Everything in this trailer makes so much sense...
is probably what I'm going to say in about a month when the DLC is out. When we look back, this
trailer will explain everything, but right now I've got so many questions, especially about this
scene in particular. Here we're being teased with what is clearly one of the most important events
in this universe. And while the truth is right in front of us, it's impossible to make complete
sense of it yet. They're taunting us. I hate it. I love it. Let's break it down. So this trailer
comes in three parts. There's the beginning where gold arose and shadow was born. Then we see the
war that followed with Messmer reducing a city and its citizens to ash. Finally, we see Miquella near
the current age, and he's been preaching a hidden truth about the beginning To his followers.
"Miquella the Kind spoke of the beginning. The seduction, and the betrayal. An affair from
which gold arose. And so too was shadow born. To start, This is Queen Marika. The bracelet, And
these armbands, They're an exact match for her jewelry and this piece of artwork. But what is
happening here? The first shot we see is Marika pulling what looks like hair from what looks like
a corpse. The hair seems easy to explain. I think these are runes of the Elden Ring. Compare these
threads to the ones that you see in this cinematic where the Elden Ring was being repaired. This
is Marika's Hammer and its description reads: The hammer partially broke upon shattering the
ring, becoming splintered with rune fragments. And obviously these threads are very much the
same as the rune threads here. So I think Marika is essentially looting runes from a corpse, maybe
somewhat similar to what we do in the actual game. Please bear in mind that from this point forward,
a lot of this is speculation. However, even if this speculation is wrong, I think this is still
a really good opportunity to talk about and become familiar with concepts that will likely show up
in the Land of Shadow one way or another. So yeah, here goes. I don't think these are just any runes,
nor do I think this is just any corpse. The thing this mass first reminded me of was the attire of
the godskin enemies. It's really similar in color, tone, and the thick folds really remind me of
skin and fat. What's more, we can see horizontal stitching at the edges, which brings to mind
the Godskin Stitcher, which is a weapon that references the creation of the Godskin attire,
which is peeled and then stitched together from God's skin. And considering Marika's hand alone
is bloody, it's not bloody further up, clearly, she's reaching into something visceral. But what
is she doing here? Obviously it's too early to say for sure, but I do want to comment specifically
on the shape these threads are making. It's being pulled into a downward arc, which is a really
potent symbol as it relates to the Elden Ring. So there are two downward arcs on the Elden Ring.
One is here at the bottom, which is explicitly a Rune Arc. It's a basin in which the blessings of
the Elden Ring pool. But the more relevant arc, I think, is here at the top. This arc creates
a symbol that is iconic to Marika. It's seen on her scarseal and in her crucifixion at the end of
the game. And now again in the trailer here and at the end of the trailer as well, with the gold
flowing between the two shadow trees. Something that the YouTuber Quelaag talked about very early
on is that Marika'a Seal seems to be a subversion of the Rune of Death. You would have seen the Rune
of Death after defeating Maliketh. It's something that was once a part of the Elden Ring, delivering
a Destined Death to all until Marika, the Eternal removed it and sealed it away. According to Enia,
this rune was plucked from the Golden Order upon the Golden Order's creation, and indeed, Marika's
age became defined by its defiance of death in all things. So it is that I wonder if the Rune
of Death has anything to do with the subverted symbol of Marika we see here. Understanding the
Rune of Death is important also, because it has a lot to do with the godskins. Now I'm at risk of
going too far down a tangent That could be built on a false premise here, but if this is Godskin we
see in the trailer, then it really could have huge implications for what's happening in this scene.
