The Future of Zenos Yae Galvus(heavy spoilers for 4.5)

[MetalSnakeXI1]

To recap what we know so far as short as I can

After his apparent "suicide" at the Royal Menagerie,Zenos as a villain is kind of divided in two in his usage in the story from 4.1 onward.

We have his body possessed by the ascian Elidibus planting the seeds for a full garlean invasion(alongside Solus sos Galvus who turned out to be an ascian too) which culminates into the battle of Ghymlit Dark

The real Zenos however,uses the resonance to possess the body of an elezen soldier from the Ala Mhigan resistence and started tracking the warrior of light albeit a little late to catch up to him before the warrior of light prepares for a journey to the First.


By the finale of stormblood both Elidizenos and EleZenos remain at large and I speculate both will play a big part in 5.0's story....tho mostly in post 5.x rather than the main story of 5.0.Personally I think the result of the War at the Ala Mhigan borders won't be fully disclosed until the end of 5.x where we see a preview of whats to come in 5.1 onward but that's a speculation beside the main point I wanna talk about.


Ever since 1.0 up until Stormblood we haven't really had a defined main antagonist beside those who were the main villain of their own expansion beside the ascians with the exception of Gaius Van Baelsar who,as we learned so far,is the only one of the villains we had to survive their bout with the Warrior of Light(unless you count Nael's trapped soul in the coils) and even then Gaius is no longer our enemy anymore as he too is on his own hunt for the ascians.

Zenos seems to be the exception for this(for better or for worse depending on what you think of the character) as he seems like a legitimate attempt in XIV to have a defined main villain,a main foil to the warrior of light who continues to be the only force that consistently managed to defeat us more than once beyond the first encounter.He had the most presence out of any villain so far both physically and his looming influence in Doma,Ala Mhigo and the rest of Eorzea and what his existence means for the realm

And it seems the writers have more plans in store for him if 4.5 is anything to go by and in a way.... I like that.

Personally(and take this with a grain of salt as this is purely my subjective take on this)I think Zenos is one of if not the best thing to come out of Stormblood for me.Yes he is a being of pure evil and in a way that won't appeal to everyone but personally,I don't think every villain needs to be a relatable sympathetic one or have a morally just cause even if that's the trending troupe of writing in media nowadays.There is a place for this type of villain that,while not relatable,still exudes enough charisma to keep me interested in them and their opposition helps to bring the best in The Warrior of Light and the rest of the cast.

Don't get me wrong I love Nael,Gaius,Thordan(despite my issues with how he concluded) and Nidhogg but if I had to pick one to be my favorite of the XIV villain... Zenos is probably up there for me and I cant wait to see what the future has for him in Shadowbringers

[Gula]

This game is full on anime at times so I'm looking forward to our own yandere. Only he can kill us, only we can kill him. And he'll (try to?) kill anyone who tries to upset that.

The more straight forward players may want to see him perma dead for that classic sense of accomplishment, but this is the side of me that enjoys anime BS in which the mass murderer joins the MC's friendship/harem crew. Fordola's still kicking, though with an explosive collar. Let's get Zenos fitted for one. Hell, he could be our SAM trust.

[ObsidianFire]

I thought I knew where we were going with Zenos (guy who keeps trying to get into fights with us) and then we found out we were going to the 1st Shard and now I'm a lot less certain.

Elidibus is much more straightforward. He's an Ascian and he's trying to cause a Calamity. The only question is how SE is going to show us in-game what he is doing. And for all we know, he might just decided to follow us to the 1st Shard. Since he's an Ascian that would be easy.

Zenos himself is a lot more complicated. The last we see of him, he talks about getting what is his back, only it's a tad ambiguous if he's just talking about his body or if he includes the Garlean Empire with that too. If he's just talking about his body, I could see him trying to make for the 1st Shard too to fight us. He's got the Resonance, so that might be close enough to the Echo that he could do whatever we did. If he's talking about getting the Garlean Empire back under his control, then I don't think we'll be seeing him until after 5.0 is done. Sure, we'll see him taking (or trying to take) back the Garlean Empire, but that's going to take time since no one knows he's alive yet and I can easily see that being a reason to get back to the Garlean Conflict once we finish saving the 1st Shard and come back to the Source. The only thing is, Zenos has admitted to not caring about Garlemald, so I don't know why he would be interested in taking back Garlemald.

