There are a lot of unanswered
lore topics in this game that haunt me but three things in particular
have been bothering me as of late: dragons, Visions, and Celestia. No surprises there, though. I mean, these are three of the biggest plot points in the game. But recently, I think I've had a bit of a breakthrough. What if I told you that I might know exactly what Visions are why they exist, and who or what grants them? Well, there's no "what if" because that's exactly
what I'm going to try and do in this video because, yes, I spent way too much
time thinking about Visions and dragons and now I have an absolutely bonkers theory for you that I think you're really gonna like. So, allow me to present to you the final installment of my five-ish part series: Project: Teyvat. Details about the series, as well as timestamps links for further reading, and spoiler warnings are in the description box. And don't worry if you haven't seen the other episodes each one is more or less self-contained so you can watch this one without worrying. Okay, I think that's all of the housekeeping I have so let's begin the theory
and start by talking about the Gnoses. For the last three years,
all we really knew about the Gnoses is that they could summon massive amounts of power at will enhance pre-existing abilities, power incredible machines and that they somehow served
as a direct connection to Celestia. That's not a lot for three years of video game lore. It's only in Fontaine that we learned exactly what a Gnosis is. It's an object containing the stolen Elemental Authority of the original Seven Dragon Sovereigns taken from them and regifted to the Archons without the consent of their original owners. And this hearkens back to Teyvat's so-called Genesis story. See, Teyvat was originally ruled by Dragon Kings until someone called the Primordial One invaded then won a war against these dragons for control terraformed the world so that they could populate it with their favored humans and then they crippled the dragons' power by seizing their Authorities
and sealing them into the shape of a Gnosis —so, like a little chest piece— which would later be given to the Archons for safekeeping. This is as accurate as we can get
our Genesis story for right now based on what we know from records like "Before Sun and Moon" as well as testimonies from
the Dragon Kings Apep and Neuvillette. There's a very obvious difference
between Apep and Neuvillette and that's the fact that
Neuvillette here is very human-shaped while Apep is not. This seems to be because Apep was one of the original dragons who experienced the "Dragon War", as I'm going to call it while Neuvillette was born much later after the previous Hydro Dragon died. It's reasonable to assume that he was probably born in the form of a human rather than a dragon because of his missing Authority and that, in order to become a true dragon Furina, or whoever has the Hydro Gnosis will need to return it to him. And based on his final Ascension line, they're going to. Now, there's a lot to unpack here but I only wanna talk about this concept of Authority because the last time
we encountered this term in a meaningful way it was in relation to King Deshret and believe it or not, Deshret's story is actually relevant to the fate of the dragons. Hear me out on this. In the years leading up to the Archon War King Deshret appears to have been offered a Gnosis or rather, a Dragon Authority, which he ended up rejecting. Now, this could have been because he had a strong alliance with the local gods,
like the Goddess of Flowers and Rukkhadevata and therefore felt no need to participate in a war over the power of dragons when he was arguably already the supreme ruler of his nation. But I think this move was actually
far more calculated on his part. See, Deshret and the Goddess of Flowers believed that humans should be free to rule themselves; that they should be their own king, so to speak. And to this end, the two of them conspired to challenge heaven and win humans this very freedom. This involved the Goddess of Flowers sacrificing herself to open the way to the Abyss where Deshret would obtain this thing called "forbidden knowledge" which is basically just abyssal energy. These two things are more or less interchangeable for all intents and purposes so just keep that in mind if I switch
back and forth between the terms. Deshret was said to have mastered all the elements but still believed he needed more power to take on heaven and that's where the forbidden knowledge comes in. It's the type of power that can tip the scales, so to speak. You see, during the Pari quest we learned that there are technically
three types of power in Teyvat: Elemental, abyssal, and the Khvarena which appears to be the power of heaven. Now, dragons rule over the elements and some unknown thing rules over the Abyss and Celestia rules over heaven. So, this is basically like your typical fantasy magic system where you have a bunch
