FFXIV: Shadowbringers Lorebombs - Hydaelyn, Zodiark & The Ascians

The ShB 5.0 MSQ forced us to reevaluate some of the fundamental "truths" of FFXIV lore, so we're getting back on track!
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[@VentusxBBSxSpero]

God, I can't wait for Encyclopedia Norvrandtia

[@Titanxzero1]

I like that use Urianger's home in Il Mheg a setting for your Lore analysis videos. Makes a lot of sense

[@IxyMorningstar]

Agreed. It's totally Ethys' natural habitat!

[@Cyraneth]

Tons of references in all of Shadowbringers to the 1516 book, Utopia, by Thomas More. It's about an ancient island utopia, its capitol named Amaurot. The protagonist is shown around the island by Raphael Hythloday, and the utopia is based on the 5 Greek aspects of love: Agape, Eros, Philia, Storge, and Philautia. And that's just some of the references...

[@Mathenaut]

It is made explicitly clear that, whoever the WoL was in their prior life, they were someone that Emet-Selch KNEW. Not just knew, but someone that he was CLOSE to. He even states his intention to possibly elevate us, should we have been able to contain the Warden's light. Additionally, the Omega storyline reveals that Midgardsomnr is from another planet entirely. He crossed the great void, using all of his strength to carry his children across the stars to Hydelyn, where they made a pact (the same pact he invokes when removing your powers). Omega, having destroyed that previous world, then crossed that great expanse in pursuit, where it would begin it's mission anew. It is not a coincidence that Allagan technology resembles Omega. It is the void-crossing ability of Omega, crossed with Alexander's ability to manipulate time, that gave birth to the Tycoon, which is what was used to transport the Crystal Tower across time and space (where they overshot the mark by 100 years or so). From the context of how the event was described, the sundering of all life seems to have been accidental. However, with Hydelyn's mission being to preserve all life, it seems that she makes a point of still trying to protect everything. The Ascians abuse this by operating concurrently across all of the shards, where Hydelyn laments her repeated failure to save everyone with her powers stretched so thin (Knowing this, one could speculate that her special attention paid to us in ARR left one of the other shards vulnerable. We also come to learn that her absence from most of the HW/SB plot wasn't idle, as she has been a very busy little bee trying to preserve the First until our arrival.) Edit: Also a fun little detail, I don't think it's a coincidence that many of the monsters in Amarot resemble the various boss monsters that we've fought in the past.

[@anydaynow01]

Yes that was probably one of my biggest shocking moments at the end was when our form was temporarily replaced with one of an Ascian I was thinking the same thing as Emet-Selch, "No! It can't be!" and then immediately thought about how awesome it was that Hydelyn had kept the spirit of her original hero / summoner with her this whole time, the same way Zodiark still had his.

[@gateauxq4604]

The races and monsters on Norvrandt also having similar or the same being with different names (lalas and dwarves for instance) also proves that whatever is on the other shards is probably very close to the population of The Source. I’d hazard a guess that everyone and everything is probably a product of entries in the vast stores of what the Ascians had created and ‘kept on file’ and that would help make the similarities make more sense.

[@gateauxq4604]

Also I lost my shit when the game implied the WoL is a shard of the 14th. Needless to say that the confirmation has my head in the clouds! Maybe now Urianger Sempai will look at me! I kid, I kid...mostly >_>

[@commanderkitsune8524]

While most of the new points I had already started thinking about, the vision of the meteor shower we have on our first meeting with Hydaelyn and the near destruction of Amerot through a 'rain of fire' I didn't make the connection. But connecting those two gave me a deep sense of awe that this realization has been many years in the making, and that we were seeing an echo of the chaos before everything happened. That floored me.

[@YukihyoShiraki]

I remember in some of the quests the shades mention how easy it is for stray thoughts to alter their creations. That tidbit plus everything that was mention in the simulacra dungeon implied to me that terror/fear was the sickness that spread like wildfire

[@Mathenaut]

That is, literally, what what narrated to us in Amarot

[@maxspecs]

It doesn't explain the ringing from the planet that caused them to lose control in the first place, unless that, too, was caused by their creation magic.

[@fleeplayTV]

@@maxspecs na it was lavos

[@Mathenaut]

@@maxspecs The actual root cause of it all is actually conspicuously absent in Emet's retelling of this history.

[@unloyal4847]

Wasn't it something about an earthquake and a sound that ticked the fear thing?

[@GG-yy4yx]

I’m so invested in the lore of aumorot and how it came to end and the cause of its fall. Excited for more.

[@vfaulkon]

My personal theory regarding Hydaelyn's power to sunder the essence of everyone on the star is that it was intentionally done by the dissident 14th member of the Convocation. It's likely that the 14th member either somehow disscovered that the Amaurotines' power of creation was what created the calamity in the first place, or since Hydaelyn was summoned second simply saw the downside of their creation magicks from a new perspective. Either way, they realized that as long as their people could use that kind of magic, not only could this disaster repeat itself (since obviously the Convocation at least had learned nothing to dissuade them from relying on said magic...perhaps as a consequence of being tempered?) but that any life that was made post-Zodiark would ultimately just be fodder for the primal. So they opted to create a counterforce to Zodiark. Where one consumed life to function, the other functioned to preserve what life remained. Where one would draw power from the multitude into itself, the other would split the power of those it struck and disperse it into many. And where one was fueled by and for creation magic, the other would weaken those capable of such magic, even its creators, to the point where they couldn't perform it anymore. And the reason Hydaelyn was able to counter Zodiark so completely in this way is because the one who created it, the 14th Convocation member, understood exactly what kind of thinking went into Zodiark's creation. I'm really hoping we learn more about the original calamity and all of this now-relevant ancient history as Shadowbringers goes on. Obviously my theory is purely speculation, but it rings true to me, and it would also further link our WoL and the 14th member - someone of great power who sought to protect and preserve life, regardless of the cost to themselves.

[@dariusd2003]

I actually like this theory. It goes into other Sci-fi/fantasy stories where the "original people" were so powerful that their power began to destroy their own society. They had to shackle future generations to keep that power in check. Hence they always lose something like immortality reduced to mere mortals as fallen gods that remembered heaven. There may be some twist where Hydaelyn nor Zodiark offer the ultimate truth/solution and there is something else that must happen.

[@armon29]

I mean the paintings in that ruin were there yes but i wonder if it really is like Emet-Selch was told us. In the end. he could simply talked about "his/Zodiarks" point of view of the Story as "Minfilia/Hydelyn" talked about her point of view. Maybe there is a bit truth and lies in both of their stories, maybe its up to us to find out what really happened. I mean yes we fought for Hydelyn most of the time until now but we are still seemingly independent from her "temper" and can listen to other ppl and creating our own meaning of all where Emet-Selch still talking about the one true god and seemed very tempered for me.

[@azadalamiq]

I think you hit the nail on the head, much more so that it can be backed up by the ripple with in the sundered beings that make up the races. lalafell, hyur, and miqo'te have strong affinity to magic. Lalafell being more prone to it which is backed up by nym, mhachi, bela dia, u'ldah, sildah being mostly lalafell city. Hyru made up most of amdapor. Elezen would be next, then auri and roegadyn. gealeans can't use magic at all. then factor in the different clans that make up each moon keeper hae good affinity ofer magic, where dunesfiolk lala basically piss magic. This make sense because garleans literaly can't use magic so they must be the final copy. while hyur lala elezen miqo'te are the first few copies.

[@zakuraayame5091]

@M. Woller exactly; people tend to ignore all the life we destroy on our quests for Hydaelyn. More blood has been shed by her and for her than anything else in this universe. If you read up on Zodiark, the Ascian wishes are not his. He wants balance between he and Hydaelyn, with a slight tilt in his favor, and the shattering of the source pretty much proves it was a sound idea. The Ascians wanted to sacrifice to get their loved ones back, having never known loss or anguish before; and you can't put their desires on Zodiark. Hydaelyn didn't/doesn't seem to want balance, she wants no darkness at all, and we saw what happens when that is the case; while we can use darkness (DRK) to our advantage the same way as we use light for the same purpose. Just because very old Ascians have lost the plot, doesn't mean they are speaking for Zodiark's desires. Just like the Scions have been pretty blind faith in Hydaelyn, and if they had the power of the Ascians (similar names of the two groups), they'd be just as radical about snuffing out all darkness, and any and all things not Hydaelyn and we'd be approaching a world like the First. I think people have a hard time with seeing it this way, even with the ShB story, because it is so infused into culture/societies that light = good, dark = bad/evil. What the game is getting at, is you need to balance both sides. Too much of either is a bad thing and becomes dystopian very quick. A silly example of this can be found in the Red Dwarf episode 'Demons and Angels' www.imdb.com/title/tt0756588/ In game, the First has to be taught balance again instead of thinking darkness is good and all light is bad, just like in the Source we have the opposite to a lesser extent.

[@Mathenaut]

From the sound of it, the sundering was accidental. Hydelyn does not seem to have been aware that the defeat of Zodiark would sunder all life on the star.

[@LadCarmichael]

Concerning the Dragonstar, I seem to remember Koji answering the question back in Stormblood saying that the Dragonstar was basically outside of the "Sundered Sphere" but that how Midgardsomr managed to arrive on the Source is still a mystery.

[@GrandCatapult]

He formed a pact with Hydaelyn, to protect the Star is return for the protection of his brood. It's implied to be post-sundering, but perhaps could have been during?

[@Yokai_Yuri]

Even so Midgarsorrm is the only being able to cut off the pact between Hydalein and the hero meaning he is extremely powerful

[@qaztim11]

He and his brood flew through space to get to the source. Fighting against some aliens and Eldritch horrors along the way.

[@ArmageddonEvil]

@@qaztim11 And Omega found it way to the Source as well.

