Revelations from SHADOWBRINGERS

[Cilia]

There is also the fact that FF7 had a meteor that dropped an alien parasite that wanted to hijack the planet and use it as a means of transport to other planets.

Or Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, where the plot was caused by a meteor containing some of another planet's lifestream crashing into Earth and the souls within it antagonizing humanity as phantoms.

Or Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles, where the instigator of the game's conflict (though not its main antagonist) was literally named "Meteor Parasite," crashed on the planet, and began spreading toxic miasma that the game's main antagonist (Raem) took advantage of to sate his appetite for painful memories.

... come to think of it, meteors with unwelcome guests crashing into planets is relatively common in fiction.

Sarcasm aside, a lot of the Amaurot dungeon takes cues from the Book of Revelation, from the "names" of the locations, to fire raining from the sky and the rivers turning to blood, to the bosses being identified as "Beasts." Notably the final boss is named "Therion," which is one of the many names attributed to the Beast of Revelation.

[Zohar_Lahar]

So, odds that the Terminus was caused by some sort of Cosmic Parasite?

Or that there actually was an original will of the star that Zodiark replaced, and the reason that was needed was because the parasite flat out killed the original?

I'm still inclined to think the Ancients borked something, since that whole mention of the "keening" of the earth made me think of the Elementals flooding the Source in retribution over the War of the Magi. And of course the First getting overtaken by a Flood of Light. It's almost like the Final Days was a flood itself.

Plus, right before we head for the Tempest, Feo Ul mentioned how the immortal fae had to balance what they create and destroy. In Amaurot, the immortal ancients were doing a lot of creation but apparently little destruction.

[Theodric]

Well, Zodiark had to rewrite the laws of the planet anew so I'm more inclined to believe that a third party was responsible for the plight of those who resided in Amaurot and the other cities at the time. It'd be a bit disappointing to me if it was pushed that they were somehow at fault for their situation, even if it was an unintended consequence. By all accounts, their society regulated their powerful magic rather well after all. That their civilisation fell is a huge tragedy - that attempts to preserve it failed is even more so.

[Alleo]

Well it could be both. The start of it was out of their hands. Maybe it was a third party or maybe the planet simply was dieing? I mean planets do have lifespans too and it could just be that the planet was "crying" out in his last days. This sound then and maybe some starting catastrophes created a huge amount of fear in the people around the world. And as we learned, the ancient ones can create really bad things when they are fearful. I can imagine that this then started a chain of events. One city heard that sound -> fear -> monster coming from their own minds and other catastrophes. (We know that Ascians can summon meteors too) Then other cities start to talk about this, fear takes over in their minds and make it worse. Amaurot hears about this but continues to only discuss if they should help or not and caught one of the created monster to study it. They only seemingly do something when its right at their own door and the world is already beyond saving.

Also its interesting to see how they do handle bad situations. The side dungeon shows an NPC that cant believe that something went wrong, while inside the building Ancient ones die left and right to their own creations. (Funny how such a strong race seemingly die so easily to these creations) At the end the NPC is still not overly concerned with the situation, even though a huge beast got out (and stayed out since we can fight it) and quite a few Ancient ones died..They might have been powerful but the quest already showed that they were far from perfect and that simple things could change their creations immensly. Also they too had human emotions, including the negative ones and they were forced to wear the robes in the fear that individuality could lead to negative outcomes. I have no problem seeing that not every single being on the planet would conform to this.

Also if Zodiark had to rewrite the laws of the planet then wouldnt he destroy the source too, to stop it from happening again? And with that, even if it had been a third party, it would not be important to our story anymore.

Of course it could also be like Zohar_Lahar pointed out and they just used too much of that power over time. No matter the regulations you will always have those that dont care about this. And we do know that they too had people without that huge amount of aether. (Which is why that one NPC has a solution for us) Maybe those tapped a bit into the life of the planet itself and over a long time this small amount can leave traces. This could then be used as a lesson to learn from: Its better not have that amount of power and be happy with the way we are now.

