#igheyorm | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

sebastard69 · 2 years

Text

absolutely fucking losing my MIND thinking about lahabrea right now and on the one hand i absolutely hate that but on the other hand what the fuck is up with lahabrea???

so there's a lot of interesting lahabrea lore in the Pandaemonium raids this tier. like i thought him having a son was shocking enough but this shit is a DOOZY. but i'm also replaying the game on my alt and when i fought ascian prime before thordan in heavensward i was thrown for such a loop. when lahabrea and igheyorm make ascian prime, the things they say and do are identical to the things lahabrea and athena say and do in pandaemonium when they soul bond - and that experience (along with so many others caused by athena) was deeply traumatic for lahabrea, so much so that he literally ripped himself apart to prevent himself from succumbing to whatever athena had left behind in him after the bonding in an attempt to protect his son. so if that were the case, even if it is 13000 years later, why would lahabrea so readily bond with igheyorm in heavensward? it just doesn't make sense to me.

HOWEVER

while the behavior of the lahabrea we knew and the lahabrea we meet in pandaemonium do not line up cohesively, it DOES line up with the behavior of hephaistos, the half of lahabrea that was ripped out to protect himself and his son. hephaistos was so strikingly similar to the lahabrea we fought i can't help but wonder... was the lahabrea we fought actually lahabrea? or did the final days claim the real lahabrea and release hephaistos from containment and he just took over? it would make sense that in the aftermath of the final days, a horrifyingly traumatic event, emet-selch wouldn't notice - especially since he was the one who taught the fragmented souls how to be people again, like he was kind of busy AND grieving. i've often said that it felt to me like emet-selch was the only unsundered who retained his humanity, and i think i was right, but not in the way i expected. it would have made sense that lahabrea and elidibus simply went a little mad with grief and anguish after 13000 years, but we already know that the elidibus we fought wasn't entirely elidibus to begin with and he had in fact been irreparably altered by being zodiark's heart - he had lost his humanity, his reason for being, and all the memories of those dearest to him. after this tier's cutscenes, i no longer think emet-selch was the only unsundered to retain his humanity, i think he was the only true unsundered to begin with.

#i am so fucking stoked for the next tier #and we're not even going to see it til like april aaaaaaaaaa #ffxiv spoilers #endwalker spoilers

15 notes · View notes

thecat-inthehat · 4 years

Text

3. Muster

Crossposted to ao3, as chapter 4 of “Let’s Call it Scientific Curiosity”

What will you say? >Why choose this form here on the First? >Actually... Nevermind.

The comforting shade of the trees overhead thankfully blocked out the Light overhead, making it at least somewhat bearable. Emet-Selch could only stand so much Light in a given day, thank you very much, and even beneath the shaded boughs of the Rak’tika greatwood was cutting it.

Then again, with the amount of shade being thrown his way from the Scions he needn’t worry overmuch.

The group was milling about amongst themselves, with the roegadyn woman and the hyur man having a furious discussion, and the hyur woman and elezen man both giving him glares. The young blonde girl with strange eyes was staring at him, but she seemed to do that with everyone, so he didn’t take much offence. What did interest him was the miqo’te wearing a hat who’s tail was flicking left and right like she was about to pounce on some unsuspecting victim. She glanced at her companions, then at him, then seemed to square her shoulders.

It was an interesting effect, really, to watch her gather herself up like she was about to march out into the front lines, facing off as a general against a battlefield. It was nostalgic almost, reminding Emet-Selch once again of his days in Garlemald, of pushing his weak mortal body into the frontlines and carving out a path to victory with nothing more than the gunblade in his hand and the luck of the draw. She reminded him very much of his second in command, he reflected, the poise, the sharp eye underneath her hat.

The Warriors Three were formidable adversaries, but time and time again the most dangerous of them proved to be the miqo’te. Technically the weakest out of all of them, she had shown an aptitude for tactics and strategy that had bested several Ascians singlehandedly, and caused the permanent demise of Nabriales, Igheyorm, and Lahabrea.

To say that he was nervous over her marching straight up to him like a captain about to draw a line in the sand over his spilled entrails was a bit of an understatement.

“What is it now, then?” He drawled, slouching ever so slightly more to give off the illusion of being less threatening. “Do you expect me to regale you with friendly banter like your dear companions?”

“Not at all, you’re not my friend.” The miqo’te said, tipping her head back to look at him. “Instead I have some questions, if you don’t mind.”

