DLC THEORIES!!!

[Cain]

I suck at typing and already accidentally deleted this whole thing once so keep that in mind in regards to my writing and possible annoyance with this XD and there is a second accidetnal full deletion but at least i copied this portion...

So im going to take this in order of the smallest and easiest to understand and accept theories to the ones that require knowledge of obsceure real world mythology i dont think hardly ANYONE would know even in a playerbase of currently 76,000.

I also want to make one note to keep in mind that i am operating under the color theory of elden ring theory from hawkshaw that states how all of elden ring is made up of differing colors and hues as the basis for all forms of life so if i state something like how i will mention the creation of life, this is what i am refering to.

OK.... lets go at this one more time..... The first theory is the thought that the erdtree we see is forcibly grown FAR FAR FAR beyond what it EVER should have grown the size of that could even be remotely considered health for the erdtrees with the MANY examples we have showing that they NEVER get anywhere near this large unless of course, one were to sacrifice an EXBORINENT amount of life to it with i think the trailers of the DLC show what that cost has to be. I say this because the small erdtrees we find golden seeds at not only despite being so small produce the seeds already but also are a VERY bright and brilliant gold implying to me at least that, that smaller size is what is considered 'healthy' and of age to be considered fully grown for erdtrees which also implies the gross and sad thought that marika basically did the same as force feeding someone exborinantes amounts of food so they would have more and more blood for you to take from them before also taking their ability to die so even as you drain every drop of blood they could give, they cant even die as you keep trying to drain more from them. I believe this theory to be true and also shows that erdtrees ARE NOT necessary in the lands between but like anything in it, are just another thing that lives in it and takes form in a way similar to the origin of life perhaps as maybe all life existed in one single golden tree that the greater will broke apart into all the colors and unique life in the world and so in a way, its almost like an echo of what once was hence why they grow through specifically the shedding of life and more specifically blood being the essence that contains all life as the life gets shed and recombined into the erdtrees very being. This i think is most interesting in regards to what it says about order in the lands between and what it means and what is required for it as well as playing into the next theory i have as well.

[Cain]

The second theory is a more intersting one as it implies several things including probably the biggest lie of marika, even greater than the importance of the erdtree to the world, that being that not only is marika not the only god but she IS NOT the god of the greater will but simply of an outer god and her entire order is based on the lie that she represents the will of the creator of all the diversity of life and what she says is the penultimate truth of everything. This theory is based on a few things starting with the fact that we KNOW of at least 3 gods and another 2 can be inferred to be gods as well and before you start asking questions or calling me crazy, we need to define the difference between an outer god, the great one, and the greater will...

To start with, the great one is a clear stand in for the monad of gnostisism while i believe the greater will to be the stand in for the demiurge. This brand of christianity states that all life was once containted within the great all also known as the monad. at this point in time, there was NO deliniation in life until the demiurge came into being and seperated the monad shattering it into all the diversity of life but do not think that the gnostics see the demiurge in a good light... They see this event as the most horrific event of all time and see the demiurge in the same vain as other versions of christianity see satan or the devil, pure evil.... They believe this because there was NO suffering before the monad was seperated in to the diversity of life and so as such, they believe this life to be a prison... A hell created by the demiurge to torture all life for its own sick enjoyment and would gladly see to the end of all life which is what the frenzied flame wants... now i dont believe the frenzied flame is the great one/monad and nor do i believe the elden beast to be the greater will/demiurge but rather both are the closest aspects that represent each with what i mean requiring a quick detour into what an outer god in elden ring is. Outer gods seem to be the manifestections of aspects of life and reality. They all seem to represent something that is merely a part of a personality as if each individual aspect of the great ones/monads personality was seperated into each deliniation allowing for the diversity of life and its because of this that i believe that the frenzied flame is truly just the manifestation of chaos while the elden beast is simply the manifestation of the concept of order and while the monad when it was whole embodied pure chaos with no deliniation between ANYTHING, likewise the elden beast represents the order that the greater will had introduced into the great one to allow it to seperate its aspects individually and keep them seperate thus allowing for life and diveristy of life as well.

