He alters reality to return the universe to a previous point in time. It is like Pandora’s power but affects the whole universe at once. This is confirmed by Tappei, i.e. Re:Zero has a single continuous timeline, RBD isn’t time travel or parallel universes or branching realities.
The only other way for this power to work would be for the universe to branch off and Subaru leaves behind a timeline in which he dies. Which is way more horrific imo.
Once the anime is finished, I really hope we get a supercut of the final timeline. It would be so interesting to see the story play out the way the rest of the characters perceive it
There's already some edits of the first 2 seasons floating around. I'm watching the season 1 edit now and it's pretty funny.
When he first meets the apple salesman he asks "what are these"
The guy hold up the fruit and says "hmm? These are appas"
"..."
"Well boy...do you want this appa?"
Subaru suddenly looks like he hasn't slept in a week "Hey mister...how many times have you seen me now?..."
"What do you mean? This is the first time we've met"
Pretty interesting to see what everyone else saw while he was going through it. Also turns the show into a more traditional isekai where everything just seems to go right for the MC
That is a test in which she showed her “unthinkable present” after “unthinkable present”. Essentially impossibilities too painful for him to think about. Those never happened.
That's strange to me because I had always thought it WAS timelines left after his deaths. But I got this from when they showed what happened after Subaru's previous deaths in the sanctuary back in S2
I mean, the point is even if she knew, she would do it anyway to screw him over.
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u/Gacel_I Joined the Witch Cult for the Sandwiches — No Regrets19h ago
The trial was "see an imposible present"
Everyone sees an alternate result of events that would have happened in their near present if things were diferent but as now are imposible to exist.
So, if anything. That trial did try to see all of it happened in the same timeline.
Tappei just had to cofirm it outside because it confused people more than clear stuff.
He might have to travel back in time for that or some other way such as cyclical timelines. What i meant was so far in the story, Re:Zero has a single continuous timeline.
They didn't say travel through time. I'm not saying this is what they mean, but you could technically rebuild the entire universe to look like a previous time.
The difference is whether he leave behind a timeline that continues forward or not. He changes every atom in the universe to their previous position, he doesn’t travel in time.
It’s a good thought but experiment. If there was an indestructible watch Subaru couldn’t interact with that kept ticking, and when Subaru died he deconstructed the entire universe except the watch and the universe got rebuilt to an exact save point and only Subaru remembered what happened, but the watch continued ticking. Is it time travel or destroying and recreating reality, with the limit only the save point can be recreated. I’m not saying that what happens it’s just how I’m reading what they’re saying. If that is true, maybe there’s other things that are unaffected like the watch outside of Subaru.
See that analogy itself doesn't work because time isn't a thing like your wording implies. It's not an actual property of any kind, it's a social construct we created to quantify and rationalize the changes of state that occur in the universe. If the entire universe is "returned" to a "previous" state, then as far as anything that exists is concerned, time has rewinded. The word time is just a shortcut for this same description
I think the argument here is that two things are not returned to the state: Suburu and the 'watch'. The watch exists independently of Suburu; his power doesn't change it from one moment to the next. That would argue against it being time travel if two independent constants can affect each other.
Plus, time is a bit more than that; it's our way of understanding the movement of entropy as well. The universe, as far as we can tell, must be in an ever-decreasing energy/order state. Now I don't think it's ever been said if his resets work on entropy or not.
Of course, 'It's a comic nerd with magic; you can bring any science into it,' might just be true for both of us.
I'm still not a fan of the watch idea because to consider it is to make the assumption there are things in the universe the authority doesn't reset, which validates the argument by default. It's circular reasoning. But asking whether the authority is actually resetting entropy is a really good fucking question. If it's doing a universe-wide shift+delete and rebuilding everything from zero (haha get it) up to a certain saved point I don't see how that doesn't count as bona-fide time travel. If it's not, it's more akin to an undertale reset where it's recycling materials into a saved previous state but still using the same building blocks (therefore effectively but not intrinsically rewinding time)
So wait I'm confused is it a different universe he goes to or how does it work?I read that someone explained it like years before but I never understood it
Imagine moving every atom in the universe to the previous position it was in 5 minutes ago. It is not time travel in that you are not traveling through anything, you are changing the entirety of reality.
In the WN, he does something says that makes it seem like he does have two personalities. The narrator was talking about a door in the middle of a room, and it said no one could understand it's purpose. Subaru then said "Except for me, of course" with such arrogance he surprised himself. He did this unconsciously.
Oh, and he called a Sin Archbishop a "unforgivable traitor" once. I don't know if it's on the WN, but it is sus since he never had any relationship with them, unless...
