The lore of (what's probably) Eureka Orthos

So it turns out that the Allagan Eureka we saw in the 6.3 live letter isn't from nowhere! A fair few people knew this already, and it's actually explained by an NPC in-game. But since nobody had copied down this NPC's dialog out-of-game as far as I could find, I've decided to get it myself.

All of this is from the Expedition Scholar in Eureka. The Scholar's actually hanging around the home base of every Eureka zone, but mostly only talks about the aetheric wackiness of the island, or to sell you Aetheric Stabilizers in Hydatos. But in Pyros (the third zone) she's actually available to talk to you about the original Eureka, the one that our Eureka was named after. I've copied it all down here:

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Originally Posted by The ancient legend of Eureka

The first thing you need to know about the ancient legend is that there is more than one! Though, I suppose you could say that the various extant fragments add up to a single legend's worth of information.

Alas, given the myriad sources from which it's been compiled, what we know is full of contradictions. But what we can say for certain is that it was a grand labyrinth constructed in the twilight days of the Allagan Empire, in which weapons of terrible power were squirreled away!

I say we can say this for certain, but due to all the contradictions surrounding other details, most scholars have long since dismissed Eureka as a faerie tale deserving of no further scrutiny.

At least that was the case until the Seventh Umbral Calamity unearthed the Crystal Tower, which was also previously believed to be wholly fictional. After that, well, everybody stood up and took notice, including the Sons of Saint Coinach and the Students of Baldesion.

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Originally Posted by The location of Eureka

I'm glad you asked! You see, according to most sources, Eureka was buried beneath the Crystal Tower!

The tales sometimes describe the structures as being related to one another in some fashion, so when the Sons of Saint Coinach started poking around the Crystal Tower, there was an expectation that they'd find evidence of the legendary labyrinth as well.

Unfortunately, their efforts thus far have yielded nothing save an increasing certainty that wherever Eureka is, it is definitely not beneath the Crystal Tower. But hey, knowing where not to look is still a step in the right direction, is it not?

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Originally Posted by The treasures of Eureka

That there is the million gil question, isn't it? What wondrous and terrifying weapons of unimaginable destructive power could be contained within Eureka?

Untested Allagan prototypes with the potential to reshape the world. Cursed relics obtained by Archmagus Noah through a pact made with the rulers of the voidsent. Or perhaps sacred treasures bequeathed to mankind by the golds of eld! The possibilities are endless!

Alas, this is one of the points of contention upon which the extant sources do not agree. It may well be that the authors of these accounts from the Third Astral Era had no idea what weapons had been hidden inside Eureka, and so let their imaginations and their writing run wild!

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I love that this actually has nods to both the FFIII Eureka, and the original plan for FFXIV's Eureka. For those not in the know, in the original FFIII Eureka was a hidden bonus dungeon, which contained both a bunch of bosses and the game's strongest jobs, Sage and Ninja. If you want to check it out now, it is in the pixel remaster, but isn't in the 3D version.

We've learned over time that there was a plan for a Eureka similar to that original in FFXIV; it was apparently what Nero's wrist communicator/detector thing blipping at the end of the Crystal Tower was originally supposed to be a hook for. We don't know what sort of content this original Eureka would've been, just that it was going to be located under the Crystal Tower.

And, for what it's worth: the name 'Orthos' was one of the alternative spellings of what's now commonly called Orthros, a two-headed dog from Greek and Roman myth; child of Echidna and Typhon and brother of Cerberus, it was killed as part of the Labors of Hercules. Orthros has never faithfully appeared in Final Fantasy, but the name was likely-mistakenly given to Ultros in a few early translations. Not sure how much any of that could matter--FFXIV very rarely does faithful mythical adaptations--but I do notice that with the exception of Hercules, every character I mentioned in this paragraph appears in FFXIV as a voidsent. A pattern of importance? Who knows, at this point.

