Theory: We are Azem

Yo, my theory is that we will one day travel back in time as completed beings and become Azem.

Evidence: We have the same gender as Azem unlike Ardbert neccessarily who is always male, yet still a soul fragment of Azem's.

That means there is no reason for Azem to have our gender at all, since Ardbert would also share it if it was a requirement for shards to have the same gender as their originals.

Maybe Azem is us from a different timeline in which the Ascians succeeded in merging all the shards, so they traveled back in time and created the timeline we are now in.

We won't take our original form back. Yoshi P said that we will never see how Azem looked like. We are supposed to assume that he/she looked like our characters.

When an Ascian soul is sundered, they scatter in multiple fragments ("shards"). Gender doens't matter, they made it dynamic to increase our immersion. In our world, Tenzen was one previous reincarnation of our current character. On Ardbert's world, he was our old shard. To recover our form we would need to reunite all of our shards (i guess). FFXIV development time won't last that long lol

The Ascians rejoining the shards would by necessity lead to whatever 'Azem' that results not being us by any worthwhile metrics, because them doing so would've taken more than enough time for any playable race, including viera, to die of old age even if we survived any of the Calamities. (Which we wouldn't have, we did die in the Eighth Calamity.)

So at that point it just feels like an extra twist for twists' sake, what does this do if 'an Azem from an aborted far future that isn't literally exactly us' is true that 'Azem is our many-years-before predecessor that also isn't literally exactly us' doesn't?

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Originally Posted by Elissar

We won't take our original form back. Yoshi P said that we will never see how Azem looked like. We are supposed to assume that he/she looked like our characters.

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But why would they look like our characters?

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When an Ascian soul is sundered, they scatter in multiple fragments ("shards"). Gender doens't matter, they made it dynamic to increase our immersion. In our world, Tenzen was one previous reincarnation of our current character. On Ardbert's world, he was our old shard. To recover our form we would need to reunite all of our shards (i guess). FFXIV development time won't last that long lol

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If gender didn't matter, why does Azem share our gender, but not the other shards'?



I like how you didn't disagree with my theory at all, I see what you did there ♥

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

(...)what does this do if 'an Azem from an aborted far future that isn't literally exactly us' is true that 'Azem is our many-years-before predecessor that also isn't literally exactly us' doesn't?

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Then why didn't they make Azem have their own defined gender, like Ardbert?

Because we are supposed to identify with Azem. Because we are Azem.

Hmmm... whilst I do hope the Azem aspect is still explored, I do not really want time travel to be involved. Lets leave that plot device alone for a while after Endwalker haha.

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Originally Posted by Eisi

Because we are supposed to identify with Azem. Because we are Azem.

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I think it was done purely for the identify aspect, so they could hammer in to the player that Azem was part of our character. I really like how our Azem is made up of shards with diffrent gender and races. Makes sense with games themes and Azems title as an explorer.

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Originally Posted by Eisi

Then why didn't they make Azem have their own defined gender, like Ardbert?

Because we are supposed to identify with Azem. Because we are Azem.

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Nix your third sentence, because your second sentence is correct.

Consider Ardbert. Even before Shadowbringers, Ardbert's design was already communicating 'this is a version of you' by way of having the same design as ARR Trailer WoL. That's a really solid, metatextual way of communicating that to us, so when they were more explicit with that in Shadowbringers, they actually didn't need to do much extra to sell that he was the direct fragment of our soul; the design nods had already gotten him there.

Azem has to reach the same conclusion in an entirely different context; Azem doesn't appear in person, and either never has their 'this is you'-ness take center-stage or has taken so long to reach that point that at this point we still haven't gotten it. This means they instead have to sell 'this is a version of you' entirely by actions and non-physical descriptions. They manage this by having characters point out physical/aetheric similarities, describing their personality in a way that (hopefully) matches how you read the WoL themselves, and... yeah, matching the pronouns. All this evidence is considerably more subjective than the ones working in Ardbert's favor, so they all have to be as strong as possible. Because if Azem was set in stone to be male, then it's all the more possible for someone playing a female character to just go 'oh that's a new, unrelated character' and ignore all the evidence, thus misreading Azem entirely.

