Bloodborne Lore | The Choir and Eldritch Truth

yarnum is a sprawling multi-layered City and at the highest point in this city sets the orphanage the home of the choir great unseen thinkers that represent one of the most powerful factions in the healing church and in yardam as a whole it is in the orphanage that the choir undertook its Sinister and sharp tish's work to make contact with the great beyond and Ascend Humanity with their methods and philosophy bringing them some success whilst also showing a callous disregard for human life yet despite this the choir come much closer to the Eldritch truth than most others with a keen understanding of the cosmos and higher planes of thought they even work alongside a great one and have successfully developed procedures that could lead to Ascension for all that however the choir has overreached and their veiled rulership of the healing church has led to its ruination we find the orphanage broken empty except for the hollow products of their Grim work while black plumes of Smoke Rise from its chimneys and cast a dark shadow over the city of yharnam never mind the collapse of the healing church that has happened under the rulership of the choir while the choir has essentially folded by the time we enter the frame their story is a fascinating one and no doubt they are one of the greatest actors in this play who are responsible for many of the calamities that we face in yharnam today so join me this week as we unpack the origins the history the culture and the great works of the choir but remember before we get started guys that if you like bloodborne lore then consider subscribing to the channel and liking this video at this stage I would like to credit the incredible contributions of Loki author of abyssel archive whose work on bloodborne I will quote throughout however in general I wanted to make it clear and give credit that their work has influenced my own understanding in general of the subject matter surrounding the choir Loki has produced incredible long-form articles on bloodborne lore on their website and so I would implore you to check out their articles linked and reference below to understand the nature of the choir and what it stands for we need to understand their history and who they owe their lineage to having a quick look at the blindfold cap the signature mask of the choir we can see that they owe a lot of their methodology and culture to bergenworth so let us start there a great bet of background information on bergenworth comes from Alfred one of martyr logarius's followers who says the following on bergenworth bergenworth is an old place of learning and the Tomb of the Gods carved out below yanam should be familiar to every Hunter well once a group of young bergenworth scholars discovered a holy medium deep within the tomb this led to the founding of the healing church and the establishment of blood healing in this sense everything sacred in yanam can be traced back to bergenworth but today the college lies deep within a tangled wood abandoned and decrepit and furthermore the healing church has declared bergenworth forbidden ground so this tells us of the origins of the healing church and yharnam as we know it the bergenworth school was once the home of Scholars who explored the great labyrinths like we can do through chalice rituals exploring the labyrinths as no mean feat and can work up quite an appetite which is where today's sponsor comes in this video was sponsored by hellofresh who have once again decided to partner with sportone and I couldn't be more delighted as it is a product that I actively use in my day-to-day life I want to eat and live healthier and yet I really don't like going outside and thankfully hello fresh spares me that Pain by delivering easy to prepare recipes right to my door and when I say easy to prepare I mean easy each meal is portioned out with all the ingredients an easy to follow instructions making it absolutely foolproof and yet so delicious meaning you can have 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bargainworth itself Germanic for worth of the burial plays and that in these Graves he would find some evidence of the great ones that would eventually lead to the discovery of the labyrinth themselves and the foundation and purpose of the school Willem would become obsessed with this discovery the description of the iron makes it clear that Willem had become disillusioned with the limitations of the mundane human world and thus he became obsessed with this Eldritch truth indeed we have descriptions like that of the kin Cold Blood which reads dare not to delve into the world Beyond Humanity the eldest truth touched upon long ago at bergenworth this Eldritch truth is mentioned a number of times when talking about these studies at bargainworth for me as I've already said the Eldritch truth is essentially the discovery and knowledge that the great ones exist the realization that there are beings beyond our comprehension the term Eldritch truth is also used in the description of the tumeru chalices beings who are of course aware of the great one's existence and had a whole society built around serving them indeed the labyrinths are filled with evidence of the great ones from materials to phantasms to actual encounters with great ones themselves evidence of their existence would become quickly apparent to whichever Scholars first explored them the abundance of evidence that could be found about their existence Within These labyrinths is reinforced by the description of the Tomb prospector Garb which reads the healing Church traces its roots to bargainworth and is therefore aware of the ruins true importance they contain much more than mere Hunter trinkets indeed they hide the very secrets of the old great ones sought after by those with the insight to imagine greatness thus abundance of evidence makes sense if we consider that the Labyrinth civilizations and specifically tameru and ease are built around the great one's influence for example the great Timur ahil chalice reads the following tamero ahil was the title of both the temerian Monarch and its capital this reveals that while early temerians were mere humble Guardians of the Slumber and great ones their descendants felt entitled to name themselves a leader so tomorrow itself was a civilization actually built around the guardianship of the great ones meaning they actually had contact with them and clearly the exploration of these tombs by Scholars would have eventually led to the discovery of the great one's presence one way or another but we really get a sense of the start of this inquiry from the description of the auger of ibritas now the English translation of the ogre of ebratas to me anyway is somewhat confusing in regards to a timeline but instead I will provide Loki's translation of the item which is as follows remnant of the Mysteries that bergenworth once saw it summons a piece of ebratars an abandoned Higher One via the Phantasm a mollusk known as important of a Higher One this chance encounter began the research seeking the cosmos and the underground ruins and it connects to the later choir so this translation makes the timeline clearer to me that this item was actually discovered by bergenworth Scholars but later would be an important part of research for the choir and thus the bergenworth scholars who discovered this auger would begin researching the cosmos from within the Labyrinth itself and under willem's teachings they sought to elevate Humanity to the same levels of the old ones via knowledge via Insight elevating one's thoughts in the world of bloodborne does have real physical and metaphysical results if you look at the icons of madman's knowledge and Old One's knowledge then one can see phantasms growing out of the skull and as we will discuss later it is most likely that brain suckers are those that have witnessed Cosmic knowledge and have had their brain supplanted it or parasitically controlled by one of these phantasms it is also implied by mekalash's dialogue that Rome was a human who ascended via contact with cars who granted her eyes I.E insight and she once did for the vacuous role grant us eyes plant eyes on our brains to cleanse our