Problematic notion about Zone 5 & 6 story bits.

[Alenore]

First, thanks for a well written post, based on facts and dialogues.
If you didn't know, you can circumvent the 3k character limit by editing a post

The thing that the crew from here on keep mentioning is that people are remembered by others as they die and that THAT'S how it SHOULD be. And there is very little in terms of trying to understand this new reflections beliefs. Even if they too know about the Aetherial Sea and how it functions.

I'm not sure we're told they know what the Aetherial Sea is, only that their memory extraction process is pretty similar to how it's done naturally.

And what does Cahciua say to Erenville?

"Everything that lives must one day die, and that which has died isn't meant to return. This is only natural"

This part especially annoyed me. Especially with G'raha next to us, who literally went back in time to save people he didn't want to die.

And I agree that we're shown to just shutdown what is a life support terminal for an entire race a few hours into realizing they even exist. We're told only "living aether" can sustain them. I suppose it's what we've seen the puppet steal from a corpse during Tural attack : there was 2 orbs of aether, one naturally being the soul, and I suppose the other being the aether needed to sustain the Endless.
But while I can understand souls being a problem to make from scratch due to complexity, natural law etc, I'm unclear what "Living Aether" even is when we can literally create life with creation magick, ie summoning.


I think one subject that I've seen rarely commented on, is how Alexandria and the Source view on what "life" is differ on a fundamental level.

The Ancients saw "souls" as being what makes something "alive" :

• The difference between Arcane entites and natural life was the presence of a soul ;
• They say things like "we'll meet in another life" to mean "when our soul reincarnate" ;
• Emet Selch doesn't mind killing sundered people because they're only shards of a soul, ergo not alive, ergo not murder ;
• The focus is always on "the soul" going back to the Aetherial sea to be "cleansed" of memories, or the life experience, as being natural ;
• I think the only moment someone shows fear of being erased is when Amon is defeated and he realizes HE will disappear ;
• Playing with souls was frowned upon as it was seen as an almost sacred part of existence ;
• Which is not to say memory manipulation was okay with them either, but mostly because it removed free will to that person.

The Scions point of view (and scholars I suppose)), is that both make someone alive. they take the Ancient view on souls being important, but add to it :

• "It's the sum of our experience" kind of arguments Scions love to throw around when cutscenes get philosophical ;
• the splitting of soul and memories for the Spirit Vessel in Shadowbringers. While natural, they've made a point explaining that's what made somebody what they are ;
• Alisaie revulse at using souls, a part of someone's self, as a resource ;
• How they don't consider "just memories" to be living beings. For them they're just shades, just like the recreations in Amaurot ;
• On the other end, the people in Ultima Thule were recreated with data on both their souls and memories thatwas in Meteion's cocoon. They're not pure memories. And we consider them as actual beings ;
• Memory alteration spells are banned or at the very least frowned upon: the Sharlayan imposed a ban on it, and the fact the Forum had to rely on it wasn't common knowledge ;
• The fact some people are against the use of regulators, not only because they use souls, but also because they don't want their memories altered.

But Alexandrian don't see it the same way. For them, "life" is "memories" :

• Souls are seen as a commodity: they appear out of nowhere and they found a use for it (disclaimer: a NPC says something along the lines of "some speculates our use of souls caused our birthrate to decline", which would tend to say there's a finite number of souls that can be generated at a time, and supply is lower than demand if you don't have the recycled souls with them) ;
• Memory preservation is shown as granting them eternal life ("Endless"), despite their souls obviously being used as fuel ;
• Sphene shows concern about her people's memories, but don't even blink about their souls ;
• The Regulator's whole point is to make sure your memories don't disappear when you die, at the cost of souls, and refresh those on your soul when it's diluted by the consumption of another ;
• While old Endless tech had a soul and a memory in the same body (Otis), they removed the soul component along the line.

It leads to a very different conception of what's "natural" and "good" to all of them:

• The Ancients didn't really care about death, for them it was more "going back to the lifestream and coming back some time after". In that regard, from their point of view, nothing ever really "died" because souls always came back at some point and memories were unimportant ;
• People on the Source have the view that since souls and memories are so intertwined in what makes somebody who they are, either you conserve your soul and memories intact and it's OK (Allagans, G'raha, etc), or you're dead. If any of them are destroyed, it's tantamount to murder ;
• The Alexandrian artifically created a society where the cycle of life and death didn't matter either, but unlike the Ancients, because memories always stayed safe. They have a revers-elifestream where the soul is discarded and memories can come back.

