Nature of the Sound

[EaraGrace]

As far as the Ascians knew anyway. Remember, we only know things from their end, not from Azem's memories. We're missing knowledge on what really happened, and that missing knowledge is going to come into play in Endwalker. We may find out that the Sound had formed inside the Underworld itself by the malice of souls unable to accept their own deaths and regrets, and when Zodiark "saved" the world it only managed to calm the being enough by changing out the souls that created it, which would make it so it needed more time to reappear. If so, then Zodiark was indeed not a long term solution, it would only be able to temporarily deal with it, it would still eventually form. If Azem discovered this, then Hydaelyn's Sundering of the world may have been figured out as the long term fix.

It basically not only divided the souls that created The Sound up into 14 parts, it evenly distributed the malice making it less potent. Now since Hydaelyn, and thus Venat and her followers were not Sundered themselves since they died to create Hydaelyn, you have 14 FULLY POWERED Ancients (assuming the tales of "The Twelve", technically 13 because twins, being gods is true), taking on a single part of the Sound themselves, keeping it under control. You have fixed the problem, in a very long term solution.

Couple of issues.

First, Zodiark calming the Sound by giving the souls that were offered makes little sense given we have an Ancient who is noted as being able to see the movement of Souls to and from the Underworld. How would he have not noticed such an influx to the Underworld? Not to mention Elidibus is clearly shown to be an uncompromising person when it came to protecting and saving his friends and family. There’s no reason to believe that him acting as the core would be okay with that.

Second, there’s nothing that we know that would lead us to believe that the Sound could be bargained with or appeased. It sought out destruction without overtures or negotiation. Why would it acquiesce to Zodiark? It could’ve ignored him and had all of the souls it wanted.

Third, any description of the Sound and it’s motives is purely speculative atm. We don’t know what created it or what it wants other than it seemed to desire destruction.

Fourth, the idea that the 14 Ancient Souls were capable of a feat that nearly half of Amarouts existing population wasn’t makes no sense. Venat and the group themselves recognize they are weaker than Zodiark, and that only through Enervation would they be capable of standing against him.

Now, is it possible that with info from Endwalker this is correct, sure. But we have nothing to believe this is true and would be a convoluted explanation if it does turn out to be right.