[SPOILERS] About Marika and Radagon

[Orion Invictus]

I'm just gonna put some filler here so people don't accidentally hover over the thread and get spoiled. Lorem ipsum whatever.

So, Radagon is Marika, but he's also different from her (has a different will, for instance - she shattered the Ring and he tried to repair it) and she herself said he was "almost" her. She also married him, which is bizarre all on its own. How does any of that work? Did she split into two people, or did she create a life form in her image?

Speculate, please. And no YT videos, I don't want to watch someone else talk about this for slightly over 10 minutes, I want your opinions.

[John Titor]

Orion Invictus の投稿を引用：

❛❛Liechée❜❜ の投稿を引用：

I don't think they are a singular body with a split personality with follow up conditioned mental illness or that they are shapeshifters. If they are, it makes no sense.

Marika is with Godfrey at Leyndell at the same time Radagon is with Rennala in Liurnia of the Lakes. Radagon returns to the Capital AFTER Godfrey is banished by Marika. They also born out twins.

Was Marika born? Who are her parents?

A couple of rando Numens.

[❛❛Vénttea❜❜]

Orion Invictus の投稿を引用：

Was Marika born? Who are her parents?

Marika is born and as for her parents, we won't know.

[Orion Invictus]

Toad の投稿を引用：

D[arian] and his twin brother D[evin] both share a soul, but are two separate physical beings. In my mind, Radagon and Marika are two physical beings sharing the same soul as well. Whether Marika and Radagon were born together, or Marika created Radagon through some unknown process is the real question.

Well, she did tell Radagon that he was becoming her, or something like that, so maybe they are indeed twins.

On the other hand, if memory serves, they said Radagon just kinda appeared at some point, after Marika's first husband died or left her or whatever.

[Sabaithal]

They are the same person, but at the same time they're also not...Its difficult to explain.

The two main pieces of irrefutable evidence we're presented with are thus:
- Law of regression (if you know, you know), a message directly stating simple "Marika is Radagon". However it does not go into specifics of what this entails exactly.
- The fight with Radagon, just prior to the fight we see a clearly female figure with much lighter hair color turn into Radagon (hair turns red most notably). Meaning they quite literally are two people with the same body.

However, as already stated it seems that Marika and Radagon's wills are actually in opposition, so its more like 2 souls inhabiting the same body.

Going outside of their situation, look to Ranni for a second. She slew her own flesh, destroyed her "empyrean" body, yet she is clearly still around, she just inhabits "doll" bodies instead (look at all of her bodies closely, they are not organic). So this implies that the body and the soul are indeed separate things. At least for the demigods, or "empyreans".

The real question being, were Marika and Radagon always in the same body, or were they separate at some point? In the past maybe? And if so, what bound them together the way they are now?

[Elymnir]

My theory is that Marika split herself into Marika and Radagon, and did it in a very specific way. There is a lot of loose ends and holes in this theory, but the gist of it is that Marika used the rune of Death (or Destined Death) in order to split herself.
As we can se with Ranni and Godwyn, there are some shenanigans happening where one loses only his soul and the other her body. The faint link I have is in the form of Radagon's and Marika's scarseals. Radagon's seal only boosts physical attributes (strength, endurance and such) while Marika's only boosts attributes that deal with the mind, like faith and intelligence.
On the one hand, we have two being that represent either the "body" or the "mind", and on the other hand, we have a rune that can separate body and mind. It might just be two completely separate things, but I want to see a link there.

Now, why do that? Well, time for another crazy take. We know that Marika isn't the biggest fan of the greater will. She shattered the ring, asked Hewg to forge a weapon capable of killing gods and she possibly have ties with the black assassins. I think her goal is to kill the greater will, but she wasn't powerful enough. She needed stronger bodies and weapons.
It's stated somewhere (don't remember where) that the body of a god can be used to craft a weapon capable of killing gods. That's what we see when we kill Radagon in the final bossfight. A dark hand rises, swallows Radagon into the ground and then pulls up a sword where his body was. A sword with a skin-like aspect (it doesn't quite look like metal to me).

