Questions about other shards of Fandaniel… (6.0 Spoilers)

Just replaying the part in EW where Fanny spills the beans about being Amon. During that flashback, Emet mentions it’s a great time for Amon to become Fandaniel because the Ascians happen to be short one Fandaniel at the moment.

First question: Why were the Ascians missing an active Fandaniel/Hermes?

Second Question: Is that missing Fandaniel/Hermes dead, or did he simply part ways with the Ascians?

Third: Is it possible that the missing Fandaniel/Hermes was more like the Hermes we meet in Elpis?

I was thinking about this, because Hermes and Meteion seem a little random in EW. They’re characters we’ve never really met before, who are now central to the MSQ’s endgame.

But what if instead of meeting them for the last time in EW - we’re actually meeting (at least one of them) for the first time, and will continue seeing them in the next ongoing storyline?

Could another Fandaniel/Hermes be out there? One who doesn’t have the crazy Amon personality dominating? (Because he’d be a Hermes soul shard from another reflection - so a different starting person entirely).

Here’s a wild thought. What if it’s Deryk - who is concerned for the leftover Elpis creations currently masquerading as Gods on the Source? (Just a theory).

I think you need to entertain a possibility that's much more likely, both in terms of general plausibility and in terms of narrative convenience: What if there wasn't a Fandaniel shard before him? What if Amon was just the first one they found? It's not particularly implausible; on the scale the Ascians were working on the Third Astral Era was relatively early in, and they apparently didn't lose Ascians all too often before we started offing them, so it wouldn't be that weird that the reason it's empty is because nobody's been sitting there anyway. The actual line in question just says 'the seat of Fandaniel lies empty and waiting'; there's no actual implication that it was a recent vacancy.

And on a practical writing standpoint, there just not being any previous Fancy Dans means there's nothing to clean up when you're done with the story, and no open questions to resolve. Don't need to answer how they died if they never lived in the first place. Given that they've openly said Endwalker was the end of the whole Zodiark/Hydaelyn/Ascians story, it'd be a pretty bad idea to introduce loose ends right at the last moment.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

I think you need to entertain a possibility that's much more likely, both in terms of general plausibility and in terms of narrative convenience: What if there wasn't a Fandaniel shard before him? What if Amon was just the first one they found? It's not particularly implausible; on the scale the Ascians were working on the Third Astral Era was relatively early in, and they apparently didn't lose Ascians all too often before we started offing them, so it wouldn't be that weird that the reason it's empty is because nobody's been sitting there anyway. The actual line in question just says 'the seat of Fandaniel lies empty and waiting'; there's no actual implication that it was a recent vacancy.

And on a practical writing standpoint, there just not being any previous Fancy Dans means there's nothing to clean up when you're done with the story, and no open questions to resolve. Don't need to answer how they died if they never lived in the first place. Given that they've openly said Endwalker was the end of the whole Zodiark/Hydaelyn/Ascians story, it'd be a pretty bad idea to introduce loose ends right at the last moment.

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You left out the part of the quote which got my ears up. Emet says, “And as fortune would have it, the seat of Fandaniel lies empty and waiting.”

It’s that first “fortune” part which got me interested. It’s possible that line implies the lack of an available Fandaniel is a recent one - and Emet considers himself lucky to have found Amon.

It’s also possible the Ascians just didn’t bother with old troublesome Hermes before finding Amon.

But I do wonder… something prompted them to decide that was the time to snag them a new Fandaniel.

As far as starting new threads at the end of an old storyline - the writers got to seed for future stories somehow (besides having Emet rattle off the DLC). And if there were another Hermes shard out there, perhaps he’d make an appearance in the 6.X patches to help tie up some of those loose ends.

If there's a shard of him somewhere around. Please keep it in the dark. The guy somehow managed to start not one but two apocalypses and I think it's better not to have the number increase to three.

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Originally Posted by Shookbeast

You left out the part of the quote which got my ears up. Emet says, “And as fortune would have it, the seat of Fandaniel lies empty and waiting.”

It’s that first “fortune” part which got me interested. It’s possible that line implies the lack of an available Fandaniel is a recent one - and Emet considers himself lucky to have found Amon.

It’s also possible the Ascians just didn’t bother with old troublesome Hermes before finding Amon.

But I do wonder… something prompted them to decide that was the time to snag them a new Fandaniel.

As far as starting new threads at the end of an old storyline - the writers got to seed for future stories somehow (besides having Emet rattle off the DLC). And if there were another Hermes shard out there, perhaps he’d make an appearance in the 6.X patches to help tie up some of those loose ends.

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The problem with your idea is that it's at least four 'what if's deep, and none of them really have any evidence in their favor. 'What if there was a Fandaniel shard before Amon, and what if he was more like Hermes, and what if he peacefully left the Ascians, and what if he went on to be Deryk specifically?' You're getting too excited about something EXTREMELY unlikely--the only storylines that ever get that wild outside of an expansion MSQ are normal raids, and this would be a long bow for even those.

