The Canonical Main Story of Dark Souls (FULL)

hey there I hope you're doing swell I'm Jake the ash and Hollow a majority of the story within Dark Souls is derived from pure speculation as it was designed to do we often find ourselves coming up with wild stories for our favorite characters but this video series will be a little bit different I want to tell the story of Dark Souls without the use of speculation using only the undisputable facts we receive in the game to give a canonical outline of what is considered to be the main story in the game in this series we will only be referencing Dark Souls 1 and 3 now I know there are a lot of fans of Dark Souls 2 out there and this is nothing against the game itself but it has little to nothing to do with the story arc we see highlighted in 1 & 3 even the most die-hard fans of two can attest to that creating an accurate timeline of Dark Souls is quite challenging and at some point we can simply only know a handful of events occurred before another but we don't actually know the order in which those happen so I've done the best I can and trying to put them in order that makes the most sense when coming across events with no solid timeline and remember time is convoluted so without further ado I give you Dark Souls our first perception of time is during the Age of ancients where we find the world unformed and shrouded by fog it is a world filled with grey crags arched trees and of course everlasting dragons but then one day fire appeared and brought with it disparity and imbalance enlightens art and from the dark the humanoids came and found the souls of Lords within this flame the witch of izalith nieto and Gwyn though there was a unique soul amidst the flames the Dark Soul which was found by the furtive pygmy so easily forgotten using the strength acquired from these Lord Souls when and the others challenged the ancient dragons the pygmies who acquire the unique soul the Dark Soul were petitioned by Gwyn to help in the battle as well though their Knights weapons and armor were forged in the abyss a place of Darkness where humanity and or the Dark Soul draws at strengths in so fearing this seemingly infinite strength Gwen cast a seal of fire upon their weapons and armor to contain it and keep it from spreading these Knights would go on to be basically used as cannon fodder in the war against the dragons and would receive no recognition for their deeds so begins Gwen's manipulation of the humans the war had begun both sides fought hard but the fight was proving more difficult than Gwyn had expected for every dragon slain but God's lost 3 score of their own Gwen's luck would soon turn when seeing the pale Drake betrayed his own kind the secret behind the ancient dragons immortality laid within their stone scales so when took on the mantle of Lord of sunlight and he and his Knights conjured bolts of lightning which peeled back the dragon's scales it wouldn't be long until the gods had defeated their adversaries and the ancient dragons were no more hue in the age of fire the age win helped create when he defeated the dragons and the age that well fire brought in this golden age most life would seemingly flourish the gods are thriving they erect grand as civilizations Gwyn created the beautiful city of anor londo the city of the gods and things were relatively good Gwyn granted seas the Dukedom as well as granted him a piece of his own soul and built for him the grand archives Percy could begin his research into immortality but as we know all good things must come to an end and that a fire cannot burn forever so soon the fire began to fade and the world teetered on an age of darkness Gwyn feared this dark and recognized it for what it was in this age the humans would flourish the humans would reign as gods over them for their soul is made of this dark the gods fearing this impending dark needed to find a way to stave it off the first attempted this came from the witch of izalith and her daughters using a soul they attempted to recreate the first flame along the lines something went wrong and instead they created the flame of chaos the witch and her daughter's for all they're worth worked hard to give this new flame under control during this time one of the witch's daughters Quay Lana fled from her family and from her duties she would return in the far future to feign ablution and pretend to seek answers but to what end we do not know it's hard to pinpoint exactly how long the witch and her daughter's were able to contain the flame but chaos is true to its nature and it could not be held at bay forever eventually they were engulfed by the flame as well as all of izalith and from this the bed of chaos was created and from the bed of chaos demons were born some of the witch's daughters were molded into disfigured beasts spider-like demons some were seemingly unscathed and some were and are missing though there are certainly some rumors as to their whereabouts as for the witch herself it's hard to say some say that she herself became the bed of chaos some say she was completely