[@eivarden]

and with the twinning, it suggests its also outside of our dimension, due to omega. so its something weird, thats not quite made clear.

[@Ephidiel]

Midgardsomr arrived after the Sundering of Hyedaelin/Zodiarks World

[@Pink_Sinthetic]

But the question was more is the Dragonstar one of the 13 reflections and he traveled through dimensions instead of or as well as space, or is his star separate in the universe of just the Source, or it is not only separate from the Source and the reflections, but the whole galaxy/universe was sundered, and there is a Dragonstar in every dimension where a shard also exists?

[@Nikrard]

@@Pink_Sinthetic They come from other planet. in the light discord we assume that only hydalean planet isthe only affected. this explain why the wyrms have larger lifespan and power

[@eshbena]

@@Pink_Sinthetic I'm pretty sure that while Hydalin dived the world into thirteen, that's a dimensional shattering. She created thirteen alternate dimensions that each received a fraction of the life force of the original planet. That sundering wouldn't have necessarily affected any other planets out there. We can see the night sky, so we know there are other stars and possibly other planets out there. Middy came from another star to here, then got caught up in our nonsense. XD

[@Pink_Sinthetic]

Yes, I was always under the impression the Dragonstar was its own planet, but it is still not fully outlined in reality. That is what makes it fun to question and think about. And then are the dragon-esque creatures on the First fae, or descendants from dragons that traveled to the First at some point? Is one of Midgardsormr's missing children on the First, or another shard? Or was at some point? That would be interesting. Additionally, maybe the shards aren't in a real space. Maybe the space they occupy is an illusion. We don't really know. We assume that the planet sits in space, like our own does. But in a world like FFXIV, it seems just as likely we could be in a pocket of illusion. Like, a pocket dimension in a much larger universe. You can get the same imagery of stars in a night sky from a black dome, some tiny holes, and a light sort. And when your villains are gods, attempting to bring back other, infinitely more powerful gods, who is to say what reality really is. We were not standing in space at the end of Amaurot. But... it sure looked and felt like it. But it was a creation. An illusion that was controlled by one godly being. It looked like an infinite expanse of space and the cosmos. But in reality, it was not. And that's the really fascinating thing.

[@Mathenaut]

@M. Woller By Omega. That is why they fled.

[@bupbup7659]

The metoers at the opening cutscene with "Hear, Feel, Think" could be The Final Days in Amaurot?! Mind blown.

[@DevinOfBacon]

Opening cutscene of 2.0 or 1.0?

[@calzonexiv]

@@DevinOfBacon 2.0 I think, after you make your character and start the game.

[@DevinOfBacon]

@@calzonexiv 2.0 cutscene is the 7th Calamity, with Bahamut and Dalamud

[@annahhinman605]

@@DevinOfBacon welllll, it never really specified it was Bahamut and Dalamud but I do agree with you that I think it was the 7th Calamity too

[@DevinOfBacon]

@@annahhinman605 That was confirmed though... Long ago.. On many accounts.. It's also obvious in many many ways, especially if you did the Binding Coil of Bahamut raid..

[@galloviking4766]

Urianger: "What arth you doing in mine home"

[@arkboi2145]

While I mostly agree with your findings, there are some area's that I would like to expand on. 1) As it's been said in Shadowbringer's cutscenes, Creation Magic requires a vast amount of aether to produce and sustain. The grander the concept of creation, the more aether is required. Many people are under the presumption that Zodiark is inherently evil and chaotic. Which may or may not be wholly true. However, what I want to point out is that summoning Zodiark wasn't necessarily an "Evil" act by itself. The concept of a God who could stop the plight of the source world and rewrite the very laws of existence is a monumental endeavor. And in order to create such a monumental concept, an unsurmountable amount of aether was required. As such, half of the Amaurotine populace had to be sacrificed in order to summon Zodiark into existence. It was simply a necessary requirement as it was the grandest creation to date. One which needed to be made as the source world was on the brink of complete and total annihilation. Equally, recreating and reviving an entire populace with all their physical bodies, memories, spirit, souls, and aether in-tact would also require a significant amount aether. It's not inherently good or evil, it just is. A key point people need to realize and understand here is that to summon Hydaelyn into existence, the other half of the remaining Amaurotine populace had to be sacrificed. So really, she's no better or worse than Zodiark. **(FYI -- The reason Zodiark IS an entity of the Umbral/Dark, is due to the nature of Astral and Umbral. Umbral/Darkness is the force of activity and change. Astral/Light is the force of stasis (as Urianger explained and as seen throughout all of the Shadowbringer's Xpac). 2) The player base, your character, the scions, and the people of Hydaelyn presume that Zodiark is inherently evil and chaotic, and Hydaelyn is inherently good and orderly. That only other lesser Primals and Zodiark enthrall. Which is not the case. ALL Primals enthrall, as it is their nature as deities. a Diety only exists due to their followers. Through thoughts, prayers, worship, and idolization. Without that, they are nothing, they cannot exist. We, the player, are in-fact enthralled to Hydaelyn and are her champion. **She lends us (and only those who have the Echo) her constant aid and advice, in return for championing her cause (Massively hinting that those who have the Echo are a shard/part of an Ascian and either a summoner and champion of Zodiark or a summoner and champion of Hydaelyn). 3) All we really have up until this point is Hydaelyn's side of the story. And we, the player, constantly view events and scenarios through Hydaelyn-colored glasses. Of course, looking at things this way makes everything the Ascians and Zodiark are doing seem evil and wrong. And why wouldn't it? The complete annihilation of a worlds people and creating world-ending apocalypses in order to reform the original source world and it's people is considered wrong. To us. To us, we believe and feel that we are completely unique individuals who have a right to live, to love, and to exist. But to the Ascians (especially Emet-Selch, Elidibus, and Lahabrea) who have been around since the beginning --- we are nothing more than mistakes that should have never been. We and the 13 shards are the resulting mistakes between the battle of Zodiark and Hydaelyn. We are mere ghosts, shards, pieces of a once-great world and people who are completely blind and ignorant to the truth. We do not know or remember who we were, how our home originally was, and what power we once held. Everything the Ascians do is to restore and bring back the original world and people to what they were before Hydaelyn shattered it and imprisoned Zodiark. From the Ascians perspective, Hydaelyn is the evil one. A diety who willingly disrupted the balance between Astral and Umbral, light and dark, and seized power over Zodiark, to become the sole deity of the source. A diety which proceeded to bury itself inside the sundered source world and make it it's own. A parasite. Furthermore, ancient beings, such as Midgardsormr, don't like or trust Hydaelyn. 4) **Here are the key elements here - The Ascians Goals and Motives: Zodiark was summoned during an emergency to halt the apocalypse of the Source, rewrite the laws of that world, and to cleanse, revitalize, and restore the badly damaged star so it would once again be capable of sustaining and producing new life (all necessary). These feats required insanely vast amounts of aether, which would have needed to have come from the life force of the people, fauna, and flora. The final step, was to cultivate life enough to a point that half of the new life could be used as an energy source for Zodiark so he could bring back and revive all those that had to sacrifice their lives in order to summon him into existence (not necessarily bad or evil, just a requirement to perform). Once completed, the Amaurtine's would then continue cultivating new life. However, a part of the remaining Amaurtine's deviated and felt that enough precious life had already been lost. They believed that the current new life was precious and innocent. So they decided to preserve it. In order to this, they ironically and hypocritically sacrificed the lives of all the remaining Amaurtine's (aside from the Paragons) to summon Hydaelyn into existence. Hydaelyn championing her follower's/summoner's wishes, and Zodiark championing his follower's/summoner's wishes. In the end, Hydaelyn wrestled power away from Zodiark and sealed him away under the pretense that he was power-hungry. And then she destroyed and sundered all that Zodiark and the Amaurotines worked towards in order to preserve and protect "the new life" that her summoners wished for in the creation of the 13 shards -- what remained of the new life. Up until the end of the Shadowbringer's MSQ's, the Ascians believed that the only way to bring about the rejoining was by creating calamities. They didn't know any other method of doing it. However, after seeing you and witnessing the events in the Trial, the Dying Gasp, Emet-Selch believed that perhaps there was another way. You. Emet-Selch, exhausted from the eons of repeating events, decided that just this once, he would put his faith in you. In the end, he bequeathed the mantle of Steward of the Star to you, entrusting you with the Ascians/Amaurtine's legacy, hopes, and dreams.

[@alexestler8521]

Arkboi21 We can talk about perspectives all day, but it would be objectively wrong to destroy the shards and all life upon them in order to remake an old and gone world. There is nothing we can do about the past. We are fighting for the future. Secondly, is splitting the worlds the same as destroying them? It seems implied that the original people were not killed, but divided into 14. Not that ripping people into pieces is right, but killing would not be the correct world. Furthermore, there are two aspects of the Zodiark Plan. I’ll call them Phase One and Phase Two. There is a key difference between them that makes the actions in one right, and the other wrong. Phase One. One half of the city voluntarily sacrifice themselves in order to save the world. Then, a second half, again, voluntarily, sacrifice themselves to revitalize their injured world. They are heroes. But the Amouratines are a powerful and immortal people. They are not used to death. This is new to them. They don’t know how to handle the loss, so they decide to save their lost brothers. Enter phase two. Phase Two: The world has been saved, by the voluntary sacrifices of the Amourotines. In order to save them, the survivors need to cultivate the new life in order to grow the necessary aether to exchange for their lives. Admittedly, there are not a lot of details about what this would have involved. But there is a distinct difference between Phase One and now. This sacrificial garden of aether, which I find it reasonable to assume includes human lives, asked for none of this. The Amourotines, understandably, are willing to sacrifice the new, innocent life to save the old. Understandable, but not right. Necessary to save the dead, but not right. Morality trumps necessity.