Now, that takes care of the god-killing weapon, but where's the body? I think that Marika, being split into pure "mind" used her newfound state to possess the elden beast, the very envoy of the greater will. As for my "proof"... again, that's all just a hunch, but there a re odd things in the fight against the elder beast. First of all, it is wounded on its torso. The wound is even there to strike when you posture-break the beast. Where did it get this wound? I believe it's when Marika entered its body by force to manipulate it from the inside. I think Marika is the skeleton of golden rays we see inside the beast. Plus, another odd thing: the elden beast is... well, a beast. But it fights with a sword like a human. Like Marika is used to fight.

So here's a tl;dr to sum up my theory:
Marika wants to break free of the greater will by killing it. In order to do so, she splits herself in two, body and mind, possibly by using the rune of death. The body is Radagon, destined to be turned into a god-killing sword, and the mind is Marika, ready to possess the elden beast and be powerful enough to defeat the greater will with its own envoy.

[MrSoul]

Based on rebis myth iirc the spelling

So, are one being but of a duality that allows them to respec without having to visit Rennala, beyond that all fluff from brain of George rr Martin and can be safely disregarded as non meta relevant discussion

[Sabaithal]

Elymnir, great observations, especially with the holy cucumber. It does make me seriously wonder where it got that wound from. Someone clearly did that prior to the player showing up.

Now Marika being one of the two obvious guesses, the other is Radagon. I'm not entirely clear on Radagons motives, but its possible his hammer could wound the beast, but was unable to kill it (does holy damage, which EB is practically immune to).

Or its entirely possible that the two fought prior, but were unable to kill each other? If they fought previously and Radagon lost, I don't know why he would still be around to fight us...

Well I guess that reinforces the marika theory.

[I-Chi]

I heard the following conversation took place between Miyazaki and G.R.R.M.:

Miyazaki: "You know, you don't have to come up with the complete lore. You can leave holes and people will make things up on their own."

G.R.R.M.: "WHHHHHAAAAAA.....????"

[Sabaithal]

I-Chi の投稿を引用：

I heard the following conversation took place between Miyazaki and G.R.R.M.:

Miyazaki: "You know, you don't have to come up with the complete lore. You can leave holes and people will make things up on their own."

G.R.R.M.: "WHHHHHAAAAAA.....????"

Not accurate, that implies GRRM finished something.

a conversation

[Orion Invictus]

I-Chi の投稿を引用：

I heard the following conversation took place between Miyazaki and G.R.R.M.:

Miyazaki: "You know, you don't have to come up with the complete lore. You can leave holes and people will make things up on their own."

G.R.R.M.: "WHHHHHAAAAAA.....????"

Yeah, I think it's clear they just thought about interesting plot points instead of an interesting plot and ran with it. That's why there are no real answers.

[❛❛Vénttea❜❜]

Orion Invictus の投稿を引用：

On the other hand, if memory serves, they said Radagon just kinda appeared at some point, after Marika's first husband died or left her or whatever.

Thing is Radagon kind of appeared out of nowhere and the exact timeline is unknown. At this time Marika is still married to Godfrey even when Radagon is at War at the Liurnia of the Lakes.

[Orion Invictus]

❛❛Liechée❜❜ の投稿を引用：

Orion Invictus の投稿を引用：

On the other hand, if memory serves, they said Radagon just kinda appeared at some point, after Marika's first husband died or left her or whatever.

Thing is Radagon kind of appeared out of nowhere and the exact timeline is unknown. At this time Marika is still married to Godfrey even when Radagon is at War at the Liurnia of the Lakes.

That's what I'm saying, Radagon just kind of appeared, so I think it's clear she made him somehow.

[Orion Invictus]

What if Radagon was created by the Greater Will, to serve as an additional measure of control over Marika?

[John Titor]

Orion Invictus の投稿を引用：

What if Radagon was created by the Greater Will, to serve as an additional measure of control over Marika?

Could be, seeing that he's trying to repair the ring. He could also be a self-hating descendant of the giants, who seem to oppose the greater will.

[Orion Invictus]

John Titor の投稿を引用：

Orion Invictus の投稿を引用：

What if Radagon was created by the Greater Will, to serve as an additional measure of control over Marika?

Could be, seeing that he's trying to repair the ring. He could also be a self-hating descendant of the giants, who seem to oppose the greater will.

That (him trying to repair the ring) is why this came to mind. He wasn't created by Marika to be her consort, he was created by the Greater Will to be their representative, because they knew Marika was turning against them. At the same time, Marika tried to change him, to make him become like her in every way, which is why one of her "spoken echoes" mentions that he hasn't yet become her, or something along those lines.