of elemental powers plus light and dark but Genshin just made light
and dark a little bit more special. Based on Rene's investigation notes and bizarre transcript the Khvarena, or heaven power, is distinct from the elements and is actually more comparable to the power of the Abyss hence the duality of light and dark, right? He then goes on to say that they possess the ability to "rewrite the rules of this world" which implies that they have a higher level of Authority than Elemental Energy. It is vital at this point
that we understand that the elements commanded by the dragons make up the very fabric of reality. They are elements of matter, comprising plants animals, solids, liquids, gases, and plasmas, etc. The Khvarena and the Abyss, however do not appear to actually make up the physical world necessarily but instead seem to possess the ability to shape that matter and dictate how it works. To put it into earthly science Teyvat's elements are like
the atoms that make up the universe while Khvarena and the Abyss are like the laws of physics which tell us how those atoms behave. It's not a perfect example,
but it's the best I've got for right now. So, with this new context in mind picture Deshret trying to come up
with a plan to overthrow Celestia. Celestia has total control over not just the Khvarena and this heavenly power but also the seven Elemental Authorities that make up all matter in the world. So, in order to surpass that level of Authority and gain control over everything to rewrite the rules of the world he would need an even greater type of Authority, right? Or at least a comparable one. But the power of heaven, or the Khvarena is something that's very limited in supply in Teyvat because Celestia kind of has a monopoly on it, right? So his only option was to leverage the power of the Abyss. And this feels pretty logical, right? Like, after all, this was also the plan of the king of the Dragon Sovereigns, Nibelung. He thought that their only hope
of victory against the Primordial One was to utilize forbidden knowledge,
a type of energy from the Abyss. In other words, he needed
a higher or comparable level of Authority in order to challenge Celestia on even ground. And this logic of matching authorities could also explain why the Abyss Twin aligns themselves with the Abyss. They may be trying to obtain a higher level of Authority through the Abyss knowing that Elemental Authorities won't be enough to challenge heaven and win. The point that I'm trying to make here with all of this is that right now, Celestia has too much power and the only time it's been able
to be challenged enough to be scared was when the Second Throne attacked them with what appears to have been abyssal power during the first human civilization,
many years after the Dragon War. Many have theorized that the Second Throne could have been the Dragon King Nibelung returning to Teyvat after obtaining
forbidden knowledge in the Abyss and if that theory holds true, it would make sense why Celestia would decide to isolate itself. The Dragons they once conquered with ease managed to break through their defenses after all. If they're not careful,
they could lose control over Teyvat entirely. Now, I could go down this rabbit hole for an entire video but let's stop it there because the main reason why I wanted to hone in on this whole Authority thing is because of something that Venti tells us at the very beginning of the game. After Signora takes his Gnosis,
Venti tells us a few interesting things. The first is that a Vision is a primitive version of a Gnosis and the second is that
an Allogene, or a person granted a Vision is someone who is capable of ascending to godhood and therefore Celestia. Now, I'm going to assume that the term "primitive" here is more like "lesser" and not "older,"
if only because it would make more sense if the Gnoses existed before Visions since they were basically stolen from the Sovereigns and there's no record so far of any Visions existing prior to the Archon War which would have taken place much later on than, you know the... the whole dragon Authority thing. So, if a Vision is a primitive or lesser version of a Gnosis and a Gnosis is the Authority of a Dragon King then doesn't that mean that a Vision is the Authority of a young or less powerful dragon? When you put it like that,
it doesn't make a whole lot of sense does it? After all, we've always assumed that Celestia is the one responsible
for the distributions of Visions, right? But… why would they hand out lesser versions of the powers that they seized from their draconic enemies? And then allow the people