beastly idiocy indeed we ourselves can Ascend to become a great one through Insight through the knowledge gained from three umbilical cords our brains become linked with eyes and we transform at the end of the game however this line of study was interrupted because when exploring these ancient labyrinths some Scholars discovered some kind of artifact a holy medium of some kind that would be Central to the healing Church's foundation and to the process that we know as blood Administration the exact nature of this medium is never outright said but we can read between the lines to establish what it is namely Alfred claims this holy medium still exists within the main Cathedral of the healing Church as you know the healing church is the founding head of blood healing well I'm a simple Hunter quite unfamiliar with the ins and outs of the institution but I have heard that the holy medium of blood healing is venerated in the main Cathedral and that counselors of the old church reside in the high stratum of the cathedral Ward in general I think the holy medium being worshiped here is of course the old blood but in a lateral sense I believe it to be a reference to the deformed skull of Lawrence which very much is being venerated in the main altar of the cathedral indeed Miyazaki himself acknowledges that this is the item which laid the foundation for the healing Church itself in an interview originally done as part of the bloodborne future press guide he said the following his skull served as the start of the healing Church itself but it's taken the form of a twisted Beast just as an FYI I was able to read this article and more thanks to tune and fair weather's excellent blood Echoes of which I have a digital copy and have pre-ordered the hard copy this is a beautifully presented book edited by Simon Parkin and is illustrated by a friend of the channel shimhak who also did the thumbnail for this video this collector's book celebrates bloodborne by bringing together essays and articles about all aspects of the game from the story to the music so if you'd be interested in picking that up I will link that below but returning to the quote from Miyazaki I think it is quite abstract and can be quite confusing as to why this skull is the holy medium and how it could even form the foundations of the healing Church well I think the importance of this item not only comes from the ascent-like canonization of Lawrence but also what Lawrence's deformed skull represents it represents Evolution Through Blood Administration Lawrence became the first cleric Beast a mighty monster and it is ultimately proof that the old blood can be used to alter the human form and it is this old blood the led to the falling out of Willem and Lawrence and ultimately to the foundations of the healing Church an event we can witness via a memory of Lawrence upon touching his warped skull Pastor William I've come to bid you farewell oh I know I know you'll think now to betray me no but you will never listen I tell you I will not forget our adage we are born of the blood May Men by the blood undone by the blood our eyes are yet to open fear the old blood I must take my leave and it's important to highlight this event because the choir as we will see in later chapters does definitely draw on both of these skills of thought the choir definitely owes a lot of their aims and culture to Willem but they definitely still use the methodology of blood Administration what Lawrence and the healing Church hope to accomplish through the use of the old blood is made pretty clear by the description of the clockwise metamorphosis Rune which reads the following the discovery of blood made their dream of evolution a reality metamorphosis and the excesses and deviation that followed were only the beginning Evolution bloody and forcible Evolution and despite Lawrence's assurances that he would not forget their adage the adage of fear the old blood I.E to treat it with respect and not use it in a reckless manner the blood-soaked streets of yharnum say otherwise the fact that Willem invented this adage fear the old blood implies that Willem was aware of its effects and indeed Loki makes a great observation in their bergenworth article that the scholars likely witnessed bestial transformation through the experimentation of blood that took place at birkenworth before the church was even founded as evidence for this Theory Loki points out the Beast Rune which is described as being one of the first runes made by the bargainworth rinsmith Carol meaning that this must have been an early experiment of the bergenworth scholars and if Willem did witnessed these side effects then it is no surprise that he believes the Insight was the truer and safer path to Ascension as Willam says we are undone by the blood yet clearly Lawrence and his associates disagreed with this seeing the potential power in Old Blood is to get an opportunity to give up even with the risks that it entailed this is why in this cinematic we see Lawrence setting off to establish his own research into blood metamorphosis an institution that would eventually become the healing Church as I've said I wanted to focus on their split because it represents the two skill of thoughts that the choir owes its lineage to both blood Administration but also the Insight research of wellum and the culture of the choir in general is closer to that of scholarship rather than the blood-sort scientists of the healing Church returning to that Holy medium the old blood what the old blood is is something that has been hotly debated within the community but the most widely accepted View and the view that I obviously share is that the old blood must be the blood of the great ones the blood of these powerful beings of course has incredible properties such as healing we ourselves use blood vials that no doubt were developed by the healing church and their processes started by Lawrence this is an easy product to sell and this becomes the public purpose of the healing church yet the real purpose being that described in clockwork metamorphosis something that we will see when we visit the research Hall later yet the wrongness of administering Eldritch blood blood that is not meant for Humanity is punctuated by the outbreak of the Beast Scourge a karmic response from meddling with that that is beyond the Mortal plane let us not forget Lauren a land itself that fell to the best of your Scourge no doubt for meddling in the old blood a tragic lesson that Lawrence and his compatriots didn't take to heart and I want to talk about the healing church and blood administration because while the choir claimed lineage to Willem and bargainworth they are ultimately still part of the healing church and a lot of their work is equally built upon the blood-based experimentation of the church as well as the work of the old research Hall what is interesting about the healing Church's Research into how blood Administration can transform humanity is the way that it has tried to obscure its past by keeping bergenworth suppressed lest the truth of their blood Administration experimentation come to the light because of course bergenworth and its Scholars would be some of the only people in the world that would know the true source of the bestial scourge Alfred says the following but today the college lies deep within a tangled wood abandoned and decrepit and furthermore the healing church has declared bergenworth forbidden ground this is very logical that they would lock down bargainworth because of course if anyone was able to make contact with the scholars at bergenworth the culpability in the healing Church spreading the bestial Scourge would become fairly evident and while the healing properties of the blood has allowed the church to gain great power and influence it would be so easily undone if it was publicly known that the scourge of Base was connected to their blood Administration program and this is one of the many truths that is revealed in the Hunter's nightmare in the form of the surgery altar that depicts the experimentation of the healing church and a beast emerging from underneath this surgery table a symbolic representation of the consequences of the healing Church's