Why does Hollow Knight do this? [mild spoiler]

[oprah winfrey]

Why does he stabs himself during the fight? I have some really vague understanding of the game's lore, and I have no idea why is he doing this? It makes me so sad, especially with that music, it bursts my tears, like bro, I know I came here and we fight, cause you are the boss, but you don't have to do this, come on, bro...

[kanna]

Yes, it is very sad. I was surprised my first time too. I know you've done PoP, which means you've heard a lot of the first vague clues from Hornet about what's going on with our character and its siblings, but have you been to the birthplace yet? How much do you know about the game's story? I don't want to spoil anything (including further endings you could get), so I'm asking that first.

For now, there are two common interpretations (1) HK isn't fully affected by the infection yet and is trying to *help* you with the last bit of strength that it has left, and (2) the stabbing just helps spread the infection further. (Personally my interpretation is #1, but maybe someone else will come along who can argue for #2.)

[oprah winfrey]

Thanks for reply, I'm not worried about spoilers because I finished the game twice, got all endings except those which are after Pantheons, and really got everything what I could from the game. And after my second playthrough, I can say that I'm mildly disappointed in lore, it's really vague, it's much more vague than in DS series, Dark Souls is like an open book to me in comparison with HK. I thought that Hunter's journal will give me some lore, but it turned out that there is very little if not less lore in it.
I think that your first version is more likely to be true too, cause when you beat radiance, the hollow knight helps you to make the final blow.

[oprah winfrey]

Originally posted by kanna:

Yes, it is very sad. I was surprised my first time too. I know you've done PoP, which means you've heard a lot of the first vague clues from Hornet about what's going on with our character and its siblings, but have you been to the birthplace yet? How much do you know about the game's story? I don't want to spoil anything (including further endings you could get), so I'm asking that first.

For now, there are two common interpretations (1) HK isn't fully affected by the infection yet and is trying to *help* you with the last bit of strength that it has left, and (2) the stabbing just helps spread the infection further. (Personally my interpretation is #1, but maybe someone else will come along who can argue for #2.)

What's a PoP by the way? :)

[Perseus]

Originally posted by oprah winfrey:

What's a PoP by the way? :)

Path of Pain.

[oprah winfrey]

Originally posted by perseus:

Originally posted by oprah winfrey:

What's a PoP by the way? :)

Path of Pain.

How did you know that I've done it?

[kanna]

Originally posted by oprah winfrey:

Originally posted by perseus:

Path of Pain.

How did you know that I've done it?

I thought the thread about Path of Pain was yours, but it belonged to someone else. Sorry for the confusion!

The story of this game is told not only through dialogue-based exposition dumps but in the environment (lots of dead bugs with their eyes clawed out because they couldn't handle the infection, Pure King and Radiance-related art and architecture, etc.), through boss fights (such as Broken Vessel and THK - both of those fights' soundtracks include the main title theme in them), and so on. The character Myla's deterioration can be hard to spot if you don't visit her frequently, she basically exists to show what the infection did to living bugs from early on (she even has a phase like the one you see when you first meet Sly and Bretta).

Maybe it's not your style, which is fine. Many of us do like investigating and delving into the mystery though, since there's always more to find and figure out (or theorize about).

If you've spoken to the White Lady, listened to Hornet and the Dreamers (in addition to watching the scenes after the first Hornet fight and before you get the Dream Nail, you can Dream Nail them btw) been through the birthplace scene though, you should know that our character is one of thousands (?) of vessels that were created to contain an infection. If you've come to the Seer with 2400 Essence, she also has some history about the Radiance. Long story short, the god PK took the god Radiance's followers away from her and she got mad and lashed out at everyone in Hallownest with a vicious and torturous infection that plagued their dreams and made them claw their own eyes out and such. She could control the bugs that were infected as well, hence most enemies and boss fights where orange liquid is spilled upon hitting them with your nail. That's just the gist, and leaves out a lot of interesting details. It's way more interesting if you actually get it from the game.

Personally I'm not really a fan, but you might want to check mossbag's videos on Youtube for deeper delves into the lore. The videos are entertaining, at least.

[Noborus]

The hollow knight stabbed them self to help the other vessels, they did not choose to become infected, there was nothing they could do about it. That's why in the true ending you see a void version of the hollow knight rise and help the knight defeat the radiance, to defeat the source of all the chaos. Or in the normal ending the knight absorbs the infection and saves hollownest, but becomes the infected vessel himself.
This is all what i got from the story so some things i said might be false but it makes sense to me that this is what went down. I'm still confused why the pale king had children with like 3... women? entities? bugs, and what that added to the story.