So in a way eureka orthos is an allagan pandaemonium? Given their founders and fandanial i can see it.

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Originally Posted by sidurgu-12

So in a way eureka orthos is an allagan pandaemonium? Given their founders and fandanial i can see it.

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More accurately I think it's supposed to be Allagan Baldesion Arsenal, as it's explicitly a weapon vault rather than a zoo or a lab. Granted we're looking at the Allagans here, who love them some horrible biological crimes against nature, so it's entirely possible that all three of those things look effectively identical.

Thanks for posting the background information on this. Orthos was probably just a research facility designed to extract out the power from Eureka, similar to the ones we've seen for the other Third Astral primals that Allag captured. Perhaps the Allagans had devised a means to replicate Eureka's ability to produce weapons that evolve and grow in strength with the user, this time of i620-i630 quality.

Did they ever say where Galuf actually found the primal in the first place before it ended up on the Isle of Val? I know that they were ultimately contained on the Isle of Val, but that might not have been the starting point. The Crystal Tower itself was well buried after the Fourth UC to begin with, so escaping Orthos would have been quite a feat.

Interesting; considering the Crystal tower acts as a sort of huge mana battery to…conduit.. between the void and source, it would not surprise me to learn they were making weapons using voidsent…along the lines of the Diabolos Armament.

In fact, given the text on the Diabolos Armament Triple Triad card, I would theorize it to be a foundry to produce void-powered warmachina, with the intent to use them to fight the dragons way back when.

Card text for reference, bolded bits for ease of reading:

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Eikons were perhaps one of the greatest threats to the Allagan Empire, and the Allagans devoted a great deal of their resources to two primary means of combating them. The first were warmachina akin to the Ultima Weapon, designed to feed on the very life force of the Eikons they were built to destroy. The second were biological weapons resembling the recently unearthed Diablo Armament, designed to harness the power of entities from the void.

The Allagans had long believed the voidsent could make for powerful thralls. However, there were two key obstacles to their weaponization.

Firstly, there was the matter of preparing a suitable host. The strength of the voidsent one may summon is largely dictated by the vessel it will occupy. The entity that might inhabit the corpse of a coeurl, for example, would be several orders of magnitude weaker than one inhabiting the corpse of a behemoth.

Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, was the unpredictable nature of voidsent and their need to feast on aether. A binding spell could be cast at the time of their summoning to subjugate them, but the efficacy of these incantations drops significantly when employed against the higher echelons of voidsent.

In short, the Allagans required immeasurably powerful hosts and an equally potent means of binding these creatures to their will. Neither could be obtained through natural means, and so, as one might expect, the Allagans turned to science for solutions.

In the end, they chose to use genetically augmented components to create what they believed to be the perfect host, paired with the restraints used to imprison Meracydian dragons.

The weapon discovered in Zadnor was in all likelihood an interim vessel for Diabolos, a demonic voidsent believed to occupy the second rung of the voidal hierarchy. It would not be easily summoned, much less bound, and so researchers speculate it could not have been encountered until after Emperor Xande formed the pact which opened a gateway to the World of Darkness. Moreover, it is quite possible the ancient Allags intended to unleash this chimeric monstrosity upon the fledgling nation of Bozja to test its capabilities.

Though we but glimpsed its power, it appears the Allagans succeeded in creating a formidable addition to their arsenal, perhaps even comparable to the Ultima Weapon. It remains to be seen if more such weapons lie buried beneath the plateaus of Zadnor.

