"Key" to Azys Lla?

[Anonymoose]

What was the actual "key" that Bismarck swallowed? Why do we need a key to get into Azys Lla in the first place?

Azys Lla was surrounded by an aetheric barrier and had cloaking technology; the key pointed the way to its location and disabled the cloaking. The Vanu Vanu didn't seem to, as a culture, fully understand what it did or where it led, but knew that it was bad news and to hide it away (on an island that Bismarck eventually swallowed).

[H]ow did the Allagans bind the Warring Triad in the Flagship?
How do the Containment Bays work?

As far as I can tell, it was a lot of "pretty much Dalamud, but not in space". The essences of these primals (or eikons) were captured by anti-primal weaponry (Ultima; Omega) and then bound to devices which kept them healed, drained their power, and connected them to a group of their torpid followers ("in suspended animation") in case more faith was needed to sustain their summoning.

The centrifugal crystal engine then drained that nigh-infinite power. (A primal is as powerful as the prayer that summoned it; an entire society praying for the power to throw back an Empire and win an unwinnable war is a lot of primal fuel).

Why did fighting Thordan stir the Warring Triad's slumber? Thank you!

He was going to consume them.

The Ascians don't like it when wars end; the seeds of chaos must be sown and spread and grow and thrive. (This one is one reason the Warrior of Light is such a threat; they strike at the heart of conflict and destroy its root causes.) Because Thordan was about to lose the Dragonsong War, they gave him enough power to turn the tide because he was desperate and willing to escalate bloodshed.

But Lahabrea didn't fully understand Thordan's ambitions; the Archbishop was going to consume the Warring Triad and start systematically wiping out everyone who didn't accept him as God King - you know, because that's the best way to ensure peace. The irony is that he probably would have provoked another Calamity before he succeeded, he just slipped the Ascian's leash.

But if you look closely, during the fight, he slams his sword down into the containment bays and tells it to drink deep of the slumbering eikons. This is what woke the triad and so severely compromised the prisons.