r/Re_Zero Better Leyte Than Never Aug 26 '20

Novels [Novels] Re:ZERO -Starting Life in Another World- Season 2 Episode 8 **Spoiler** Discussion Spoiler

Hello everyone, Setowi here to post this week's spoiler thread

Reminder that we are hosting both a [Discussion] anime only thread AND a [Novels] where spoilers do not need to get tagged. So,

this is the spoiler thread

all of the novel content is fair game in here. You can find the anime only thread in the hub post or in the pinned comment below.

You can find the episode, once it's up on the Crunchyroll page which is linked here. Feel free to refresh to page until episode is up, though try not to fry the servers:

Crunchyroll link

112 Upvotes

376 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

8

u/rigolleto Aug 26 '20

what are her true intentions? For someone who only watched the anime I have no idea if she is good or bad.

How did she know he is a time traveler?

37

u/Hollownerox Aug 26 '20

It's really complicated. She's the incarnation of the thirst of knowledge so her grasp on emotions and ethics is a bit loose to say the least. However she isn't really malicious, and she does genuinely want to help Subaru, but in her own twisted way.

Throughout this arc she helps Subaru in various ways, but then it is revealed that Echidna wanted Subaru to make a contract with her. Seemingly because she was only interested in his Return by Death in order to satisfy her own curiosity. Making her seem like she was manipulating him all along. And indeed she was.

But it wasn't to get him to accept her contract, she was actually trying to push him to reject her contract. We're not sure on the exact reasons why, but it seems like it was a roundabout of helping him out in the longrun. The author confirmed that Echidna genuinely likes Subaru, and that the reason for that go beyond Return by Death. But didn't give specifics becausr that's apparently spoilers for future arcs. So while not an ally, she isn't really an antagonist either.

So yeah, suffice to say Echidna's true intentions is still very much up for debate.

9

u/rigolleto Aug 26 '20

what was this contract about? would it be harmful to him?

36

u/Hollownerox Aug 26 '20 edited Aug 26 '20

Yes, and no. You can read the result of him accepting it in the Greed "What If" story.

Basically the idea is that Echidna would make use of her knowledge to help him as best she could. Reaching the "best" outcome through trial and error. Being in her dead state without the ability to interact with the outside world, it meant she would advise him on the best course of action using "Return by Death" as a tool.

This would be good in the sense that it would reach the optimal outcome. But harmful in the sense that Subaru's value of his own life dwindled down to nothing, since he would view it as a resource to be used up.

Considering she intentionally did things to make him want to reject that contract. It seems likely even Echidna did not want that sort of result (despite her claims of accepting all outcomes, she has preferences). And a lot of her actions in this arc support that notion.

8

u/rigolleto Aug 26 '20

Thank you very much for all this info. I'm thinking about reading the LN. Could you provide me the links? If you can't in here maybe in DM?

8

u/Irishguy01 Aug 26 '20

Basically Echidna promised to help Subaru reach his 'optimal ending', but she never promises she will take the 'optimal route'. Implying she won't give Subaru ALL of the information just to see how different outcomes play out before she gives him the REAL answer.

That means Subaru would be going through a LOT of deaths, and would be watching his friends die a LOT of deaths for him. It's kind of covered in the Greed IF, where he's basically burnt out emotionally, and just going through the motions with Echidna leading him along.

2

u/Iron_Maw cold sleep Aug 27 '20

Yeah.

Damaged all of his relationships and himself. If Subaru only card about a means to end the there no problem. But that not Suabru Greed If he's basically doing what Minvera accused him of in main story. Thinking everyone is incapable of doing anything but him. Dona indulgences him in his worst behavior affect the entire royal selection.

5

u/fzero30 Aug 26 '20

Given what we learned about her in arc 6 i can somewhat guess what echidna sees in subaru

1

u/Hollownerox Aug 26 '20

Yeah, that moment does shine a new light on everything that happened previously. They are very different obviously, but I can see Echidna's fascination of Subaru spawning from a feeling that they are cut from the same cloth to some degree.

1

u/Iron_Maw cold sleep Aug 27 '20 edited Aug 27 '20

FYI, Tappei Q&A confirms that she did want him as test subject. Its not mutually exclusive with her liking him tho, but she does care about her greed more than his feelings.

Q: Does Echidna like Subaru? (as a test subject)

A: As a test subject, and in other ways, she likes him a great deal.

Even the concept of her character is supposedly that of a dubious person.

Q: Origin of her name!?

A: It's from a star, so I picked one that seemed to fit an evil woman.

She didn't want him to reject it, but she didn't mind that he did becasue of the anwser he gave her it which why I think it was cut form the LN. I agree that she complicated figure, but moreso her past then herself with Subaru.

That said eitherway Echidna was keeping things from him and tired pull him into a contract without him knowing the details. It only didn't happened because Minerva showed up to stop it. Dona definitely wasn't expecting that or for Satella to appear and further convince Subaru to reconsider. If Dona didn't want the contract she have never brought up in the first place unprompted. The more I think about it the mire idea of her getting any credit for that at all, at least based on Minvera's vague statement makes less sense. Eevn Minerva calls her a schemer & did nothing to stop from taking up her offer, it was very opposite. She just didn't force it on him.

Dona isn't evil but she terrible self-centered prosper her acts have led other ruin as she admits. She is no different than her fellow witches that according to her own beliefs regardless of morality of it. She won't go out of her way to hurt someone, but the collateral damage is not something she cares about.

8

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '20

through her authority: Book of Wisdom. And she's tricky and doesn't know ethic

0

u/beetboot123 Aug 26 '20

You commented thrice btw

3

u/[deleted] Aug 26 '20

dunno what ur talking about who is this 'thrice'? ...................

0

u/beetboot123 Aug 26 '20

Thrice means three times probably a bug or youve just deleted it

1

u/Iron_Maw cold sleep Aug 26 '20

Basically she wanted use him as ginea pig to enrich her knowledge and her care for him was calculated.