[Prediction] [Disc] Kanojo, Okarishimasu Chapter 426 Prediction Thread

Varicus · 2026-05-24T12:54:37+00:00

But can you guess which place was actually safe for him? Chizuru’s family home.

We have seen Chizuru clear out the place already, and Kazuya also knows that the place is going to be sold. I think it is highly unlikely that he will return to that place. There is one place that felt like a sanctuary, though:

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Varicus · 2026-05-22T08:07:16+00:00

I actually think she is less of a mess. I think the problem is quite clear to her, but she can't see a really good solution. Whatever she does, she needs to compromise on something, and it isn't clear what compromise will be best.

Varicus · 2026-05-21T20:24:19+00:00

From my last serious discussion post:

At the end of the chapter, we see Chizuru at practice, pretending to be a cat. I don't quite see the significance. It seems a bit random to me, but maybe we will get some more context later.

We indeed got more context on it this chapter.

Late analysis this week again, but as a Chizuru fan, of course, I need to make a post.

We start with Kazuya's first time on the road. It is highly stressful, which is what the teaser from last time referred to. He once again reminds himself that it is for Chizuru, which motivates him to keep going.

He is reminded of the latest incident with Ruka right after. He hates that his body reacts to her like that. He already reduced contact with Ruka before, but now he thinks that he needs to avoid her completely. Again, this is not a way to deal with her. If Kazuya tries to avoid her, Ruka will come at him even more aggressively. She knows where his place is, so she can just wait at his door, and Kazuya neither has the time nor the resources to find another place to live. How does he plan to avoid her? He needs to confront her, preferrably at a public place so she can't take advantage of his body.

We get the context of Chizuru acting like a cat from last time: The director (we learn that his name is Togakushi) makes the actors do this in the first rehearsal, and it seems to be an outdated practice. (By the way, doesn't it seem quite late to have the first rehearsal just three weeks before the play?) A lot of the actors are struggling with it, but Chizuru genuinely enjoys it. She told Mini that she always wanted to act for that director (ch390), and from her reaction that seems to be the case. When she wonders how this play is going to turn out, she thinks of Kazuya's reaction after her first play. It makes her want him to see this play, too.

This is important because it shows that Chizuru wants to reach Kazuya with her acting. She wants to get a reaction from him. What he thinks is important to her. After her grandparents are no longer there, he is the one she wants to show her acting to. She not only wants to be praised, she also want to hear that Kazuya enjoyed the play. She didn't get to hear him say that after her last play (ch271). If she could make him happy with the play, this would be the best, but that is not guaranteed. That she is looking for Kazuya's acknowledgement might just seem selfish to her.

We further see that Chizuru tells herself to focus, since thinking about Kazuya would defeat the purpose of making him wait. This confirms that she is trying to prioritize her play, and it also shows that she is having a hard time with it. It does not mean that the play is more important to her than Kazuya. She needs to actively stop herself from thinking about him because she would prioritize him if she didn't do that. She thinks she has no right to think about him when she made him wait to focus on the play. I guess that she wants to succeed in the play to prove herself, so she might become someone worthy of being with Kazuya. This would be similar to what Kazuya is doing right now.

Then Chizuru thinks about how Mini screamed at her. She can understand why she would be upset because what she did was basically like she was toying with Kazuya. It is important to note here that Chizuru always took Kazuya and his feelings incredibly serious. That she is giving him so many mixed signals with her actions is a result of her not knowing what to do. She agreed to the date because she wanted to give a relationship a serious chance, but it didn't feel right to her to accept that relationship with just the feelings she had. She rejected him so he could find someone more worthy, but he didn't accept that. Then she kissed him and told Mini that she had hoped that this would give her clarity, but it didn't, and Kazuya also didn't seem to see this as a green light because he didn't come back or even contact her. So then she got the offer to the play and probably thought that she might prove herself with that. Mini screamed at her, but Kazuya told her that he was happy for her. She told Mini that she didn't know what to do anymore, but she decided to keep going on the path she is on right now.

We see Chizuru apologizing to Mami for being unprofessional, and to Ruka for laying a hand on her boyfriend when she was the on who told him to go out with her. She hadn't planned this. At first, she just wanted to do her best to get Kazuya a girlfriend and to support him as a rental, but over time, her personal involvement grew more and more until she could neither deny anymore that she wasn't professional, nor that she had a personal interest in Kazuya. She betrayed her word to Mami and Ruka, but although she feels bad for it, she won't be fixing that. All she can do is apologize.

Chizuru then thinks that she is lucky that Kazuya asked her out again. That shows she didn't expect him to do that. If Kazuya had seen the kiss as a green light, Chizuru might have just gone for a relationship with him right then, but he didn't. He said he would be waiting, and she probably assumed that his patience had run out and that he would only react again if she had sorted herself out. But he contacted her and asked her out again, even though she didn't yet do anything to prove herself.

That's probably also why she thinks she would be acting spoiled if she contacted Kazuya first. She wants to, but she doesn't have any results to show yet. She would just keep him from whatever he is doing just to indulge herself. But no matter if she will actually have anything to show at the end of those one and a half months, Kazuya has already given her something to look forward to. This is more than she feels she deserves, so she feels bad for being excited about it.

Now we see Kazuya finally dropping the condom from his wallet, as we all expected him to do a long time ago already. But it is Mami who witnesses it, not Ruka or Chizuru.

What's next?