experimentation while it is clear that Lawrence deviates from his old mentor's morals everything he and his healing Church builds upon very much is on the back of that learned at bergenworth this applies even to their aesthetic Choice the garbs that the doctors of the healing Church wears as the student uniform reads uniform of the students of bergenworth a bygone Institute of learning features a thick cape the healing church has its roots in bergenworth and naturally borrows heavily from its uniform design the focus knot on knowledge or thought but on pure pretension would surely bring Master Willem to despair if he only knew a lot of what the healing Church does is about obscuring their true purpose the Ascension of mankind Through Blood Administration and they do so by muddying the water with religious Superstition but as we've said the true purpose of the healing Church in general is to carry on Research Through Blood ministration to achieve that goal set out in clockwise metamorphosis a sentiment that is repeated by the description of the white church say which reads they believe that medicine is not a means of treatment but rather a method for research and some knowledge can only be obtained by exposing oneself to sickness it is unethical experimentation on a whole populace pure and simple and yet it is presented as a theistic organization the healing Church no doubt there are some within the church who do believe in the theistic side of the church believing the all blood to be miraculous and holy like Amelia for example or the fanatical executioners behind the veil we do get the impression that it is just a method of control but despite that it is presented to yarnam as a whole as a grand religious movement administering the blood of the Gods to help people heal the clerical and religious robes of their clerics come scientists the ornate statuary and the dominating presence of the cathedral itself these are all the aspects of pretension that Willem would have hated the trappings of possession and power and the highest amongst this religious pretentious body are the choir themselves their Garb not much different from the other clerics of the healing Church indeed Ludwig will recognize you as a member of the church should you approach him in the choir gear there robe describes them as the highest ranking clerics and we know from the upper Cathedral Ward key that to this day the choir remains one of the main ruling bodies of the church as it reads the following the upper echelons of the healing church are formed by the school of Menses based in the Unseen Village and the choir occupying the upper Cathedral Ward much like the bergenworth chapter the point in highlighting the healing church here in this video is to show that the choir are very much part of the healing church and while it may be easy to see them as The Heirs to willem's Destiny they are still something he would very much despise whilst they see themselves as Scholars they are still considered clerics the highest ranking ones unafraid to utilize the power of the healing Church to achieve their aims and as the ruling body of the healing Church they are the ones that still oversee the healing church as it is today were they true Scholars and true Heirs of Willem they would not use the methods they do and surely would have led the healing Church to reform to become something closer to a school disregarding the pretension of the healing church but this of course makes sense as I will argue in the next chapter the choir itself was born within the healing church it was started as a further attempt to ascend Humanity a continuation of research by the healing Church themselves and so with that said let us move on to the choir itself and speculate on how it first developed with that foundational work out the way we will aim to show that the choir is a complex blend of the healing Church's physical experimentation but also far closer in ideology to master Willem and bergenworth than the rest of the church at least they are set upon ascending Humanity through understanding and elevating one's thoughts but aren't afraid to use the physical experimentation akin to what we see in the research Hall the blindfold cap mentions the path diverging from that of Willem and this is clearly the departure that it is referring to that while despite they ultimately agree with his goals they also believe that blood Administration is an accelerant to be used in attaining them physically the choir is based at the very top of Cathedral ward in the area aptly named The Orphanage and we can learn a little bit about this location via the orphanage key which reads the orphanage shadowed by the grand cathedral was a place of scholarship and experimentation where young orphans became potent unseen thinkers of the healing Church the choir that would later split the healing church was a creation of the orphanage a place of scholarship and experimentation the two pillars to acquire ideology this key description is interesting because it makes it clear that the choir formed out of the orphanage rather than the orphanage being an establishment of the choir the orphanage location seems somewhat similar to that of the research Hall with the research Hall more or less overlapping with the altar of Despair and the lumenwood garden in the orphanage today and I don't need to give credit to Loki and their choir article for bringing my attention to this overlap so given its location perhaps this suggests that the orphanage timeline wise was established following the failures of the research Hall at atop its very foundations a successor institution and as we will see later they seem to have carried on and improved upon the experiments of the research Hall the name the orphanage has extremely Sinister undertones one that is confirmed by the key itself that clearly states that orphans children were utilized here to become unseen thinkers presumably then the healing Church of built this orphanage to take gifted orphans off the street and use them for their own gain so that their Insight might be used to the church's benefit and the church's research and the way this makes sense because their minds could be molded from a young age we of course can't be certain as to how exactly these orphans were employed by the church but given what the choir would become we can assume that the church wanted them to study the great ones and the cosmos and come to New conclusions on how Humanity could Ascend as well as to eventually carry on the work of the research Hall on which their orphanage was built we can learn more of their aims and studies from the auger of ipritas which reads remnant of the Eldritch truth encountered at bergenworth their National encounter marked the start of an inquiry into the cosmos from within the old Labyrinth and laid to the establishment of the choir this creates a causal link between this Research into the higher plane the cosmos and the creation of the choir suggesting that this was the purpose of the orphanage to harness the thinking minds of young children to mold them from a young age into great Scholars that would be able to finish the inquiry started at bergenworth all those years ago clearly as these orphans grew into adults they managed to Garner enough power and influence that they would become their own group with their own identity the choir evolving from a group of exploited orphans to one of the most powerful groups in the church and this is not unexpected given they seem to have been groomed from a young age to be the best Minds in the church such a callous way of treating children and molding them in such a way will in turn create a group of people who are ruthless and attaining their goals and will have a callous and cold approach to their work and research and when you think about that it really isn't hard to imagine why the choir managed to take control of the church according to the orphanage key it was the emergence of the choir that would split the church which implies it wasn't necessarily an amicable takeover they weren't elected to this position rather they just simply grew into it and took it for themselves and no doubt their new way of doing things and differences