with those powers to ascend to godhood? By all accounts, it doesn't make sense. In fact, it's possible that Celestia doesn't possess the ability to grant these Visions at all. After all, the Gnoses were stolen. They don't belong to the Archons, they belong to the Dragons and that's probably why the separation of Archon and Gnosis has little to no effect on the Archon apart from a small drop in overall power. The Gnosis were never theirs to begin with so why would it affect them in any significant way? But you can't say the same thing
about Visions and Allogenes, can you? Inazuma's entire Archon quest was about the relationship between Visions and humans. Visions belong to their Allogenes. They are not stolen. And that's why separating a person from their Vision can really mess them up
mentally, emotionally, and even physically like they've actually lost a part of their body. And that checks out actually, because Visions are described as external organs on multiple occasions and one of them being from this very conversation with Venti where he describes them as primitive versions of the Gnoses. And both types of objects are technically likened to organs. In Chinese, a Gnosis goes by the name “Heart of God” while a Vision is called the "Eye of God." Both of these things are organs and therefore vital to the person that they belong to. We can only therefore assume that Visions are a physical part of an Allogene and are not taken from any other life form like a Gnosis is taken from
a Dragon and transplanted into an Archon. Losing a Vision means losing a piece of yourself not unlike how Neuvillette isn't a true dragon without his Gnosis or Authority. And here's the thing: in Chinese folklore, there's a thing that perfectly matches the description of both the Gnoses and Visions. And that thing is a dragon's pearl. Hear me out on this. A dragon's pearl is a precious gem that can grant wishes and contains all or most
of a dragon's esoteric wisdom and power. Without its pearl, the dragon is no longer a true dragon and grows weak, and vulnerable. Stealing a dragon's pearl is a way to cripple the power of an incredibly powerful god-like being and in this context, Neuvillette's loss of the Gnosis and his lack of true dragonhood is just another case of a dragon losing its pearl. Now, Celestia's movements begin to make a bit more sense; seize the pearl of a Dragon King
and you prevent them from striking back. You basically force them into submission. Now, give that pearl to someone you command and that person can gain the power of that dragon. And this actually happens
in Chinese folklore from time to time. In fact, there are even cases of a very normal human boy swallowing a dragon's pearl
that they just found on the ground only to find themselves transforming into a dragon. Teyvat's Archons are obviously not dragons but they are able to take a Gnosis into their body and leverage that power
that didn't originally belong to them. And maybe this is why, when Ei
tried to place the Electro Gnosis inside of her divine puppet, he cried. Maybe those emotions were
carried over from the dead Electro Dragon because the Gnosis was basically its heart, its pearl. And maybe this wealth of incredibly dangerous power is why the Gnosis ended up not in the hands of the strongest gods from the Archon War but in the hands of the gods who loved humans the most. And this was always the weakest
of the gods they could've picked with the exception of Zhongli. Think about it. Makoto was weaker than Ei Venti was weaker than both Andrius and Decarabian; Rukkhadevata was at least weaker than Deshret and Egeria, well, she remains to be seen. And had Guizhong lived, I have no doubt she would've been the one to take the Gnosis in Zhongli's place. The ones who eventually received the Gnoses were the ones who were the least threatening of Celestia's power and control over Teyvat. I know this statement makes that whole Deshret was offered a Gnosis thing feel kinda weird but that should've taken place before or very early on into the Archon War, so it's very possible that at that point Celestia was looking for
powerful gods to protect the Gnoses and then later changed their minds
when they saw it could be problematic. It's either that, or Deshret was just a chad who was not only powerful as heck but who also loved humans the most,
and both statements can be true. I mean, the dude did try to fight heaven
for the sake of humans, so, you know... And if Visions are lesser versions of Gnoses and Gnoses are dragon pearls, then Visions must be the pearls of a lesser dragon like we hypothesized earlier. Allogenes don't possess
the ability to become a celestial god they possess the ability to become a draconic god and dragons are the enemies of Celestia. Visions are the pearls of dragons. They represent minor Authority over the elements and a threat to Celestia's control over Teyvat. Don't believe me?
