Revelations from Patch 6.3: Gods Revel, Lands Tremble

[Kranel_San]

Golbez had multiple opportunities to come to the source and didn't use them to kill himself there.
So i guess he wants to save the other voidsents.
Personally i believe he is the shard of Azem from the 13th, so he could have been a warrior of light before the flood of darkness.
And since he couldn't save his people in the past, he decided to deliver them from their fates no matter the cost.

Deliver them from their fates no matter the cost by opening the way to the source and sending voidsents to die there in the long run so that they join the lifestream.
The archfiends were clear about their want to just die in the source and get into the lifestream so again... why not just suicide?
Unless Golbez has another goal which... cure? the current voidsents. Suicide on the source seems to be the only proper way to get into the lifestream and be reborn as a mortal again without ruining the source and... well... having a large population of voidsents in it ready to kill you or even transform you into a voidsent again.

[Seraphor]

Tried searching, the Forum search is awful though, so maybe this has been brought up before, but...

I think the plot may be angling towards a Giant of Babil scenario.

You have the "Anchorite at Corvos", which is labeled very largely on the world map even when Corvos itself isn't (???), and supposedly, the "Anchorite" is the leftover foot of a "giant statue" that used to stand with one foot in Thavnair, and one foot in Corvos.

Then you have Khadga in Thavnair, which is held by Thavnairians to be the leftover "sword" wielded by the "gods" when they fought a long time ago.

Khadga's position would place it about right to be where that "statue" would drop it, assuming it stood straddling the Corvos Narrow.

So I'm wondering if these are all parts of the remnants of some ancient superweapon. Either Allagan, or maybe some hyper-anime thing like "Hydaelyn couldn't defeat Zodiark directly, so she created a gigantic Mecha-Rabbit Suit operated by Loporrits that blasted Zodiark into pieces".

Somehow or other, this "Giant" gets woken up or reassembled, and then does FFIV-style things to the world, or some specific target, or something.

The world unites to oppose it, maybe we even get Dwarven Tanks teleported in from the First.

We then go inside its head Alexander-style for a Giant of Babil dungeon. And maybe along the way, we unlock a trial where we fight all Four Fiends again simultaneously, just to drive home the "Did you know FFIV exists?" factor of the 6.x MSQ series.

Eh... considering we've already had the Tower of Babil, and nothing much has hinted at the Anchorite at Corvos and the Khadga being important in any way, I'd suspect they're just interesting map details that were thrown in without any thought of what part, if any, they would play.

[Shookbeast]

I don't know if someone asked this but...
If the voidsents or at least the archfiends' ultimate goal is to die on the source so they can go to the lifestream. Then why not suicide as soon as you arrive?

I noticed this too and have been wondering. Some lines in the English version call it an “invasion” as if the Voidsent mean to take over the Source and occupy it.

Other times characters say they simply want the ability to die on the Source.

I guess those two things aren’t mutually exclusive- but it does feel a little contradictory.

My guess is the writers assume that “we assume” the Voidsent are unruly - and most will simply attack anything and everything on the Source before being killed or passing away on their own. So it would be a sort of invasion in that the deluge of Voidsent would cause chaos on the Source.

Golbez would then simply wait for things to sort themselves out - as anyone who died on the Source would just hop back into the life-stream.

But! Here is a thought. Golbez seems to consider this a war…

What if the war is being waged on the Ascians who caused the Void calamity? Golbez plans revenge on them (even though they’ve returned back to the life-stream or are dead/sundered/hiding) by ruining the Source - and somehow stopping any further re-joinings? Petty revenge paid back for thousands of years languishing on a ruined planet?

[RyuDragnier]

I think it's likely that the reason Voidsent won't just off themselves is because they cannot by instinct alone. Theirs is a world of survival instinct taken to the extreme, only the strong survive, the weak devoured. The instinct is so strong that Rubicante himself was barely able to keep it at bay. And if he couldn't keep it under control despite being one of the most powerful Voidsent, how could the rest?

[Shookbeast]

I think it's likely that the reason Voidsent won't just off themselves is because they cannot by instinct alone. Theirs is a world of survival instinct taken to the extreme, only the strong survive, the weak devoured. The instinct is so strong that Rubicante himself was barely able to keep it at bay. And if he couldn't keep it under control despite being one of the most powerful Voidsent, how could the rest?

Agreed. I think that’s the assumption being made and why this will be an “invasion.”

I can’t help but wonder if Golbez doesn’t have a secret plan though.

[Kranel_San]

So basically: "We're going to invade the source so that their people can kill us because we're too... instinctual?... to suicide by ourselves."

[Cleretic]

I think it's likely that the reason Voidsent won't just off themselves is because they cannot by instinct alone. Theirs is a world of survival instinct taken to the extreme, only the strong survive, the weak devoured. The instinct is so strong that Rubicante himself was barely able to keep it at bay. And if he couldn't keep it under control despite being one of the most powerful Voidsent, how could the rest?