“... Oh, very well. I will humor you this once. You may consider it my latest act of good faith.” Emet-Selch said, sniffing in mock disdain. Hopefully she wouldn’t ask any particularly prying questions as to their plans. “Come on, then. What do you wish to know?“

“Why chose this form here on the First?” she asked, tilting her head at him. “As far as we’ve seen, there’s no other Garleans around on the First, so you obviously wanted to be spotted by us, or at least be conspicuous. Nevermind the fact that you’re wearing Garlean clothes, clothes that only have importance to the scant few of us that actually recognize them. So... why? Why not hide and use some other face?”

What.

“Well, well,” Emet-Selch drawled, intentionally dragging out the words to give him time to think. What the hell kind of question was that? “What a curious question. Hm... Mortal flesh is but the vessel into which we Ascians pour the elixir of our souls, molding it as fits the occasion. Or not, if we so choose.“

“So you can--” She started, then cut herself off, and waved for him to continue.

Emet-Selch’s eyebrows rose. That wasn’t what he expected at all. “Be it for a year or a millennium, I prefer to retain the same form until my duty is done. So, after arriving here in the First, I fashioned some hapless body into the man you see before you.”

The miqo’te’s eyes narrowed at him, as if she thought he was trying to trick her. “Did you take a corpse, or a living being? I was under the impression that corpses were easier to possess, given how Ascians operate, but then again, with Lahabrea overtaking Thancred...”

“Ah... Lahabrea,” Emet-Selch sighed. “He was ever the rash one. Jumping from vessel to vessel. Never heeding the toll it took on him. We can choose to forgo molding our vessels as we wish, as Lahabrea did, or keeping the same form for eons. It merely depends.”

“... You make it sound as though Lahabrea’s willingness to ‘put up’ with his host’s looks is what tired him out,” the woman said, crossing her arms over her chest and tapping her claws against her arm. They were covered in tattoos, in what looked like aetheric ink, and Allagan in nature. Summoning sigils, unless he missed his mark.

“Well... yes. As powerful as our souls are, our identity is, in part, shaped by how we present ourselves,” Emet-Selch mused. “To jump from vessel to vessel without due consideration for ourselves strips our self away bit by agonizing bit. To continue to keep a form, to impose it onto the host we have chosen to bear our souls, it helps ground us. To pretend to be anything other than what we are for too long would give rise to falsehoods and madness.”

The woman tapped her claws against her arm again, clearly thinking through a problem. “So the masks that you identify yourselves with aren’t just to keep your faces away from us, but to keep your selves for ... yourself.”

Emet-Selch blinked. And blinked again. She wasn’t wrong, per se, but... Lacking context. “A fascinating speculation. I don’t think I’ve ever heard that one.”

“Then how long have you had this form, then?” She asked, instead of continuing on with her previous observation. “If it’s the late Emperor of Garlemald, surely your job would be done by now, you’ve passed on, and your Empire will implode in less than twenty years, hopefully ushering in another Calamity.”

“My, my, spicy today, aren’t we?” Emet-Selch laughed. “You’re not wrong. I had thought my job done as well, but then my dear grandson saw fit to ... actually do his job. And I couldn’t have that. So out of the depths of the dead I came to steer Garlemald on it’s rightful course.”

“Varis did seem rather incompetent,” she murmured. “At least he wasn’t as stupid as Zenos, however. But still, how long have you had this particular form? If you’ve had it in order to usher in another Calamity, then wouldn’t you have had the chance to change it, or mysteriously die once the Seventh came crashing down?”

Oh he liked this one. He was keeping this one.

“True, but the Seventh was not actually my doing. I have been working on another, so my form is ... more dependent on that. Haven’t you noticed that the sin eaters look an awful lot like the golems in the ruins of Amdapor?” Emet-Selch asked, smiling down at her.

Her claws paused, and she squinted up at him from underneath the brim of her hat. She considered him for a long, long moment, then smirked. “Oh, Y’shtola’s going to be so mad at me, because I just won our bet.”

Emet-Selch’s peals of laughter rang around the forest, and he nearly doubled over from the force of it. He stood back up and wiped the slight tears from his eyes, and glanced down at her. “You never cease to amuse me, Warrior of Light. Tell me, what is your name?”

“Nivelth Ajuyn,” She said, rolling her eyes. “Though honestly you should know that by now.”

“Yes, but you haven’t introduced yourself to me properly,” Emet-Selch chuckled once more. “Nivelth Ajuyn, then. I don’t suppose you have a shorter name?”

She gave him a wry smile, and offered her hand for him to shake.

“Nive.”

#Emet-Selch #Nivelth Ajuyn #ffxivwrite2020 #headcanons abound #ascian headcanons #use of in game dialogue #The Daedalus Project #creator writes

11 notes · View notes