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This leads me to ask
1) what is the base creature required for such a powerful voidsent…are the allagans using dragons?
2) is this place the foundry of such creations
3) do they take further inspiration from Heracles, such as Geryon..who guarded the island Orthos the dog lives annnnnd
4) The island Geryon/Orthos/etc lives is called Erythia (air-ee-thee-ah) is pronounced verrrrry similarly to Eureka. Certainly closer than the Bahamut/Dalamud switch.
5) Erythia means, in Greek, “The Red One”… Dalamud connection?
6) “ Erytheia was also the place where, according to one account, the sun god Helios kept his sacred cattle when the Giant Alcyoneus stole them during the Gigantomachy.” Helios ..an Ascian!? Sacred cattle are the warmachina!? Or perhaps the biological creations to host the voidsent?

also me:

https://i.kym-cdn.com/entries/icons/...qyvo1_1280.jpg

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Originally Posted by kaynide

3) do they take further inspiration from Heracles, such as Geryon..who guarded the island Orthos the dog lives

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Geryon is the name of the hecatoncheir midboss in the Sil'dihn Subterrane, so I doubt they'd be planning to use it for something else significant so soon. But in any case...

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

And, for what it's worth: the name 'Orthos' was one of the alternative spellings of what's now commonly called Orthros, a two-headed dog from Greek and Roman myth

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I suspect you are going for a more obscure take than what is intended – orthos meaning "straight, upright, correct", thus "true Eureka".

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Originally Posted by kaynide

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I think this is slightly different. The Allagan 'Weapons' were designed to absorb primals using auracite and utilize their energy. The Garleans later reverse engineered this using synthetic auracite to expand on the original concept. A spin-off to the Allagan Weapons project was to utilize chimeric technology (i.e. genetic engineering) to create 'Weapons' that were partially biological, so that more powerful Voidsent could use them as vessels to be summoned into our world (without having to tear open a large Voidgate or 'Hollow' for them to enter directly). The Diabolos Armament is the one example that we have so far. This is similar to Gargoyles simply using statues as vessels to come across the rift.

Eureka is a primal that makes weapons, with Zantetsuken being the most well known example. The role of this zone would depend on what sort of experimentation the Allagans did on Eureka, be it creating an arsenal of weapons, as a battery like they did with Bahamut and Dalamud, or something completely different.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

If you want to check it out now, it is in the pixel remaster, but isn't in the 3D version.

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It is. You just don't get Sage and Ninja there, as they were moved to the Earth Crystal.

I only ever made it to the second zone of Eureka, because it was so tedious, so never had a chance to talk to said scholar in said location. Of course further details would be buried in there somewhere.

So where is it, then? And what's the hook, since the logical starting point, Heaven-on-High, isn't required? Perhaps we'll get a combo quest once you've beaten story mode on both? Hopefully clearing the whole-whole thing isn't made mandatory, since I'm always the odd-man-out for 4-man content.

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Originally Posted by Iscah

I suspect you are going for a more obscure take than what is intended – orthos meaning "straight, upright, correct", thus "true Eureka".

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God damnit, of COURSE it's a pun! Lesson learned, always start with the assumption it's a pun before going further.

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Originally Posted by SilverArrow20XX

It is. You just don't get Sage and Ninja there, as they were moved to the Earth Crystal.

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And thanks for the correction here! It's been a LONG time since I played the 3D remake, and I think I might've missed it when I did.

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Originally Posted by Fenral

I only ever made it to the second zone of Eureka, because it was so tedious, so never had a chance to talk to said scholar in said location. Of course further details would be buried in there somewhere.

So where is it, then? And what's the hook, since the logical starting point, Heaven-on-High, isn't required? Perhaps we'll get a combo quest once you've beaten story mode on both? Hopefully clearing the whole-whole thing isn't made mandatory, since I'm always the odd-man-out for 4-man content.

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I don't think you really need a 'hook' per se to explore a newly discovered section of the Crystal Tower. Let's be real, they could just have Rammbroes page us and we'd come running. It's the centerpiece of the game at this point.

This is more your area of expertise, but I don't recall HoH all providing that much additional information to Crystal Tower/Allag lore, outside of a loose reference to Desch and Salina to tie it all together. And while I'm sure G'raha will make an appearance, I'm guessing this will be more centered around Krile and her father's history. Otherwise you'd just cheat and scan G'raha to unlock the next floor. You might get some bonus dialogue for completing HoH or Eureka, though.