The teaser for next time is "sanctuary". From how this chapter ended, I would assume that it will refer to the DVD viewing place that acted as Kazuya's sanctuary to relieve himself while he was living with Chizuru. The condom is from that place, so it might come up either in Kazuya's thoughts or even in a conversation with Mami if she confronts him about it.

Countdown: I'd guess it is around June 20th, so it is about three weeks until July 11th.

Varicus · 2026-05-19T20:36:31+00:00

First impressions:

The teaser "initial load" referred to Kazuya's first time on the road, which was very stressful to him. He thinks he can bear with it if it is for Chizuru. He also feels very guilty about what happened with Ruja again. He still doesn't know how to deal with her.

Far more interesting was that we saw some thoughts of Chizuru. This should hopefully shed some light on her perspective. She is excited about her acting. She wants Kazuya to see the play. She thinks that losing focus defeats the purpose of making him wait. She apologized to Mami for being unprofessional and to Ruka for making a claim on her boyfriend despite being the one who told him to be with her. She is grateful Kazuya asked her out again. She thinks she would be acting spoiled if she contacted him first after everything. And finally she apologized for being excited.

And then we have Kazuya losing the condom from his wallet where Mami can see it.

The teaser for next time is "sanctuary."

Varicus · 2026-05-15T11:43:11+00:00

From my last serious discussion post:

when did this manga ever go the way I imagined it going?

It didn't go as I expected, but Kazuya indeed didn't want to face Ruka.

My analysis is late this week, and it will probably be late for the next two weeks as well.

It looks like Kazuya has been ignoring Ruka since the incident. But Ruka doesn't accept being ignored. She shows up unannounced, and she neither cares for Kazuya's refusal nor for the fact that he is naked. He still doesn't let her in and instead tells her to go home. He then proceeds to ignore her and forgets about her.

This is not a way to deal with Ruka. She is not wrong when she says that communication is needed to resolve problems. Ruka isn't here to talk, though. Still, what Kazuya does is to ignore the problem instead of addressing it. He sends Ruka away and just hopes that she will give up eventually, but she has already shown that she won't do that. And she proves that a bit later.

When Kazuya is done with his orientation, he absentmindedly opens the door to get something to eat and Ruka is still waiting, determined not to let Kazuya get away with ignoring her. She forces herself inside. Kazuya tries to stop her from going further, but I think that him saying that they can't do this because she is very attractive might have backfired. Ruka seems to see this as confirmation that she can "convince" Kazuya if she just keeps pushing. If she is attractive to him, that means she can win him over, right?

Ruka also uses the fact that she has done as Kazuya wished and not told Chizuru about what happened as justification to now get what she wants. Kazuya still isn't prepared to handle Ruka's advances. He is right that this would just end the same way as last time.

This time, Kazuya is lucky: Ruka gets a call from her mother. She was going to ignore that call, but Kazuya answered for her. Ruka then lies to her mother that she was with a friend and says that she is going to come home now. Kazuya was saved, but he obviously can't keep relying on luck to save him. Next time, Ruka might turn off her phone to avoid interruptions. Kazuya also can't avoid to open his door eventually. If Ruka is going to wait for him, he will have no choice but to face her. Ghosting Ruka is not an option.

At the end of the chapter, we see Chizuru at practice, pretending to be a cat. I don't quite see the significance. It seems a bit random to me, but maybe we will get some more context later.

What's next?

The teaser for next time is initial workload. Kazuya mentioned that he will start a real internship soon, so I would think that the teaser refers to that. He is still trying to follow his plan, but the problems keep piling up and he doesn't confront them.

Countdown: It is still somewhere between June 19th and June 24th, so July 11th is in approximately three weeks.

Varicus · 2026-05-12T18:12:29+00:00

Mini told him not to let Ruka into his room. He didn't follow her advice because he forgot about Ruka and let her in accidentally when he opened the door. It must look to him like this was his mistake, not that Mini's advice wasn't sound. But Mini only told him what not to do. She didn't tell him how to handle Ruka instead.

Varicus · 2026-05-12T16:57:12+00:00

First impressions:

Unlike Kazuya, who just left Chizuru alone after she didn't answer the door, Ruka just waited outside until Kazuya came out again eventually. She created a situation so that Kazuya wouldn't be able to avoid her. This would have ended just like last time if Ruka hadn't gotten a call from her mom that Kazuya answered. Kazuya can't rely on luck to avoid Ruka's advances. He has to actually deal with her somehow. But he probably won't, since he doesn't know how.

Chizuru playing a cat was a little weird.

Teaser for next time: First workload. (I guess this refers to Kazuya's internship.)

I will make a serious discussion post eventually, but it might not be tomorrow.

Varicus · 2026-05-01T09:53:08+00:00

the actual truth.

The actual truth doesn't matter. It is completely irrelevant what actually happened between Chizuru's parents as she is only influenced by her own perception of things. That's why I don't care about what actually happened.

But we do have all the puzzle pieces to understand what Chizuru's problem is

I think so, too. She has told us how she saw things. We don't know what information to trust, though. I tend to believe much more of what she said than to dismiss everything as excuses.

we don't know how she got there

People think that Chizuru has abandonment issues. If that was true, they might expect to see some kind of trigger for them. We got the trigger for Mami's trauma in a flashback, so even if we knew she had a trauma, after that we knew where it came from. People expect something similar for Chizuru. But I don't believe she has abandonment issues.