Basically: Azem matches our pronouns because they need to communicate who they are as clearly as possible for the people in the cheap seats.

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Originally Posted by Eisi

But why would they look like our characters?
If gender didn't matter, why does Azem share our gender, but not the other shards'?
I like how you didn't disagree with my theory at all, I see what you did there ♥

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I don't disagree with your theory because i thought the same thing for a few days! Last week a dear friend of mine asked the same thing. For some reason, FFXIV writing mess with our heads in the same way lol

1 - Just because the authors want it. This is the easiest answer. Even if Azem appears, he would appear as a shade just like happened in the end of 5.0. HOWEVER, you may find some clues about how his mask used to look like:
https://i.imgur.com/LiFovrw.png

2 - Our gender matters because you are the protagonist. Other shards has their own lives, mostly of the time they don't know what is happening, just like Ardbert. An Ascian shard compose your soul but it's not your whole soul, you have your own memories and life. If you see it like DNA and heritage, is the same concept. You are who you are, you are not your parents, however, you share a little of both.

Plus: in Stormblood, an old lady tells you about a prophecy.
https://youtu.be/xF7DP62JYAs?t=11764
So...as you see.. gender belongs to the physical realm. It's irrelevant to the tale.

There are easy ways to add Azem without showing themselves, and while making them match the player. This includes having them take the form of the player because "I thought the form looked interesting, so I felt I should try it out," and having dialogue options where you choose one, but then Azem is the one saying it, a "we think alike" type deal.

I'm sure when they get around to whatever Azem is supposed be doing (this was hinted in the live letter Q&A that followed Endwalker that Azem is doing something plot relevant), that we will see them choose a specific form that represents Azem or they will make Azem look like your player character (share gender and race).

Also this latter point is already set up in the lore, as the previous Rising Event had a short story that spoke about Venat and how she chose Azem from among people who weren't from Amaurot that she discovered in her travels. Clearly implying Azem could be any race.

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Originally Posted by Kesey

I'm sure when they get around to whatever Azem is supposed be doing (this was hinted in the live letter Q&A that followed Endwalker that Azem is doing something plot relevant)

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Just to be clear, the answer was more along the lines of "Yes, Azem was doing something ... secret". The answer went on with something like "Imagine what your Warrior of Light would be doing, and that's probably what Azem was doing". They may never go there in-game. Link to relevant video + interpreted answer is below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wd4R5cfhLwA

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Originally Posted by Eisi

Yo, my theory is that we will one day travel back in time as completed beings and become Azem.

Evidence: We have the same gender as Azem unlike Ardbert neccessarily who is always male, yet still a soul fragment of Azem's.

That means there is no reason for Azem to have our gender at all, since Ardbert would also share it if it was a requirement for shards to have the same gender as their originals.

Maybe Azem is us from a different timeline in which the Ascians succeeded in merging all the shards, so they traveled back in time and created the timeline we are now in.

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Woaw...

So yes, but not completely, only 2/14 of her/his soul.

And it's still not the same person.

It's like how a person can be different depending on their experience. But it's still not quite the same person.
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Ps: Is the reincarnation of a person the same person?

Ps':
And it is no longer a theory when Azem systematically has the same gender as our Avatar.

If your character is a man, he will be referred to as He/His.

If your character is a woman, she will be referred to as She/Her.

That's why in the Lodestone devs' stories, you can choose her/his gender.

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Originally Posted by Naoki34

That's why in the Lodestone devs' stories, you can choose her/his gender.

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For clarification: only in certain languages. Specifically, German and French (and I can tell from your signature that you're French!). Every other language avoids gendering them, but in German and French they just couldn't construct it in a way that made sense without using some gendered pronouns.

It's still not evidence, the OP's theory is still effectively baseless, but I do find that part neat from a linguistic perspective.

