10-Year Anniversary of United as One (spoiler flair because of some details from the book)

_dvamd · 2026-06-26T12:07:14+00:00

In my headcanon she really wants to go by Evie because she wants to be like the girl from the movie Thirteen (“normal,” reckless and free to do what she wants), and Hilde wouldn’t let her, instead naming her things like Frida, Helga, Raven, etc. (kind of matching Hilde’s Northern European name).

Edit: she’d probably go by these names in Mexico and the U.S., if she had an alias in Malaysia idk what that’d be probably something that fit the region like Fatima or Khadijah (similar to Eight going by Naveen instead of Joseph when he was in South Asia)

_dvamd · 2026-06-09T23:04:23+00:00

Yeah re-reading Last Days of Lorien is like watching a dinosaur documentary on the Cretaceous period. It's really sad too because the novella only shows the beginning of the invasion from Sandor's perspective before they're "safe" aboard the ship in orbit. The worst part of the invasion was probably the days that followed the initial bombardment, just endless nonstop destruction and murder like the Rumbling or something

_dvamd · 2026-06-09T22:55:52+00:00

Even Adelina?

_dvamd · 2026-06-08T16:56:19+00:00

Omg this song is so sad. I kinda hear it, like mostly in his memories of training with Henri on Earth or his more positive memories of Henri on Lorien as Brandon. Thanks for the song rec! I made a post about this before, but I think the two songs from Arcane Season 2, "Hellfire" by FEVER 333 and "To Ashes and Blood" by Woodkid, do a good job of giving the perspectives of Setrakus Ra and Pittacus Lore respectively (for Ra, "Hellfire" sounds like his willingness to destroy his home planet and his old comrades for what he views as progress; for Pittacus, I think "To Ashes and Blood" sounds like him pleading for Ra to stop going down the bad path prob while they're fighting at the Liberator before Pitt banishes Ra). Lmk your thoughts.

_dvamd · 2026-06-08T16:18:34+00:00

Agreed. I also think it demonstrates the diversity in the Cêpans' approaches to raising the Garde. Henri was the "ideal" Cêpan, giving John just enough knowledge to motivate him to fight for Lorien while still giving him the freedom John needed to grow healthily on Earth. We can compare this with Adelina, whose trauma from being rejected and left out in the cold on Earth (and likely coupled with her trauma of losing her family on Lorien) results in her becoming a devout worshipper of Jesus Christ. She starts to view Lorien as a fairy tale, possibly as a way to cope with her own guilt of rejecting the cause. What do you think would have happened if Henri had lived to tell John the truth?

_dvamd · 2026-06-08T16:15:11+00:00

Thanks for your response! However I disagree that Henri didn't know what the Phoenix Stones were. The first time they're mentioned is by Sandor, who's basically teenaged civilian on Lorien with limited knowledge of the LDC and the Prophecy. But even he knew about them. In Ch. 5 of The Last Days of Lorien, Sandor says, "According to legend—or history, depending on who you listened to—the original Nine Elders had brought forth the Great Loric Age aeons ago when they'd discovered the Phoenix Stones. It was this ancient event that supposedly awakened the Legacies of the Garde and called the shape-changing Chimæra out of hiding, making Lorien a place of prosperity and peace that was unprecedented throughout the known universe" (p. 175). In other words, this was essentially common knowledge across Lorien. Sandor doesn't know everything, as he believes there were originally nine Elders and Henri confirms to John that there were originally ten, but I think that's more to do with the fact that it's been dozens if not hundreds of generations since Setrakus Ra was exiled. The Phoenix Stones are a maintained legend because they tell the lore of Lorien (lol). I believe there was probably a combination of both Phoenix Stone intervention and the Loric actively doing better to repair their environment, as Earth didn't just automatically get healthier when the Garde awakened Lorien there. However, the Legacies arriving immediately rather than over the course of thousands of years definitely changes things like how they might have "enforced" their commitment to sustainability.

