Echidna – Thorough Watch

A Re:Zero Theory: Reid taught amnesiac Subaru to think critically rather than always receiving explanations since he’ll need this skill to restore his memories and be whole

Posted on June 24, 2026 | by anicritic | Leave a Comment

As alluded to in the title, I believe Reid was teaching amnesiac Subaru to think for himself in Ep. 77 since this version of Subaru was really used to having everything explained to him, much like how he’d get an explanation on everything after he’d initially lost his memories and immediately after the first time he fell to his death.

More on this front is that I also believe Reid saying, “Ah, finally.” is him potentially following Echidna’s instruction in waiting for a specific cue before going after Julius, which was that rumbling he heard, which may have been what prompted him saying that.

Of course, maybe this is just White Fox being lazy on details, but while the first part of the GIF has Reid saying that Subaru came too early in Ep. 74 may imply he’s aware of the passage of time, in all the instances Reid had screen time, there was zero indication of in which direction the sun was shining, and given how heavily Re:Zero focuses on details and how the area in the second exam may be a special sort of space like Echidna’s Dream Castle, Reid shouldn’t be able to perceive how much time had passed as getting exposure to sunlight is important in ensuring one has a normal circadian rhythm, and this space possibly has no sunlight but merely mimics daytime conditions, so even this Reid who apparently only remembers having swung a sword for 3 months may be on the same side as Satella, Echidna, and Flügel and is acting with future knowledge from Echidna through a soul link, contract, or oath with the assistance of her Authority of Greed: Tome of Wisdom.

More to potentially back this up is that Reid basically said that amnesiac Subaru shouldn’t have ran and instead hashed things out with his people in the second and third parts of the GIF, which is very generous advice for someone who’s supposed to be an enemy, almost as if he’s guiding him in his own way, and this is especially notable since Reid is supposed to be someone who loves bullying the weak, so why did Reid seemingly give him any advice when the interaction could’ve been much shorter and even harsher (Yes, I know piercing his body was harsh)?

The words Reid said in the second and third cuts of the GIF may have been meant to highlight just how strange it was that amnesiac Subaru went to a higher floor, and particularly to him, even though amnesiac Subaru was told that the group was more interested in going to the higher floors ’cause they wanted to find out what happened to him and pass the exams so that they could leave, which suggests something’s up.

Thus, I conclude Reid may have told amnesiac Subaru that he’s early ’cause he knew that the poor guy wasn’t really ready and was in no condition to face him. Yes, Reid’s the type who likes to bully the weak as Shaula had said, but I suspect there was more to this interaction than what was on the surface.

I strongly believe the Freud reference in Episode 69 was meant to show that Subaru’s the type to act on hunches and subconscious thoughts given what Freud is known for (and yes, I as told that in the WN it was a Kurapika reference and was a different reference in the LN, but the point still stands given an extra loop was cut off in this episode according to LN viewers as the Freud reference makes great sense in the anime given Subaru chose the path on the right). That’d be why Subaru chose the path on the right, ’cause it led to Satella’s sealed body as shown by the ever increasing amounts of miasma, and Satella herself had asked Subaru to love himself and then someday come kill her in Episode 38, which could be indicative of a lovers’ promise to kill her four hundred years ago, which Subaru subconsciously tried to fulfill or fought against fulfilling (either could work).

Where I’m going with this is that I’ve extrapolated the Freud content from Subaru in Ep. 69 to Ep. 70 to show that Subaru wasn’t crazy or stupid to think he had Returned By Death at the start of the episode when he woke up on Emilia’s lap given he woke up in a new place, and it was ’cause he subconsciously realized that he’d been to the dark world where Satella lies within the vicinity of his soul, and since most visits to this dark world involve him dying, he instinctively thought that he’d died, not ’cause he has no brain or is a super irrational person, but ’cause he subconsciously linked dying with going to the dark world.

As such, I theorize Subaru thinking of Reid in Ep. 70 despite it having been explained earlier in the episode that Reid died of old age is also ’cause subconsciously he knows what’s in the tower much like he knew the path to the right in the cave/tunnel led to Satella, and he knows there’s a version of Reid on one of the higher floors due to his time in the world 400 hundred years ago, and that’s why Subaru thought about Reid in the moment Shaula said she gives no thought to who she’s killed, not ’cause he can’t remember basic details, but since he’s letting his subconscious thoughts and hunches drive him.

That’d be part of the reason why amnesiac Subaru asked Reid any questions at all in Ep. 77 despite his last memory of him being how he pierced his body and inflicted so much pain to him, ’cause Flügel, Volcanica, and Reid were part of the Hero’s party, and Reid was most likely his friend 400 years ago, and amnesiac Subaru felt an affinity with him despite the pain he made him suffer through him. For more on why amnesiac Subaru could have any subconscious memories of Reid at all despite likely having his memories eaten by the Authority of Gluttony due to the line in Ep. 74, “Memories are what shape a person.” from Rui Arneb’s VA, read this: https://thoroughwatch.org/?p=281

Thus, I believe that Reid may have given Subaru a very teachable moment that he’ll need to draw upon by thinking for himself instead of having everything answered for him, which will be crucial for dealing with the issues of this arc. And given Reid’s words in Ep. 74 basically stated what amnesiac Subaru had to do, which is not avoid his friends and face them honestly, which is what he resolved to do in Ep. 77, I’m leaning to Reid perhaps having intentionally given him a leg up this episode.

Reid doesn’t necessarily need to be a nice guy. This version of Reid and perhaps even the original may have been in on the plan of the original Echidna to save the world, which Tea Party Echidna herself may have been following.

As for Reid not recognizing Emilia’s appearance or Shaula’s, this could possibly be explained by this Reid being an artificial construct of the Pleiades Watchtower, which was hinted at in this episode given it was implied that since the tower was under attack that he no longer had to stay on the second floor. Thus, this Reid may have partially formed due to a Book of the Dead, specifically Reid’s, and not its entire contents, with the memories he did have forming the basis of this version of Reid’s soul, and if I’m right about Books of the Dead being partially a by-product of Echidna’s Authority, that may give Echidna some power over this version of Reid.

A Re:Zero Theory: Foxidna hinted at her own game to amnesiac Subaru, contradicting her stated reason for being at the tower, and he was none the wiser

Posted on June 21, 2026 | by anicritic | Leave a Comment

Again, as I stated in a previous write-up, I feel I didn’t do a good job doing Ep. 77 justice by not being thorough enough in my reasoning as I shouldn’t just assume that everyone remembers everything I’ve posted before, especially since it’s been four episodes since I last commented on Foxidna being suspicious, so I am again posting a supplementary write-up.

As seen from the content of the GIF, which I have brought up before previously, Foxidna stated that she didn’t share her secret with Julius ’cause he didn’t see through her act like Subaru did, but Subaru’s first glimpse of Foxidna not being Anastasia was when she said that she thinks that Reinhard and Felix were more than just friends to Julius, something Subaru found surprising due to the face he made since he had previously not known anyone who could remember someone whose name had been eaten by Gluttony.

That’s why Subaru said later on that something’s been off the whole time ’cause of that moment hinting that Foxidna remembers Julius before talking about how coldly Foxidna spoke about Ricardo, which I believe was Foxidna deliberately cluing in Subaru on her identity since she had already given him a hint, meaning that next hint would confirm his suspicions.

Then when the tower’s under attack, Foxidna said, “I should have listened to Ana’s intuition. I shouldn’t have brought anyone else here.” (which is in the GIF) meaning that she shouldn’t have brought anyone else to the tower, going with those from her own camp and listened to Anastasia. This calls into question pretty much everything she’s said this season given she said that Anastasia had been asleep in her od ever since the battle with the Witch Cult in Priestella, but apparently, she either had a talk with Anastasia sometime during the battle or pre-planned the Priestella visit with Anastasia’s consent, bringing into question her motives for gathering everyone to Priestella. Any way you slice it, Foxidna is a serial liar.

To top all of this off, Foxidna also says in the GIF that this pain is penance for Ana since if she were to give back control to her, Anastasia would feel the extreme pain and the horror of death, implying she had the power to give back her body to Anastasia the whole time but didn’t, flying in the face of her previous remarks about not being able to give back Anastasia’s body, showing she’s just very suss in general since she contradicted her statement about not being able to give Anastasia’s body back twice in the same episode.

I believe Foxidna was outright trolling/following the Tome of Wisdom when she said that she should’ve listened to Anastasia’s inuition, and that was to stay in character regarding her not trusting Subaru when she knows full well that he’s trustworthy. That would be why I propose she said it should’ve been Beatrice instead of her that Subaru was dragging along with him, highlighting that Beatrice is an unfortunate girl to draw sympathy to Beatrice from Subaru despite Foxidna not really even knowing Beatrice well to aid in learning to believe in himself. While it may just be survivor’s guilt, Foxidna is just so suspicious that this interpretation I’ve come up with just can’t be ruled out.

And I do believe Foxidna still remembers Julius given the content of Episodes 67, 70, and 72 with Episode 72 providing a further hint of Foxidna remembering Julius with how she aggressively used Jiwald to try to defend Julius when he was fighting Reid. Someone who barely knows him wouldn’t do that, and Subaru even pondered about why she’d go to such lengths, which means Tappei intended for viewers to think hard about that detail. After Episode 67 with Foxidna putting it out there that Reinhard and Felix were more than just friends to Julius, which Subaru notably reacted to with his face before later saying something’s been up the whole time after she talked coldly about Ricardo, which was a reference to that first scene, and her general gaze toward Julius along with her look of discomfort in Episode 70 when Shaula was shattering Julius’s fantasy about Reid Astrea being a man of great character ’cause of his sword skills when nobody else was paying him any heed, showing she knows that Reid had been Julius’s idol since childhood, there’s a clear pattern of Foxidna showing a level of connection with Julius no one else in the group has, not even Subaru.

