Does Zodiark have to stay in charge of Darkness?

Ok, so the whole "warrior of darkness" stuff coming up and talk from dark!Derplander a few patches ago has me thinking. Can we fix the light/dark balance issues by replacing Zodiark?

We know Hydaelyn and Zodiark are basically presented as equal, but opposite. And we've been told that both Dark and Light are necessary to survive, one mustn't overbalance the other or there is death, etc.

One shard has already succumbed to Darkness and is what we refer to as the Nether realm on Hydaelyn. And dark!Derp's home shard has been subjected to a Flood of Light and is in the process of dying due to it. Or maybe becoming light mobs like the darkness turned the other shard into the Nether, populated with demons and imps. Either way, its bad.

Hydaelyn is dealing with the shard being overwhelmed by Light by trying to siphon off the excess Light. She's trying to *undo* her element's "victory" in the interest of saving the people living on the shard from harm.

As far as we know, Zodiark does no such thing for the Nether(and ultimately seeks the same for the rest of the shards). But in theory he *could* have saved those on the Nether shard by siphoning off darkness, as Hydaelyn is siphoning off light. Because they are equals in mother/father crystaliness and, presumably, in capability. He just doesn't, because its not about anything other than his victory to him.

Could the real problem with all of this be the "man" at the top? Could another being, one that will see death as a thing that needs to be in balance with life, not dominate it, be put in his place? Could that be the answer here?

Note: I'm not saying that the PC is going to be the replacement, or even who/what would be instead. Maybe Hydaelyn herself, maybe an NPC we've not met yet, etc.

It's entirely possible that he could have intervened in the same way with Elidibus as a proxy, but keep in mind that this entire conflict is the result of Hydaelyn sealing Zodiark. If Zodiark could function to the same extent as Hydaelyn, his followers wouldn't need to spread chaos to revive him in the first place, and the 13th shard would never have been lost to darkness.

Also, in siphoning off the light from the 1st shard, Hydaelyn is regaining some of her power. It's less a matter of undoing a victory as it is bottling up a whole bunch of extra light that was generated in a shard tipped too far astrally. It's certainly not a selfless act.

In all of this, I somehow doubt Zodiark on his own is the problem, as one, he's not actually capable of doing anything, and two, there's really no way for the narrative to sell that thematically without casually insinuating Light is somehow better. I think the end game is to either replace Hydaelyn with Minfilia and Zodiark with Elidibus, or else merge/destroy them both.

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Originally Posted by Fenral

It's entirely possible that he could have intervened in the same way with Elidibus as a proxy, but keep in mind that this entire conflict is the result of Hydaelyn sealing Zodiark. If Zodiark could function to the same extent as Hydaelyn, his followers wouldn't need to spread chaos to revive him in the first place, and the 13th shard would never have been lost to darkness.

Also, in siphoning off the light from the 1st shard, Hydaelyn is regaining some of her power. It's less a matter of undoing a victory as it is bottling up a whole bunch of extra light that was generated in a shard tipped too far astrally. It's certainly not a selfless act.

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Zodiark was in a weakened state when the Nether shard was made, just as Hydaelyn is in a weakened state now. Given that fact, its strange Zodiark didn't siphon off some darkness, if siphoning off their respective element is supposed to add to their own power. I'm not sure it actually does. Not in the way we're thinking at least.

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Originally Posted by Fenral

In all of this, I somehow doubt Zodiark on his own is the problem, as one, he's not actually capable of doing anything, and two, there's really no way for the narrative to sell that thematically without casually insinuating Light is somehow better. I think the end game is to either replace Hydaelyn with Minfilia and Zodiark with Elidibus, or else merge/destroy them both.

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I think it'd not be insinuating "light is better", but "dark doesn't have to be evil". Which it doesn't. Zodiark, however, does seem to be so, since he is fine with having his minions sow death and destruction if it benefits him. Whereas Hydaelyn seems to be the opposite. Given the choice, she'll give up the elemental win if it preserves life. We've seen her do it.

Speculation, but: Its probably that evil, self-focused intent that caused Hydaelyn to seal Zodiark in the first place. He was a danger to their creation, so he got sent to timeout.

The way Hydaelyn tells it (and the way the lore devs tell it in interviews), she and Zodiark were the only beings in creation at the start. At one point, Zodiark grew more powerful at Hydaelyn's expense and tried to absorb and/or kill her. Hydaelyn then banished him to what would become the Moon out of desperation, an act that created the Source and all the Shards. And importantly for the Warrior of Light, all the life on the Source and Shards.

