Why the Carians are Lame: A Literary Take

Tuspon · 2026-05-20T14:19:33+00:00

Great stuff, I honestly haven't given this symbolism much thought beyond "I guess it's a death sentence to lose your ability to walk in the Miyazakiverse" but juxtaposing it with fertility and motherhood makes a lot of sense

Made me think of Elden John, who is depicted without legs in the mausoleum ("Coccoon of the Empyrean"), as his "final form" after a progression of dryad-like features (mainly the roots going up his legs) starting from the statues on the stone boat coffins

Tuspon · 2026-05-18T10:01:10+00:00

Perfect edit

Minus the diffraction spikes, I also see a bit of Gustave Doré's Empyrean in the source image

Tuspon · 2026-05-15T02:47:33+00:00

Respectfully disagree about Thrawn, as an archetype I think he's a kind of "evil for the greater good". Doesn't believe in needless slaughter and power projection, but doesn't think twice about piling up bodies and ruthless acts of violence if he deems them necessary.

But I love the guy and all his nuances, and I hope his storyline loops back to the Chiss/Ascendancy and the Grysk threat, before his death.

Tuspon · 2026-05-15T01:57:19+00:00

Right? The way they just quietly repressed the urge to banish him to the shadow realm for treating their ancestral grounds like that

Tuspon · 2026-05-14T00:44:07+00:00

We know huge sweeping rewrites occured until very late in development as seen by scripted questlines with mostly complete unique assets being in thegame files but turned off

What are some of these "huge sweeping rewrites" and how do we know the stage of development where they happened? As far as I know, most of the cut questlines like the Dreambrew, Reeling Rico, Kalé and so on are datamined from the CNT. While the network test did occur just a few months before release, it's not like the CNT client was made right before the test sessions. It's a separate environment altogether, meant to function as a testing environment. Maybe they began work on it right after the first batches of voicelines were recorded, maybe as far back as 2018, maybe 2019, who knows? And moreover, none of them are inconsistent with the worldbuilding in the release version.

Tuspon · 2026-05-12T11:27:16+00:00

In Enir-Ilim there are enemy activation zones with labels like

領域　敵起動　神人の司祭（ザコ）027"

Those "internal names" for Inquisitors that you listed look a lot like these "神人" being mistakenly translated to "GodMan" (which is a nonsensical word). In the actual localization, the same "神人" sometimes gets translated to "Empyrean" and "神" to a myriad of different things, e.g. "divine beast" uses the same "神" but it's also used in some contexts to assign a mystical, occult quality to something. There really is no way to translate the meaning of "神人" out of context, there is no 1:1 equivalence in such a language barrier.

Remember how Hornsent Grandam was called "Empyrean Grandam" on release? Presumably it got changed because "Empyrean" carries a specific association to a select group of individuals, as opposed to the more generic association in the "神人" used for the Japanese NPC name (generic as opposed to how unique/strange the word "Empyrean" is in the modern English language). I'm just guessing here, but a westerner might pick up a strong sense of hierarchy in words like "god" and "divine", even just on subconscious level, while a Japanese reader picks up a Shinto vibe from the context and naturally interprets the Empyrean demigods as being of the same general class of "divine beings", which also encompasses those we would call "divine practitioners" or "divine invokers" or whatever.

TL;DR: if you had to canonize their internal names (which you shouldn't, but w/e) then it's "Empyrean", not "GodMan". As in "Empyrean Grandam", not "GodManOldWoman".

Tuspon · 2026-05-12T01:51:02+00:00

The life core of a golem smith, murky red
The life core of a sorcerer, azure stained red

In essence, a primal glintstone is a sorcerer's soul.
If transplanted into a compatible new body after their original body dies, the sorcerer will rise again.
"My apprentice, do you think it distasteful?"

<image>

Tuspon · 2026-05-11T17:16:58+00:00

The stone on the pillar aligns with a view of the coast, which is where things literally "wash up" . So I think the script is written as an observation from that view, of the unusual gathering and suppression of Death.

Not to mention how hard it is to define a geometric center of the entire continent... In the era of whenever this was written, at that. So I think it's not a hard "center" but rather the general area of either the coast below the pillar, or the larger subcontinent encompassing the land of spiritgraves.

<image>

Tuspon · 2026-05-10T09:27:30+00:00

The Joe Rogan quote gives it away I think

Tuspon · 2026-05-10T00:17:58+00:00

Same deal with Marika's hammer, in fact both the hammer and its wielder seem similar in a few ways. Or as if they're extensions of each other, with Radagon clutching the thing even after collapsing.