As I said with my post from four weeks ago, I believe Foxidna staged the talk she had with Subaru and Julius following her Authority of Greed: Tome of Wisdom due to her being a soul clone of Echidna’s, not just an artificial spirit, so that Julius would feel insecure about his role as Anastasia’s first knight as well as cause a fight between Subaru and Julius right before Subaru loses his memories to bring Julius to a new low with the one person he believed to have remembered him also forgetting him and that she likely spammed Jiwald not for the reason she stated in Ep. 73 with being unsure about Reid having lethal intent but ’cause she wanted to direct Subaru’s thoughts to Julius instead of the exam so that she could prevent the bad future from Emilia’s third Sanctuary line in Episode 48, and Muse Asia’s translation was: “I have bent my knees and lost even my sword. Just what do I have left?” This line suggests that that depicted a future in which Julius had to bend his knees in deference to Reid while also having lost his sword, leading to him being crushed emotionally and possibly suicidal.

Why Foxidna would be able to psychologically prime Subaru to do this is that he’s the type to follow his hunches and subconscious thoughts, as seen by when he likely chose the path on the right in Episode 69, ’cause of the ever-so increasing miasma and the doors that he could open that may have been built or cast by himself, subconsciously remembering his promise to Satella to kill her as she’d requested for him to do in Episode 38, and when he thought he’d Returned by Death when he woke up in a new location without it being exactly warranted since he associated a visit to the dark world/shadow garden with death, and why he thought to Reid as an answer for the exam on the third floor even though he had learned that Reid died of old age not that long ago, ’cause he subconsciously knew that Reid is in the tower.

If she’s indeed a soul clone, Foxidna should also have the same Authority the original did. And given Satella wouldn’t know which savepoints to choose without future knowledge, she probably has either an oath or contract with at least one or more Echidna soul clone(s) given Satella wouldn’t know what would be the right future/path to follow based on Subaru’s previous time as the Hero and what worked then wouldn’t necessarily work now.

As for how Foxidna would remember Julius, the common denominator between Subaru and Echidna is that they were Witch Factor holders who emitted miasma, so I believe the mechanism by which Subaru and Foxidna would remember Julius would be either ’cause of their Witch Factors or their miasma.

I believe Foxidna stating in Episode 67 that she will choose the option that has the highest possibility of success, no more or less, may be low-key a consistent character trait of all of Echidna’s soul clones, and that’s why Tea Party Echidna pushed Subaru to reject her contract even if she would’ve liked for him to take her contract since the world continuing rather than being destroyed very much aligns with her goal of attaining more knowledge. This would be the reason I posit that all Echidna soul clones follow the plan of the original Echidna.

And as for Anastasia being pragmatic and someone who would follow the mindset Foxidna mentioned, plenty of merchants do not choose the option with the highest probability of success ’cause that option may yield the smallest margins, so they weigh their decisions against their personal risk tolerance to go for something that has a higher reward, and if Anastasia is indeed a skilled merchant, this would perhaps be moreso her mindset, not that of which Foxidna shared, and you know since it’s Tappei, he’s done his research and should know the type of reasoning merchants deal with with it not simply being going with the option with highest probability of success.

If Foxidna is a soul clone of Echidna and her Authority, I also posit that she wouldn’t grant Anastasia her every wish much like those who genuinely believe in Foxidna’s goodness believe. Tea Party Echidna followed the plan of the original Echidna in Season 2, and the original Echidna may have made her soul clones specifically ’cause she knew they’d follow her plan ’cause of the core personality trait I’ve proposed they all have, so if that means following one specific future, Foxidna would do it even if it wasn’t the optimal choice every time but the choices that helps Subaru learn important info and give the cast character development.

I acknowledge a possible counterpoint anyone in that anyone with adequate social awareness should realize that Reinhard and Felix were more than friends to Julius based on Julius’s reaction, and I I may have been reading too much into Foxidna’s apparent connection to Julius, but the attention she showed him in Ep. 70 when none of the others paid Julius any attention when he was going on about Reid makes me believe there’s something more to it as it would’ve been easy for her to treat Julius like all the others did, not acknowledging him at all, if she really doesn’t remember him, and given Re:Zero is a series with a ton of details while also being short on available time, showing Anastasia’s reaction at all appeared to be like a big thing to me given her previous attempt to distance herself from Julius in Re:Zero Break Time Season 4 Ep. 6 even if I acknowledge she may have just figured out that Reid was his idol.

A Re:Zero Theory: Ep. 75 may be more evidence of Satella + Echidna coordinating on RBD, and the point’s for Subaru or at least a part of him to become more self-confident

Posted on June 8, 2026 | by anicritic | Leave a Comment

Given Regulus told Subaru to thank him for mauling a chunk of his leg off when he would’ve preferred doing more, and in Eps. 53/54 after the tower bell rung, Sirius shouted she must cease hostilities ’cause they were told to stop and Capella had to move into the government office in, and Foxidna indicated Capella’s blindly following whatever the Gospel says in retreating, this shows there’s a grander plot at play rather than Gospels telling the holder’s best path to happiness.

That’d be why whoever was in Rem’s body said, “Try to figure it out next time” to amnesiac Subaru, and whoever it was knows he can Return by Death by either having eaten his memories or having been told of it by Rui. Ultimately, I still expect Subaru to win since I believe Gospels don’t truly tell the future but are meant to keep the world on a particular path which would be why Regulus thought he’d meet Emilia again in Ep. 51 despite it not happening until the fourth loop.

This’d also be why Patrasche was unharmed while everyone else killed, and it’s ’cause the Gluttony trio’s Gospels didn’t tell them to kill Patrasche ’cause Echidna, who I believe is the one making the text in the Gospels appear, wanted amnesiac Subaru to trust Patrasche for now and find out about there being an unknown attacker. It’d also be why they were cornered at the hidden passage to the balcony ’cause Satella likely broke out of her Seal given he’d made multiple doors disappear, making it easier for the Seal to be broken, and the black smoke was actually either her miasma or her mass of shadows with her coordinating with Echidna to make that happen since that loop was clearly a disaster, and heneeded to learn to trust at least one of his allies since Patrasche would never betray him. This would be why the miasma or shadows deliberately cornered him and Patrasche where it happened so that Patrasche would be forced to toss him through the hidden passage leading to the balcony.

Additionally, this would be why amnesiac Subaru opts to trust Shaula later since she treats him the same as always as Patrasche does unlike the others who notice that he’s acting differently, leading to him learning to trust a second person, which he very much needs at this point in time given he’s not in the right mindset to trust others due to being in the shadow of both his father and pre-amnesiac Subaru, as shown by him talking about how they’re pushing their problems onto him, not to mention having been pushed to his death twice being on his mind, showing a direct through-line between the third loop and the fourth loop of Ep. 75.

We’ve known since the beginning that Satella is choosing Subaru’s save points, which begs the question about how she knows at what point Subaru can make a difference. A lot of anime-onlies believe in the theory that Satella and Subaru travelled back in time four hundred years to ensure that this current Subaru succeeds, and although I don’t believe in this theory I will nonetheless use it to support my argument.

Let’s say that this is true and Satella actually is a future variant of Emilia. How would she know in the current day at what points Subaru can make a difference so that he succeeds this time? The answer is that she doesn’t. Even if she knew how the previous Subaru’s run through as the hero worked, that doesn’t mean Satella 100% has an ironclad way of knowing what’s the best point for him to still be able to make the most impact given what failed last time would obviously fail again while what would’ve worked last time may not this time. The only way to know for sure is with future knowledge for this current world, which is why I’m now proposing that Satella has a contract with Echidna in that Satella shares her field of vision with Echidna for some unknown price we viewers aren’t privy to.

If Satella did have this sort of arrangement with Echidna, it’d explain why she makes the save points she does, and it’d be ’cause she consults with Echidna beforehand, who we know to have future knowledge and acts with it in mind as shown when she turned Petra’s handkerchief into a spectral knife for Subaru to kill himself after he revealed RBD to her. Echidna also looked forward into the future hundreds of years ago given she made Puck with the express intention of defeating Melakuera only for Puck to lose his memories so that Roswaal could draw Emilia into his camp with Puck losing his memories of the Roswaal who co-existed with Echidna four hundred years ago, making him oblivious to Roswaal’s Soul Transcription. Certain parts of the fandom say that Echidna doesn’t use her Authority, but I call BS as she has clearly used it well in advance hundreds of years ago.

This situation in Ep. 75 would also force Subaru to confront his insecurities about how the pre-amnesiac Subaru was such an incredible guy with his comment about “Just what the hell are you?” showing he thinks that his past self was a helluva guy, and if my write-up three days ago had some truth to it, it’d serve a point on pre-amnesiac Subaru perhaps having dissociated due to the imminent threat of his memories being either about to be eaten or in the midst of being eaten by Rui given Subaru remembering her seiyuu stating, “Memories are what shape a person.” in Ep. 74 at 19:26 with Tappei clearly planning to address this in some way, possibly by having Subaru become more self-confident or at least a part of him becoming more self-confident.

