she hasn't actively trying to sabotage any of Aya's social relationship, right? And about what she said at the end of ch12, it was her emotion got better of herself, which made she said horrible things, not a move to manipulate Aya at all. If you are trying to make this person cut tie with her friends, telling her "cut tie with all your friends" is not the way to do it, everyone knows that, right?

Terrific. Now I'm going to have to stop reading people's theories here.

Same here. It would be wise to wait at least until chapter 14 is released before we read the discussions again.

All that (again, at this point, pending some further revelation) involves a great deal of direct contradiction of what we know from the text.

Koto says she never saw Aya at the festival.

Aya says she doesn’t recall the entire day of the festival.

Erika says she talked to Aya the day of the festival, but makes no mention of the festival itself, nor does she tell anyone that she saw Aya during or after the festival.

How are they contradict? I implied "In young Erika's view", which means "Erika in the past (at the moment she was asking Koto "Did something happen between you and Aya at the Tanabata Festival") thought so", not "these things actually happened". It's like this:

1. Aya and Koto dating in Tanabata festival. => Erika thought so, not actually happened.
2. Something happened between Aya and Koto during the festival. => Erika thought so, not actually happened.
3. Aya met Erika and told her something really weird. => Actually happened, Erika thought it was because of (2), but it wasn't.
4. Aya stop coming to school. => Actually happened, at this moment, Erika didn't know about Aya's disappearance yet.

I'm sorry if my explanation is hard to understand, my English isn't good.

One open question perhaps related to your theory is: “How did Erika know that Koto and Aya were dating before Aya told her after her return?”

Immediately after the “Aya can’t remember” scene Aya announces that back then she and Koto had started dating, and Erika says, “I already knew.” But when Erika later meets Koto, Koto is surprised that Erika knew the two were dating, which Erika explains by saying that Aya told her. So Koto obviously never told Erika, and, assuming Erika wasn’t lying to Aya, Erika somehow found out that they were dating. But Erika seeing the two of them together at the festival implies either that Koto also has a memory lapse, or that there’s an alternate timeline where they were all at the festival that Koto and Aya don’t remember but Erika does.

In chapter 1: https://dynasty-scans.com/chapters/how_to_break_a_triangle_ch01#35
Unless you're assuming the person in this page isn't Erika, it's enough for Erika to find out they're dating, if not, how about Aya told her in that mysterious conversation? I don't recall Erika seeing Koto and Aya at the festival, is it somewhere in the manga?

last edited at Jun 13, 2024 1:16PM

If my response makes you uncomfortable, l apologize.
It may seems like an excuse but l'm not a native English speaker so sometimes l can't choose words properly.
Being offensive is never my intention.

I also sorry if my reply sounds defensive.

This whole “Aya ping-ponging back and forth in time” theory is an enormous stretch given the evidence we have in the text

Could you elaborate, what was the "evidence we have in the text"?

The ping-pong thing is just to fill in the gap of Aya's memory where she doesn't recall any conversation, because I honestly can't come up with anything else, lol. I mean, I still believe the Aya who had a conversation with Erika in the Tanabata day is the future Aya, but where the future Aya go after that, I couldn't come up with anything good, going back to the future is just a vague idea. But there must be a better reason for Aya not remembering her conversation with Erika than just forgetting it and conveniently remembering it when the author sees fit.

→②chapter 11, asked Koto "Did something happen between you and Aya at the Tanabata Festival"

That’s perfectly explicable in the context of that flashback as an attempt to figure out what’s up with Aya when she first was absent from school; they only realize that Aya has actually disappeared after Koto finds Aya’s grandfather unconscious on the floor.

Re-reading this makes me wonder, did the conversation between Aya and Erika happen before or after the Tanabata festival? If after, then in young Erika's view, things would have happened in this order:

1. Aya and Koto dating in Tanabata festival.
2. Something happened between Aya and Koto during the festival.
3. Because of (2), Aya met Erika and told her something really weird.
4. Aya disappeared.

Then the conversation between them might be related to Koto.

last edited at Jun 13, 2024 1:07PM

I'm not really asking for a better Mtl here lol.

Yeah, please give me permission to share my experience of using a MTL when people are discussing about it, not particularly asking for it.

The first night when Aya is staying with Erika, Erika asks her about what happened to her on the day of the Tanabata festival, “after our conversation.” But Aya not only doesn’t recall the conversation, she doesn’t recall anything from that day at all.

This is what bothers me the most. It'd be boring if Aya just forgot everything from that day. So I'm going for this ridiculous idea: Aya already got spirited away to the present world the day before. And then later, she travel back to the original world just to have a very important conversation with Erika (which could like, save someone's life), then again travel back to the present world. Idk, just some shower thoughts.

last edited at Jun 13, 2024 1:06AM

I have to say unless you can read Japanese.
It's unavoidable that even high quality translation have its own comprehension from the translator sometimes. (Which is understandable)

But l do agree google translation is trash lol.

I found a really good AI translator called Ichigo. I tried it and several auto-translation tools on the same Manhua, and Ichigo is heavily superior. I don't know Chinese, so of course, I can't tell if it's accurate or not, but the translated dialogues at least make sense (you can actually understand what they're saying, and they fit the chapter's context, characters' expressions, etc.).

If you want to try it, find it on Chrome extension store. But beware, it allows you to translate only once (a page of the browser, so don't refresh your browser), then it'll ask for money.

