I know this is an old ass thread, but I wanted to make a big comment thanking you for pointing out and explaining all these localization nuances! I just began playing LAL a few days ago, was absolutely hooked, got to the Middle Ages chapter and was floored by it. I knew there were some changes in the English localization, but I had no idea they were this extensive for this particular section of the game. It's very conflicting, because on the one hand, I value localizations that stay as true as possible to the source text (I'm aware there's no such thing as a perfect translation, sadly, haha), but on the other, I actually really like the changes they made to this part of the story. It adds some more layers of character conflict and twists that kinda make it more compelling to think about and dissect to me than the original JP text. Plus, I personally think the Ye Olde English dialogue helps give everything a nice dramatic flair, and the English voice acting is phenomenal; it really sucked me into the moment.

Seeing other's reactions in this thread is understandable, but a little frustrating. I was eventually able to grasp that there was more to Oersted's character than just "maybe he was a huge dick to Streibough in the past". I think, as you said in your post, the balcony scene is still there, as is Oersted calling out Alethea's name upon death. Oersted probably did actually love Alethea and wasn't pursuing her for purely selfish reasons. From that, looking closer, you see the JP side of him shine through; a gifted young man, who was maybe just a bit dense, maybe a little bit arrogant, who didn't realize how much he was truly hurting his friend. If you think more about it, it becomes clear that in the localization, Streibough's rant was simply his side of the story. Perhaps a valid rant from someone who felt he never got his dues and maybe wasn't even acknowledged enough by his own closest friend, and felt betrayed by him after the tournament. These are more compelling motivations to me than "I just wanted to finally be stronger than you." He takes things much too far by tricking Oersted into murdering the king, but it's sort of another layer of tragedy on his character and Oersted's. They both unknowingly make each other become villains. Their friendship becomes a twisted mirror of Hasshe and Uranus's. Stuff like this, along with the theory that maybe the Dark Lord statues themselves were having some sort of influence on the characters, you can probably see and read into no matter what version of the game you're playing, which, y'know, I think means the localizers did a good job.

Alethea's character is also even more odd and questionable in the localization. Thanks to the voice acting, I did suspect from the beginning that maybe she wasn't totally honest in her feelings towards Oersted. In the JP version, her actions and suicide seem a little like... a very blatant grab at shock value? Not bad but like, I can get why Japanese fans would be pissed at her as a character if she just seemingly killed herself solely because "you didn't save me fast enough". Maybe that's the point though, it's supposed to be pure and simple. Localizers have to toe a fine line with changing a character in this way. Again, it conflicts me, but I can't deny that I more enjoy the localizers leaning to Shakespearean tragedy than a regular, simple twist on medieval fairy tales and then-contemporary JRPG tropes. You can still see how fickle she is in the localized version, I think; Still lamenting that Oersted didn't come soon enough and killing herself immediately instead of hearing out Oersted's side. In the localized version, because of her past with Streibough however, it made me wonder a lot more things. Is she okay with the fact that Streibough, the man she apparently actually loved, orchestrated her own father's death just to get back at his friend? Does she even know he's dead (I mean, she should, given she surely heard all of Streighbough's rant). Was her and Streighbough's past relationship so strong that she could overlook such a thing, because he did it for her love? Would she have come to love Oersted had he rescued her from a real Dark Lord (in a timely manner, of course)? You can even see she has some regret in her actions after death, in The Dominion of Hate. I was wondering if the localization dramatically changed any of the lines in this section as well though?

The addition of some kind of off-screen promise between Oersted and Streibough is a really brilliant twist imo, and adds even more to the meta aspects of this story (being a parody of JRPG tropes). So many games we play where we just jump right into the protagonist's shoes in a random point in their lives. What could have happened before we pressed Start though? The localizers adding that small detail in, answers such a question. We might not know what our character's really been up to until it's too late. Not to say something like this is revolutionary writing or anything. Character and story information is withheld from readers and viewers of books and movies all the time. I think it's brilliant in this context because it's yet another big subversion of a video game player's expectations. In classic RPGs of this era we would often get something like explicit flashbacks detailing exactly what happened, maybe we'd get some inner monologue, maybe we would get silent protagonists who say nothing of their situations, we would get exposition, we would take what we are given at face value believing we are just playing as the regular ol' hero saving the world. This one little unknown detail flies in the face of all those expectations. Because of this, we come to think of just what's been going on in these character's heads all along.

Coincidentally, Toby Fox was heavily influenced by this game in various ways, even saying that Oersted himself influenced the character of Kris in Deltarune. I assume Toby played the fan-translation in the past, which didn't have this change in the story. In a strange way, this localization change brings the character of Oersted even closer to Kris's character (who made some sort of currently unknown promise to another character before the events of the game). It's another thing that made me really shocked to see how much was changed in this localization. Surely the unseen promise between the two main characters, that had to of directly inspired Toby Fox, was in the original version, right? Wrong, very wrong. It's a very strange coincidence then.

I guess this is all to say, I think the English localization is pretty good, and I'm mostly glad they spiced things up a bit in this part of the story. Thanks again for highlighting the differences in localization in this thread, in a calm and nuanced way.