So let's entertain the idea that this is Godskin, just to see where this takes us. The leader of
the Godskin Nobles and the Godskin Apostles was the Gloam-eyed queen, who, like Marika, was an
Empyrean. someone chosen by the Two Fingers as a candidate for godhood and items describe
how she was defeated long ago by Maliketh, who was Marika's Shadow. So essentially she was
defeated by Marika. However, the exact nature of this clash is really unclear. We don't know if the
Gloam-eyed Queen and Marika were equals or rival Empyreans, or how or if control of the Elden Ring
was split between them. But we do know that in the end, Destined Death was sealed and the true power
of the Gloam-eyed Queen's blackflame was lost. Marika had won. So one kind of insane piece of
speculation is that this body could actually be the Gloam-eyed Queen's, given the Godskin and
the rune and the war that Marika won against her in the beginning. But this theory about this
being the Gloam-eyed Queen is entirely built upon the premise that this lump is Godskin, and that
premise might be false. Of all the characters we know in Elden Ring, I do think she's the
most likely candidate. But to be honest, I actually think it's more likely that this is a
character or a thing we've never seen before. It's a sort of tempting impulse with Elden Ring lore
to try to explain the story based on what we know, but the truth is that fromsoft are going
to introduce a ton of new characters and concepts and names that we've never even heard
of before in the DLC, and those are the things that will shape our new understanding of the
game. Thus, keep in mind it's just as likely this could be some old God We've never heard
of that Marika took runes or the Elden Ring from. And speaking of claiming the Elden Ring,
the soundtrack you can actually hear in this scene is the Elden Beasts soundtrack. The Elden
Ring became the Elden Beast, and it's something that we face as we attempt to claim the ring,
so maybe that's kind of what Marika is doing here as well. The Elden Beasts theme here
sounds really distorted, as if it's cutting out. I wonder why that is. Miquella the Kind spoke
of the beginning. The seduction and the betrayal. "Seduction and betrayal" is certainly par for
the course for Marika, Who has a history of such things. Rennala in particular comes to mind. She
is a champion who was seduced by Radagon, who is also Marika. Their marriage with Rennala settled a
war that Marika couldn't win. After which Rennala was abandoned by Radagon/Marika and left broken.
Marika wins again,. So I wonder if this seduction and betrayal that the trailer mentions could
have been applied to the Gloam-eyed Queen or some other rivals in the past as well? The next line
does call it an "affair". The wording makes it sound so scandalous, "an affair from which gold
arose." So could Marika have used Radagon to play that seductive trick twice? For that to be true,
Radagon would need to have been one with Marika since the beginning. And actually, Marika's torso
is a bit more masculine here than I expected. Better evidence though here is the hair. If you
look closely, you can see a strong reddish tint to Marika's hair, particularly at the back here.
But to be honest, I think it's more likely that the trailer is talking about Marika's seductions
and betrayals in a more general sense. The Erdtree and the Golden Order are inherently very seductive
concepts After all. It was advertised as an age of endless bounty and endless life. But that was
a lie, and the truth is surely more sinister, Clearly. So where is this place? On the border
of two worlds apparently filled with corpses and viscera? It's almost as if this mountain of
corpses is making up some sort of gate. From our perspective, you can see a golden sky within,
and a gloam colored sky without. And presumably the reverse would be true if you were to look in
from the other side. At first I thought this dark world might be the Land of Shadow, and that light
world might be the heavens or something like that, and that the Lands Between could be named "The
lands Between" because maybe it grew out of the border of these two places. Is that even possible?
Alternatively, this could be the Land of Shadow and the Lands Between could be the golden world
beyond. What do you guys think? So here comes the next crazy theory. What if this towering structure
is the Erdtree in its primordial form? It would make sense for the Erdtree to have been grown on
some border between worlds. It appears in both worlds After all, Golden in one, and shadow in the
other. The biggest piece of evidence for this idea is that the primordial form of the Erdtree is also
known as the Crucible, where primordial life was blended together. We know that the Crucible is
what became the Erdtree's vital energies. Now, we've never seen the physical form of this
Crucible, but we do have a few hints as to what it might look like. The first comes from
the gilded Greatshield, which states that the red tinge in the gold coat mirrors the primordial
matter that became the Erdtree. There's also a greatsword of a crucible night that has a red tint
that exemplifies the nature of primordial gold, said to be close in nature to life itself. Lastly,
red mushy root resin shows up at the Erdtree's own roots, and this towering structure
does feature a very red blending of life, What with all the viscera here. So could the
Crucible literally be a blending of lives that gave rise to the Erdtree? In the end here, all we
really know for sure right now is what the trailer literally tells us. And it's that this affair,
this beginning, gave rise to gold and shadow and that a war would follow sometime after. "What
followed was a war unseen. One that could never be put to song. A purge, without grace or honor.
The tyranny of Messmer's Flame. This part of the trailer is a little bit easier to explain.