As for how the text in the Gospels may appear due to Echidna, given Roswaal’s not-quite-Tome of Wisdom didn’t include Otto in it, I posit that this is also the case for that text as well, and it was also meant to keep the world on a particular path rather than be a true future-telling text and since the prototypes of the Witch Cult Gospels is Roswaal’s not-quite-Tome of Wisdom, they may be partially made of the same materials, such as Echidna’s fingernails, toenails, hair, body hair, dead skin, or body fluids, and if they are indeed partially constructed by such materials, the Witch Cult Gospels and Roswaal’s not-quite-Tome of Wisdom could be connected to Echidna’s mind through magic, and she’s the one who makes the text in the Gospels appear, meaning Echidna may be stealthily manipulating the Witch Cult through her Authority of Greed: Tome of Wisdom with the Witch Cult being created four hundred years ago so that it could eventually be used to give Subaru and others character development and achievements.

I guess Echidna could be using Satella, but a potential relationship with this level of coordination suggests that Satella might not just be being used but is closer to that of an equal partner compared to Roswaal. And if Echidna does in fact love Subaru given she said that she’s very fond of him in Ep. 38, she and Satella could have the same goal in trying to get him to save the world from being destroyed in part through the eventual slaying of Satella at the end of the story.

Echidna being partners with Satella could explain why she cried during Emilia’s second Sanctuary Trial with the reason being that she’s actually fond of Satella in spite of supposedly hating her with all her heart, and whatever the relationship between Satella and Emilia is, Echidna may hate that she herself’s the reason Emilia’s going down the path she’s headed toward, not that she truly hates Emilia after all without ever really having met her, and it might’ve been a moment of self-hatred. That may even be the reason she let Minerva see Emilia if Minerva is Emilia’s mother due to her feeling that she robbed Emilia of a happy life.

I believe the final boss biased the story path when an ancient hero, after his lover, the heroine, became the Witch of Envy, chose not to strike down his lover after her yin magic power was used to defeat what came out of the Seal in Elior Forest, which I posit was a monstrous horde of creatures with passive AoE auras that Reinhard cannot protect the world from due to not being able to be everywhere at once, and that’s why the heroine had to become the Witch of Envy, and then the world was destroyed due to the heroine not having complete control over her powers with that being the start of the wretched cycle. And Subaru may be the first Hero of the story since the cycle had started who’s overcoming the fatal character flaw all the previous Heroes of the story had, which is that they considered their lovers everything to them, leading to them choosing their lovers over the world, which is why the cycle has persisted up until now.

Feel free to share your thoughts on this.

A Re:Zero Theory: Shaula’s rules for protecting the tower seem like orders, suggestions, and oaths that’ve been made already, and so, the point may be for her to go berserk later

Posted on May 24, 2026 | by anicritic | Leave a Comment

The number three is pretty important in Re:Zero. Subaru died three times before realizing he had Return by Death. There are three opposing pairs of magic attributes. The Pearlbaton siblings are triplets. The three entities who sealed Satella were known to be the Divine Dragon, the Sword Saint, and the Sage. There were the Three Great Mabeasts. There were 3 different Sanctuary trials. Liara had three different baby daddies and bore children for all 3 of them. The Sin Archbishops of Gluttony are a trio. Capella made 3 more demands outside of the main demand for the remains of the dead witch in Priestella, Typhon’s corpse. Suffice to say, we know that three is a prominent number in Re:Zero. Where I’m going with this is that there were three moments from Season 2 that are likely a telltale sign of plans from Echidna and Flügel.

First up is with Puck’s oath. Viewers know that a female speaker’s words which had been denoted by a special font in the Frozen Bond OVA were revealed to be the words of Echidna in Season 2 based on one of the episodes of Season 2 reusing that font. Echidna had made an oath with Puck in that if he got too close to Emilia, as in form a contract with her, he would lose that which makes him himself, which were some of his memories. I suspect this oath was made to ensure that Puck didn’t enter into a contract with Emilia until it was absolutely necessary when Melakuera decided to arrive in his main body to kill Emilia, for the very specific moment Echidna intended for it to happen using her Tome of Wisdom.

And this oath is how Puck even allowed Emilia to join Roswaal with him as her backer in the Royal Selection and how he also didn’t realize that Roswaal had been speaking like Hector did for hundreds of years since he didn’t regain his memories until he broke his contract with Emilia, thereby restoring his memories, showing clear intent that Echidna had planned this out hundreds of years ago, or else the whole scenario of Seasons 1 and 2 wouldn’t work.

Next is Subaru rejecting Echidna’s contract. Puck’s oath with Echidna coupled by how Tea Party Echidna suggested to Beatrice to wait for that person who will free her from her duty of maintaining the Forbidden Library are quite suspicious. Echidna stated that she had wanted to see who Beatrice chose, but I believe she fully knew that it was Subaru, and she wanted to ensure that Beatrice didn’t choose Subaru or anybody else until Subaru pleaded to Beatrice to choose him in a location that was burning down. As for why this is likely, what suggests that Echidna intended for Subaru to reject her contract and take Beatrice’s hand are these three situations:

Echidna told Subaru that even after three days of trial and error she had no hope of breaking Emilia out of her shell, which indicates, if Echidna was being truthful, that she varied up the first Sanctuary trial to help Emilia pass it, not making it as hard as possible for Emilia as some people believe. Echidna then requested that maybe Subaru could do it and give the cowardly princess wings, and this amounts to two instances Echidna hinted or outright told Subaru that the way out of Roswaal’s trap in Season 2 is to have Emilia do the trials.
Echidna stated what she said about having Beatrice stay in the library ’cause she knew how evil it sounded so that Subaru would reject her contract. This is both backed by Subaru’s actual reaction and Echidna saying that she didn’t want him to think that only she among the dead Witches of Sin was evil, showing she understood how vile what she’d stated had sounded.
Echidna, after stating that she didn’t want Subaru to think she was the only evil Witch of Sin, took away Subaru’s qualification for entering the tomb, which had to be done since Subaru was using entering the tomb as a crutch instead of supporting Emilia, which is why the first thing Subaru did after Otto talked some sense to him after Patrasche dragged him out of the tomb was try to go back into the tomb. Only after that was no longer an easy option, was he able to be the emotional support Emilia needed.

This shows that both the oath with Puck and the suggestion to Beatrice were part of a greater plan.

And lastly, there’s Petelgeuse having promised Flügel, whether it was a direct order or a promise, to not take in the Sloth Witch Factor, and given Petelgeuse apologized to Flügel-sama in the flashback, showing he’d considered it an important thing to uphold, this also reeks of a scenario in which Petelgeuse didn’t do it until it was absolutely necessary when Pandora and Regulus came to Elior Forest as part of a plan to steer the future to a particular path by Flügel. Thus, Flügel intended for the future in which Petelgeuse killed Fortuna, leading to freeze the forest and the elves, leading to her eventually being drawn into Roswaal’s camp and for Petelgeuse to be the main antagonist of Arc 3.

Thus, the point of Shaula’s rules for protecting the Pleiades Watchtower, which were given to her by her master, Flügel, may be to force Shaula to lose her mind and become a killing machine later in Season 4/Arc 6 given the pattern of the three moments from Season 2 in which three characters were told not to do something so that they wouldn’t do that thing until it was no longer avoidable for them to put it off. It stinks of a grand plot to guide the world to a desired future in which the world avoids being destroyed through Subaru, the current Hero of the story. Flügel potentially having created Shaula for her to become a berserk killing machine seems pretty uncalled for, but maybe he had good intentions in guiding the world to a good future along with Echidna and Satella. I’m not saying it’s not a horrible thing for him to have done, but I guess I could understand why he did it if there is a greater plot at play.

A Re:Zero Theory: All the possibilities for what Shaula could’ve meant when she said, “Again?” in Episode 70 in reference to her believing her master lost many memories once again

Posted on May 2, 2026 | by anicritic | Leave a Comment

One final note I had on Episode 70 itself is that when Shaula said, “Again?”, in reference to her master forgetting many things once more, that may have been the single most suspicious line in the entire anime as there are a number possibilities for what it means, the first of them being that if Al was split from Kenichi’s soul, he may also have the same scent as Subaru, meaning Al may have reached the Pleiades Watchtower within the last nineteen years he had been summoned to this current fantasy world. As for the implications of Shaula having previously met Al before, there are four things that come to mind:

Shaula has Alzheimer’s disease after having lived for so long, meaning it slipped her mind that Al, who she would’ve recognized as her master, had visited her within the last twenty years, which is plausible given she remembered her master forgetting many things, and if Al was in a similar position as Subaru, this would make a lot of sense since he wouldn’t have recognized himself as Flügel. Based on the allusion to Atlas, this thematically makes sense for consideration.
Shaula has a secret oath with Al that she made sometime between the last nineteen years he arrived in the current fantasy world and now, and Shaula is deliberately withholding info from Subaru’s group, and Al was the one who ordered Shaula to shoot anyone who approaches the Pleiades Watchtower as he’s getting instruction from the copy of the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom I believe he may possess, which means this was a part of the plan from Echidna and the heroes from four hundred years ago. It could still make thematic sense with the allusion to Atlas since Shaula still forgot that Reid was a human.
Al visited the Pleiades Watchtower when he was the Hero of the story in the immediate previous iteration of Re:Zero’s fantasy world before Subaru became the current Hero of the story. In this scenario, Shaula would’ve recognized Al as her master, and then after this iteration of the world was destroyed, Shaula was re-summoned into the next iteration of the world in which Al would eventually be re-summoned into that Subaru would eventually be brought to Lugunica in in which I believe that Subaru had been frozen in suspended animation in Flügel’s tree for hundreds of years, so Shaula’s memories are jumbled up or potentially have been modified to an extent with Shaula saying, “Again? in reference to her master not having her many memories being her subconsciously remembering her time from when Al was the Hero of the story in the previous iteration of the world before the current world. Thematically, this still fits since it’d show that the passage of time has really done a number on Shaula, making the allusion to Atlas fitting. As for Shaula being re-summoned into the world, it’s 100% possible since Melakuera referenced himself facing world-ending crises countless times, which shows he remembers himself being re-summoned into the world after it is destroyed repeatedly by the Witch of Envy and reconstructed.
Al visited the Pleiades Watchtower both when was the Hero of the story and during the years between he was summoned into the current world and Season 4 with an oath or straight up memory modification being responsible for Shaula saying that she had been waiting for four hundred years.