Well, let's take another look at the Genshin manga. The infamous Vennessa presumably ascended to Celestia and since only Allogenes can ascend,
she must have obtained a Vision at some point, even if we never see it happen in the manga. But, when she got there, instead of achieving godhood as was her expectation, she was presented with a building that was far more like
a panopticon prison than anything else. Besides her horrified expression, the only thing we see are doors closing behind her and the small ghost of a falcon escaping. Do you really think that's what ascending to godhood means? Becoming a ghost bird? Come on now, it's way more likely that Celestia is deliberately blocking human ascension to godhood capturing Allogenes on their way up and filling the land with legends
and false promises of ascension in order to keep those baby dragons pious, obedient and easy to capture quietly, without sowing panic in the general populace. A false god actively preventing humans from ascending beyond the mortal realm is actually also a core theme of Gnosticism which is one of primary inspirations for Genshin's higher-level narrative so it would make the most sense
if this was the case with Celestia. Now, the only person who is prophesied to ascend but isn't an Allogene is the Traveler. It literally says so in their character story and on their character card. And they may have been kind of draconic too or at least allied with the dragons, 'cause... they might not have a Vision or a pearl (that we know of) but they do seem to be gathering dragon Authorities. Since the very launch of the game there's been this extremely popular theory that the Traveler's combat kit always matches that of the Archon it shares an element with. It's one of those theories that where, if you squint it just fits so well but Sumeru kind of casts some doubt on it because the Traveler's kit didn't really match Nahida. And Fontaine... I don't think it holds up in Fontaine either because the one who shares the most kit similarities with the Traveler in Fontaine is probably not the Archon but instead, the region's Dragon Sovereign - Neuvillette. Neuvillette's kit is pretty basic. Skill and burst give a couple of big blasts of Hydro and drop source water droplets, while his charged attack sucks those droplets up and lets him insta-charge a giant water cannon at the enemy. The Traveler has a very watered down version of Neuvillette's charged attack
on their skill, a small finger gun that also generates the exact same source water droplets and weirdly, the Traveler's Hydro burst is exactly like Azhdaha's
Hydro leg slam attack, orbitals and all. And this suggests that there should be a connection not between the Traveler and the Archons but the Traveler and the dragons. And working backwards, this kinda checks out. The Traveler has almost nothing in common with Nahida's kit other than, just, their burst
both doing Dendro damage over time but their burst is very similar to Apep's Heart of the Oasis and it's even shaped with a mushroom, something that Nahida is not associated with, but Apep is. The Traveler even has a Constellation
that's named after the Withering which is a condition that was caused by Apep and had nothing to do with Nahida. We can't talk at all about the Electro Traveler since we have no Electro Dragon to compare to but Geo Traveler also resembles Azhdaha more than Zhongli. C2 causes boulders the Traveler
creates to detonate, just like Azhdaha and Zhongli doesn't do that. And the shape of the Traveler's burst is tall and jagged and crystalline, just like Azhdaha's especially notable during the tail slam. It lacks the perfect cubic geometry
of anything related to Zhongli and is completely devoid of his shielding ability something that Azhdaha also lacks. The Anemo Traveler's skill may represent Venti's burst quite a bit, I will give you that but the Traveler's burst is a tornado which is what Dvalin creates during story scenes but admittedly not during his boss fight. So, there's your outlier, I guess unless you wanna argue that
his little, windy, plasma ball things are akin to the Traveler's skill, which I-I could see that. But still, isn't this a little bit weird? The mysterious golden Traveler naturally gathering lesser dragon authorities
from the statues of the seven Archons. And I don't know how many of you actually remember this but way back when the Traveler
first acquired the power of Anemo they touched the Statue of Seven
for the very, very, very first time and there was a sound of a heartbeat just before the Authority was granted. Now, it certainly wasn't