With all of that said, back to the main second theory, we know marika is the god of the outer god of order while maleina is the god of the outer god of rot and ranni is the god of the outer god of the dark moon. This already calls A LOT into question about marikas claim to be the ONE TRUE god when 2 other equally god, GODS exist AT LEAST and with this in mind, i think we also can classify rennala as a god as well as she is the god of the full moon even if by the time we meet her, like marika, she has decayed in her own isolation and imprisonment to the point that calling her a god is hysterical. Last but not least is the god of the frenzied flame which our very own tarnished can become.... we do this by taking the freznied flame into our very being, becoming the embodiment of chaos and the frenzied flame. Now that is a leap i might imagine a lot of people saying but there is good evidence behind this being that in ALL endings barring the freznied flame ending and rannis ending, marika is restored and subsequently one could assume SHE remains the god as you become her lord consort while in ranni's end, she lets marika die for good and RANNI becomes the god as you become her lord consort but in the freznied flame end what happens? mariak fades and crumbles away but ultimately YOU remain and your body is altered by the power of your outer god to resemble it like malenia when she unleashes her rot or ranni when she takes on her doll form and sheds her body. This fact also calls into question something about godhood which i had previously assumed but could be not the case tho i will make a case against this very thought as well after being that i THOUGHT you had to be female to be a god and only a male could be lord but we know that a female can become elden lord and if the thought i had about the freznied flame end is true, a male can become a god which messes up a thought i had about miquella abandoning his fate by abaonding his chance at godhood by using the frenzied flame to seperate himself and st.trina from their body and subsequnetly, permanently seperating himself from st.trina who was the only path to godhood he had as she was the female while he was the male resigning himself to being an elden lord at best. Before i move onto the next theory, i will provide the thought at least against a male becoming a god as it is posisble marika becomes the god of frenzy but instantly is destroyed by the chaos along with the rest of the world though part of the thought of all elden lords being male and gods being female was a thought i had in regards to alchemy and the sun (male) and the moon (female) when combined represting a perfect union and what could be called a god. This meant that the eclipse would represent the perfect union and also could be called a god meaning a female being able to be elden lord throws a wrench in that idea as well.

[Cain]

OK SO THAT WAS A LOT BUT AT LEAST NO MORE DELETIONS SO FAR AND WHAT HAS BEEN TYPED HAS BEEN COPIED SO I CAN REPASTE IT IF I DELETE IT...... Anyways, the final theory is one im sure of but dont know the full implications of myself and also like the most cause the mythology it dips into is my peoples mythology which IS NOT talked about much AT ALL in much of popular media with that being the native american mythology (im over half alaskan native on my with my mother being a full native who was born on a res even tho she was adopted and i was born off a res never having been on one till i was 15 and still never having LIVED on one)

This final theory is in relation to the divine beast dancer, the pinnacle of the storm, and in relation to another possible outer god which is why i had to go into such length on the marika train of thought and the erdtree train of thought as well with i came up with this while watching vaatividyas 3 hour gameplay breakdown and even commented this idea there if you wanna read it there where you can find timestamps to the item descriptions vaati found that i was referencing and for a version directly referencing them rather than operating off of memory like i will do here. This theory starts by pointing out both the design and a lot of descriptions about the lion dancer as well as how its boss fight starts so if you wanna avoid spoilers, stop reading here. To start, the lion dancer is very human looking, not just possessing a beastial head but human arms and legs and even 2 rows of human teeth with an incomplete set of beastial teeth, only possessing a bottom row of beast teeth with a not only a crown of horns but horns all over the body which is all poinient because to mean, it almost seems to represent a regal embodiment of a divine beast taking the form of the hornsent being a race of people who seem to have horns as a symbol of divinity and having this divine beast even be sent from the heavens with literal descriptions stating this, never mind vaati having found a hornsent who did have horns all over his body and face. This first part is also important when we consider the ancestral followers who are seeking to grow budding horns and are only adopting a culture they found with i believe they are adopting the hornsents culture which at this point, given the hornsent npc vaati found also was using a metal sword, i would imagine like real world natives like myself as a great example, despite being majoritively native and more native than most who dont live on reservations, i dont actually practice anything of my peoples culture and hardly know much more than anyone else could learn online and so while many may practice my peoples culture far more than me either out of respect for it, a desire simply to live it, or a thought of keeping it alive, funnily enough, they likely know it better than me with hell, the amish are somewhat like this living the asetic lifestyle, seperated from modern society with plenty of other people going off to live in the wilderness off the grid like that one guy who went off and tried to make it in the alaskan wilderness only to not survive it sadly. All of this is important and not only supported by the ancestral followers desire to grow horns but also by a description that mentions the people of the land of shadows worshiping a dead beast who existed in the spirit world much akin to the ancestral spirit and regal ancestral spirit with this also is why i brought up the erd tree not being necessary to the order of the world and only being a creation of marikas golden order as it would seem the ancestral spirits were that faith center in the days gone past and this only further confirms the connection between the ancestral followers and the people the land of shadows.

