Deli and Arriana's relationship has been a really funny running joke ( I was going to say prominent plot point but after episode 1 we haven't had a lot of direct interaction with that dynamic at all so it feels more of a beat through the jokes more than anything) but no one-- at the table at least I haven't been active on tumblr in a hot second-- has said a word to it at anything other than face value. Which is really odd to me because I feel like there's an elephant to at least passingly mention in it...

... So Deli was being groomed by her, right? we all agree on that? because everything about it feels inherently manipulative to me. She is introduced calling his grandfather father five minutes after she's teasingly propositioning Deli. Deli who is freshly 19 and hasn't scene her in multiple years... the timeline there doesn't look great. Just to start with. and we know he's been specifically saving himself for her and that all just reads so clearly manipulative. It's giving Daemon and Rhynera vibes ( rip to any fans of theirs but that's not all kosher *before* you factor in the incest) She is also clearly someone that Deli respects and wants to emulate on top of her inherent allure.

Then, moving into episode three and the reveal of her involvement at the end-- I was shocked by the joke reaction that got because that has MAJOR implications on the nature of their relationship. It is a doubling down on everything I had said before because clearly she was grooming him for *this*. But it also means that she was grooming him *FOR* this. ya know?

It's not just that she was trying to influence him in ways to make him useful to her-- you have to ask, did she start grooming him for this purpose specifically? Was their relationship started for the sole purpose of making him into a man who could kill a queen, and creating leverage to force his hand?

I was really shocked in the adventuring party after 3 especially, that there was no comment on this. Even when discussing that reveal. If the relationship was truly only for the purpose of this that has so many implications on the course of Deli's life, especially now as we see what he as become by the end of the war. How much of this spiraling blind ambition was sewn into him but Arriana? How much of his life has been decided by leading him to that bridge with his spear in hand? His response to Pamela when she begs to know why he has done this was "Destiny has been designed."

Oh, how true that really is. How much of Deli's destiny has been designed for him? It also leads to the next question of how much has the rest of their destiny's been designed here? We don't know the rest of the members of the FDA, we know the bishop and I don't hesitate to assume that the broccoli bitch (read: Barassica) is involved. But depending on who fills those robes, might the others be in the same sort of boat?

The easiest to assume this might be true for is Raphaniel, especially after gaining the archbishops view of his place in the church. He has spent his life in service of the bulb-- not fully, obviously because it is clear how much his position is simply a tool for him. But that doesn't mean he hasn't been at the whim of this cauliflower in his placement in the church and uses in the large collective as a whole. So what parts of his work were decided to set him up for this task? and then thinking of that more over, depending on when Raphaniel started his time as a bishop at Greenhold, was Amaungeux's relationship with him orchestrated?

That thought feels like more of a stretch however still in the realm of possibility.