Venti's heartbeat and it likely wasn't Dvalin's because we meet both of them later on and they don't seem to know anything about it. So, whose heartbeat was it? Well, if I had to guess I'd say it probably belonged to the High King of all dragons: Nibelung. Nibelung would have been
the High King of the Dragon Sovereigns so the eighth Dragon King and when the Sovereigns were losing the war against the invading Primordial One Nibelung suggested using
the power of the Abyss in order to fight back. Presumably, he left to obtain that power and then returned with it challenged the Primordial One again and lost. At this point, he would have been very full of Abyss juice and the Primordial One up in Celestia hates Abyss juice. According to the Goddess of Flowers Celestial Nails are a tool used
to force the Abyss back underground. So, it's not unreasonable to assume that an Abyss-juice-filled Nibelung might have been nailed and then forced back underground with the rest of the juice. A powerful, dark dragon
sealed underground is also something that we find in Norse mythology, in the form of Nidhoggr. I'm looking at Norse mythology specifically because Nibelung is the name
of a race of dwarves from Norse myth. Now, Nidhoggr breaking free of its prison is supposed to herald Ragnarok, or, like, the end of the world and after the events in chapter 4 the return of the Dragon King seems to be a theme that Genshin would want to explore narratively so this is a pretty realistic reference. Nidhoggr isn't just trapped underground, though; he's trapped beneath the roots of the world tree Yggdrasil which, in Genshin, should be Irminsul. We'll get to that a little bit later. Now, Irminsul's roots stretch deep into the Abyss so if Nibelung is trapped
underground with all of that Abyss juice then he may be located at the base of Irminsul's roots. Now, remember: Irminsul's roots are also called the Ley Lines and these Ley Lines cover the entire world collecting Elemental Energy
and bringing it back to the tree. In fact, Ley Lines are how
the Traveler canonically teleports ─according to the description
of the teleport waypoints, anyway─ which means that the Statues of Seven are also connected directly to the Ley Lines since you can teleport to them. And since Authority over the elements rightly belongs to the Dragon Kings Nibelung should have some compatibility with this system and possess some means of influencing it. We'll also talk about this a little bit later. But, with this new context in mind let's revisit this event again. The Traveler touches a Statue of Seven
connected to the Ley Lines which are, hypothetically,
trapping the Dragon King deep underground. The Dragon King recognizes the Traveler and grants them a weak Anemo Authority. Now, remember that
the Dragon Authorities are called the "Heart of God" so hearing a heartbeat here serves as an indirect nod to the type of power being granted. And the weirdest thing about all of this is that the Traveler seems to know
where these powers come from why they got them and, potentially, what the implications are; implying that they are familiar with the Dragon King or at least the type of energy that they were given. And that's a pretty weird thing
to know if you're not from Teyvat or somewhere adjacent to it. So, it's pretty interesting that the Abyss Twin calls Khaenri'ah their homeland since Khaenri'ah is adjacent to Teyvat deep underground. And, to that end the Abyss Twin also claims
that they journeyed through the world just like the Traveler did once upon a time which implies that they already obtained all seven elemental Authorities and yet they still decided to pursue abyssal power. If you ask me they must have realized that
those seven authorities weren't enough just like Nibelung did. That's why they gave us that warning: once you've journeyed through this world like I did you'll come to the same conclusions. And you know what's really weird? We already did something very similar to this during the Golden Slumber world quest because in that quest, we had to take the Scarlet Sand Slate to different stone pillars throughout the desert to obtain seven clearance levels which eventually gained us access to Deshret's throne. And anyone who sits upon his throne gains his Authority and thus control over his world of the Golden Slumber. Now, is that not exactly what
the Abyss Twin and the Traveler are doing? Gathering powers from seven statues in order to ascend to the Throne of Heaven? And one of them even aligned themselves with the Abyss. And what with Deshret having a lot of really weird connections to Khaenri'ah ─which I outlined in this two-part video series─ I am now extremely suspicious of the fact that he, and the Traveler,
