Volume 12 (Arc 4 Chapters 49-75)
TL;DR:
1) Subaru’s mentality that he has to solve all problems himself, as well as his general disregard for his own life is emphasised more compared to the WN (this is somewhat true for the previous volumes as well, but is especially obvious here)
2) While being ‘swallowed’ by the Witch of Envy, Subaru experiences a short scene of “melting” with other swallowed victims (see chapter 1 for more details) In the next loop it is revealed that while he was “melting” he pulled out some sort of fragmented “memory” from the other swallowed consciousnesses (probably from the Lewes’. See chapter 2 for more details)
3) The pyroxene is linked to Lewes Meyer’s crystal and seems to have some connection with the command rights, but still no explanation of the teleporting.
4) Meili shows up in person and kills Petra/Freddie/Rem and probably the rest of Arlam Village who had been evacuated from the mansion. The details upon Subaru’s return to the mansion are quite different, see chapter 3 for more details.
5) Meili has a last name (ポートルート - “Portroot”)
6) Elsa’s regeneration is a “blessing” (祝福) she got from “someone mean (malicious, mean-spirited)”. [This is not the same terminology as “divine protection” (加護)]
7) The reveal of Roswaal’s gospel (to Subaru) is moved to his confrontation about Subaru’s “redo” power.
8) Typhon and Daphne show up before Echidna’s contract proposal along with the other witches instead of after Satella’s appearance later (doesn’t change anything).
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****CH1 – LoveLove….Mee****
1) This chapter is the continuation of the WoE fight, going up to Subaru’s death, respawning and being comforted by Emilia in the grave (first scene of WN chapter 52), and is almost identical to the WN aside from the following (mostly unimportant) differences.
a) After Garf bails Subaru out, the WoE instead of continuing to pursue them decides to fuck off and starts walking away to the forest, as if to leave Sanctuary. This confuses Subaru until he has a snap sudden realization that she’s probably going to the mansion (to kill everyone there too I guess)
(“(...)in this world, to steal all potential sources where Subaru could direct his love, in order to monopolize him”)
This causes Subaru to panic, until he remembers that “Satella” is a half-elf who won’t be able to get out of Sanctuary’s barrier.
b) Subaru and Garf (who is pissed because Stelly killed Ram and Granny) move into the forest with the hope that fighting near the barrier will weaken Stelly enough so that they can win (spoiler: it doesn’t). When near the barrier, Subaru asks Garf if the barrier will impede him, because “hey you’re a half too right?”. In response Garf just pulls out the pyroxene. Subaru is like “???” and Garf is like “shut up we don’t have time to explain important plot stuff”. Then he summons the grannies (illustration 1)
(I’m not sure if this is just a hint that Garf is not a half, or if he’s saying the pyroxene will help him somehow with the barrier, or if the pyroxene was just to summon the grannies [chapter 2 suggests this is likely] but either way it still leaves Garf’s ancestry ambiguous)
c) While being swallowed by the WoE (mid chapter 51), a new short-scene describing Subaru “melting” with the other swallowed victims (or something I dunno). See below.
d) Instead of attacking “Satella” with the magic knife, realizing it’s a possessed Emilia and then killing himself, Subaru kills himself almost immediately after realizing he has the knife. As he’s dying, the glow from the knife illuminates “Satella’s” face who is grieving and he promises to save her (as in the WN). After respawning he realizes that Emilia was likely possessed.
2) Rough translation of the short scene where Subaru is being swallowed by the WoE
Filled with dread. Trembling with pleasure. Scared of fear. Tearing up with delight. Acclimated to vomiting blood. Screamed with joy. Emotions are, in chunks, jumping all around, losing their legitimacy, to the contrary-----.
“-----“
As his body dissolves in the shadow, it is seen that the boundary of Natsuki Subaru becomes obscure. Why is this understood? Is it Natsuki Subaru who understands, or the understanding of something different?
“------“
Inside the shadow, he feels the presence of something different whispering love. ----No, not felt. It is not coming from something different. It’s Subaru. It’s from Natsuki Subaru. As the remains were mixing and melting into one lump, there is no boundary with the others in there. Everything that was swallowed becomes Natsuki Subaru.
There is warmth, there is sorrow, there is hatred, there is affection, there is dejection, there is ecstasy, there is disappointment, there is relief, there is grief, and there was satisfaction.
Yes, there was satisfaction. Much despair, much grief, but amongst them, there was satisfaction.
That satisfaction was also one part of Subaru. If it can fill the entirety of Natsuki Subaru, then also-----.
”---?”
He stretches his hand out to the satisfaction---no, he has no hands. There is no body anywhere---no, that is not the case. The body was swallowed by the shadow, it still exists there. What melted was Natsuki Subaru’s mind, his consciousness, his soul(spirit?). Gather them up. Gather them up, and understand the reason for gathering them up.