consumed by the flame others believed that she escaped and disappeared into the world the truth of the matter though that we'll never know for sure but the dark was still looming over Gwyn and options were dwindling more concerned about himself and his kind over the humans and the pygmy Lords Gwen conceived a plan to manipulate them to his own game he gifted the pygmy Lord the great crowns and gave them a grand city the ringed City at the World's End he also gave them his youngest daughter though he promised to return for her when the time was right the Ring City was used as a containment of sorts to keep the Dark Soul cut off at the end of the world perhaps Gwyn thought that that would save him the way of White was a church or a covenant or maybe even a cult it's depending on how you view things but its purpose was dedicated to Lord Gwyn's age of fire to preserve that fire by any means necessary it was the most widely known and most commonly practiced religion in the world and Gwynn's deception even humanity fell in with the way of white perhaps it was they never sought power or perhaps it didn't know as we'll find out in time though some of you men and they certainly knew of the power they could achieve and ward for him so the pygmy Lord sat at the end of the world inside their walls contempt to keep the Dark Soul in check but the Dark Soul reside all humanity whether it was spread to them by the furtive pygmy upon finding the Dark Soul or that is just the true nature of mankind surely it could not be contained forever with izalith lost and the demons spreading Gwyn stood on the precipice of yet another war he took an army of his Silver Knights and descended into izalith to snuff out the demon threat we can't know for sure how long this war lasted or how long the demons existed before Gwyn took the war to them one way or another Gwyn was also no match for chaos his band of silver Knights had been shard black and failing to defeat the demons he retreated Gwyn was out of time the age of dark had dawned and his fire had burned away when knowing what he must do had the foresight to first split pieces of his powerful soul among those he trusted and needed a piece of his soul went to the four kings of New Londo we'll come back to them later Gwen commanded his people to Shepherd the humans and would no other choice he took off with his remaining Knights to the kiln of the burst flame it was here that Gwyn sacrificed himself to preserve his age of fire using himself as the kindling he ignited himself to reignite the first flame and bring back the age of fire in doing so he placed the same seal of fire he previously placed upon the abyss forged weapons of humanity on the Dark Soul itself creating the undead curse upon humanity the humans were branded with the dark side and a curse it's symbol that marked them as Undead cursed to never die reborn after death time and time again with each death they lost more and more of their humanity and so one day they would go hollow a hollow being and unbend who has completely lost their mind who've lost who they were lost everything of their humanity except for life itself so the age of fire is restored but Gwyn is but a hollowed husk of the powerful lore that he once was the first lord of cinder he stays at the kiln and sits in defense of the first flame and eternal duty the way of white recognizes that the undead could pose quite a threat so upon Gwen's command to Shepherd the humans they led great undead hunts and corralled the undead into asylums or the undying men and women are left to await the end of the world of course not all in Deadwood end up in asylums queue in the primordial serpents two of them in particular let's start with coffee and we'll talk about frampt later oh that's actually a picture of fret that's not cut off your face okay all right okay here's a picture of God anyway not much is known about these mustachioed toothy primordial serpents their name suggests that we should at least assume they've been around for a long time and as we'll learn we have to take everything they say with a grain of salt cost makes his way to the city of oolacile known for its ancient sorceries far beneath ullas seal was the tomb of manis the primeval man cost was the serpent who was an advocate for the dawn he didn't believe in Gwen's age of fire and was searching for the wooden shows him to be the Dark Lord who will help bring about the age of dark again as for his or any serpents motives oh Peary or not we'll never know for sure cause convinced the people of oolacile that they needed to awaken Manus in doing so they drove him to madness until his humanity went wild as he endlessly sought out his precious broken pendant as for what the pendant contained or represented that again we may never know but it is said of humanity that the will feels envy or perhaps love and despite the inevitably trite and tragic ending the will sees no alternative and is driven madly towards a target and so Manus became the beastly father of the abyss the abyss itself began spawning off a menace and threatened