in philosophy would lead to those within the church that would oppose them as I will argue later I believe that the school of Menses was formed after the choir and is partially a consequence of the choir with all that said about their establishment let us talk about their research and how their investigations molded what the choir would become Let Us return to the iconic blindfold cap once more because it is an insight into what the choir actually believes in Willem also wears a metal blindfold and the purpose of this comes from willem's understanding of insight in essence it is a rejection of normal sight so that one can focus on their inner sight so that one can begin to think on higher planes using your eyes to analyze information is thinking on the basis of planes willem's desire for this inner sight is explained via the one-third umbilical cord which reads Provost Willem sought the court in order to elevate his being and thoughts to those of a great one by lining his brain with eyes the only choice he knew if men were ever to match their greatness as an aside this particular umbilical is found in the possession of fake yosefka who appears to be a rogue member of the choir and we will return to her story in the next chapter but the fact that this umbilical that was being sought by Willem is in the hands of a choir member again shows that while the choir's methods were different from those used by Willem their aims were ultimately the same and as such their inquiry into the cosmos LED them back to the very beginnings of that initial inquiry by bergenworth back to the Labyrinth where the scholars discovered the auger of ibritas the object that started the inquiry in the first place and as we know and as we looked at earlier is the object that would lead to the foundation of the choir suggesting that the orphanage itself was established so that the orphans could continue to study the auger of ibritas and continue the inquiry into the cosmos from within the Labyrinth that sailed indeed if you venture into ease itself you can encounter Prospectors who are clearly aligned with the choir Tim prospector gremia on NPC that you can encounter both as an enemy and summon as an ally with an ease level 3 are armed with the rules marinus and can use the call of ebratars identifying them as a member of the choir given they are using parts of their Arsenal so the choir clearly used the auger of epritas as a starting point and returned to the Labyrinth to study the cosmos and here they would find a relic of great significance the great ease chalice the description of which reads the following the Great East chalice became a Cornerstone of the choir the elite delegation of the healing Church it was also the first great chalice brought back to the surface since the time of bargainworth and allowed the choir to have an audience worth ibratars this description states that the Chalice was the first chalice brought back to the surface since the time of bergenworth meaning that it is a really significant discovery that also does ring true as it is only one of two that we can actually find on the surface world of bloodborne this discovery must have been massive as it gave them access to ease and ebratat herself hence why it became a Cornerstone of the choir we can presume that they performed a chalice ritual just like we can do and explored the same East chalice that we do I well discuss planes of reality in the later chapter but in regards to chalice dungeon instances I believe that each chalice dungeon that we break the seal of is a specific instance in time and space a pocket Dimension if you will which is why we can still find ibritas here but also in Upper Cathedral Ward at the same time and were you to undo the ritual and do it again you would once again find ebratas here it is a fixed pocket Dimension and a fixed instance all versions of epritas are the same being it's just versions of her that exist in different dimensions and planes of reality as such I believe what we experience in error Journey Through the ease set dungeon is what the choir also experienced when they first broke the seal they would have met ebratas in the deepest level of this Labyrinth and thus as the audience that is mentioned in the ease chalice item description but instead of having a boss battle with her like we do they presumably brought back Hebrew test with them to operate Cathedral Ward when we meet ebratas herself in the altar of Despair we can see that she doesn't attack us and this is because the great one directly Works alongside the choir as the choir Garb reads the following together with the Left Behind great one they look to the skies in search of Astral signs that may lead them to rediscovery of true greatness but why would they be looking to the sky for astral signs what has this got to do with the great ones the cosmos and the Ascension of mankind well to answer that let us move on to the next chapter where we discuss the beliefs aims and methods of the choir so we know that the choir carried on the inquiry into the cosmos and that the discovery of ease was massive leading them into contact with one of the great ones themselves no doubt their association with ibratas a loving great one would have advanced their understanding of these beings and their realm beyond anything that had come before was interesting however is that ebratas herself seems to be trapped on our side of reality we've just looked at the choir set and it refers to her as the Left Behind great one it seems as though both ebratas and the choir seek access to the astral plane making contact with those who exist within it and I think this is where the name the choir really comes from in the real world a choir is a collection of singers who religiously commune with a deity through song it is a way of communicating with an otherwise untangible God they literally reach out with their voices and their song likewise I believe the choir are called this because they are trying to communicate with the great ones and thematically the name fits within the fake Theology of the church whilst also describing the choir as a body of communicators those who raise their voices up to the cosmos for all the choirs failed experiments which we will review shortly their understanding of the cosmos is far more nuanced and is closer to the truth than anything else we see in the game in my opinion there is a note in Upper Cathedral Ward that is attributed to the choir and it reads the following the sky and the cosmos are one when the choir talks of the cosmos they aren't talking of space and stars as we would rather they are talking of the realm that the great ones inhabits they are plain of existence so this note is seemingly saying that this guy is one with this other plane of existence we get a little more elaboration on this philosophy of theirs via the cosmic eye Watcher badge the hunter badge which represents the choir it reads the following the i signifies the very Cosmos the choir stumbled upon in Epiphany very suddenly and quite by accident here we stand feet planted in the Earth but might the cause most be very nearers only just above our heads this is one of my favorite quotes in any game but what does it actually mean well it has to do with the way that realities and planes of existence are stacked in bloodborne and this is obviously an old Theory when we talk about the stacking of planes obviously I can't take credit for it I believe I first heard of it in Epic nimro's bloodborne Series so credit to e and B from where I first got this Theory but the idea of stacked realities is most easily seen in the nightmare Frontier where we can see different realities above and below us you can see the nightmare of mentus above in the distance of the nightmare Frontier and below the nightmare Frontier you can see some shipmasts later when the DLC launched we would learn where these masks came from the fishing Hamlet as we can see the same mass models being used as we enter the fishing hamlet in addition in the fishing Hamlet itself if you look into the water beneath you can see the Hunter's nightmare again suggesting that the fishing Hamlet layer is right on top of the sky of the Hunter's Nightmare and