But Shaula having referenced her master forgetting many things again could also involve different scenarios including the original Flügel, who I believe was originally both Kenichi and Subaru, and even Kenichi himself after having split Subaru away from his soul, and I can think of two possibilities for such situations:

Flügel, who I believe was originally Kenichi and Subaru, literally lost many memories himself, possibly ’cause something happened, whether it was someone in the tower that caused it or something that occurred during his time as the hero. Thus, that time from four hundred years ago would be the true context for Shaula saying, “Again?” to her master forgetting his memories again. This isn’t thematically in line with the allusion to Atlas as if Shaula was referring to a moment four hundred years ago, she would’ve been thinking hard of other characters who were alive at the time, such as Reid, meaning it could’ve been a simple slip of the tongue ’cause of her reminiscing of the past for a moment, and this is the possibility I’m least in favour of since it contradicts what I believe is an allusion to Atlas given the Sigmund Freud reference in Episode 69 since Freud is known for emphasizing subconscious thoughts, hunches, and slips of the tongue, and given Subaru also showed signs of acting on two subconscious thoughts in Episode 70, Shaula may have acted on a subconscious thought, resulting in her having a slip of the tongue, to make the episode have three moments of acting on subconscious thoughts given how important the number three is in Re:Zero.
Kenichi, after having split Subaru from his soul when he returned to Earth to set up Subaru and Al as future Heroes of the story, may have returned to Re:Zero’s fantasy world at one point using his super Authority to fly through dimensions and visited the Pleiades Watchtower, and he lost his memories ’cause he was no longer the Hero of the story as that would’ve been Al or Subaru, meaning there was a drawback to what would usually be a drawback-less super Authority. In this scenario, Shaula would’ve been referring to her master forgetting many things “again?” ’cause of that moment, and whether Kenichi returned before Al’s time as the Hero in a previous iteration of the world, before Al became the Hero in the iteration of the world after that while Subaru was frozen in suspended in animation in Flügel’s tree, during Al’s time as the Hero in that same iteration of the world in which Subaru had been in suspended in animation up until that iteration of the world was destroyed, or in between Al’s time in the current world up until Season 4, which could’ve been an indication of Shaula having become senile, having been re-summoned into the world with her memories in a mess or modified in some way, having been sworn to silence by an oath with Kenichi she can’t divulge, and it could be thematically relevant to the allusion to Atlas depending on what the actual scenario is, which I don’t hazard to guess what it exactly is.
Flügel lost his memories for some reason 400 years ago, and then after he returned to Earth to split his soul and make Subaru and Al heroes, Kenichi also returned returned to the fantasy world and lost his memories with an oath or straight up memory modification being the reason Shaula said that she’d been waiting for four hundred years.

In actuality, there are still three more distinct possibilities I can think of with variable expressions of them since Flügel having forgotten in the past doesn’t necessarily mean that Al never went to the Pleiades Watchtower, so here’s what I can think of:

There’s the scenario of Flügel having lost his memories for some reason that I had previously mentioned along with any of the four distinct Al possibilities I had mentioned came after that with memory modification being possible for all of them.
Kenichi, having returned to Earth and lost his Hero designation of the fantasy world, created his two sons to be future Heroes of the story, and then due to any variable expression of what I had mentioned before, returned to Pleiades Watchtower with no memories, and then any of the four distinct Al possibilities I had mentioned came after that with memory modification being possible for all of them.
Flügel lost his memories for some reason 400 years ago, and then after he returned to Earth to split his soul and make Subaru and Al heroes, Kenichi also returned returned to the fantasy world and lost his memories with any of the four Al possibilities being on the table with an oath or memory modification being the reason Shaula said that she’d been waiting for four hundred years.

I’m serious when I talk about just how suspicious this line is as based on current content it’s impossible to know what it really could be even if I have narrowed it to down to roughly ten possibilities, the last three of which could manifest in several different ways.

A Re:Zero Theory: Echidna saying that Carmilla gave non-human beings emotions could be Tappei incorporating an important real-world problem in Re:Zero

Posted on April 17, 2026 | by anicritic | Leave a Comment

I see some people viewing Echidna as this honest person who is forthcoming about her intentions, but from what I saw of Season 2, that is not the case, and as for why I believe so:

Echidna said that Satella, the Witch of Envy, killed and devoured the other Witches of Sin, using them as sustenance, which is 100% false since if that were the case, there would be no corpse of Echidna at the Sanctuary. Echidna has almost certainly been spreading this lie deliberately to unite the world against Satella in the future, and she likely had Beatrice unknowingly cooperate with her by having her tell this to outsiders like she did with Subaru.
Ram previously indicated that folklore indicates that the great dragon that protects Lugunica lies beyond a Great Waterfall. Echidna said that Sekhmet, the Witch of Sloth, drove a dragon past the Great Waterfall all for a chance to rest, which is likely referring to the same dragon. I don’t dispute that Sekhmet may have wanted to catch a break, but as for why the info about the legendary dragon’s whereabouts is almost certainly false, if said dragon really were trapped beyond the Great Waterfall, how would the Royal Family have entered a covenant with it since it’d be beyond the end of the world? It doesn’t make sense and appears to be misdirection to keep common folk from seeking out this dragon.
Echidna outwardly made it seem like she really wanted Subaru to enter into a contract with her, but that just doesn’t pass the sniff test based on the entirety of her actions in Season 2, which had a heavy bent toward Subaru rejecting her contract. For one, Echidna hinted to Subaru that the path forward is to have Emilia take the trials when he was determined to take the trials himself by suggesting that he might be able to give the cowardly princess wings when she (Echidna) had no hope of breaking Emilia outside of her shell even after three days of trial and error, which shows Echidna varied up the trial in multiple ways to try to get Emilia to pass the trial. Does that sound like someone who is trying to trap Subaru in a contract to you when she outwardly helped Subaru get through the Sanctuary arc 3 times and by her own admission tried to specifically help Emilia?

The second and third times Echidna showed she wanted Subaru to help Emilia pass the trials is when Echidna said that she gave Beatrice a blank book because she had wanted to see who Beatrice would choose and her follow-up remark to Subaru rejecting her contract. Echidna fully knew that Subaru is the one who would free Beatrice, and she specifically chose to tell Subaru what she did was because she wanted to seem so outrageously evil so as to deter Subaru from accepting her contract. This is backed up by Echidna saying to Subaru after he rejected her contract that she didn’t want him to think she was the only one of the Witches of Sin who is evil, which led to her revoking Subaru’s qualification for entering the tomb. Subaru was using his right to enter the tomb as a crutch at that point, and Echidna did him a major solid by taking it away so that he’d be forced to do all he could to help Emilia pass the trials. Thus, Echidna clearly knew how evil what she said about her motivations would sound. Echidna’s actions do not read as somebody who wanted to force Subaru to accept her contract no matter what. The true reason Beatrice’s book was empty was probably because Echidna needed Beatrice to stay in the library in case she died or something, and since all she did was stay in the library, there was no need for further instruction. If you’re still not convinced, think of it this way: A woman tells you she loves you. After this, she punches you in the face, asks the man who bullies you out on a date, and specifically calls you a wimp on social media. Can you agree that this woman does not love you?

Now for the real point of my post, Carmilla supposedly giving emotions to non-human beings is most likely not referring to insects or dragons but actually demihumans since the term non-human beings strikes me as being a term used to other people who aren’t pure-blood humans. And I believe it is highly likely that this information is completely and utterly false. Why that is the case is that it may have been a lie invented hundreds of years ago to discredit demihumans and eventually make them become second-class citizens. A hint to whether this was a lie may lie in which of demihumans or humans learned magic first. If demihumans knew magic first, humans may have learned magic from demihumans and then discredited the demihumans to supplant them as the dominant intelligent species of Re:Zero’s fantasy world. An example of this having previously happened in the real world is North American settlers weaponizing disinformation with the lie of the native peoples of the land being savages to justify the colonizing, displacing, and killing of Indigenous peoples even though the settlers were often the initiators of violence and savage acts against the native population. So demihumans being treated as second-class citizens may have been the reason for the Demihuman War, which was namedropped in Season 3.

This can be gleaned from context from the anime given there were demihuman-only businesses in Season 1 and how demihumans were drawn to the Sanctuary in Season 2 ’cause of the rumour of it being a safe place for demihumans despite it actually being a shoddy place that’s not very well-run, showing there is some underlying tension between humans and demihumans, if not across the whole world than just within Lugunica itself. And I do believe Tappei is savvy enough to include this sort of subject in Re:Zero given how there is so much unreliable narration in this series since it’s a storytelling technique that allows for a twist like this.