So they really have a different, and somewhat impossible to reconcile, view on the subject.
This difference explains a lot of how we act during the 97+ quests.

First, Zoraal Ja use of souls is seen as abhorent to us, but not because it'd deplete supplies for alexandrian. We compare this to voidsent, and soul manipulation is a big no no for us. Outside of getting revenge for Tural and preventing a war, we're motivated by stopping this practice.
Likewise, we only agree to have Endless made to help us in Arcadion, and then win the tournament, so that we can free all souls so they can go to their sweet afterlife.

When we reach Living Memory, while our character and companions understand they are recreations of real people, they're just that - recreation. They don't live, they're just simulacra of what they used to be. For them it's a cool concept, a nice theory, and a fun little mind experiment, but at no point do they think "they're living beings, so shutting them down is wrong".
This is also why Krile have seemingly no trouble letting go of her parents. And interestingly, while Erenville who is the less scholarly of the group has trouble letting go. He just sees her mom is going to disappear forever.


Now that it's out of the way, to your conclusion...

Maybe, maybe I'm overlooking something incredibly simple. But to me, this ending was just stupid and the only way to make it make sense is to say that we were in a rush and just had to literally send thousands if not millions of people to the Aetherial Sea.

Hydaelyn would literally groan in her grave.

I just felt so miserable every time Wuk Lamat or someone else, especially if it was G'raha or Krile saying this system is somehow unnatural or a perversion of their beliefs. I never took them as people who held so fast on the idea that all people should just go to the Aetherial Sea without having a stopping point at a gas station.

I get that the Endless are literally endless, that they NEVER move on. But the solution to that is to just tell the people and try to make Sphene to tell the truth about the system to her subjects. But no, I guess we kill Sphene instead and I guess she forgot to make backups just in case.

Shutting down the terminal don't send anybody to the aetherial sea, since their souls were already taken out of the natural cycle (which we intend to correct, if Arcadion is any indication). For the Scions, we're just doing the natural thing of letting dead people memories fade into oblivion, because due to their tech, it didn't happen naturally.

Their issue is not that people have a stopping point, it's that people died when their soul and memories were separated because that's what true death is for them.
So from their point of view, they didn't commit a genocide.
Just like Emet Selch didn't commit genocides when wiping reflections according to his understanding of what "life" is.
Or Venat when sundering the ancients, destroying all their memories and maiming their souls.


Some detail that won't make it any easier for you: people in Living Memory are not just the same static memories reincarnated again and again. As we see in multiple quests, they remember being reincarnated multiple times, experience new things, and the terminals know when a memory would benefit from being reincarnated (the person who marry their love interest from centuries ago).

[Iscah]

And what does Cahciua say to Erenville?

"Everything that lives must one day die, and that which has died isn't meant to return. This is only natural"

There was nothing natural about the calamity that happened. It was cause by a weapon of mass destruction.

You're conflating two separate things here.

The cause of the calamity – of anyone's death – is irrelevant. One way or another, people die, and when they do it is natural for their soul to return to the flow of the Lifestream.

Additionally, Living Memory isn't just some cosmic justice machine for those who suffered an unnatural death in the events that befell Alexandria – firstly, even if that was the original intent, they have long outlasted what years of life were lost to them, and secondly the place is a repository for all people who have died in Alexandria ever since. For these later additions, the use of regulators ensures that they do not die any kind of premature death, so they have already lived a full earthly life and are not owed more.

This part especially annoyed me. Especially with G'raha next to us, who literally went back in time to save people he didn't want to die.

There's a key difference between what G'raha did and what Sphene is trying to do: he is fully aware that the people he left behind are doomed and his only choice (at least as he understood it) was to leave them to their fate and do his best to save people that still could be saved.

Here, our choice is between prolonging the existence of these people who are so doomed they're already dead, and either actively asking to be turned off or completely unbothered by the prospect, versus the actual ongoing lives of everyone else in the universe. There's no real choice to be made, just a grim but necessary task before us.

[Alenore]

There's a key difference between what G'raha did and what Sphene is trying to do: he is fully aware that the people he left behind are doomed and his only choice (at least as he understood it) was to leave them to their fate and do his best to save people that still could be saved.

Here, our choice is between prolonging the existence of these people who are so doomed they're already dead, and either actively asking to be turned off or completely unbothered by the prospect, versus the actual ongoing lives of everyone else in the universe. There's no real choice to be made, just a grim but necessary task before us.

This isn't the first time a calamity happened and almost destroyed the world. In fact, Midgardsormr seems to consider there's hope since he wakes up and try to fix things after he went back in time.
G'raha left a world ravaged by Black Rose for another ravaged by light. There were living being in both world, both were following a near extinction event. Couldn't they try to fix what happened in their world, instead of dooming them all to probable oblivion?

