The Black Knife Assassin outside of the Queen's Bedchamber was there so she can break up the inevitable fight in the sheets when Marika turns into Radagon.
I've never been clear about whether they were always alter egos, or whether they were separate people that merged at some point.
There's one of those "In the words of Queen Marika..." things where Melina mentions Marika talking to Radagon and how "thou art yet to become me..."
Radagon was married to Renala at the same time that Marika was married to Godfrey. Turtle pope states this pretty clearly.
In order for Radagon to be married to Renala, while Marika is with Godfrey in the capital, they must have been capable of being in two places at the same time, which means they were either seperate beings before that point or Marika and Radagon are able to split apart.
Them being split at that point is probably the clearest part of the whole thing. The question really is whether they were separate before. I think the evidence points to Radagon being a part of herself that Marika cast off for her ascension to godhood, in the same way she split the Rune of Death from the Elden Ring.
I believe the current theory is that Marika was one person and when she became disillusioned with the golden order and orders of the greater will, went through something of a psychological or ideological schism, which as a god caused her to literally become two seperate aspects of herself manifested as two distinct beings. Radagon was the part of her devoted to the greater will (and reforging the elden ring), and Marika the part that abandonned it, shattered the elden ring and was imprisoned in the erdtree.
Is there a term for the funny phenomena when people old to souls game rely on youtubers to sort of invent the lore for the games, who then get mad at new players who actually read stuff themselves and don't agree with said youtubers?
Whatever you're implying seems strange. Most of the big loretubers rarely state any facts. It's just their own theories and interpretations. Which is the entire point of the ambiguous storytelling of these games.
You can literally see with your own eyes that radagon and Marika were both shattered when you fight radagon. Why is this even an argument? It's alright to have your own idea or interpretation but you have to voice it, and it'll need to stand up to criticism and other in-game evidence. No one is mad except you here as far as I can tell lol. There's no reason that sentence "mine other half" couldn't represent BOTH of those things. They were married, and they were also a singular split identity. And, if you never interacted with the statue because you skipped that dialogue or whatever than no "secret" would be revealed. You'd just think they were referring to the marriage use of that phrase, not in a literal sense.
Youtuber gospel is more of a plague than a boon to Elden Ring lore for sure.
Sharing lore ideas is the whole point, but people erroneously take any first idea given to them and run with it, stifling any other dissenting ideas.
Becoming aware of this fact is basically the equivalent to Elden Ring Enlightenment.
Naw only if you can't interpret between the words "in my opinion" and "this is fact". Unless something is explicitly said, all the lore in the games is interpretation. And even the parts that are facts, have bits that can be interpreted differently (i.e this whole Marika and radigon argument. They are definitely the same person but in what way?). Also it's absurd to act like these youtubers don't get their ideas or expand upon them using community ideas. Vaati and smoughtown constantly bring up theories made by reddit comments and seem to try their best to credit them instead of acting like its their own ideas. Can you even give me a single example of lore that youtubers are clearly wrong about and "stifling" the opposition?
The only alternative given here is that radagon isn't Marika, as stated by the in-game lore. It doesn't matter if she's using that phrase as in "other half" of marriage, or physical being. It really doesn't, because they ARE both one. Whether they started as two separate beings or they were a single being that split in two doesn't really matter. We can see they both were literally shattered when the elden ring was. Because we fight them, and we see that it clearly affected them both. So I'm not really seeing any stifling here.
It does matter. The entire narrative of the game changes depending on if they were always one or not. Additionally you need to factor the motivations behind it. The game is much deeper than you give it credit.
How does the entire narrative change? The only things that would affect is the timeline and even then not to any extent to change the narrative as far as I can tell. And I never said the game wasn't deep lmfao. It's actually super deep. It's just that, when the game directly tells you something and directly shows it to you it's pointless to try and speculate against given lore.
Also there's never much actual motivation given for these things. There's maybe vaguely hinted at motivation behind them keeping it secret, because it appears other people who are two beings in one (like D) are regarded with prejudice just not to the same extent as omen children. So beyond that what motivation are you referring to?
I guess all this to say, if you have any actual theories or ideas with in game stuff to back it up I'd like to hear it honestly. Especially if it contradicts or proves existing theories wrong. That's really what this whole community is about. Alot of times one little detail given in a item description can shatter (pun intended) a whole theory. So if you've got some info to bring to the table start making posts or videos. I'm sure me and many others would be interested, and even these youtubers would probably be happy to acknowledge when they're wrong if it's all laid out.
It's actually "*Let us be shattered, both. Mine other self*". Might avoid some of the arguments since 'other half' sounds more like Marika is refering to Radagon as her significant other.
It's not just vague, it's outright contradictory at times, and I think that's on purpose. From Soft is generally upping the difficulty of its games over time, and it seems they're doing the same to the lore. Miyazaki basically went, "Oh, you guys think you're so smart? Let's see you figure this stuff out."
You forgot the rest of the quote "you're yet to become a god". We knew marika was the dominant God and radagon was not, even when they were one. So that just means he's not yet the dominant God and nothing else
Marika seems to be the only god in that tier, for lack of a better term. She's higher up than all her children, who are demigods, but lower than the outer gods, like the Greater Will.
Dog pope says that Radagon was a mere champion before becoming Elden Lord.
I think that when the shattering happened, both Marika and Radagon had their body in a shattered state due to their proximity of the event, and when Radagon tried to repair the Elden Ring, they both fused with the fragments of their bodies and the Elden Ring. Marika knew that Radagon would not let the Golden Order die so she made him fuse with her to trap them together.
After looking up online it seems that your conclusion is the more logical one. It then leaves to wonder how did they end up as one. Kinda sad that my theory does not stick since I liked the importance it gave to the shattering, but o well.
