After a pretty forgettable loop in which Subaru had died to the alleyway thugs, he found himself at the same starting point. Nonetheless, this time was different.
"Guards!!!"
Subaru screamed from the top of his lungs. He was tired of having to deal with the three annoying thugs every single time. If he could not beat them on his own, he had to put aside his pride and call out for help.
"Reinhard?" Emilia murmured.
The red haired young man had appeared to save Subaru. After scaring them away, Subaru and him were having a light chat.
Subaru left his message to Reinhard and got on his way, leaving the Sword Saint with a weird sensation.
"No plan, again. He's just heading for the loot house with no preparation. Not only that, but he rejected Reinhard's help. How selfish," said Ram.
She was indeed correct. Subaru's necessity to carry all of the weight by himself did not benefit anyone. Therefore, it was selfish by nature, a child's petty desire.
His inability to ask for help had undoubtedly caused more deaths than were needed, ending the loops with not only his own death, but the deaths of others too.
Had he learned from his mistakes? That was the question in all of the camp companions' minds.
The room was quiet. They all watched as Subaru arrived at the loot house, now aware of the danger Elsa posed, but still without a way to counter it.
Knock knock
There it was, the sound of someone knocking on the door.
"Elsa..." whispered Rem.
But Rem was not the only one aware of the identity of the person behind that door. Subaru entered a panic.
"Don't open the door. She will kill us all." He begged Felt not to open the door.
The second she did, her face went pale.
"That's not Elsa."
This time, Emilia was the one who had raised her voice, her tone confident.
Then, an identical voice to Emilia's resounded in the room, but it was not her. The voice came from the video.
"How rude. I would never do something like that."
The half elf entered the loot house.
"How is that possible? It's too early. Wait." Rem's line of thought was interrupted by a sudden idea.
"Your assumptions are correct, I suppose," Beatrice read her mind, as she too had deciphered what was going on. "Emilia recognized this timeline. That means this is the real one."
The real timeline had been found. After multiple painful deaths, Emilia's memories finally coincided with the events happening.
Subaru, Puck, Emilia, and Rom all joined forces to cope with Elsa, who this time had not even left room for negotiations.
It was not much, but a slight flash of improvement could be seen in Subaru's persona. Instead of being unable to do anything, he was now being crucial in the fight.
His fast thinking even allowed Felt to escape.
"If, as we presume, this is the actual timeline, Reinhard should be appearing right about..."
"Now."
The red haired swordsman appeared just in time to save the day. A few minutes later would have resulted in the inevitable death of either Subaru or Emilia.
With Reinhard now with them, the scale quickly balanced to their side. His insane amount of divine protections left Elsa unable to do anything to him.
However, even after Reinhard proceeded with an attack that destroyed the whole loot house, Elsa managed to barely escape.
Finally, Subaru had been left alive. After enduring what felt like hell, he achieved life. For that reason, he demanded Emilia reward him. He deserved it, maybe not from Emilia's perspective, but from his.
This sudden petition startled Emilia, who covered as much of her body as she could with her arms. Who was that guy? As far as she knew, he could be some pervert whose life was driven by lust. Or maybe he
"What is your name?"
With a weird pose, he voiced his only demand. Knowing her name was his one and only goal. All of his pain and suffering led to this moment. For him, that was more than enough.
After thanking Reinhard, Subaru started thinking about where to go from that point on. That was when his gaze fixated on the club Subaru had used to defend himself from Elsa's slashes. It was cut in half, which meant that
"Ughh!"
With a red line covering his belly, Subaru fell to the ground. All the movement caused the cut to open, resulting in a massive loss of blood.
"Are you kidding me!?" Garf jumped from his seat and looked back at Emilia.
She stared back at him and, with a tone as composed as she could manage, answered, "Don't worry. He only lost consciousness there. I took him back to the mansion and he recovered without... he recovered."
"Without any problem" was what Emilia was about to say. That was what she had believed, at least, but now she was not so sure about it. Subaru had looked terribly stressed during his first days at the mansion too. Could this mean...
"W~ell, it appears that Subaru has finally managed to overcome the adversities in his way, saving his life along with Lady Emilia as well. That's quite the achievement, if you ask me," Roswaal commented.
"As out of line as usual, I suppose," Beatrice responded.
The screen went dark again, but this time it did not mean a death. Progress had been made. The events of the tumultuous first day had been left behind at last.
"So he did. Subaru sama is truly impressive," said Frederica.
"Yes! Subaru is the strongest knight there is!" added Petra.
The little maid still did not let go of her senpai, but by simply seeing her face, one could tell her nerves had calmed.
"That's boss for you!" said Garf.
Otto had been left speechless.
Ram and Roswaal were composed at the back.
Emilia was a jumble of emotions. Was she allowed to be happy? She did not believe that to be the case.
Rem was in a similar situation, who, contrary to Emilia, did not show it on her face. However, no matter how much she tried to hide it, her emotions were about to overwhelm her again.
Beatrice was lost. What was the right call when she next saw him? She wondered about it, but never seemed to arrive at an answer.
The fact was that Subaru had managed to overcome the first obstacle. Next up, the mansion would not be a walk in the park either.
END OF ARC 1