Fire Emblem!

Spoiler: end of Edel's monastery time

Welp, Rhea goes from 0 to murder very quickly when you side with Edel. I'm actually impressed, that puts her and Edel on the same tier in terms of threat-delivery (Rhea's "rip your chest open and take back your heart" vs Edel's "until you have no blood left to bleed"). I can see why people don't like her or trust her, in fanfic and the like, though as someone who is doing this route last there's a part of me that aches seeing her turn against me. I legit like Rhea a lot, she's a fantastic character.

Also, on Maddening, the fight after the Tomb is rough, what with not having any time to prepare and level for it. And with me having leveled Flayn, not realizing that of course she'd leave, like the fool I am.

 

Spoiler: response to the above

Yeah. I was already extremely predisposed to not trust Rhea due to my issues with organized religion and my experience with anime popes in JRPGs. Then my dad was like 'Oh don't trust that Rhea,' and then there was how she talks about dealing with the Western Church in that one mission and then there was Dad's diary.

and then she said that shit

and i was like

oh

yeah no color me fucking surprised you gotta go

I will probably soften up on her after I get to know her more in other routes but I will admit it'll likely be hard for me. Since Rhea falls into a character type that I tend to really fucking hate. Don't like those sketchy seeming anime popes. Don't like them or their fucking churches at all. Burn the church! Reform the religion! Free the faithful from the shackles of their fucked up leader! That tends to be where I like going. But I only know Rhea on one route. I've read up on her in the others and what her deal is in general but I really have only seen her in the route where she comes off the absolute worst and the route which specifically feeds into people like me's issues with organized religion. The jump to liking Edelgard I'd probably have been able to make easier since Edelgard's issues are not pressing any of my specific Fuck You And All That You Are trauma buttons. If anything she's hitting personal relation buttons with her dumb bullshit.

el i love you

but also

we need to get you therapy

There's another thing that is kind of That's Just A You Thing issue for me with her too. Which I guess I'll hide in another spoiler since it's one of my weird deals.

Spoiler: Aon's weird kink shit

Rhea disturbs me because she is like attempting to bring back her dead mother. And I find the ways she talks to the Professor and how quickly she turns to 'I will not grant you mercy' very distressing in that regard since it hits my 'I don't want to consent to this sex thing and you're being weird about it...' button really hard. Like lady I did not sign up to be your perfect cg/l dream mommy. Leave me be!

Also I personally enjoy that she and El go from 0 to murder real fucking fast and both have like similar levels of fucked up threat. I feel like there's a number of parallels drawn between the two which is hilarious given how much Edelgard fucking hates Rhea and what she stands for as a ruler in her eyes.

 

Spoiler: responding to the response, plus some extra

Yeah, they're very similar in some ways, very different in others. They make excellent contrasts. All four of the "Lords" do, really. They're a group that, in other circumstances, could get along, I think. But Rhea refuses to trust humanity to not betray her again, Dimitri is haunted by survivor's guilt, Claude won't trust Fodlan's people to not hate him on racist principle, and Edelgard (thus far, at least) seems to think that only force of arms will bring the world she wants... and that Crests alone make the nobility so arrogant and inequality so rampant. Coming from our world, that looks naive, and even in Fodlan it's clearly not true, but...

They're all kids. Even Rhea, honestly, though she's old enough to fake it, seems no older than some of the students.

But yeah, I love Rhea, but I didn't trust her my first run, either, even though I went with the Church, funnily enough. Even with all the "positive on Rhea" routes behind me, she's a mixed character that's made a lot of mistakes, and is just... unable to move on. It feels like she wants her mother back not just to be her mother, but because she thinks Sothis ought to rule Fodlan, and so the Church is partly set up in such a way as to allow her to take control once Rhea succeeds in bringing her back. I don't think she wants the power for herself, she wants it to pass on to someone she thinks of as being more worthy than her... though she'll suffer through it in the meantime.

Admittedly, I also find I like Rhea much more than Archbishop Rhea. In her supports, even if she's a bit of a creeper with her pseudo-Oedipus complex stuff, she's a lot more of a person than when she's acting officially or as a leader. So far, in CF route, she seems to be falling into the role all the more heavily, rather than allowing herself to be a person. It's rough.

Dunno if you'll like her more in the other routes or not, she's definitely That Kind of Anime Pope in a few respects, but the Golden Deer route, especially, really helped me see bits of why she turned out like that, why she acts the way she does at various points.

Funny thing I've noticed in fix-fics so far, by the by, is people avoiding Hubert to try and win over Edelgard because they think he'll stop them from changing her mind. But I think approaching him and finding a way to get him to see that the path she walks both isn't necessary and might do more harm to her than good... he'd actually change sides, or work to temper her, I feel. He's the single most genuinely loyal character in the game, I think, because Dedue would do anything Dimitri asked even if that meant Dimitri came to harm. Hubert would still commit basically any atrocity in Edelgard's name, but he wouldn't do it just because she had a passing fancy, and he wouldn't do it if he saw no real benefit to her.