Here we see Messmer's forces marching within this castle that we saw disintegrating in the
previous gameplay trailer. It's a bloodbath here, and it looks like Messmer's forces experienced
very little in the way of resistance. Perhaps the residents of this place weren't expecting
or prepared for a purge at all. Messmer stands over the battlefield, directing snakes of
red black flame below. If you need to learn more about who Messmer is, then I recommend you check
out our previous news video, which speculates more deeply on his character. But suffice to
say, he is a character that is considered to be on equal footing to the other demigods and
children of Marika. That's the official quote, and he's almost certainly a child of Marika,
given his dialog in the previous trailer. "Mother, Wouldst thou truly lordship sanction, in one so
bereft of light?" In this new trailer, we see him purging this part of the Land of Shadow, at
least in an act of what they're calling tyranny, presumably on behalf of his mother, who wanted
no songs sung about this land or war. Earlier, we speculated that Messmer might have been
specifically a child of Marika and Radagon's union, considering his red hair. And while I still
think that's likely to be true, I don't think we speculated on when Messmer would have likely been
born. So let's do that now. As far as we know, Radagon only made his first public appearance
in the Liurnian Wars and only had children with Rennala and then again with Marika after he
abandoned Rennala. However, I'm not sure it makes sense for Messmer to have been born that late in
the timeline, since it seems likely the purge took place much earlier in the timeline at a point
that followed the beginning. So what if Messmer was born outside of wedlock, so to speak? What
if Marika/Radagon conceived Messmer on their own, ages ago? In this early age, Marika might not
yet have had Godfrey to fight her wars for her, but it seems she did have Messmer. In this context
It might have been a brilliant political play to use Messmer to usurp the Land of Shadow in his
tyranny, and then essentially lock him away in this veiled land to rule. Maybe this solved quite
a few problems all at once, especially considering how blasphemous Messmer would have been to
Marika's rule in the Lands Between. Though again, this is just speculation. As expected, The
Wicker Men march on Messmer's side and we'll have to fight one, as seen here in the gameplay
trailer. A recent tweet states "the sordid sins of war still walk the realm of shadows, even as
their victims search fruitlessly for recompense." The brunt of Messmer Army consists of extremely
well disciplined, masked soldiers wielding spears, led perhaps by these knights in black and gold
trim. They look a lot like this Knight fought in the gameplay trailer. In the next scene, we see
the Lion Dancer smashing aside two of Messmer's soldiers before it confronts Messmer himself.
In the shot to follow, we see the flame he's conjuring in response to this assault, followed by
three large impaled bodies. As you might already know, the Lion Dancer is actually made up of three
bodies. And so the implication here is that these are the three bodies with long cloaks that were
puppeteering the Lion Dancer in the previous scene, before Messmer killed and impaled them. Now
is a good time to note that many on the receiving end of the Messmer's purge have what look like
omen horns. The creature on the stairs has them too, and its robes look a lot like the ones
worn by these enemies in the previous trailer, Who also have horns. As discussed at length in
previous videos. Those with omen horns can be linked to the Primordial Crucible and the Crucible
talismans make it clear that horns and other such aspects were once considered signifiers of
the divine. It seems this was a culture and an idea that Marika wanted to stamp out, since
she probably had new ideas about what should be considered heavenly. This is probably why the
almost genetic reappearance of omen horns during her era was seen as a bad omen, to her at least.
Maybe these horns were an element of the truth hidden beneath the surface, coming back to haunt
her. The only one without horns that we see on the receiving end of Messmer's Flame is seen here,
a feminine figure who seems to be holding some sort of undulating blade. Is this a spiral weapon
like so many others in Elden Ring, or is it maybe a sort of banner? Anyway, she's the last in this
video's long list of atrocities for now. Next, let's talk about Miquella, who seems intent
on bringing the truth to life. "And so Kindly Miquella would abandon everything. His golden
flesh, His blinding strength, Even his fate. But we are not deterred. We choose to follow. Will
you walk with us?" One question I'm curious about the answer to in the DLC is how did Miquella
become aware of what happened in the beginning with Marika? My answer for now is that Miquella
is quite like Marika in a couple of ways. For one, he's considered to be an Empyrean with the
wisdom, the allure of a god. Maybe he's quite capable of thinking like one. Another similarity
is that Miquella literally tried to grow his own Erdtree watering it with his own blood since it
was a sapling. What if this gave him an insight into how such trees were supposed to grow? And if
we're right about this being the Crucible, perhaps Miquella realized the sheer amount of blood
that would have been required for the Erdtree that already exists. So out of everyone, Miquella
could probably figure it out. A few items actually consider Miquella to be a genius, and he's
called a prodigy, so his ability to puzzle out the truths of this universe make good sense. In
the face of these truths, He abandoned everything, and these sacrifices clearly have a purpose.