Given even insects in the real world can feel emotions, it doesn’t make a lot of sense to me that demihumans, whether pure-blood or not, couldn’t feel emotions at any point in history. It makes a lot more sense to me that Echidna spewed a lie, which Carmilla may or may not have been in on, to ensure that demihumans were discriminated against ’cause if people believed they only had emotions due to a Witch, they’d see demihumans as being inherently inferior, needing the help of a monstrous Witch they can’t understand to be on the same playing field as humans, and even then, the fact that they needed external help keeps them inferior in their eyes, especially if people have forgotten that the lie was originally about Carmilla and now attribute it to Satella, who’s the bogeyman for all the world’s evil. Even if the reason demihumans were discriminated against was forgotten over time, they’d still keep their second-class status ’cause of the lie even if it happened to take on another form. Specifically referring to them as “non-human beings” in the first place suggests an intent to undermine them from the beginning to me.

As for why Echidna would try to ensure that the Demihuman War happened when it did, the answer lies in Season 3. The primary reason Echidna would want the Demihuman War to happen would be to set up the current story with the troubles within the Astrea house. The Demihuman War hurt Theresia in having family members die ’cause she wouldn’t take up the sword, motivating her to truly take on her duties as the Sword Saint whereas it was just in name only previously due to her not wanting to fight. Theresia taking up her duties as the Sword Saint also saved Wilhelm from dying in that war, leading him to train hard so that he could surpass Theresia and relieve her of her duties as the Sword Saint so that he could marry into the family and relieve Theresia of the burden of doing something she never really wanted to but was forced into, resulting in the pair starting a family with the birth of Heinkel, who in turn would start of a family of his own with his wife who gave birth Reinhard. Thus, I see plenty of reason for Echidna to be involved in the start of the Demihuman War if one uses critical thinking given it was established that Echidna manipulated many events through Roswaal for hundreds of years, and causing the war that would eventually result in Reinhard’s grandparents getting married and herald the eventual birth of Reinhard would be fully in line with that.

As for why Echidna would want Reinhard to be born, Reinhard is one of the pieces needed to bring about the future in which the world stops being destroyed by the Witch of Envy and reconstructed as hinted by Melakuera when he talked about the world imbalance and Witch and remarked about him facing world-ending crises countless times, showing that he has likely experienced the end of the world countless times. I believe Re:Zero’s fantasy world is a stuck in a cycle of the world being destroyed and constructed due to an Authority or curse that affects the story path the world is following based on a battle from eons ago when I speculate that the Hero of the story in Re:Zero’s fantasy world faced off against the Final Boss of the time that the Hero chose his lover, who would become the Witch of Envy, over the world when the Seal in Elior Forest was opened, and in that moment, the Final Boss of the time activated his Authority or cursed the world to be biased toward repeating this general story path for all time, leading to countless iterations of the world being destroyed before getting reconstructed by a prototypical overpowered but selfish hero, leading to the heroes in the age of Satella starting a grand plan to hijack the story path to give Subaru the best chance of ending this cycle after somehow finding out about this cycle with Subaru being weak compared to past Heroes of the story intentional to prevent him from becoming conceited since Subaru needs to overcome his character flaws unlike those who came before him who never did.

Reinhard is needed to kill Satella in the future when she returns, and Satella and Echidna are likely on the same side given that Satella told Subaru to love himself and then one day come kill her and that Echidna did so much to ensure that Subaru rejected her contract and to shape the world to her liking through Roswaal’s not-quite-Tome of Wisdom and also the Witch Cult Gospels since if the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom was the prototype of the Gospels, they may have been made partially by the same materials, such as hair, nails, or body fluid from Echidna, meaning the text from both may come from Echidna’s mind through magic, showing why Subaru’s being put through the wringer time after time again all to be the true hero that defies the dreaded fate of him allowing the world to be destroyed ’cause of his feelings for his lover.

A Re:Zero Theory: Episode 67 indicates the heroes from four hundred years ago were involved in the creation of the Witch Factors

Posted on April 10, 2026 | by anicritic | Leave a Comment

After Season 4’s first episode, I believe there’s a very good reason to believe this. Episode 67 hints that Foxidna very much remembers Julius even though he had his name eaten by Roy Alphard, one of the Sin Archbishops of Gluttony when the show previously led viewers to believe that Subaru was the only one who could remember such a victim when everybody else forgot, and conveniently, Foxidna also puts it into Subaru’s mind that it’d be a good idea to take Rem with him to the Pleiades Watchtower so that he could have the perk as being the first one she sees upon being cured, which is showing the same sort of manipulation skills as the original Echidna and Tea Party Echidna.

As a refresher to those who don’t remember all my theories or to segue those who have never read my theories before into the meat of my post, there is a basis to believe this given that everything up until Season 2 was planned at least partially by Echidna centuries ago and probably by Flugel too given he made Petelgeuse promise to not take in the Sloth Witch Factor, which was implied by Petelgeuse apologizing to Flugel, most likely so that Petelgeuse wouldn’t until Pandora and Regulus invaded Elior Forest when he had no other choice to protect the love of his life, Fortuna, and Emilia. A similar event involves how a special font was used in the Frozen Bond OVA to denote a female’s speech regarding a contract with Puck in which he would lose his memories and perhaps other aspects of himself if he entered into a contract with Emilia with that female’s speech being revealed to be that of Echidna based on Season 2 reusing that font. That both Echidna and Flugel both made someone promise not to do something only for them to do it when there was no other choice with Regulus and Pandora’s arrival for Petelgeuse and Melakuera’s assault against Emilia for Puck may indicate that one of Echidna and Flugel learned that sort of behaviour from the other, meaning there was an age difference between them. Alternatively, they could’ve just closely collaborated on things like I have speculated, but these things aren’t necessarily mutually exclusive.

As Season 2 revealed through Roswaal and Season 3 reiterated, Echidna’s not-quite-Tome of Wisdom, however many there are given Echidna might’ve lied about how many copies she made, is the prototype for the Witch Cult Gospels, meaning that they are most likely at least partially made by some of the same materials, and given how Roswaal’s not-quite-Tome of Wisdom was not meant to bring about the return of the Echidna Roswaal knew, the same could go for Gospels in not directing their holders to their goals. I don’t buy into the theory that the reason Otto wasn’t in Roswaal’s not-quite-Tome of Wisdom is ’cause he was meant to have died as Ram, Petra, and Emilia all died in Arc 3, and with that being the case, it can be argued that all three of them were meant to have died, so the true reason Otto wasn’t in the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom must have been something else. As a text that supposedly tells the future and can update itself based on current happenings, there’s no good reason why Otto was excluded unless the source of the knowledge of the Tome just didn’t want it to be included, and if that’s the case, Echidna may very well have been responsible for its contents with the common denominator between the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom and the Witch Cult Gospels possibly being that they are made at least partially from a body part or body fluid of hers much like her tea in the tea parties with these texts being connected by magic to her mind/soul since we know the soul is the seat of the mind in Re:Zero, which is why Subaru remembers his past lives even after Returning by Death ’cause his whole body resets to a prior point, but his mind/soul doesn’t.

This implies that the Echidna from four centuries ago, Tea Party Echidna (mostly her), Foxidna, Flugel, and others from that era were driving events from that timeframe until present-day Re:Zero with a common future in mind with examples being Puck being in a contract or oath with Echidna to not enter into a contract with Emilia or lose some of his memories should he choose to, Flugel conveniently planting the world tree known as Flugel’s Tree in the exact spot the White Whale extermination force needed to trap the White Whale’s main body, Petelgeuse apologizing to Flugel in making his decision to take in the Sloth Witch Factor, Roswaal saving Ram and Rem after allowing for their village to be wiped out, and the White Whale leaving Subaru alone in Episode 17 through someone’s order, probably Pandora’s, even though there appeared to be orders to not allow people to inferfere with Petelgeuse’s Ordeal to Emilia, meaning Subaru was allowed to escape from the White Whale so that he could learn about the White Whale’s Fog of Elimination, inadvertently kill Emilia, pushing him to the point of giving up, and see Petelgeuse’s Authority of Sloth: Unseen Hand, so that Rem could give him his From Zero moment and so that Subaru could plan his counterattack against the Witch Cult.

One big thing about mabeasts that we learned in Season 2 is that they were created by the Witch of Gluttony and that they find the scent of Satella and Subaru, irresistibly delicious, showing it’s probably the miasma of the Envy Witch Factor or the Envy Witch Factor itself that is irresistible to them. Thus, given that Subaru being pushed to his breaking point and finding out about Petelgeuse’s power was all conditional on the White Whale chasing after him, that the defeat of the White Whale was also conditional on Subaru being irresistible to the White Whale, and the defeat of the Great Rabbit was also conditional on Subaru being irresistible to that mass of rabbits, Daphne, the previous Witch of Gluttony, and her mabeasts might have specifically been drawn to one aspect of the Envy Witch Factor that I talked about, either partly due to experimentation (from herself or somebody else) given the weird coffin and restraints associated with her along with the weird shape of her arms, which perhaps suggests she is far more than just a normal human with the power of a Witch and that there’s more to the story of her true nature. If I’m right about this, Daphne may be a homunculus of sorts made specifically as part of an overarching grand plan from the group of heroes from four hundreds ago to bring the world to a free future, and she may be the first the host of a Witch Factor given the signs of experimentation on her that aren’t present on the other dead Witches of Sin from Season 2. Now I’ll have to take a detour before getting back to this point.

In my main theory, Satella and the hero group, which includes Satella and Flugel, from four hundred years ago started a grand plan to cause an intervention that would end the cycle of the world being constantly destroyed and reconstructed by forcibly ensuring that the Hero of the story at some point would be weak enough, as in Subaru, since that’d be the best way for the Hero to overcome his character flaws unlike the past Heroes of the story who I posit had everything come easy to them, and that means the heroes are the reason for the Witch Cult’s founding and even why Pandora took over the Witch Cult eventually, and yes, I do consider Pandora to be one of the heroes.