During the Elpis and Pandaemonium quests Azem is always referred to by the same gender pronouns as your character, but this is more clearer if you're playing a female character.

Additionally, unless you're playing as a lalafell, hrothgar or roegadyn (in other words, a more 'human' looking race), you're outright stated as being in "Azem's spitting image" (paraphrasing none other than Emet) - of course viera and miq'ote's animal ears are convienently ignored in that regard. ;)

So it's pretty clear that Azem's canon appearence is truly meant to resemble your character, but naturally behind the scenes during development this means the 'true' default appearence of them would be a male midlander hyur (to resemble 'Derplander'/Ardbert) however. ;)

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Originally Posted by Naoki34

Woaw...

So yes, but not completely, only 2/14 of her/his soul.

And it's still not the same person.

It's like how a person can be different depending on their experience. But it's still not quite the same person.
___
Ps: Is the reincarnation of a person the same person?

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The process of reincarnation in the Lifestream ensures that when a soul is reborn their memories of their previous life are meant to be lost, but, some fragments can still linger, and we saw this with none other than Fandaniel - his last mortal form before his 'ascension' as the Ascian Fandaniel was the Allagan scientist Amon who, as the reincarnation of Hermes, inadvertently created a snake familiar with the same name as one Hermes did pre Sundering, without even knowing it (although he probably realized this belatedly after Emet raised him back to his office as an Ascian in the dying days of the Allag and thus restored his memories - arguably this is why Fandaniel ended up so unhinged).

After Fandaniel destroys himself and Zodiark his soul returns to the Lifestream, but it resets his very personality back to Amon (and he gleefully admits "of all the faces (he's), worn, this is his favourite!" just before fighting him as a spirit at the end of the Aitiascope), showing that a soul seems to accumulate memories with each reincarnation, and that it can affect the next incarnation in ways not known.

And on that particular point, is Azem's sense of altruism and wanderlust very much influenced the WoL's motives and drive even now, and even Emet basically tells the WoL to be more like his old friend and continue to explore the world, study other cultures and help people with their problems.... ironically pretty much what an adventurer does anyway.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

For clarification: only in certain languages. Specifically, German and French (and I can tell from your signature that you're French!). Every other language avoids gendering them, but in German and French they just couldn't construct it in a way that made sense without using some gendered pronouns.

It's still not evidence, the OP's theory is still effectively baseless, but I do find that part neat from a linguistic perspective.

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I'm no longer up to date, I'm at 5350 and it's still useless the recommendations.

How? You mean cultural differences related to a language and its way of speaking? Yes.

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Originally Posted by Enkidoh

During the Elpis and Pandaemonium quests Azem is always referred to by the same gender pronouns as your character, but this is more clearer if you're playing a female character.

Additionally, unless you're playing as a lalafell, hrothgar or roegadyn (in other words, a more 'human' looking race), you're outright stated as being in "Azem's spitting image" (paraphrasing none other than Emet) - of course viera and miq'ote's animal ears are convienently ignored in that regard. ;)

So it's pretty clear that Azem's canon appearence is truly meant to resemble your character, but naturally behind the scenes during development this means the 'true' default appearence of them would be a male midlander hyur (to resemble 'Derplander'/Ardbert) however. ;)



The process of reincarnation in the Lifestream ensures that when a soul is reborn their memories of their previous life are meant to be lost, but, some fragments can still linger, and we saw this with none other than Fandaniel - his last mortal form before his 'ascension' as the Ascian Fandaniel was the Allagan scientist Amon who, as the reincarnation of Hermes, inadvertently created a snake familiar with the same name as one Hermes did pre Sundering, without even knowing it (although he probably realized this belatedly after Emet raised him back to his office as an Ascian in the dying days of the Allag and thus restored his memories - arguably this is why Fandaniel ended up so unhinged).