Your only real evidence is a very specific and selective reading of a single line by Emet-Selch. Not only will I point out that Emet picks his words for maximum emotional manipulation--and framing something as 'fortunate' is a great way to both make the intended audience feel special and like the opportunity presented might be very slim--but that you're picking apart language choice from the English version, which is known to be particularly loose and flowery. I'd suggest checking the script for other languages if your evidence is right down to linguistic semantics; I've fallen into the same mistake myself, with a Fandaniel line from 5.2 that turned out to only be eyebrow-raising in English and of course turned out to be nothing.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

The problem with your idea is that it's at least four 'what if's deep, and none of them really have any evidence in their favor. 'What if there was a Fandaniel shard before Amon, and what if he was more like Hermes, and what if he peacefully left the Ascians, and what if he went on to be Deryk specifically?' You're getting too excited about something EXTREMELY unlikely--the only storylines that ever get that wild outside of an expansion MSQ are normal raids, and this would be a long bow for even those.

Your only real evidence is a very specific and selective reading of a single line by Emet-Selch. Not only will I point out that Emet picks his words for maximum emotional manipulation--and framing something as 'fortunate' is a great way to both make the intended audience feel special and like the opportunity presented might be very slim--but that you're picking apart language choice from the English version, which is known to be particularly loose and flowery. I'd suggest checking the script for other languages if your evidence is right down to linguistic semantics; I've fallen into the same mistake myself, with a Fandaniel line from 5.2 that turned out to only be eyebrow-raising in English and of course turned out to be nothing.

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Thanks, I’ll take a look at the original text and see what translations I can find (:

And no worries about the deep read on the possibilities - that’s more fun on my part than seriousness (but it could be…).

I wonder about old Fandaniel though. They spent so much time telling us this wasn’t really Hermes, but more a crazy Amon - and then they introduce us to Hermes - but he’s not that same guy causing trouble as Fandaniel. It makes me think there’s more to explore there regarding a Fandaniel who is actually cool with being Hermes. We’ve yet to really settle the remaining sundered Ascians, and have a limited cast to pull from…

I suspect that Hermes' probably just died of old age or eventually returned to the star of his own volition. When he returned to the lifestream the aetheric effects of Kairos were then removed, leaving behind the imprint of his time on Elpis, which caused Amon to retain his memories of his prior life. He later confirmed this when Emet came to initiate him back into the Convocation.

On another note, someone needs to make an illustration of Asahi furiously scrubbing Hermes' now sparkling soul with a cleaning brush to erase his old memories.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

I suspect that Hermes' probably just died of old age or eventually returned to the star of his own volition. When he returned to the lifestream the aetheric effects of Kairos were then removed, leaving behind the imprint of his time on Elpis, which caused Amon to retain his memories of his prior life. He later confirmed this when Emet came to initiate him back into the Convocation.

On another note, someone needs to make an illustration of Asahi furiously scrubbing Hermes' now sparkling soul with a cleaning brush to erase his old memories.

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I do remember seeing someone doing fanart of what's going on below the Flow Together music video art, of Asahi and Amon having an extremely undignified wrestle.

one of the ai chocobos you can race against in the saucer is named hermes so i like to think hes already been reborn lmao

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Originally Posted by Lihtleita

one of the ai chocobos you can race against in the saucer is named hermes so i like to think hes already been reborn lmao

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Hermes speedrunning the process of being reborn

If Gia is anything to go on it can take to almost one hundred years for a soul to go through the getting reborn process. Hermes himself when we fight him says that Amon is the one he enjoyed the most. Which hints that he's had a few lives. If the Neir stuff is to be believed the first time Emet found an inheritor of Azem's soul is when he saw the WoL on the first. You also have to remember not every Ancient has the soul sight ability. Let alone have it as strong as Emet does. Otherwise I'm sure things would be a bit awkward when dealing with Themis during Pandeamonium. He would have also would have a better idea of who's soul we were when he had a glimpse of us as an Ancient that one time. So, even if we don't know about the other times he's been reborn it doesn't mean that they ran across him. Or depending on who did might not have recognized them as being Hermes.

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Originally Posted by SannaR

If Gia is anything to go on it can take to almost one hundred years for a soul to go through the getting reborn process. Hermes himself when we fight him says that Amon is the one he enjoyed the most. Which hints that he's had a few lives. If the Neir stuff is to be believed the first time Emet found an inheritor of Azem's soul is when he saw the WoL on the first. You also have to remember not every Ancient has the soul sight ability. Let alone have it as strong as Emet does. Otherwise I'm sure things would be a bit awkward when dealing with Themis during Pandeamonium. He would have also would have a better idea of who's soul we were when he had a glimpse of us as an Ancient that one time. So, even if we don't know about the other times he's been reborn it doesn't mean that they ran across him. Or depending on who did might not have recognized them as being Hermes.

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Now that is an interesting thought. I hadn’t considered that the other Ascians might need Emet to parade around with them - just so they could sniff out sundered Ascian souls…

I suppose one of our yet to be located Ascians (the leftover sundered ones) may have similar powers… but this could actually be a future plot device. The remaining Ascians need someone (or something) that can read souls…