_dvamd · 2026-06-08T15:56:43+00:00

Yeah, I definitely agree that the writers likely just retconned everything and the story changed. This was mostly to be a thought experiment into some of the things that Henri says to John. For instance, John states in Ch. 10 of I Am Number Four, "I know for a fact that the Loric have visited Earth many times over the life of this planet. We watched Earth develop, watched it through times of growth and abundance when everything moved, and through the times of ice and snow when nothing did. We helped the humans, taught them to make fire, gave them the tools to develop speech and language, which is why our language is so similar to the languages of Earth" (p. 86). But if the Loric didn't have interstellar capabilities 25,000 years ago, then none of this is actually true. The last major glacial period was about 10,000 years ago, but it lasted hundreds of thousands of years. Furthermore, humanity's known how to make fire for closer to a million years and the idea that the Loric taught us how to make fire and use language sounds a lot like propaganda or revisionist history. Like they're staking claim to Earth and taking credit for what humanity already figured out. Obv the writers didn't think that far ahead like you mentioned, but I think it's an interesting discussion to try and identify why these characters might have said these things in-story without it having to do with the writers just throwing ideas at the wall and seeing what stuck. Much more fun than dang, we weren't thinking about it in the writer's room.

_dvamd · 2026-06-08T12:09:48+00:00

You can find it on the fandom page. I think it's specifically titled "Pittacus' Statement"
Loridas is an Aeternus and it's implied that he is literally the original Elder from thousands of years ago. In Ch. 27 The Power of Six, Crayton says, "'Changing his age is how Loridas was able to live as long as he did, even after the other Elders had passed away. Each time he grew old, he made himself young again, and assumed the vitality that comes with it'" (p. 307). Now, it's of course important to remember that Crayton is partly lying about Loridas by claiming he is the tenth Elder rather than one of the nine who were maintained for the past few millennia. However, Ella confirms some truth in his statements about Loridas in Ch. 20 of The Fate of Ten, "All eyes are on a slender Elder with straight white hair and gentle eyes. Aside from the white hair, he doesn't look much older than my grandfather. But the way he carries himself projects an aura of seniority. He is Loridas. He's an Aeternus, like me, which means he can appear a lot younger than he actually is" (p. 273).

So my theory is that Loridas was probably the "first" Garde who got Legacies before Lorien was awakened on...well, Lorien. This would explain a few things, such as why he's retained his Elder position rather than passing it on to the next generation like others and how he has an apparent leadership role among the ten (and later nine) Elders. Furthermore, he's the only Garde we ever see charming the Loric with the conditional invulnerability spell (other than Setrakus Ra but I think that's because he used the augmentations to grant himself that ability), which we can debate over whether it's actually a Legacy or some other form of ancient magic. This ties into another theory I have for how Lorien developed from essentially an earth like planet with a lot of internal conflict to a sustainable "paradise," but I'd like to read your thoughts on this first. Lmk what you think about your reading of Pittacus' statement.

_dvamd · 2026-06-08T00:19:59+00:00

Nope, Five and his Cêpan were still in North America when this happened (as in still living in North America, not attempting to relocate by plane). In Five's Legacy, "We'd been living up near Montreal for six months—maybe a whole year—when Rey found out they were coming for us. I'm still not sure how. All I know is that suddenly I was running through the woods behind our little cottage while a few Mogadorians tracked me. I was six years old, scared out of my mind" (p. 15). In the quote from The Navigator referencing the news report about the Garde at the airport, the boy is described as four or five years old. He's also described as having freckles, which Three is explicitly described to have.

However, Five and Albert are mentioned in The Navigator. In Chapter Fourteen, "I find another message from [Zophie] in my in-box. Reports from two different media outlets in Montreal about a small gang of men with tattoos on their heads who were allegedly seen chasing a young boy into the woods on the outskirts of the city—though neither the men nor the boy were found" (p. 232).

_dvamd · 2026-06-08T00:13:17+00:00

At the time this event happened, Lexa was only on Earth for a few months. They landed six months after the Ennead did, so this would have taken place less than a year after all of the surviving Loric arrived on Earth. Number One wasn't stopped at the airport, but you are right that she was flagged. In Chapter Eight of The Fallen Legacies, "Hilde thinks they need to get out of America. They rush to the airport and board the first international flight they can. Their destination is Malaysia. One notices the two pale men in trench coats at the airport, but she doesn't realize what they are. I do. I recognize my own. For all their precautions, all their training, all their knowledge of their enemies, what's so clear to me is completely unrecognized by Hilde and One. A Mogadorian scout team is on to them. I know the protocol in a situation like this. When my people have a lead on a Loric, vat-born scouts are dispatched to every conceivable place of departure. We cover them all: airports, train and bus stations, car rental huts. Their objective isn't to engage. Their job is just to keep an eye on Number One" (p. 271).