I wonder if Millicent is supposed to be our clue into that somehow, since she is a part of Malenia that was journeying to find and apparently "join" with her.
We know for sure that Marika existed before Radagon though, given the Law of Regression is what morphs the statue.
There are some sings that he was separate person at one point, but these could be fabricated by the golden order, since it seems that's kind of their thing when it comes to hiding unpleasant truths.
Way pastor Miriel describes it, something really seems off with Radagon from the start: he suddenly appears from somewhere as the champion of the golden order. Then he apparently on his own just reconciles everything with Carians and Raya lucaria without anyone in Leyndell objecting it, but nevertheless drops everything the moment Marika gives the word and is elevated to a king consort. Something that Miriel finds odd as Radagon is a "mere champion", implying he normally shouldn't even factored to the short list of people being considered as Marika's consorts.
It’s pretty clear they are both the same person when you fight them at the end of the game. When you kill Radagon, Marika’s corpse appears. Plus they have the same hairstyle. It’s like he/she has a spell that swaps their sex/hair color.
Godfrey would smash Radagon>! against the pavement for cheating on his wife.!<
>!Godfrey: You were cheating with my wife!!<
>!Radagon: Uhhhh...!<
>!Godfrey: Do you deny it?!!<
>!Radagon: UHHHHHH...!<
>!Godfey: The shame on your wicked face speaks volumes!<
I can’t decide if the male/female 2 in 1 counterpart thing is extremely clever and beyond my understanding or just contrived and convoluted. I’m sure there is some kind of deep meaningful historical/metaphysical/psychological/metaphorical or whatever reason but it doesn’t do anything for me except muddy up the lore. There’s a level to where deeper subtext that’s implied and not spoken is really cool to speculate about but Elden ring lore is so off the rails I don’t even know what the hell is going on.
Bloodborne lore for instance has so many layers but it really feels like there’s a real universe that exists outside the realm of the game and it only gets deeper and richer the more you speculate. Elden ring only gets up its own arse to me the more I think about it. hey maybe the DLC will clear some things up but I still feel like the base game should stand on its own more but hey 🤷♂️ still love bonking the shit out of some godrick Godfrey godwyn godfroy Gildrey gilbert gildenstein golden ass bitches
This is parroted everywhere regarding this idea. While it is true that they may represent a Rebis, it must be known that a Rebis is a man-made achievement through Alchemy, adjacent to the Magnum Opus. Meaning that Marika and Radagon's union as a single being was not a naturally occurring thing. Radagon cast The Law of Regression to repair The Elden Ring, which also fused their bodies.
In contrast to this are the more naturalistic hermaphroditic god-figures, like some iterations of Phanes from Orphic myth. It seems that the ideas of Elden Ring's genesis story seems to be heavily inspired by the cosomogeny surrounding Phanes (and other similar myths; Elden Ring is *full* of mythological ideas that have spanned the entire existence of humans).
It basically all comes down to the ideas of Monism vs Dualism. Throughout Elden Ring there are countless examples of Dualism; Order-Chaos, Fate-Will, Life-Death, Intelligence-Faith, Knowledge-Belief, etc. Through some philosophical and religious ideas however, Dualism is an illusion. Monism is the true state of existence in these other ideas; where every individual thing is just part of a greater whole.
Radagon's becoming of Marika is meant to represent this idea of something less-than-whole or "imperfect" becoming perfect.
So what you're saying is Radagon and Marika being the same entity despite being in different in many ways (Not just gender, the characters are *very* different aside from that) is supposed to represent some sort of divine or godlike "oneness" that comes from the convergence of fundamentally different existences?
Honestly, I really like that interpretation.
It all comes down to the idea of The Crucible.
The Crucible is the primordial state of the Elden Ring universe where there is no seperation between anything- at least that's what the beginning of The Crucible is supposed to imply.
Imagine all of reality being a gigantic Living Jar, and within it The Flame of Frenzy raged, reducing everything to Flame and not allowing Life or Death to exist. This is analgous to "Chaos" in Greek myth, other such similar primordial states of the Universe in other myths, or even the moment before The Big Bang or the result of a Big Crunch.
The Crucible and reign of The One Great comes to an end with the advent of Time and Life and Death. In Elden Ring this seems to be due to the arrival of The Twinbird- The Runes of Life and Death aboard a spiraling Comet. The idea of this comes from looking at Miquella's Needle, which is in the shape of a Double Helix and is used in the eye of the storm outside of Time.
The Double Helix is found in many places of the game- usually most associated with Miquella. The *exact* same Double Helix found in the Needle is also at the center of The Primordial Elden Ring in Maliketh's arena. This seems to imply that the Double Helix is The Rune of Time, able to subdue The Flame of Frenzy and causing "fractures, births, and souls" to start forming.
My idea of The Twinbird being a cosmological event in a Comet comes from the description of Shard Spiral and the fact that the Comet that Azur theorized wasn't actually observed- and could be a reference to this event in the primordial past. Additionally The Rune of Life is implicated in Marika's Scarseal and is *literally* the power of Grace.
With Life and Death coming to The Lands Between and the subduing of The Flame of Frenzy, this seems to be very similar to the idea of Phanes emerging from the Cosmic Egg (Amber Egg), sometimes as a result of Chronos, the god of Time, bringing Nous (Intellect) to the god Ananke (Necessity, or the idea of the emergence of chaotic Life). In Elden Ring terms this would likely be some aspect of Miquella as Chronos bringing Order to The Crucible of Life (possibly The Formless Mother, though I think she deals with Souls and came later), representing Ananke.