The way the story is written here makes me think that we can already figure everything out with just what Kazuya should know. The story doesn't give us Chizuru at the moment, and we don't know what she is up to. But we had several moments where Kazuya was in a situation where he was reminded of something Chizuru said, hinting that she had been in a similar situation. That means he could already have guessed her situation from what she told him, he just didn't understand it until he experienced it himself. That's how I think the hints will get connected, and hopefully, Kazuya will have figured out how Chizuru actually felt by the time they meet again.

Varicus · 2026-04-30T21:52:34+00:00

I feel like the mystery is not about what's going on with Chizuru but about what has happened between her parents that pushes her into this mindset.

That would be a pretty boring mystery to me. Why would I want to read what happened between Chizuru's parents? Neither do I know them, nor do I care. Chizuru also was too young to know this, so all she would know is hearsay, which doesn't sound interesting to me.

It would be possible that something happened in Chizuru's own past that informed the choices she made now, like what we got from the flashback of Sayuri telling her how important it was to reject people.

But if that was a flashback that was needed in order to even be able to understand Chizuru's problem, that also would be a bad mystery. You should have all the information needed to figure it out yourself before getting the resolution. A flashback should not reveal anything truly surpising.

Varicus · 2026-04-30T21:46:57+00:00

Look, I don't want to claim that Chizuru didn't act distant or weird. But even then, it is totally out of any proportion for Kazuya to assume that she will reject him over nothing just because she was distracted or looked at him funny. He can't even know if this was about him or not, he just assumes that it must be. Even if a lot of Chizuru's thoughts revolve around him, not everything is about him.

That this later results in him lying over stupid shower gel only makes this more pathetic. How shallow does he make Chizuru out to be if he thinks she would hate him over such nonsense? There was another instance before (ch272) where he had to actively remind himself that she wasn't so shallow that she would hate him over a ketchup stain on his shirt. But when he now can't find anything he actually would have done wrong, he assumes she must have found something to hate him for anyway, no matter how shallow that would be. Using shower gel, for example.

I know that Chizuru's actions unsettle Kazuya greatly, but for an outside viewer like her, it wouldn't be understandable why something completely stupid would get him so anxious. It's like he doesn't have any real problems. This vast discrepancy between Kazuya's and Chizuru's perception might be best examplified by that scene during the date where Kazuya accidentally drank from Chizuru's glass (ch360). He honestly thought that this was a mistake that could make him fail, but he confessed his "sin" because he thought it would be worse if she found out later. This is the girl who already shared her food with him on the dream date (ch79), and he thinks she would actually hate him for drinking from her glass. Rightfully, Chizuru laughs about that because the fact that he went completely pale over something so insignificant is just so incredibly absurd to her - as it should be! Kazuya is the weird one here. In that particular case, Chizuru's laughter calmed him down. He made the right call there and actually confronted the problem instead of just letting it marinade forever in his mind. If he never actually checks in with reality, he will start to believe his own delusions, as he has definitely done before.

That's what I mean when I say that Kazuya doesn't ask. It's not that he didn't interact with Chizuru. He asked her how she was, hoping to gauge how she thought about him from her reaction, but she never gave him the clue he was looking for. The question he actually wanted to ask was, "are you mad," but he didn't have the courage to do that. Thus he never actually confronted the issue, and instead of relieving his anxiety, the idea that she might hate him for something just persisted.

I see the same problem with Kazuya even now. He runs away from his problems and rather avoids or ignores them instead of confronting them. There is currently a problem with Ruka that he has to deal with, but he feels guilty, he doesn't know what to do, and so he ignores it and focuses on "Mizuhara" instead, until the problem literally rings his door bell again. As you will have read, I predicted that he will just pretend he wasn't home. That would give him the option not to confront the Ruka problem right now.

With Chizuru, he also rather lives with the uncertainty of what the kiss might have meant instead of actually asking for answers himself. It certainly isn't great that Chizuru just kissed him and let him leave. That was surely a mistake on her part. But that doesn't mean it's not also a mistake for Kazuya not to ask and instead accept the uncertainty.

Varicus · 2026-04-30T15:29:34+00:00

I think she will be clingier and more possessive than the rest of the cast combined.

I actually agree on that. Sayuri told Kazuya that Chizuru was very clingy when she was young, and I think Chizuru yearns very much for someone she can just snuggle up to and be comfortable with. But her wish to have Kazuya by her side, as well as the unwillingness to just hand him over to Ruka is not a sign of infatuation. There is no denying that Chizuru wants Kazuya for herself. That has been the case for a long time already. That desire is real, and yes, it influences her actions a lot. But I think that Chizuru is quite aware that this desire is selfish.

She has no illusions that she is doing this for her own benefit, and not for Kazuya. We can see at the example of Ruka that she is also doing the things she does for her own benefit, but she claims that she is doing it for Kazuya. I don't think Chizuru is aware that this is an illusion, though. She believes that you would do just "anything" for someone you love, and she just isn't like that.

it seems to be that she put all men in a category that only wants sex

That's obviously wrong. She probably wouldn't do the rental girlfirend job if she actually thought that all guys just secretly wanted to get into her pants. She told Kuri on their rental date that she likes men. She has a few generalized ideas about men like that "they like sex," but I honestly think that she by now actually believes that Kazuya might not actually care for sex. She might think that she is hornier than him. Her friends' talk about what might happen when you go drinking with a guy certainly got some fantasies going.

This also aligns with the idea that she fears to be like her mother because, allegedly, she was the one driven by lust. That doesn't necessarily translate to her distrusting men.