They always design the story such that it's complete before the challenge levels start, and completing the whole thing is usually just for glamour (which PoTD had the best). If it's really important to you, though, I don't think it will be difficult to put together a group to get to the top. I have to resist temptation and defer it for two weeks this time around, but I know there will be people still running it out of interest.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

God damnit, of COURSE it's a pun! Lesson learned, always start with the assumption it's a pun before going further.

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Koji has trained the Loc team well.

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Originally Posted by Iscah

Geryon is the name of the hecatoncheir midboss in the Sil'dihn Subterrane, so I doubt they'd be planning to use it for something else significant so soon. But in any case...




I suspect you are going for a more obscure take than what is intended – orthos meaning "straight, upright, correct", thus "true Eureka".

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Hadn’t done it yet, but good to know. Sounds like devs have been reading Greek mythology and are drawing on more fringe names, probably nothing more than that (like you said, using puns etc)

@Lyth: could be. I am curious what this Eureka actually is. Yeah it makes weapons, but are we talking a humanoid smith? A creature that belches out weapons? Mario RPG crossover giant sword monster?

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Originally Posted by kaynide

Hadn’t done it yet, but good to know. Sounds like devs have been reading Greek mythology and are drawing on more fringe names, probably nothing more than that (like you said, using puns etc)

@Lyth: could be. I am curious what this Eureka actually is. Yeah it makes weapons, but are we talking a humanoid smith? A creature that belches out weapons? Mario RPG crossover giant sword monster?

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I mean, we've seen the forge Eureka. It's a primal, and it looks like basically a really fancy cube. You only see it at the end of Hydatos, so fair enough that a lot of people haven't. There's no confirmed evidence that the primal Eureka and the Allagan Eureka were connected--the primal Eureka likely was given that name by the Sharlayans based on the same myth that led to the island getting the name, although we don't know that for sure--but the primal Eureka does go back to at least Allag, as that's where the first known Eurekan weapon-primal, Odin, was first recorded. So it's entirely plausible that they're connected, but it's not confirmed.

While we know very little of the primal Eureka's history beyond that, it can be surmised that sometime after Allag Mhach came across either it or its creations. On top of Proto-Ozma, the first bosses had abilities that looked awfully similar to some of Scathach's and Diabolos'.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

This is more your area of expertise, but I don't recall HoH all providing that much additional information to Crystal Tower/Allag lore, outside of a loose reference to Desch and Salina to tie it all together. And while I'm sure G'raha will make an appearance, I'm guessing this will be more centered around Krile and her father's history. Otherwise you'd just cheat and scan G'raha to unlock the next floor. You might get some bonus dialogue for completing HoH or Eureka, though.

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It wasn't Heaven-on-High itself, exactly, but the implications that there's a shadow organization spread out across the world dedicated to keeping Allagan artifacts from being "misused," HoH being one such artifact. That information is only acquired during that particular quest chain, but it seems unlikely they wouldn't have a stake in Eureka, assuming it's anywhere other than Syrcus Tower. Some of G'raha's small talk during Endwalker's MSQ suggested the Corvosi G have a similar role (and it seems likely they could be one and the same). I don't think they'd turn all the Corovs setup into a Deep Dungeon, though.

I guess I'm still wondering where it is on the assumption that it's gone from "under CT" to "anywhere but under CT." I suppose the devs could finally make use of the Unfinal Coil entrance in Coerthas by the Mor Dhona zone wall.

We wouldn't need to bring G'Raha to cheet scan. We still have his soul carrier. So we could just go with Krile and use that instead.

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Originally Posted by Fenral

I guess I'm still wondering where it is on the assumption that it's gone from "under CT" to "anywhere but under CT." I suppose the devs could finally make use of the Unfinal Coil entrance in Coerthas by the Mor Dhona zone wall.