to swallow all of you Lucille so the fall of a Lucille began as this land was plundered into darkness and its citizens figured into tainted creatures of the abyss cough is also spotted in New Londo and played a role in the four kings called dark when he dangled the power of lifedrain before them he inside of the Covenant known as the dark race was consisted of the Knights of the four kings he granted them the art of lifedrain in which they could SAP the humanity from other humans to preserve their own as they were intended to play their role in following the Dark Lord and ushering in the age of dark the age of man the darkwraiths could invade the worlds of other humans to pillage their humanity they are commonly referred to as the enemy of man yet that as many other things in Dark Souls is completely subjective so we see the abyss springing up in New Londo as well as the king and his people willingly embraced the dark this is where we meet knight artorias one of the four Knights of Gwyn who were Gwen's most trusted and most competent Knights in the world of the Dragons and we'll get to the other three at some point down the road knight artorias made it his mission to battle the abyss at every turn Artorius was known for annihilating dark rates in his quest to stop the abyss the abyss in New Londo was different than a Nuala seal while the abyss itself is the same thing in Allah seal it was spawning from Manus and a new londo it was simply there there was no conventional way to prevent the abyss taint of due Londo to find its way to the rest of the world so three sealers sealed the city up and flooded it with water this was the only way to contain the abyss here though it was an agonizing decision countless lives lost the robust culture of the city erased victims of the flood would go on to roam the ruins as ghosts knight artorias then set off to allah seal with his wolf companion SIF Artorius had made a covenant with the beasts of the abyss but the ring that symbolized this covenant wearing it allowed artorias to traverse the abyss so he insisted send it into the abyss to slay Manas and halt the spread in Allah seal but a hero such as artorias has nary a murmur of dart and would thus become corrupted by it before losing his fight to the dark he used his great shield to place an aura around SIF to keep the wolf safe thus Artorius falls to the abyss and is nothing more than the creatures he had hunted this is where things get interesting and a little confusing with how time works and Dark Souls in the future the world tells great tales of our tourists the abyss walker' the one who defeated Manus and stopped the spread of the abyss in illusio only that isn't what happened isn't so we'll have to do some back and forth here and there as much as I wanted to keep this in as close to a linear timeline as possible foolish me for now just hang on to the fact that the abyss was indeed stopped the new Lucille just not by artorias let's pan over to an Orlando now the great city of the gods Guinevere at the eldest daughter of gwen among the most notable and the other gods had begun to flee from anor londo Gwyn was gone the fire would eventually fade again the abyss is getting all kinds of different land masses pregnant [ __ ] wasn't just hitting the fan it was getting smeared all over that poor fan so they fled to where who knows but one God did stay behind Gwendolyn the god of the dark moon Quinn's youngest son though Gwendolyn was raised as a daughter because of his affinity for the moon so they say but don't worry he wasn't voted Woman of the year for hitting someone with his car though lordran isn't as silly is my native country Gwendolyn though was a master of illusion the Sun had set on an Orlando and it's abandoned state it was incredibly depressing so through illusions Gwendolyn restored Anna Londo the Sun was shining the Sentinels were guarding and Guinevere was back doing that thing she does with her tits all was well in an Orlando or rather all seemed well so the age of fire continued for how long this time again we can't know for sure cue the flame starting to fade again the world is on the precipice of dark the story leads us to the northern undead asylum here locked in a Cell we find who will be the main character of the story for the foreseeable future the chosen undead through a hole in the roof of the cell of the chosen undead an unnamed Knight of a store drops a corpse on the corpses person was a key to this cell and yes I'm going to continue calling the chosen undead a dude it's not a gender thing please don't social justice my ass the next main character later in the story will be female alright deal so escaping his cell that chosen undead wanders the asylum in search of escape he later stumbles upon the same night that helped him escape this cell earlier but the night is gravely wounded this night of a story reveals to the chosen undead an ancient legend that thou who are undead are chosen and that one day an undead will be chosen to make pilgrimage to the land of the Lord's Lord run and when thou ringeth the