-----

About something else: I watched a stream again about the shadowbringer story and I saw a interesting scene (which I did kinda forgot). Ryne talks in Il Mheg about her role. She says that if we could not be summoned, she would be the one to kill the Lightwardens.

So I started to wonder: Why did nobody, even her, ever think about the possibility of sharing the light? First I thought that she might not be able to hold in much because she is just 1/14 of the soul, but after joining with Minfilia (a source soul, who had 8/14 too) she should be on the same level as we are. Which means that after the joining and getting her own name, she could have easily taking in some light, right? Why not (seeing how it hurt us) at least help with the last two? Why not have at least a scene where she tries to do that but we stop her because we believe that its our burden alone? The light never was fully great for us but only after the last two lightwardens, did we truly felt it and have it negatively impact us.

I know its probably because the plot had to go a certain way but I dislike it when it feels like such solutions are completely overlooked. Or did I miss something?

Also another question that then popped up. Why was the crystal exarch not turned into a lightwarden? We know that anyone without the blessing would turn as soon as they got the light into them. He came and took a bit of this light out of us until he was stopped so why is he still fine? Also would he have really managed to even reach a place to die before truly turning?

[TankHunter678]

Also another question that then popped up. Why was the crystal exarch not turned into a lightwarden? We know that anyone without the blessing would turn as soon as they got the light into them. He came and took a bit of this light out of us until he was stopped so why is he still fine? Also would he have really managed to even reach a place to die before truly turning?

He was winding up for the teleport and extraction to commence at the same time. He was going to instantly turn into a lightwarden when he yanked all the light out at once, but the teleport into the rift needed to happen at the exact same moment so that instead of attacking his friends he just dies in the rift. He was literally balancing 2 spells at the same time. So he did not get to do either when he got interrupted by being shot in the back.

[Deusteele]

Well, we have no evidence that Ryne or anyone else in our circle is an original Amaurotine soul. In fact it stands that there can't be that many full 1/14th souls around. Plus Ryne doesn't have our full plethora of Blessings that help shore up the strength of our soul.

[Ilenya]

So I started to wonder: Why did nobody, even her, ever think about the possibility of sharing the light?

I've been wondering something similar, in regards to the White Auracite Urianger made for us in Il Mheg. I've not found much information, unfortunately, on why that wouldn't work.

[TankHunter678]

I've been wondering something similar, in regards to the White Auracite Urianger made for us in Il Mheg. I've not found much information, unfortunately, on why that wouldn't work.

The White Auracite was explicitly prepared for dealing with Ascians. So it was basically held in reserve, especially after Emet showed himself.

[Ilenya]

The White Auracite was explicitly prepared for dealing with Ascians. So it was basically held in reserve, especially after Emet showed himself.

Which is fine...But did no one think to try? Did it take Urianger that long to make one that they couldn't make a second to test? Heck, how did he even know there would be an Ascian there, considering the known Ascians on the First were dead? I mean, logically there would be the moment we started playing with their plans, but still, there's a thing we know can hold aether. Why are we not testing things?

[Iscah]

Which is fine...But did no one think to try? Did it take Urianger that long to make one that they couldn't make a second to test? Heck, how did he even know there would be an Ascian there, considering the known Ascians on the First were dead? I mean, logically there would be the moment we started playing with their plans, but still, there's a thing we know can hold aether. Why are we not testing things?

It does seem like white auracite takes a lot of preparation (IIRC Urianger mentioned having set up in Il Mheg specifically because it was aether-rich and ideal for creating it) but it's also about the nature of how it functions.

From memory, it was covered in 2.X that the auracite could only hold aether for a short period of time - which is why Moenbryda put a lot of effort into building the separate aetheric siphon device that would allow them to gather aether after trapping the Ascian in the auracite.