I mean, the Leopard could be associated with some other place but I don't see Remiferia getting an arc (Akatsuki's got it covered, kinda). the parallels don't fit Arteria even if I wasn't convinced the Holy Nation is sitting on top of the Sept-Terrion of Time and there's no other area we know about that seems important enough to get its own arc. So, the East it probably is.

My old theory regarding the Sept-Terrion and the Grandmaster took a huge hit with CS4's ending, since the Grandmaster and Society as a whole seem totally fine with not obtaining the Sept-Terrion, though there's that 'almost' line that leaves a bit of wiggle room. But amusingly the endpoint of the theory actually does seem to have been correct to an extent even if the premises it was based on weren't. xD

Anyhow, assuming that Lost Zem originally looked like a hammer of some description, we've still got a person (Demiourgos) and a selection of things that could have belonged to/been associated with a person (halo, box and hammer) so I'm sure there's something that can be made of that. I'm just not sure what it is right now.

And while I'm thinking about it, per the big CS3 infodump the true body of the Great One was sealed away in the 'higher plane' while its power in the 'normal world' was divided into the vessels that became the Divine Knights. The way I took it (because it's not really detailed) the destruction of Ishmelga and the disappearance of the Knights cut the link between the realms so the Great One's higher-plane power wouldn't be able to connect to Zemuria and do anything there. And since Ishmelga's influence is gone it shouldn't be actively dangerous just sitting there. But if that link could be reestablished by, let's say, an Ishmelga/Rean fusion from another timeline somehow manifesting in Zemuria and there was a way to get at that higher-plane body...

"The first beast was like a lion with eagles’ wings. As I watched, its wings were pulled off, and it was left standing with its two hind feet on the ground, like a human being. And it was given a human mind."

Considering Roselia's exact condition this is a pretty significant coincidence... if it's a coincidence.

For Mariabell's line, this is the second time she's used it. The first was in describing Azure Demiourgos as the Crois family's Ars Magna. It's Latin for 'Great Art' and is pretty clearly intended to be a play on the alchemical concept of the 'Great Work' that ends with the creation of the Philosopher's Stone. Both look similar in Japanese Per Ao and as clarified in Crossbell Archive, she uses the term to express the concept of creating something that transcended Aidios' own creation and would put power of divinity in human hands. As a result there's a few ways to interpret her usage in CS4; perhaps Mariabell thinks that the Grandmaster herself is some sort of transcendent entity like the one she'd previously tried to create.

*Totally giddy that there is a substantial link between Demiourgos and GM*

Related to this, the word Mariabell uses is also employed in Japanese translations of some hermetic texts, which incorporated the idea of the Great Work. So it seems they were aiming for that imagery even if they didn't use exactly the same words for it. For all I know, they thought that Ars sounded better than Opus because of its link to Arts. xD

Oh, speaking of this I don't want to go too deep down the rabbit hole right now for fear I won't be able to find my way back out (and I need to do more reading on the topic anyways) but I got absolutely giddy when last week's screenshots came out because Lapis' weapon name makes for some very interesting speculation-fodder. It's 'Rosenkreuz', which is the name of the allegorical founder of the Rosicrucians, who had a serious thing for alchemy. And one of the expressions used to refer to the Holy Grail as a representation of the Philosopher's Stone is lapis exillis. Yeah, I don't think that's a coincidence...

On a different note, I'll be curious to see what the general opinion on Osborne will be with the populace after everything that happened. Do we get an idea of how at least Rean feels on the matter at the end? They seemed to reconcile somewhat, looking at their interaction.

This topic is everything but straightforward. In fact I detect a marked difference in tone between English sources and German ones, though I'm not yet ready to make a value judgement on why the German sources show a clear avoidance of mentioning or committing to the more 'occult' aspects of this... well, what to even call it exactly? An order? A spiritual movement? A cultural meme, when memes weren't a word yet?

Inside this morass of partly contradictory accounts and opinions two things jump out to me. First is of course that allegorical founder Christian Rosenkreuz, whose name was hidden behind the acronym of C.R. in the first manifesto fama fraternalis, which kicked off the whole Rosenkreuz phenomenon in the first place. I mean, when locking at the 3rd party in Hajimari, Nadia and Swin are shown as one pair, while <C> and Lapis are implied to also have some kind of connection. And with this Rosenkreuz connection found, I'm not sure anymore whether this <C> acronym really is something as straightforward as the first letter of the name of the guy (or gal) behind the mask. Would be the ultimate red herring that the letter would follow another kind of logic.

There's also the fact that the name Christian is a clear reference to Christ himself, so I'm not really surprised that there is a connection between the Holy Grail and the fixation of that allegorical founder on alchemy. What I find more important though is that the existence of Christ is of course tied to his resurrection and looking at a Rosenberg Doll that exhibits independent conscious thought and perhaps even sapience, I'm now more sure that Lapis is a vessel that houses the soul of a person who died once. And about the Philosopher Stone itself, I thought for the longest time that transforming lesser metals to gold and making the Elixir of Life was its main function. But in truth it has a really long list of ascribed properties among them turning lesser crystals into precious stones (wouldn't that be a nifty function in Zemuria?) and the creation of clones or homunculi - and here I thought tying Crois Alchemy to homunculus creation was Falcom imitating Full Metal Alchemist which in turn did some creative liberties on the topic. Shows what I know and to not trust J.K Rowling to give me the whole picture.

Last I want to give another shot at C's identity though it feels like I'm simply throwing stuff at the wall until something sticks. And it's highly circumstantial even for a Crack hypothesis. Well, C is alternate dimension Jusis. As I already mentioned, I'm starting to doubt that the letter really is just the first letter of the name behind the mask and if Lapis actually houses the soul of alternate dimension Millium (a theory I expressed at an earlier point) some interactions especially in the latest trailer make an interesting amount of sense. The height fits. The weapon fits. The trousers fits. Him fixating on Rufus fits. And this implied connection to Lapis also fits if she is indeed alternate dimension Millium's soul extracted from the Sword of Demise and stuffed into a Rosenberg Doll. Or perhaps alternate-dimension-Sword-of-Demise was stuffed wholesale into the doll to make things even more messed up. And I can't help but wish that the scene with C rough-handling Lapis in the trailer and her complaining that he isn't treating her properly like a lady ends up an ironic echo of Jusis complaining to Millium to behave more ladylike in CS3 - while he's being facehugged by her.

What basically seems to have happened is that Osborne got thrown under the proverbial bus and was assigned all the blame that could be given to him. This left the Emperor in a stronger position to end the hostilities since he could disavow everything that happened after he was shot. The people who knew the truth weren't going to contradict the official story since the Emperor coming out and revealing that the nation had been living with a curse for over a thousand years (and by the way, we've known about it since forever and kept it secret) would have just made matters worse. Keeping the public perception of the house of Arnor positive was a huge thing, since Olivier and Alfin are noted to have played a huge part in calming internal tensions in the aftermath.

At the end of the day, Erebonia has a more politically active and empowered citizen body, the nobility have been dragged into the modern era (albeit kicking and screaming) and the next generation of their leaders are much more enlightened in the historical sense and thus unlikely to try and turn back the clock once they take over the reins. I don't think Osborne would mind too much, since he accomplished his goals and left Erebonia in a better long-term social position.

As for Rean, yeah, he and Osborne do reconcile at the end. Rean even calls him 'father' for the first and only time.