But I understand the key of that sentence is "at least as he understood it". Which is my point, in fact. For Sphene, the Endless have as much right existing as her other subjects, and being saved in the cloud is just another step in their lives.
So we take the decision to shut them down, because her conception of what is alive is different to ours and we consider she's wrong.
Sphene is actually fully aware she's dooming other civilizations to save the Endless who will disappear if she can't find the aether to sustain them, just like G'raha is aware his timeline is probably doomed if he actually manages to save us / prevent the calamity. She doesn't see a choice, and only the grim necessity of killing people to save hers.

As I said in my post, they're only dead with the Source definition of the word, but are actually living forever in the Alexandrian definition.

About the Endless they're okay being shut down, except Cahciua and Krile's parent, I remember a few mentioning it, but I wonder if they realize it's permanent and they'll just fade away.
We're told we're erasing them (Krile's parents were looking for a way to erase themselves), but they seem to just think it's another cycle and they'll be recreated at a future time. But I guess it's still unclear if we just turned them off or if everything in the terminals is gone

[Cleretic]

There's a key difference between what G'raha did and what Sphene is trying to do: he is fully aware that the people he left behind are doomed and his only choice (at least as he understood it) was to leave them to their fate and do his best to save people that still could be saved.

Here, our choice is between prolonging the existence of these people who are so doomed they're already dead, and either actively asking to be turned off or completely unbothered by the prospect, versus the actual ongoing lives of everyone else in the universe. There's no real choice to be made, just a grim but necessary task before us.

It's also worth, if we're bringing G'raha into this discussion, how G'raha actually feels about this. He got a whole scene focused on that, remember? I don't like G'raha at the best of times, but he did make a fairly relevant point here: that this isn't what people actually want when they say they want to see a departed loved one again. As nice as it would be to have one last moment with them, to say that thing he didn't say when they were alive, or to see them smile one last time, that's not actually what he wanted, that's just the soft platitude on top of the real wish: he wants them to have lived.

Living Memory isn't an embodiment of people's desires for the dead to live: it's a twisted caricature of them, a genie's corrupted wish for an afterlife to be real, paired with removing even people's ability to grieve enough to have those thoughts. It's not just G'raha's awareness of what price he had to pay to bring back the people he needed to see live that's different, or even the fact he actually succeeded: it's also the fact he was permitted the capacity to have those thoughts and feelings himself, enough to even know what he really wanted out of it.

But, of course, there's two separate questions floating around here, and not just two sides of the same one. 'It was wrong for Living Memory to exist' does not, inherently, also mean 'it was right to destroy Living Memory'. Those are two different discussions, albeit inextricably connected ones.

[Iscah]

But, of course, there's two separate questions floating around here, and not just two sides of the same one. 'It was wrong for Living Memory to exist' does not, inherently, also mean 'it was right to destroy Living Memory'. Those are two different discussions, albeit inextricably connected ones.

Indeed, but another aspect is that it's not simply an isolated question of whether to destroy it because its existence is "wrong", but whether it deserves to exist at the expense of the living.

Essentially, it's a variation of the "trolley problem", and if we do choose to sacrifice the living to keep the lights on in Living Memory then they're still only going to last until the battery runs out.

[Cleretic]

Indeed, but another aspect is that it's not simply an isolated question of whether to destroy it because its existence is "wrong", but whether it deserves to exist at the expense of the living.

Essentially, it's a variation of the "trolley problem", and if we do choose to sacrifice the living to keep the lights on in Living Memory then they're still only going to last until the battery runs out.

Agreed; I believe both of those statements, but I don't believe the second one just because because I believe the first.

If Sphene wasn't pulling the knives out, and Cahciua wasn't giving Endless approval for what we have to do, we'd have sort of a 'SeaWorld orca program' problem: the act of making it was wrong and horrible, but once it existed it would then be even worse to just kill it. (And yes, I am proud of finding a theme park metaphor for Living Memory.) It's Sphene and Cahciua that make the road we land on okay, or at least justified, not the existence of Living Memory itself.

EDIT:

I do agree on those points. I would have hoped that Cahciua more firmently states that this is actually something she's discussed with all the residents and that it's ok to shut them down. But from what we see is people who really are enjoying their lives and we are just inserting our own beliefs onto them. Yes it's a difficult decision, yes Sphene has delivered and ultimatum, we have to do this. But I was firmently hoping atleast someone, either Erenville or G'raha Tia who is somewhat of an expert on dimensional things would at bare minimum entertain an alternative option or suggest somehting else. And I get there ISN'T an alternative option, Krile's parents and Cahciua say this, but I would still hope G'raha at the ery least try and find a solution. He quite literally had no purpose being with us.