and the Abyss Twin followed the same path as the Dragon King Nibelung. And this is the part
where I go off the rails and I say that I think Nibelung and Khaenri'ah's
infamous King Irmin are the same person or are at least related to each other. Obvious reasoning first is that
Irmin shares the name with Irminsul and that's not accidental because the name Irmin is an epithet for Odin and Yggdrasil was another name for Odin's tree and since Yggdrasil and Irminsul are both world trees Irminsul is likely another name for Odin's tree. You with me so far? The second and way less obvious reason is partly because of this name card. It's presumably talking about the Twins and their arrival in Khaenri'ah over 500 years ago based on the fact that we know Khaenri'ah performed a summoning
that the Heavens responded to which resulted in the Twins arriving in Khaenri'ah. But look at what they're referencing in the beginning: "O Almighty Sovereign." I checked the original Chinese characters and they translate more closely into high king the implication being that this is
a king that rules over other kings like how Nibelung was the king of all the Dragon Kings. Now, this title should belong to King Irmin since he was the only known king of Khaenri'ah, so... why would they call him the king of all kings if there was only presumably one king of Khaenri'ah? And before you put anything in the comments yes, I know that "the king of kings" is a biblical term and can refer to emperors
or an emperor-like rank in the Middle East but the Chinese Wiki page on nobility in western culture where I found this specific set of characters deliberately differentiated
between a high king and an emperor and there were literally only two results in the entire Wiki with these characters in that order. The first one literally referring
to the high kings of Ireland which is a situation where one king
rules over a bunch of lesser kings and the second one was actually just a whole page about Odin's special throne in heaven. And if the translation team was aware of that then the choice to translate
"high king" into "almighty sovereign" is kind of suspicious since they'd be knowingly translating a title of Odin or Irmin into one typically reserved for the Dragon King. But, speaking of which Odin is responsible for breathing life into the first humans in Norse mythology. The way I see it, this heavily suggests
that the humans of Teyvat are directly related to dragons, and Khaenri'ahns most of all. You know, since Odin is Irmin, and Irmin is their king. However, the creation of human beings is actually referenced twice. Most people know of Ask and Embla: the first man and woman
carved from ash and elm trees respectively by Odin with his brothers Vili and Ve. Ask and Embla would then go on to populate the entire Earth kind of like an Adam and Eve kinda thing. But literally one stanza below this one there's an entire myth about the first humans which claims that it was actually the dwarves who sculpted the first mannequins out of clay and then Odin, Vili, and Ve gave these sculptures life and they became the first humans. This is a subject of scholarly dispute, obviously as many instead claim that these sculptures became dwarves instead of humans, thus allowing
both myths to exist at the same time but I am not an authority on the subject, so I can't comment. Still though, that is two
human creation stories in the same poem one saying that they were made of trees by the Aesir and one saying that they were made of clay by the dwarves. Now, in Genshin, dwarves are dragons. Nibelung is actually named after a race of dwarves. Durin and Dvalin are also named after prominent dwarves and Neuvillette draws inspiration from a folk tale about a dwarf named Otr who literally transformed into an otter and got murdered by Loki for his pelt. The story is about justice and law and Neuvillette looks like the Fontaine otters and I don't really know what else you want me to say on that. It's just- that- that- that is what it is. But even the Khaenri'ahn people themselves share commonalities with the dwarves of Germanic folklore and I'm not just talking about
the fact that one of their noble families is named after the dwarf Alberich. Both dwarves and Khaenri'ahns
are a people who live underground with exceptionally advanced technology
and craftsmanship. Both are a people with connections
to the original human creation story what with Khaenri'ah being called "the homeland of all humans" and both of them have