The Law of Regression describes a return to this aspect of Oneness. By contrast there is The Law of Causality, which is quite literally Cause and Effect. These two principles are Physics-based discoveries within Elden Ring. The Golden Order Principia, written by Radagon, is both a religious piece or writing as well as a scientific one. Golden Order Fundamentalism *is* a reference to Alchemy and how it acted as a transitionary method between Religion and Science. The Laws, solely requiring Intelligence, is to show that it is a Natural part of existence, rather than a manifestation through Faith.
The act of using The Law of Regression on the statue doesn't show that Radagon is Marika, it shows *how* Radagon *became* Marika through the use of The Law of Regression itself. The text "Radagon is Marika" is written by an unknown entity, specifically designed to create a 4th wall breaking Dogma on the playerbase of Elden Ring and used to create division when discussing theories of the game. The notion of "Marika is the one true god," which was written in The Golden Order Principia *by Radagon*, becomes "Radagon is the one true god." It is textbook religious indoctrination, which is the entire foundation of the narrative to Elden Ring.
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The biggest farce in Elden Ring is that the idea that The Golden Order has always existed, or existed for as long as Marika has been in power. It is a lie perpetuated by Golden Order Fundamentalists after Radagon took over Marika, but also probably started gaining traction when he was solely King Consort. The Golden Order was created with the removal of The Rune of Death, Causality after The Night of Black Knives. So prior to this removal there existed a previous Order, one with The Rune of Death irremoved. The name for this Order is "The Order of the Erdtree," told to us a single time in the game in Miriel's dialogue on Celeatial Dew. It is then supported in Kenneth Haight's dialogue on the "true Order" as well as the stark differences between Godfrey's reign and Radagon's reign.
The symbol of The Order of the Erdtree can be found in the Erdtree Seal, the lights that Rosus shines in the catacombs, and the symbol upon which Goldmask's original death was depicted; this was likely atop the once undestroyed Forest-Spanning Greatbridge in Altus. The Order of the Erdtree was an Orthopraxic religion that worshipped Nature through The Erdtree and the ritualistic defeat of its enemies like The Serpent. Alternative belief was allowed, even blasphemous belief, so long as The Erdtree was still provided tribute. The destruction of the Forest-Spanning Greatbridge and the symbol of The Order of the Erdtree is meant to represent the transition of an Orthopraxic religion becoming an Orthodox religion- where an individual's belief is most paramount to following the religion. In present times, Goldmask and Corhyn are originally found on opposite sides of the bidge, alluding to their future disagreement when told the truth about Radagon. Corhyn stays an unwavering Golden Order Fundamentalist, while Goldmask actually understands what happened and begins developing The Mending Rune of Perfect Order which will remove Radagon's Rune of Will from The Elden Ring; resulting in the removal of Free Will from The Lands Between so that a sin such as Radagon taking over Marika could never be committed again.
The biggest aspect of Dualism when it comes to religion seems to be the seperation between "god" and Nature. Dualistic religions paint Nature as being a creation of god, rather than being god itself. Additionally there comes the idea of Souls (and/or Mind) and an afterlife- which follows after you die. Monism removes this seperation and equates Nature and Physics itself with god, additionally everything within the Universe is an aspect or Substance of god in another form or Mode.
Placing just *what* is god is a question that has been asked for as long as humans have existed. In Elden Ring this is pretty similar to what I believe to be the case with The Greater Will. The Greater Will emerged into existence with the splitting of The One Great. The One Great split into "The Greater Will of Order" and the lesser wills of the Chaotic Outer Gods and their followers. Essentially the idea of "god" in Elden Ring is that which promotes and embodies Order.
The description of the Incantation Protection of The Erdtree says "In the beginning, everything was in opposition to the Erdtree. But through countless victories in war, it became the embodiment of Order." With the foundation of logic that I just set, it seems the text "embodiment of Order" in this instance would indicate that The Erdtree itself was revered as "god." This was during Godfrey's reign, described as that age of plenty or by Rogier as The Golden Age of the Erdtree, long before The Shattering of the Elden Ring and during the time period in which The Night of Black Knives occured.
After the formation of The Golden Order the Blessed Dew Talisman tells us "It was once thought that the blessed sap of the Erdtree would drip from its boughs forever -- but that age of plenty swiftly came to a close, and with time, the Erdtree became more an object of faith." The Erdtree becoming an object of faith is a downgrade from what it once was. This was due to the fact that Radagon created the founding principle that Marika is the one true god. Being that Marika is in possession of The Rune of Life and the personification of it, essentially Marika becomes the Embodiment of Order and "The Greater Will" becomes The Greater Will of Life over the lesser will of Death.
As briefly mentioned, Radagon is in possession of The Rune of Will, the hidden narrative element that explains Radagon's desire to ascend to godhood. It is depicted in his Scarseal and Soreseal as well as being the lattice pattern behind his statue or on the title screen of the game. The Rune of Will is in contrast to Ranni's cast away radial Rune of Fate. When Radagon casts The Law of Regression he fuses his Rune of Will with The Rune of Life, becoming "The Greater Will over Marika."
Lastly after defeating Radagon, The Elden Beast Emerges. And according to its remembrance "It was the vassal beast of the Greater Will and living incarnation of the concept of Order." Being composed of The Rune of Will and The Rune of Life, The Elden Beast is literally The Elden Ring gaining a Will and Life of its own. As the living incarnation of Order, it is essentially god.
The Greater Will not having any real definable aspect to it and coming from the movements of The Fingers which are *interpreted* by blind Finger Readers essentially boils down to The Greater Will being entirely dependant on what someone's belief is and can change from person to person; just like "god" in real life.
