The Reasoning behind The Sundering? (*6.0 Endwalker Spoilers*)

**Lersayil** · 01-13-2022 04:55 AM

Originally Posted by Ayche

I don't know what moral calculus is being applied here, but I do not know how the death of the whole natural world is somehow equalized to the demotion of few god-wizards. God-Wizards, who on the record, were responsible for their own doom. So when one god-wizard is turned into 13 farmers and fishers, and natural order gets to, you know, not get disintegrated, I fail to see the math here.

Guess it wasn't then... a shame. The best and most generous reading on the sundering is that Venat wiped out a civilization AND the natural order of the now restored planet. She didn't literally kill the individuals, just took their soul, sliced it up into 14 pieces and created 14 new individuals who had a soul similar to the original, but none of the memories. Oh and she also shortened their lifespans by a good amount. Even by the games own lore standards, that is as close as you can get to the process of death without calling it such. There are differences, but none that really affects the moral dilemma. She herself admits her deeds as terrible.

She almost literally did what the Ancients planned to, but in the reverse. She sacrificed her own people for the life that would grow in their wake and the potential she saw in that.

**Ilenya** · 01-13-2022 04:56 AM

Originally Posted by SpectrePhantasia

(one that has already failed before, in Graha's timeline, as Endwalker's story has doomed it).

How, though? By your own admission Zodiark would have bought a lot more time without Fandaniel's interference, and Fandaniel wouldn't have had the means to pull his plan off without the events of Shadowbringers. At minimum Emet-Selch would still be around, and almost certainly Elidibus as well (unless we someone managed to completely take him out in that timeline, which was unlikely since we didn't have the auracite), and neither of them would have even remotely allowed Fandaniel to do this.

**SpectrePhantasia** · 01-13-2022 04:58 AM

Originally Posted by Ilenya

How, though? By your own admission Zodiark would have bought a lot more time without Fandaniel's interference, and Fandaniel wouldn't have had the means to pull his plan off without the events of Shadowbringers. At minimum Emet-Selch would still be around, and almost certainly Elidibus as well (unless we someone managed to completely take him out in that timeline, which was unlikely since we didn't have the auracite), and neither of them would have even remotely allowed Fandaniel to do this.

I mean in a general universe sense, that timeline is screwed. Etheirys itself is probably fine for a good while, but it stands to reason the Rejoining is probably going to happen in full that timeline.

**EaraGrace** · 01-13-2022 07:32 AM

Originally Posted by SpectrePhantasia

I mean in a general universe sense, that timeline is screwed. Etheirys itself is probably fine for a good while, but it stands to reason the Rejoining is probably going to happen in full that timeline.

Even in the “failed” timeline, hope can still remain, even if the end is seemingly assured. People will still rebuild, live their lives, have moments of happiness, etc. Maybe they’ll find another way. Maybe not.

**Cilia** · 01-13-2022 08:43 AM

There are infinite potential ways the 8UC/AE timeline can go. Infinite ways they survive, infinite ways they don't. Until we observe a given timeline, it can go any way imaginable.

**Vyrerus** · 01-13-2022 03:27 PM

Originally Posted by SpectrePhantasia

I mean in a general universe sense, that timeline is screwed. Etheirys itself is probably fine for a good while, but it stands to reason the Rejoining is probably going to happen in full that timeline.

It depends. Despite what Venat says about struggling harder with Zodiark's shackling with each Rejoining, the Ascians also have it more difficult due to any opposition getting stronger souls. Despite the desperation stated in prior expansions, it turned out in Endwalker that there was actually zero desperation for Hydaelyn. She had her final battle power stack and the mothercrystal. If she really needed Emet-selch to die, she could dish that out, as necessary, for the delay of her own plan (which might not even delay it, since she'll have more years to sit and gather power, though that may be balanced by the increased tax of keeping Big Z under wraps).

Of course, there's no way to enact the exact time conundrum since no time machine in that timeline, at least none that the Ironworks have. Alexander still exists, so all that remains as necessary is killing Elidibus in some manner that causes him to get merged into Alexander, such that he pulls a similar scenario to send the next WoL back in time.

So the nations change and it's a century after the last story with Midgardsormr waking up, but everything eventually shifts to being similar beats in different places. With a new 9/14 WoL.

And even with that speculation, there's still a ton the short story never told us. Like, what happened to Zenos and his body in that timeline? Would a cure for tempering still be discovered short of Alisaie's experience in the First?

The possibilities aren't endless, and it's a lot more than they could tell us in a short story, but the protagonists always have the advantage in this story in the same way that the players always have advantage in the fights. The antagonists are designed to be beaten, plot contrivance or otherwise.

**Rulakir** · 01-13-2022 04:30 PM

Originally Posted by Vyrerus

With a new 9/14 WoL.

Given that a 7/14 WoL killed Lahabrea, I would think the other unsundered wouldn't take any more risks. Any new adventurer who appeared to be making strides would need to be snuffed out immediately and decisively.

**Lersayil** · 01-13-2022 04:46 PM

I recall someone somewhere mentioning that the Ascians were only one or two Rejoinings away from freeing Zodiark, and that would've meant they won? In the light of recent events I find this strange, but w/e.

Can anyone recall who said so, or if its discarded lore, or if I'm just pulling stuff from where the sun don't shine? Might be relevant to the fate of the Graha timeline.

**Rannie** · 01-13-2022 04:54 PM

Originally Posted by Rulakir

Given that a 7/14 WoL killed Lahabrea, I would think the other unsundered wouldn't take any more risks. Any new adventurer who appeared to be making strides would need to be snuffed out immediately and decisively.

8/14 .... 1+7 is 8

**Cleretic** · 01-13-2022 05:08 PM

Originally Posted by Lersayil

I recall someone somewhere mentioning that the Ascians were only one or two Rejoinings away from freeing Zodiark, and that would've meant they won? In the light of recent events I find this strange, but w/e.

Can anyone recall who said so, or if its discarded lore, or if I'm just pulling stuff from where the sun don't shine? Might be relevant to the fate of the Graha timeline.

I think the reason people get that was from the post-Antitower scene, where it was described in vagueries that things were getting dire enough that the next Rejoining was Team Hydaelyn's last chance. Unclear at the time if that was because of an issue on Hydaelyn's end, the world's end, or just because at that point the Ascians could pivot in strategy to something even harder to stop, but given what we know of G'raha's timeline it probably wasn't the last one, or else they'd have been more active.

Originally Posted by Rulakir

Given that a 7/14 WoL killed Lahabrea, I would think the other unsundered wouldn't take any more risks. Any new adventurer who appeared to be making strides would need to be snuffed out immediately and decisively.

Actually, a 7/14 WoL didn't kill Lahabrea, a 7/14 Thordan did; we just bruised him up a bit. Hell, given we don't even know if Thordan had the Echo and so was a sundered soul, a fraction might not even be useful. An 8/14 WoL did kill Emet-Selch, but that hadn't yet happened in that timeline. Perhaps even more alarming, though, was that in both timelines, a 1/14 Ardbert killed both Loghrif and (apparently) Mitron.

I don't think the fact the Ascians were no-shows in G'raha's timeline was actually all that important, though. Remember that the Seventh Calamity was actually the odd one out in terms of not sending the world back to the stone age, so suddenly the Ascians had to work pretty quickly as far as their timescale goes. The way Rejoinings normally went was that it took centuries until anything of much note to them happened, so the Ascians being quiet until rebuildings had fully gotten started was actually the norm.

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