Ok, So I'm writing this as I'm re-watching the 2nd episode after I read the Discussion thread for episode 2. I watched it 2 days later so I guess I'll post this in the 3rd episode thread. You could call this my take on Hachiman’s struggles as a character. Anyhow, In the 2nd episode we got the confession event for Tobe and Ebina (Great character development btw) and Hachiman fixing the outcome the way he does best, that is throwing himself to a methaforical bus of awkwardness, pain, lies and judgment. The thing that was different this time is that Hachiman finally gave to himself the right to see how wrong he was. With this, I believe Hachiman is someone that’s both extremely selfish and helpful. He sees the world as something that would hurt him as soon as he lowers his guard. That’s why he convinced himself to distance himself of it the most that he could. If he puts a front, then he won’t get hurt again. He became a loner after realizing the pain that comes of not trying to end up a loner (Thanks to TG:RE for this). However, the environment that he established with Yukino and Yui was something he would never have expected to have. This makes him doubt his one self, the one that he built in order to define a stronger version of himself. In order to prove that his safe zone actually exists he had to remember the pain he experienced so much in the past. To remind himself that same pain again is the only way he thinks he would be able to defend himself if those times ever came again. He took every opportunity that appeared to put himself as the evil-guy. The biggeste eHe made up the lie that if he didn’t matter then nothing would hurt him. I think he realized all of this in the final part of the 2nd episode, when he said he was the biggest liar. He lied to himself in order to find the same comfortableness the other guys wanted. When solving all those problems, he was only caring about himself, but made it look like if he did it of pure kindness. Yui and Ebina kind of shown him this. He was basically hurting himself the same way he feared anyone else would.