for reference, as best as i can tell these are emmrich's relationship statuses in the romance:

confirm attraction: Death's Call lock in: Entwined Souls

finish sacrifice of souls (manfred): Fade's Embrace finish heir to the dead: Love Undying

finish sacrifice of souls (lich): Death-Kissed finish will and testament: The Flame Eternal

"rivaini wear their stories" and every little piece of jewelry corentin wears has meaning and magic baked into it and so he sits down with emmrich and starts telling him all the stories attached to every single one so that when he dies he can leave all of his stories behind for emmrich to remember him by

was looking through my screenshots and. it was there the whole time man

The Sacrifice of Souls, Part 2

this is the second instalment of a 2-part essay series. the first part focused on the events of emmrich's quests, as well as my analysis and critique of his quest line overall. this part will focus specifically on the effects these choices have on the romance, as well as my thoughts on how i'm handling the events for my emmrichmancing rook, corentin.

spoilers ahead! beware that both essays are going to assume you have completed The Sacrifice of Souls and at least one of the follow up quests, Heir to the Dead or Will and Testament. if you have not, i suggest returning to this later and playing it out yourself.

so let's start with the most important question of the day:

what happens to the romance after the sacrifice of souls?

good news! no matter what you pick, the romance can continue on unabated. there's just some long-term details and tone changes that need to be considered.

if you choose to save manfred, be prepared for parenthood. previously, the game had poked at the idea of manfred being emmrich's kid, but now that manfred is talking and progressing at a rapid pace, he is in full "magic-flinging skeleton son" territory, and a romanced rook is going on that journey with emmrich. there is also now a near certainty that rook is going to outlive him—regardless of your personal headcanons, the game assumes that rook is younger than emmrich, and now that he's locked into a mortal lifespan that's something that needs to be considered. especially since, as discussed in part one, emmrich's fears of his own mortality haven't really been addressed at all.

but if you're into co-parenting a rambunctious skeleton with an older, gentlemanly necromancer (which, let's be real, is what most people signed up for when they hit those first flirt options anyway), then this path is probably exactly what you were looking for.

*light bulb going off over my head* oh so THAT'S what the devs meant in the q&a when they said "not that skeleton"

The Sacrifice of Souls, Part 1

welcome to my 2-part essay about the conclusion of emmrich's story line. this part will focus on the actual quest(s) involved and analyze the decisions we make. part two will be about the effects on the romance, particularly as i am approaching it with my rook, corentin.

spoilers ahead! beware that both essays are going to assume you have completed The Sacrifice of Souls and at least one of the follow up quests, Heir to the Dead or Will and Testament. if you have not, i suggest returning to this later and playing it out yourself.

so what are we even talking about?

for my purposes, about 90% of the sacrifice of souls is irrelevant. here are the important bits: hezenkoss puppets a giant skeleton monster powered by the gloaming lantern, manfred sacrifices himself to rip it out of the thing's chest, and emmrich risks his life to free the souls trapped inside, symbolically overcoming his fear of death (for the moment).

when manfred's beautiful skeleton body is brought before the lich lords in the necropolis to ask if his spirit can be recovered, the lich lords give an ultimatum: they will allow emmrich to bring manfred back, but it will remove his candidacy for lichdom.

"how many exceptions 'til tyranny?" they say. if emmrich is to become a lich, he must be able to accept that people he cares about will die as he lives on.

emmrich is obviously extremely conflicted. he's being forced to choose between his life's work or having his pseudo-child back; he is torn because he at once wishes to spare himself the pain of losing someone, while also wanting to "honour death and let him rest."

from there, the choice is given to the player: encourage emmrich to bring manfred back, or encourage him to pursue his life's work and become a lich.

so conflicted on which ending i want to go with on emmrich's quest. i went through both paths hoping it'd help me pick and it just made me MORE conflicted

edit: i made a decision and it's not looking good for corentin