#muriel the woman that you are... haunting the narrative 100 chapters before you appear and without even being named

[microwaving-tesilid-argente]

Looking again at some scenes at the start of the 17th and yeah, I was right about the Muriel-Tesilid-Ailette dynamic being “my lifelong crush reminds me of this one backstabber” lmao. Tesilid's trust issues at the start of the 17th were definitely caused in large part by Muriel

(Written as of Chapter 209, shortly after Muriel makes her first in-person appearance in Round 17, and without reading MTL)

--

The pre-Muriel chapters already had plenty of hints imo, where Tesilid was noticeably wary of or harsh towards Ailette.

Pandora’s Dungeon (Ch 96): 

“Plague, death, hope… Yes… hope… false hope. Ailette, are you false hope?”

Ch 97: 

He believed Ailette Rodeline to be one of two things. She was either a rare compensation bestowed upon him by Order and Goodness or an instrument of false hope, designed to make him fall into further despair and misery. If by chance, she was the latter… If the Strict Order and Goodness is trying to make a fool of me once more. “That won’t do.” He swung the holy blade. A titanic burst of aura was unleashed from his blade, shattering the earth like a tidal wave. The ground rumbled and soon filled the deep abyss from the impact. The rift was no more. “Ailette Rodeline,” he muttered. “I sincerely hope that you are neither taken away nor betray me.”

Snow Queen Dungeon (Ch 110):

I was half-expecting him to be deeply impressed by how knowledgeable I was, but all I got in return was a sceptical look of disbelief. “Hmm.” “Excuse me, Sir Tesilid?” I said tauntingly. “What’s up with that face? Is that any way to look at a fellow companion?” “Then let me ask you this, as a companion, how do you know so much about everything? It’s almost like you’re omniscient.” “Allie, it’s an important issue, so I need you to answer me honestly. If, by some far-fetched possibility, your true identity is the Strict Order and Goodness’ avatar…” “Whoa, don’t go there. That’s not it at all.” “It’s not? Good. That’s a relief.” Tesilid seemed to have noticed my puzzled expression and proceeded to explain with a dazzling smile on his face. “I meant that you need to be human in order to stay by my side.”

Muriel’s actual appearance in Round 17 makes it pretty clear that Tesilid was talking about her during the above instances, because she’s the avatar of someone who serves the Strict Order and Goodness.

Ch 208:

[...] and lastly, Myu Elinas, the Divine Watchmaker, who had been asleep for 500 years in a holy resting site of Order and Goodness.  Muriel was her alter ego.  She knew that this world was a World of Return that was abandoned by its god, but she couldn't remember any of her previous lives.

And on that note, I think the way that Tesilid chose to frame his relationship with Muriel in this round is really funny.

Ch 207:

“You’re the master of the holy sword, aren’t you? Sir… Tesilid Argente, was it?” “That’s correct, Your Eminence.” “This may sound like a strange question, but is this the first time we’re meeting?” “What do you mean?” Tesilid asked, his voice tight with discomfort. “For some reason, I feel a sense of longing when I look at you. Would it be al right if I call you Tesilid from now on?” According to the original plot, Tesilid was now meant to politely approve her request to call him by his first name. I was waiting for the scene to proceed as I remembered when Tesilid suddenly went off script. “A sense of longing…” he said, slowly sounding out the words. “I must say, I feel the same way.” “Saintess.” “Yes, Tesilid.” “It’s ‘Sir Tesilid’.” “Pardon?” “I hope you dig deep and discover why you feel that sense of longing. I will only allow you to call me by my name once you do so.” For some reason, Tesilid’s tone had suddenly become short and cold, and he turned her down without any room for compromise.

“Dig deep and discover why you feel that sense of longing” is a pretty strange thing to say given that Muriel is already aware of both her role/identity, and the truth of the world (from Ch 208). So either Tesilid doesn’t know that she knows (doubtful, I’m pretty sure that’s why he’s so angry with her), or he knows that she knows and is just trying to tell her in a roundabout way that he knows she knows. Basically going “ ‘sense of longing’ :))) b**** do you mean your duty to make me go through shit :))) I see what you’re doing and don’t pull that shit again.” I love seeing Tesilid be rude while still being polite on the surface.