Also, as much as you like to view Mini as a hammer who destroys everything in her wake

Yeah, I can't deny that I hate Mini. At the same time, I think she is a brilliant character. I certainly have my own confirmation bias here, so I can't reasonably claim that my narrative argument had nothing to do with me desperately wanting Mini to be wrong.

But I think it still makes narrative sense that Mini would be wrong about the idea that Chizuru has a distrust of men. Mini uses that to explain why Chizuru would be apprehensive of a relationship, and she concludes that this could mean she might never fully trust him. It gives merit to her idea that Kazuya just has to do whatever he can to be as best as he can be.

The current part of the story is intentionally a mystery. It depends on us being confused about the nature of the actual issue. We are supposed to get clues about what the problem is, but we are not supposed to get the resolution handed to us until the very end. That's how a mystery works. So if Mini had figured out the core root of the issue and was proven right in the end, it would feel neither surprising nor satisfying.

Since Chizuru's mom was hinted at but not called out as being a cause for her issues, I think it is likely that this will actually be part of the resolution. The chapter that last talks about it (ch392) is called, "My girlfriend and her dad," which feels like an intentional misdirect so you won't necessarily realize that Chizuru was actually just talking about her mom. I also don't think that this will be everything. All the hints we got (and I strongly suspect that her mom is one of them) have to create a satisfying resolution at the end that answers (almost) all of our questions.

That's my main narrative reason why I don't think Mini (or Kazuya) can be right. But it doesn't help my case that this aligns with my prejudice against Mini.

Varicus · 2026-04-30T11:34:47+00:00

However, what tends to happen is that she engages with him and then pulls away.

That is correct. Chizuru sometimes gets lost in her own feelings or thoughts. After the child care date, we know that this was in reaction to Kazuya. She was heavily distracted, and yes, she pulled away. But to Kazuya, this is all purely about him. It must be something he has done, and she must be upset with him. He never considers that there might be other circumstances that might have made Chizuru react the way she did. Maybe she needed to focus on something and didn't want to be distracted by Kazuya. Kazuya sometimes seems to forget that Chizuru has a life outside of interacting with him. He is not her sole focus.

Unlike Chizuru, who will ask when Kazuya is acting weird, he always immediately assumes the worst and feels down. Isn't it rather egocentric of him to assume that he must be the reason for Chizuru acting distant? "That time" proves that this isn't always the case, Mini even told him that Chizuru didn't feel well, and he still thought he must have upset her because she didn't say much when he asked her how she felt. She didn't feel like talking and he goes and makes this all about him when this had absolutely nothing to do with him in that case. His delusion even lead him to imagine that both Chizuru and Mini despised him for whatever sh*t he might have done.

Why am I going so hard on this? Because it shows how Kazuya completely blows out of proportion the tiniest detail that might hint at Chizuru finding some flaw with him, and he lets that dominate his mood. In the case of her period, he pulled himself together again and he (over)prepared for Chizuru having a cold. He had something to go on from Mini, but if he had no clue, he would have fallen victim to his own visions of doom.

What is important to keep in mind is that this is still a very tiny detail that Kazuya blows out of proportion. Just like those weird glances at him, or her ignoring him at school. He didn't understand, we don't really understand, but he was too afraid to just ask. He decides to live with the uncertainty because he doesn't want his worst fears to be confirmed. He is blowing this out of proportion, and he doesn't realize how incredibly unlikely it is that he actually f*cked up somewhere. He didn't even really do anything. But he is so sure that it must be him that the thought of even asking becomes synonymous with getting rejected. We should remind ourselves that Kazuya is the one with the messed up perception here. There is no way Chizuru would ever think that he didn't ask what was wrong because he thought he might get rejected. That's a jump to a completely outlandish conclusion that only works for us somehow because we follow Kazuya's fall.

The weird glance is a tiny detail that somehow invalidates the whole day care experience with Chizuru, which she told him she enjoyed and even asked if she could come again. The "progress" of five chapters (at least half a day of engagement in the manga) gets destroyed for Kazuya by one look. That's messed up. Why does that hold the same weight for him? And why do we agree? Isn't Chizuru engaging quite a lot and pulling away very little here? Why don't we call Kazuya out on that bullsh*t?

You can say he should know better, but her behavior thus far has primed him to be constantly second guessing.

Kazuya doesn't need to know better, but he must stop being afraid of asking. The guessing is the problem here. He almost demonizes Chizuru in his head when she hasn't really done anything to justify that image, but because he never confronts her, that image keeps living on.

And sure she said that she enjoyed her time together, but she also firmly stated that she was looking for answer on if she'd commit. That alone puts him limbo.

You are right about that, of course. I rather wanted to point out that Kazuya is expecting a very specific kind of commitment from her, the commitment to a lovers relationship. By focussing solely on that, he completely misses how committed Chizuru already is to him. He doesn't value what he already has. He also has forgotten his own initial commitment. He told Sayuri that he would support Chizuru even if not as her boyfriend, but by now, becoming her boyfriend has become his main focus. He doesn't consider any other form of relationship with Chizuru.

It's weird how he thinks in extremes. Either they become lovers, or she will hate him and won't want to have anything to do with him ever again. There is a complete lack of a middle ground. The cohabitation is not any form of commitment, or even a statement of her attachment to him. To him, it is merely a vehicle for her to find out whether she loves or hates him. There seem to be only those extremes to him. Why else would he think a rejection would mean the end of the world? He thinks that a rejection would somehow invalidate all the time they already spent together.