After Fandaniel destroys himself and Zodiark his soul returns to the Lifestream, but it resets his very personality back to Amon (and he gleefully admits "of all the faces (he's), worn, this is his favourite!" just before fighting him as a spirit at the end of the Aitiascope), showing that a soul seems to accumulate memories with each reincarnation, and that it can affect the next incarnation in ways not known.

And on that particular point, is Azem's sense of altruism and wanderlust very much influenced the WoL's motives and drive even now, and even Emet basically tells the WoL to be more like his old friend and continue to explore the world, study other cultures and help people with their problems.... ironically pretty much what an adventurer does anyway.

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It's still sad to be reincarnated as a potato for a human from the old world.
It's like I'm getting as big as my toe.

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Originally Posted by Naoki34

I'm no longer up to date, I'm at 5350 and it's still useless the recommendations.

How? You mean cultural differences related to a language and its way of speaking? Yes.

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Basically, yeah. It's mostly related to gendered pronouns; English was able to construct the Emet-Elidibus conversation without giving Azem a defined gender, and Japanese pronouns are so non-gendered that you actually have to go out of your way to gender someone (which famously caused problems with Nael Darnus), which would sound super weird. But German and French are such heavily gendered languages that it wasn't possible to construct the sentences about Azem without giving them a gender--so, they introduced the WoL gender switcher for those languages, but not the others. I believe Spanish and Italian would've had the same problem if there was official localization into those languages.

This isn't the only time it's come up; the Shadowbringers all-roles quest has Cylva gender Mitron only in the French version of the scene, and the Lodestone story from Omega's point of view only genders them in (I think) German. Both times going for gendering them as female, which starts interesting conversations with both!

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Originally Posted by Elissar

HOWEVER, you may find some clues about how his mask used to look like:

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This has always felt like such a stretch. Why should Tataru have any idea what Azem's mask looked like, or that we should wear it? And the lines drawn over the spell circle seem only weakly connected to the pattern that is actually there, though it's harder to tell when they didn't provide an unaltered version to actually see what's there.

And as I think on this more, Azem could just appear in the typical Ancient robes and mask for everyone really making the appearance and race point, well pointless.

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Originally Posted by Iscah

This has always felt like such a stretch. Why should Tataru have any idea what Azem's mask looked like, or that we should wear it? And the lines drawn over the spell circle seem only weakly connected to the pattern that is actually there, though it's harder to tell when they didn't provide an unaltered version to actually see what's there.

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Because Tataru is Altima, the patron of the arts. /headcanon

I think that it is unlikely that we will formally 'become Azem' from a soul density perspective, for a couple of reasons. The first is that accumulating soul fragments to merge with requires each of the current bearers of those soul fragments to die. It also requires that the shard in question is either destroyed, or that we travel there in person to find the soul of the Azem who died (as was the case with Ardbert and the First). The other reason is that adding more soul density may make us paradoxically weaker due to Dynamis.

The main questions around Azem are historical ones. Where was Azem during the Final Days, and why were they 'missing' at the time of Emet's Amaurot? What is their backstory - where was their birthplace, how did they encounter the various members of the Convocation, and how were they chosen to be Venat's successor? How did they leave - did they just pack up and head off, or did the Convocation formally revoke their post first - were the rumors that we got from the general public accurate, or was there more to the story? There's mention of Azem having being previously censured by the Convocation during the short stories, and it doesn't sound like the departure was on very good terms, given that Emet had to create the corresponding soulstone in secret.

Some of these may just be subjects for the 'Tales' sidestories, but it's possible that we may have some answers from Pandaemonium and Myths.

My guess is Azem knew he/she needed to be sundered in order for everything to come to pass. Maybe Venat told him/her everything about our visit.

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Originally Posted by Elissar

In our world, Tenzen was one previous reincarnation of our current character.

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I know this is probably from the four lords questline but do you know where specifically? Because I feel like I have missed the party where they said this.

All I know about the WoL (The player) is that they're a descendant of Ramza (Either a previous reincarnation of the WoL or a literal ancestor) based on Ultima, the high seraph's dialogue at the start of the final phase.