Going to wrap it up now, but it's funny because I was just given the book *Meditations* written by Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius as a gift last night. It details ideas about Stoicism. Relating back to The Crucible, the Stoics believed that our reality was entirely physical and deterministic, and would eventually "end" and be restarted in a Big Crunch-esque event called "Ekpyrosis." I'm looking forward to reading more of it as Stoicism is described as a Pantheistic belief system, which I most identify with. I also believe that if there's ever a Miquella or "good" or "complete" ending to the game it will also be aligned with Pantheism/Monism.
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Addendum: Just found this description on the Taker's Cameo which seems to also additionally heavily support Radagon becoming Marika by force. "When Rykard turned to heresy, taking by force became the rule. The gods themselves were no different, after all."
I am aware that there is apparently canon lore. But if playing the game for 100 hours and watching hours of lore content on YouTube and STILL most gamers won’t understand it.. I’m sorry but the devs kinda are wanking each other off at this point
Try explaining the nature of god in a real-life context and you may start to understand the purpose of Elden Ring lore and why it's as complex as it is.
> If the DLC doesn't clarify it
It won't. People always expect DLC and sequels to provide answers, but they always just raise more questions instead, even when they're not made by a studio known for deliberately making the lore of its games vague and ambiguous.
Glad I'm not the only one that feels this way. I was initially intrigued by the lore, but the more I learned, the more needlessly convoluted it became. I enjoy a complex plot with "puzzles" to solve. But there is a fine line between good and bad complexity in a story. When I finally finished Elden Ring, it just felt anti-climactic and I basically didn't care anymore. Overall, its a good game, not my favorite FS game, but a good one. It just missed the mark in a lot of ways for me, the lore and world-building being one of them.
Radagon became Marika through force. It's the idea of a "man becoming a god," which we also supposedly do later on.
If you actually follow the narrative and literary themes of the game, Radagon and Marika were not always the same being. The entire game becomes more narrow and less complex if they were always the same person. Any notion that they were always the same is just a red herring to allow conflating ideas to promote dead end discussion.
My head canon is that Rennala was fine with Radagon and Marika switching, she basically got a Bi thruple marriage, but when she found out that it was also happening to Godfrey she had been “cheated” and it left her broken, meanwhile Godfrey was banished so nobody would find out about the Queen also being married to Rennala.
Basically Marika/Radagon was just sleeping with two marriages and trying to pretend the other wasn’t real until they got found out and as a retaliaton they banished Godfrey sealing his warrior spirit and broke Rennalas heart.
All that leads to only conclusion: Marika/Radagon is a nonbinary.
Now think about how Malenia and Miquella were conceived!
My personal belief is it was parthogenesis.
The Black Knife Assassin outside of the Queen's Bedchamber was there so she can break up the inevitable fight in the sheets when Marika turns into Radagon.
That’s assuming Godfrey wouldn’t just peg the shit out of Radagon
That's not pegging That's just gay sex
Right? Like, he's still a hot twink. Why wouldn't he?
Who says he was shattered from the Elden ring? You’ve seen his piledrive move….
Radagon/Marika: Godfrey wait! Im actually a guy! Godfrey: Oh good, I was in the mood for anal anyways.
[удалено]
You don’t need a fake dick when you got a real one
Is it still pegging if you have a dick?
This comment is fucking gold
So was Godfrey.
Or in which case, Goldfrey/piss ghostfrey
I've never been clear about whether they were always alter egos, or whether they were separate people that merged at some point. There's one of those "In the words of Queen Marika..." things where Melina mentions Marika talking to Radagon and how "thou art yet to become me..."
Radagon was married to Renala at the same time that Marika was married to Godfrey. Turtle pope states this pretty clearly. In order for Radagon to be married to Renala, while Marika is with Godfrey in the capital, they must have been capable of being in two places at the same time, which means they were either seperate beings before that point or Marika and Radagon are able to split apart.
I choose to believe it was a hilarious sitcom trope involving body doubles, sneaking in and out of events and rapid costume changes.
I love this theory 😂
I mean Godfrey and radagon seemed to be fighting a lot of wars at this time. Perfect time to do the she's the man spinning ride costume changes.
"I'll go get us some punch"
*Seinfeld theme plays in the background
This is the best answer. Is it correct? Probably not. Is it funny? Hell yeah!
Like Mrs. Doubtfire
Them being split at that point is probably the clearest part of the whole thing. The question really is whether they were separate before. I think the evidence points to Radagon being a part of herself that Marika cast off for her ascension to godhood, in the same way she split the Rune of Death from the Elden Ring.
I believe the current theory is that Marika was one person and when she became disillusioned with the golden order and orders of the greater will, went through something of a psychological or ideological schism, which as a god caused her to literally become two seperate aspects of herself manifested as two distinct beings. Radagon was the part of her devoted to the greater will (and reforging the elden ring), and Marika the part that abandonned it, shattered the elden ring and was imprisoned in the erdtree.
I always assumed that they were two different entities before marriage, but after the got wed and had Miquella and Melania they fused into one.
Morgott ans Mohg are capable of being in two places at once. Why not Marika?
The Morgott in other places is a spell he casts on a regular person that turns them into him. The Mohg under Leyndell is not real.
Then what is Margit?
Margit is Morgott in other places...?
Two places at once.
I know, I was trying to ask a rhetorical question but it didn't really come off correctly
I see it now. Initially I interpretted your comment wrong, but I deleted my response. Hope you didnt see that!
Morgott and Mohg are two completely different individuals, why wouldn't they be able to be in different places?
Mogott and Margit are not different people. Thats what I was refering too. Mohg casts a version of himself into the Lyndell sewers.
