With CRME featuring some remorseless Villain Protagonists, this story can certainly show many disturbing elements while providing insight on their activities.
- This story, if nothing else, shows how truly sadistic Cinder can be.
- The most notable moment is when Cinder strangles Melanie Black. She viciously attacks her and starts choking her with a deranged expression. And seeing the fear in Melanie’s eyes prompts a Slasher Smile from Cinder. It’s one of the only times we see Cinder’s calm façade drop and make way for nothing but pure rage.
- Seeing Cinder’s change from being affectionate to Emerald to being violently angry with her can be quite jarring. It gives you another sense of how unstable she really is under her Mask of Sanity.
- Mercury's punishment for trying to expose Cinder's true intentions for Emerald? Having Emerald Mind Rape him for his behavior. She makes him see several illusions of his parents insulting him continuously while he gets angrier. He seems like he wants to murder Cinder for making him go through that. As a child of abuse, she should know how painful it is to relive those memories. Despite this,note she's willing to make him relive them up to eleven while she looks on with a Psychotic Smirk.
- Remember in Roman's Empire when Roman said that Neo would be a serial killer if she wasn't working for him? He apparently wasn't wrong. When Emerald and Mercury go to find Neo after Roman was in jail, they come up to the house and there are bodies all over the place. Neo violently attacks Mercury on sight and only stops when they mention that they're working with Roman. Before that, Neo would've sliced Mercury's head off.
- Mercury wasn't kidding when he said that he would beat the crap out of Emerald if she tried to Mind Rape him again. When she does a little bit of it in Chapter 13, he grabs her throat and slams her against a wall out of nowhere.
- Amber preparing to attack Emerald. While she was nice enough to stop and help a child, she was still about to murder Emerald for attacking her.
- Chapter 16. When Mercury says Emerald needs to get over her remorse. How? He encourages her to choose an innocent person to kill in cold blood. And the target Emerald picks, even to Mercury's surprise, is a lonely young boy. She creates an illusion to lure him away so she can take him to the forest and kill him. Despite the fantasy elements used to lure him away, this is a depressingly common thing that can happen in real life. The child could have been killed and no one may know until it's too late. And just before Emerald has him in prime position, she drops the illusion to see a gun pointed at his head.
- By the way, the reason we're saying "could have" is because the scene cuts just as Emerald prepares to take the shot. The writer intentionally left this scene where it was to leave us in suspense and makes us wonder if Emerald actually shot him.
- The description of the poor kid's murder is no better. Emerald shoots him in the chest and then shoots him in the neck to keep him from screaming. And what disturbs her most is her lack of remorse about the act.
- Lionheart definitely has a good reason to fear Salem and he reminds us what kind of monster she is. Lionheart and a group of huntsmen tried to fight against her, but she obliterated them right in front of him. He was terrified of that happening to him. And Cinder actively idolizes this behavior. Not only does it show what little regard Salem has, it also shows the foundations for the power-hungry egomaniac she'll become in the series.