[kanna]

Originally posted by Coco:

This is all what i got from the story so some things i said might be false but it makes sense to me that this is what went down. I'm still confused why the pale king had children with like 3... women? entities? bugs, and what that added to the story.

Wait, was there somebody other than the White Lady and Herrah that PK had kids with? I can't think of anybody else...

[Noborus]

Originally posted by kanna:

Originally posted by Coco:

This is all what i got from the story so some things i said might be false but it makes sense to me that this is what went down. I'm still confused why the pale king had children with like 3... women? entities? bugs, and what that added to the story.

Wait, was there somebody other than the White Lady and Herrah that PK had kids with? I can't think of anybody else...

I think i have it confused then, i haven't read about the lore of hollow knight in a while

[MADE IN IRON]

Originally posted by Coco:

TI'm still confused why the pale king had children with like 3... women? entities? bugs, and what that added to the story.

I think Hornet's birth was meant to mark an alliance between Hallownest and Deepnest.
When you visit Deepnest, you can even see the failed tram, an entrepreneurship meant to connect both kingdoms.

And if you dreamnail the dead bugs from Hallownest you can find:
Failed Tramway:
"...My King. I'm sorry..."
"...It couldn't be built..."
"...this nest rejects us..."

Distant Village:
"...They lied..."
"...Not friends..."

So I guess for some reason that alliance failed. Maybe the spiders were more violent and couldn't resist their killer instincts against Herra's plans. Or maybe when Herra became a Dreamer the spiders forgot about the alliance.


As for the offsprings of the Pale King and the White Lady, they were meant to be vessels to contain the infection. Probably they didn't think of them as "children" but as "tools". Even when I think I read somewhere the Hollow Knight failed to contain the infection because he was somehow "spoiled" by their parents who couldn't remain distant/deatached enough.


I don't know what do you mean with 3 women, I only know about those two.

[Melon]

Originally posted by kanna:

Originally posted by Coco:

This is all what i got from the story so some things i said might be false but it makes sense to me that this is what went down. I'm still confused why the pale king had children with like 3... women? entities? bugs, and what that added to the story.

Wait, was there somebody other than the White Lady and Herrah that PK had kids with? I can't think of anybody else...

I think the 3 women your referring to is the 3 queens who were supposed to be connected to Hornet. There is the White Lady who raised her, Herrah who birthed her, and the Hive Queen (Vespa I think?) who trained her.

[Noborus]

I don't know if there were 3 women pale king had children with, sorry if i confused you, i said three women as i wasn't sure whether the radiance was one, i'm not up to date with hollow knight lore.

[kanna]

Originally posted by MADE IN IRON:

So I guess for some reason that alliance failed. Maybe the spiders were more violent and couldn't resist their killer instincts against Herra's plans. Or maybe when Herra became a Dreamer the spiders forgot about the alliance.

Your second possibility there makes a lot of sense. I've always wondered why Deep Nest rejected the Pale King even though Herrah says "Fair Bargain Made" when you Dream Nail her. I mean, maybe it's the soundtrack when you're with the Dreamers that's influencing me but I just can't convince myself that she intentionally deceived the Pale King. Having Hornet was a prize and she sacrificed herself partly because she cherished Hornet.

Originally posted by CallMeDeleto:

I think the 3 women your referring to is the 3 queens who were supposed to be connected to Hornet. There is the White Lady who raised her, Herrah who birthed her, and the Hive Queen (Vespa I think?) who trained her.

Neat. It sounds plausible and I feel like I've heard it somewhere before, but I don't remember seeing anything about Vespa training Hornet. I'll have to look that up later. But seems it's as I remembered, Pale King had kids with White Lady and Herrah only.

[EonGamer74]

He stated himself because for the second when he starts to Stan himself he snaps back to reality for a sec and he tries to kill himself to stop the radiance

[kanna]

Originally posted by Ghost:

He stated himself because for the second when he starts to Stan himself he snaps back to reality for a sec and he tries to kill himself to stop the radiance

No voice to cry suffering, remember? So who "stated" this (or is "stated" a translation issue)? I like the interpretation that HK is trying to help us (just like how it helps us in the Dream No More ending as Coco mentioned above), but this is never explicitly stated at any point. In fact, I could see a competing argument that since HK killing itself probably would NOT kill the Radiance, maybe she's making him do that too, for her own benefit.