Edelgard,

We should probably meet soon. I found a folio in Rhea's personal library while researching my current hypothesis regarding the Professor's disappearance. To be completely honest, I didn't mean to read it, but I guess I did anyway…

And it's done nothing but rob me of sleep for the past three nights.

To wit, it's a record of all the experiments that the Archbishop performed on her subjects in order to revive the Goddess. In respect to your own experiences… I can understand not wanting to read the details, but I took the liberty of tearing out one of the entries and binding it to this memo.

You should probably read it. Just… not before a good rest.

If I could use an analogy that I tried out with the Professor once… it's like casting a line thinking you've landed the Big One, but then you reel it in….and it's Seteth.

Or in this case, Rhea…? You…? Him…? The Goddess, even…?

The point is… I'm very, very shocked.

And I'm sorry.

If the mood strikes me to rummage through that shelf again… I'll just take a nap.

-L.v.H.


Mother,

How ordained it all seems to be: revealing yourself to me on the birthday of Macuil. How could I have expected anything else?

Oh, the look on his face would be just totally infuriating… I miss him all the same, though.

But I am glad he is not here.

I am happy this spectacle is only to behold for my eyes, alone.

Now I know surely: you are the one behind those hands, behind that passion, behind that care. For the man that comforted that daughter of Wilhelm is not a man at all – he is dead, a thing without life, purpose or drive. He is your most imperfect vessel, and is beginning to leak you everywhere. Sitri held you too tightly, and fought for her soul every step of the way. This one had none to start with, and thus cannot hold you at all.

And I can see so clearly now that you are seeping through, by your own will, ever so slowly after lying dormant for so long…

It sickens me. But it delights me, as well.

This is not how it was meant to be, but it is happening all the same.

And when the time comes, I will have to end it, of course – just like I've had to for the others.

I have quietly observed everything since Jeralt brought you back to me, and was nearing this conclusion myself. But the actions of that scion of Hresvelg finished painting that portrait. And how fortunate she completed it so soon – that steel exterior of hers overcome by her perverse, pathetic attachment to you. What a joyful thing it is, watching her resolve melt away. I feel emotions in me that have not aroused in a thousand years, and they are the ones that I drove down in scorn and agony.

From the very first moment I met her, I knew that she resented me just like her ancestor did – that she would so cavalierly discard my love had I been so stupid to grant it to another human again… and most of all, I know so intimately the force that draws her to you. It is the same that drew me to her ancestor Wilhelm, that sickening curse of blood that hides from us the one essential truth that humanity has taught us.

And how deliciously ironic it all is, that I assented to you becoming her teacher. How the tables of fate have turned, Mother. Those words: "your heart has made its choice" – those are the words you said so many eons ago to me… did you remember them?

Earlier though – I must admit – I found myself wavering. A thought took hold of me the moon before: that perhaps in our absence, that dead child had successfully conquered you in its struggle for life, a path which so many other failed experiments of mine had tried to walk before I severed the legs from under them… each time, with my own hands. Each time, for you.

The gossip that emerged from Alois about that boy – that he was a demon who relished in nothing but killing… it caused me to dread my hubris: was that the price of wrapping your heart around another man? A wicked whimsy brought on by how attached I made myself to the idea of Sitri and Jeralt perhaps making good on our suffering?

But then I saw it in your eyes… it mattered not the vessel that you rested in – it was you. And you were breaking through that creature.

And you have become so much like me. What a terrible thing I have done to you…

You are making a mistake, Mother.

The same one I made with Wilhelm.

But I will grant you the time to realize that. It is the least I can do. Because that is the gift you granted to me, at the cost of your own life – I know the price all too well. And when you realize that too, I will tear you out of that dead man's chest after we've spoken to one another, face to face.

Then, I will watch as that carrier of Wilhelm's blood cries out in agony after she realizes what I've done. And every last bit of me will fill to the brim with happiness, because we'll be the same after that – you and I.

When that is done, I will leave the white haired girl alone to wander this world unmoored, just like I've had to. That girl who looks so similar to her white-haired ancestor… the man who championed me… the man who destroyed me.

And then I will find a new vessel.

And I will try again.

All this I will do just before she graduates, I think.

But for now, I will wait.

I'll let you and her grow close.

I'll let you understand what it means to truly lose yourself among humanity.

I'll let you lose yourself in her.

And then I'll demonstrate to you what a disaster that was for mankind.

And for our race.

And for me.

For now, however – I will consent to your flight of fancy. And honestly – I will watch it avariciously, because when it all comes crashing down, we can finally share that one experience that caused our separation in the first place. That gift you tried to grant me which became a curse that I've carried every single day, moon, year, decade, and century.

I write this in case I cannot ever bring myself to explain what I've done to you through my own lips. But for now… I feel quite confident. So this will be filed away… and perhaps I'll rehearse it as my speech to you for when that day finally comes.

My excitement will grow with each passing day. They seem to fly by now anyways.

Compared to the last millennia of waiting… It doesn't seem very long at all.

I will see you very soon.