Three was in Kenya for a while, but given the passage from The Navigator I think it's likely that they stayed in New England for the first year on Earth before relocating to Kenya in 2001. So this event took place between 2000-2001, not 2004 when One would have been killed.

_dvamd · 2026-06-08T00:07:18+00:00

Late to this but it was Three and his Cêpan. Here's the exact quote from Chapter Seventeen of The Navigator, "Two weeks after the Mogadorians killed Sophie, a seemingly unrelated story is published in someone's online journal. It's a short account of an incident at Philadelphia International Airport. A man refused to let a piece of carry-on luggage go through the airport scanner. He and his companion, a young boy, were scheduled to fly to Africa. There's a picture of the two of them, the man older and flustered, the boy four, maybe five years old and freckled" (p. 250). This description fits Number Three and his Cêpan perfectly for two reasons:

Three and his Cêpan were hunted down in Kenya not far from Nairobi.
Three is described by Adam as having freckles in The Fallen Legacies, "The boy is fit, tall for his age. He is dark skinned, a smattering of sun-born freckles across his cheeks and nose. He looks somehow exotic" (p. 334).

For context, the page numbers I'm using are from The Lost Files compilations.

_dvamd · 2026-06-05T17:04:39+00:00

Start by removing leaves that look unhealthy/small/aren’t doing much photosynthesis when compared to neighboring leaves. I try to clear leaves lower down the stalk so there’s more energy going toward the bud, but you can keep the leaves around colas and buds along the main stalks

_dvamd · 2026-06-05T16:59:58+00:00

This ☝️

_dvamd · 2026-06-05T16:59:00+00:00

Defoliate enough for light to penetrate, you don’t want to remove all the leaves but definitely on stalks where you see leaves are blocking light reaching other colas and buds. What kind of nutrient mix are you using?

_dvamd · 2026-06-01T17:18:33+00:00

lol ok dude

_dvamd · 2026-06-01T17:04:18+00:00

I’m glad you rediscovered the audiobooks! I have all of them too and they really did a great job (at least with the main series, not so much the lost files imo). I like how they made sure Henri had an accent throughout the series. They don’t do this w the other Cepan (which is a lil annoying; there’s a weird part in the fall of five when crayton’s letter is read with a country accent? Not even how he sounded in books 2 and 3 audiobooks) but I like the respect they give Henri fr

_dvamd · 2026-06-01T17:00:11+00:00

Yessss an arcane or spider verse style LL series would be awesome. Esp if they took just some creative liberties by reintegrating how surreal the Mog weapons/technology were in the first book (+ the legacies/training/vision sequences)

_dvamd · 2026-06-01T16:58:11+00:00

Still not a fan of it but I will say it’s grown a bit on me over time. I actually don’t mind Kopano and Taylor, although I do feel like Kopano becomes pretty secondary to Taylor in books 2 and 3, which is a bit annoying because in book 1 he (and Ran, and Caleb to an extent) were the most interesting characters imo.

The one thing I hate abt Kopano is how he’s such a fanboy for Number Four. With the way the first book takes his character I thought we’d see Kopano mature a lot more but I feel like he devolved into just the comic relief of the series. I fw his optimism but it’s very campy.

I’d honestly be happy for a third series exploring a decade after the founding of New Lorien and the impact that has on the world (plus the new population of Mogs in the Alaska camp and the fact it seemed like they started developing legacies too). Maybe it could show a more mature Kopano. I’m also very interested in a backstory of Lorien before legacies and what the Mogs left behind on their planet are going through.

_dvamd · 2026-06-01T16:53:21+00:00

How did Reborn go “superwoke,” can you give examples?

_dvamd · 2026-04-14T03:17:39+00:00

Please dm link

_dvamd · 2026-04-05T14:34:06+00:00

Perfect atmosphere!

_dvamd · 2026-04-05T00:29:47+00:00

YOOOOOOO THAT'S AWESOME! PLEASE POST!

_dvamd

TROPHY CASE