We don't understand that purpose just yet. But take these scenes, for instance. These markings
left behind are in the shape of a great rune, something that Miquella would have had. And
surely these are Miquella's own great runes that he's leaving behind. Presumably for us. At first
I thought that you might be able to rest at these, like, sites of grace, but in a recent promotional
image, it's been revealed that Grace still exists in the Land of Shadow. The previous trailer
says that Miquella is awaiting his promised Lord. That's likely us, though it's possible
his followers each believe that it's them, as they're clearly following this hallowed land
that Miquella has left behind as well. And here they are, a veritable Band of the Hawk, presented
with this uplifting surge of music in the trailer, Miquella's faithful compelled to follow him.
Surely all these great NPCs aren't going to suffer horrific, terrible deaths. Right? Right? We've
already seen four of these NPCs in the previous trailer. There's the Knight, this warrior,
this tanky guy, and the masked one. Previously, the masked one was actually seen sleeping in what
we suspected was a swamp of Saint Trina. And since then, we've received confirmation from Miyazaki
that Saint Trina will indeed make an appearance in the DLC. And sure enough, here they are now in
the trailer, Saint Trina presented in the context of things that Miquella has abandoned "his golden
Flesh, his blinding strength, and even his fate." Considering Saint Trina is falling in this
scene, holding their arm up to the light. At first glance, I assumed that this is the fate
that Miquella was leaving behind, abandoning his alter ego. On second thought, though, we know
that Miquella is abandoning his golden self, so perhaps it's more likely that Saint Trina will
be all that's left. But since they're making an appearance, I assume that we'll get to the bottom
of things. All of this is a lot of speculation, I know. I feel like the closer we get to the truth,
the more questions are raised. But hopefully, if nothing else, I think this was an opportunity
to refresh our memory of a few things that we should look out for going into the DLC. But what
about after the DLC? Well, I found one other game that I'm interested in playing when it releases in
September. It's called an Enotria: The Last Song, and it's a lot of fun. The demo for this game is
actually available for free for everyone to try on steam, Epic games Store, and PS5 right now, and I
highly recommend you check it out and see if this is something that you might like. Now the devs are
the sponsor of this video, but I'm really picky with the souls-likes I play. You guys probably
haven't seen me advertise any others on this channel, so if I'm talking about it, that's
generally a good sign. First up, the game is really pretty. Like actually gorgeous. It's nice
playing a souls-like game that isn't super grim, and the vibe is just really on point. It takes
place in this really unique Mediterranean setting, and the environments are just enchanting,
to the point where I actually start to feel quite relaxed playing, even though the game
is also a tough souls like. As for the combat, it's solid. It's got the Dodge system from
Bloodborne, it's got the parry system from Sekiro, even the jump from Elden Ring. And there's this
great flow to combat where you're incentivized to dodge, but also to get perfect blocks in so
that you can build up your enemies stagger meter, and knock them off balance with a critical strike.
The thing I like most about the combat, though, are these abilities in the bottom right. You
charge them up by getting regular hits in on enemies, and then when you've charged these
abilities enough, you can unleash them to solve tricky combat situations that you find yourself
in. For example, if I was ever getting swarmed by an enemy, I would use this ability to dash
out and then back in with my secondary weapon. And if I ever needed to kill an enemy at range,
I could whip out a phantom crossbow or a lance and take care of whatever enemy was harassing me
at a distance. This flow between using regular attacks to charge up your powerful abilities, and
then going back to regular attacks and repeating that process that feels really good. In terms of
difficulty, I think I found myself dying maybe once, at least between each checkpoint, which
felt tough but fair. Since I know all of my deaths were deserved, like when I ignored these dancing
soldiers to loot an item, for example. A bunch of other stuff are The enemy placement is clever,
You're constantly finding new weapons and new abilities to try, and the level design is a lot
of fun too, It has a bunch of these little glowing glyphs that turn into platforming challenges or
combat challenges, and these are hidden throughout the level. The devs are also confident in
their product because they're letting me talk about anything, even criticisms. So I will
say on PC, the only criticism I have so far are some minor framerate issues, but I think that's
pretty normal for a game that's coming out in September. This is just a demo, so there's still
a few months to go, and I just think it's a great sign that these devs are really chill and letting
people say whatever they want, even though they're sponsoring them. In conclusion, I think this
is worth keeping an eye on to learn more and to wishlist the game or preorder or whatever, please
click the link in the description. Thanks to the devs for supporting this channel and thank
you for watching. I'll see you next time.
