A primal halted the Empire's advance after Ala Mhigo?

[Enkidoh]

Actually, Gilgamesh isn't a Primal - he's just a hapless guy from a whole other universe but was caught in the Void and ended up in various other worlds - Hydaelyn isn't the first world he's visited.

But your idea of the 'Primal' that supposedly stopped Gaius's initial invasion being not a Primal at all but something else might ring true - given the fact the Empire uses the term 'eikon' to refer to any metaphysical being, whether Primal, god or any other aetheric entity, it's entirely possible that it could have even been a reference to Midgardsormr, a very real and living entity that was the guardian of Silvertear Lake, and the term 'Primal' was just a mistranslation. But nothing is known for certainty.

[Anonymoose]

it's entirely possible that <snip> the term 'Primal' was just a mistranslation.

I'm relatively sure they meant primal. It was part of the Version 1.0 flash website, promotional materials, etc. and then they borrowed pieces of it for the ARR website, as well. I feel like somewhere in between someone would have been like, "Wait, primal? That wasn't a primal! Silly typo..." and fixed it. To guess an identity, the main unknown is when exactly it happened. When we had the chance to ask about the lore, any attempts to get clarification on when it happened and who it was have been carefully skirted around to not give any hints to those details. I assumed that meant the answer was going to come someday, but we had to wait for it. Then the issue just kinda disappeared for a while, again, lol.