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Originally Posted by Kranel_San

I know this is probably from the four lords questline but do you know where specifically? Because I feel like I have missed the party where they said this.

All I know about the WoL (The player) is that they're a descendant of Ramza (Either a previous reincarnation of the WoL or a literal ancestor) based on Ultima, the high seraph's dialogue at the start of the final phase.

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The line at least how I remember it is where they say our aether feels like Tenzen's. Instead of how it gets worded by Ancients for the most part. Where to me I always took it to mean that our aether feels similar cause we both are/were WoL's. Since none of the four lords get all old friend in their verbiage. Versus how most ancients treat us.

Kind of how Windwaker Link isn't an reincarnation of Twilight Link, but they're both Links for their times and thusly end up doing similar stuff.

I am not sure we are Azem themselves ( though I consider it technically possible right now), but I know we must have something to do with them. The gender thing, begun in the Hyth convo in Amaurot, is one thing. Azem is their own character, like Ardbert. Them getting a different gender based on ours makes no sense unless we have something to do with that choice directly.

Second, in EW, the fight with Venat in Elpis implied something to me. She makes a point of linking suffering and strength in her conversation with us. She basically says we are as strong as we are bc we must have experienced a lot of trials. Then she mentions Azem and how, tho s/he was half her age when they met, they were immensely strong. If suffering=strength, well we come from a world where harrowing experiences have followed us and suffering loss is normal. What’s Azem’s excuse? The ancients are all fairly certain they live in a utopia. In fact, that was part of the problem, apparently. So how’d Azem get the experience needed to match venat’s strength at half her age, before even becoming the Traveler? It would make sense if they also came from a world where suffering was normal. Or were somehow influenced by someone who did.

The idea of us being in a giant time loop or something is weird at present, and I can’t say I love the idea yet, but it does seem to be possible.

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Originally Posted by Kranel_San

All I know about the WoL (The player) is that they're a descendant of Ramza (Either a previous reincarnation of the WoL or a literal ancestor) based on Ultima, the high seraph's dialogue at the start of the final phase.

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That's actually a throwback line to the end of Final Fantasy Tactics, where Altima says that exact like to Ramza. But if we're a direct descendant of anybody in that case, we'd be a descendant of Alma's. Meaning our character is ironically distantly related to the current days Ramza and Alma. Doubly funny if you're a Hrothgar, since that means he's related to one of the "vile beasts" he complained about early on.

1/13th of Azem soul to be more precise. So was the warrior of darkness. We still yet to find the other 11 pieces.

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Originally Posted by Kranel_San

I know this is probably from the four lords questline but do you know where specifically? Because I feel like I have missed the party where they said this.

All I know about the WoL (The player) is that they're a descendant of Ramza (Either a previous reincarnation of the WoL or a literal ancestor) based on Ultima, the high seraph's dialogue at the start of the final phase.

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We can’t be a reincarnation of Ramza because his soul never passed on.

I was under the impression that like Tenzen, Ramza was another WoL, but not necessarily our WoL. There have been many Warriors of Light, including all of Ardbert’s party, but not every Warrior of Light is a shard of Azem.

I don’t remember it being said that Tenzen or Ramza are our past selves, just that they’re other WoLs.

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Originally Posted by rxantos

1/13th of Azem soul to be more precise. So was the warrior of darkness. We still yet to find the other 11 pieces.

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We are more than that because at this point 7 shards have rejoined, reuniting those pieces to us.

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Originally Posted by Teah_Kaye

Yeah, we're 9/14ths. Source + 7 shards already rejoined + Ardbert. So we technically have most of Azem's original soul already.

I don't remember as much about Ramza but wasn't Tenzen's soul locked away with that frenzied auspice until the end of the Four Lords questline? That would kind of preclude him from being an Azem shard. I think he was just a wol.

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Yeah, Tenzen and Ramza's souls are both currently accounted for, and as a result cannot be our previous incarnations.