Now we're nearing the end of this final theory by being able to move onto descriptions of the divine beast dancer as well as of the myth i think its base on with i will start by posting this that anyone who cares enough to have read this far should give a thorough read first before than reading this next part https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderbird_(mythology)

The description i remember being most poinient here was that the divine beast was a messenger sent from the heavens by the pinnacle of the storm whos rage mirrored the tumult of the sky and whose combat moves and what could be assumed to be dances before its power was turned to martial combat mimic the flight in the sky as well as the lightning of the storm and with a specific tornado move, the rage of the storm as well and when you consider again all its regal aspects as it takes human form which is a thing the thunderbird can do in many forms of the myth, i believe the lion dancer also says something interesting about what the two fingers are when you consider how the bossfight starts and what happens with a specific npc after you finish it as it would seem i would imagine, the outer god of the storm perhaps enters this effigy of it made to allow it a foothold in reality which also could be the case with the two fingers and based on the shaman woman vaati met who it sounds like resembled the finger reader crones both in design and purpose and who initally called upon the lion dancer to activate and felt incomprehensible grief at its destruction when you kill it. This also calls into question other things when the thunderbird lore is considered as there are versions where the thunderbirds were created to combat *WATER SPIRITS* kinda like the mariner spirits of godwyn and his deathblight which seeks to corrupt and destroy all it touches killing it before raising it in a unholy way that completely rejects the cycle of life and death and the natural order in an unhealthy and disgusting way when you consider the state of virtually all who live in death. Beyond this, they also are the messengers of the great sun in in other versions who were made to dull out moral judgement on humans who commited evil while also fighting the *GREAT HORNED SERPENTS* which sought to devour all humans which when you consider the horns being the divine part and swapped onto the hornsent and the humans being connected to the serpents which in this case would be messmer, it seems pretty clear that when we see the lion dancers fighting messmer, that was what they ended up being partially created to do when the need arose even if they failed to stop him from devouring the hornsents culture and people whole. And lastly, the most intersting thing i think, is a story about a boy who made friends with 4 thunder bird young and was asked by their mother to protect them only to also make friends with a *2 HEADED SERPENT* kinda like messemers serpent pair that seems to have a head on either end of it and subsequnetly is a 2 headed serpent only for the boy i think to turn on the thunderbirds and allow the serpent to devour them..... all in all, i think this is pretty interesting especially when we see what is called a 'gate of divinity' in the bellerat tower which needle knight leda i think mistakenly thinks miquella entered not understanding its nature with this gate of divinity resembling almost to a T, the entrey way into the erdtree i think being the biggest nail in the coffin that the erdtree itself its not whats important per se but rather something akin to it that can house the gate of divinity hence why the bellerat tower was the only thing to survive messmers burning of the town in the trailer as it is as powerful as the erdtree in a sense and would allow entry into the realm of the outer god of storm like the erdtrees gate of divinity allowed us entry to the elden beasts realm of order.

OK.... WE MADE IT..... THAT WAS A LOT...... To any still reading, thanks for reading till the end of these word walls and if ya wanna respond to any of the theories with your own, i would love to hear thoughts cause maybe someone else can take this understanding of the myths these were based on and important lore concepts and spin em into larger theories that could possibly tell us more but until than, thank you again for reading! :D