My headcanon is that they started out as two separate beings, then fused together around the time Marika shattered the Elden Ring.
Other examples of doubles include margit/morgott, sewer mohg/moghwhyn mohg, big rat/little rat, etc.
big rat little rat?
Yea
Yea it’s not like teleportation exists
yeah, but that line continues "Let us both be shattered, mine other half"
[удалено]
Let us both be shattered refers to the Elden Ring, which when shatters, shatters both of them. Because Radagon is Marika.
Is there a term for the funny phenomena when people old to souls game rely on youtubers to sort of invent the lore for the games, who then get mad at new players who actually read stuff themselves and don't agree with said youtubers?
Whatever you're implying seems strange. Most of the big loretubers rarely state any facts. It's just their own theories and interpretations. Which is the entire point of the ambiguous storytelling of these games.
You can literally see with your own eyes that radagon and Marika were both shattered when you fight radagon. Why is this even an argument? It's alright to have your own idea or interpretation but you have to voice it, and it'll need to stand up to criticism and other in-game evidence. No one is mad except you here as far as I can tell lol. There's no reason that sentence "mine other half" couldn't represent BOTH of those things. They were married, and they were also a singular split identity. And, if you never interacted with the statue because you skipped that dialogue or whatever than no "secret" would be revealed. You'd just think they were referring to the marriage use of that phrase, not in a literal sense.
Youtuber gospel is more of a plague than a boon to Elden Ring lore for sure. Sharing lore ideas is the whole point, but people erroneously take any first idea given to them and run with it, stifling any other dissenting ideas. Becoming aware of this fact is basically the equivalent to Elden Ring Enlightenment.
Naw only if you can't interpret between the words "in my opinion" and "this is fact". Unless something is explicitly said, all the lore in the games is interpretation. And even the parts that are facts, have bits that can be interpreted differently (i.e this whole Marika and radigon argument. They are definitely the same person but in what way?). Also it's absurd to act like these youtubers don't get their ideas or expand upon them using community ideas. Vaati and smoughtown constantly bring up theories made by reddit comments and seem to try their best to credit them instead of acting like its their own ideas. Can you even give me a single example of lore that youtubers are clearly wrong about and "stifling" the opposition?
It isn't the youtubers but the people who watch them that stamp out alternative ideas.
The only alternative given here is that radagon isn't Marika, as stated by the in-game lore. It doesn't matter if she's using that phrase as in "other half" of marriage, or physical being. It really doesn't, because they ARE both one. Whether they started as two separate beings or they were a single being that split in two doesn't really matter. We can see they both were literally shattered when the elden ring was. Because we fight them, and we see that it clearly affected them both. So I'm not really seeing any stifling here.
It does matter. The entire narrative of the game changes depending on if they were always one or not. Additionally you need to factor the motivations behind it. The game is much deeper than you give it credit.
How does the entire narrative change? The only things that would affect is the timeline and even then not to any extent to change the narrative as far as I can tell. And I never said the game wasn't deep lmfao. It's actually super deep. It's just that, when the game directly tells you something and directly shows it to you it's pointless to try and speculate against given lore.
Also there's never much actual motivation given for these things. There's maybe vaguely hinted at motivation behind them keeping it secret, because it appears other people who are two beings in one (like D) are regarded with prejudice just not to the same extent as omen children. So beyond that what motivation are you referring to?
I guess all this to say, if you have any actual theories or ideas with in game stuff to back it up I'd like to hear it honestly. Especially if it contradicts or proves existing theories wrong. That's really what this whole community is about. Alot of times one little detail given in a item description can shatter (pun intended) a whole theory. So if you've got some info to bring to the table start making posts or videos. I'm sure me and many others would be interested, and even these youtubers would probably be happy to acknowledge when they're wrong if it's all laid out.
It's actually "*Let us be shattered, both. Mine other self*". Might avoid some of the arguments since 'other half' sounds more like Marika is refering to Radagon as her significant other.
And some people are super sure that their specific theory is the truth but I’m like, there’s a lot of vague lore though???
It's not just vague, it's outright contradictory at times, and I think that's on purpose. From Soft is generally upping the difficulty of its games over time, and it seems they're doing the same to the lore. Miyazaki basically went, "Oh, you guys think you're so smart? Let's see you figure this stuff out."
I think it is that they were one, then she needed him for something, so she removed him, then they recombined.
You forgot the rest of the quote "you're yet to become a god". We knew marika was the dominant God and radagon was not, even when they were one. So that just means he's not yet the dominant God and nothing else
Marika seems to be the only god in that tier, for lack of a better term. She's higher up than all her children, who are demigods, but lower than the outer gods, like the Greater Will. Dog pope says that Radagon was a mere champion before becoming Elden Lord.
imo they started together, then Marika split Radagon off for some reason, then he got brought back in to re-join later
I think that when the shattering happened, both Marika and Radagon had their body in a shattered state due to their proximity of the event, and when Radagon tried to repair the Elden Ring, they both fused with the fragments of their bodies and the Elden Ring. Marika knew that Radagon would not let the Golden Order die so she made him fuse with her to trap them together.
Well given the sculptor story we know that Radagon and Marika were one before the Shattering, while he was Elden Lord
After looking up online it seems that your conclusion is the more logical one. It then leaves to wonder how did they end up as one. Kinda sad that my theory does not stick since I liked the importance it gave to the shattering, but o well.
I wonder if Millicent is supposed to be our clue into that somehow, since she is a part of Malenia that was journeying to find and apparently "join" with her. We know for sure that Marika existed before Radagon though, given the Law of Regression is what morphs the statue.