Not to mention, us being a reincarnation of Tenzen would actually ruin the story around him. Not only would it devalue his sacrifice to seal Koryu, but you'd go from the Auspices treating you as similar to him and occasionally mistaking you for him because of similar vibes, to the Auspices actually being factually right but just... not bringing that up after a point for some reason?

If I remember correctly what was said about the Ramza descendant that was it was not the descendant of Ramza but one who inherited the will of a Warrior of Light atleast that was how Ramza (from the Ivamice Raid) explained it after he stopped being such a douche. If I were at home I could give the cutscene from the Inns journal that says it.

We definitely are Azem, and the game doesn't even make it subtle.

The only question remaining is that are we the sundered reincarnation of Azem? Or are we directly Azem, in that at the end of our journey, when we are fully rejoined, do we travel back to Elpis and become Azem in that age.

I think the signs point to the latter and that we are in a time loop. Not only backed up by the fact that all the time travel in this game is time loop based, and there is lots of it, but also that Azem told Elidibus to go to Pandaemonium and meet us there. The only way Azem would know that is if they were us. Emet also says we look just like Azem, it's because we are one and the same.

Tenzen and Ramza were also previous reincarnations of Azem. When each they died, their soul was returned to the aetherial sea to be reborn. If we had ended up dying in the 8th Calamity, the same would have happened to us. I feel it's likely we will learn of another past reincarnation in the final part of the 24 man.

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Originally Posted by TheRealQuah

We definitely are Azem, and the game doesn't even make it subtle.

The only question remaining is that are we the sundered reincarnation of Azem? Or are we directly Azem, in that at the end of our journey, when we are fully rejoined, do we travel back to Elpis and become Azem in that age.

I think the signs point to the latter and that we are in a time loop. Not only backed up by the fact that all the time travel in this game is time loop based, and there is lots of it, but also that Azem told Elidibus to go to Pandaemonium and meet us there. The only way Azem would know that is if they were us. Emet also says we look just like Azem, it's because we are one and the same.

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My greatest fear is that the final quest before this game goes into sunset mode in ten years or more is that this will be true, because the fanservice would make it an easy choice and because it would be the thing to sour me on FFXIV and make me horribly sad and dissatisfying for the fate of my WoL. Would rather it be completely open-ended or dying, because consigning my player character to Amaurot and a lifetime railroaded into friendship with Emet and Hythodeaus is appealing to many but revolting to me. Would pray for another 8th Calamity AU where we decline Venat's offer to become the next Azem. Bad enough they went with 'a piece of our soul has its roots in this important Azem figure so it's a Chosen One via luck of random magic inheritance rather than chosen actions'. But that's why people don't like closed time-loops when the possibility otherwise exists and why I hope it stays open-ended so everyone can be satisfied with personal head-canons, even those that want the closed loop Rejoined and Time-Traveled Azem instead of their WoL.

I wonder whether the shards of Azem are strictly one per world-shard or if Hydaelyn has the power to shuffle them around as necessary? Maybe Tenzen and Ramza are different shards of Azem.

(Hydaelyn: "Another one dramatically sacrificed themself to seal away terrible evil? How very Azem. Let me see if there's another shard that isn't busy right now...")

Any which way, I really don't want the story to end with the WoL tracking down all their shards, regardless of exactly how it would play out.

That's a fairly smart idea, and plausible. In the absence of any further elaboration around 'what Azem was up to' (and any further time travel mechanics around this), it's more than likely that each of their fragments have been through multiple lives over the past 12000 years, and there's not necessarily a need to account for all of them individually. Any heroic spirit through the ages could have been an Azem fragment.

My personal hope is that when the game wraps up down the line, the Fourth reflection from the Source turns out to be Earth, with the implication that the players all have a little bit of Azem in them.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

My personal hope is that when the game wraps up down the line, the Fourth reflection from the Source turns out to be Earth, with the implication that the players all have a little bit of Azem in them.

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I've never liked plots where long-standing fantasy words suddenly turn out to have been linked to Earth all along.