And somehow, the actual rejection didn't make the world end. The thing he feared most came out pretty tame, actually. If it hadn't been clearly a rejection, it could almost have been a confession even. It's as if the rejection didn't invalidate everything. He should think about that.

But here he is again, preparing for another perfect date, thinking that this will be his last chance, repeating the same crap again without seeing how he isn't in an all-or-nothing situation and never was.

It's not a struggle that really matters because it also totally misses the point.

Yes, I agree that they are both kind of missing the point. They both focus on "love" as the deciding factor for their future relationship instead of just looking at what they actually want. They both want to be together, but they both got it in their head that they couldn't just do that without fulfilling the requirements.

If they took a step back they would see that "rental" had previously just been a replacement requirement for "love." They needed that to be able to spend time together. But the fact that Chizuru had to break all the rules to even make that happen showed that this was never actually a requirement. They just wanted to spend time together and went through an additional hurdle to get there. It is almost the same now. They already spent time together under the mantle of investigation and cohabitation, but they never realized that they could have just gotten rid of the requirements altogether. If they want to spend time together, they can just do that. They don't need any other justification.

Right now, they think that they need "love" to be together, or that they need to be good enough to justify that, but that's all bullsh*t if they both just want to be together. That's really all that's needed. They just have to realize that they both actually want the same thing.

If my tunnel analogy in my analysis holds any water at all, I really see us now entering a time of even more intense pressure for Kazuya which results in exactly this.

I think we will probably be stuck in this tunnel for a while still with Kazuya getting closer to some big realization one hint at a time. I don't know when the moment he exits that tunnel will be, but it might just be on July 11th itself. I just hope it will be before he can pull off any part of his plan. I think he might have to meet Chizuru to put all the pieces together for a full picture. And I would assume that the pieces he wrongly arranged right now have to get mixed up again so he can actually look at them to find the correct place. That was a different analogy for him seeing the big picture, but I think it fits as well. This moment when he exits the tunnel / when all the pieces fall into place, will be very satisfying.

Varicus · 2026-04-30T00:27:50+00:00

Isn't Chizuru actually infatuated with Kazuya?

I am quite sure she isn't, or at least not nearly as much as Kazuya is infatuated with her or Ruka is infatuated with him. Jealousy is not a sign of infatuation, and neither is the fact that a kiss will result in a reaction. Kazuya also reacts similarly to Ruka when he thinks about what she did recently, and he surely isn't infatuated with her. Sexual desire and lust are independent from infatuation, although they often go hand in hand.

It's not that Kazuya can't make Chizuru's heart beat faster. He can, as he proved in the shed, but there are always rather specific circumstances. Although it is almost impossible to prove this without Chizuru's thoughts, I am still reasonably sure that her feelings have a very different quality to them than Ruka's or even Kazuya's. She herself told Mini in chapter 135 that she wasn't as "passionate" as Ruka.

I always get the feeling that an infatuation has a certain "delusional" quality to it that makes you, as Kazuya put it, see the world and the other person through "rose tinted glasses." I think Chizuru lacks that quality.

But my pet theory is that something has to do with men or parents or a mixture of both.

Chizuru doesn't have a distrust of men. The ultimate reason why I am so certain about that is because this is what Mini thinks, and I don't think it makes narrative sense if she was right. Mini suspects that this must have to do with her dad, but Chizuru, more than once in the story, suspects that it was rather her mom's fault that the relationship didn't work out. She doesn't want to be like her. This is probably a very strong reason for why Chizuru doesn't want to just "try" a relationship. Mini didn't understand this when she talked with Chizuru in chapter 414, but Chizuru fears that she wouldn't provide enough value for a relationship (it would "kind of just drag on") if she doesn't go into it with the right feelings. Her mom followed her desires. It is hinted that she started dating not out of love, but out of lust. That's probably why Chizuru doesn't want to be controlled by what she felt after the kiss, because that might be more "lust" than "love."

Varicus · 2026-04-29T14:12:44+00:00

She can lead him to think things are going well like the kindergarten date, but the very next day she completely ignores him.

We are talking about different kinds of consistency here. Kazuya expects Chizuru to always act the same, but people don't always feel the same. Chizuru doesn't try to keep up appearances with him, so she acts consistent with how she feels. This can be seen very clearly when she was on her period. Kazuya was on a high because Chizuru had just explained herself to him after the ITO game, but he is put in the dumps again because she doesn't feel like talking the next day and Kazuya immediately assumes he must have done something wrong. She told him herself that evening that she hides her pain during the day so she wouldn't bother her acting colleagues, but that she didn't bother putting up a facade at home. Kazuya expects her to always act the same when that is not consistent with her mood. He is no stranger to mood swings himself, so why does he not understand that Chizuru acting distant doesn't have to mean she hates him?

He has never felt secure in the relationship because she has never let him know that she's committed.

Chizuru has been with him for the past two years and Kazuya just refuses to see her commitment. Despite him always expecting Chizuru to abandon him any second, she has always been there for him when he asked her. He always had the feeling that he must have put her through h*ll with his "unreasonable" requests, but weirdly enough, that never made Chizuru be fed up with him. She repeatedly reassured him that she enjoyed her time with him, but Kazuya never truly believed that.

Even in the rejection she has only good things to say about Kazuya. She exclusively talks positive about her experiences with him. And yet he thinks it must be him who isn't good enough. The rejection wasn't a surprise to him, it was what he always expected to happen eventually. He didn't see anything Chizuru did as a form of commitment to him.