this is why a snail lady falls from the sky randomly when you're in the Hunter's nightmare literally a being who's fallen from a higher plane to the one below so theoretically putting all of this together we can see a stack of realities that goes from the Hunter's nightmare at the bottom to the fishing Hamlet to the nightmare Frontier to the nightmare of Menses reality stacked upon each other like layers of a cake so when we understand this idea of stacked planes we can start to make sense of the cosmos which is repeatedly referred to as the highest plane or at least a Higher One compared to the waking world for example there is the description of the great ones wisdom wherever reality and human thinking is called the basis of planes again suggesting that we exist on a lower plane to the cosmos and of course this is reinforced by the irune the Rune that wellum himself can drop and it reads the following disillusioned by the limits of human intellect Master Willem loot to beings from higher planes for guidance and sought to line his brain with eyes in order to elevate his thoughts I do need to give credit to a Reddit post by use our stinkhorse for really making the concept of the different planes become more clear to me so I was able to write their script in a more coherent Manner and so I will post that original post below and it's from seven years ago so it's pretty interesting and that post the ope also makes the point that this is probably why Flora the moon presence descends upon us from on high it is descending from a higher plane so following this Logic the choir realized that each reality is stacked upon one another and the cosmos being one Higher to errors sets above errors so when one looks up at the sky they are literally looking at another plane of existence that exists on top of ours so when one looks at the sky and the astral signs you are looking at this different plane of existence that the choir and others want to be elevated to hence the sky and the cosmos are one the sky of error world is the base of their world this is also reinforced by the description of the ease Rich Alice which reads according to the choir the land of ease lies in contact with the cosmos which allowed the great ones to function on transcendental planes of thought so again the term transcendental implies that the cosmos is a higher plane of existence but it also links the idea that the mind is also tied to being able to access these higher planes of existence as the ease of Rich chalice description implies that because this region was in contact with a higher plane the great ones were able to operate on higher planes of thought as well the great one's wisdom description and the irin also link Insight or elevating one's mind to ascendance and understanding this connection between thought and ascending to a higher plane is the basis of willem's research but also the choirs it's just that the choir had a more sophisticated understanding that these higher planes were not only linked to one's understanding but also that they literally were higher than the one that we inhabit but in short the choir came to realize that the distance between the cosmos was not spatial but rather related to higher planes of thoughts and existence and as such their works are dedicated to elevating the human mind to the level of the great ones thus understanding coupled with working alongside one of the great ones has given the choir a great understanding of these beings indeed I would go so far as to suggest that they are aware of Flora the Min presence a very surreptitious figure within the bloodborne lore the reason I believe this is because I think we can find representations of this being enscribed into the stonework of the orphanage's lumenwood gardens but that is of course my speculation let me know in the comments below what you believe these depictions are as such a lot of their works are dedicated to making contact with this higher plane of existence and the beings who exist within it in the hopes that this connection would lead to Greater insight and understanding for example we have the make contact gesture itself a gesture associated with the choir of course because we learn it there from a corpse it's not a stretch to imagine that this was taught to them by ibratars we know from the ruin Workshop tool that runes are essentially the words of the great ones and given they are pictographic in nature showing different shapes I feel like they make contact gesture is essentially using your body to illustrate a rune that may makes contact with a great one and it does seem to actually work because if you use the make contact gesture when in front of the brain of Menses a great one itself it replies with a rune so a sort of very slow conversation there what if the choir's signature techniques is also a failed attempt at making contact with the cosmos be called Beyond it reads one of the secret rights of the choir long ago the healing Church used phantasms to reach a lofty plane of Darkness but failed to make contact with the outer reaches of the cosmos the right failed to achieve its intended purpose but instead created a small exploding star now a powerful part of the choir's Arsenal the reference to phantasms is of course a reference to the slug-like beings who act as familiar as to the great ones such as the auger of ebratas the empty Phantasm shell and the Pearl slugs the connection that these invertebras have to the cosmos is pretty clear when we consider their use the auger of ibratas is able to partially summon her despite being an especially different plane and they call Beyond another slug-like creature literally creates an exploding star as we've discussed already when one looks at the icons for a madman's knowledge or a great one's wisdom we can see that more invertebrates slugs seem to be emerging from the skull and these must also be phantasms given the phantasms connection to the cosmos and their ability to bridge the gap between our world and the cosmos these depictions seem to imply that when one's mind ascends it literally connects to the cosmos hence why these beings these phantasms are also present Within These skulls and this would explain the cosmic effect and the presence of phantasms on both of these item icons and I don't think this is a huge stretch given that the auger of ibratars and the call Beyond both form a sort of bridge between the cosmos and the human plane and as such I believe that phantasms are drawn to ascendent thought and insight which is why they are so drawn to the great ones and become their familiars it's always reminded me of the symbiotic relationship between remoras and sharks these smaller beings gathering around a mighty Beast much as the phantasms seem to gather around the great ones I think that phantasms are seeking out insight and being a bridge between the cosmos and the Base plane can explain some of the Ken enemies that we find in the orphanage and throughout yarnum the brain suckers but we do find them in their greatest numbers in the orphanage given what we have just stated about the connection between insight and phantasms it would make sense that the orphanage would be a place in which many people could be overwhelmed by the insight and the Eldritch truth that they witness through the research the description of madman's knowledge reads the following making contact with Eldritch wisdom is a blessing for even if it drives one mad it allows one to serve a grander purpose for posterity firstly is the Baseline idea that some people can be overwhelmed by the Eldritch truth and I believe that brain suckers are those who have been overwhelmed with their exposure to the Eldritch truth and essentially have now become hosts to a Phantasm in their brain If a brain soccer is able to grab you and suck your brain it takes some of your Insight and at that point a large slugly appendage appears from the brain sucker's head to me the brain soccer are humans who have been overwhelmed by the phantasms drawn into their brain and the slug-like creature that comes out of their head is that Phantasm which has in essence become a parasite this Phantasm then turns its human host into a vehicle a vehicle through which