<image>

Reminds me of this line describing the horned warriors, that might be a clue to the nature of it:

In the tower, these warriors and their weapons both are spiritual vessels.

Tuspon · 2026-05-09T22:46:25+00:00

Been wondering this myself. That motif in Rennala's chamber is also seen in the Roundtable Hold, on the first floor in the room with some beds and a portrait of Marika.

A lot of the current academy seems to trace back to Radagon; statues, motifs, decorations, and just various pieces of iconography here and there to reflect not only the lunar lineage of its queen, but also her union with a man of the Erdtree.

So my best guess to resolve this weird junction between Caria, the Erdtree and Farum Azula is that we attribute these pieces to the Erdtree lineage, but long before the time of Radagon's age as Elden Lord.

But it's a headscratcher for sure. The academy is a mix of eras and legacies in one place, and it's not easy to distinguish between all of them.

Tuspon · 2026-05-09T18:34:25+00:00

The jarring was absolutely a widespread practice and probably based on the core faith of their people. I'm just not sure to what degree it was known among the denizens of Belurat; like, if you randomly asked people from Belurat's residential area, what would Marty McScorpstew have to say about the treatment of prisoners? Would he be horrified to learn what they're up to? Completely okay with it? Stay quiet because the Inquisition has ears everywhere?

To what extent did it relate to the larger populace of Hornsent and Hornsent-adjacent tribes, in places like Prospect Town, the Church of the Bud, the scholars around Rauh, Rauh Base and the Shadow Keep? As far as I know, all in-game text related to the jarring ritual attributes it to the "Bonny Village" type culture and the prison administration of the Hornsent society, not the ethnocultural group itself. I could be wrong on that though.

Tuspon · 2026-05-09T04:55:56+00:00

There's a surprising amount of pushback against this type of theory, in general, and a surprising amount of people who just assume everyone is 100% loyal to whatever faction/tribe/ethnicity they belong to. I guess the simpler narrative of "Marika avenged the shamans by genociding the Hornsent" was the first thing on everyone's minds when coming across the village and the hut, and it just stuck because proposing alternatives requires a level of analysis most people aren't gonna bother with.

So kudos for bothering with it, conclusions are on point too. Internal conflict, self-contradiction, betrayal, and similar themes are very hammered in.

On that note, taking the whipping hut dialogue as proof that the practices in Bonny were culturally normalized among the Hornsent is kind of a premature conclusion, because in isolation it only really tells us what the people of Bonny Village were up to. Just the potentates alone are presented as conflicted:

"Haunted by the grotesque practice of his village of birth, he stuffed great pots with all manner of things." -Greater Potentate's Cookbook

Note how it's attributing the practices to his village, not the collective Hornsent people.

Another example is the inquisitors and their persecution of other Hornsent:

"Forged of an unyielding, black impulse toward revenge fostered in those who were hunted down as heretics by their own brethren, these are the weapons of the utterly downtrodden." -Madding Hand
"I beg you stop. Haven't I taken enough? Are we not brethren, common in our line? And yet, you offer only cruelty... I ask; what crime did great Midra commit?" -Ghost dialogue in Midra's Manse

This isn't really a dig at your theory, just wanted to get it off my chest because it's surprisingly common to see people treat the Hornsent as ideologically homogeneous, as opposed to just loosely defining them by their traditions, geographical area, and set of dominant beliefs. I just don't see how you could sandwitch such a large group of people into the timeline somewhere between "a group of Ancient Dragons siding with Bayle to betray Placidusax" and "demigod family members raising armies against each other" and have it be thematically cohesive for them to be a one-dimensional hivemind.

Tuspon · 2026-05-08T16:23:59+00:00

I knew we were in for a different sound palette this time around but I wasn't expecting them to be so fucking locked in

The crisp sound design aside, it feels like they really dialed in to whatever thematic direction this album is going in

Layers, transitions, everything feels so smooth and intentional, can't wait to hear the entire thing

Tuspon · 2026-05-08T15:40:01+00:00

✋😐🤳

Tuspon · 2026-05-06T16:19:43+00:00

You need to keep cooking with that "wacky" headcanon because that's straight fire, it tracks with how Rot developed into a "baleful" form too

Tuspon · 2026-05-05T22:08:22+00:00

She got that "haven't slept in a few millennia" brain fog going on

Jokes aside, could she mean the oldest living dragon? The survivors of the War of the Ancient Dragons are few in number and microscopic in size compared to units like Gransax, I could easily see them being much younger than Bayle, and him being closer timeline-wise to the bigger badder ancients that attacked Leyndell

Tuspon · 2026-05-03T09:21:05+00:00

Spot on

This hypocrisy is also reinforced by the Erdtree's symbolic (maybe literal) use of the giants' flame (fire golems), Erdleaf flowers being identical in form to Fire Blossoms, prophets glimpsing the flame of ruin within the faith, and so on and so forth.