I expect the final boss to be someone with an Authority that allows him/her to control the story path. This would make Melakuera stating that he faced world-ending crises countless times makes sense if the world was continuously being destroyed and reconstructed before the age of Satella. Melakuera remarking about the world imbalance and Witch suggests that the world’s repeatedly destroyed by the Witch of Envy, likely due to the actions of selfish and overpowered heroes of the story of each iteration of the world who choose their women over the world due to never overcoming their character flaws with Subaru saying in Episode 29 only someone who hates the world would choose mayonnaise over the world being foreshadowing of the choice he’ll have to make.

If Satella actually had a contract in which she shares her field of vision with Echidna through a soul, similar to how Satella can read Subaru’s thoughts and can take action against Subaru for doing so, which would explain how Satella knows what should be Subaru’s save points given it’s unlikely for her to remember the exact details from four hundred years ago of the grand plan, meaning she should be getting direction from someone else. As a reminder why it’s literally impossible for Satella to be future Emilia, Satella told Subaru what he gave to her in Episode 38, and Episodes 18, 25, and 38, respectively show that Subaru has dormant memories of Satella given that Puck revealed to Petelgeuse in Episode 18 that if he wants to kill him he needs to summon a thousand shadow hands, half of what Satella could (Half of 1,000 is 2,000), that Subaru used a number associated with Satella to express his affection for Emilia when he said that if Emily names ten things she hates about herself, he’d list two thousand things he loves about her, and after Satella requested to Subaru in Episode 38 that after he comes to love himself that he should one day come kill her, he suddenly had a positive upwelling of emotion for Satella and swore that he’d save her even though he had called her a monster he couldn’t understand shortly before that, which indicates that they used to have a close relationship and were probably lovers. Given Subaru literally has dormant memories of her, it therefore makes it 100% impossible for Satella to be future Emilia, so Emilia and Satella’s relationship is something different than that. This would explain how Subaru hasn’t been trapped in a bad loop that is inescapable, and that’d be due to Satella’s direct collaboration with Echidna.

Thus, I theorize that Daphne may have been part of, as a test subject, in the initial research from the group of heroes from four hundred years ago on how to create Witch Factors, and this is both why mabeasts and Daphne are attracted to Subaru’s scent and why both Subaru and Foxidna are protected from the aftereffects of Gluttony eating somebody’s name or both that person’s name and memories either due to having a Witch Factor or having a high amount of miasma because it was important for story purposes that Subaru be chased by mabeasts and also be able to remember Gluttony victims such as Rem and for Foxidna to also be able to remember those victims in order for Subaru to overcome the challenges he must face and to keep the world on the path the group from four hundred years ago is trying to bring about in which the world is saved and stops getting destroyed.

All of Arcs 1-5 so far (Seasons 1-3) have all developed Subaru’s character in a certain fashion with Arcs 4 and 5 (Seasons 2 and 3) being Subaru’s greedy arc where he tries to reject the type of person Roswaal tried to fashion him to be, and Emilia as well as other characters, whether they be part of the Emilia camp or not, have been developed in ways that may be crucial to the story with Foxidna being perhaps an important driver of this arc’s events in continuing the grand plan in suggesting that the group visit Shaula and for Subaru to take Rem with him with her selling the latter idea very well to Subaru, and I believe Subaru’s fatal character flaw will be dealt with by the end of the story so that he can bring about a future free from determinism.

Re:Zero Episode 67 (Season 4 Episode 1) – Analysis + Important Details + Aside on Crunchyroll’s Horrible Work

Posted on April 10, 2026 | by anicritic | Leave a Comment

For this season, I will not be using the same approach I did with Season 3 in that my posts will be less recap and more interpretation of the scenes along with my heavy focus on theorycrafting as all the recap itself burned me out as I kept taking the same approach with multiple series.

Before I go into that, I deride the current state of Crunchyroll, which based on the translated words at multiple points in this episode, point to machine translation with stuff that makes no sense in the context of what is currently happening or what came before. Muse Asia, which is available in southeast Asia and to those who use VPNs with hosts in that region, is known for having much better translations of Re:Zero than Crunchyroll, and I suspect a higher-up at Crunchyroll knew this, which is why Crunchyroll used its financial and legal might to force Muse Asia to release Re:Zero Season 4 two weeks behind its simulcast, which is a big departure compared to the past. It’s disgusting that instead of trying to do a better job, Crunchyroll, or maybe should I name Sony instead since it owns Crunchyroll, decided to kneecap a competitor that was putting out a far superior product compared to what it was churning out with machine translation and robbed viewers of being able to watch an accurate translation in a timely fashion.

Episode 67 starts out somber with Subaru feeling a mixture of pain and anxiety over him being the only one to remember Julius although Julius is clearly happy that Subaru took this subject as far as he could. Subaru remarks that Julius only had his name eaten, which makes the people in the world forget you, as opposed to having only having your memories eaten, which happened to Crusch, and having both eaten, which makes it so that you functionally never existed in the world even though your body still exists although in suspended animation, with the source of that info being Puck when he spoke with Subaru early in Season 2.

After Julius said that he considered Reinhard and Felix friends following Reinhard saying that they were acquaintances or perhaps more than that, Anastasia according to Crunchyroll says, “Just two friends? I don’t think that’s all there is to it” when the conservation was about the trio of Reinhard, Felix, and Julius, showing a complete failure to understand the conversation, which suggests machine translation that can’t understand context. Using Google Translate, I see that “Tada no tari no tomodachi?” rendered as “Just casual friends?” so I’m assuming a proper translation would be “No more than mere friends?” rather than “just two friends”, which is very wrong based on the context. Subaru notably raised his eyebrows at this point since her suggesting there’s more to it than that shows that Anastasia remembers who Julius is unlike all the others aside from Subaru, which clearly demonstrates that she’s not the genuine article. If you recall from Season 3, Al clearly stated that the one in front of him cannot be Anastasia ’cause of her ability to use magic, and I speculated that either a shapeshifter had taken Anastasia’s place or someone/something had possessed Anastasia’s body.

Anastasia then suggests that even though they captured the Sin Archbishops (which is false since only Sirius, the Sin Archbishop of Wrath, was captured), they should visit Shaula the Sage, who is known as one of the three great heroes of the Dragonfriend Kingdom of Lugunica ’cause Sirius would be unlikely to tell the group what they need to know to either undo the damage to the victims of the Sin Archbishops of Gluttony and change back those who were transformed into different creatures by the Sin Archbishop of Lust. The Sage is supposedly the keeper of knowledge who foresees everything that will ever be, but I wonder how true that is since Echidna’s Tome of Wisdom apparently could see all of the past, the present, and possible futures of Re:Zero’s fantasy world based on Season 2, so it’s a question mark how accurate this info is. Shaula supposedly lives on her own at the Pleiades Watchtower located somewhere in the Auguria Dunes located in the easternmost edge of Lugunica, which was built to prevent invaders from reaching the sealed Witch of Envy, so now we know where Satella’s body is. Reinhard had set out in search of the Pleiades Watchtower two years ago when the Royal Family fell ill and was eventually wiped out, but a barrier prevented him from ever reaching it, similar to how there’s a barrier near the Sanctuary in Season 2 that made it hard for outsiders to find the correct path to get to the Sanctuary. He had been ordered to make this journey by the council, as in the Council of Wise Men, who are ruling in place of the king. He can’t take part since since he has to escort Felt and transport Sirius Romanee-Conti back to the Capital, and there’s probably no one better suited to bringing Sirius back since no one is a match for him in Lugunica.

After they make camp for the night, and everyone aside from Subaru and Anastasia are asleep, Subaru drops the fact that he knows it’s not really Anastasia speaking due to how coldly she talked about Ricardo, a close friend of hers who has a life-changing injury, with him saying something’s been off the whole time, a nod to early on in the episode when she gave a sign that she remembered Julius. Whoever’s in Anastasia’s body reveals that Priscilla also outed her, but surprisingly, she didn’t name Al, Priscilla’s knight for some reason, which I find suspect given the opportunity was 100% there. She reveals that her name is Echidna, identical to that of the Witch of Greed, and that she remembers nothing about herself aside from her name and that she’s an artificial spirit whose true form is the fox muffler that Anastasia wears. However, this artificial spirit speaking in an Echidna-like cadence suggests that she’s lying to an extent. Given Re:Zero has already used a character in the past speaking like that of another character in Season 2 in Roswaal to show that he had been traumatized due to his beatdown from Hector in Season 2, imitating his speech pattern ’cause to him Hector was the embodiment of power itself, it’s clear Tappei is willing to use speech patterns to imply relationships between characters. Now, I’ll be referring her to Foxidna from here on out on due to it being Subaru’s preferred name for her.