[@TrungTran-yg3uv]

​@@alexestler8521 Is it truly killing, when a shard rejoins? Or are its inhabitants, and all of their aether, simply merge and live on in the Source? You speak of perspective, but the perspective of killing is not killing when viewed through an Ascian's lense: Emmet didn't consider WOL alive at all. You cannot speak of one interpretation of morality when the two sides couldn't agree on which interpretation it is. And to speak of "nothing we can do about the past": That was exactly what the Ascian was doing - rewriting the past, in a way. Once the Unsundering is completed, everything goes back to Aumarotine conditions, as if no Sundering happened. Is that not the same as G'hara Tia did? As the Scion helped the Exarch did?

[@alexestler8521]

Trung Tran I suggest that killing is not the right word for the sundering under an assumption that, although divided, the souls of the people were not destroyed. Rather, I assume that when the original world split, the people were divided across and their memories were altered, but they were not destroyed. During a rejoining the lifeforce of the shard’s inhabitants is, to the best of my knowledge on the subject, passed along to the source with the rest of the shard’s aether. From what we have seen on the source and the First, I believe that their souls are destroyed in this process, if still alive by that point. The First was not rejoined, yet most of its inhabitants were killed in the Flood of Light. Furthermore, there are those caught in the crossfire on the Source, like the Black Rose victims from the future, and the Bahamut victims from the distant past. As for how Emet sees us as, so what? We ARE alive. His opinion does not change that. If I decide Urianger is less than me, since I’m the WOL/D and he’s just an evasive liar, and go stab him, I still murdered someone. He went from living to dead. Emet wants the people on the shards currently living to die. He’s going to destroy the world in its current state to bring back the dead. Furthermore, the Ascians want to erase the past. To take what IS, kill it, and then pretend it was never there. But we ARE here. “As if the sundering never happened”. But it DID happen. And the fact that it happened matters, even if erased and forgotten. The people on the shards are ALIVE and they have a right to their life. “Rewriting the past, in a way”. A similar concept in some regards, but the way matters. G’hraha and us did not obliterate a currently living people. He time traveled back to before the tragedy (potentially creating alternate timelines?), and saved two worlds by preventing it. Admittedly, time travel is confusing, but we didn’t kill the future people because, well, they don’t exist yet. We changed history, we didn’t erase it.

[@alexestler8521]

M. Woller Admittedly, my assumption that the sundering divided but did not destroy the souls of the original people is only an assumption, I am no lore expert, and may very well be contradicting something someone said in game. Having read the responses, I do believe that the sundering was wrong and the souls probably were destroyed in the process. There are a few of my thoughts I would be fine with discussing on the sundering and such if you have any interest or want any clarification. However, I find the state of the people now a more interesting topic of discussion. I don’t believe you are giving the people of the shards enough credit. Are we so much lesser because of the sundering that was should just let the world die out? Is there no value, or at least so little value they’re a worthwhile sacrifice, in the lives of the current people? Would it be better to risk everything we know for an old, dead world whose time is done? And how can we possibly judge when all we have to go off of is the memories of a tempered, lonely immortal of a race with a reputation for lying and manipulating? The shards may be frail, but they are not worthless. Besides, the original world managed to more or less self combust without any outside help, as far as we know, so are they any better in that regard? Ignoring logistics, we can’t just uproot the people of the first, or tell them to stop having children. It simply would not be moral to force people to do anything like that. They are human beings and they have the right to make their own choices. You can not compare the shards to the separated limbs or a body. The people on the shards are alive with thoughts and feelings, and when you theoretically remake a body, you don’t destroy the limbs. You make the body whole again. Putting the world back to the old way would destroy the shards. It would be more fitting to say you could bring a mother back to life by killing her children. I would say something similar about comparing life on the shards to sin eaters. Sin eaters are mindless, destructive beasts. The people on the shards are, well, people. They are nothing like sin eaters, and I do not understand how they can be compared.

[@alexestler8521]

M. Woller I find that the people have everything to do with why we fight. Yes, the Empire doesn’t want primals, good for them, neither do we. But the Garlemald Empire’s ends do not justify the means. They feed off of weaker nations, stripping them of freedom and conscripting citizens to fight and conquer for them. The city-states aren’t perfect, but they are improving. We’re going to be rebuilding Ishgard in a few months. We helped Doma regain her freedom. That’s what the WOL wants. To help the people, because the people are worth it. Why is there an assumption that the shards are doomed to fail? We don’t know the specifics of the rejoinings, but they were all caused by the Ascians over the course of thousands of years (presumably, as time runs at different rates). They’re not self destructive. Certainly no more than Amourot. “A fragment of an actual planet and its life” Like I’ve said, I’m no lore genius, but my interpretation is this: We have our original planet, which gets sundered into 14. All the aether is split across 14. So someone like Y’shtola isn’t 1/14 of some Amourotine who is supposed to exist, like a fragment of a soul lingering after death as a ghost. She just has 1/14 of the aether An Amourotine would have (no creation magic, not immortal, not a giant, ect.). But the people themselves aren’t lesser for it. Honestly, I believe the Amourotine paradise is bs. Human nature was not invented with the sundering. Maybe death was a rare occurrence. But that doesn’t mean the place was some perfect garden of eden scenario. The city has an off feeling. Maybe a security over freedom scenario? The society is stifling and lacking. And on top of that, everything we see is what Emet wants to show us, and of course the dude who wants us all to think his people were so much better than us would show us a “perfect” world.

[@starwyvern010]

This is the one I was waiting for. 5.0 left me with so many questions. In the Akademia we see statues of Zodiark, so he either existed before this or at least was conceived of before they chose to summon him. We also see the full version of Halmarult and Lahabrea's glyphs, so those aren't just a post-Zodiark Ascian phenomenon either. I really hope the source of the original calamity turns out to be something we need to discover and deal with, and not just a case of the Amaurotine's creation magics having drained too much from the star, or a chain reaction as utopia experiences fear for the first time. I loved 5.0 so much but it leaves me so curious as to where the story will go from here!!

[@starwyvern010]

@M. Woller Obviously. I suppose Emet-Selch could have intentionally or accidentally created this version with those things for whatever reason. I choose to assume it's an accurate recreation.

[@Beredaman08]

His form being decided on ahead of time does seem to fit with the research they were apparently doing in the Akademia, namely looking into the creation of guardians of sufficient power. Having the concept, from its powers AND its form, does make a certain amount of sense. I mean...wouldn't want any unintended extra heads or anything, heh.

[@DavidTimothy]

@@Beredaman08 interesting idea. Especially if we combine that with the theory that someone (probably one of the three) set up the circumstances that led to the summoning of Zodiark, it's entirely likely that the concept of Zodiark was already well developed and existed in lesser forms before the Amaroutine calamity occurred.

[@ReiSilver]

I feel like the dragons are on par with amarotines, especially with the power of their eyes and midgardsomirs particular brand of immortality

[@Yokai_Yuri]

No, they are superior. A weakened, dormant, no physical body midgarsorrm can easily cut the link between Hydalein and its blessed hero. No other being has been able to do that. Remember when you are CLAIMED by a primal,nothing can sever those ties, not even other primals, yet the fact a weakened midgarsormm could is a testament of how powerful the father of all dragons was. After all it was the only being in existence who stalemated Omega in a fight.

[@Mathenaut]

@@Yokai_Yuri Midgardsomr invoked the pact that he made with Hydelyn in order to sever your link. That dates back to when the dragons first arrived and sought refuge from Omega.

[@katiepersons6575]

@@Yokai_Yuri Save, perhaps, for the Warrior of Light, who *ended* Omega in a fight! We did what midgarsormm couldn't do in his prime.

[@LordReginaldMeowmont]

Omega has already stated that it and Midgardsormr came from very distant stars.

[@DavidTimothy]

Indeed. We knew in the lore that Midgardsormr brought the first brood from somewhere called "dragonstar". Ethys mentioned that in the video. It is implied that Omega came from somewhere even further out there (since he journeyed to dragonstar then came further to the source as he was chasing midgardsormr).

[@maxspecs]

@@DavidTimothy If Dissidia is to be believed, all the realms of Final Fantasy exist within the void that is the Interdimensional Rift. Scant few people are able to traverse it, though Omega is one. Gilgamesh is another, as is Shantotto(?)... This claim is backed up by Omega's recreations of beings from other stars, namely, the Deltascape, Sigmascape, and Alphascape.

[@rosenbraut]

Right now i think you make the best lore videos for this game. One of your strongest points is that your scripts are really nice. They condenses a lot of scattered informations, and thoughts into a coherent and comprehensive summary. Also the voiceovers" or "narration" (however you refer to it) of the videos i watched, are clear and understandable, the basic audio- and recordingquality as also your voice in general and skill to "narrate" or "read" - its just so pleasent and makes video content so much more enjoyable. I am looking forward to more Lore Videos for Final Fantasy XIV from your channel

[@paradoxicaldragon]

Well put-together, particularly with regards to the footage! That you're showing the sources that spawned the line of thought you speak about is a really nice touch. Keep it up! I look forward to listening to more of what you have to say! As for me, in a nutshell, I think Shadowbringers has exposed to us the magnitude of uncertainty we're actually in. As was mentioned near the beginning: much of our fight against the Ascians and the vague 'Darkness' has been a rather blind endeavour. But now we're learning that not only is the nature of our conflict rather grey as opposed to black and white, it turns out our conflict's roots are more personal than we thought. This is especially the case with the interpretation that the WoL might be the dissident 14th Convocation member. I am definitely liking how the pieces are starting to emerge, showing how we appear to be scratching the surface of a much deeper mystery that we are very much a part of. I do wonder what direction the story will take, now that ShB has set the ball rolling in the direction of the game's most fundamental story level (in my view): the Ascians, Zodiark and Hydaelyn. I feel like soon we'll be coming across the game's final thesis statement, if you like. For instance, I thought the principal take away from our showdown with Emet-Selch is that no past is worth the sacrifice of the present.