Erika's fans only see Aya as an OBSTACLE and all they fucking cares is when is Aya going to fuck off so Erika can finally have a chance.

Erika's fans: Koto is the worst, Aya should run away from her as fast as she can.
Also Erika's fans: Why couldn't Koto realize Erika's feelings and give her a chance? I'm so mad at Koto.

Since, it's implied that Aya was either being abused or at the very least had a bad home life. Even if Erika had something to do with her time skip and Aya found out, I think Aya might actually be thankful that Erika "saved" her from that situation. That's just a possible guess, in my opinion.

It's possible, but I doubt it. Her home life is the only good thing in this world. In her original world, she was the star of the school, having the upper hand over her rival (Erika) was a given, and she had a nice girlfriend. Now, most of the people she knows have become strangers, she is just a child compared to Erika, and her girlfriend became like... this.

last edited at Jun 14, 2024 4:38AM

Ehhh this headcanon that Erika a) has in some way the power to make someone disappear and reappear and b) can be blamed for using it feels really off and not fitting how she's characterized. Even if she did make a Tanabata wish for Aya to go away, she'd feel guilty but rationalize it as an awful coincidence, because that's just how people deal with one-off supernatural-seeming experiences. And if she made a second wish for Aya to come back seven years later and THAT worked? I think it would be dominating her internal monologue over whatever else she could be thinking of, especially since Aya's unchanging age makes this hard to explain away. Since she's not going around thinking "what the fuck why do my wishes come true am I like a witch or something oh my God I ruined someone's life with magic powers oh god aaaaaaaaaa" I wouldn't expect her to have anything in particular to do with Aya's weird happening.

Yeah, which is why I have to state it everytime I make a comment about Erika: "IF that Tanbata theory were true". Again, she could still had done it and actually went around thinking of herself having magic, the author just chose not to show us yet for the plot twist sake, like how we know that Aya had a little meeting with Erika right before the festival, but what the meeting was about? Erika knows it, but we don't, it's not the time for us to know yet.

Tanbata theory aside, my opinion about how little Erika think of Aya still stands.

I really don't think this story has any sort of villain, nor any sort of actual culpability. Just three people with flaws and traits, trying to do their best.

I agree.

last edited at Jun 10, 2024 9:00AM

You're giving Erika's negative self talk way too much credit wrt her feelings about Aya. She's very good friends with her, absolutely a better friend to her than Koto, she just also feels guilty about being in 'competition' with her because she's a "winning feels bad if it means someone else had to lose :(" kind of person.

Erika's negative self talk is actually what make her a little more likeable to me, and I don't talk about it. I'm talking about how Erika only tried to bring Aya back when she realized that Koto couldn't move on (give that the Tanbata theory were true). And also, when Aya disappeared, Erika only care about how Koto feels, she doesn't really think of Aya's safety. To her, Aya only serves the purpose to have Koto move on, she doesn't care about Aya as a person.

last edited at Jun 10, 2024 1:09AM

I think there’s a reason for that self loathing still. I’m still suspicious that Erika was somehow responsible for Aya disappearing in the first place. Not in like an active way, but I strongly suspect she made a tanbata wish for Aya to disappear…and it worked. She then, possibly, wished her back when she saw Koto couldn’t move on.

Same here, and if that were true, it'd say quite a lot about Erika. I mean, I'd expect she'd wish Aya back right when she realized these Tanabata work, not only when it's convenient for her.

I get why people love Erika so much, but it's such an ick for me looking at how she thinks of Aya. A lot of horrible things happened to Aya, but all she can think of is Koto. Aya is her rival, but they're still friends, it's not like they're enemy, but Erika has very little concern for her. It's sad Aya thinks of Erika as such a good friend, but for Erika, not that much.

I think the ending is fitting, but I wish that there had been a few more chapters building up to the conclusion. I also really really want to know what happens afterwards too, maybe an extra (optional) volume detailing how they found the two girls, the rest of the cast's reactions, as well as Ichika's conclusion. (No, that one-shot spinoff doesn't count, it just shows the thoughts of a new girl which is nice, but I want to see the others)

True. Also, when I see this extra, I hoped for Ichika/Yoshimi (glasses girl)/Yuko's part (Where Ichika was about to expose Yoshimi), too bad it didn't happen.

I don't give a fuck about Nanao or Mai. Sayaka is best girl and deserves to win Asumi.

I absolutely agreed.

So the EpiPen is gone, which caused bug girl's death. I wonder if the girl who hates Seo so much has stolen it to do something to her.

Everything seems to be hitting the fan I wonder if this series is almost over. Huge shame if it is love the art and I've very much enjoyed the story.

This entire thing is odd because the reason the monsters attacked her at the start of the series was because she smelled so good and they wanted to eat her. Or was that all a lie that our cute fishwomen told us. Because if their blood is mixed and disgusting why would all of those things attack Hinako really then?

I think what makes the blood disgusting is if it's mixed with YOUR OWN blood. So Hinako is only disgusting to the fish, any other monster (like the fox) still find her tasty.

Ehhh, I keep reading this, hoping for some exclusive chapters of Wakana and Yuina but in the end it gave me none >:c

I wonder why the teacher was also involved with that bully. Kids bully each other because they're stupid, but why the teacher too?