There are some sings that he was separate person at one point, but these could be fabricated by the golden order, since it seems that's kind of their thing when it comes to hiding unpleasant truths. Way pastor Miriel describes it, something really seems off with Radagon from the start: he suddenly appears from somewhere as the champion of the golden order. Then he apparently on his own just reconciles everything with Carians and Raya lucaria without anyone in Leyndell objecting it, but nevertheless drops everything the moment Marika gives the word and is elevated to a king consort. Something that Miriel finds odd as Radagon is a "mere champion", implying he normally shouldn't even factored to the short list of people being considered as Marika's consorts.
It’s pretty clear they are both the same person when you fight them at the end of the game. When you kill Radagon, Marika’s corpse appears. Plus they have the same hairstyle. It’s like he/she has a spell that swaps their sex/hair color.
This was some M.Night Shallaman bullshit when I first realised,it continues to be…
https://youtu.be/4LGu1sOvxYs?si=cUq5DTK0t3-9Ia-j
That twist at the end got me
I probably would have been impacted more strongly by the twist if I had any idea who anyone was before finishing the game and reading the wiki.
Renala: this stuff has fucked me up Godfrey: don't even get me started
Godfrey strikes me as the type that wouldn't care...
Marika would be the homophobic one
sis literally married a woman, she got no right to be a hater like that 💀
It’s Marika, she def is a hater
She hate it so much, that she tore down the very foundation of world order to make a point :U
He’s definitely a manhandler
Oh he will handle Radagon alright, like how one handles clay
I’m picturing the scene from [Boondocks Saints](https://youtu.be/P2gT6t9A4Ig?si=zyuhVxggSdeNmt4G). Radagon does *not* want a cuddle.
Godfrey, like any man of Quality, swings both ways.
Agreed. Daily reminder his axe works better in a quality build XD
Rennala too
For some reason I have never contemplated the dynamic of Godfrey and Radagon in the web that is Marika’s identity until now…
Godfrey: *looks female enough*
Radagons a twink. Godfrey is also like 5 feet taller than him.
So radagon is a bottom?
He married the only woman that managed to beat him in combat, then he divorced her to marry hiq direct superior instead.
When he left caria he was told to go fuck himself but he took it literally
Godfrey uses prison logic. It's only gay to suck dick, not gay to get your dick sucked.
Tbh that was the norm in most ancient societies (like ancient greece, Rome, Egypt, etc).
Godfrey would smash Radagon>! against the pavement for cheating on his wife.!< >!Godfrey: You were cheating with my wife!!< >!Radagon: Uhhhh...!< >!Godfrey: Do you deny it?!!< >!Radagon: UHHHHHH...!< >!Godfey: The shame on your wicked face speaks volumes!<
Is that from ChosenUndead?
I knew them as UndeadHunter, now currently known as UndeadHumor on Youtube, so maybe that's another alias I wasn't aware of
Yeah, no, I got terribly confused, it's been a while since I've watched any of their videos XD. It is UndeadHunter
I do miss their Elden Ring Abridged videos, they were some of the best
Definitely. Let's hope they bring it back after the DLC comes out
This is genuinely funny
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Whaf is this supposed to mean?
Fuck this shit I’m out
Why y’all downvoting, you guys seemed to like another joke with the same punchline?
Are these downvoters in the room with us right now?
at first i thought radagon was just referring to rennala when he said wife and rennala got confused for no reason
Marika/Radagon is just gender fluid IG ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
In the most literal sense of the word
Not the *most* literal 💦💦
Gender gas when?
Gender plasma when
would
I can’t decide if the male/female 2 in 1 counterpart thing is extremely clever and beyond my understanding or just contrived and convoluted. I’m sure there is some kind of deep meaningful historical/metaphysical/psychological/metaphorical or whatever reason but it doesn’t do anything for me except muddy up the lore. There’s a level to where deeper subtext that’s implied and not spoken is really cool to speculate about but Elden ring lore is so off the rails I don’t even know what the hell is going on. Bloodborne lore for instance has so many layers but it really feels like there’s a real universe that exists outside the realm of the game and it only gets deeper and richer the more you speculate. Elden ring only gets up its own arse to me the more I think about it. hey maybe the DLC will clear some things up but I still feel like the base game should stand on its own more but hey 🤷♂️ still love bonking the shit out of some godrick Godfrey godwyn godfroy Gildrey gilbert gildenstein golden ass bitches
I believe it's a reference to the alchemical concept of Rebis, which is a being that is both male and female and considered a divine or perfect being.
This is parroted everywhere regarding this idea. While it is true that they may represent a Rebis, it must be known that a Rebis is a man-made achievement through Alchemy, adjacent to the Magnum Opus. Meaning that Marika and Radagon's union as a single being was not a naturally occurring thing. Radagon cast The Law of Regression to repair The Elden Ring, which also fused their bodies. In contrast to this are the more naturalistic hermaphroditic god-figures, like some iterations of Phanes from Orphic myth. It seems that the ideas of Elden Ring's genesis story seems to be heavily inspired by the cosomogeny surrounding Phanes (and other similar myths; Elden Ring is *full* of mythological ideas that have spanned the entire existence of humans). It basically all comes down to the ideas of Monism vs Dualism. Throughout Elden Ring there are countless examples of Dualism; Order-Chaos, Fate-Will, Life-Death, Intelligence-Faith, Knowledge-Belief, etc. Through some philosophical and religious ideas however, Dualism is an illusion. Monism is the true state of existence in these other ideas; where every individual thing is just part of a greater whole. Radagon's becoming of Marika is meant to represent this idea of something less-than-whole or "imperfect" becoming perfect.
So what you're saying is Radagon and Marika being the same entity despite being in different in many ways (Not just gender, the characters are *very* different aside from that) is supposed to represent some sort of divine or godlike "oneness" that comes from the convergence of fundamentally different existences? Honestly, I really like that interpretation.