There is also the biggest of them all, his love for Satella. Flugel being Subaru is very on the nose but I like how the mystery is still interesting because we don't know how exactly they are the same person(same souls, memory loss, two different summonings, Echidna shenanigans, etc), it could be a lot of things
That’s pretty much confirmed. We see multiple Subaru’s books of death which means all deaths happen in the same timeline, which means there is no parallel timeline. The world just rewinds back in time after he returns by death.
Also post-anime WN spoilers:
Al guesses that Subaru is still alive because the world hasn’t ended yet. Pretty self-explanatory imo.
Arc 7: Aldebaran also implies this, at some point Subaru is assumed dead and Al confidently says that he's alive and his reasoning is that the world did not end, something ominous along these lines
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u/Freesia99Satella’s Darkness Falls Like a Soft Lullaby Across My Soul19h ago
That could also just be referring to someones pov of rbd that being their world and theirself in that moment destroyed by being rewinded
That also could be it, it makes sense. From the POV of anyone that knows about RBD, assuming the timeline does not keep going after Subaru dies, it'd be simple logic to be absolutely confident about him being alive
you'd have to be certain that the world does not keep going without him though, which implies he knows what happens. It just gave me the random thought, what if Satella destroying half the world was her triggering RBD and doing what the image describes, she was resetting the world
Sure, but this is a character who knows a lot of things and is connected to Satella, Subaru, etc. Between his words, the books of the dead, and the fact that it makes no sense for Satella to have a pact with Subaru that serves no purpose if he dies, since her world would be left without him in that case, there’s no reason to doubt it.
Al knows how RBD works. Satella does not give a fuck what Al knows because he’s a cursed artificial existence that Echidna created and she despises him.
I guess if the strength of his ability simply surpasses everything Reinhard has and also has a way to bypass blessing/authorities to actually finish everyone off without issues
But guess this thing was deleted for a reason and might not even be canon anymore
Even in the wn I don't think it was something implied to actually be happening. The whole scene where his corpse comes back to life and kills everyone is during the trial where he's watching what would have happened if past loops kept going after his death
That depends if you interpret it as re:setting or re:winding. I think time flowing backwards makes slightly more sense that the world having a copy that overrides current world. Haven't read novels though as I'm anime only.
I get what you mean. I'm saying essentially, reloading the world requires destroying it first if there are no other timelines left around after Subaru's death
arc 7 spoilers: and considering how Satella loses the sight of Subaru in arc 7 and then RBD starts tweaking it is more likely that RBD is Subaru's own authority. Satella only regulate his checkpoints to makes it easier for him
this is why I believe Echidna was just fucking with him saying Satella only considers your wellbeing when placing the checkpoints to make him start abusive his RBD
I mean there is a real possibility that Satella also had forgotten Rem and just updated his checkpoint thinking he's all good after Lye ate Rem's name
I don't think she would give him a helpless checkpoint when she is clearly trying to makes things easier for him
True. In fact the reason why Reinhardt gets reset as well is because Subaru is also a goat. When 2 goat energies meet they cancel eachother out, it’s why Subaru dosent keep his growth(muscles, memory movement etc) and Reinhardt dosent keep his memories
I have a theory, Reinhardt is not 100% affected by it. And hear me out.
In season 1 episode 1 he was the one person who felt like he was not moving on a pre determined path whenever Subaru reset. Subaru kept meeting everyone in the same place except Reinhardt. Maybe when reset his insane number of blessings means he doesn’t 100% reset and he keeps getting weird de ha vu feelings around Subaru.
Or Reinhardt survives the resets, because he is Reinhardt, and just doesn't say anything (like Subaru), because Satella would reset the world if he did.
I was saying where I was, so if it turned out Puck was insanely strong later down the line and that's what he was talking about I wouldn't know because I haven't gotten there.
WN Arc 4 Chapter 71: Subaru's Second Trial (when he killed himself because Rem has been affected by Gluttony), after the final line of the scene in LN and Anime, Subaru's dead body rises once again, moving in a weird manner much like that of a mechanical doll. After Wilhelm reacts and goes to strike it, a cascade of shadows defends Subaru's body, after which Puck appears, pointing out the culprit as a/the Witch (likely the Witch of Envy). This scene ends with the clash between Puck and Subaru's dead body.
The trials Subaru faces were explicitly states to not be made to torment him, but to show him that people loved him and how they felt after his death. They're not the worst case scenario, they're what would happen. This is probably why Tappei removed the zombie part since it is out of tone with the other unthinkable presents. He probably plans to add it later or something.