Now I’m going to go out on a limb and make guesses about what Muriel and Tesilid’s dynamic was like before Tesilid discovered the truth, based on the info we already have. I think the clues lie in what sets Ailette and Muriel apart in Tesilid’s eyes. As usual, I'm not going to assume that Muriel falls into the stereotype of The Villainness Bitch because let's be real Irinbi is a better writer than to write flat characters like that.

Obviously the biggest difference is that Tesilid was already in love with Ailette from the 300th dungeon up until the present. It’s why Tesilid never fell in love during all the regressions, and it was enough for 117th to keep playing nice and not kill himself right away when he first woke up. But this just means Tesilid keeps her around and doesn’t necessarily mean that he would trust her.

The more fruitful parts imo are when Tesilid is surprised or heartened by what Ailette does, and which probably got him to start trusting that Ailette won’t be a repeat of Muriel. Instances include but definitely are not limited to:

her beating up the bandits at the harpy dungeon

her beating up the Knights of Worship in his stead

her worry when he came out of the Library fight half-dead

her repeated and complete trust in him to look after her in her post-Divine Advent state

Based on this I feel like it’s reasonable to suggest that Muriel:

1) Never took revenge on those who wronged Tesilid 

This could possibly be played off as some “Saint-like” demeanour where you try to get people to stop fighting instead of punishing injustice or being biased towards/protecting your own people; some kind of duty to the world generally instead of just to him. This seems like it’d play well into pre-regression Tesilid’s self-sacrificing nature and philosophy, where he thought nothing of his own suffering.

2) Never expressed worry and distress as sincerely as Ailette does whenever Tesilid gets hurt?

Honestly Muriel I’m disappointed, this seems like a low bar. But then again, Ailette is very obsessed with Tesilid so maybe it was the intensity that caught Tesilid off guard

3) Never fully trusted Tesilid when she was vulnerable? 

This would makes sense because she can’t remember her past regressions – she never knows how Tesilid actually feels towards her. Tesilid could spend a regression just making her life a living hell if he so wished.

If Muriel really was like this towards Tesilid, then ngl it really was a miracle that OG!Tesilid fell in love with her at all. He probably had really low standards, which makes sense because, well, everyone else treated him worse. OG!Tesilid didn’t even have Hestio & Ephael getting angry on his behalf to put things into perspective. The whole world was gaslighting him and treating him the same way, like him being trodden upon was only natural, and Muriel might even have encouraged him to think that way too. It also really makes sense why Ailette absolutely hates Muriel’s guts, because in that case Muriel would have been doing even less than the bare minimum as a lover and would have been taking advantage of his good nature. 

It also would make sense why current!Tesilid never fell in love with her, and why he was so shocked when Ailette said his future self would. Like, fall in love with someone like that???? Really????? (Especially when Ailette promised to find him again????) (And assuming also that Hestio & Ephael managed to get him to have Some standards about the way he is treated by others by getting mad on his behalf many times over the years.)

Anyway it’s really funny how in the early 17th parts I quoted, Tesilid sounds like he would straight up kill Ailette if she made one wrong move. He must really hate Muriel, huh! I need Muriel to have her next appearance soon, I want to see this unfold.

TLDR; I think it’s likely that Muriel had veneer of kindness and sympathy but maybe subtly let Tesilid down in a lot of instances where it counted, or kept trying to convince him that him getting treated terribly by others was the natural way of things / that he should put up with that treatment. Her acting was probably good enough that Tesilid genuinely believed she could help him for a good long while, but also lacklustre enough that Tesilid never thought of her as a potential lover.

mystery solved!!! (<- didn’t even know there was a puzzle to begin with) (their history is probably going to be revealed in like 10 chapters anyway)