the Phantasm can seek more insight it's a zombie that craves Insight rather than just blood or brains a whole human host driven and controlled by that one desire but we can still witness the phantasms connection to the cosmos through the cosmic Powers they use to try and bind their victims whilst we mainly find them in the orphanage there are two other places where we can find them in decent numbers bergenworth and the Labyrinth and this again really reinforces the idea that these are phantasms who have overwhelmed people who have been exposed to the Eldritch truth as both bergenworth and the Labyrinth are definitely places one can be exposed to the L Eldritch truth as is the orphanage while the brain suckers are clearly a failed byproduct of the orphanage's research the same cannot be said of the other subjects that we find within the orphanage the celestial emissaries whom I believe the choir used to try and make contact with the great beyond which of course makes sense of their names they are literally the emissaries to the Stars the second stage emissaries Sprout tendrils from their head which I've always assumed to be antennae a way in which they can communicate with the cosmos above and indeed this does seem to be backed up by the sound design if you turn off music and turn up the sound effect you will hear what sounds like Sonic vibrations or radio static and to a degree it does seem as though they are making contact with the celestial plane as in their second stage they are also able to use cosmic power and redirect it against their enemies such as the Hunter the choir have clearly tried to use a lumenwood garden to amplify the effects of these creations and credit to Loki again in their choir article for pointing out the relevance of the illuminwood gardens in both the research Hall and in the orphanage the milkweed Rune explains the purpose of a lemon wood and therefore why they are found in both the research Hall with the failed experiment and in the orphanage alongside the celestial emissaries the Rune reads those who swear this Earth become illumineward that peers Towards the Sky feeding phantasms in its luscious bed phantasms guide us and lead us to further discoveries I think at this stage in the thesis we have well established that phantasms seek out beings of ascended thought and also act as a bridge between our world and the cosmos and thus to have a ready supply of them in a garden would logically help direct the choir to new cosmic discoveries and possibly could direct the celestial emissaries in their attempts to make contact and so these lumenwood Gardens are essentially used as a hotbed for phantasms talking of these two lumenwood gardens we do need to address the parallel of the failed experiments of the research Hall and the celestial emissaries of the orphanage as I mentioned earlier Loki in their choir article suggests that the orphanage is literally built on top of where the research Hall used to be but not only that but they would also actually carry on the work that was started in the research Hall developing the research Hall patients and failed experiments into the more successful Celestial emissaries this is obviously quite compelling when we compare the end products of the research hole the failed experiments against the celestial emissaries of the choir side by side in these dark Halls of the research Hall humans were experimented on following the fishing Hamlet raid and the discovery of course by the early healing Church These Scholars saw a connection between the Aquatic and the cosmos and thus they wanted to exploit this connection to water to try and connect with the great beyond and this isn't entirely wrong as there is some success in this program both the failed experiments and some of the bloated patients who are present in a Lemonwood Garden are able to use Cosmic Powers again suggesting that they are somehow acting as a bridge between airplane and the cosmic plane though I do know that the research patients have to be in the lumenwood garden to use these Powers again highlighting how much less successful they are than the celestial emissaries who can actually use these Powers outside of the London wood garden throughout yharnam and indeed Adeline one of the patients in the research Hall is able to perceive a rune in the darkness in her fully transformed State the milkweed Rune the word of a great one ultimately and one cannot deny the physical similarities between the patients and the celestial emissaries the former looking more like rougher earlier 1.0 versions of this particular experiments and the celestial emissaries do appear squid like or I see an enemy in their tendril stage either way they are distinctly aquatic in appearance and the clear connection between the two projects is most notable when you look at the failed experiment boss themselves which have the blue skin and similar physique to the celestial emissaries to quote Loki's theory on the matter either way the orphans similarly recreated the research Hall experiment making men more attune to Celestial communication by turning them into Ken whose heads were bloated with water and again I have to give credit to Loki for pointing out the similarities between the research Hall project and that of the celestial emissaries the fact that both grips place these enemies in lumenwood gardens really does suggest that the choirs version of the celestial emissaries are a 2.0 run at the original research Hall project sadly as we know from the research Hall boss they are called failed experiments suggesting they were unable to properly make connection with the cosmos and it suggests that they are able to use Cosmic Powers but that it is raw and untempered not the communication link or source of knowledge that the healing church was actually after when they created these experiments however the choirs version of this experiment the celestial emissaries seems to have been more successful even physically you can see they are a more refined result the celestial emissaries and their tentacle form are able to summon the power of the cosmos but more importantly through them the Imposter yosefka does seem to be able to make contact with the cosmos and Elevate her mind perhaps almost ascending to become one of the great ones the fake yosefka seems to take control of the original yusefka's Clinic during the height of the Hun while this person is only wearing the white church set they clearly stole this from the original yusevka who was also wearing this The Imposter is able to use a coal Beyond and the call of ibritas and the fact she is associated with Celestial emissaries enemies we find primarily in the orphanage really does make it an absolute certainty that this is a rogue member of the choir taking advantage of the hunt and the facilities provided by yosefka's Clinic to carry on her research the aim of her work is clear the same aims that we have tracked through Willem and into the choir to ascend one's thoughts we must find a way to surpass our own stupidity you're one of the bright ones don't you see how much this means to achieve this end the Imposter has turned you safe because a place of healing into one of experimentation with each Survivor sent there being transformed into a Celestial Emissary and just a nice little detail an observation made by Loki is that we can see partial human features on some of the Dead emissaries the human skin still being present on the hand and some of the legs just the final piece of evidence if you weren't convinced that the celestial emissaries were indeed once humans yosefka herself sadly appears to be one of the victims as one of these Celestial emissaries found in the clinic drops her signature blood vial in her dialogues the Imposter makes oblique references to a procedure and we can assume that blood Administration plays a role given the original subjects of the research Hall seem to have blood transfusion drips next to their beds the clock work metamorphosis Rune that we looked at earlier also makes it clear that blood is a good medium for transformation or metamorphosis so I can't think of a better material to be used when transforming humans into a Ken being indeed it does eventually