WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Episode 3 of The Genius Prince’s Guide to Raising a Nation Out of Debt, "A Proposal as a Pretext," now streaming on Funimation.
Prince Wein Salema Arbalest is the crown prince of his tiny kingdom of Natra -- a role he wants to quickly rid himself of by any means possible. In Episodes 1 and 2 of The Genius Prince’s Guide to Raising a Nation Out of Debt, Wein tried to leverage the conflict between his kingdom and the kingdom of Marden to his favor by letting Marden invade. Instead, he unwittingly contributed to their defeat by being an inspiring figure to his own small army. As such, the Natran army defeated Marden's massive army, not once but twice.
With the defeat of Marden alone, Wein has been finding it increasingly difficult to escape from his role as the crown prince of his nation. This internal conflict only gets worse in Episode 3 when he unexpectedly gets reacquainted with a classmate from his days as a student at the academy. At the start of Episode 3, viewers are introduced to three new characters: Lowa, Glen, and Strang, all of whom were friends of Wein and Ninym at the academy, and together, they pursued their own interests. Out of the three, Wein greatly admired Lowa for her intelligence and ambitions.
Years later, Wein got an unexpected visit from Princess Lowellmina of the Earthworld Empire, the most powerful nation in their continent. The reason for her visit? She wants to marry Wein after learning about his surprise defeat of the Marden kingdom. When he learned the real identity of his surprise would-be fiancée, however, Princess Lowellmina is revealed to be none other than his childhood friend Lowa. As it turns out, Lowa, like Wein himself also hid the fact she was an imperial princess from the academy and was immediately suspicious of her true intentions.
Since his youth, Wein has been aware of Lowa's use of trickery and other underhanded tactics to get what she wants. At one point, Wein had a conversation with Lowa at the academy about what she really needed to do to pursue her ambitions. Specifically, he recalled telling Lowa to seize what she wanted by force, in this case, by declaring war. When she asked him if he would help her achieve her ambitions, Wein refused, stating that he would do everything to resist her. He would only "help her a little" if she managed to corner him through trickery. Years later, Lowa appears to have taken Wein's advice to heart.
In the present, Wein asked Lowa to drop all the pretenses and to be honest with him and Ninym about what she's really after with her "marriage proposal." Admiring Wein's boldness and unchanging demeanor, she told him that there is an ongoing conflict between her three older brothers on who should become the next emperor. Lowa herself wanted to become empress but has no support from her people because she is a woman. As such, she was hoping to gain support from her former friends from the academy and thinks marriage to Wein would prove advantageous for her. Wein remained unconvinced this is all there is to her story.
Wein's concerns about Lowa's true intentions were soon validated when he found out non-Natran weapons are being smuggled into the country during Lowa's presence. What's more was that Lowa herself has been evading a marriage proposal from Gerard of Antgatal, whose father was a notorious tyrant. Between the weapons being smuggled and the Earthworld's own conflict with Antgatal, Wein knows Lowa is trying to lure him into a trap. The bigger question is how she intends to use Wein as a tool, especially given the strong likelihood he could end up entering another war with Antgatal over Lowa's marriage proposal. Either Lowa is acting out as a victim of circumstance, or she herself is a tyrant in the making given her own past and her own need to defeat another tyrant.
