Mashima's own statement

Official arts from Mashima

Chapter covers

This is supposed to be a hypothetical miraxus kid drawn by Mashima (idk she looks like Kyria)

Say I'm in love, so it's hard to admit

I can't eat, I can't sleep

Teruhashi went from being in denial to genuinely liking Saiki for who he is, enough to admit her crush to multiple people. Heck, she was even ready to practice confessing to him in front of someone she had just met (Saiki disguised as Kuriko). She made him chocolates on Valentine’s, literally shouted in front of everyone that nothing could ever make her hate him, even changed her style and personality for him. She changed her college preferences just to be at the same college as him (she literally wrote “Saiki’s wife” as her first choice lmao). Most importantly, she let her perfect pretty girl mask slip away just to go thank him. Her excitement and the little jumps at the thought of spending some alone time with him in the last episode of Reawakened should be enough to make people realize that all Teruhashi wants is be around him. The Mixer episode is the biggest proof. To her, Saiki is not just another “offu” from the crowd. She genuinely likes him and wants him to like her back. Even after hearing about the meteor that could annihilate them all, she still didn’t stop thinking about him.

Unfortunately for any of us nalu shippers i fear this tells us everything we’re ever going to need to know about where nalu’s relationship will end up. This isn’t the first time hiro has stated he enjoys the idea of certain couples living within the ‘more than friends less than lovers’ mentality and i believe this is him just slowly trying to get the fandom to a place where they are comfortable with nalu never ending up as a canon couple.

I truly don’t know how to feel about this, on one hand I do believe nalu’s relationship is alot more deep and complicated to simply be defined by lovers or friends. I think mashima has done a really amazing job at having nalu show their love for eachother through actions over words, and having them both be comfortable enough with their relationship to never feel the need to put a one dimensional label on it.

On the other hand, I truly think if mashima decided to make every single ship canon excluding nalu it would truly be a huge disservice to the connection nalu have. I think hiro is truly struggling to find a way around making nalu canon because even he is aware that he couldn’t get away with giving them a kiss scene or even a confession scene as it would be so ooc for both natsu and lucy.

However, I really do hope mashima takes the time to think of a solid way to make them canon, nalu has always been the ship at the forefront of the show considering their insane amount of screentime, there are even people that don’t interact with this show or fandom anymore but still take the time to check back in to see if nalu is finally canon or not. Not only would it seem like mashima really did just bait his mcs(I know technically the entire guild is the mc but you know what I mean)ending up as a couple to boost his engagement with his most popular show, but it would also just mean hiro wasted the time of his entire audience by using so much of the shows screentime to develop their relationship just to never end up taking it anywhere.

The mixer chapter is THE biggest Saiteru hint out there istg. I’ve talked about it before but I just had to make another post about it.

When Imu and Chiyo try to convince Teruhashi to stay for the mixer, she eventually agrees, and right after that, her internal monologue is shown. Under the pretense of reluctance, she wonders what the boys are going to be like. This is very much aligned with Saiki’s perception of her. He further helps the boys impress her.

And right when he thinks he has succeeded in moving Teruhashi’s heart, she pulls an uno-reverse on him. She thinks it’d be more fun if Saiki were there. Even if all he did was sit in the corner with a blank face, she’d still enjoy his presence regardless. At that moment, it had nothing to do with getting an offu out of him. She just wants him around because she likes him as he is.

And THAT catches him off guard because the realization is huge on his end. Safe to say, until the mixer event, Saiki strongly believed he wasn’t Teruhashi’s type (throwback to the moment when he saw her with Makoto at the movies and assumed she must’ve found someone who was actually not suitable for her tastes). So, he obviously thought she didn’t really like him and it was just her bruised ego because he didn’t react to her beauty the way others did.

However, Teruhashi proves him wrong and makes him realize that she genuinely enjoys his company regardless of his boring nature. That IS a big deal. Saiki yet again loses to Teruhashi, but he isn’t sad this time. In fact, it makes him smile a little.

Teruhashi’s heart didn’t change, the one whose heart got moved was Saiki’s. He takes the boys out because he finally understands that helping them was useless. Even though Teruhashi ended up enjoying their company, she still didn’t forget about him.

Saiteru is implied a hundred times throughout the entire series, and this has to be one of the most obvious instances lol. Saiki could’ve just taken the boys home without participating in the who-gets-to-be-with-Teruhashi game. Ofc none of the boys deserved to take her home because they weren’t genuine to begin with.