hontou ni sou omou?

Yamato and Honoka-chan are now officially a couple. The rest of the gang finds out - Ninja Miki overhears, Yasunobu observes and Daimyo Suzuka Asahina is reluctantly informed of this latest development by her faithful, beautiful but unfortunately no-yuri-crush-on-her camo-lovin’ shinobi spy. Honoka-chan confesses to stalking Yamato and later gives him a token to mark him as her property. However events intervene and tests Yamato’s resolve while fraying Honoka-chan’s nerves.

While I do broadly agree that Yamato being a chump by treating Honoka-chan as a consolation prize, I also can’t get too peeved with him since it is well-established that he reacts to the immediate situation without thinking about its consequences. Also after being rejected thrice already, he has started to see Suzuka as being out of reach with her serious attitude towards the regional tournament and her third place 173 cm high jump.

While Honoka-chan probably has an idealized image of Yamato, I think she loves him for who he is and will not want him to change much whereas Suzuka is an active force for change in Yamato’s life. And, although I am a Honoka fan, I think Suzuka will be better for Yamato even if he doesn’t hugely deserve either. At this point, Gandalf’s line in The Fellowship of the Ring movie comes to mind "Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement. For even the very wise cannot see all ends." - instead substituting "life" with "love" and "death" with "loneliness" as a caveat to my own judgement.

Mentar has described Miki as the voice of reason with respect to Suzuka but Yasunobu completely pwned her in this department by essentially throwing an Article 2(7) interpretation of love and inter-personal relationships at her.