The Lost City of Amdaphor and the Sineaters

[Renato]

One thing that has constantly been on my mind since seeing the trailer for Shadowbringers is the fact that Kuribu and the Winged Lion both make an appearance as bosses in the first. Has there ever been any mention or explaination of this in the lore relating to the City itself?

[Cilia]

To be a little more accurate, the Amdapori statues are just that - statues, animated in the same way as normal golems are, but made in the likeness of Sin Eaters. I think Kuribu's card or some other tidbit of information tells us it was only made in the image of an "otherworldly being;" we now know this to be a Sin Eater.

When / how did the Amdapori glimpse a Sin Eater? Whooooo knows...

[Anonymoose]

The thing that gets me is the timeline boundaries.

The Source (Patch 3.4) = The First (100 Years Ago)

That's when the sin eaters appeared on the First, so no matter how you mess with the relativity in absolute time passage speed between the two dimensions, which does oscillate, it never goes backwards. Even if time stops whatever inspired Amdapor could not have been a direct glimpse of the Flood of Light on the First 1:1 at the time it was happening.

And yet somehow Amdapor had some notion that if one was to counter the "demonic" beings summoned forth from the void by Mhach, the making of golems with these "holy" visages was the right theme to go with to boost morale.

If you think out-of-world, from the artist's point of view, the real-world inspiration and connection in theme to both stories is obvious. The desire to recycle that model would be high. But how do you justify it? How do you make sense of it in-world?

We don't have that answer.

[Vulcwen]

Creatures like voidsent were not exclusive to the 13th due to the flood, they can be created by any heavy astral corruption, as the voeburtian plague demonstrated. It'd not be unreasonable to think that sin eaters are therefore also not exclusive to a flood of light, and that any heavy umbral corruption can cause them to appear. This would solve the time issue, where they would've originated instead would still be a mystery.

[Kalise]

One might assume that, a group of "White Mages" (The Amdapori) whom are battling against Dark corrupted enemies (Voidsent) may have tried to create a Light infused combatant (Sin Eater) as a logical course of action.

Until they realized that said Light based combatant, was literally just as bad as the Dark variant...

Thus, creating golems in their visage in lieu of using them (I dare say the Mhachi wouldn't have been able to tell the difference. They'd just see these "Holy" entities wielding powerful White magicks fighting against their Voidsent)

We have no evidence to suggest this is the case, but it's a possibility.

Since, while the only place we've seen Sin Eaters is the First shard, it doesn't mean that they're exclusive to the First and the Flood of Light. It's just that, that is a location where the ambient aether was tilted to a point where creation and propagation of Sin Eaters was easy to come by.

[Anonymoose]

Creatures like voidsent were not exclusive to the 13th due to the flood, they can be created by any heavy astral corruption, as the voeburtian plague demonstrated.

What makse you say this was "heavy astral corruption" and not simply sacrificing people to bring voidsent essences through the veil, as we've seen before, from the Lambs of Dalamud to Haukke Manor?

Tadric
While I still have so many lives at my disposal? I think not.
Come, children! In death shall your meaningless lives gain glorious purpose!

What helps us say this is definitely not voidpact / sacrifice stuff of the Lady Amandine sort? I can't find the words "astral" and "corruption" used in the same sentence, even.

Admittedly, I've only skimmed the tank arc briefly, so there might be a citation in there that says it's not drawing upon pre-existing "sacrifice people to bring voidsent essences over." Do you know of one? Withtout it, it's more a guess than a conclusive solution. A good guess, but probably in need of refined terminology only because sin eaters aren't "umbral" corruption according to any of the mentions in the game, but explicitly "Light" corruption.

That Sauldia's personality held out mid-transmutation might at least support that guess for the time being, though.
(In Japanese and French it goes out of its way to present the speech in a way that shows it warped and fading, so it cuts both ways.)


Any ideas for citations I can be on the lookout for when I do the quest proper?

Granted if we look at the caster quest, instead, we get more "whenever the rift is involved, time is meaningless, anything could happen" so there's always that to lean back on. If we need other things to try to build excuses with, 3.4 - when the sin eaters first appeared on the source, does chronologically happen at the same time as Alexander's time travel (...lol).