seem as though the old blood directly will eventually be involved in the procedure for in one of the imposter's dialogues she says oh hello you're alive good I've received another patient this time I'll be trying old blood so the old blood is clearly being used for metamorphosis and given all we have discussed about the celestial emissaries it's clear that not only is this imposter using their transformative process to elevate her mind in understanding the human form and how it can transcend into that of Ken but also to use them to make contact with the cosmos above and during the blood moon after all her Grim work the Imposter is rewarded with a third umbilical cord suggesting that she is on the verge of Ascension the third umbilical chord description state every infant great one has this precursor to the umbilical cord the implication of this is that the Imposter has received an umbilical cord because she is going through a transformation that her mind is ascending and she will become a great one just as we do ourselves if we use three of these umbilical cords God I'm nauseous have you found this it's progressing see things I knew it I'm different I'm no Beast I oh god it feels awful but prove that I'm chosen don't you see how they arrived rise inside my head rather Rapture is that additionally she talks of arithing within her head and once more if we look at the wisdom of a great one and its item icon we can see that having the wisdom of a great one comes with a whole host of phantasms and that's what I imagine are writhing around in the imposter's head this does really seem like a successful Vindication of the choir's work brittle though it was this imposter from the choir was able to elevate her mind to that of a great one using the choir methods and further Vindication of their methods is found in the lumenwood garden back in the orphanage an interesting observation made by Loki and something I completely missed as the description of the achievement that we get for defeating the giant Celestial Emissary in the luminwood garden this achievement describes their Celestial Emissary as a great one this means that somehow one of these beings was able to make contact with the cosmos and Bridge their mind to it to such a degree that it has now ascended to this higher plane and as a result has joined the ranks of a great one so again props to Loki for that observation and once more proof that there was some method to The Madness of the choir's techniques with that said there is still one enemy type in the orphanage that I haven't really addressed that is the celestial children the little slug-like enemies that we find in great numbers outside the orphanage now not only do these children give new meaning to the orphanage title but they also have potentially massive lower implica Nations the only Celestial child that we actually see coming into existence is the child that is born of Ariana Ariana will give birth to this child within erden Chapel during the blood moon we know that one of the great driving forces behind the great ones is that they seek children we know from the description of the umbilical cords that every great one loses its child and then yearns for a surrogate and then you combine this with a note from bergenworth which reads the following when the red moon hangs low the line between man and Beast is blurred and when the great ones descend a womb will be blessed with a child this exactly happens to Ariana and so we can assume that it is a great one blessing Harwin with a child as the red moon is hanging low when she gives birth to this child though you generally accepted narrative in the community is that it is erden who blesses her womb with a child and I am inclined to agree but more importantly the child that she gives birth to essentially the child of a great one is the exact same model that is used within the orphanage and the potential implication is chilling to me have the choir been using the orphanage as a battery Farm to produce Celestial children that surrogate mothers have been used to breed these creatures in large numbers given that we only see one of these children being produced and it is through a surrogacy process I have to think that this is what is happening here that the choir half-bred these children in great numbers it does also meet the orphanage in the choir come full circle once orphans were the founding members of the choir but now they are filling the orphanage with new Celestial orphans and if I am correct this has dire implications for those who were the surrogate mothers to these Celestial children despite describing themselves as Scholars the choir are no less brittle and callous in their research I see them as almost called scientists who see the worth of their work as far greater than any individual human life when I was recording footage for this video I noticed that the orphanage seems to have great plumes of smoke rising from a number of chimneys which of course begs the question what is being burned here given the experiments with Celestial emissaries the potential breeding of celestial children and the numerous people lost to Beast transformation or being taken over by a parasite and becoming a brain sucker I'd always assumed that the obvious answer was corpse and that when you see their smoke rising from the orphanage low down even in Cathedral Ward you should get an ominous feeling in the pet of your stomach the black plumes of smoke are very Sinister to me and made me think of a Charnel house immediately Loki's article expands upon this idea by making a strict observation of the numerous coffins found throughout the orphanage and outside of it to quote Loki directly many coffins have been brought up to the orphanage and set up on stands inside implying that the dead which the church has been collecting were being mainly transferred to the choir instead of him work this isn't just a pet stop either as towers of blacksmouth uniquely Bellow from the foster home the only reason for so much burning would be that the orphans have been taken upon themselves to cremate the cadavers indeed we find coffins throughout yarnum but most interestingly in the tower and the church Workshop that leads up to the choir which does make Loki's argument very compelling that all the coffins we find throughout the orphanage are research subjects in essence while on the surface I've always thought of the choir as a more sophisticated facet of the healing Church it is clear they are no less willing to sacrifice innocence and transgress social norms in pursuit of their goal The Imposter yosefka is the only member that we really get to speak to and her demeanor is that of a cold scientist possibly even a sociopath who has a certain Glee at the prospect of a new test subject being sent up to her in general I want to summarize the work of the choir they have worked out that the cosmos is a higher place of existence literally that lies atop our world in the sky and that to reach that higher plane we have to ascend our minds to a higher plane of thought a notion conceived by Willem himself however they go further than Willem would ever be willing to using the powers of blood Administration to transform the human body so that the Mind May soon follow and thanks to their association with a great one their understanding of the great ones is far more nuanced and far closer to the truth than anything else we see in the game well maybe aside from one other school to complete the story of the choir and to come full circle on this subject we need to discuss the Rivalry that exists between Menses and the choir as we have already discussed in the orphanage key item description the creation of the church would split the church suggesting that their way of leadership violently clashed with the status quo of the church splitting the church to me implies that there are those who argued against the methods used by the choir while yes they are brittle and callous the methods employed by The Choir to achieve their goals are still slower and more methodical seeking to ascend Humanity through refined processes and understanding and I believe that the school of Menses and this is my own speculation of course was born