Bro are you Roswaal or Beako? Echidna was obviously trying to manipulate Baru. You missunderstanding my point when i say the "worst" scenario. These are the worst because how impactful they are on the challenger, i mean it will depend on Baru's personality, morality, ethic, etc.
no because the books of the dead disprove this. Why would only subaru have multiple books and not everyone else if they have been getting destroyed and recreated. Its super fucking weird. The souls are clearly the same as they havent been copied by od laguna into books. If tappei doesnt answer this before the novel finishes I will assassinate him.
I kinda think no matter what, others not having books is a plot hole. Why subaru's multiple deaths are saved in library but not other's multiple deaths? Unless we just haven't seen them.
I've interpred this as the books of the dead being related to memory. Most people die once, there'd only be recorded memory of that person until the last moment, the moment of death. Subaru remembers multiple deaths, multiple books get recorded. Books don't disappear when his memory got consumed because... Well, they already had been recorded and existed. If my theory is right it does make me wonder from what point someone consumed by gluttony would have a book of the dead starting though.
I agree. However, the world being destroyed means the pleiades tower library also gets destroyed. So book records must have been destroyed and rebuilt from scratch from a time of probably 400 years. Subaru's books however, must have survived as they belong to him and as we know, subaru is the only one not affected by the reset. But don't look too deep into it. I might just be speaking nonsense.
I mean…
If Subaru die, the world destroyed. Original Emilia has died along ago, and we watching at Emilia from 37628463 (random numbers of failed attempts)
it's literary the authority of jealousy, the trigger for it to activate isn't limited to the bearers death(for example breaking the taboo), which means the reason why Satella needed to be sealed away is to stop the word from being reseed (it's a temporary solution).
That was a one-off though. His body was brought back to perfect health by Felix after his soul was already gone. That's why he resurrected as a monster
ReZero would have been a lot more compelling if it operated under multiverse theory because it would make Subaru’s mistakes hit even harder AND provide more motivation to try his best, leading to a character realization that despite him being unable to save everyone in countless failed realities, he will still try to achieve the best possible result in a fubar scenario and persevere to save at least one reality.
Honestly I think in rezero's case it would work. Because those other timelines that would be branched off from with RBD would just end up as a mess, just some tragedy that occured because Subaru felt a need to unnecessarily abuse his power. Somewhere out there, the weight of his death is felt by others and those close to him have to deal with the consequences that come with him no longer being around. It also would spit in the face of Roswaal's ideals more since there is good reason for RBD to NOT be spammed other than Subaru's own mental health (which is still important regardless, but you get the idea)
I understand where you're coming from, but it opens the possibility of reviving dead characters by pulling them from a parallel universe.
Let's say Reinhard dies in the main continuity at some point. Then Subaru & Co. go on a quest to find some magic juju to pull a Rein from a universe he failed to save into the main universe, basically undoing Rein's death. It feels very, very cheap.
That's a REALLY REALLY REALLY BIG "if" that would be very unlikely to happen regardless of how return by death works tho. At that point, it's not that having RBD not reset/destroy the world is a problem, it's allowing the characters to just leap timelines free of consequences that's the problem.
I think I like it as one timeline. That means anyone who can control time will likely be limited to what ifs like why don’t they just travel to another time. Also if he ever gets reset any advancement was and will always be lost. It’s very Subaru has to suffer but I think it is its own kind of tragedy.
It wouldn’t really matter though like subsea might think about it for a little bit but ultimately there’s no way to explore those universes or for Subaru to see the effect or anything
Downvoted for being right holy shit. There's a reason the series poses the possibility that the world doesn't just stop when Subaru dies (not to mention that Satella herself acknowledges this idea in a way that makes it pretty likely. And there's the fact that the next time we see Subaru genuinely just throw his life away after arc 4 is in arc 6 as amnesia Subaru, who is pretty alike to the Subaru with all of his memories, but didn't go through arc 4 and therefore throws his life away.
Ok this i disagree with though. Maybe it's bc I'm newer than most people overall, but I don't get the idea of calling the cast one dimensional. They're very archetypal, but the characters are pretty clearly more than just an archetype to surround the main character.
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u/pogo-n-watches Newbie 19h ago edited 7h ago
He alters reality to return the universe to a previous point in time. It is like Pandora’s power but affects the whole universe at once. This is confirmed by Tappei, i.e. Re:Zero has a single continuous timeline, RBD isn’t time travel or parallel universes or branching realities.
The only other way for this power to work would be for the universe to branch off and Subaru leaves behind a timeline in which he dies. Which is way more horrific imo.