[@LadCarmichael]

I have a bit of a minor remark, you say that the Amaurotines were sacrificed (seemingly and implying against their will) when your screenshot of Hythlodaeus conversation implies that on the contrary they "sacrificed themselves" to Zodiark, hence the feeling of gratitude and wish to bring them back that drives Emet-Selch. This change quite a lot of things on a narrative perspective, as if Hythlodaeus is to be trusted, then yet again we don't have any proof that Zodiark really harbor a will, and that despite being 80% into His story.

[@JamesTheTurnbull]

I think the problem is that we never even heard Zodiark "speak" let alone have a will. That might change soon with appearance of a "Maiden of Darkness".

[@TKUltra971]

Hythlodaeus = Big Boss reveal at the MGS V He is US and WE are him. It's so lightly hinted but genus in a way.

[@LadCarmichael]

@@JamesTheTurnbull That's what I'm getting out. We got Bahmut's intentions through Nael and Louisoix, same for the Triad's who were fanatics. Here the only fanatic we saw was Lahabread who from the own admission of the other Unsundered was considered batshit crazy. Emet-Selch says he's Tempered, yet everything he does is for his goal, which goes through Zodiark, and not for Zodiark Himself.

[@Krane2000]

I adore how "Echo" is a literal name for our ability. It's an "Echo" of the powers the Amuroteans - and thus we - had. I think the Warrior of Light has always been the same essence reincarnated over and over again, each time the actions of the 14th member of the council Echoing throughout history. My assumption when it comes to why some people have the echo and other don't is that the world pre-sundering had more than simply just Amuroteans who could wield creation magics, and it's these people that the more mundane population are remnants of, or that everyone *does* have the echo to some degree - helping to explain perhaps why the people on the source seem much more powerful and intelligent in general when compared to those we saw on Norvrandt - but that their echos are so weak that they don't manifest in any easily discernable way. A craftsman's echo allows them to better visualise their final product, a gatherer's echo helps them see through the underbrush, a swordsman's echo helps to predict the swing of a blade, these sorts of things that would be overlooked as people simply being hyper proficient in their profession. The idea of there being a weak echo everywhere would also imply that the power of one's echo is determined perhaps by the power of the person you were created from, or perhaps the power of the echo becomes diluted as more and more people are born; we have to make the assumption that there are more people across all the shards alive today than there were Amuroteans at the end times, for example. Thus, those with discernable Echo are remnants of much more powerful Amuroteans, and us as the most powerful Echo user would naturally be the descendent of the 14th council member. Also, the artifical Echo that Zenos has is named the "Revenant", which serves the dual purpose of tying into Zeno's inability to leave the world after his death - literally a revenant, haunting the Source - and how the power of the Echo is itself a revenant; a blight on any star where it occurs, allowing an escalation of power beyond what the very fabric of reality itself can manage.

[@blackh9604]

I like this.

[@rainbowsnail4171]

I missed Emet's explanation on the "lesser" Ascians when I played. Glad to see it included in this video!

[@vert5807]

thank you for making this recap, i appreciate it so much! i have adhd so it can be hard understanding a lot lore like this. it doesn't make reading and processing information very easy :') so this helped me a ton. thank you

[@MrMadokz]

Guess your got your "answers" now. It was under our nose this whole time.

[@ElFenrir13]

I almost feel like the First Calamity might have been caused by a sort of alien, Lavos-like entity. I got real Lavos vibes hearing about the 'groaning within the earth' and such. And we know about aliens already; I wonder if it came, buried itself in, and then after it all went down, the Amaurotines started getting afraid, and that's when their mana went haywire, and they went and sort of imagined the worst things, which then spawned more things from their own abilities and so on. Basically something started it, and then their fears were made manifest which spiraled. It made sense that what they summoned would take away fear totally; hence tempering. Better to take away fear completely to cause this from going bad again. Also with the fact there's a Sharlayan like symbol in the Akademia Anyder at the end, I wonder if maybe the Circle of Knowing/those from Old Sharlayan were descended from the group who broke away to summon Hydaelyn? (Besides us.)

[@armon29]

Isnt it their own creation magic that went out of control and created these things we fought in the dungeon? i think i read that somewhere just cant remember where but i have the feeling i have read it.

[@ElFenrir13]

@@armon29 At some point their creation magics went out of control. What I can't quite pinpoint(I'm doing a second replay) is if their creation magics started going out of control to start the earth-rumble and then it cascaded, or if something else caused them to start to fear something, which then in turn caused their creation magics to go out of control. I'll have to see since I forget exactly myself but it seemed a bit vague on what caused the initial 'spark' so to speak.

[@armon29]

@@ElFenrir13 hm i really cant remember if something "triggered" it and made them fear. all i seem to remember is the out of control thing. you can answer again when you found out :D

[@helbendt581]

@@armon29 A bit late on this, but NPC chatter in the Akademia indicates that most of the enemies already existed, and were simply let loose from their containment by Prototania's escape (or whatever the FATE-chain boss's name is in the Tempest). We see the last boss being created/summoned on purpose by one of the surviving researchers, who seems to stop surviving in the process.

[@maxspecs]

Ancient beings crossing the stars to infect a planet reminds me of JENOVA, myself. They were also a being that interfered with an ancient race and caused a calamity.

[@Iautocorrect]

Thank you Patreons! Just stumbled upon this channel!

[@catboy_on_main]

This was very helpful in sorting things out thank you so much Ethys

[@astrealbrizbee9815]

Cam we talk about Akademia's music being Emet trying to find some semblance of peace? Looking for that old tune that once made him happy. Yet all he can find is a sad, jazzy tune.

[@azadalamiq]

that was a cool sound concept.

[@calzonexiv]

They did say that Hydalen was created as a sort of checks and balances, to ensure that Zodiark wouldn't gain too much power at the expense of the lives currently living. So I could see why to the eyes of Emit and the Ascians she's a "Parasite" but in reality she simply did what she was created to do: stop Zodiark from destroying any more life. I don't know if the Sundering was an intentional consequence or a byproduct that was unexpected, but either answer gives credence to why she has a chosen warrior of light on each shard; they allow her to continue the job she was assigned even with the source being splintered.

[@crazy13alex]

It's the same with Zodiark; from the way he was summoned to the way he pushed back the first true calamity. He was carrying out his purpose with no malice and Hydaelyn was summoned to carry out hers. There is no good or evil to them; they're basically godlike machines performing their tasks.

[@calzonexiv]

Exactly, it's not them who are inherently good or bad, it's the people who follow who have given them these labels. It'll be really interesting to see how they proceed with this.

[@calzonexiv]

I think the only real question I have related to all this is...How did the creation of Zodiark cause the tempering? Did all creations made cause their creators to become tempered to them? If not...they why did it happen with Zodiark/Hydaelyn? Is it because of the magnitude of which they were made? That to me is the most interesting part and one I really hope we learn more about soon.

[@sparthyslaysstuff2405]

I've run with the idea that pouring so much faith and aether into a creation essentially willed Zodiark into bending the will of his creators to him as the most efficient means of seeing their goals achieved. The Amoroutines were already pretty collectivist so their ultimate creation essentially rolling with a hive mind mentality to achieving its goals isnt too far a stretch.

[@Drakonzeta]

One theory I've seen that I really like is that, because Zodiark was created explicitly to stop the Terminus stuff, from the beasts born from the Amaurotine fears and instinctive use of their creation magics, he was given the ability to control the mind at that subconscious level, to quell those fears and/or curtail that instinctive use of creation magic. Which led, perhaps unintentionally, to tempering. Which, since it is useful for the purposes of causing chaos, the ascians have included in their teachings of primal summoning.

[@Kairos_Akuma]

Thanks for doing that. Brought back some details in my way-to-much-Ascian-focuses-Mind. xD

[@Phantasmeels]

A hypothesis on the question of what initiated the apocalypse of the unsundered reality: You mention that it's a staple trope of final fantasy narratives where a nigh-utopian society engineers its own doom. This might be partially true, but there seems to be more to it than that. What was the rumbling beneath the earth that seemed to cause it? My idea concerns another Final Fantasy trope, most often seen in the oldest games. Remember how many games begin with the world physically falling into entropy and gradual eradication, before a group of chosen heroes step in to correct it? And it's always due to a cosmic antagonist of some sort (Chaos, Cloud of Darkness, Exdeath etc). I feel like a similar thing hapoened to the unsundered world. "The winds die, the seas rage, the earth rots... " And in this case, fires rain from the sky, and the Amourantine creations are plagued and twisted by chaos and fear. This screams "foreign cosmic antagonism" to me. In this case, though, there were no traditional heroes restoring balance to light and darkness (as far as we know), though one of the convocation of 14 and those who summoned Hydaelyn might be counted as warriors of light in a sense. Who knows? Maybe the daemon Chaos, like from FFI and Dissidia, or something like it, might have upset the balance as a whole, starting with the aforementioned rumblings from beneath the earth. Juat an idea though. Loved the video! It illustrated the subject matter neatly and asked the questions we're all wondering. Subscribed and looking forward to more.

[@theNeonfrequency]

I legit did not want this video to end the idea of the warrior of light being the 14th member is so exciting again I absolutely LOVE the story of this game

[@DarthSanguine]

5:58 It wasn't just Amaurotines that were sacrificed - it was half of everyone on the planet.

[@Wildbarley]

I kinda expect a Sorceress and Lunatic Cry tie in to the fall of the Unsundered world. 8 is not my fav, but there’s definitely vague connections at play.