weird amounts of connections with dragons. Like, in Norse mythology dwarves liked turning into dragons, for some reason? Like, in the case of Fafnir he turned into a dragon to protect a bunch of treasure but he was originally a dwarf... I don't know, it's kinda weird. And while the Khaenri'ahns boast about being a civilization without a god Odin, the highest of all Norse gods is literally the name of their king and if he's not a god, then what is he? A man named after a god or... maybe a dragon or a man of draconic descent. Because if Khaenri'ah is a land ruled by dragons and is also the homeland of humanity, it stands to reason that all humans must have originally come from dragons or must be dragons in a human skin ─kinda like Neuvillette─ and if that's true, then this explains why Khaenri'ahns share a stronger resistance
against the effects of the Abyss why they have no Visions,
and why they don't turn into Hilichurls: they've maintained a connection to their draconic origins whereas the people of Teyvat may be slowly losing it or having it extracted. This would fit with the Gnostic themes of Genshin. See, the Demiurge, or false god, notices that humans have a spark of divinity within them and they do everything they can
to prevent humans from using it to ascend. In Genshin, this may manifest as Celestia trying to extract draconic power from within people. So, the final question is: why? Why would Celestia go through all this trouble? What is their obsession with humans? And why are they so prejudiced against dragons? To answer this let me tell you why I named this series "Project: Teyvat." The word "teyvat" is Hebrew for "chest" or "box" but can also be used to describe an ark like Noah's Ark, or "teyvat Noah." Our oldest records of Teyvat's genesis
references Noah's Ark a lot: from the dove holding branches, to the time spent on the ark to literally talking about the opening of an ark. Noah's Ark was meant to save
certain species from complete destruction after God decided to destroy the world with a flood. But the presence of an ark in this Genshin myth implies that there was a civilization around to build it in the first place, right? 'Cause you can't save anything on an ark if there's nothing there to save in the first place. In the previous episode I suggested that Genshin was HoYo's way of exploring a fallen timeline
of sorts for Honkai Impact 3rd where the heroes failed, the Earth was destroyed and Project ARK was sent
into space as the ultimate backup plan to reseed the Earth with humans once it was safe to do so after the apocalypse. I still think this. In Honkai Impact, Honkai energy is dangerous to humans and can cause them to mutate into Honkai Beasts. Now, on a thematic-level only Honkai energy is quite similar to abyssal energy and Honkai Beasts are similar to dragons. If abyssal energy flooded the world then perhaps some humans were able to adapt and later evolve into dragons kind of like how some Honkai Beasts were formed from humans. But seeing how toxic this abyssal energy is humans may have needed a little bit of help. Now, the only power that can counter the Abyss is the Khvarena or "heaven's power" and I think that's what Irminsul is. It's a tree of light forcing back a sea of darkness with Elemental Energy being a far less harmful byproduct of this interaction and a means by which the earth was reborn. Perhaps, Irminsul was always
the way the previous civilization planned to survive the apocalypse and the ark was merely a back-up plan in case they failed. And perhaps it was Irmin who
either figured out how to use this tree or who created it in the first place,
hence "Irminsul," or "Irmin's tree." Now, imagine the Primordial One
who is aboard the ark this entire time returning to Teyvat and finding it infested with monsters. Logically, they would assume that humanity must have failed in their mission and they would begin the process
of reseeding humans around the world. But the rules of the world had
fundamentally changed since the last era. In order to reshape the world and take things over in the name of humanity they would need to take control of Irminsul itself. So, they found an opportunity
to seize control of the divine tree or rather, the divine Authority which allowed them to rewrite the rules of the world; an operation I call Project: Teyvat. With its newfound control over Irminsul the Primordial One was free to terraform the planet and reboot the concept of humanity
as it existed within the previous era. And I think this process mostly involved mindjacking the lives that already lived on the planet meaning those new humans were
actually former dragons given a new shape. They were brainwashed into becoming human. Over time, these humans would forget their draconic roots and submit to the new order. These draconic roots are humans' divine origins. And forgetting one's divine
