Gerun Oracles

[Anonymoose]

I've just wrapped up a fresh pass through my tome of everything the Ascians have ever said. TL;DR it didn't help much.

90% of the references mesh with what we've already put together. The Ascians breed chaos, chaos is entwined with Darkness, Darkness covers the world and leads to the rise of Zodiark. A major part of the plan is teaching the arts of summoning so that various gods will be risen and set against one another in great wars - it's a pretty reliable strategy.

Elidibus and Lahabrea have both made claims that Hydaelyn is the root of an imbalance, with Lahabrea going to far as to claim that it threatens to undo the natural order of the corporeal and aetheric worlds. They have both said that they plan to resurrect the One True God, Zodiark, because only He can ensure her complete annihilation. They have both said that the Rejoining will set things right and restore the original state of things (the way they always should have been). Elidibus only talks about balance around Hydaelyn's children, but you can't just dismiss it outright in its entirety because Lahabrea said basically the same thing right before trying to kill us (why lie then?).

Except every hint points to the Rejoining being a compression of all worlds into a state of Genesis - a state of Creation that Zodiark could guide.

Now, Lahabrea freely admitted all of this in the presence of Igeyorhm, so if Elidibus' plan is different from the mainstream, he kept it from Lahabrea. He doesn't seem to have anything different in mind, though, since he too freely admitted that Hydaelyn would be lost and everything would be reverted to some form that they've been trying for seven Calamities to restore. Why, then, when everything else they say matches, does Lahabrea speak of eternal Darkness while Elidibus speak of Balance?

Trying to unravel it all into a coherent "this is what's going on" is making me go cross-eyed at this juncture. What I'm missing could be anything. It's all true but not in our best interest, or there are different goals that overlap in certain places or not others, or someone's lying about something... What's the key? Maybe I'll be able to nail this final bit when we learn why Calamities happen later in the 3.X series.

All I know right now is that I'm going to be pretty dejected if it's revealed that the other thirteen facets of the Sea are the worlds Lahabrea and Elidibus didn't come from. You know, Vana'diel, Ivalice, etc. and that by saving Hydaelyn, we save all of Final Fantasy. You know, like not letting XIV sink helped accomplish. Heartwarming though the theme is, please no. Leave that kind of stuff to Dissidia.

I hope it's something more, like, whatever dimensions gave rise to theories about the Seven Heavens and the Seven Hells.

[Kuwagami]

All I know right now is that I'm going to be pretty dejected if it's revealed that the other thirteen facets of the Sea are the worlds Lahabrea and Elidibus didn't come from. You know, Vana'diel, Ivalice, etc. and that by saving Hydaelyn, we save all of Final Fantasy. You know, like not letting XIV sink helped accomplish.

Isn't that already debunked by the existence of FFXV ? Or did they only change the game's name and made it a part of Grand Pulse's world as well ? (I can vaguely remember something said about the Nova Crystallis saga, but I don't know what was said exactly).

Anyway, such a lore would effectively put an end to the FF series (or they pull some BS afterwards like "Hey, we forgot that world there"). I don't think they want that to happen right now. I can't see it being a good commercial move with the huge delay FFXV got through the years of failed development.

[Anonymoose]

Isn't that already debunked by the existence of FFXV?

It doesn't seem to be a likely outcome. I was just mulling over all the info and happened to stumble through the progression, "Collapses worlds? And Lahabrea and Elidibus are from this one. And there are fourteen facets of the Sea..." and I had a moment that I, to be frank, needed to exorcise from my consciousness, lol.

You never know, though. Who expected Final Fantasy XIII to be the real-time death rattle of a collapsing universe that ends with

Lightning emerging in the New World of (possibly but not confirmed to be) modern-day France down to real-world train models?

[Morningstar1337]

Isn't that already debunked by the existence of FFXV ? Or did they only change the game's name and made it a part of Grand Pulse's world as well ? (I can vaguely remember something said about the Nova Crystallis saga, but I don't know what was said exactly).

