Welp... at least the world doesn't have to worry about the demons anymore.

Literally cucked to death.

I mean, childhood friends almost never end up with the MC(for some reason)

The childhood friend curse strikes once more.

At least she took revenge.

Well, let's be fair- how would he have known? All that tsundere probably convinced him she wasn't into him, of course he'd go with another girl, one who probably made it clear how she felt about him!

Seriouspost: If you're interested in someone, make it clear (as long as you don't go past that point into creepy). You miss 100% of the shots you don't take after all, and even if you crash and burn, at least now you'll know and can move on.

Dank.Knight said:

I mean, childhood friends almost never end up with the MC(for some reason)

Coga said:

Well, let's be fair- how would he have known? All that tsundere probably convinced him she wasn't into him, of course he'd go with another girl, one who probably made it clear how she felt about him!

Seriouspost: If you're interested in someone, make it clear (as long as you don't go past that point into creepy). You miss 100% of the shots you don't take after all, and even if you crash and burn, at least now you'll know and can move on.

You're a good man mate.

DESTRUCTIVE FINISH!

Naked_Flame said:

Love Hina.

That's the worst example, you know... But anyway:

EXPLOSION ENDINGS!!!

Dank.Knight said:

I mean, childhood friends almost never end up with the MC(for some reason)

Ai Yori Aoshi
Kashimashi (original manga version)
The Invincible Reincarnated Ponkotsu
Tomo-chan is a Girl
We're New at This (starts with marrying the childhood friend)
My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom (basically all romantic interests are also childhood friends)
Tsuredure Children (Tsurezure on Danbooru) has couples like this, including the main/first one.
So I'm a Spider, So What? has a side-couple of reincarnators that were childhood friends who became lovers.

Oh, right, and here's TVTropes's collection of them

Basically, whether or not you have a victorious childhood friend tends to depend on two things: If she shows up first (first girl wins trope), and if the basic premise of the story doesn't depend upon one of the other girls. (I.E. "I Was Kidnapped By A Catgirl Space Pirate Princess" no longer stays true to the title if the guy decides to go with a normal life and a normal love interest.)

NWSiaCB said:

Ai Yori Aoshi
Kashimashi (original manga version)
The Invincible Reincarnated Ponkotsu
Tomo-chan is a Girl
We're New at This (starts with marrying the childhood friend)
My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom (basically all romantic interests are also childhood friends)
Tsuredure Children (Tsurezure on Danbooru) has couples like this, including the main/first one.
So I'm a Spider, So What? has a side-couple of reincarnators that were childhood friends who became lovers.

Oh, right, and here's TVTropes's collection of them

Basically, whether or not you have a victorious childhood friend tends to depend on two things: If she shows up first (first girl wins trope), and if the basic premise of the story doesn't depend upon one of the other girls. (I.E. "I Was Kidnapped By A Catgirl Space Pirate Princess" no longer stays true to the title if the guy decides to go with a normal life and a normal love interest.)

Great example! As for childhood friends seems to be unfavored for winning, well...
They already have a HUGE advantage for knowing the MC all of their lives.
It would be too easy to couple them with the MC, which may make the story boring.
Plus, A LOT of them feel overly secure about it and never bother to make a move.

Making them lose is a good way to teach morals about not getting cocky, despite your advantage.
Besides, that advantage could also backfire, making the MC only feel familial/sibling love for them.
It will serve as great character development for the childhood friend, to fight for their love, instead of just clinging to MC all the time and flaunting their 'oh-so-special' status.
So even if they lose, it's not because of their inaction or being too comfortable with that special position.

silentGK2 said:

Great example! As for childhood friends seems to be unfavored for winning, well...
They already have a HUGE advantage for knowing the MC all of their lives.
It would be too easy to couple them with the MC, which may make the story boring.
Plus, A LOT of them feel overly secure about it and never bother to make a move.

Making them lose is a good way to teach morals about not getting cocky, despite your advantage.
Besides, that advantage could also backfire, making the MC only feel familial/sibling love for them.
It will serve as great character development for the childhood friend, to fight for their love, instead of just clinging to MC all the time and flaunting their 'oh-so-special' status.
So even if they lose, it's not because of their inaction or being too comfortable with that special position.

I looked at the TVTropes collection I linked, and I noticed Urusei Yatsura there, and that's honestly where it all probably comes from.

Urusei Yatsura was basically the Ur-love-triangle-anime. Rumiko Takahashi basically pioneered the harem anime, and modern ones really do just play out as rehashes of her work over and over with fairly minor changes to her tropes.

The basic plot of Urusei Yatsura is there's a lazy boy who doesn't want to settle for a boring, ordinary life, he wants to have adventure and shit, while his childhood friend has her life together, and wants him to get his life together so they can live a proper adult life together. Then comes Lum, the crazy oni space princess to give him adventure, and he's put in a love triangle between living fast, dying young and leaving what is probably a bloody smear from death by snu snu, or he can become a proper adult and marry the childhood friend and live a normal life. The whole thing was supposed to be a coming-of-age story and he was going to marry the childhood friend... but the audience said they liked the crazy oni space princess better because she does the wacky anime hijinks (again, because the basic premise of the show was centered on catgirl space pirate princesses, the first one of them to show up has to win to satisfy the audience), so Rumiko Takahashi broke the moral of her own story... and so has everyone to follow after her.

Notably, all the ones where childhood friends win, it's when the story has relatively grounded stakes. If it's just about someone being a scruffy, tomboyish childhood friend versus a rich and beautiful woman, Betty beats Veronica every time. It's when Betty's up against Haruhi that she loses. All of the series I list are either slice-of-life types with grounded romantic interests, (Kashimashi involves aliens gender-bending the MC, but Tomari's rival is just a pretty girly-girl schoolgirl, and all the 'action' is just getting used to lesbian dating,) or else involves something like if both MC and childhood friend get isekai'd together so the wacky premise is inherent in the setting, and childhood friend can either be the wooby straight (wo)man to the crazy crap (or in Ponkotsu's case, the overpowered idiot cause of the craziness).

Incidentally, this also means that if this setup were in a normal story, a hero x sympathetic demon lord romance is already one of the highest orders of fan favorites, and adding in that she's a childhood friend absolutely guarantees she'll be the one that the fans demand gets the happy ending (which is why BB subverting it has such dramatic punch).

Coga said:

Well, let's be fair- how would he have known? All that tsundere probably convinced him she wasn't into him, of course he'd go with another girl, one who probably made it clear how she felt about him!

Seriouspost: If you're interested in someone, make it clear (as long as you don't go past that point into creepy). You miss 100% of the shots you don't take after all, and even if you crash and burn, at least now you'll know and can move on.

This, for real. It is hard to move on from if you never get the closure of an answer. It took me years to move on after I moved away without telling my crush my feelings, and it still hurts to think about.

someguyted said:

This, for real. It is hard to move on from if you never get the closure of an answer. It took me years to move on after I moved away without telling my crush my feelings, and it still hurts to think about.

It’s been a few more years now. I can confidently say I’ve managed to move on. I have learned to be happy with myself as I am, without needing to rely on someone else