bell of awakening the fate of the undead shall be known the chosen undead continues to search for an exit only to find it being guarded by the asylum demon after defeating the demon the chosen undead receives the key to the large gate leading out the key is said to belong to the chosen undead pilgrim which has sparked a lot of debate in the Dark Souls community are you chosen because you defeated a demon and received the key or did you only defeat the demon because you were already chosen but this isn't a video for speculating so feel free to chew on that one for yourself so the chosen undead makes his way out of the asylum only to find there isn't anywhere to go the asylum is isolated in the middle of nowhere before he has time to scan his surroundings a giant crow or is it a raven I'm not quite sure I'm not as efficient in bird laws charlie but either way he's scooped up by this giant black bird and ushered to Lord run to begin fulfilling this ancient legend so the chosen undead arrives in Firelink shrine which will be a focal point of his journey it is here he meets a fire keeper even though she does not speak as she is impure of tongue a fire keeper is slated with a duty to tending to the bonfires across Lordran each fire keeper is a corporeal manifestation of her bonfire and as a draw for the humanity offered to her her soul is not at by infinite humanity the bonfires offer an undead a place of repose it is at a bonfire they can burn humanity to regain their own and a simpler analogy think of the bonfires as a plain the undead as a first class passenger and the fire keepers as the stewardesses now the role is far more important and more difficult than that but for analogies sake you know so in Firelink shrine the chosen undead also meets a rather crestfallen warrior but this warrior has very important information he tells the chosen undead that there are actually two bells of awakening that needs to be rung rather than just one Bell one up above fire link in the abandoned Cathedral and one down below in the ruins of blight Sam after receiving the information that there are two bells of awakening to be rung from the crestfallen warrior the chosen undead heads off to ring them both he heads to the top of the abandoned Cathedral to ring the first Bell only to find it guarded by Garland's after defeating these gargoyles the chosen undead rings the first Bell of awakening he then heads deep down into blight town for the next bell it's there that he encounters kweilyn one of the witch of izalith daughters she was disfigured into a demon when hurry along with her sisters and mother lost control of the flame of chaos after defeating quail egg the chosen undead brings the second Bell of awakening upon ringing the second Bell the giant gates barring off Sims fortress are open it is a fortress that blocks the path to an Orlando to make passage to the city of the gods you must first master the house of traps the chosen undead returns to Firelink shrine before continuing his journey upon returning to Firelink the chosen undead meets frampt the other weird [ __ ] I mean primordial serpent again not to be confused with CAW although I did get you good that one time now unlike his counterpart [ __ ] cramp sided with Lord Gwyn and his age of fire still though we cannot know any of the reasons or rhymes behind why these serpents do what they do those sneaky shits anyways Fran tells the chosen undead that he was a close friend to Lord Gwyn and that he wishes to elucidate the fate of the chosen undead to him if he agrees and agree he does Fran tells him that is his fate to succeed Lord Gwyn and to link the flame cast away the dark and undo the curse of beyond dead but he first must go to an Orlando and retrieve the Lord vessel with this the chosen undead makes his way to an Orlando but not before traversing sins fortress inside of the fortress the chosen undead crosses paths with a brilliant scholar but not so brilliant as to not get himself locked in a cage either way this good sir is big-hat Logan a very smart mage responsible for creating many of these sorceries we enjoy today so the chosen undead helps Logan out of the cage and of course Logan is very grateful and he escapes the fortress and the chosen undead carries on making his way through booby traps guillotines and the other dangers of Sims fortress the chosen undead encounters his last obstacle the iron golem a giant sentinel created by the gods to guard the passage into their city but of course this is the chosen undead the Catalina Wine Mixer of undead so he has no trouble with this goal after defeating it the chosen undead is finally ushered into an Orlando by the batwing two demons why or how these demons are in the service of the gods well you guess because we never may know for sure so here we are beautiful and well mostly abandoned city of the gods now of course I know why you are all watching this video you want the canonical lore behind these two twice well let me shed a lie on these [ __ ] wait no not like shine a light on a [ __ ] that's in approach I'm een like