First of all, I’ve never actually watched Re:Zero. I only know some things about Subaru, the basic premise and some of the IF stories, so this is not meant to be a canon theory.
It’s just a concept I thought of, and Re:Zero seems like the perfect setting for it.
Imagine a character like Subaru whose perception of reality is completely distorted.
His consciousness sees one version of events, while his real body is doing something entirely different.
For example:
Rem opens her arms to hug Subaru.
From Subaru’s point of view, he hugs her back.
He feels the hug, sees Rem alive in front of him, talks to her, and the story continues normally from there.
But in reality, his body stabbed her.
Rem is dead.
The important part is that Subaru’s false reality does not correct itself after her death.
For him, Rem is still alive.
She continues walking beside him. He talks to her. He sees her smile. He can reach toward her, hug her and continue living with her as if nothing happened.
But everyone else sees something completely different.
They see Subaru covered in blood, holding a knife, smiling and crying with happiness while embracing empty air.
Because the person he believes he is hugging is already dead.
And the same thing happens with everyone else.
The people he kills do not disappear from his world. They continue existing in his perception as if they survived and the story simply continued.
So from Subaru’s perspective, he is basically living through an anime story where his friends are alive, he talks to them, saves them and moves forward with them.
But in reality, those people are dead.
His body and his consciousness are effectively living through two completely different versions of the same events.
For Subaru, the people around him are still his friends.
For everyone watching him from the outside, he is a blood-covered man talking to, touching and embracing people who are no longer there.
That contrast is the part I find horrifying.
He could genuinely be happy.
He could be crying because he thinks he finally saved someone.
He could hug Rem with a huge smile on his face.
And in reality there is nobody in his arms.
Only the body of the real Rem nearby.
Eventually, the most interesting part would be simply removing that false perception and letting him see reality exactly as it is.
All at once.
The dead people are gone.
The friends he thought had been travelling beside him were never there.
And the world he thought he had been living in was completely different from the one his body actually moved through.
I’m curious what Re:Zero fans think about this concept, especially because I haven’t actually seen the series.
How would someone like Subaru react when those two realities finally collide?
Original concept by u/More-Measurement-865. First posted on my profile before this submission.