[Kalise]

Any ideas for citations I can be on the lookout for when I do the quest proper?

It can go either way to be honest.

Sul Oul
The fifth was discovered yesterday. A young girl not yet of age...transformed into a misshapen beast like the others before her...

Tadric
I studied her remains myself. 'Twas plain a powerful magick had been employed─vestiges of the enchantment lingered long after. The culprit I think is not a man to be trifled with...

Branden
It was you, Tadric─do not deny it! Tormenting our people, twisting and transforming them into monsters...and for what!?

Tadric
Hear me, my children! The hour of reckoning is at hand! Rejoice, for in noble sacrifice shall you find everlasting glory!

Cylva
We've rounded up the rest of Tadric's co-conspirators and tossed them in the gaol. The ones who hadn't been corrupted by his magicks, that is...

They speak a lot about "Transforming" and at one point do state "Corrupted", as opposed to "Summoning".

Also, the fact that Sauldia transformed after Tadric died (After being blasted by his magic) seems different to the typical "Summoning" that is done by mortals i.e. usually done via rituals (Though, we don't see a lot of cases of summoning Voidsent into currently living bodies, pretty much just the Succubi in Haukke Manor (Hard))

However, there is additional reference to it via a dialogue option with Beq Lugg in the scene after clearing The Grand Cosmos (I can't find a citation for it, but after she mentions how her knowledge of souls was abused before, there's an option to say something like "Do you mean the Voeburtite Plague?") - Though, whether or not her knowledge would lean towards aetherial imbalance (Possible given that she was able to aid Halric with her knowledge) or Voidsent summoning rituals, it can't be stated with any certainty as of yet, since we don't really know the full extent of her knowledge (Also, she IS helping us figure out a way to transport souls and psyche across shards...)

[Anonymoose]

Indeed, it's tough to suss out. I'm still digging through it, and it's even further complicated by [1] that the denizens of the First would - not even knowing what voidsent are, as evidenced by the caster arc - would not have other words than "transformed" / "transmutated' ... and by [2] that all of these events were truly conspired by the Shadowkeeper ... who was

herself from the Thirteenth,. The Shadowkeeper passing on her Ascian masters' knowledge of magicks and voidpacts (as Lahabrea's minions did in the Source many times) is not a stretch of the imagination.

If that is indeed the case, we're back to the monsters we see being pre-existing voidsent, whereas sin eaters are yet to exist, and thus we're back at square one.

The risks of not working from a "facts have citations, otherwise it's theory" mindset.

Y'shtola for lore forum mascot. /s

[MrThinker]

Indeed, it's tough to suss out. I'm still digging through it, and it's even further complicated by [1] that the denizens of the First would - not even knowing what voidsent are, as evidenced by the caster arc - would not have other words than "transformed" / "transmutated' ... and by [2] that all of these events were truly conspired by the Shadowkeeper ... who was

herself from the Thirteenth,. The Shadowkeeper passing on her Ascian masters' knowledge of magicks and voidpacts (as Lahabrea's minions did in the Source many times) is not a stretch of the imagination.

If that is indeed the case, we're back to the monsters we see being pre-existing voidsent, whereas sin eaters are yet to exist, and thus we're back at square one.

The risks of not working from a "facts have citations, otherwise it's theory" mindset.

Y'shtola for lore forum mascot. /s

Does not the the transformed Sauldia retain some vestige of her personality before it slips away in a similar manner to Tesleen? I need to rewatch that cutscene, but if my memory is correct, it seems more like actual transmutation/transformation rather than ritual sacrifce.

EDIT: And my memory was right.

To...to your friend... Who never doubted you. Who knew...knew that you...would return...and see justice...justice...

...No. It should be me.

Branden...my sword...now and...ever after...

[Anonymoose]

Does not the the transformed Sauldia retain some vestige of her personality before it slips away in a similar manner to Tesleen?

As mentioned in my second post, yes. But, again, it cuts both ways:

Succubi manifest on the physical plane by forcing their souls into the bodies of deceased women. Once the transition is complete, the resultant creature is said to be both fair and fey to look upon. Still more disconcerting, researchers claim that these voidsent occasionally exhibit the personality traits of their deceased hosts. Succubi occupy the third and fourth rungs of the voidsent hierarchy.