you know these guys anyway the big reveal is there's no Lord they're just mega dicks so as you could guess the chosen undead runs into another obstacle blocking his path but this is the mother of all obstacles this is Dragonslayer Ornstein or Ornstein one of the four nights of Blin and execution or smoke or is it spa or smog or smoochy poo however you care to pronounce it there's a bit of debate about whether or not the Ornstein here is the real one or an illusion or impostor etc I've explored this in a few different videos but as for an outline of the main story like we're doing in this series it isn't super important I just wanted to bring it up so the dynamic duo of Borenstein and SMO proved to certainly be a challenge for the chosen Undead but nevertheless he prevails awaiting him in the next room is the princess of sunlight herself wins Elvis daughter gwynevere or at least the illusion of her though the chosen undead wouldn't know this unless he was naughty so when aveer gives him the same speech frampt gave him succeed my father chosen undead and leaped the flame blah blah blah she grants to him the Lord vessel and the Lord vessel allows the chosen undead to walk between bonfires it would become an important Kia sorts in the future to come so the chosen undead returns to Firelink shrine to present the Lord vessel to frampt he is of course pleased so pleased that he eats the chosen undead and the story is finished the end oh god I got you again just as you were letting your guard ease back up this door it doesn't end here at all oh we're not even halfway done alright so he does kind of eat the chosen undead here though but only to transport him to fire link altar it is here that fran tells us the chosen undead to place the lord vessel upon the altar and the altar is placed before a large door leading to the kiln of the first flame and the Lord of cinder Gwyn himself but it will not open yet so Fram pants trucks the chosen undead that he needs to satiate the vessel with powerful souls in order to get the gates opened he says to retrieve the Lord soul of the witch izalith to get nito's Lord soul and also the bequeathed shards of Lord Gwyn soul that he had given to seek the pale Drake and to the four kings of New Londo so there's more people to kill and no time to waste the chosen undead buckles up his boots and gets going on his way back to an Orlando to find cease and the Duke archives the chosen undead passes through the Darkroot garden and this is one of those random and weirdest tidbits I have to put in there to make things appear as linear as possible since these events are technically canon in the dark route basin the chosen undead stumbles upon a raging Hydra a multi-headed serpent but our hero makes quick work of the Hydra but beyond it something catches his eye a golden golem he approaches the golem to find out that it is hostile of course this is Mother Love and Dark Souls after he vanquishes the golem though something peculiar happens a woman appears a woman who had been trapped within the golem she thanks the chosen undead for rescuing her and tells him that she is princess dusk from the land of oolacile though she is from a different time from long ago and that she must get back to her own timeline she parts ways offering to help the chosen undead if he ever needed it to just summon for her the chosen undead then arrives back in Anor Londo and begins the path to the duke's archives the archives are filled with crystal golems and undead soldiers that have been crystallized basically a lot of crystal [ __ ] is going on fighting his way into the archive is one of the crystal golems drops something interesting half of a broken pendant the chosen undead doesn't quite know what to make but there's a certain air of reverence and nostalgia that's surrounded the pendant is attached to a vine that appears to originate from Allah so out of curiosity the chosen undead returns to the Darkroot garden some maybe ask tusk what she might make of it but he doesn't find dusk instead he finds a strange pulsing tear floating in the air while inspecting it more closely a giant hand appears from this tear and yanked the chosen undead through the chosen undead now finds himself in a Lucille but he is not in the allah seal of now from his time but in the ELA seal of the past he is greeted by a giant talking mushroom weird right her name is Elizabeth and she says she recognizes your aura because princess dusk describes you after you saved her from the golem Elizabeth asked if you could play the Savior who once more because dusk has been taken into the abyss by Manas ah yes Manas remember him from before so the chosen undead obliges and heads off to find Manas before he can make it to him a rather tragic tale stands in his way as he crosses paths with Knight Artorias remember him - this is like a family reunion up and yeah but this isn't the Arcturus the world knows it's the one who failed in his mission and the one fallen to the dark the chosen undead puts artorias out of his misery and presses on to stop the abyss and save dusk