The Road to 5.0

[Anonymoose]

I forget how the debate even started, but we were laying out all of Varis's actions and positions to discuss his brilliance in short-term situations, complete lack of far-sighted strategy, and seemingly waffling opinions between 4.0 and 4.5.

Between 4.0 and 4.3 is probably the best window to ask, "What would Regula counsel Varis to say to Elidibus right now?" before remembering that Elidibus specifically tasked Unukalhai with getting Regula killed one patch before he showed up in 4.0 to start dropping Alleged-Truth Bombs on him. However, in 4.3 and 4.4, we see that Varis is second-guessing giving Elidibus a blank check just because he promises to continue to support the Empire's supremacy, and that he loathes the idea of mankind not controlling its own destiny. By 4.5 it seems as though he's chugged the Kool-Aid, but one thing he says stands out.

Solus tells Varis in 4.4 that they should all be on board with the Rejoining and that Elidibus liberates him from the burden of free will, he just has to follow orders. Solus's job was to set up Rejoinings, and if Elidibus says keep the balance, keep the balance. (Varis's lack of foresight is again highlighted in their next chat, when he only just then realizes that [a] Solus planned the War of Succession and his ascension to the throne, and [b] Solus never cared whether the Empire survived the Calamity.)

However, in 4.5, Varis swaps that around. He says that he's on board with the Rejoining and that Elidibus has imprisoned him with the burden of free will. Because the Ascians have no plan for the Empire, he must usurp their plan. This brings his waffling in line and everything is now consistent. Now, by this point Solus has already gotten distracted thinking about Black Rose and run off to The First to try something (FORESHADOWING), leaving Varis to reveal the details of his plan to usurp the Ascian plan. I think this is where our focus should be.

It all hinges on the idea that "Man" predates the sundering of the star, and that in this age man was a single, perfect race. By completing the Rejonings, the world will become "as it once was" and mankind will be restored. At this point, man can turn on the servants of Light and Darkness Thordan-style and take the reins of history by force. We're meant to assume that this is what Elidibus has planned all along.

So there's one layer of questioning: Is this the "way it once was" Elidibus wanted back? Is Zodiark's revival incidental? What happens to man, then?

Here's another layer of questioning: Is that premise even true? We've always been told that Hydaelyn created Life to respond to Zodiark's treachery. This was in the Gerun Oracles, which Elidibus held up as truth. Is this the big hint that Varis has been duped? Or is the truer truth that life as we know it, the mortal races, are Hydaelyn's children, but that we pre-date this? That we were created when Hydaelyn and Zodiark were one, that THIS is why we are both Light and Dark, that THIS - our being ALIVE - is what pulled them apart?

(Now there's more than one way to interpret "Were Light and Dark given form when man was born?")

Or is this all a classic Elidibus misdirection and that's not at all what mankind being "perfect and whole" even means?

No matter how you slice it, though, Solus has pointed out several times now that Varis is terrible at hiding his emotions. Elidibus knows he's rattled. And just before Solus left for the First he all but said goodbye. Varis is perhaps about to make his exit. But did on his way out, did he merely reveal the means of his deception, or point us in the "right" direction?

Right or not, I'm backing Hydaelyn's play on this one. I'm just fine with the world as we knew it and fought for it all along. Finding another way to smite everything that would see it any other way is preeetty much what this franchise is about.