I’ve been sitting on making this video since 6.0, but with the revelations in 6.2 I don’t think I can put it off anymore. I didn’t want to make this video, as I don’t care for this theory, but I think it will be good to spark a discussion on this topic.
If you have thoughts, ideas, or complaints that agree with, blow holes in this theory, please feel free to comment. If you agree with this theory, also feel free to comment. If you have no opinions whatsoever then, you guessed it, comment!
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It's usually a good idea to get something off your chest.
I think this is a "fine enough" theory if your character is say, a Midlander Hyur (I mean I have the same reservations you do) but its a lot less clean if you're say, a Hrothgar or a Lalafell. It either means that:
a) Azem's body-plan could have been FAR outside the norm for the ancients (in which case why do Hyth and Emet bring it up right away?)
b) becoming fully rejoined turns you into an ancient, regardless of what you originally looked like
c) your character CHOOSES to alter their appearance, with the writers god-modding you to a degree they've really never dared to.
I don't know chief, I don't like any of these reasons.
To begin we must first see the end. That line in To The Edge makes sense with your theory.
On the FFI time loop though it would be the ultimate way to pay homage to the game that started it all.
Great video! Love when you all do these as much as I love the streams!!
That's a very interesting theory, I kinda was thinking the same at some point, and I'm not fond of it just like you guys are xD
I would prefer if devs just left Azem's backstory alone, so every player can have their own special and bizarre headcanon. I've been tweaking mine all the time since HW revelations and onward, but at the same time those revelations still allowed me to keep all the crazy stuff I incorporated for my character. So, as of now, for example, my Azem's story is a tale of a girl from a special family (akin to silver eyed warriors from RWBY), who was raised outside Amaurot, and due to some tragic events she gained an ability to see the future and the past by using ambient aether (something like we did together with Venat during the investigation of Hermes' activities, but better, maybe?), and I'm still constantly rewriting this part to make it a more logical fit into 14 canon lore. And I want to keep it in some form or another, thank you very much xD (Not to mention that I stole Nomura's design of Stella for my Azem and some other smaller ideas from other games, but that's a fun story for another time lmao).
I like to ad one possibility here. We become Azem, fully "rejoined" but we don't go back to restart the cycle. We break it. Our iteration of Azem is not to become one with the endless loop. Our's is the one that end it.
Some of what you suggest is quite likely. But even if true I hope the writers would give us a better ending than the end of all adventures. As you point out, the game is about the joys of chasing the unknown and of uncertain futures.
This theory would be a great setup, but I want the azem of this loop to decide that her/his journey would lose all meaning if it were to continue infinitely and end the circle. This would be a great massage for the players to move on and play games other than xiv instead of a never ending adventures within xiv.
An interesting theory, however I have some gripes with it. The reason being that Ardbert was a soul adrift in the First without someone to interact with and that's why he decided to join us. However, Zero has her own body and can be a adventurer at the end the story they are going for. I think that we, the WoL, will guide Zero to adventure on her own. But yes we will find out that she's our shard.
there is one flaw in the theory.. if azem ends up exploring everything there is to explore why would they go back in time to re-explore it ? they like the journey and discovery so knowing everything they'll go through wouldn't be exciting to them to keep doing that over and over. It's a good theory but fall short when you consider that part of it.
I won't lie to you. I don't like it. I don't want this theory realised either.
but no matter how many times I tried to refute it, I shudder to think of its credibility. But I honestly hope that the devs won't take this route. In the end, the devs have always been revising past story decisions and elements. I'll be paraphrasing an interview that Yoshi-p said, that some of the msq ideas were made up as they go along while backtracking and revising gaps that cane be slotted in to make past notes become relevant. Ascians were initially just bad guys. No plans of Etheris's genesis was written until Shadowbringers. Upon their revision to crafting Endwalker, they made key things relevant from ARR up until present.
That said, they can try and allude that Azem may know all, or that Azem is a future us. But. that will sort of ruin a thematic standpoint of Endwalker's ethos. and by extension, the ethos of Haedalyn's arc from ARR to EW. but that's only my opinion so feel free to disagree.
Honestly, I can't refute the theory that we will look back at our friends as we go back one final time down the time stream to become Azem. It reminds me of that moment back in ARR (or HW?) where Cid got his goggles for the first time on the air ship, it was us giving it to him. That could be when we became the fully realized Azem.
Now go rewatch the first cutscene with Brendt. You should thank the gods for sending those amalja…
I wonder if he has some Twelve symbol on him.
Who better to guide reiterations of the warrior of light than Oschon god of vagrants?
And then pry the reiterations what brings them to Ul'dah.
I think you're on to something.
Maby this is done by Azem because she's trying to prevent the rejoining?
I propose there is yet one unsundered being left. Argos
What if Azem's Echo was so powerful, that he/she could literally see hundreds, if not thousands of years into the Future?
It has already been established that the Echo can afford you glimpses of things to come, like after we defeated Zodiark.
I personally don't like the theory of a timeloop, because it doesn't explain where Azem came from. As if he/she was always fated to be a paradoxical entity. And a paradox doesn't make for good storytelling in my opinion
What we can't discount is the possibility that the time travel is from the bad-future timeline, and rather than create the loop, they'd set up everything needed for our branch to exist even when they can never reach it. (It does require a resurrection plot that actually succeeds somewhere in that bad-future timeline)
Isn't the WoL 8/14 parts of Azem's soul? Not 9/14?