after reaching the edge of the abyss the chosen undead finds SIF Artorias as Wolf's companion safely trapped inside the or artorias had cast the chosen undead eliminates the surrounding threat and the wolf can leave safely after making his way further towards the abyss that chosen undead finally finds Manas he of course defeats him and the spread of the abyss is halted so the chosen undead played the role of artorias that the legend speaks of only it was never or torria hsihu ended Manas and the chosen undead would never receive recognition for this anyways he saves dusk again and probably the whole world and continues forging onward he goes back to the duke's archive in his timeline and encounters seif try as he may though the chosen undead can't seem to inflict damage upon the pale Drake let alone kill him it isn't long until the chosen undead is killed himself so hooray for our hero he has the curse of undeath so he's free to try again this time after dying however he isn't teleported back to his bonfire he arrives at a bonfire inside of a prison cell in the archives tricky seat must have set this up lucky for the chosen undead though the guard with the key is conveniently leaning up against the ball so Hugh in the easiest jailbreak of all time making his way through this new part of the archives the chosen undead runs into big hat Logan again who has of course gotten himself locked up but since jailbreaking here in the archives is a laughing itself the chosen undead has no problem springing Logan - he joins Logan in the library of the archives and Logan tells the chosen undead how to kill seat he says that his immortality is linked to the primordial crystal and that in order to kill the pale Drake he would first have to shatter the crystal the chosen undead makes his way to the crystal but seif is hot on his ass the chosen undead manages to shatter the crystal and the to do battle once again this time however seat the scale is false and the chosen undead retrieved the necessary piece of the Lord's soul he needs he chosen undead then makes his way to the ruined city of izalith he finds there the bed of chaos the creature created when the witch of izalith attempted to use her soul to recreate the first flame and [ __ ] went south he promptly unmake s' this bed did it because this because it so bad and he retrieves the witches former soul he then makes his way down through the catacombs to the tomb of giants and finds Neto the first of the dead nothing is stopping the chosen undead now he easily puts the ass being on Neto he needs and retrieves his Lord so all that's left now is the four kings but the four kings reside in the abyss and that is a pretty tricky situation the chosen undead needs a way to traverse it naturally the Covenant of artorias a ring that allows us where to traverse the abyss is the obvious choice the chosen undead head back to Darkroot garden which is more and more seemingly like it's actually just for a Gunilla feel but hey that's not technically canon so he finds the grave of our tourists where I guess he assumes is where the ring is that and some game mechanics are hard to squeeze into a canonical story just cut me a little bit of slack here guys the chosen undead soon finds he is not alone here but great gray wolf SIF shows herself still guarding her master's grave SIF remembers the chosen undead though members that it was he who saved her and he who were relieved artorias as reluctant as this fight is both combatants clash head-to-head and what is probably the single most tragic fight and all of Dark Souls gosh damn it though the chosen undead is victorious and SIF is SIF is slain so the chosen undead receives the ring and leaves for New Londo he arrives in New Londo only to discover a problem it's flooded he's going to need to pull the plug if he wants to make his way to the four kings so he finds inward the last sealer to stay at his post Ingrid of course knows his mission because everyone freakin does and gives him the key to the seal the chosen undead uses the key to break the seal and New Londo is no longer flooded to the abyss he goes and easily dispatches the four kings and receives the shard of the Lord so now he has all four things that he needs he returns to frampt who then returns him to the altar he places the souls into the altar and the door to the kiln of the first flame is open frampt gives him a grand old pep talk and the chosen undead is off to do what he believes is saving the world bear sits Gwyn at the first flame a hollowed husk of a lord but still powerful regardless the chosen undead defeats Gwyn in combat and is left alone at the kiln the chosen Undead on the advice of frampt and everyone else believing in Gwynn's age of fire sacrifices himself in the same way as gwen to link the flame once again and bring life back into the age of fire it works the ages were set and the world is quote-unquote saved this story would happen time and time and time again the world on the edge of dark and the flame rekindled who's to say how many times and for how long if I had to guess