Looking for a shoujo manga series with a tough female lead, and a male lead that can’t live without her? This is the one for you.
You can check out this series for yourself below.
What happens in chapter 1?
The female lead of this series, Shinonome, only wants to be the number one in someone’s life. While that shouldn’t be all that difficult, her somewhat abrasive personality is rather off-putting to everyone that she shows interest in. While she is very proud of the fact that she always sticks up for people, and that she puts her martial arts training to use, just about everyone around her that she’s not cute. They cite her being tall, her not being afraid to stand up to men, and her not speaking in a cutesy way as faults in her personality, and some go as far as telling her that she’s not suited to be in a relationship.
After getting dumped for running after a man who was taking secret photos of girls on a train, she begins wondering if she really is the problem. While she is still really proud of her strong personality and morals, she really does want to have someone in her life. As she’s struggling with her ideations, she’s introduced to a new Chinese exchange student, Yan.
Yan is incredibly popular with everyone in the university from the start thanks to his handsome looks, but is described by everyone as being distant. Shinonome doesn’t really pay him any mind, as she has a clear person that she wants to impress by the time he is introduced to the story. Things quickly go awry at a mixer though, as it’s revealed that she was just freshly dumped mid-date. The conversation quickly changes to why everyone thinks that she was dumped, and they begin discussing all of the traits that they believe make her undateable. All the while Yan is just quietly listening, and sometimes contributing to the conversation… But he speaks in Mandarin during this scene so I couldn’t tell you what he says.
After the mixer, Shinonome runs into Yan by accident as he’s actively being come-onto by one of her upperclassmen. He looks rather shell shocked as it’s happening, and calls for her to save him when he notices her. She does, and ends up bringing him back to her apartment.
The next morning, he explains to her that his whole life he’s had great difficulties with women – he freaks out and freezes up when they touch him. But, for some reason, he’s completely fine when Shinonome touches him. Amazed at the revelation, he quickly proposes that she become his bodyguard.
Our Shinonome is both happy that someone clearly needs her, and unhappy that that need is as a bodyguard, not a girlfriend.
What I liked most about this volume
❤️ Yan speaking in Mandarin half the time. While I didn’t understand what he was saying, it added to his character! If he just came back from living in China, it makes sense that he speaks the language. (though I can’t vouch for how accurate it is)
🧡 Our FL liking herself – I feel like often-times our strong-willed FL’s tend to dislike themselves! I like that Shinonome is depicted as someone who really wants to stay true to herself. Even when she beings wondering if she should think about changing herself to fulfill her dream, she is really apprehensive, because she’s proud of herself!
💛 When Shinonome ditched her date to follow that creep who was secretly photographing young women on the train. (and then when Yan secretly had a friend help her bring him back to the train station)
💚 The whole scene of Yan confessing his aversion to being touched – Japanese is really vague, and so when he asked Shinonome to try hugging him to test if he could touch her, she misinterpreted it as him asking her if she would sleep with him oop. The misunderstanding was soon cleared up, but it was very funny.
Maddies Manga 
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