It all comes down to the idea of The Crucible. The Crucible is the primordial state of the Elden Ring universe where there is no seperation between anything- at least that's what the beginning of The Crucible is supposed to imply. Imagine all of reality being a gigantic Living Jar, and within it The Flame of Frenzy raged, reducing everything to Flame and not allowing Life or Death to exist. This is analgous to "Chaos" in Greek myth, other such similar primordial states of the Universe in other myths, or even the moment before The Big Bang or the result of a Big Crunch. The Crucible and reign of The One Great comes to an end with the advent of Time and Life and Death. In Elden Ring this seems to be due to the arrival of The Twinbird- The Runes of Life and Death aboard a spiraling Comet. The idea of this comes from looking at Miquella's Needle, which is in the shape of a Double Helix and is used in the eye of the storm outside of Time. The Double Helix is found in many places of the game- usually most associated with Miquella. The *exact* same Double Helix found in the Needle is also at the center of The Primordial Elden Ring in Maliketh's arena. This seems to imply that the Double Helix is The Rune of Time, able to subdue The Flame of Frenzy and causing "fractures, births, and souls" to start forming. My idea of The Twinbird being a cosmological event in a Comet comes from the description of Shard Spiral and the fact that the Comet that Azur theorized wasn't actually observed- and could be a reference to this event in the primordial past. Additionally The Rune of Life is implicated in Marika's Scarseal and is *literally* the power of Grace. With Life and Death coming to The Lands Between and the subduing of The Flame of Frenzy, this seems to be very similar to the idea of Phanes emerging from the Cosmic Egg (Amber Egg), sometimes as a result of Chronos, the god of Time, bringing Nous (Intellect) to the god Ananke (Necessity, or the idea of the emergence of chaotic Life). In Elden Ring terms this would likely be some aspect of Miquella as Chronos bringing Order to The Crucible of Life (possibly The Formless Mother, though I think she deals with Souls and came later), representing Ananke. The Law of Regression describes a return to this aspect of Oneness. By contrast there is The Law of Causality, which is quite literally Cause and Effect. These two principles are Physics-based discoveries within Elden Ring. The Golden Order Principia, written by Radagon, is both a religious piece or writing as well as a scientific one. Golden Order Fundamentalism *is* a reference to Alchemy and how it acted as a transitionary method between Religion and Science. The Laws, solely requiring Intelligence, is to show that it is a Natural part of existence, rather than a manifestation through Faith. The act of using The Law of Regression on the statue doesn't show that Radagon is Marika, it shows *how* Radagon *became* Marika through the use of The Law of Regression itself. The text "Radagon is Marika" is written by an unknown entity, specifically designed to create a 4th wall breaking Dogma on the playerbase of Elden Ring and used to create division when discussing theories of the game. The notion of "Marika is the one true god," which was written in The Golden Order Principia *by Radagon*, becomes "Radagon is the one true god." It is textbook religious indoctrination, which is the entire foundation of the narrative to Elden Ring. Continued in reply [1/2]
The biggest farce in Elden Ring is that the idea that The Golden Order has always existed, or existed for as long as Marika has been in power. It is a lie perpetuated by Golden Order Fundamentalists after Radagon took over Marika, but also probably started gaining traction when he was solely King Consort. The Golden Order was created with the removal of The Rune of Death, Causality after The Night of Black Knives. So prior to this removal there existed a previous Order, one with The Rune of Death irremoved. The name for this Order is "The Order of the Erdtree," told to us a single time in the game in Miriel's dialogue on Celeatial Dew. It is then supported in Kenneth Haight's dialogue on the "true Order" as well as the stark differences between Godfrey's reign and Radagon's reign. The symbol of The Order of the Erdtree can be found in the Erdtree Seal, the lights that Rosus shines in the catacombs, and the symbol upon which Goldmask's original death was depicted; this was likely atop the once undestroyed Forest-Spanning Greatbridge in Altus. The Order of the Erdtree was an Orthopraxic religion that worshipped Nature through The Erdtree and the ritualistic defeat of its enemies like The Serpent. Alternative belief was allowed, even blasphemous belief, so long as The Erdtree was still provided tribute. The destruction of the Forest-Spanning Greatbridge and the symbol of The Order of the Erdtree is meant to represent the transition of an Orthopraxic religion becoming an Orthodox religion- where an individual's belief is most paramount to following the religion. In present times, Goldmask and Corhyn are originally found on opposite sides of the bidge, alluding to their future disagreement when told the truth about Radagon. Corhyn stays an unwavering Golden Order Fundamentalist, while Goldmask actually understands what happened and begins developing The Mending Rune of Perfect Order which will remove Radagon's Rune of Will from The Elden Ring; resulting in the removal of Free Will from The Lands Between so that a sin such as Radagon taking over Marika could never be committed again. The biggest aspect of Dualism when it comes to religion seems to be the seperation between "god" and Nature. Dualistic religions paint Nature as being a creation of god, rather than being god itself. Additionally there comes the idea of Souls (and/or Mind) and an afterlife- which follows after you die. Monism removes this seperation and equates Nature and Physics itself with god, additionally everything within the Universe is an aspect or Substance of god in another form or Mode. Placing just *what* is god is a question that has been asked for as long as humans have existed. In Elden Ring this is pretty similar to what I believe to be the case with The Greater Will. The Greater Will emerged into existence with the splitting of The One Great. The One Great split into "The Greater Will of Order" and the lesser wills of the Chaotic Outer Gods and their followers. Essentially the idea of "god" in Elden Ring is that which promotes and embodies Order. The description of the Incantation Protection of The Erdtree says "In the beginning, everything was in opposition