There was heat. Natsuki Subaru feels the sense of heat returning to him. It is in a completely different place to the initial feeling of satisfaction, on the arm he tried to stretch, on his right arm, on his wrist. That is---
(the heat is from the magic handkerchief which then snaps him back to reality)
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****CH2 – I Do Know Hell****
3) Subaru and Emilia exit the grave. Subaru is back to “trying out” not telling Emilia he obtained the qualifications and Emilia is in a good mood and everything is similar to the WN (scenes have been condensed).
4) Subaru leaves Emilia and goes to ask Ram to distract Garf while he does some shit. She agrees eventually. During the conversation Ram brings up that Subaru is “seeing someone else in her” (almost the same as the WN).
“---” (56)
He thought then of confiding the entirety of the truth about Rem to Ram.
He wanted to tell her that she had a doting younger sister, that a girl who had fallen into unexpected sleep could be found at the mansion. Wanted to tell her about the feelings harbored between the two of them, about the memories the two of them shared.
---But as it’s on the tip of his tongue, Subaru remembers the world in which Ram tried to sacrifice Rem.
The dejection and disappointment he felt in that moment halted Subaru’s words.
Ram and Rem, older and younger sister, a world where she would abandon her, such a thing could drive his mind insane.
5) While Ram is distracting Garfiel, Subaru heads towards the Lewes Meyer laboratory, following a hunch of an unconscious “memory” (quotations not mine) he obtained (from the Lewes’ presumably) while his consciousness was being swallowed by the WoE.
As the “memory” became stronger, Subaru took breaths as he was enduring the throbbing pain.
Biting his (excitement/agitation), his forehead cold with sweat, he attempts to compare the scenery of the “memory” to his current field of vision. Amongst the overgrown ivy and foliage, inside the center of the dark green (forest) area disliked even by beasts, the reason was surely inside here.
The aching “memory” ---- while swallowed by the shadow, he saw a thing of light amongst the chaos as his existence was dissolving.
Chaos, there was no other way to describe a situation like that but chaos. As his existence was stirring in the shadow, Subaru who dissolved in the darkness blended with many “consciousnesses”. Perhaps they were the consciousnesses of the victims swallowed by the witch’s shadow. If Subaru had not broken away, he was on the verge of being jumbled together with them.
After that, Subaru had lost his life purposelessly, but the life or death of Subaru was not important. ----That he touched the “memory” of others while in the embrace of the shadow, and brought back a portion of it, that was what was important.
The “memory” was but a brief fragment, and things like explanations and conjecture about would likely be misguided. It was the adverse effects of being blended together with a large number of beings, but his return was still exceedingly large.
Because he was able to take so much back that it could not balance against just one of Subaru’s lives. (t/n: might have worded this badly but I think it’s saying that one life was a small price to pay for this)
6) Following the vague “memory” Subaru arrives at the Lewes laboratory (noting it’s the same place he was confined and teleported to in Volume 11), noting that the location matches his “memory”. The “memory” unconsciously tells him place the pyroxene in some part of the room and doing so reveals a hidden room with the original Lewes Meyer crystal (who is actually called “Lewes Meyer” and not “Lewes [something else]”
7) After that, black Lewes (‘Burma’) and the original dummy clone Subaru saw while entering the Sanctuary (it’s ‘Pico’) show up and infodump for like 20+ fucking pages all the stuff about the Lewes clones and the experiments and the command rights and blah blah it’s all the same as the WN.
Placing the pyroxene near the crystal seemed to give Subaru the command rights. At the end of it Subaru asks Lewes to assist him, saying he doesn’t want to force usage of the command rights if he doesn’t want to, and she agrees. Also he asks why she doesn’t call herself “Lewes Meyer” and she’s like “the clones use different names because we all have different memories and personalities and muh individuality”, so there’s that.
8) Subaru returns to the settlement and runs into Emilia who is wandering around. They have a short talk where Subaru encourages her that she can beat the trials. Afterwards he returns to the cathedral to sleep where Otto is still up late doing stuff (also he was worried that Subaru had fucked off into the forest and hadn’t returned yet). Otto says he’ll listen if Subaru wants to talk about anything but Subaru just brushes that off.
He was truly a kindhearted human being unsuitable to being a merchant.
That kindheartedness saw him dead. Therefore, (Subaru) absolutely cannot rely on him.
Emilia, Otto, the Arlam Villagers, none of them can help him.
Subaru alone this life would save them all.
9) The scene where Subaru discovers he can read Pete’s gospel is not there (not immediately relevant, so I guess this will be moved to later arc4 or arc 5)
10) Subaru leaves a letter for Emilia and departs Sanctuary the next day alone on Patrasche. Garfiel attempts to stop him, Subaru says “kill me if you have a problem”, Garf of course doesn’t, and he leaves.