Also, having just gotten onto the Crimson Flower part of the route: CASPAR, y'gonna get away with just making your emperor blush like that? EL, holy fuck, you a CUTE. That BLUSH, my goodness. The way she turns her head and just stays looking at the ground, blushing and sweat, good LAWD.

 

Spoiler

Edelgard is a severely traumatized child who has a very limited lifespan. I'm honestly not surprised she went with the course of action she did. Because like. Yeah? Why wouldn't she assume that the things that are behind her torture and the deaths of her siblings behind all of life's problems? She's like 18 with undealt with C-PTSD who knows that she's probably going to die at like 30 or some shit. El needs therapy. And hugs. And cake. They all do. Though I am most fond of El because she is My Wife and also I too would want to burn the entire fucking system to the ground and view only that as the only solution. I still want to really as I think that reform moves too fucking slow and I have 'It is better to kill a smaller amount of people to save a larger amount' tendencies even though that isn't like...A great way of viewing shit. My natural gut instinct though is that the ends justify the means and that if a revolutionary war will solve the problem faster then that should be gone for instead of slow reforms.

Yeah I didn't support with Rhea at all because I was extremely creeped out by her and wanted fuck all to do with her. And the more that came out with our deal with one another the more I was like 'Well I never want to talk to you!'

Hubert strikes me as a man who would defy an order if he had enough reason to feel that it would just hurt her. At least based off how he is in El's route. It would need to be a hell of a thing to like get him to though.

And yes. Edelgard is absolutely fucking adorable. She is precious. ENDLESSLY SO. Her supports show more of that and in general they provide like a really fun and rather natural feeling progression towards her being less of a shitfuck. She never backs down from her war, but she does back down from some of her tendencies and beliefs. The supports with Manuela in particular stand out in this regard. So if you can. Please do get through her supports with Manuela.

 

Spoiler: Spoilers for Edelgard and Hubert supports, Byleth's support too

There are many things in her supports I like but one of my favorites is this bit with her and Hubie...

Edelgard: Wait a moment. Are you saying...you have romantic feelings for someone?
Hubert: Yes. That is the one secret I had particularly hoped to keep from you.
Edelgard: Well, that's utter nonsense! You can't possibly keep something so fascinating from me! Who is it?

because i am just like. edelgard. honey. sweety. it is obvious to literally everyone in this army but fucking you apparently.

...and then she pulls this sort of shit again in the S support with the Professor with her 'I must admit, I feared my feelings would be unrequited,' shit. LIKE REALLY EL. YOU REALLY THOUGHT THAT? Our romantic tension was so fierce that Dorothea joked about how operas about the war might include it between you and the professor. LIKE REALLY. She's just all sitting over there writing the professor's name in a heart in her diary after the like fiftieth tea party they had this week and is like 'Oh, but surely she couldn't love me.' She's a hopeless romantic with incredibly stunted emotional maturity who has the observational skills of a rock and I love her for it.

 

Spoiler: El route

she spent ALL NIGHT on "Black Eagle Strike Force" shes such a DORK

 

Spoiler

i didn't have the heart to tell her it was a stupid name

 

Spoiler: Ferdinand von FIRE

Now even Ferdie's getting in on the teasing. El, you're too cute. Stop trying to hide this fact, it's not working how you think.

 

Spoiler

It really doesn't work like how she thinks it does! She is like 'Stop telling me I am cute!' while blushing and looking at the floor in a cute fashion. I love her so dearly because she is just. So. Adorable. And in a way that I feel is fitting for her given her entire deal.

 

Spoiler: Edeeeelgaaaaard! also other route spoilers

Yeah, after my first run I've been trying to max everyone's supports I can, especially those that are route-specific. El's only missing Linhardt's A+ support, now, and then she'll be fully supported.

And while Rhea's no saint (heh), I think part of my frustration is that the history El got taught, from what I've seen so far, is... lacking in important context. She seems to think Nemesis and Seiros just had a "dispute" (jilted lover? territory? currently unclear) and that the 10 Elites made their weapons themselves. And, like... those are all true statements, but the dispute is based in what the relics were made from in the first place, which is also why they got confiscated. It's possible that every other route that covered it lied about the history, there, but... seems more likely to me that the Agarthans have been poisoning the informational well over the millennia.

 

Spoiler

Oh they've definitely been poisoning the well and Edelgard bought into that. Which is helpful if you want to have someone who can and will attack and destroy the fucking church and Rhea with. I don't think they really bet on Edelgard being able to wage a successful shadow war against them though. She's also got no real reason to not believe the history that her father told her. If she dug more she might be able to find the real truth, but her trauma keeps her from doing that I feel like. Her dad told her a specific truth. She was experimented upon and her siblings died for crest research. The church is a significant part of why Fódlan is what it is currently and she knows that the church is built upon a lie. So the fucking church needs to go down too.