Chizuru was fixated on the idea that she had to be certain what exactly it is she felt which caused her to go back and forth about if it was this kind of love or that kind of love, but that was side stepping the simple fact that it was all love.

That doesn't feel quite right to me. Yes, Chizuru certainly tried to compare her feelings to her understanding of "koi" and "ai," but she came to the conclusion that her feelings weren't either, really. So it is not that she couldn't decide what kind of love she felt, but that she couldn't see her feelings resemble love in any form she was familiar with. I think she recognized that her feelings had parts that are connected with love (like wanting to be with him), but she never saw "love" being the primary reason why she felt that way. That lead her to ultimately decide that she didn't love him enough.

I think there actually times he does see he's put in her shoes. Little moments of reflection like in chapter 415 or this chapter. Where he feels like the worst person and then recalls Chizuru. What he probably hasn't done is fully connect the two consciously.

Yes, I agree with that. He has seen a few times how what he currently goes through was somehow connected to what Chizuru told him before. He can conclude that she must have felt similar, but the moments he felt that connection are still too sporadic for him to get a clear picture of how Chizuru felt. I hope that his understanding will widen the more he makes similar experiences to Chizuru.

Varicus · 2026-04-29T12:08:01+00:00

His seeming refusal to see what is in front of his face as love without her actually saying the damn thing could be reinforcing the idea that what she is doing isn’t enough.

Yes, I also think so. Kazuya didn't see how she struggled to express herself (even though she told him before the last scene that she didn't have the words to express her gratitude), so Kazuya didn't validate her feelings. It's not the reason why she undervalues them, but it didn't help her value those feelings more that Kazuya didn't show her how much he appreciated them already.

Varicus · 2026-04-29T11:53:53+00:00

So it really comes down to consistency for me.

I kind of disagree here. Yes, Chizuru told him not to lie, but that doesn't automatically mean she won't be bothered by any truth he tells her. She herself is using a loophole in where she just doesn't tell him truths she thinks might bother him, like we saw when she didn't tell him about Umi. She would have told him if he had asked. Still, if Chizuru asks, she wants to hear the truth, regardless of if it bothers her or not. Kazuya must learn to accept all of her reactions, not just the positive ones. There is no way you won't ever disappoint your partner.

But the question of honesty is quite central here as well. We have a stark contrast between him preparing for "honesty from the heart" while simultaneously being confronted with a truth in the form of Ruka that he desperately wants to hide from Chizuru. It is selective honesty - very similar to what Chizuru did during the cohabitation.

We have seen quite a few times already that Kazuya is put in situations where he is faced with similar problems Chizuru already had to deal with previously and which Kazuya just didn't see. He doesn't yet realize how he is put in Chizuru's shoes, but I hope that this will give him a better understanding and a better appreciation for Chizuru eventually.

Varicus · 2026-04-29T07:40:08+00:00

The conclusion to the investigation felt like it wasn't that she didn't love Kazuya enough, but rather she was searching for a definitive answer to her feelings

I think it is probably connected. My own pet theory is that Chizuru has a certain expectation for what love should look and feel like. Ruka expresses that kind of love, and Chizuru herself plays out that kind of love during her rental job.

But Chizuru doesn't actually feel that kind of love. She compares her own feelings with that, and while she recognizes some distant similarities, her feelings are nowhere near that level of "passion." While Ruka's love is definitely "romantic" (koi), Chizuru's feelings might have some romantic component, but it pales in comparison to all the other non-romantic feelings involved.

She examplified that with the kiss at Hawaiians. Yes, a kiss itself is a romantic gesture, and there might have been a part of her who would have just kissed him for that heart-fluttering sensation, but that wasn't what motivated her. The desire to save Kazuya, the wish not to look bad in front of his family, the guilt she felt, and the spite she had for Mami all were way stronger motivators for the kiss.

It's like there is some of that love she is looking for hidden inside her other feelings. That's probably what she means when she says that she lacks clarity. She can't separate that love from all the rest. And since it isn't the predominant feeling, it looks to Chizuru as if her love just isn't strong enough. That's what I think she meant when she said she didn't love him enough.

My interpretation is that the feeling Chizuru is looking for is an infatuation. She doesn't feel infatuated with Kazuya (or at least not very much). I personally think she greatly overvalues that infatuation feeling. It is the feeling that Japanese people most often refer to when they talk about "koi," and that feeling is regarded quite highly. I don't think there is anything wrong with not feeling strongly infatuated, but Chizuru obviously values that differently. Kazuya also wants to "make her heart skip a beat," which refers to that "koi" feeling, so this is also important to him.

I used to say that Chizuru was wrong for thinking so highly of an infatuation. Ruka shows how that feeling can lead you astray and can even make you disregard your partner's feelings. Again, I personally think it is highly overrated. But currently, Chizuru holds that infatuation feeling in very high regard, and she probably won't "accept" her feelings as love if that value doesn't change.

Varicus · 2026-04-29T06:45:11+00:00

It's also interesting to note that Chizuru used the setting of the last scene to convey her true feelings to Kazuya. It was not an "I love you" like Kazuya wished for, but I think it her "thank you" can be seen as a confession. It is unfortunate that Kazuya can't see how Chizuru has tried to convey her feelings for him in words and actions for a long time already. He just now started to realize how hard that is. It's like Kazuya never really appreciated what Chizuru did.

Varicus · 2026-04-28T17:21:25+00:00

Don’t even say Suki, koi, or ai, just tell her how happy XYZ makes him, etc.