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Why are we assuming it isn't under CT? Nero's scanner picked up something down there that time-wise couldn't have been the Furure Ironworks portal device (as that was apparently only dropped there by the Exarch sometime after patch 3.4), and from the Twinning we know that there's an equally big door in "our" Syrcus Tower waiting to be cracked open. There's no reason to write it off yet.

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Originally Posted by SannaR

We wouldn't need to bring G'Raha to cheet scan. We still have his soul carrier. So we could just go with Krile and use that instead.

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Who said anything about needing him for practical reasons? We need him there because he's going to have the biggest history nerd geek-out since... well, since his previous geek-out at least. (Don't miss the opportunity to mention the Omega Jammer to him at Ultima Thule.)

But seriously. This is something he's been researching and looking to discover for years. It would be outright unfair to not involve him in the questline.

True. We need Krile to lead the expedition, G'raha to geek out over the lore, and Alisaie to crack the password protection on any Allagan nodes that we encounter.

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Originally Posted by Iscah

Why are we assuming it isn't under CT? Nero's scanner picked up something down there that time-wise couldn't have been the Furure Ironworks portal device (as that was apparently only dropped there by the Exarch sometime after patch 3.4), and from the Twinning we know that there's an equally big door in "our" Syrcus Tower waiting to be cracked open. There's no reason to write it off yet.

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I grant it is possible that it still could be under CT, but the NPC from other-Eureka Cleretic quoted in OP suggests otherwise. A flip-flop on the flip-flop on the flip-flop would absolutely be par for the course at this point.

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Originally Posted by Iscah

But seriously. This is something he's been researching and looking to discover for years. It would be outright unfair to not involve him in the questline.

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Yeah, which it's why it's weird to me that the Students are already occupied with Myths of the Realm. Unless Krile and G'raha are going to make like Thancred and Urianger during the Eden questline and bow out for some reason after the second raid (or maybe just G'raha). MSQ commuting is easy enough, but I don't even think Cid has managed a three-way commute between MSQ and two side-stories. It can still absolutely happen and this is just me getting hung up on meta excuses, even though I hate meta excuses.

Yeah, basically the only thing we do know about Eureka is that it's not where legend said it was 'supposed' to be. There's no reason for them to backtrack on that one, nor any evidence that they have (not that they really ever do that beyond 'it's okay they're not really dead'), so it's fair to assume that wherever it is, it's not under the Crystal Tower.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

I mean, we've seen the forge Eureka. It's a primal, and it looks like basically a really fancy cube. You only see it at the end of Hydatos, so fair enough that a lot of people haven't. There's no confirmed evidence that the primal Eureka and the Allagan Eureka were connected--the primal Eureka likely was given that name by the Sharlayans based on the same myth that led to the island getting the name, although we don't know that for sure--but the primal Eureka does go back to at least Allag, as that's where the first known Eurekan weapon-primal, Odin, was first recorded. So it's entirely plausible that they're connected, but it's not confirmed.

While we know very little of the primal Eureka's history beyond that, it can be surmised that sometime after Allag Mhach came across either it or its creations. On top of Proto-Ozma, the first bosses had abilities that looked awfully similar to some of Scathach's and Diabolos'.

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Ah, sorry, I was meaning Eureka..prime.. I guess? Whatever the Eureka in the new DD is and not the cube.

If it created the Eureka Cube on the island, or if it is another one of many, or if it even an entity at all and not just the name of the location.

Personally (and I have nothing to back this), I am kinda leaning towards a Horizon Zero Dawn cauldron kinda place; a factory-esque place that mass produces war machines (and not primals). I’m kinda leaning that the primal was created out of mistaken memory (like Garuda). All hunches tho, kind of thinking it’ll be like the Fractal Continuum.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

Yeah, basically the only thing we do know about Eureka is that it's not where legend said it was 'supposed' to be. There's no reason for them to backtrack on that one, nor any evidence that they have (not that they really ever do that beyond 'it's okay they're not really dead'), so it's fair to assume that wherever it is, it's not under the Crystal Tower.