I get the want for a counter-voice in something like this; it can be hard to believe an argument you only hear one side of. It's why I think Fandaniel (both Amon and Hermes) is the saving grace of Emet-Selch's story, because his very existence poking holes in it lets me believe that the Ancients were actually real.

But I also don't know if it would necessarily help here; the story of Living Memory is ultimately the one of us having to put an end to the Endless. A third option doesn't help that; it weakens it, as it either becomes something we could just not do, or something we could have averted.

[Kirutsuki]

You're conflating two separate things here.

Yea I had more to say to that point, but I kind of realized that it would deviate from the point too much.
But what you gotta understand is that Cahciua is from the source, so ofcourse she thinks it's natural for the dead to go the the lifestream.
But that isn't necessarily what the Alexandrians believe, we barely know what the Alexandrians think of the system in the first place.

[Alleo]

Here, our choice is between prolonging the existence of these people who are so doomed they're already dead, and either actively asking to be turned off or completely unbothered by the prospect, versus the actual ongoing lives of everyone else in the universe. There's no real choice to be made, just a grim but necessary task before us.

And at the end keeping them "alive" would have just postponed their destruction anyway, since there is no unlimited power source for them. So bascially its just: End them now when the sacrificies are still low or end them when everyone else in the universe is death on top.

4.) Emet Selch was a racist.

While you are right, that Emet Selch thought we really weren't alive, it was because he thought we were inferior. His whole talk about how we're "insects" mirrored similar views that people have used to justify genocide in real life. Since even if our souls were less dense than his, we still had souls. We were still alive based on all definitions of life, in universe.

Being tempered aside I think he also wanted to believe that we are inferior because it would make it easier to just destroy all these shards and cause all these conflicts on the source. It would be a bit strange for him to sire children with people from the source if he truly believed us to be not alive.

Anyway the Ascians have always planned to sacrifice the remaining people on the source after everything is fully rejoined so genocide was always on the menu.

In the end the NPCs in living memories are bascially stuck in a neverending dream, where most cant even leave the zone they are assigned to and have to live through the same stuff again and again. One of the children even says that he has seen that performance 50 times and that it bores him. A lot of the stuff is also not working anymore and a lot of the memories are stored because they are missing the energy to keep them out the whole time. So these people are bascially at the whim of the system and can be locked away for decades/centuries and they know all of this and still dont really care. They are not angry about it. Just as not a single one react in any way when the world around them starts to turn off. For the whole times the only ones truly feeling at least a bit alive where the ones we had a personal connection to. And even those where all like: Yeah please delete us. Even Otis, who swore to protect his country.

[Bright-Flower]

I don't think the Emet comparison really holds water. If you look at it on a surface level sure you can seen parallels but that requires looking at the differing circumstances between sundered life and living memory.

When doing the side quests, even these people we interact with that don't want to go yet feel like lost souls, ghosts clinging to some unfinished business and peacefully passing on once we resolve it for them. I know they aren't actually ghosts but that's what they feel like in how they act and speak. Ghosts that just need a final act of kindness to move on.

Even Otis, who swore to protect his country.

For Otis this is probably made much easier because his country still exists. Living Memory is not the nation and people of alexandria. It's just the uploaded memories of the dead. The people are still alive and well, and with their land fused onto the Source and with the potential to even leave the bubble if they want, and not being held to task for what happened with Sphene and Zarool Ja, all in all have it pretty good right now.

[17cupsofcoffee]

But while I can understand souls being a problem to make from scratch due to complexity, natural law etc, I'm unclear what "Living Aether" even is when we can literally create life with creation magick, ie summoning.

I was also a little fuzzy on this, but a post I saw on Reddit made a really good observation: the term that they commonly use to describe the energy used to sustain the Endless in English is 'life force', but in Japanese they use 'seimei-ryoku', which is the same term that was previously translated as 'corporeal aether' (the type that sustains your physical presence, seperate from your soul - it gets spent by exerting yourself, is replenished via eating/drinking, and without it you'd become a ghost). 'Life force' seems just be what non-scholarly people call the same concept, from what I can gather.

So I think that Sphene's plan was basically to turn the physical bodies of the entire population of the Source into a giant aether bonfire to power the Endless (and then possibly convert the leftover souls into cells + Endless, which would require more life force, which would require absorbing more reflections, etc...). Grim!