Subaru using the Lewes clones to force his way past Garfiel seems to be cut (either because Garf is more reasonable or perhaps because Subaru already negotiated with Lewes to do something about Garf earlier in the chapter). The scene/dialogue is very similar to the one in Chapter 54 (“I know hell”).
Extra: Not really important, but in the scene where Subaru talks to Emilia there is a line where he calls Emilia pretty like a fairy (yōsei) and Emilia gets mad at him because she interpreted it as a contraction for “yokoshima seirei” (evil spirit). I just thought that was a funny hint/nod to Emilia’s past.
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****CH3 – Scream from 400 Years Ago****
11) Subaru returns to the mansion and tells Petra that her handkerchief came in handy. Petra is happy.
12) Subaru kicks Petra out of the mansion because danger is coming. Petra is butthurt. Unlike the WN, Subaru is aware that 1) The timing of the attack changes, and 2) Witch-Beasts are involved, so he’s also telling Frederica to evacuate with Rem to Arlam Village (thinking that if the mansion is the target, they should be okay for now, as long as they get everyone out temporarily).
Petra who is still sorta grumpy tells Subaru that since her handkerchief saved him then as compensation he should go on a date with her later. Subaru agrees (“lol re zero is a harem xd”). Petra is happy (“It’s a promise!”)
13) While Petra runs off to get Patrasche, Subaru talks to Freddie about some stuff they couldn’t fit in earlier (such as why she left Sanctuary). Then (somewhat reluctant to part with her) he hands over Rem and tells Frederica to protect all of them no matter what. Freddie of course agrees. Then as they leave Subaru goes to find Beatrice.
14) Subaru finds Beatrice, intent on getting her to help. Beatrice isn’t interested. Subaru gets mad and literally tears the gospel out of Beatrice’s hands to find out what the fuck is making her act this way and finds out it’s blank. Then the rest of the scene plays out like the WN up to where Elsa arrives (added is a small bit where Subaru thinks that Roswaal is kind of a douchebag for suggesting that Subaru lie to Beatrice about being “that person”).
15) Short summary of the rest of the chapter which is very different:
Elsa talks about how she broke Beatrice’s door crossing by opening all the doors, like in the WN. Afterwards she says something about it took her a while to do that but she’s really relieved that she could do it before Meili returned from the village. Subaru figures out that “Meili” is probably the Witch-Beast Tamer responsible for the loop 2 attack (LN) and is shocked at why they would be at the village. Elsa explains that “the target(s) escaped to the village” so it’s natural that they “split the work. ”, then goes on about how despite there being more targets at the village the targets here are ‘better quality’ and blah blah. (the wording here cleverly avoids giving away the twist regarding Meili and Elsa’s employers revealed in the arc4 epilogue)
Subaru realizes that evacuating to the village was a mistake, because he underestimated the lengths that Elsa and friend would go to, and that his assumption that they would be safe if they left the mansion was too shortsighted. He Shamac’s Elsa (Beatrice helping to strengthen the effect so it lasts longer), grabs Beatrice and then starts legging it to the village, all the while carrying Beatrice who is still in “I want my life to end” mode and not giving a fuck. Smoke can be seen in the distance.
While running to the village, Beatrice is telling him that it’s over/too late etc. Subaru gets angry at this, but instinctively knows she’s right but still keeps running anyway, not knowing where to direct his anger /sorrow or who to blame for this (he thinks himself).
[???: Eh, big bro? What’re you doing here?]
On the way to the village Subaru runs into a girl strolling cheerfully with her hands behind her back, who he puts together is the witch-beast tamer, and also the girl from arc 2 after it is revealed that she was using hair dye (lol). (t/n: in the LNs Meili’s hair was brown during arc2 not blue like in the anime).
[Meili I had lotsa fun playing together that day. Would you like to play together again today?]
[Subaru: You…, the “witch-beast tamer”!]
[Meili: It’s Meili Portroot. (メィリィ・ポートルート). Don’t call me by such a dumb name]
(blah blah it was this girl that was responsible for the smoke behind them)
[Subaru: You...you’re as much a monster as Elsa! What...did you do to Rem!?]
[Meili: Umm, I dunno about any person called Rem, I was just happily off doing my assigned job, yeah? A big maid from the mansion and a small maid ---- it’s a shame the small maid had to be Petra-chan]
[Subaru: Shame? It’s a shame? Shame, shame...y..you, what are you…]
[Meili: Don’t worry, she was my friend too you know? So I made sure it was painless, it was done in one bite]
Hearing this finally breaks Subaru’s denial of the situation. (Note that while Meili didn’t specifically Rem was killed it’s implied by the village being on smoke, and Subaru seems to think she’s dead)
Then Beatrice gets up and is all like “those who have disrupted the library will not be forgiven” and gets ready to fight. Suddenly surprise Elsa attack, who has caught up to them and tries to sneak kill Beatrice, but it doesn’t work because Beatrice defends (“If you think yin magic leaves me no means to defend myself, you think too naively”), then pretty much instantly “kills” Elsa with “Mīnya” (in the WN it was Al-Shamac).