Where I’m going with this is that the number three is important in Re:Zero. The group who sealed Satella were revealed to be the Sword Saint of the time, the Dragon Lord, and Shaula the Sage, was a trio. The Pearlbaton siblings are triplets. There are three magic attribute pairs in fire and water, earth and wind, and yin and yang. There were the Three Great Mabeasts in the White Whale, the Great Rabbit, and the Black Serpent. The Sin Archbishops of Gluttony are a trio. Liara, Garfiel’s mom, has had children with three fathers since Frederica and Garfiel had different fathers as they’re half-siblings. To refresh one’s memory of previous seasons’ events, Puck called Beatrice his little sister in Season 1 and only in Season 2 did we find out that Beatrice is an artificial spirit made by Echidna. This makes Puck also an artificial spirit of Echidna’s if you’re able to connect the dots from past content. In the Frozen Bond OVA that came out in 2019, it was revealed that Puck had been ordered by a female speaker whose speech had been denoted by a special font to find Emilia, and he had a contract or oath with this female speaker wherein if he got too close to Emilia as in formed a contract with her, he would lose that which makes him himself. This special font was reused in Season 2 in one particular episode that showed that Echidna was the one who had given Puck the task of searching for Emilia and made him take up that contract/oath, and what it did was cause Puck to lose some of his memories. This is why Puck had no idea that Roswaal L. Mathers was the same Roswaal from four hundred years ago, only that he was body-snatching his descendants and why he allowed Roswaal to become Emilia’s sponsor at all, and only after Puck broke his contract with Emilia did he remark that Roswaal is speaking like someone he used to know very well and eventually remark that Roswaal will never be that devil/warlock, referring to Hector, ’cause he had finally recovered his memories. Also of note is that Echidna tasked both Puck and Beatrice with something in searching for Emilia and taking care of her Forbidden Library until she finds “that person”, so it’s established that Echidna has given her artificial spirits orders or suggestions for hazy reasons. Given Foxidna is familiar with Echidna’s speech pattern, she may very well be lying about knowing nothing about herself and at least remembers talking with Echidna four hundred years ago. Given this information, Puck, Beatrice, and Foxidna may be a trio of artificial spirits created by Echidna when one considers how often Tappei makes use of the number three, and since Foxidna had the opportunity to mention Al but didn’t, choosing only to mention Priscilla, the order or suggestion Echidna may have given her is to not say anything about Al with Subaru under any circumstance since she was about to bring up Al to Priscilla in Episode 59 only for Priscilla to answer what she had intended to ask before she said it. Echidna may have plans for Al that she needs Subaru to not know.

My next point will go back to the point I made at the start of the episode in that Foxidna remembers who Julius is. This is a very surprising development ’cause based on previous seasons, Subaru was the only person who remembered victims of Gluttony’s eating Authority, meaning this is breaking new ground. Given Echidna was the Witch of Greed in the past and was seeking immortality, and we know she had successfully created at least one soul clone since Tea Party Echidna spoke in Ryuzu Shima’s body in Episode 49, Foxidna might be another soul clone who was placed into a fox muffler as her body. This would make sense given Foxidna knows Echidna’s speech pattern, and Echidna may have worn the fox muffler that is Foxidna in the past, and that’d be how Foxidna learned how Echidna speaks. If that’s the case, what are the common denominators between Subaru and Echidna that could explain why Foxidna remembers who Julius is? What we know for know for sure is that both of them had Witch Factors, and people with Witch Factors and Witch cultists in general emit miasma, which we visibly saw in Episode 15 from Rem after Subaru looped and had retreated into a shell due to his being unable to bear how so many people died ’cause he wasn’t able to save them given Petelgeuse claimed that the love that hangs upon Subaru is equivalent to that of a Sin Archbishop, showing they emit something that is responsible for what Rem and Beatrice have described as a foul smell, and we know that Subaru can command Witch cultists due to his emitting a lot of miasma, and if Echidna split her soul into Foxidna, she may still have a piece of the Greed Witch Factor. In conclusion, I surmise it is either having at least one Witch Factor itself or emitting a high amount of miasma that allows for Subaru and Foxidna to remember Gluttony victims, and this makes me believe that all Witches of Sin, Sin Archbishops, and people with Witch Factors in general can remember Julius if they cared to even if this is just conjecture for now.

Furthermore, Foxidna says that she had Anastasia’s consent to take control of her body when danger presented itself and only this time was she unable to. I speculated last year with regards to Season 3 that Priscilla may have known what happened to Anastasia in Episode 59 when she Priscilla mused on the unseemly guilt, the vixen, Foxidna, placed on Julius, and it’s very likely ’cause Julius while out to battle the first time against the Witch Cult, he was unable to protect Anastasia, which is what led to her taking over, and Foxidna’s remark backs up my speculation. Foxidna made it seem like Julius doesn’t know about her to Subaru, but he almost certainly does. In Season 3 when the one who appeared to be Anastasia used yang magic, the magic came directly from her whereas when there was an actual metia as used by Beatrice and Felt, we saw the magic emanating from the metia, not Felt or Beatrice, so this should show that Anastasia was not using a metia. And given the White Dragon’s Scale, Kiritaka’s mercenary group, didn’t incur serious setbacks against Sirius aside from Kiritaka’s capture, perhaps Anastasia had a mishap somewhere outside their base since everyone was buying time for her escape. In a big city, there are many potential hazards, so it’s not just the Witch Cult or Demi-Beasts you should worry about. As for Julius showing no discomfort upon returning the first time, Julius has a reputation for being the most knightly of knights, the opposite of Arc 3 Subaru, the self-proclaimed knight, so I believe Julius could remain stoic if Anastasia had really been hurt due to him being away from her when others aren’t capable of that.

Foxidna also had a very interesting thing to say about what she’d do to return Anastasia’s body. She said that she’d make the choice that offers the highest probability of success, and that’s why she wants to visit the Sage, and if that’s the case, it backs up my theory that Tea Party Echidna deliberately steered Subaru into getting Emilia to do the Sanctuary Trials with her saying that even have after three days of trial and error, which imply that she changed up the trial to try to get Emilia to pass it, she was unable to break Emilia out of her shell, lied about her telling Beatrice to wait in the Forbidden Library for “that person” ’cause she was just curious who Beatrice would choose, which was an effort to sound as evil as possible so that Subaru would reject her contract that would involve him doing the Sanctuary Trials, and this is backed by Tea Party Echidna saying after Subaru rejected her contract that he didn’t him to think that she was the only evil one of the Witches of Sin, leading to her taking away Subaru’s qualification for entering the tomb, and this is important since Subaru was using his ability to enter the tomb as a crutch instead of speaking to Emilia and getting to know her, which viewers know to be true since the first thing he did after he composed himself was to try to go back into the tomb. Perhaps choosing the choice that offers the highest probability of success is actually a fundamental part of Echidna’s character, which would explain why she, as I surmise, enacted a grand plan with the heroes from four hundred years ago to bring the world to a good future. She may just say that all she wants is all the knowledge in the world, but the world continuing on instead of staying stuck in a cycle of being destroyed and reconstructed would be the best way to acquire more knowledge, so surely she took to the plan that would offer the highest chance of success. And there are signs that Foxidna may even have the Authority of Greed: Tome of Wisdom just like Tea Party Echidna did based on how she suggested to Subaru that taking Rem with him would be a good plan since he could say that he was the one to save her when she wakes up, which Subaru used a reason to take Rem with him on the journey to Ram when they meet later on in the episode, and Subaru’s notably reacted to that, showing that Foxidna’s words had a strong impact on him and that it dawned on him what a great idea it was in that moment. Foxidna may have shown that she’s just as manipulative as Tea Party Echidna and the original Echidna was. I suspect there is a very important plot reason why Rem has to be at Pleiades Watchtower, and it’s something we viewers won’t be able to see coming, but Foxidna knows why it must happen, and that’s the reason she planted the idea in Subaru’s head.

When they finally made it to Roswaal’s mansion the next day, there was yet another terrible translation by Crunchyroll when Subaru’s words were translated to “I hear the meeting with all the fakes went well.” As stated earlier in my write-up, the Council of Wise Men are currently ruling Lugunica in the absence of a king, meaning “caretakers” or “regents” would be a much better translation. “Fakes” in this scenario is gibberish that no human would come up with, showing that Re:Zero has an AI translator. This shows that just as Reinhard venturing out to try and reach the Pleiades Watchtower was done so by decree of the Council of Wise Men, Roswaal needed to meet with the Council of Wise Men to give Subaru’s group the okay to make the journey, likely ’cause of Satella’s sealed body being at the Pleiades Watchtower, meaning permission is necessary to ensure that the Council of Wise Men approves of their decision and doesn’t get squeamish at the thought of a large group travelling to where the Witch of Envy is sealed. Subaru reveals when they’ve arrived at the mansion that they are there for two reasons, to pick up Rem and Meili, and given that Meili blushed hard when she heard Subaru’s footsteps and that all the stuffed plushies there were made by Subaru since no one would know to make a plushie of a witch from fairytales from Earth given witches from Re:Zero’s fantasy world don’t look like that, this shows Meili has really taken to Subaru, making his title “The Little Girl User” very apt. Meili is only happy to go along since she doesn’t want to be cooped inside all day and going back to a familiar place where there are mabeasts she can control is fine with her even though she swears she isn’t like Beatrice and Petra, which is false given what we saw of her reaction to Subaru coming down to visit her.

In a later scene, Julius also shows some very uncharacteristic vulnerability, diverging from his reputation as the greatest of knights, in wondering which is more painful, being forgotten or forgetting someone else, ’cause he was struggling with being forgotten and not being able to remember his own kid brother. However, Subaru snaps him out of him by reminding him that he remembers how capable Julius due to his humiliation by Julius’s hand, and that immediately improved Julius’s mood, leading to him bantering about Subaru’s weakness and how Subaru is remarkable since he can bounce back from bad situations so easily, and they’ve come a long way since Julius talked smack about him and completely and utterly humiliated him.