[MetalSnakeXI1]

I thought I knew where we were going with Zenos (guy who keeps trying to get into fights with us) and then we found out we were going to the 1st Shard and now I'm a lot less certain.

Elidibus is much more straightforward. He's an Ascian and he's trying to cause a Calamity. The only question is how SE is going to show us in-game what he is doing. And for all we know, he might just decided to follow us to the 1st Shard. Since he's an Ascian that would be easy.

Zenos himself is a lot more complicated. The last we see of him, he talks about getting what is his back, only it's a tad ambiguous if he's just talking about his body or if he includes the Garlean Empire with that too. If he's just talking about his body, I could see him trying to make for the 1st Shard too to fight us. He's got the Resonance, so that might be close enough to the Echo that he could do whatever we did. If he's talking about getting the Garlean Empire back under his control, then I don't think we'll be seeing him until after 5.0 is done. Sure, we'll see him taking (or trying to take) back the Garlean Empire, but that's going to take time since no one knows he's alive yet and I can easily see that being a reason to get back to the Garlean Conflict once we finish saving the 1st Shard and come back to the Source. The only thing is, Zenos has admitted to not caring about Garlemald, so I don't know why he would be interested in taking back Garlemald.

I'm sure he meant his body cuz Zenos himself has no interest in politics and conquest and could care less if the empire succeeds or burnt to ashes

Heck he more or less went the Nael route of going against the rules of Garlemald and became one with the primal shinryu

As for him going to the first...I'm not sure.It could happen don't get me wrong but I don't think he'd risk a trip to a different shard(let alone knowing how to get there in the first place) with the weak body of an Ala Mhigan Elezen rather than his original body

[ChaoticCrimson]

As of yet, I don't think Elidibus even suspects that the real Zenos is still kicking, albeit in a totally different body. I have a feeling that Zenos could be a bit of a wrench in Elidibus' plans, but how much of an impact it will really have is anyone's guess at this point. Based on the stinger at the end of 4.5, we can be reasonably certain that EleZenos fully intends to confront Zenodibus eventually, in order to "reclaim what's (his)". For all his faults that his personality invokes, Zenos isn't going to charge in foolishly against an Ascian. He's more clever than that. Between him and Gaius "Shadowhunter" Baelsar, I think Elidibus and Solus are probably in for a surprise eventually if the WoL ends up working with them. But even then, I don't suspect the Ascians to be without their own contingency plans, and I'm sure they have plenty of tricks up their own sleeves. I'm really intrigued what they plan to do with things, and Zenos is a huge variable as long as he's still around.

[Lacan]

I'm hoping we actually get to be friends at some point since I told him we could be friends before he died the first time. I was hoping we could hang out, maybe go to the gold saucer together, that sort of thing. I just wonder if he thinks I'm cute. He's the kind of guy who'd just straight up tell you I think.

[MagiusNecros]

Zenos isn't so much evil then he is the definition of a Blood Knight. I'm just confused where this resonance possession garbage came from. I must have missed something.

[Rocl]

I'm just confused where this resonance possession garbage came from. I must have missed something.

There's an Elezen in Resistance garb walking around using a katana yammering on about the Hunt and searching for his one true friend, his one true enemy--and at the end of 4.56 we see his eyes light up with two Resonance symbols. The only other person we've see with two Resonance eyes is Zenos. There's very little subtlety here, the Elezen possesses Zenos' soul by some means, and the most likely explanation is the Resonance--as the Echo can allow a person to persist after death (as seen in 2.2's Sahagin Priest).

[Noitems]

My hope (I feel this may happen based on how SE has been taking it's roleplay aspects) that we at some point control Zenos for a roleplay session. Get to experience everything from his angle (I figure either DRK or SAM would be his job) and just go as him as he supports us in the First or on the main crystal where all the action is happening.

I like him a ton and want to see more of Zenos as I love how he's just deadset on fighting us. That will def lead into moments where the WoL may be against the wall and will almost die but Zenos will come and destroy whatever was going to get him. He'd say something like "The only one who can claim the Warrior of Light's head...is me."

Cliche I know, but it's the fun of it all.

[SpiritualOcean]

cliche is okay if it’s well-done.