They said that XV is no longer a part of the Nova Crystalis saga anymore.

[Paxsean001]

Hmm, split in 12 could have something to do with the 12 demons fought by the Zodiac Braves...

[Frederick22]

snip

Maybe Elidibus's plan is something completly different but with the same goal ( destroy the WoL ). Lahabrea always used aggresive startegies, maybe his orther ascian is doing ways slowly and being smarter?
Using doubt, true evidence, and deceit. To make us be confuse, so we dont see whats right and whats wrong, and keeping us apart of our main goal to weaken us.

Maybe he understand that he isnt going to beat us if he is constanting atacking us on the contraty in may make us even stronger. He may just be using a very different way, our trojan horse.

[myahele]

When you think of it, there have been a total of 14 Umbral/ Astral Era (7 of each) cycles, already.

With the exception of the 7th Umbral Era, each represented an Element. We're also currently in the 7th Astral Era. It makes me wonder if the Asciens intended awaken Zodiark in 7th Umbral era, but that plan was foiled by the WoL -- a singularity that's not part of their plan.

[Anonymoose]

It makes me wonder if the Asciens intended awaken Zodiark in 7th Umbral era, but that plan was foiled by the WoL

Regardless of what the 14 facets of the Sea end up being, this remains my long-standing assumption.

Eeeeeverything comes in sevens in this game. Six Elements + [Insert Thing Here]. The Highest Heaven. The Lowest Hell. Polar Astral. Polar Umbral. Sometimes it manifests as 8 (6 + 2; the week). Sometimes it manifests as 12 (6 x 2; the Gods, the Months). Sometimes it manifests as 14 ((6 + 1) + (6 + 1); total outer realms; the eras). Everything implies that it was "intended" (a la Mezaya Thousand Eyes) for there to be one cycle of the elements for each element, followed by Oblivion (or its prevention).

Perhaps I'm not always crazy.

[Nalien]

FFXI-style continuity lockouts just don't work when you have as many questlines as XIV does, and a need to work between them.

Was FFXI really that strict on continuity? I seem to remember Chains of Promathia and Rise of the Zilart breaking it pretty badly;

At the end of Rise of the Zilart, Tu'Lia is temporarily reactivated, that resulted in the Crystal Line reactivating, which resulted in the 5th Mother Crystal being drawn back to Vana'diel along with Selh'teus, which was Chains of Promathia content. The entire sequence in Qufim Tower should occur after completing Rise of the Zilart, but most saw the resulting cutscene long before getting to the Shadow Lord, let alone starting Rise of the Zilart... My memory is going to be a bit off, but I remember seeing the start of Chains ~Lv25, while Zilart had to wait until I'd beaten the Shadow Lord at Lv40~50.

That was pretty much in exactly the way I'm talking about having continuity going forward... Had you done Zilart, you "get" what happened at the start of Chains, the events of Zilart aren't directly referenced at all. Ideally I'd hope XIV does that going forward, complete with something like The Last Verse, which was strict on its continuity requirements (required Zilart and Chains completed). An "epic" quest like that, to tie together two expansions (or raid content), I think would be perfectly fine. Let people do Eureka without requiring Crystal Tower, but then throw a quest at the end which requires both and ties up the loose ends. I think XI nailed it in that regard, it was a nice way to maintain continuity, without locking entire expansions down.

[Alisa180]

It occurrs to me, Elidibius didn't quite say that there *had* to be a balance between Light and Darkness. What he said was 'Things are tipping too far towards Light, any further and *our goal will fall out of our reach*' Paraphrased, but that's more or less it. The Ascian's 'goal', of course, being the revival of Zodiark.

I think what he was saying is the Light, thanks to the WoL, was on the verge of a descisive victory that would, if not permanently prevent, *severly set back* their goal of reviving Zodiark.

The Ascians are trying to tip things towards Darkness. At no point did Elidibius say they wanted balance, merely that 'balance' in terms of an eternal tug-of-war between Light and Dark existed. Just my take on it.