Who knew the 6.15 Omega Quests… (Spoilers)

[EaraGrace]

If you're waiting on a "definitive statement" on what it's like from an individual human perspective in response to an environmental condition, then, conveniently, you'll be waiting forever and can draw upon the "who can saaaaay" angle for eternity. Drawing on some personal experience so I can speak more confidently on it, if you'll forgive me - without a constant supply of insulin, I would die a painful death. But one of the first things you learn in managing this condition is that there is no definitive or universal experience you can absolutely cite or draw upon. It is different for every single person who has it. In other words, you all now get to enjoy type one diabetes and have to manage the constant fatigue and giving yourself multiple daily injections or die, along with the associated financial burden, but don't worry, you should all be totally okay with it, because some people manage fine!

With sources please explain what the conditions in Zodiark are to justify human sacrifice. I see a collection of despondent souls desperately repeating their devotion to the god they became. And if that experience is so horrible then maybe they should sealed Zodiark away and put the souls into a state of sleep and not, yknow, use them as their own personal god? Maybe not subject new souls that to “torture?” I think we can find a middle ground between “fate worse than death” and “not great.”

"Some people manage fine" and there not being a "statement of definitive experience" does not mean that does not mean we cannot confidently say that, as a whole, it is a shit condition to live with, that we should not expect people to have to live with it if there's any alternative, and if there some kind of cure ever exists in the future, it is absolutely positively the moral choice to apply it to those who need it.

If that cure required grinding living breathing human beings into paste I’d say that’s not ok.

Also, we're talking about different things in your second statement. "Death" to the Ancients is "returning to the Star and entering the cycle of reincarnation." I never suggested being trapped in Zodiark is worse than what happened to the Hydaelyn followers. Both of those outcomes, from an Ancient perspective, construes a fate worse than death. Would you like me to agree that the fate of what happened to the souls fueling Hydaelyn was worse than Zodiark? I can certainly agree to that! It's quite messed up, and I feel extremely bad for the ones sacrificed to Hydaelyn!

Great! Wonder why they felt they needed to do that then!

Uh, yes. It's canon that you can use other sources.

Cool we’ve established they could break down other sources.

That's the entire basis of the Ancients' plan to get their loved ones back. That is not the same as saying that at the time Zodiark needed to be summoned the alternative resources were available in the quality or quantities needed - once again, it is stated those resources needed to be "nurtured" until the planet was "bursting with vitality." Zodiark is a Primal of darkness, of moving, active dynamic energy - so, likely, yes, dark-aspected aether - living energies - as Hythlodaeus's shade put forth.

Ok so now we’re establishing that any living energy is an acceptable alternative. In which case, why did the Ascians work towards sacrificing the denizens of the Source, given the wealth of living beings that aren’t sentient?

It's also impressed upon us the massive amounts of aether contained within an Ancient's body and soul. Hydaelyn powered herself on the souls of very few individuals to Sunder the entire world, stay operable for the next twelve thousand years, and continue to empower Warriors of Light and intervene on their behalves to make sure things were proceeding smoothly. It's a bit hard to take the suggestion of "why didn't they just use some ruined buildings instead lol" in good faith, I'm sorry.

Oh so now we’re saying that Ancient souls are special. So you agree that Ancient souls are special, and thus are a better option than other living alternatives. In which case we suddenly have another reason to believe the Ancients were not sacrificing chickens right?

My response was not "maybe he did." My response was "we do not know," or to put it another way, "you can't reasonably cite something as evidence for your argument that has never been concretely established in any way, shape, or form." We have no context as to the debates that took place among the Ancients, only that they happened. Perhaps some people felt that the urgency of getting their loved ones out meant taking the fastest route possible, versus a slower, more humane approach; perhaps people were still so stressed out and traumatized not all options that seemed "obvious" were apparent to them. We have no idea. I'd love to have a better understanding of it, don't get me wrong!

You’re justifying human sacrifice by saying they were stressed out.

Hydaelyn was explicitly relying on Zodiark to protect the planet to make her plan work, and the Watcher clarified that "opposing Zodiark" never meant wanting him gone.

This is the exact quote in English.



Notice this is a bit more nuanced that your quote. They opposed his creation, yet never wished to unmake him. If what you say is true then this would be a lie. The alternative is this isn’t a lie, and Hydaelyns group rightfully recognized that once Zodiark was summoned no alternative form of protection was feasible and thus did not wish to unmake him. By itself, one could I think handwave this away as another gap purposefully left in his memory. That is if we didn’t have another who disagreed with Zodiarks summoning. A noted defector specifically.

I'm dizzy from the spin that the Ancients had other options besides sacrificing themselves and that even the stated "purgatory" coming from apparently the gold standard of those sacrificed meant that existence within Zodiark wasn't that bad. I can't say I'm surprised that the supposedly "empathetic" ones are actually just full of false virtue.

The term has been co-opted, but I believe this is what they call “virtue signaling.”