[@azadalamiq]

a lunar cry is a drop of monsters raining down from the moon. this was magic hysteria, where their senses were going awray. Pretty much think of an Autistic child having an outburst over sound sensory. (i have autism so its my best example cuz i speak from experience. it literally drives you crazy)

[@gateauxq4604]

I braced myself for a Zodiark/Ascian apologist video so this has of course made me happy to see its an unbiased analysis of what was known before 5.3. Thank you!

[@TrueEnding]

2:47 That statue in the foreground resemble the cave painting of Zodiark. Could that be how his humanoid form will look?

[@TheJSullivan]

Why can’t I add more likes to this !!!!!

[@darkfury1733]

Great video bro. Much love Dark Fury - Jenova - Aether -

[@dariusd2003]

The biggest issue for me is if Hydaelyn is in fact created by us, it calls into question whether she can be seen as some objectively good or incontrovertible constant like entropy or gravity. It moves the bar further because then what if we have to completely destroy Zodiark by some means. In turn, we may have to completely annihilate Hydaelyn in turn since one shouldn't exist without the other. What if both sides of the convocation were wrong. We have seen primals completely deluded in their beliefs buying into their own creation myths. Either way, I find it fascinating because of the implications. The same with Dragonstar and the war between Omega's creators and Midgardsormr.

[@TrungTran-yg3uv]

Was there an actual war between Omega's creator and Dragonstar? I remember Omega being created to avert its own star's threat, and to do so it must amass great power - to do so it must seek out great foes to test its steel, and its course drew it to Dragonstar where it clashed with Midgarsommr. At the very end of Omega's arc, it mentioned that despite all its power, it still could not return home. Which gave me the impression that there was no conflict between Midgarsommr and its creator - because after all, it didn't seek to destroy Midgarsommr even when he was weakened. It fought Shinryu, and then us.

[@Nirual86]

I think the Echo is a result of the original soul being Tempered by Hydaelyn (or Zodiark) when they were brought into being.

[@a40989d1]

I wonder if Fandaniel was behind the ancients calamity.

[@ViewTube_Emperor_of_Mankind]

If it goes down to terminology its not 12000 years ago. Its several billion years ago according to Emet-Selchs words.. which fits way better into the ruins we saw and their "non-enchantment" scale.

[@EchoOddity]

There is another primal we encounter who upon being summoned one of their firstlines is that they are "eternal", I think that Hydaelyn doesnt Know that things existed before the summoning/sundering

[@EchoOddity]

also on the topic of the echo, not everyone who has the echo has the blessing of Hydaelyn, I think its pretty safe that wielders of the echo have partially rejoined with their shard counterparts during calamities and if you look at the floor of the room where people are given the Resonence you see a mural of a large figure in the middle with 7 smaller figures being drawn into them so the resonance seems to be obtained by forcing souls to merge.

[@c_huvaknunh9138]

Wonderful as always Ethys, thank you. On a side note, is it just me or does some structures of Amarot very similar to Sharlayan structures?

[@vadagget]

I'm betting the Ascians caused their own demise in much the way the ancient race in the 50's film 'Forbidden Planet' destroyed themselves - creations powered by the unconscious mind. Perhaps Emmet Selch himself, being apparently such a powerful Ascian, unconsciously spawned the 1st mote of trouble and it snowballed from there.

[@pjharper2643]

Floating chair? Respect.

[@e.q.8681]

I think the chair is slowly evolving over the series.

[@Cadiangrunt99]

All I can think of with the few bits about the cause we have is. God it sounds like Lavos...

[@aSmolGoth]

Midgardsormr/Omega already mentioned in SB raids that he journeyed a LONG way to Hydaelyn - to the point that the fiery mane he had fizzled (why our Midgardsormor looks VERY different from the one encountered in the Alphascape raids).

[@neflarionshadowflame2050]

Uh, that's a long list of questions, I hadn't even thought of yet and now my brain hurts.

[@devouring_worlds]

I honestly thought (mostly based on the stuff scattered around Akadaemia Anyder) was that Amaurot was destroyed *because* they lost control of their own creation magic and began willing things into existence that never should’ve been created by accident

[@ChouhouinNeko]

this is what i believe also

[@SupahPowers]

This is what I thought as well. Especially after Emet-Selch admits that their unconscious fears are the main source of this original calamity of beasts.

[@calzonexiv]

It's like the one NPC says, it was only a matter of time before the disease that was inflicting the other nations reached Amaurot, hence why they were trying to find a solution before it was too late. It seems that Zodiark was officially created amidst this time, when it finally hit the city.

[@SupahPowers]

@CalCrazy i think Selch admits that his recreation of amaurot is of the day before or the day of the calamity

[@TKUltra971]

To be honest while playing thru Amaurot without the epic tragic 2 steps from hell level music playing in the background. His explanation raised more red flags than a china communist parade. He's obviously omitting something important - a key detail. But as Eyths said - Utopias always are destroyed by those that inhabit them. So what were they planning or were they manipulated by a even higher power than both the elder primals and their own? Something is obviously behind that curtain. I'm kinda scared to see what.

[@zodiark420]

I do not back this info!!! lmao no but seriously great work! i enjoyed this. i knew a bit but i wanted it all to get peace'd together as i was..... away for along time...... cant recall where...

[@knifewieldingwomen]

Oh no maybe Lavos was/is the being beneath the Earth. Lol.

[@katiepersons6575]

Plot twist: The cataclysm that left the world in flames happened 12,000 years ago in FFXIV. Lavos destroyed destroyed everything in Chrono Trigger in... 12,000BC!! oh snap!

[@carstan62]

Now I need a Chrono Trigger themed raid.

[@TKUltra971]

Woot more Ethys lore! **pulls out puff pipe like a Sir** Also Ethys i feel that Minfilia is Hyadelyn's one and only tempered.

[@mattsullivan2458]

What about the warrior of light?

[@Matthias-pj6th]

@@mattsullivan2458 My personal thought is that Hyadelyn inadverntently tempers anyone who's Echo she awakens (I.E. Us, Minfillia, Krile, Ysale) but her first words to everyone when their Echo awakens is "Hear. Feel. Think." without exception. I personally think that we *are* tempered by Hyadelyn, but the only order she ever gives is essentially to think for ourselves.

[@TKUltra971]

@@Matthias-pj6th thats a interesting spin. I know soon or later everything is going to come full circle.

[@pofruin]

@@Matthias-pj6th I believe Resonant throughs monkey wrench in those theorys. Echo bieng Hydelyns tempering would mean that she can order Zenos to stand down. But I don't realy think She can. The way I see it Echo is a matter of soul rejoyning. If Hydelyn can sunder mayhaps she can cancel/reverse it. And that gives one power to "Remeber" all that has passed and to resist creation (primals). This also would explain Zeno'ses use of enslavement. Echo Makes the user closer to original ancient. And the creator have influence on creation.

[@blackh9604]

I'm glad you mentioned the question about who (only WoL? only echo users? everyone? what about sundered ascians?) gets rejoined after calamities. I thought I missed something but I guess we just don't know yet.

[@Hayami4]

their fears started to manifest little by little (like we see in the reports in Akadaemia Anyder), having the power of creation really is terrifying, could it be that they created that calamity themselves? An accumulation of fears?

[@tek512]

Any chance we could get a full rundown of Garlean lore? Lots of it, though available, seems to have eluded the masses. Not just imperial lore, but info on GArlean physiology as well.

[@SirVyre]

You should watch the movie, "Forbidden Planet." It stars Leslie Nielson, and it is an old sci-fi thriller. The crux of the plot is that a researcher is living on an alien world with his daughter, where he is performing miraculous conjurations of life from Earth, and he has created a beautiful paradise for his daughter. When the Starship Captain arrives with his crew, at the request of relatives of the researcher, the researcher begins clandestinely using the powers he has attained to try to scare them away, believing that one of them will seduce his daughter and leave him lonely, depriving him of his only source of joy. In the end, it's revealed that his fears got the better of him, not only fear for his daughter but fear of his own power running wild and rampant and attaining a will of its own. He is crushed and killed by a specter of his own tormented mind's making, and the Starship Captain infers that this is also how the civilization, whose ruins granted the researcher these powers, died out. This and other stories akin to it are very much the basis for the Amaurotine crisis. There really is nothing vague about it. As you go through the Amaurotine sidequests, you learn that self-expression is required to be limited so that all may be seen as equal. Yet it extends so much further than that. They are required to be peaceful and have peaceful minds, because to think violently would cause more creations capable of violence to be. The Amaurotines have no defined defense against creations that gain their own will and turn violent. We see this in Akademia Anyder. One Ascian is seen doing something to stop this. He raises a hand to the sky above the building, sacrifices his life force, and summons Quetzalcoatl. It's important here to remember that this is yet another place and event put into our present by Emet-Selch and his memory. Who put down the original outbreak at Akademia Anyder 12000 years ago? Likely the convocation, but imagine how much fear started to spread through the capital, after those Ascians who lived through the tragedy succumbed to fear of their own creation magicks, something that we learn is integral to Ascian identity as a whole civilization. Note that a common theme for most of the monstrosities that we fight in Amaurot itself in the recreation of the first calamity is that of fiery explosions, meteors, comets, bombs, and the like. Of more interesting note is that each and every boss has a distinct face or faces. A man faced sandworm, with a body of gaping maws, that has the ability to call meteors down from the heavens, and knows enough about Amaurotine architecture to bring the buildings around you down with meteors in such a way that they fall on you. A man/ape faced bird bomb that calls hoards of beasts into creation to stall you while it focuses its energy into a self-immolating catastrophic explosion, as though it were a suicide bomber. The final abomination is a dragon like beast that has 4 human faces, all conjoined. In battle it summons yet more humanoid heads that shoot lasers at you. These monsters have some sort of identity based in the Amaurotines themselves, and they may be a mere masquerade for Ascians who were evil and used creation magick for destructive purposes. Some of the ending monsters are voidsent like beings, before voidsent were extant,and they are dubbed, "Terminus Worshippers." End Worshippers... The Amaurotines were naturally immortal as far as we know, prior to The Sundering. I conclude that there were those who wanted to die.