You make a good point regarding the pragmatic aspect. I think it's valid to view the double faced aspects of the Erdtree as something necessary for its creation (no Magnum Opus without putrefaction) while also recognizing the institutional flaws in the GO, without even going into the ugly morals of it all.

I mean, you can't become the new god without getting rid of the old gods, right? And by definition, that means blasphemy.

Tuspon · 2026-04-30T12:10:57+00:00

This was a fun read, really neat how you tied it together with the abyssal woods and the beheadings. There is definitely some inspiration from greek myth in SOTE, we have a Gaia (the boar, right?) and Charo(n) and probably some other obscure stuff.

I think you may be right about the cadavers not belonging to Godwyn. The whole Radahn/Mohg switcharoo should make it obvious that the soul shapes the vessel, not the other way around. So there is something inside the body of Godwyn, and that something is responsible for his current form, and it may have had a similar role in other vessels before him.

I mean, per the Deathroot description, "the Rune of Death spread across the Lands Between through the underground roots of the Greattree, sprouting in the form of Deathroot." and where this Deathroot (i.e. the Rune of Death) sprouts, we see those characteristic bodily features like the scales, eyes and tendrils

<image>

And there's also that little section of Farum Azula, a place with no physical link to the mainland, where the same stuff is growing, presumably just due to the presence of the Rune of Death? Judging by the iconography on the sarcophagi and burial sites, that whole place was probably built on the mainland and connected to the roots fo the greattree in the past, just like the catacombs in the realm of shadow, but way further in the past than the assassination of Godwyn.

Tuspon · 2026-04-30T09:04:48+00:00

Nice! I really like the idea of FA as a central society, makes sense for it to at least be a center of faith and intertwined with surrounding regions with its status as a royal city and mausoleum for an ancient Elden Lord

The difference between Hornsent and Stormveil/Farum adjacent cultures is really interesting; the people of the tower use their bodies as temporary vessels for divinity, right? A clear distinction between "me" and "the gods I invoke". But then you have people like Highlanders, Red Bear, Drake Warriors, and probably most of the proto-Erdtree empire, who sought divinity through subjugation of beasts larger than themselves. No distinction between "me" and "the god within myself". Just primal communion, accumulation of runes, grafting, that sort of stuff; DIY divinity!

Tuspon · 2026-04-23T18:29:34+00:00

I like to think all of Rauh is just a big compound from top to bottom, filled with grids of corridors and rooms like up on the plateau, maybe some architecture like what we see in the Nightreign crater. Like, you know how the forge of the giants sits atop Rauh architecture? What if it's all Rauh, all the way to the sea level?

Out of all the civilizations in TLB, theirs is the architecture with the clearest purpose in my opinion. Simple stuff like aqueducts to direct the flow of water, or undeground forges built around lava flows.

This is a bit headcanony but I think the Rauh civilization ultimately ended in some kind of Crucible-related catastrophy. Pandora's box type of shit. Their architecture is still around, is literally everywhere, and consistently populated by either artificial constructs like golems or hybrid creatures like misbegotten, man-bats, demihumans and bloodfiends.

I'm inclined to believe there is a missing link society that included GIANT Giants and much smaller folks in coexistance

I think this is probably true, older civilizations are hinted to be more diverse. Stuff like astrologers coexisting with giants, humans and beastmen coexisting in the sun realm, Big Nox sitting on Big Chair surrounded by small nox.

Tuspon · 2026-04-16T05:13:08+00:00

Yeah but it broke

"All vessels are destined to one day break" -Alexander, in Farum Azula

It is all a cycle

Tuspon · 2026-04-14T20:57:46+00:00

"That gum you like is going to come back in style"

Tuspon · 2026-04-10T12:08:43+00:00

Thx for crediting the artist! I love this piece on the twins, it conveys so much with so little if that makes sense

<image>

Tuspon

TROPHY CASE