Ciri becomes a witcher because she has no choice. She's forced into a life basically still in hiding from who she is, she also doesn't have the choice to become empress to get that ending. And as she says in the other ending she doesn't believe being a witcher can actually accomplish much.
You take her to Emhyr. Nilfgaard wins the war, aka. Radovid is dead and you allow the Temerians to make a pact with Nilfgaard. So, if you want Ciri to be a witcher AND kill Radovid, you have to avoid taking her to Emhyr . You get the choice after the Kaer Morhen battle and before going to the bald mountain, in case you forgot.
If you made 3/5 positive choices and took Ciri to see her father, the empress ending is locked in. The only way to get the witcher ending after the empress ending is locked in is for Nilfgaard to lose the war (in which case she can't become empress as Nilfgaard collapses). The bad ending just requires 3/5 bad choices.
Either way, Emhyr's done for and Ciri will become a witcher. Just as i said above - I see letting rule Radovid as another "bad" ending. Yes - Ciri becomes witcher (I think that's an better choice than empress, not on emotional but on rational grounds), but all mages and non-humans will be hunted down and burned at stakes or be slaughtered.
1.1M views 8 years ago. The Witcher 3 Wild Hunt Sad Ending - Ciri joins Emhyr to become Empress of Nilfgaard and leaves Geralt and the life of a witcher behind.
False Ciri only becomes an issue if you take the real one to see Emhyr and receive the Empress ending as a result. If you don't, Emhyr never says or does anything that clashes with the facade of him already having "Ciri" as his consort, at least publicly. If you do, there's little point in trying to explain the double's absence, since the
2UJzVdU.ciri becomes empress ending