[@josevelazquez5721]

You know another thought as well is Yoshida said we are most of the day done with the Hyedaelin/Zodiark ark. So lets say we actually do you know win this whole thing and get fully rejoined with powers of an unsundered original Amaurotine, meaning nearly infinite aether, the ability to create at will and of course all of our power gained from our experiences up to then. I mean at that point what craziness can challenge us. Maybe we have to stop whatever caused the original calamity

[@Marpfie]

What about the other ascians we have seen long before?? Why do people think only three survived. In an ARR cutscene I think it was you saw them meeting up in their dimension or so and plan stuff. There was also this female ascian as the boss in the last HW dungeon before Thordan. Can someone please explain and remove these loose ends?

[@i.147]

Only three Ascians survived the Sundering : Emet-Selch, Lahabrea and Elidbus. The others are sundered, weaker versions of their original self. For now we know that Loghrif, Mitron, Nabriales, Igeyorhm and Emmerololth have been killed, and Fandaniel was probably one of the Ascians killed by Gaius. But they could come back with another sundered soul. Encyclopedia Eorzea says that the Nabriales we defeated was from the 12th. Emmerololth has already been replaced, since Eureka tells us that they were killed when the Isle of Vale vanished, but we see them later in 2.3. We don't know how many sundered souls they have left, and Elidibus is now the only one who can "recruit" new Ascians. On the other hand, Emet Selch and Lahabrea are dead for good since they were complete.

[@Im-not-ram]

@@i.147 There is no proof that Lahabrea is dead. For all we know he could've escaped unharmed from the Primal that absorbed him.

[@Im-not-ram]

Only known way (at least story wise, and as far as we know) to kill an Ascian is to entrap him in a crystal and blast them with a surge of pure Aether. All of the Ascians we have killed have had this method used, except for Lahabrea.

[@i.147]

@@Im-not-ram We do know the auracite thing works to kill them, but nobody said other methods won't work. Both Elidibus and Emet-Selch confirmed he died anyways (Elidibus even did it off-screen so he had no reason to lie).

[@Im-not-ram]

@@i.147 Same way Gaius, Y'shtola, Thancred, Minfilia, Tsukuyomi, etc, were believed dead. I doubt that Lahabrea's anti-climatic ending was his final appearance in the series. Look closely at the cinematic involving his "death". He gets absorbed into the blade, not into Thordan. Mind you the blade itself was a different entity as well. At the end of the fight Thordan dies but the blade is intact on the ground. Not saying you're wrong, just that the talk amongst the characters serves as no real "proof" of his dead, since we have seen from time and time again they keep resurrecting characters. I believe Lahabrea is too important in the plot to meet his demise on the hands of a weak primal.

[@undeathstroke7168]

I think the 3 Ascians managed to avoid the Sundering through a combination of having the echo which in itself when mastered would/may allow longevity of the soul with the bi product of body jumping, and sacrificing their mortal form to Zodiark before the sundering happened. Elidibus had already been sacrificed to become the heart of Zodiark so thats probably how he probably knew of this solution.

[@MurakamiTenshi]

I had always assumed that Midgardsormr came from the 14th world before it was destroyed. If I remember, Omega was created to protect the people before it went crazy, and it can easily be linked to how Unukhalhi and the elf chick failed to save the 14th.

[@jaeusa160]

At the very least, something I hope we get in the near future is a chat with Mama Hydaelyn about all the things we've learned, because she got some 'splainin to do. Things aren't adding up as we'd be led to believe previously and, retcons aside (Lahabrea, for example, says Hydaelyn is the cause of an impending Terminus-like calamity... which seems to contradict what he should know about Terminus and Hydaelyn), we do more recently have a character in Emet-Selch who has explicitly avoided lying to us. It doesn't mean what he says is correct, simply that it is what he believes he knows.

[@Edge2177]

So the implication of Minfilia's words is that Zodiark caused the sound inside the planet, so the Ascians would actually summon him into being and give him more power. Meaning he's likely connected to the Cthonic beings as well.

[@phutton]

At around 2:48 there are some scene sequences of Ascians I dont remember, anyone know what these are so I can watch them?

[@PaceBreaker]

I believe this was after Nabriales is defeated back in 2.5.

[@boxinthefield]

Considering the apocalypse preceding the Sundering, I've been thinking about one of my favourite anime series. In Shin sekai Yori, humanity has evolved psychic/psionic abilities. Active uses are great , but the fears leak out through the subconscious and warp the world elsewhere(in the case of SsY, outside of the "protected/warded" zone, which was purely psychological). Could it have been that the Amaurotians have been responsible for the horrors themselves by their creation powers subconsciously leaking out to congregate elsewhere in the world? Up to a point where those same fears have become so real and closing in, that active creation of them nearby is inevitable?

[@TKUltra971]

that's HALF of it. The real question is what caused the voices under the earth that caused them to become afraid in the first place.

[@tabuukiller13]

You mention the vision of awakening the echo the first time. When did that cutscene pop up?

[@Shadowcynder1830]

I believe that this occurs when you first create your character.

[@azadalamiq]

the star/ meoter shower you see that the star. both 1.0 and 2.0 experience this.

[@mattstansbeary3068]

I think there a lot more to it and I'm going in that 5.0 continues into 6.0 and finishing before 7.0. on the 14th member I'm going to say some how we are link to that person.. how and who they were is still a mystery to solve.

[@truthless4720]

Question. Isn't it hard to know if we're 9/14ths or 8/14ths, since the Void is a thing and we're not sure of what happened to the shard of our soul that resided there? The impression I got from Emet-Selch's note on the matter is that the "13th was a mistake, and that shard is now lost to us", which makes me believe *everything* on that shard was lost, but I can't find the actual quote on the matter.

[@KaminoZan]

I keep thinking that the summoning of Zodiark caused some greater force of existence to split in two, as in, it was the actual trigger for the sundering. Afterward, Hydaelyn would have been summoned to try and mitigate the disaster, it might appear outwardly as though it was her subjugation of Zodiark that caused the star to shatter. Could it be however, that she enacted righteous fury against him, after his summoning caused a great calamity to erupt beyond his ability to control?

[@BenRiley83]

Can’t wait to find out who or what Hydaelyn really is!

[@HandlesAreStupid2024]

Listening to this got my mind going. I'm on the WoL is the 14th train, but is it possible that we manifested Hydaelen ourselves and that in fact she is also a piece of our "true" self?

[@Matteo_11]

I got the impression (in Amarout) that Zodiark was an existing entity and was behind this apocalyptic event. Further guessing that he caused these terrors as a ploy to then manipulate the council through various means. My conclusion was that Zodiark did this in order to become an all powerful being through the trust and sacrifice of his own victims. They say that these (clearly Dark based) terrors came from deep with in the star, and suddenly the solution is to imbue the core of the star with godlike powers via sacrifice. Hmmm.

[@weebsurfingweeb5057]

@M. Woller the way you go and preach about "DUH EBIL LIGHT!!!! 1111!!!!"

[@Miyao05]

My question is, after finding all of this out, Hydaelyn has not spoken to us. I mean i know she been sort of missing since stormblood but you would think she would at least (with the boost she got from the light of the first like Minfilia said) would have at least comment or say they were there, I get the fact we might be tamper but I think she still wants US to think for ourselves. She doesn't WANT to control people, like Zodiak, but I think she might be afraid of us. Not because we have slain primals (cuz thanks to her any way we can?) but I think she is shame on having to be the reason behind a lot of things. The split, the fight with Zodiak, etc. I think she really does adore her WoL. Hence why she calls us "her child." But she might be afraid of being hated by WoL.

[@Ladywizard]

I think she's just too weak... remember she possessed Minfilia because she didn't have the power she needed anymore to speak directly but she willingly gave up even that because the First needed help

[@carstan62]

I was really stunned by the similarities between the description of what happened to the shard that became the Void and what we see happening in the First. I know Emet said that the Void was an error made by the Ascians, so why did the Void fail and why was the First still going according to plan?

[@fkkkkkenig]

The void has no aether to work with, but on the first the aether is instead stagnated and put into stasis. There seems to be a difference, but it is true the end results are much the same, producing monsters that seek aether and rendering the planet inhospitable.

[@GG-yy4yx]

I️ wish SE would send us somewhere that was t a ruin of an earlier civilization...

[@SweatPants]

Waiting for the Ethys Asher lore ASMR where your elezen is lying in his floating magicked bed

[@chrisbennett1358]

Can't wait for Endwalker

[@fleeplayTV]

We are the Secret Ascian Man boiiiiis

[@permeus2nd]

11:22 so each of the primals from the first is a Mirror of something that once was bahamut was a real live dragon once but when it was made into a primal it was twisted by the dragon that summoned it, its not hard to believe that Zodiark and Hydaelyn were something that was real before its summons and that the people that summoned them imparted part of themselves onto the new primals and when you think that the emotions been felt by the Ascians when Zodiark was summoned were fear, despair and hopelessness i have to question what kind of thing was it they summoned?

[@theSkyRunner54]

I wonder what this refers to: «But the Darkness coveted power, and the balance was broken. Thus was I forced to banish Him unto distant heavens».. It is a very superficial explanation of what happened: it eschew any mention of the summonings, the ancients and the Terminus events. Is there any chance that the Dark was at the origin of the Terminus Dissonance? How the convocation discovered the laws of the start were unraveling? Were they unraveling because The Darkness was coveting power? How did they came to the conclusion a new will needed to be forged?

