Finally Roswaal is starting to include Subaru into his schemes.
I had my suspicions about Roswaal L Mathers and I am finally starting to get answers about him. He is finally letting Subaru in on some of his schemes. The more Subaru knows the more we know as an audience, of course the pace at which we learn is limited to Subaru. I wish sometimes Subaru was a bit smarter or handled his situation better, but I have decided to stop wanting Subaru to handle things differently. He is not going to change, and if he does change it’s not happening quickly. Either way Roswaal has Subaru in the palm of his hand. Subaru’s blind devotion and love to Emilia make him perfect for Roswaal as long as relationships stay the same between Roswaal, Emilia and Subaru. So what have we learned about Roswaal since the start of the new story arc?
Let’s start with the self admissions by Roswaal. Disturbingly he admits to setting up the confrontation with the Witch’s Cult. The battles of the previous story arc were all due to his planning; he claims that he wanted to make Emilia the hero to build her fame and reputation. If she can defeat the Witch’s Cult it simultaneously is able to dispel prejudice against her being the Witch and she also is capable of handling the most hated enemy of the Kingdom of Lugunica. It’s a recipe for success. Subaru of course handles the information poorly and instead of taking the time to find out more about Roswaal’s plan, he instantly gets mad for Rem’s sake. While he is justifiably upset he throws away the perfect opportunity to learn more from Roswaal himself.
The other aspect of the conversation with Roswaal is that he knows that Subaru has bound himself to Emilia. He even uses this as a talking point when filling in Subaru on the details. Roswaal points out that Subaru is Emilia’s self-declared knight. It seems part derision and part plotting. Subaru looks nothing like a knight and handles himself without dignity at times. But if you were Roswaal why not use Subaru’s intentions against him. After all it makes them both partners in crime to make Emilia the winning candidate for the royal selection. Subaru needs Roswaal, and Roswaal has full confidence in Subaru. But where does that confidence come from?
Putting the conjecture hat on it has to be that Roswaal either knows about Subaru’s return from death ability, or he suspects it. This idea isn’t originally mine, it’s actually a friend’s idea that I agree with. If Roswaal knows or suspects Subaru’s ability it explains why he believed that Subaru could win the battle against Betelgeuse (Petelgeuse) Romanee-Conti. Roswaal for some reason believes in Subaru’s game changing ability for the royal selection process. Subaru is a pure chaos element in any plan, because he is a foreign element from a different world. No one knows what he is going to do next. Subaru doesn’t understand this new world, nor is he going to abide to its rules.
If Roswaal is confident in Subaru’s abilities, then it makes him the biggest gambler of the royal selection process so far. And his gamble so far has paid off. Even if you have the most broken ability return by death, like Subaru does, it doesn’t mean as much if you don’t control your own destiny. For now Subaru is playing into all of Roswaal’s schemes and there is nothing he can do about it for now. Well played Roswaal.
Agree? Disagree? What are your thoughts? I want to know!
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Fortress William 
I don’t know if you’ve watched episode 33 yet, but I’m going to mention that was revealed in that episode.
While I don’t think Roswaal directly knows about Return by Death, I do agree with you that he at least suspects that Subaru has a power that lets him succeed somehow. Maybe he even suspects that Subaru gets to do over things. Roswaal is very alert about the things Subaru says. When Subaru mentioned he didn’t have time to deal with Garfiel this time, Roswaal emphasized “this time?” which shows he pays attention to what Subaru says unlike Beatrice who usually ignores Subaru when he says such things or flat out said she didn’t understand when Subaru said that because of her this horrible present could be set in stone.
Subaru thinking that there’s something up with Roswaal saying he had utmost confidence that Subaru would do his (Roswaal’s) work excellently in his (Roswaal’s) absence because of what Subaru had done during the Royal Selection and because of Subaru’s ugly one-on-one with Emilia after that is something that warrants serious scrutiny in my opinion. Roswaal very calmly said their conversation had come to a close and didn’t answer what he knew about Subaru.
When you examine the conversations Subaru has had with Roswaal in episodes 3 and 5 of Season 2 together, it suggests that Roswaal knows that there’s more to Subaru than meets the eye. In episode 3, Roswaal said Subaru is the once-in-a-lifetime windfall that he has long waited for, and if you take this at face value, Subaru is someone of great value that Roswaal has been waiting to come in contact with for a long time, and this suggests Roswaal knew that he and Subaru would meet one day, meaning he has knowledge of the future.
Episode 33 officially reveals that there are 3 different types of texts that can predict the future, with the Witch Cult Gospel being the one that viewers suspected could predict the future in Season 1 when Petelgeuse tried to see if his Gospel foretold of Subaru interfering in his Ordeal, only to be upset because his Gospel didn’t have a single hint of Subaru in it. There’s the Tome of Wisdom, 2 lesser copies of the Tome of Wisdom that I individually call the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom since they are the closest things to being replicas of the Tome of the Wisdom but not actually the Tome of Wisdom, and the Witch Cult Gospels. Given that Roswaal has knowledge of the future, and if you take his words at face value, he knew he would meet Subaru one day, then it’s likely that Roswaal has one or more of these type of texts.
Given that Elsa knew the exact day Subaru was returning to the mansion in the first loop, whoever Elsa hired has something that allows for you to get a glimpse of the future whether it be a defective Witch Cult Gospel or the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom. I think she’s more likely to be acting on the information gleaned from a Witch Cult Gospel since she expected Subaru to return to the mansion at the same time in the second loop even though he didn’t, meaning whoever hired her provided her details of the future that were not foolproof, which makes that person likely to have a Gospel since Gospels are apparently defective compared to the not-quite-Tomes of Wisdoms and the real Tome of Wisdom.
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I had not seen episode 33 yet. I will have to watch the episode and see how that changes my thoughts about Roswaal and Subaru’s new predicament. This arc seems intended to flesh Roswaal out more than has been done in previous story arcs. I do enjoy stories with time loops or repeat events to see how those change over time, depending on the actions of the characters.
The conversations Roswaal was having with Subaru was a tip-off that caused me to agree with my friend that Roswaal suspects or knows about Subaru’s abilities. It wasn’t originally my thought to begin with, so I can’t pin point the origin of that thought process. I wonder if predictive texts will answer questions, or make my have more questions as time goes on.
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I meant “what” was revealed in that episode, not “that”
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If Ros’s goal is to push Emilia why does he send Elsa to kill her at the beginning assuming without the presence of Subaru, Emilia will always show up at the den then gets killed.
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It’s hard to know Roswaal’s reasons why, he isn’t the type to tell you. I assume it has something to do with the predictive text that he has. If anything this series has proven Roswaal is trying to groom Subaru for a certain role. And it is not 100% known if Roswaal is responsible for Elsa at the beginning of the show, even if its highly likely.
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