I'd also point out that it's not far off from how Fandaniel was operating: he couldn't just commit suicide quietly by nature of what he was, he had no other option but to go big. A lot of the higher-ranked voidsent calling the shots probably can't actually off themselves, they're too powerful. And then when you look at the lower-ranked ones... well, how is a flan gonna do it? That's not even power-related, I mean logistically speaking how is it gonna pull that off?

But more honestly it's actually less immediate than 'they want to go die on the Source'. A bunch of them do, but they also (correctly) see that their life is going to be a lot better over there. It's not that they want to die now, it's that they want to die eventually and live well until they do.


EDIT: Also, it's not even speculating that Golbez has a secret motivation. Not only did Rubicante say it to us, he very clearly has some extra intentions going on in his 'Meanwhile' scene. We don't know what it is, but he clearly sees the end of life on the Thirteenth as key to the end of his suffering, and since that doesn't inherently follow, obviously he has some other ideas.

[rainichan]

I don't think they permanently die, but they're not conscious and they're not coming back until their consumer gets got, at which point it becomes sort of a free-for-all. I believe this was explained in 6.2, probably in relation to Scarmiglione (who himself was a weird exception).

Which tracks, given we learn in 6.3 that a big part of their motivation to invade the Source is so they can die properly. Even the closest thing they have to death isn't really death.

Yeah, it's a "death" but not a DEATH-death, they mentioned that. iirc they come back as a weaker voidsent since their consciousness still floats around the consumer and grows weaker once separated from what they've eaten (I'd have to go back and look) but it's enough of a death that they fear it like one would fear normal death. They no longer exist as themselves.

Ahh, existential dread, it's a fun topic.

So basically: "We're going to invade the source so that their people can kill us because we're too... instinctual?... to suicide by ourselves."

Some will want to if they've forgotten themselves; more are going to be more like Scarmiglione who wants more power. Having what amounts to an unlimited buffet of your fave food will be promising, but it will then carry the risk of actual, complete death instead of just going to sleep for a while and waking up weaker than before, but I don't think some will care. Living in a place that has unlimited food for you instead of fighting over it or serving those who are stronger who can provide that unlimited buffet is going to be appealing.

There are a few that just want to live because they remember what their life was before, and others will have the immortals conundrum you see in media across the board of "I'm tired of living as I have for hundreds or thousands of years, let me rest." like the new trial boss did. They all have different motivations.

[rainichan]

I had thought them Amdapori due to the stone work being similar to the ones you can see in the Shroud. That and the spires looked about the same style. I still grumble at my own WoL when I see the Io and then the post modification Behemoth. Though I guess helping the Behemoth look the way we know it looks today is better than helping with Morbol designs.

Rounding back to this, yes: the architecture when the land changes when you go to fight Althyk and Nymeia is Amdapori. One other thing I'm going to check as a For Sure before I say it a for sure, but I'm fairly certain that the houses next to Nophica's arena are... Voeburtian! I'll have to go look in a little bit, but I noticed that they look incredibly similar. I can't say for sure but the stuff in Il Mheg at the site of old Voeburt is INCREDIBLY similar which makes me Wonder about things, but hard to say otherwise. I haven't seen those sorts of buildings anywhere else, so either they were from 2E - 4E, or they know about things on the Shards (unlikely). Anyway, off we go! I'll be shoving images under spoiler cuts so they don't take up much room; apologies if they're HUGE under the cut, I can't check in post preview:

So I slammed into S Shroud to get up close and personal with the Keep to get a good luck at ruins not touched by the corruption that's in the city. Their architecture is very Round, with rounded cones, domes, and circular buildings. That's not all of it, of course, but most.

It's also in the city itself:

To note, their houses don't seem to be the round that everything else has, but that seems more suited for whatever was their government back then. Still not quite like the houses we see in the new raid, though. More on that in a moment!

As for what we see in the new raid...

Looks quite familiar! But with that knowledge, here's some closer shots of what makes me say with 100% certainty that it's old Amdapori architecture:

From the raid:


From outside at the Keep:


And side-by-side:

At the very least, they took inspo from the culture that likely worshipped them heavily; while Nophica was the main, I don't doubt Althyk and Nymeia were also worshipped heavily.

The area outside Nophica's arena was interesting though, to say the least:

Bilbo's house?!

The hobbit house isn't something I've seen around the Source, though...

And the housing structures aren't one I've seen either, not that I can remember, but they're similar to some other housing I've seen:

Hmm.


They aren't all like this though, just parts:

The tree in the background of the first area seemed familiar and I thought it could be the Percipient One out in the Fringes, but the weird glowy bits are from contamination and nothing else. However, it was said that an Elemental lived there once, so... it could still be similar to the Great One and what the big tree in the raid is from. Gives me big Implanta vibes from Ar tonelico, though...

The full album is here because I can only have 20 images/videos in a post and I was forced to pull some out of this because.... because. Some shots were mainly for comparison or extras, can't help but want to get extra shots of my fave ancient civilization.

The images should... also work now, they were very finicky on working correctly within the spoilers.

[Alleo]

I wonder if those houses were once part of the source too until all these calamities deleted them from existence.