[@helbendt581]

The simplest possibility is that Hydaelyn was lying. She hasn't exactly shown the greatest dedication to the truth, what with her demonstrated willingness to let pre-Sundering history be forgotten entirely in favor of her worship.

[@816262]

Midgardsormer is said to be a servant of the 12 and Hydalen, charged with protecting the seal on Lake Silvertear, for if the seal were to break, the primals would be unleashed and bleed the lamd dry of aether. So we can assume as the lore says, that Midgardsormer came into the picture after the sundering. But when did the Twelve also come from, to charge Midgardsormer with this duty?

[@aqj2014]

10:58 well it's said by omega that they both traveled from another star to the source, doing battle along the way in the aetherial gap. Midgardsomr upon reaching the source created the seven great dragons , which they spawned thier broods and created the dragons we know on eorzea. Omega most likely sustained several critical damages and sent itself into cartnuea, which at the time was probably controled solely by the allagan empire, who most likely had the closest level of technology to omegas home shard. Of course it went into a hypersleep or something while it repaired itself, and was then studied by the allagans, who most likely modeled the heart of sabik ( ultimas core) and most likely ultima, after designs they found within omegas memories. Of course they somehow destroyed themselves and thier tech was discovered by the early garlean empire who used it to create magitek as we know..which was most likely found by emet selch and lahabrea, who planned to use this new found weapon to create a calamity and bring forth a rejoining, well...until bahamut basically did that for them. Emet selch was most likely destroyed by bahamut but thanks to the garleana cloning , he was brought back and became more involved. Either that or he was just in hiding for some reason and letting lahabrea do the dirty work since he was more into creating weapons and creatures( as pointed out in akademia anyder) , but this then raises the question to the other ascians we see elidibus with at the end of arr (2.0) and during hw in the sortof organization Xiii type deal in the aetherial gap. Also we don't know what happens to an ascians soul when we actually manage to destroy one. Since zodiark has probably tempered them, do thier souls go to him? Or do they return to the lifestream? Which again if hydalean is a parasite, her source of aether to maintain herself would have to be the aether of dead souls, which it clearly isn't because then nobody would ever inheret the aether of the fallen when a new person is born, and nor would the wol have been rejoined nine times ( I think) freaking shb had me asking so many questions after these lore bombs I swear...

[@Nikrard]

The wyrns come from another planet from another solar system. That is why they have so long lives. They aren't broken like the citizens of hydalean make them stronger and maybe superior to all of us

[@IchiroSuzuki97]

ENDWALKER HYPE

[@blocinmotion]

Well there's been some revelations now that endwalker is out.

[@Burningskull13]

I think anyone with the Echo are reborn shards of Amurotines, and everyone else without it are just descendants of Amurotines. Could be wrong tho lol.

[@nyrahl593]

I think its more detailed than that. The echo users are the reborn shards of the dissident Amurotines that created Hydelyn. This is why they can't be tempered. They resisted the initial tempering by Zodiark. Which, in my mind means that they can't be tempered even by Hydelyn herself; Since there is a theory that the WoL is tempered by her. She granted her blessing on the reborn shard of the 14th member that was HER creator; the WoL. A being once completely rejoined is capable of unmaking her. Though her champion; she see's the WoL as her greatest ally and biggest threat. So she'll 'bend the truth' to get us to enact her will; Since she cannot temper us to it. The 5.0 MSQ makes us begin to question the limits of her benevolence.

[@DavidTimothy]

@@nyrahl593 interesting idea, that Hydaelyn cannot temper us so she bends the truth to get us to do her will... as you said, many people have suggested that we were tempered by her, but our behavior (and the choices we're allowed) do no match up with those tempered by other primals (those born of magic taught by the Ascians who were themselves enthralled by Zodiark). I think that's a prime difference between Zodiark (and those primals created by his followers) and Hydaelyn. They exist to enthrall creation. To impose their will (which they call "the will of the star") on others. Hydaelyn has a different goal. We still have questions about what Hydaelyn's goals are, but at least we know a smidge more about Hydaelyn's creation and why that occurred.

[@cougarsr00]

Anyone one else think eden in the empty looks like the gods pictured on the mural?

[@DanTalksGames]

My suspicion is there's a lot of truth to what Emet-Selch has explained, but it's an incredibly biased take. It seems fair to believe that there was a great Calamity and Zodiark was summoned in response to that. It also seems fair that the Ascian's interpretation of Hydaelyn sundering the world was a very extreme take and may have been an unintended consequence of her power. Likewise, Hydaelyn herself is probably biased in her own interpretation of events; clearly she's lied to us outright about the nature of the universe and is at the very least perpetuating a false creation myth, either intentionally to further support for her cause or unintentionally as a result of her nature as a Primal and her worshippers having her believe she is the true will of the star. But just because Hydaelyn may have lied and be presenting an interpretation of events doesn't mean Emet-Selch is completely honest either. Let's consider a few things: were all the sacrifices truly willing, or is Emet-Selch whitewashing something the most powerful conclave of Ascian society - whom he was a member of - chose for everyone else? Remember, the Amaurot we see isn't real; it's a simulacrum created from Emet-Selch's memories. Did anyone ever question why Emet-Selch is this bombastic, extremely emotional, larger-than-life character while the Ascian shades shown in Amaurot are these creepy, almost robotic beings with Vulcan-esque cold logic? I propose a theory that it's not because the Ascians were literally like that: it's because to Emet-Selch, that's what Amaurot was. This perfect, Utopian society where everything was logical and everyone was serenely happy with their lot in life. But what if it wasn't? What if Asican society was just as corrupt and flawed as our society, suffering the same human foibles of emotional and selfishness and irrationality that we do? Ethys brings up a good point I didn't even consider: Emet-Selch doesn't claim to know what caused the original Calamity, but what if it wasn't some mysterious force from beyond the Rift? As Ethys said, in a lot of fictional narratives - especially Final Fantasy games - one of the recurring themes is that the greatest of tragedies aren't caused by gods or otherwordly beings we can't comprehend, it's caused by people and their personal flaws; just that in Final Fantasy, it's often taken to those supernatural levels as those flawed people attain immeasurable power. And when you have an entire race of people capable of creating ANYTHING...well, who's not to say all it takes is one person to create a brown note capable of driving their fellow creation magic-users insane? So all this happens. Ascian society isn't the great Utopia Emet-Selch claims it to be. And to be fair, I don't think he's intentionally lying; I think he's just so enamoured with the past that he can't see it for what it was. It's his memory of a 'better time,' which is why he presents it as so coldly pristine in Amaurot. Zodiark happens, and the conclave decides to sacrifice half the population to stop the calamity, and another half to reverse the destruction. And thus we come back to the question: was everyone legitimately okay with it? Was Emet-Selch telling the objective truth when he said half the existing people the world willingly sacrificed themselves to save the rest? In a society that's supposedly as egalitarian as the Asican's, how did they decide who was to be sacrificed? Was it truly volunteered? Hydaelyn's summoning can be presumed by one of two primary possibilities: 1. The Ascians were all fine until Zodiark came along, and acted out of fear rather than hard proof Zodiark was a tyrant, much like Emet-Selch said. This narrative definitely suits him more favourably, since it paints the Hydaelyn-worshipping Ascians as completely irrational and acting out of misguided fear that ended up doing more harm than good. Since in this narrative Zodiark is faultless, it makes HIS way look more ultimately favourable. 2. There was hard proof that Zodiark was tyrannical and the dissenting Asicans needed a power to defend themselves from him. But we already have proof that something occured that could provoke a defiance: the sacrifice of half their population twicefold to save their world. If we don't take Emet-Selch's words at face value, we can openly question whether the Asicans were actually okay being sacrificed, or if they were being forced to by the leaders of their society? To me, the latter situation makes more sense. We already know the one member of the conclave didn't agree with the other 13 and decided summoning Zodiark was a bad idea, so clearly they weren't a hive mind. And consider this: even if people were fine with the initial sacrifices, it makes sense that they'd be concerned about deciding to sacrifice a THIRD half to bring back the ORIGINAL people lost. Because at that point, you begin asking the questions the Scions did to Emet-Selch during the MSQ; why are the lives of these dead people more important than the lives of the living? Who are you to decide if they live or die? And then consider what will happen to the surviving half after that: THEY'LL have loved ones who will be sacrificed for the sake of others' loved ones. Who's not to say THEY will in turn try to bring back THEIR loved ones and create an endless cycle? It's the Thanos conundrum but in arms race form. I think it says a lot about Emet-Selch that his solution to bringing back his loved ones was to sacrifice another half of the surviving Asican population to feed Zodiark. Like we think he's just a racial supremacist who sees the current, shattered races as inferior, but in truth he was willing to sacrifice OTHER ASCIANS to bring back those he deemed more deserving of life. I don't think Emet-Selch is as righteous or noble as he claims: I believe he was, indeed, the villain of the piece even as far back as before Hydaelyn was summoned. He just doesn't accept it because he's such a smug, self-important, arrogant man that he can't see anything but what HE wants, and tries to justify it as 'morally right' to ease his own conscious.