origins is a core theme of Gnosticism and is something encouraged by the Demiurge, or the false god. And that's what the Primordial One appears to be: a false god. And I think it's possible that the Primordial One also mindjacked other types of dragons altering their shapes until they
stopped resembling dragons so much and started to resemble birds... or doves. And in half-human forms, perhaps you could call them angels. Take Seelies for example: what's left of these little
ghosties strongly resembles a Clione or a sea angel, which is a type of sea slug. The only other creatures in-game
so far that are based on sea slugs are all dragons or children of dragons. Most explicitly, this can be seen in Dvalin and the Melusines who were children of the dragon Elynas. This suggests that Seelies may have been of draconic origin under the control of the Primordial One. And in fact, these Seelies might have been like the caretakers of Irminsul, which is why the Primordial One appointed them specifically to work under him. I mean, we all know how easy it is for Irminsul to manipulate the minds and
memories of those who belong to Teyvat and that's why I spent a whole
episode explaining the theory behind why Irminsul is a giant collective consciousness and that's how it reshapes the world. All of our time in Sumeru studying hive minds, and Deshret and the Golden Slumber, and the
Akasha... all of it is just a prelude to this. And those systems generally had an overmind like one mind that controlled all of the other little minds. This should be the Primordial One the "logos" from this diagram
that we shared in a previous episode. This is probably why Khaenri'ah
is so opposed to the rule of Celestia: they're actually a nation of dragons,
or humans with the blood of dragons or humans under the protection of a dragon that managed to escape the control of the Primordial One and that's why their civilization is built around warfare: they're fighting for their freedom. I think it's very telling, too,
that Dainsleif is hypercritical of every Archon but speaks very highly of Neuvillette even commenting on how amused this dragon must be watching humans revel beneath these gods that are definitely imprisoning them and fighting for territory that doesn't belong to them. Dainsleif seems to believe that the dragons have the rights to this world yet also talks of fighting for
this world in the name of humanity. This is something many have tried and failed to do. It's something the Abyss Twin is working towards. It's something that Khaenri'ah
wanted the twins for in the first place. I mean, Chlothar said as much
when he said, "To us, you were the Abyss." With the Abyss in this case being the only power capable of dethroning heaven. So, in summary: Earth got flooded, humans turned into dragons someone is pretending to be God and tricking people into acting like humans again by taking over the collective unconscious and the dragons are rebelling by building armies of robots and Allogenes so that they could be free. That's it. That's the whole theory. That was a very, very long series—let's never do that again! There's over 65 pages of cut content at this point including a self-contained essay on Hilichurls which at this point is just gonna
be its own video—I mean, I may as well. But, uh, while the names of my lovely and adorable channel members scroll on by I have a couple of closing thoughts to share. You probably noticed that I
never mentioned the Genesis Pearl on a video that was all about
pearls, and that's probably because I don't really have a solid idea of what it is. Based on this theory, at least,
it should be the pearl of the dragon who birthed Teyvat, I guess.
But I don't really have much evidence for it. If it is at all related to Irminsul though then it could also be the seed of Irminsul which is what allowed for Teyvat
to be reborn after the apocalypse so I guess that would count? Or perhaps the Genesis Pearl
is just another term used to refer to the Authority of Irminsul. I mean, that would explain why a black, Abyss-looking snake coils around it in the Battle Pass cutscene. Perhaps that's a, uh, representation of Nibelung trying to protect Teyvat from invaders. I mean, three years in and I am
still waiting for more Battle Pass lore. And I'm probably going to be waiting until the game ends but, uh, until then, I just wanna say
thank you so much for watching me and supporting this channel.
I really couldn't do this without you guys so, make sure to take care of yourselves like you're, like, the cutest kitten in the world, you know like, just pamper yourself, like... Doesn't that include, like, a bowl of milk? You know what? Never mind, I'm gonna go. I'll catch you guys later.