Since that time, the Ascians have been working to return the world to what it was. IE: before there was the Source and the Shards. The Ascians have been trying to break Zodiark out of the Moon, specifically so he can kill off Hydaelyn for good as the Ascians see Hydaelyn as the one who's keeping everything unbalanced. At least, according to Lahabrea that is. We've yet to see what Elidibus wants to really do with Zodiark and Hydaelyn. We do know that in order to power Zodiark up, the Shards have to be Rejoined to the Source via Calamities and that Flooded Shards cannot be Rejoined.

The big kicker to all of this is that all evidence points to the Shards and the Source (and all the life of them) ceasing to exist if Zodiark and Hydaelyn go back to being what they were. Hydaelyn does not want this to happen. Zodiark... we don't know. But we do know he wasn't playing nicely with Hydaelyn either. He might be able to prevent a Flood like Hydaelyn can, but that could easily be so that the Shard can be Rejoined at some later date, which helps him a lot more.

The other thing we've yet to see is if Hydaelyn is really a force of Light and Zodiark is really a force of Darkness. We know the Ascians use Darkness plenty, but that might just be their preference with Hydaelyn needing to use Light to balance them out as much as possible. Hydaelyn's character has also been presented as being someone willing to use whatever she can to ensure minimum casualties. So I can see her using Darkness herself (or telling her champions to use Darkness) if that's what will result in the least amount of people dying.

I actually dug the ol' lore book out again, but basically everything it has on Zodiark is prefaced with "According to the Scions", which is to say "this understanding is free to change at any time as we write the plot."

Interestingly, though, it describes Hydaelyn and Zodiark as wills of Light and Darkness that used to coexist within the mothercrystal, and Zodiark's banishment as Hydaelyn's counter to a shift in the balance of what was already an endless war between light and darkness. It does also say that the goal of the Ascians is to wake Zodiark, which does seem to rule out his direct intervention in ongoing events.

I'd say it's also iffy as to whether Zodiark could do anything about the 13th shard right now, even if he were awake and willing. An important distinction about the 1st is that the Flood of Light was imminent, but had not yet happened. There was still time to do something about it - it's the whole reason the WoD's took the Ascians' bait in the first place, to salvage what they could of their world BEFORE the Flood of Light erased everything.

In the case of the 13th, the Flood of Darkness has run its course, and reduced the world to void - and this all happened eons ago. Zodiark siphoning off the Darkness may not be of any use whatsoever.

I've always gotten the impression that Zodiark is "in charge" of the Darkness as much as Hydaelyn is "in charge" of the Light. Hydaelyn is of the Light, and can use it to perform various effects, but she can't actually control it and tell it what to do.

Similarly, Zodiark is of the Darkness, and can probably utilize it in much the same way Hydaelyn uses the Light, but if the Dark goes out of control and consumes a shard (eg the Thirteenth), there's not a lot he can do about it directly. He'd have to rely on agents, which here is apparently the Ascians.

My understanding is that the Ascians are flying completely blind based on what they think Zodiark wants (since he's still asleep). It's possible that finding a way to wake Zodiark without freeing him could be enough to get the Ascians to chill, as his actual desires may not align with their interpretation.


We know that Zodiark struck first (as much as that can apply to perpetual warfare), and Hydaelyn banished him, and the result was thirteen shards and the creation of humanity. But what if the order was a little different? Zodiark created humanity, Hydaelyn freaked out and banished him, and minions of Zodiark have since been systematically undoing his creation because they think that's what he wants. Maybe.

I don't think Zodiark is inherently good or evil. Same goes with Hydalyn. I'm sure we still don't know the full truth on the situation and that information is being strategically withheld.

For me, that all the Warriors of Light are standing around ready to hear Elidibus and Zodiark out adds a layer of comedy to the fact that Elidibus was straight up waving around a book with the line THE MOON HATES THE STAR in it and promising it was cosmic truth.

(Not that I'm not ready to be totally wrong about the dude, it's just ... I've been suspicious of him since 2.1 and there's no going back and keeping my dignity.)

I know I at least and waiting to see where THE THE MOON HATES THE STAR line is in relation to the THE STAR BANISHED THE MOON and THE STAR GREW WEAKER lines are. Knowing where the ZODIARK TOLD THE ASCIANS WHAT TO DO WITH THE ECHO and HYDAELYN TOLD THE WARRIORS WHAT TO DO WITH THE ECHO would also be good to know... if they even exist.

It really doesn't help that the person saying all of this has always done the more complicated thing when it comes to fixing cosmic problems as opposed to the simpler way (How hard and complicated is it to cause a calamity vs get Hydaeyn's attention?). If this turns into a "the Ascians were trying too hard to solve the problem and the mortals found an easier way to do it" story, I'll be rather disappointed. Although it certainly doesn't look like that's where we're headed at least.

I'm wondering when the Gerun Oracles were written. Was this "Gerun" a person, a place, an organization, or an Occuria? Come to think of it, was it stated when the Divine Chronicles were written?