Also, Zero is not a reflection of Azem, Yshtola would have recognized that
Azem likely just has an "echo" ability like Mide. They knew we would show up on Elpis and when. They also knew that as much as they wanted to, they had to turn their back on the convocation and Venat as well and allow their sundering. Also, I seriously hope that Zero is not a shard. That would be kind of stupid that the only humanoid we meet in and entire shard of millions is that one person. I think it's more likely that she's just a supporting character for the Scions going into 7.0. After they add a "mus" to her name and we have to kill her.
I think the Maker's Ruin leitmotif starts playing while Zero says "I have no reason to go back", because she's thinking of her mother, the actual 13th's Azem fragment. Since in our fight against Barbariccia, you call your remaining fragments to fight and Zero isn't part of the Full Party.
The Warrior of Light and his fragments have the Blessing of Light that prevents soul corruption, which is what happened to Zero, which further proves she isn't the 13th's Azem fragment
I have the feeling that 7.0 will be named Dawnsinger and Bard as the Poster Job, again just my thoughts
Instead of giving into dispair the W.O.L. escapes into a time loop?
That makes Azem/the PC come across as selfish to me(even absorbing our others reflections, who have their own lives to live, seems wrong) and in some ways proves Metion correct. Also wouldn't our aetheric density make it difficult to use dynamus a defining feature of becoming sundered?
The every "PC is azem" is pretty romantic, but it also reminds me of how the Ricks, from Rick and Morty cut himself, and all his alternative selfs, off from the rest of the universe just so they can be the smartest people in their own pocket universe.
I can't discount the theory, but from a gameplay perspective it would take a ton of agency away from the PC. We're playing a game who's themes go against this theory". I feel like you'd have to really stretch the bounds of reason to make a player feel good about going along with these ideas.
Btw why do you disagree with Venat's decision to sunder! Or have a video explaining it?
I do not see it that way, I have the feeling that we may find ways to restore the other shards
The whole time i'm going "No way, you're reading too much into this" but uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
Did y'all read that story on the lodestone about Venat? About how she found her successor (unsundered us) in some far away land or something?
I'm nervous.
I only clicked on this video because I saw a highlander WoL and wanted to pay my respects
Best face, too
I think Zero isn’t our shard reflection. I believe she’s Zeromus from FFIV. It’s more likely Golbez is our reflection or Varshan’s sister in a simlucrum like Varshan. I also believe the devs said 10 more years recently.
What if the wol we play is the version that finally break that loop? Its just my hope tho
In Tales from the Dawn "A Friendship of Record", it's implied that when Venat meets Azem for the first time, they are an outsider and not originally from Amaurot – Azem is a person she met in her journeys. Yoshi P has also said they DO KNOW what Azem was doing at the time of the sundering, but they haven't released it yet.
I really like Zero, but as soon as I saw her i was like "oh no that's me". It's made me wonder if/how we would meld with Zero. Ardbert had no body, he was just a lost soul wandering the waste. As far as I can tell, Zero has both a body and soul. Although they talk so much about soul melding and diluting one's soul in 6.2, that I'm wondering if they're like just setting it up that the voidsent have the ability to just meld at will? I just hope we can just work together and keep it that way, meeting multiple Azems definitely has more value as parts than as a whole.
edit: i grammared so much guys
i like the ideal of the close loop but i don't think repeat the sharberd situation 2 to 5 more times is a smart move, i think we may found our other shard or vaguely confirmed some characters are our other shard but we'll not merge but continue to exist as separated beings.
I think Azem's Echo is not just the ability to see the past, but also the future. Its just not something we have grasped as fully with regards to the specifics of it.
In fact, funny enough, that theory would be supported by 1.0 of all things. In the Main Story Quest "Futures Perfect", we actually experience an Echo flash forward – letting us see events that would supposedly eventually come to pass (before the storyline in 1.0 was abandoned altogether.)
As a time traveller, Azem could always travel to the future and onwards, or other timelines instead of going back just to do it all over again. Also, there are always other planets to explore.
It would be silly that knowing the risks, Azem would go back just to fulfill a desire to explore it all over again, undo what they just did. It would be like your dad deleting your Minecraft save right after you finished building a replica of New York, cube by cube.
Although lets be honest, we all know after the last rejoining, Azem will retire and marry one of the twins.
Edit: I bet Azem went to Vana'diel.
I doubt it because there was another thing not scratch over the timeline; The dark one where the Exarch came from; what happened there
did they ever go over there being two crystal towers
I have no problem with the theory of rejoining the pieces of Azem, but I think going back to the unsundered world to complete the time loop is a stupid and somewhat meaningless ending. I doubt the devs would go for that one. Instead, it would be better that they find a way to close the time loop before the actual ending and for the WOL to "return to the star" like the ancients' death when they fulfilled their duties. Therefore, we will be reborn anew.
Goodness you guys speculate and think linearly TOO MUCH. Yoshida-san literally said “7.0 will be different just like from 1.0 to 2.0” We are going to experience something we don’t even know despite all the theorizing. If you did the Rising event you will always get a hint of something…