After that, Subaru heads to Rem’s room, and Ram asks him why he’s willing to go far for Rem. He remarks that he wants to be the first thing Rem sees when she wakes up, much as Foxidna pushed him into thinking. He says that when you take emotion out of the equation it doesn’t matter who saves her, but he really wants to be the one to do it with all of his being, which elicits a genuine smile from Ram, showing just how much she appreciates Subaru for caring about her sister even though she herself has no memories of her. Given that Subaru is the one that got Roswaal, who Ram loves with all her heart, off his awful path of doing so much evil ’cause of his not-quite-Tome of Wisdom, and Ram attributes Rem’s feats in the mansion arc to Subaru due to her not remembering Rem, it’s very clear Subaru holds a special place in Ram’s heart even if it’s not the same feeling Rem had for Subaru but moreso akin to that of a honourary brother and genuine friend for remembering Rem and all that he’s done for Roswaal’s domain, and that smile from Ram just showed how far the relationship between her and Subaru had come, which I very much enjoyed since Ram is one of my favourite characters in the show. He then enters Rem’s room and shows how he is resolved to bring her back thinking he wasn’t able to get that across properly before, maybe ’cause he had no leads or anything of the sort, but Foxidna gave him the drive and hope he needed.

The last part of the episode shows Garfiel breaking down when his mother asks why he shows so much concern for them with him explaining away that he can tell that they’re kind of losing it, which Liara has no good comeback for, but she knows something is amiss when Garfiel suddenly looks like he wants to cry, and she holds him as if she were his real mother, which she is, as he bawls about missing his mom, and Rafiel and Fred both walk out of their rooms to see what the commotion was before Mimi guides them back. Once Garfiel is at the door and about to leave, Liara says goodbye to him and urges her young kids to as well, and only after he learns of Rafiel’s name and that Liara named both Rafiel and Fred that he gets the sense that somewhere deep down she remembers him and Frederica given the similarity in their names, which very much lifts his spirits, and given Garfiel in Season 2 had a notable arc on thinking that his mother abandoned him, that moment must’ve been very good for his self-esteem since although she may not have remembered him he was still in her heart in a way, which was good for closing a character arc from Season 2, showing that Tappei plans his story for the long haul.

As for the episode itself, I thought it was a great start to the season and had good emotional moments, nice lore drops, and a number of instances of potential foreshadowing, and this was just a setup episode itself, so I’m looking forward to this arc, which is supposed to be the favourite among the fandom although we’ll see whether White Fox delivers on that front, and if it does, whether it is all that it’s hyped up to be. If this season is a success, it’ll be in spite of Crunchyroll’s rancid translations.

A Re:Zero Theory: The Divine Dragon is on the side of multiple characters from 400 years ago, which includes Satella, Flugel, and Echidna

Posted on October 25, 2025 | by anicritic | Leave a Comment

We’ve seen repeatedly through Re:Zero that many characters are acting with future knowledge or at least what they think is future knowledge, such as Satella with her setting Subaru’s savepoints, especially in light of Episode 13’s savepoint, which had extremely intentional timing, Roswaal with his not-quite-Tome of Wisdom, Echidna with her real Tome of Wisdom given how she set up Puck perfectly to be Emilia’s protector all while having lost his memories so that he wouldn’t recognize Roswaal as being the one he knew 400 years ago, which was crucial to the story in many ways, Petelgeuse having been implied to have promised Flugel not to take in the Sloth Witch Factor only to break that promise to protect the love of his life and Emilia, paralleling how Echidna deterred Puck from entering a contract with Emilia until there was no other choice, and with Witch cultists and their Gospels. The central question is what is the purpose for all of these characters having the knowledge they do or think they do?

Why I believe some of these texts, such as Roswaal’s not-quite-Tome of Wisdom and Witch cultists’ Gospels, only delude their holders into thinking they provide actual future knowledge is due to the end result of some of the actions taken in the story so far, current up until the end of Season 3. We know Roswaal’s goal was to resurrect his dear teacher, Echidna, but I question whether the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom really was supposed to help him achieve that given the absence of Otto from its pages as a true future-telling text shouldn’t have that problem and should be able to account for everyone in the world, meaning Otto was excluded ’cause the source of the knowledge intended for that to happen. We know the tea party Echidna still had her Authority: Tome of Wisdom given her Sanctuary trials could fully replicate the past and show glimpses of possible futures, showing it truly was an extremely powerful Authority that could read the history of the world, so the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom, if it really was based on the genuine article, shouldn’t have a problem with missing all the actions of a particular individual from its predictions, so that suggests Roswaal was basically strung along by a book to set up the story of Re:Zero with Subaru meeting Emilia and saving her and leading him down the path that he took to defeat Petelgeuse and sacrifice nobody in the Sanctuary Arc and allowing the tea party Echidna to revive herself given she spoke in Ryuzu Shima’s body in Episode 49. Thus, perhaps the source of the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom’s knowledge is Echidna herself with her Authority, and she just makes whatever she wants to appear in the text due to a connection to her mind with her Authority’s guidance. I’ll delve more into why this may be important after the next item on the agenda, which is the Witch Cult Gospels, the apparently defective copies of the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom..

I’ve always found the Witch Cult Gospels to be suspicious given how apparently no one can read them aside from the holder of an individual Gospel, which, on the surface, could be a good way of preventing any faction opposing the Witch Cult from learning about how the cult works, but based on what I observed of Season 3, I believe Gospels aren’t even intended to bring their holders to their desired future, much as is the case I proposed with the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom. I challenge you to think about a very important detail from Season 3 in that Regulus Corneas said in Episode 3 that Subaru should thank him for adhering to his Gospel when he only did heavy damage to Subaru’s leg and nothing else. If the Gospels are meant to bring their holders to their desired future, which in this case was Regulus making Emilia his wife, there shouldn’t be an order to limit casualties as that does nothing but play into Subaru’s hands. Since Subaru and the crowd was under the effect of Sirius’s Authority, everyone connected to Sirius took the same damage to their legs that Subaru received, forcing Beatrice to expend all her mana to heal everybody so that they wouldn’t be in critical condition, resulting in Beatrice ending up in a state of suspended animation similar to Rem. This suggests that Regulus Gospel’s main purpose in that scene was to put Beatrice in suspended animation so that Aldebaran would give her a healing crystal later, waking her up just in time to have Beatrice join the fight against Lye Batenkaitos close to the end of the arc. Of course I need not remind you of Capella’s retreat as ordained by her Gospel when she probably would’ve been able to kill one of Felix or whoever this Anastasia is before Reinhard arrived since Aldebaran is hardly some amazing fighter that can handle all the Demi-Beasts and Capella at the same time. Thus, Witch Cult Gospels likely aren’t future-telling texts either or defective for the matter but also texts connected to Echidna’s mind since the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom was their prototype, meaning they likely were made at least partially by the same materials, which may have been pieces of Echidna’s hair, fingernails or body fluids, which would be how the connection to Echidna’s mind I have proposed would be established.

I have long believed that multiple characters from 400 years ago, including Satella, Echidna, and Flugel, are pushing Subaru to end the cycle of the world being constantly destroyed and reconstructed, which was alluded to by Melakuera, who said that he faced world-ending crises countless times since the only way Melakuera’s words can actually be right is if in the world is constantly getting destroyed, and now I posit that the Divine Dragon is also one of the characters in on this plot. I have always found it suspicious that Subaru arrived in the world after Lugunica’s Royal Family had perished, setting up the perfect conditions for him to meet Emilia and for Reinhard discover that Felt was the final Royal Selection candidate, and the Divine Dragon and the other characters from 400 years ago may have planned out this scenario centuries ago. How this theory could be tested is if the Divine Dragon shows any hint of having future knowledge in the future, which would make such collusion between different characters possible and have a wide-reaching impact through Roswaal’s not-quite-Tome of Wisdom and the Witch Cult Gospels for the last 400 years.

A Re:Zero Theory: Echidna is possibly lurking near the Emilia camp, and if not the Emilia camp, Roswaal himself due to a line in Emilia’s 3rd Sanctuary trial

Posted on October 10, 2025 | by anicritic | Leave a Comment

Emilia said in Episode 48, “Who is this? This should be Echidna’s grave…” ’cause she didn’t recognize the corpse, which was that of an older woman compared to the Echidna seen in the Sanctuary trials. Roswaal and Beatrice, however, recognized the corpse as their teacher/mother, showing that the Echidna in the Sanctuary trials and tea parties was not the same as the one Roswaal and Beatrice knew, showing that Echidna had previously cut off a piece of her soul when she was younger, which would explain the presence of the younger Echidna in the tea parties. Episode 50 confirmed this with a small animation of the older Echidna Roswaal and Beatrice knew whose face was closer to that of the corpse.

We know from Season 2 the Echidna from the tea parties had been able to place her soul into Ryuzu Shima, which is how Echidna spoke in her own voice after Emilia’s remark about saving the original Ryuzu Meyer got Echidna annoyed, which caused her to break her act momentarily, allowing for viewers to hear Echidna’s voice through Ryuzu Shima’s body, showing that Echidna’s immortality project had succeeded and that she created at least one soul clone, so it’s not out of the question that the Echidna Roswaal understood to be his teacher may also have been revived at one point. The Echidna Roswaal knew to be his teacher also may not have even been the original Echidna, but she is the one he long sought.

In Episode 48 of Re:Zero, one of the lines from the possible futures Emilia could face had Roswaal say, “I made the realization that I have not walked alone all this time. That is all.” For Roswaal, whose single goal that has kept him alive these past four hundred years is to bring back his teacher, it suggests that there’s an Echidna, not just any Echidna, but his original teacher, who is lurking near the Emilia camp, and if not the Emilia camp, then Roswaal himself, given he would never speak like that in reference to anyone else. What he spoke of suggests a physical closeness to Echidna that made him come upon a happy realization, and I wonder who in the cast could be her vessel or whether it’s someone not yet revealed.