She's a traumatized teenage girl trying to make sure that what happened to her never fucking happens to anyone again. She learns over the course of her route to step the fuck back and consider things a bit more but like. Damage has been done. And she's not going to learn the full truth of things because she's not in the sort of mind to be able to. I get why people still hate her for it but I also understand why that's how she keeps doing shit. She's not the Sherlock Holmes motherfucker. She's a well intentioned extremist who learns to be more emotionally vulnerable and maybe not take out her trauma on all religious people simply for being religious. And regardless of what she learns and how she improves on her shit she still fucks up. Like fundamentally she is always going to be a fuck up and she's always going to hurt people. It's part of what I like about her and her route in the context of what is learned in Claude's honestly?

 

it also gives me fuel for angsty post-game fanfictions

 

Spoiler

Bluh bluh I have more to say.

I also like that like even with the improvement Edelgard makes she isn't like. Completely there yet? The person she is still most vulnerable with is the professor. She's still got damage. If she just kind of got 100% insta-better and did shit perfectly and like dug into shit and what not I don't think I'd like her as much as I do. The fact that even when she gets to be a better person she's still far from perfect and still needs to work on shit means a lot to me. She's a horribly broken human being and she's got work to do and that's slow going. She's doing it.

But it's slow going.

So like I guess what it is is that I don't want a character that gets 100% better and fixed or redeemed or whatever in the narrative. I want a character like me who's made progress but who still has a ways to go.

 

Spoiler

Oh, yeah. I should note that me wanting to yell at the screen in the hopes she'll hear me isn't because I think she's unreasonable or unrelatable, it's because the story is very well done and it's a tragedy and I can see it coming and want her to be happy and not have to suffer. If she actually could do everything I want her to do easily on her own it'd be a much less fascinating story, and she'd be a less enjoyable character.

It's the same frustration I get from other good classical tragedies, where I know what's coming and know how to prevent it, but because of who they are and what's been done to them the characters fall headfirst into the painful future, as even their attempts to avoid it see it winding around them all the more tightly.

At least I could spare Claude. Just wish Hilda had taken his advice and run away, too. Still... much better than being forced to kill them both.

 

I gotta say I just love Edelgard. She’s such a complicated character, she’s very endearing despite how serious and cruel she can be, I love her the same way I love Vriska if I’m being honest.

 

Spoiler

Edelgard is a hopeless bisexual and it brings me so much joy to see.

Spoiler: response to helen of boy

It is very tragic, yes! And it is nice and lovely. I am happy though that she does get like happy endings. Even if those happy endings are still touched by tragedy to some degree. Because they are really.

You did pick up Lysithea I hope? She's got a real fun support line with El and you're able to recruit her in that chapter even if you didn't earlier. And yes! I like that you can spare Claude. Alternatively you could kill him I guess but I do like that with the professor around El is willing to let people like Claude go.

 

Spoiler: more edelgard bullshit because i have An Interest apparently

And now I am thinking about how I must examine my own way of picking and choosing between when I use Edelgard's super special nickname of El and when I pick to use her full name.

And how people who really fucking hate her never call her El.

It is just a small, fascinating linguistics Thing that is showing up in the fanbase.

 

Spoiler

Yeah, after finding out during my Golden Deer run that you can't necessarily recruit anyone post-Timeskip, I made sure to recruit everyone immediately. Glad to know there're some more options there, but I wasn't about to take the chance and miss out. Given that I'm on Maddening, I actually boosted her Support with renown to grab her ASAP, because I know how strong she is and how she grows best in battle. She's the most frequent MVP in important fights other than Byleth. On Maddening, a consistant party is... important, I'm finding, even if I maybe should've shared the love a little more at points.

That's why I'm so grumpy about Flayn, too, even though it makes sense. Now I've got two new characters I need to babysit into being on level parity with everyone else.

But yeah, Lysithea's supports with El are really interesting. El clearly knows some things about Lysithea, but... less than I thought she did, in some ways, unless she lies to her more carefully than when she goes "I dunno what you're talkin' about, guv."

ALSO, that line from Dorothea about romantic tension is even better than I thought it would be. Mostly the way she says "even if it's not historically accurate" and I'm just sitting there, like, "don't. don't pretend like you don't know. YOU KNOW YOU KNOW and actually you know more than El herself does, jfc, that girl"

 

Spoiler

Edelgard strongly suspects things where Lysithea is concerned but given how limited Edelgard's information pool is at the start all she has is very, very strong suspicions. Girl is sickly. Albino. Really loves sweets to a degree that rivals her own never ending need for sugar.

she suspects it so fucking bad

But she also doesn't like. Know. For certain.

Also I like how relatably they mirror experiences people have with like finding Same Trauma and Same Disorder buddies. On the one hand you'd really love to be wrong. On the other hand oh my god someone understands and we need to like. Accommodate. And do nice things that others wouldn't think to.

AND YES. DOROTHEA MOST DEFINITELY FUCKING KNOWS. I like to think that she occasionally teases Edelgard about it all. And either gets embarrassed and indignant 'I don't know what you're talking about!' type responses or the jab just flies entirely over her head because Edelgard is still like 'But does the woman who gives me teddy bears all the time really like me. No. that is ridiculous.'