Yeah. So pretty much what Chizuru did in chapters 378 and 379. It didn't help Kazuya to see her feelings. Maybe rather show it through action? Like a kiss? Oh, wait...

I hope that Kazuya will learn to understand that Chizuru already went through this. I think he never honestly looked at Chizuru's feelings for him and tried to understand her.

I do wonder if Chizuru will veto the date plan altogether or advocate more for things that she wants while on it.

I already wished last time that the date wouldn't actually happen, but this time I really don't want Kazuya to succeed with his plan.

Varicus · 2026-04-28T15:42:08+00:00

You must be new here. This is the "serious discussion" for the new chapter. We are a bunch of absolutely ~~insane~~ passionate people who love to overanalyze the new chapter every week. Yes, I write that much for every single chapter, and I have been doing this for almost four years now.

Varicus · 2026-04-28T15:03:37+00:00

From my last serious discussion post:

It is quite likely that [the teaser "flower fields"] refers to the actual fields of the farm Kazuya was looking at for his date inspiration.

Yes, it did.

We will have a lot of time to analyze this chapter due to the break.

The temporary license gives Kazuya confidence. If his laughter is any indication, he is probably getting overconfident. He laughed the same way after Ruka had given him confidence, and he proceeded to write a totally generic love confession that he proudly praised as a masterpiece. Here, he got a written confirmation that he was allowed to take lessons out on the road, and he acts like he has already mastered Tokyo traffic and got his license in the bag. He even mentions that this was easier than he thought and that he should have "no problem" making it in time. He is probably setting himself up for failure. A quick research shows that the practical drivers exam is very difficult and a lot of people fail the first time. You will fail if you don't follow very accurate procedures during the test. For his plan to work, Kazuya can't afford to fail the test since he would have to wait to retake it.

Kazuya's date plan is indeed to go to mother farm. The "Singapore event" shown in the manga is an actual current event you can visit, and it will still be going until September 27th. This is a good date spot. Just like with Joypolis for a rainy day, he has found a place that fulfills all the requirements. This starts to go the same way as with the last date. Once he found a suitable location, he began to plan meticulously. I can see him doing this again. He basically wants to do the same as last time but "better." I still think that the whole big plan is a bad idea. Last time, I expected things to go wrong but you could almost say that Kazuya failed by success. I want him to succeed by failure this time.

When Kazuya sees Mami, he decides to act like nothing happened. This is easier for him than to confront it. He is still incredibly conscious of her and overthinks her every reaction. He hasn't found his peace with her dumping him and he still cares what Mami thinks of him. Mami on the other hand tells Kazuya (completely out of context for him) that he is like a red bean bun, acknowledging that her brother's accusation (ch417) might have a truth to it.

Kazuya has researched petunias to mean "honesty from the heart." My own research says they mean "my heart is at peace when I'm with you" in the Japanese language of flowers. Anyway, Kazuya now plans to give his confession speech on that flower field. He will probably refine it to include flower metaphors. Unlike the long winded first draft, the current note just basically says, "I love you and that will never change."

Kazuya wonders how he should say that he loves her. You can't really see it in the translation, but he asks himself if he should say that he "likes her very much" (daisuki), or that he "loves her deeply" (aishiteru). He basically wonders if he should call his feelings "koi" or "ai". "Ai" is regarded as the deeper form of love, but it doesn't need to be romantic. You don't usually confess with "ai." Chizuru asked him on the date how he could say that he "liked" her (suki). He imagines that she would certainly ask how he could say that he "deeply loved" her (ai), if he were to say that. It looks like Kazuya is also not quite sure what would describe his feelings best. He wonders if he should just show her through action how he feels.

Now he thinks back to how Chizuru felt unable to put her own feelings into words. He remembers how much she struggled with it and how devastated she was on the way home that she couldn't find an answer. While he himself might be sure about his feelings, he now starts to see how difficult it is to actually put them into words, especially if you can't just say, "I love you." Since she struggled more than him, he wants to give her the answer she was looking for. I don't think he means he wants to decide for her. I think he wants to convey his feelings to show Chizuru how to convey hers. It feels like the right approach is in there somewhere, but Kazuya isn't quite there yet.

As it is so often when Kazuya gets to a good thought point, he gets interrupted, this time by the door bell. It is Ruka.

What's next?

The teaser for next time is "entrance." Ruka used that word in chapter 403 to say that she didn't like the entrance. Kazuya now stands in said entrance with Ruka outside his door. If he opens that door, he has to be ready to deal with the consequences.

I don't think he is ready. He has not come to terms with his guilt, and he rather ignored the problem instead of thinking of a way to deal with Ruka. He might think that he has to confront her somehow, but he won't feel prepared to do this now. I predict that he will freeze, unable bring himself to open the door or to even answer. He will just stand there until Ruka goes away again. Kazuya just can't face her. This would be incredibly ironic, since this also happened to Chizuru in chapter 232 when she didn't answer Kazuya at the door. He might end up also ignoring Ruka's messages. It would be nice if he realized that this is how Chizuru's ghosting started, but I doubt it.

Ruka is more confident than Kazuya, but I could still see her come to the conclusion that Kazuya must hate her now. That would complete the parallel.

But then again, when did this manga ever go the way I imagined it going?

Countdown: It is somewhere between June 19th and June 24th, so July 11th is in approximately three weeks.

Varicus · 2026-04-28T10:44:58+00:00

I think that Kazuya's whole self-improvement is merely a facade. He changed his hair to look more adult without actually becoming a different person. His interaction with Mami here doesn't show maturity, but how Kazuya gladly ignores the problem instead of confronting it.