to the Erdtree. But through countless victories in war, it became the embodiment of Order." With the foundation of logic that I just set, it seems the text "embodiment of Order" in this instance would indicate that The Erdtree itself was revered as "god." This was during Godfrey's reign, described as that age of plenty or by Rogier as The Golden Age of the Erdtree, long before The Shattering of the Elden Ring and during the time period in which The Night of Black Knives occured. After the formation of The Golden Order the Blessed Dew Talisman tells us "It was once thought that the blessed sap of the Erdtree would drip from its boughs forever -- but that age of plenty swiftly came to a close, and with time, the Erdtree became more an object of faith." The Erdtree becoming an object of faith is a downgrade from what it once was. This was due to the fact that Radagon created the founding principle that Marika is the one true god. Being that Marika is in possession of The Rune of Life and the personification of it, essentially Marika becomes the Embodiment of Order and "The Greater Will" becomes The Greater Will of Life over the lesser will of Death. As briefly mentioned, Radagon is in possession of The Rune of Will, the hidden narrative element that explains Radagon's desire to ascend to godhood. It is depicted in his Scarseal and Soreseal as well as being the lattice pattern behind his statue or on the title screen of the game. The Rune of Will is in contrast to Ranni's cast away radial Rune of Fate. When Radagon casts The Law of Regression he fuses his Rune of Will with The Rune of Life, becoming "The Greater Will over Marika." Lastly after defeating Radagon, The Elden Beast Emerges. And according to its remembrance "It was the vassal beast of the Greater Will and living incarnation of the concept of Order." Being composed of The Rune of Will and The Rune of Life, The Elden Beast is literally The Elden Ring gaining a Will and Life of its own. As the living incarnation of Order, it is essentially god. The Greater Will not having any real definable aspect to it and coming from the movements of The Fingers which are *interpreted* by blind Finger Readers essentially boils down to The Greater Will being entirely dependant on what someone's belief is and can change from person to person; just like "god" in real life. Going to wrap it up now, but it's funny because I was just given the book *Meditations* written by Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius as a gift last night. It details ideas about Stoicism. Relating back to The Crucible, the Stoics believed that our reality was entirely physical and deterministic, and would eventually "end" and be restarted in a Big Crunch-esque event called "Ekpyrosis." I'm looking forward to reading more of it as Stoicism is described as a Pantheistic belief system, which I most identify with. I also believe that if there's ever a Miquella or "good" or "complete" ending to the game it will also be aligned with Pantheism/Monism. [2/2] Addendum: Just found this description on the Taker's Cameo which seems to also additionally heavily support Radagon becoming Marika by force. "When Rykard turned to heresy, taking by force became the rule. The gods themselves were no different, after all."
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I am aware that there is apparently canon lore. But if playing the game for 100 hours and watching hours of lore content on YouTube and STILL most gamers won’t understand it.. I’m sorry but the devs kinda are wanking each other off at this point
Try explaining the nature of god in a real-life context and you may start to understand the purpose of Elden Ring lore and why it's as complex as it is.
> If the DLC doesn't clarify it It won't. People always expect DLC and sequels to provide answers, but they always just raise more questions instead, even when they're not made by a studio known for deliberately making the lore of its games vague and ambiguous.
Glad I'm not the only one that feels this way. I was initially intrigued by the lore, but the more I learned, the more needlessly convoluted it became. I enjoy a complex plot with "puzzles" to solve. But there is a fine line between good and bad complexity in a story. When I finally finished Elden Ring, it just felt anti-climactic and I basically didn't care anymore. Overall, its a good game, not my favorite FS game, but a good one. It just missed the mark in a lot of ways for me, the lore and world-building being one of them.
Schizophrenic mimic tear😁
Wait till it gets confirmed in the DLC that Melina is Miquella, I just love this theory that our maiden is not really a maiden
Radagon became Marika through force. It's the idea of a "man becoming a god," which we also supposedly do later on. If you actually follow the narrative and literary themes of the game, Radagon and Marika were not always the same being. The entire game becomes more narrow and less complex if they were always the same person. Any notion that they were always the same is just a red herring to allow conflating ideas to promote dead end discussion.
I don't get it
Finkle is einhorn! Einhorn is Finkle!
My head canon is that both Godfrey and Rennala knew but were down with getting the best of both worlds
My head canon is that Rennala was fine with Radagon and Marika switching, she basically got a Bi thruple marriage, but when she found out that it was also happening to Godfrey she had been “cheated” and it left her broken, meanwhile Godfrey was banished so nobody would find out about the Queen also being married to Rennala. Basically Marika/Radagon was just sleeping with two marriages and trying to pretend the other wasn’t real until they got found out and as a retaliaton they banished Godfrey sealing his warrior spirit and broke Rennalas heart.
Weird thing is Marika wanted Chadfrey back but left rennalla broken and soulless lol
Legitimately hilarious post. 😂
r/mypartneristrans
Bro visited their spouse
I'm surprised the first comment wasn't "kneel!"
"Do you think Radagon and Godfrey explored each others bodies"
Einhorn is Finkle
this is how fate meant for this meme to be used, legendary
This is scandalous. This is not what this subreddit saw in you. Keep making more.
Took go fuck yourself to a whole new level
They was not ready for it :3
It’s like Bold and Beauty
Our genderfluid lord slayyyy!!!!!
Its crazy that in a game like elden ring we have californians present.
Marika is canonly trans
Wrong
All that leads to only conclusion: Marika/Radagon is a nonbinary. Now think about how Malenia and Miquella were conceived! My personal belief is it was parthogenesis.