#i am also however very in love with the dreamer who refuses to cast aside his dream for being too idealistic.

[reaperkaneki]

I am begging everyone, please vote for Khalid von Riegan, my deerly beloved literal biracial king. As in, he is actually mixed-race royalty. His main goals are to break down borders, end xenophobia and racism, and help the oppressed. Heart of gold, everyone.

Edelgard’s main points are fuck the church (and Rhea specifically), fuck the nobility + crest system, and fuck the entire structure of Fodlan as we know it.

But guess what? Claude has very similar beliefs, and he did marginally less war crimes about it! Least violent of the three lords, voted most likely to survive a war with his head intact. Clever, resourceful, and an overall relatively good guy who’s always trying to see the bigger picture—past territories, countries, and even continents. And Claude&co actually get to beat up the Agarthans in his route.

(Disclaimer: I think Claude should have done more war crimes. As a treat. But, like, he didn’t, sooo… might as well flex?)

- He doesn’t like Rhea or the church, and muses about a “world without Rhea”. [Verdant Wind, Ch14]

- He’s often mildly blasphemous/asking that other people respect alternate beliefs [Claude/Petra C+, Claude/Lorenz A, Claude/Leonie B], while still respecting that religion and spirituality can “become a support system for them, that’s a good thing” [Claude/Byleth B+]. 

- He doesn’t care about being a noble (and especially not the Fodlan idea of one) and is not above doing menial tasks [Claude/Leonie C, Claude/Petra B]. He even refers to himself as someone who is not used to being a noble, who “didn’t exactly grow up in luxury like most people of noble blood” [Claude/Byleth C]

- And I don’t even have to talk about breaking down societal structures! He wasn’t even born with the Crest system, he absolutely knows that Crests are a bullshit thing to base a large portion of your society over and that plenty of people get by without… Because he’s literally from a country where no one has them.

Edelgard’s end goal is the destruction of nobility and the embrace of meritocracy. A world where the most qualified, the most skilled are rewarded, regardless of birth. Personally for her, it means purging the country of those who have committed unforgivable sins, like human experimentation, mutilation of children, all sorts of government and church corruption. It means making sure no one goes through what she did.

Claude’s end goal is the destruction of borders and the merging of cultures. A world where people embrace their differences and discard prejudice. Personally for him, it means forcing Fodlan and Almyra (and Brigid and Dagda and hopefully more) to see each other as people, to bond and stop fighting constantly, to stop excluding other based on something so arbitrary as race. It means making sure no one goes through what he did.

(They are very similar. If only Edelgard had ever learned the definition of compromise.)

Is this idealistic? Is this achievable? Are these simply the lofty goals of a dreamer with stars in his eyes? Yes! And Claude knows this! Yet this is the cause he has chosen to fight for! He knows his goal is unrealistic, he’s faced discrimination time-and-time again, but still he pursues it.

He runs away from home after enduring years of open derision and hatred at his mixed heritage, and assassination attempts at the hands of his countrymen and even his half-siblings [Byleth/Claude B, Golden Wildfire Ch5]. Yet instead of finding refuge in his mother’s homeland he finds more of the same, just in different flavors.

So he takes up a new name: Claude. Khalid is too foreign, too noticeable—but Claude is a “good, solid, all-purpose moniker” [Cindered Shadows], and is similar enough to his Almyran name. He hides his past and speaks about himself in the third person because he’s terrified of what might happen if his secrets—he’s mixed, a foreign prince from the wrong side of the border—might be discovered.

He spends five years in a country that hates his homeland when he could fuck off across the border anytime, struggling to stay neutral through a bloody war, because he wants things to be better. While people all around him call people from his country brutes and savages. (After having been called coward and weakling the other way around his whole childhood.)

All of that, and then his actual, personal character in fe3h revolves around him being this teenager who is always scheming, who actively advertises himself as being the “embodiment of distrust”. He smiles, and smiles, and smiles, and it’s hardly ever genuine [the fucking prologue, Claude/Hilda A]. No one trusts him, and so he doesn’t trust anyone else. He learns to brew poisons and tell lies to protect himself [Claude/Byleth B], but hypocritically, he desires to uncover everyone else’s secrets.

And yet, somehow, he’s the one who unabashedly trusts and believes in Byleth and their return. Culminating, ultimately, in them winning the final battle because Claude does the corniest shounen anime speech about friendship! and uniting together! and scaling walls! Which is simultaneously a genuine speech and a distraction and in and of itself a display of trust and synergy that validates the entire speech!!!!!! And it was all a scheme!!!!! AUGH

….Plus his theme song and the final boss track of his route both fuck severely.

Claude is the son of a woman who threw away her title to elope with an enemy prince and live her life in a foreign country where they call her people cowards. Plus she kicks ass. Vote for Claude, if not for his sake, then for Tiana (née) von Riegan’s sake.

I could go on, I could genuinely go on until the sun comes up, (and I will, so don’t try me) but please, I beg you, fucking vote Khalid he truly deserves it.