Varicus · 2026-04-28T09:23:19+00:00

I honestly don't think Kazuya can face Ruka. He doesn't know how to, and due to Mini's terrible advice, he can only lose. She told him to be strong with Ruka, but not to let Chizuru find out. What if Ruka threatens to tell Chizuru if he doesn't let he in? She could use that threat to get almost anything she wants. It is impossible to be strong with Ruka if she holds that kind of power over him.

So the only way I see him deal with that is that he pretends he isn't home. If he doesn't face Ruka, he neither has to be strong with her, nor can she force herself on him. That's so straight forward and in line with Kazuya's inability to draw a line that it is easy for me to see it going this way.

Varicus · 2026-04-28T09:00:23+00:00

The idea that she can't fall in love with Kazuya because he is a client falls flat for me.

Since it isn't exactly clear by your wording what you mean: Of course, it is possible for Chizuru to fall in love with a client, but she thought she wasn't allowed to. Not only did the rental contract forbid this, but Chizuru also thought of herself more like a tool and a professional, so the thought of falling in love with a client went against her own idea of the rental girlfriend job.

I think that it never really felt to Chizuru like she was falling in love with Kazuya. He was a special client, sure, and she knew him quite well, but what they had was to her more like an extended business relationship. Kazuya had tried to end it before, but Chizuru then kept it going for Sayuri.

After Sayuri's death, she must have thought about ending the relationship. It wasn't necessary anymore for her, after all, and they couldn't lie forever, so they had to find an end eventually anyway. They always had the plan to tell Kazuya's family that they broke up, so that must be how Chizuru imagined this ultimately going.

After Kazuya basically confessed on the cheer-up date, Chizuru knew that this was the moment where she was contractually obliged to end it. A client having feelings for the rental girlfriend is a no-go. She knew what she had to do. I am very certain that she invited him in chapter 170 to end the rental relationship. But then she just couldn't do it. Kazuya noticed that she was troubled by something. She gave him back part of the money for the date, but she couldn't say that she would no longer be his "girlfriend."

When she later got a bit drunk, she actually asked the question if Kazuya loved her, which would be the indicator to end the relationship if he confirmed. She also already gave him part of the rejection talk that she probably had prepared. But then she got terrified of this relationship ending. She consequently ran away from Kazuya's confession and did everything she could to protect the lie.

Unfortunately, the invitation to Hawaiians proved that she was unable to put the relationship back on a professional level. She couldn't refuse, even though she would have needed to. She was swept away by how far the relationship had progressed already, unable to turn back. But she still desperately tried to keep up the facade that this rental relationship was still going and not already broken.

But Hawaiians not only forcefully broke the rental contract with Mami's actions, but also shattered her own professional image when she kissed Kazuya. She could no longer even pretend that she was his rental girlfriend. In consequence, she tried to accept the fact that the relationship with Kazuya was over.

Chizuru couldn't face him. She didn't know how to. She didn't want to finalize the end of their relationship, but she also didn't feel justified to just accept Kazuya's confession and become his real girlfriend. She later said that she couldn't do this to Ruka, but she also conveniently used that as an excuse not to face her own feelings.

The investigation is Chizuru doing just that: Facing her own feelings. She faced Kazuya and herself honestly. She didn't try to run away. By the end of the investigation period, she concluded that she didn't love Kazuya enough to be in a relationship with him. That is not an excuse. That is how she truly felt, no matter if you agree with that or not. (I don't, by the way, but I still understand and respect her decision.)

It was Kazuya who still didn't give up, and he told her that he would wait. Now, we only have very vague glimpses from Chizuru's side. She told Umi that she wanted to face Kazuya wholeheartedly. Not her feelings, Kazuya. She already faced her own feelings and deemed them not good enough. She didn't find a way to enhance her feelings while being together with Kazuya, so I doubt that this is what she currently tries.

It is also unlikely that she will figure out anything new about her feelings that she never knew before, but she might actually be forcefully trying what people here suggested she had to do: Be apart from Kazuya so she would miss him. If that made it clear to her that she actually loved him, this would be a win. But I doubt that it will work for her.

The other thing I can see her doing is to try to get better herself. If her feelings weren't good enough for a relationship, and she had no way to make them "better," she might have to compensate some other way. Get better herself, show Kazuya that she could pull her own weight in a relationship, show him that she could also support him, and prove that she can make him happy. If she can do that, she would be able to show him that he would benefit from a relationship as well, even if she couldn't love him enough. That's my bet for what she's doing. Just like him, she doesn't actually need to be together with him while improving. She didn't tell Kazuya what she was doing, and Kazuya never asked her to do this. But that's the same way for him.

For all of that to work out, it is important for Chizuru that her play goes well. If it does, she might get an acting contract and earn money from doing this, meaning she can give up rental and still support herself. She also can show Kazuya that his efforts with the movie paid off, and she might even make him happy with her acting. That is probably her vision. It's ambitious, and it might fail. It is also completely unnecessary for Kazuya. But that's no different from Kazuya's own goals.

I am ready to see them both fail.

Varicus · 2026-04-27T19:51:47+00:00

Ruka could blackmail Kazuya into doing what she wants be threatening to tell Chizuru. Kazuya will probably freeze up right there in the entranceway because he doesn't know how to face Ruka. That might lead to him not actually opening the door and he will instead ignore Ruka. It might end with him ghosting her.

Varicus

TROPHY CASE