[@jonpowers4318]

There's obviously a major (and somewhat justified) assumption you make that Emet-Selch/Hades is diametric and binary; that he is unequivocally a "big bad" puppet-master with motives rooted in deceit, selfishness, and corruption, without morality and lacking the ability to understand righteousness and be a part of the protagonist narrative. The latter of which, maybe, since the ascians were indeed tempered but I prefer to approach it from the side of empathy, giving them benefit of the doubt. That is not to say they've done nothing wrong, or to say that their ends justify the means, but I do not see them as the purely, irredeemably evil creatures we previously thought they were and I don't think any among them would hurt their own kind for personal gain. Conversely, they don't seem truly interested in us enough to care what we think or how we judge them, so I don't see a reason to disingenuously paint themselves as the real protagonists provided it has no bearing on their ability to bring about the Ardor. That said, I can see an argument being made claiming that if we acquiesce and think "maybe these guys aren't so bad after all" they'd see a glint of weakness flash in us and take advantage of our hesitation or inaction but I don't find that narrative personally as compelling. I can't speak for ascians, but at least among our own kind, we want to share our struggles and suffering and tell others what we have been through. We find some degree of Solus (..sorry not sorry :v) and catharsis in doing that. I don't have a reason to think they're different in that way and I don't think Hades would have shown us anything at all had the Warrior of Light not evolved in his eyes. After all, no human would attempt to explain to a fly or ant what our goals in life are or where we're walking to. Now, if it was a REALLY smart ape that somehow managed to pick up on bits of human language, we might see a light inside it and try to teach it things or have a conversation. That, I believe, is where Emet was trying to approach us from, not as some manipulative evil tyrant king who sacrificed his own people for his benefit. Besides, he was only a member of the convocation and not some monarch with unchecked control over everything, but regardless I don't think that selfishness would ever come from an untempered Amaurontine. If Emet was being honest, the Amaurotines were benevolent and kind in the production he put on for us. So imagine for a moment being an (anthropomorphized) ant here on earth, and day in and day out you see these giants murdering your brothers and sisters, stepping on them or crushing them with rock (fourth calamity), flooding your anthills (sixth calamity), laying traps and bait for you or spraying toxic chemicals trying to eradicate you and your kin (eighth calamity). You learn to live in fear and hate man. They commit ant genocide, so you think every one of them is evil and vile and none of them deserve to live. No matter what they do, they can never be redeemed. That's what us fragments see in ascians, but you and I know from experience that not all humans are like that. Many of us are charitable, help those in need, and sacrifice for others and some of us even help rehabilitate wildlife or insects without receiving anything in return. Average people, though, simply don't think of insects as being aware enough to truly suffer or feel, so we don't think it's evil to swat a fly or step on an ant in our home. As a whole, we believe that expanding human civilization (keeping our society clean and free of insects) is a greater existence and that relatively, they don't even feel pain compared to us so what we do to them is not wrong. Is that evil? I certainly don't know, but this is the same ideology we carry out that it seems the ascians are doing (albeit they are enslaved to a god against their will). I think judging them as evil or selfish is simply ignorant bias since we don't know what they experience. Perhaps the cosmos' scale may not tip in our direction; maybe they're not evil but are actually in the right in the court of the cosmos. Maybe one member of their race experiences a thousandfold the pleasure, pain, knowledge, and beauty than one of Hydaelyn's fractured children. If so, maybe we should not attribute to them malicious traits and instead try to understand that they may simply be ignorant and not understand that even if our experience is smaller, our pain is still real. It doesn't necessarily mean they have evil/selfish intent. Think of it like this, they're EMTs/lifeguards/coast guard trying to save a man in the ocean from the jaws of a shark. When they arrive at the scene, the morally responsible choice seems to be to kill the shark if it keeps resisting. Few people would say that the shark's life is of more value than the person's so in this analogy we can understand the ascian existence better. We are very stubborn and resist everything they do with all our being, so their only option is to kill and weave tragedy to skirt around people like us that might harm the "greater good." I understand why you distrust them, and there are some very valid reasons, but I want to see the good in them. There's a possibility it may turn out that we discover the forces behind their star's undoing, and go "wait hol up, the ascians aren't the big threat here" or "they're a symptom of a bigger problem!" If that comes to pass, I have no idea what Elidibus would do (if he is still alive at that point), but either way I'm more stoked for the 5.x patches and 6.0 than I've ever been for this game.

[@DarthSanguine]

It wasn't a third half of their population that was to be sacrificed - it was all of the new life that had come to be after the 2nd sacrifice, once there was enough of it.

[@DanTalksGames]

@@jonpowers4318 See, to me the whole 'we are as but ants to them' argument hasn't really flown with me in the month since ShB came out. It's a false equivalence because ants are literally not capable of sapient and sentient thought; they're unable to adapt, learn complicated processes, and reflect upon introspective philosophical matters. The fragmented races of the source and the Ascians both are; they are able to communicate on an equal footing, and we can comprehend the philosophical and emotional processes the Asicans show us. They're not some C'thulian entity that is so completely incomprehensible that we go mad trying to understand them. The only difference between the Source races and that Ascians is that the Ascians have the raw biological advantage of possessing bodacious reserves of aether and the capability to use that aether to shape matter out of thin air as they see fit...which makes sense, because the Source races are literally Ascians who've just been fragmented. Emet-Selch's prejudice is a completely irrational one borne from a mindset of genetic superiority. As for the fact we don't know what they experience...sure, we certainly don't, but we don't really have anything but Emet-Selch's flowery prose to go off about that. He may be experiencing a thousand times the raw sensation we are. But he may not be either. We don't know how literal he is about that. And even then, his ignorance is no excuse. There definitely is a question about what it means for such a being to experience such powerful emotion and whether all that sensation justifies putting himself (and that of his dead race) above those who currently live. I should make it clear, I'm not saying Emet-Selch is intentionally lying or being manipulative. He's not a Zenos-level psychopath, most definitely, and I believe him genuine when he says he wants to bring back his loved ones. What I think he is though, is exactly what I said he is: biased. He's looking down from a place of power and his view is coloured by that. Even in Amaurotine society, he was in a position of authority high above the average person, said to be a magus of incredible aptitude even amongst the old Asicans. This doesn't line up with what he presents of Amaurot being a truly egalitarian society, and in many ways this is the issue with a lot of ideas of Utopia and why they're deconstructed a lot in fiction: it presents itself as perfect when really there are flaws and cracks, or at the very least tradeoffs for the kind of society they're running. And of course, the person who notices those flaws the least is likely to be a person in a position where most of those flaws don't affect them...like a high-ranking, well-respected, and extremely talented official. And that's why I question whether the version of Amaurot we saw was true to form of if it was merely flowery recreation. Again, I don't think Emet-Selch is pulling wool over our eyes intentionally. What I think is that he's looking at things through the rose-coloured glasses of a man of great power and influence in his own society. He misses the better times, and his idea of Amaurot is shaped by that. That's not his fault, that's just the reality of how his situation played out and why he would develop the sort of superiority complex that leads him to thinking himself above others, while ignoring the faults and foibles in his own ideas and conceptions.

[@Beneficialitificul]

Very insightful. I hadn't quite looked at it that way.. Emet-Selch's recreation of Amaurot's inhabitants being a kind of interpretation of how HE saw them being completely the antithesis of the real truth of who they were and their fears and plight. Like numbers. Very intriguing and would make sense considering just how hard to swallow the Utopia he described is.

[@TheSMBZfan1]

@M. Woller - You're right, but that begs the question how big of a fraction would be enough to do it if it is indeed possible? Something tells me they wouldn't stop until all their loved ones were back, and if that took all the new races to do, so be it.

[@TheLoneSpartan1128]

10/10 amazing

[@ridewild1956]

my prediction on the situation with Hydaelyn and Zodiark is that their similar to aura and morgana mode gone from .hack two deity's that are connected yet the one we fight for may have to die for the world to be born again

[@HydroHomies]

Where did you get the soundtrack?

[@eivarden]

(1) thought it was a translation error in saying the 14th members left, but instead, there were 13 members, and a 14th was added. (2) thinking on it, bahamut was used as an example of the primal not being the same as the original. So maybe Zodiark was meant to be the planets will given consciousness, but maybe it had a consciousness prior, and zodiark, like bahamut, is the "false" one, along with hydalyn. But maybe acian summons work differently, and they only gave consciousness to "part" of the planets will, which maybe zodiark was the "bad part" that was causing the problem in the 1st place. (hence why it was able to fix the problem.) the planets life stream moaned, and ill assume its like FF7 in that regard. maybe creation magic was hurting the planet, and this lead to the disaster. zodiark wanting sacrifices might be a part of the planets plan, that wants to stop the summoners creation magic, by constantly asking for reductions in population (less likly, since the cost was before zodiark) someone might have been aware of this, and suggested the original sacrifice. maybe someone had ulterior motives, knowing a primal made of sacrifice, would create a god who's all about sacrifice. its interesting to try and guess.

[@i.147]

Hythlodeus says that at the time Zordiark was summoned, it wasn't the Convocation of Fourteen anymore, but the Convocation of Thirteen, implying a fourteenth member did leave before Zordiark was summoned (and most likely wasn't tempered by him).

[@landar486_TV]

So would Krile and Arenvold be the source souls of Lamitt and Branden?

[@TheGlamourNazi]

Its not by chance that there are 13 gods in eorzea (counting nald and thal seperately) and 13 members on the council, right? (not counting the one that left)

[@EzekielExtrensic]

I am a bit confused maybe I missed it but when was it confirmed that the ascians were tempered?

[@unsungtalent21]

Crazy after endwalker

[@Ravenlion13]

Novranzivia is gonna be interesting lol

[@Kasaaz]

I really do hope Tupsimati is explained at some point...

[@aaaro88]

Star Trek Deep Space nine Season 1 episode 16 memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/If_Wishes_Were_Horses_(episode) The dreams, wishes, fears, nightmares, and stray thoughts of people become manifest leading to increasingly escalating doom. In my opinion, I think the people of Amerot were the tools of their own destruction through what I believe was a cascade of increasingly out of control creation magic or.. "Imagination gone wild" either they began experimented with destructive imagination itself, or imagined a few, maybe 13, 14 individuals have more power than normal leading to an inbalance that spiraled out of control.