[Meili: Aaah. Elsa, you’re looking really dumb now, you know]
Beatrice then says Meili’s next and that she won’t forgive her even if you are a child. Meili says something like “under different circumstances we could have been friends maybe
”. Subaru is reluctant for Beatrice to kill Meili because she’s just a kid, Beatrice is like that doesn’t matter shut up, Subaru is still reluctant and he doesn’t even know why (narration: ‘he didn’t know what he wanted to do. it may simply have been that he didn’t want to see a child die’).
But none of it matters because Elsa respawns and kills Beatrice like in the WN. Subaru is shocked at her regeneration, which Elsa explains is a “blessing” (祝福) she got from “someone mean (malicious, mean-spirited)”.
(t/n: “Blessing” is not the same terminology as “divine protection/blessing” (加護)
Elsa then asks Meili if the village job is done, Meili says ‘yeah but the big maid and the dragon killed the Guiltyrau’ (back to jobbing for you I suppose). Then Elsa fucks up Subaru’s left eye with her kukri’s and is fucking around with him for a while, until the pyroxene piece in his pocket starts glowing and Subaru teleports back to the Lewes Meyer lab. (Subaru initially thinks the teleportation was something Beatrice did with her last strength, but later on thinks that he’s not sure if it was Beatrice or something to do with the pyroxene, so THE MYSTERY CONTINUES)
Returning to the lab Subaru is ready to give up on this loop because too much has been lost. “The regret that Rem again died in a place beyond his reach, the promise made with Petra, words sworn between Frederica, answers to Beatrice’s lamentations, all could be reached in the next life”. But then he realizes there’s too much shit he still doesn’t know and that he doesn’t want to die so pointlessly in a loop where he has done nothing, so he continues. (Later narration in Chapter 4 implies that Subaru is intentionally repressing what happened here because otherwise he will just want to go back to giving up)
He slowly gets up and walks out of the laboratory only to see the Sanctuary covered in snow.
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****CH4 – Taste of Death****
16) Subaru leaves the Sanctuary, meets up with Pico, who he asks to guide him back to the settlement. Slowly walking there (takes over 1 hour in his terrible condition) he runs into Garf who is pissed and tells him to go into the tomb to get Emilia. (The scenes where Garf takes Rem hostage are gone because Rem is not here, duh)
17) Subaru enters the tomb and talks with crazy Emilia, same as the WN (some dialogue is shortened/cut but the scene is basically the same)
18) Subaru goes with Garf to confront Roswaal (who he realizes is behind the snowfall) and everything is like the WN. During the scene where Roswaal reveals he knows Subaru can reset, he also reveals he has a gospel (no there’s still no strangle-time, it’s gone, getoverit).
Also Roswaal is far more forceful in his attempts to get Subaru to redo, kicking him around a bunch before the rabbits come.
19) Rest of the chapter up to the kiss of death is basically the same.
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****CH5 – Ending List****
20) Subaru’s 2nd trial has various cuts and simplifications from the WN, most likely for pacing constraints.
--1st scene (suicide): Basically the same as the WN, except the scene cuts away before the part where ‘zombie Subaru’ appears and Puck freezes everything.
--2nd scene (Julius kill): Basically the same as the WN
--3rd scene (cliff jump): Basically the same
--4th scene (Puck and Reinhard): Reinhard uses his dragon sword to kill beast Puck (as in illustration). Most of Puck’s ominous dialogue about how he “remembers things” and all that stuff is cut, but his important line that Reinhard “could only be a hero” is still there.
--5th scene (Elsa loothouse) and 6th scene (Rem kills Subaru in mansion) are not shown
--7th scene (Petelgeuse massacre) did not happen in the LN and so is obviously cut
(I’ve seen some speculation from japanese fans that some of the cuts might be part of intentionally retconned/abandoned plotpoints instead of pacing cuts but that’s another story)
21) The Carmilla scene is the same as the WN
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****CH6 – The Witch’s Tea Party****
22) Typhon and Daphne show up along with Minerva/Carmilla/Sekhmet to stop Subaru from contracting with Echidna (they don’t really say or do anything)
23) Echidna’s contract speech is shortened by about ⅓ (guessing). It’s still 4 pages long.
24) Everything else in the chapter is the same as the WN, chapter ends at Satella’s appearance at the tea party (end of chapter 75) and everyone is TENSE (except Typhon who is just like “Hey Stella! Long time no see”)
2017-03-26, 04:58