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There was no way underneath Crystal Tower, or at least none anybody could find. Considering the Allagans love of teleportation and magitek however, what if Eureka is indeed underneath it, but the entrance to Eureka isn't directly AT Crystal Tower. Such as the actual entrance being either somewhere else in Mor Dhona, or somewhere else entirely. As we've seen with Azys Lla, the teleporters can go rather long distances, so there's a way for it to be right and also why nobody has been able to find the way in. For example, what if the entrance teleporter to Eureka is actually near Coerthas instead?

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Originally Posted by RyuDragnier

For example, what if the entrance teleporter to Eureka is actually near Coerthas instead?

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We do have that Allagan ruin in the crater at Boulder Downs...

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Originally Posted by Iscah

We do have that Allagan ruin in the crater at Boulder Downs...

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That's the ruin I was specifically thinking of with the hypothesis. It has gotten no real use, and it seems odd that nobody has really explored the place.

All we know is that it looks like Dalamud wreckage but wasn't a part of Final Coil, ergo I call it the Unfinal Coil. If you get close there's even a really unnatural flat wall blocking off what should be an entrance into the large crystal formation. Basically it's a content placeholder that's gone unused since 2.0. Now's as good a time as any, but it's really funny how long it's just been sitting there.

According to the sightseeing log, it is Dalamud wreckage so I'm a little disinclined to think that's where Eureka Orthos is.

It's possible the Sons of Saint Conach might just unearth the ruin in the overworld once 6.3 arrives proper...assuming it doesn't just unearth itself somehow.

So while I normally don't post my lore videos here anymore, my new one is directly relevant, going over All the Eureka lore, including everything here abut Eureka Orthos. Nothing new about the subject of the thread itself, but Eureka itself is a fun topic.

With the latest updated to the 6.3 special site ( https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/endwalker/patch_6_3/ ) Eureka Orthos has been confirmed to lie beneath the Crystal Tower, as was originally theorized.

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Originally Posted by Zero-ELEC

With the latest updated to the 6.3 special site ( https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/endwalker/patch_6_3/ ) Eureka Orthos has been confirmed to lie beneath the Crystal Tower, as was originally theorized.

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We also saw in the last live letter that it's in that weird green space beneath the Crystal Tower that the last part of the Twinning is in.

It seems like while we know locationally where it is, there's probably some extra complicating factors as to why it's only getting found now.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

It seems like while we know locationally where it is, there's probably some extra complicating factors as to why it's only getting found now.

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It could be that because the Future Ironworks worked out how to get that door open, now G'raha can transfer that knowledge to this copy of the tower.

Given that Archmagus Noah is involved in the quest, I'm assuming he's the reason we're learning about it.

I am glad they remembered after all this time that we have a technically living Allagan to consult regarding matters of their civilization.

Wait Noah/Koh is involved? I totally missed that.

I missed it too, but then I was deliberately not looking too closely at it.

I was certainly hoping that Noah could be involved. Preferably alongside Raha, because those two really need to be introduced to each other.

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Originally Posted by Zero-ELEC

Wait Noah/Koh is involved? I totally missed that.

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The Miqo'te he possessed was mentioned as being the quest starter for Eureka Orthos in the live letter, and you also see "him" dolled up in a new costume in the 6.3 trailer.

His ARR quests are also being dropped as of 6.3, so I'd assume his dialogue is going to differ based on whether or not you finished them before then.

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Originally Posted by KageTokage

The Miqo'te he possessed was mentioned as being the quest starter for Eureka Orthos in the live letter, and you also see "him" dolled up in a new costume in the 6.3 trailer.

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The lorebook uses female pronouns for Noah when contrasting her personality and Koh's.

It could be a mistranslation, but they seem to deal with that sort of thing by saying "well, it's canon now".