otithi frustrations that could arise from witnessing such meticulous techniques my reasoning for why the skill of Menses came after the choir is based on a few things firstly Menses exists in what is called the Unseen Village of yahar Gul a base of operations that is cleverly hidden in the sprawling under streets of yharnam and so surely if Menses existed before the choir they wouldn't need to be hiding and operating out of a hidden base to me it indicates that men's has started as a small cabal that opposed the choir and initially needed to hide their operations from their more powerful Rivals there would be no reason for their base to have been hidden had they been the main power in the church prior to the choir being formed secondly we meet a couple of Menses characters mainly mikalash and Damien Damien of course being a summonable Menses character both of these School of Menses members are able to use the choir's signature Powers the auger of epritas and the call Beyond and again while the school of Menses methodology greatly differ from the choir still hard talking about lining one's mind with eyes I.E the Ascension of the mind as well as generally talking about the cosmos as well hidden now from the side Cosmos of course let us sit about and speak English of new ideas and so this is my own complete speculation but I believe that mentis was partially formed of choir members who have the same aims and they would do if they had been part of the choir but grew frustrated with the restrained and methodical techniques of the choir even the Menses cage still seems to be a device for making contact this is the cage that mikalash and other members of Menses wear on their heads and it reads as follows best cage is a device that restrains the will of self allowing one to see the profane world for what it is it also serves as an antenna that facilitates contact with the great ones of the dream this again makes me think that there are so much similarities between Menses and the choir that Menses must have formed out of the choir there is talk of making contact the cosmos and lining one's brain with eyes of course the acquired techniques that the Menses members use could have just been taken from the choir themselves forcibly as we do of course see a choir member in a cage who is clearly been killed and interrogated by members of Menses but yes I ultimately see Menses as having the same goals they want to make contact they want to ascend their minds what differs is their ways about going about it they are far more aggressive and Reckless in trying to attain these results they want to force a meeting with the great ones via the nightmare of Menses they snatch people off the streets for their experiments and they use beckoning rituals with no head nor care for the consequences and the image that this all builds in my mind together is that this is a school that was built in response to the choir's slow techniques and in some way the school of Menses is Vindicated they are able to force an audience with the breed of Menses and with Margo and clearly the choir were concerned about the schemes of Menses for in the nightmare of Menses we find Edgar a spy of the church if he has here we have to assume that he infiltrated Menses itself and partook in the ritual that transported the school into the nightmare the choir clearly want to prevent the success of Menses one of the choir members is in bergenworth and locate in their choir article suggests that they are here to defend Rome and this definitely makes sense as we know from a lower note here and one from Cathedral Ward that it is ROM that is preventing mensa's rituals from progressing and thus it's in the choir's interest to keep Rome and the barrier alive yet there isn't much left of either Menses or the choir by the time we enter the frame in bloodborne the choir has essentially overreached the toll of their experiments is evident to see when we come to the orphanage there's not a loving human soul left in the orphanage there are Celestial children there are beasts and there are brain suckers All The Unwanted consequences of their meddling there are bloody corpses everywhere in the orphanage that speaks to a massacre indeed when we first enter the orphanage we find the choir Garb on a corpse being picked over by a brain sucker and we find the blindfold cap on another corpse telling us that these bodies found throughout the orphanage were indeed choir members that were caught up in a Slaughter that unfolded here clearly the choir have reaped what they sowed the fritz of their experiments overrunning their facility the scene in The Orphanage is just one of a society of a group that has been overrun their meddling into blood Administration and their experimentation has led to their ruin and now their base is just an empty shell Full Of Monsters And to quote locate One Last Time who puts the whole state of affairs better than I ever could they say the following some have suggested that the choir's rituals were derailed by us bringing about the red moon pointing to similar Mayhem in your heart girl it is true that we cannot visit the upper Ward before this incident however we can spy the corpse where they call Beyond hanging over the balcony since first entering the grand Cathedral long before the red moon this means that the chaotic events involving the choir were already occurring before nightfall at the latest and is likely partially to blame for the church's breakdown in administration on the day that we arrive the consequences of the choir collapsing is deeper than just the orphanage we know that the choir were at the very top of the church's hierarchy the yharnam that we meet is a city in chaos there are very few authority figures anywhere a few scattered members of The church here and there but no coordinated effort and the only real effort we see to restore order are by the citizens of yarnam themselves who have taken to the streets in great lynch mobs but they themselves are also being overrun by the beastly Scourge this is yarnum under the choir's authority and when we get to the choir itself we can see why the city is in the state that it is it is ultimately collapsed and ultimately the legacy of the choir is carried on by The Imposter yosefkar who sets up one last research station one last attempt to unpack the mysteries of the cosmos while Rome Burns around her so thanks guys that is my take on the choir and their inquiry into the cosmos a fascinating grip really who definitely had their fair share of successes but are ultimately fairly burned out by the time that we get to yarnum if you like this bloodborne video please give it a like and a subscribe as I will be covering bloodborne more in the future I do have some older videos as well from several years ago if you'd be interested in that I'd once again like to give a massive thanks to Loki the depth of this video wouldn't have been possible without them as they really rendered out my ideas regarding the choir and so if you are interested in really in-depth bloodborne law analysis providing new interpretations and translations then please check out locate lore a website where Loki writes all of their articles on all of these Souls games and finally I'd like to thank amygdala for giving me the insight to do this video but until next time guys let me know your thoughts in the comments below obviously bloodborne is a game open to a lot of interpretation so I'd be happy to hear your thoughts on the video and let me know what you'd like me to cover next if we do bloodborne but until next time guys I will see you in the Labyrinth of ease take care and have a wonderful night of the hunt

Channel: SmoughTown

Views: 135,673

Keywords: bloodborne, blood borne, mensis, bloodborne lore, bloodborne story explained, the choir, ebrietas, yarhargul, yar har gul, yharnam, queen yharnam, byrgenwerth, byrgenworth, bergenworth, master willem, master wilem, moon presence, amygdala, the orphanage, isz, story, explained, bloodborne endings explained, great ones, healing church, blood ministration, gehrman, upper cathedral ward, cathedral ward, ludwig, fishing hamlet

Id: YQCv7v20CJ8

Length: 77min 22sec (4642 seconds)

Published: Sun Jun 04 2023