Quote Originally Posted by Cilia View Post
We aren't bound to the path we walk by Hydaelyn's blessing (tempering, if you want to see it as such), we're bound to it by our past incarnation. Azem of Amaurot was a hero the world over, and even sundered the PC is just one incarnation of their eternally recurring Ancient self. It's not a compulsion from Hydaelyn, it's a compulsion from the PC's very soul.

The idea we're bound to or by anything Hydaelyn's said or done falls apart if one simply remembers Ardbert attacking Minfilia when the latter was Hydaelyn's Oracle (not by name at the time, but even so).
I’d even hesitate to say that being Azem impacts anything. As we saw with Gaia, times change, and even desires that seem to be ingrained in the soul are overwritten, undermined, or in general lessened with time, death, and experience. I can’t help but wonder how many lives the WoL soul has lived, and how many involved nothing resembling adventure or conflict.

On Fandaniel and tempering, wouldn’t tempering require an active primal to occur? A primal sealed away, with already questionable autonomy given its lack of core (Elidibus), doesn’t make it likely that one could be tempered in the usual way. The stones, and the memories within, then are the only way as they seem to return the soul to its tempered state.

Which makes me wonder, is it possible to reject such memories? Take Graha for example, at the end of 5.3 it’s suggested that Graha’s soul from the 1st may not be accepted by his corresponding body on the source when he attempts to merge. While this is obviously different as we’re talking two souls from the same person merging vs. just memories being awakened, I wonder if the discordance between the memories of the unsundered and the sundered Fandaniel may have led to something like a rejection occurring, which could have its own consequences. Gaia’s conflict with her previous self’s memories make me think that ones lived experience can lead to conflict between memories and ultimately, between the different forms of the self. Perhaps that would explain why Fandaniel seems... unique, even among Ascians.