I'd say thousands of years probably even tens of thousands but who knows what is becoming evident though is how further and further the world is messed up every time the fire is linked it's disruptive to the natural order of things in their foreheads winces despite the over popular belief that it's the only thing to do cue the story far into the future this broken world is yet again on the precipice of dark the bells began to toll and with it four Lords of cinder previous linkers of the flame rise from their graves to come together and link the flame once again but three of these lords refused to return to their thrones refuse what others believe is their duty the bells keep tolling and with it now the unhindered rise for lords of cinder are unearthed from their graves and the unkennel have risen the four Lords of cinder were supposed to return to their thrones to use their combined strength to relight the flame of course three of them didn't return the one did Bloodless of Courland a quite small man I guess you could say a pygmy some people speculate that he could be the furtive pygmy himself but that's a whole other thing despite his size he willed himself a lord and linked the first flame during his time the other three Lords were Aldrich the saint of the deep once a cleric but developed a habit of devouring men he became so bloated that he turned into sludge so they made him a lord of cinder not for his virtue before his might you're him the giant a reclusive Lord who linked the fire in an attempt to put the profaned flame to rest yet when the fire was linked the profaned capital was consumed by flame the abyss Watchers bound by Wolf's blood of a covenant forged long ago by an abyss walker' and his wolf companion this also served as their mandate as lords baron bleedin travelled the lands combating the spread of the abyss it is said that if you saw the legion at your doorstep your kingdom would surely be buried there is technically a fourth but it's a little tricky without speculation it is Prince lothric of the Lawford bloodline a royal family obsessed with creating a worthy heir to the flame even by unspeakable means only a scholar would convince Prince lothric against leading the blame and law clerks brother Lorien would take on his brothers curse of being an heir with him and together they sit and wait for fire to subside so he never technically linked the flame so it's kind of weird that he'd be considered a Lord of cinder now there are some reasons as to why that can be but it does require a lot of speculation so we're going to leave that out of this series but we do talk about it in other videos and we will talk about it in the future now the untended rise and on Kindle being someone who at some point tried and failed to link the flame this is where we meet the protagonist for the foreseeable future an untended one the chosen ash and/or ashen one there's a lot of monikers for this ship and of course as promised this role will be given to a female thank you very much for not social justice in my ass so our heroine rises in the cemetery of Ash through the distances seen Firelink shrine but she won't arrive there without triumphing over some obstacles naturally but she presses forward anyways the chosen ash enters into an arena of some sorts the roots of a giant tree hang all over the place and in the center is a being a being who's become the scabbard for a coiled sword the chosen ash removes the sword from his chest and if Dark Souls a taught us anything it's that even when you're trying to help everyone just wants to [ __ ] kill you so the fight between the chosen ash and you'd experience the coiled sword was placed into Gunder to await none other than the chosen ash him or herself Gunder serves as the judge over them to determine who is worthy of course proven your worth basically means just whoever can kick his ass kick his ass the chosen ash does which leads us to the same philosophical question we received all the way at the beginning of the chosen undead story would be Asylum demon is the chosen ash chosen because she defeated Gunder or was the reason she defeated him because she was already chosen feel free to chew on that anyways after defeating the eunuchs the chosen ash arrives and Firelink shrine not to be confused with Firelink shrine we saw back window here she meets her fire keeper we learned something new from the fire keeper here though that we didn't know before or didn't see practiced before fire keepers are forbidden to have eyes so just hang on to that wee bit of info for now so the fire keeper tells the chosen ash that she tends to the flame and Timms to thee but the lords have left their thrones and must be delivered to them she tells the chosen ash to produce the coiled sword at the empty bonfire and of the mark of ash will guide me to lothric where the homes of the lords converge now whether these lands are converging due to some sort of magic or a side effect to the linking of the flame so many times or is simply what happens when the world is near its end is a deep question itself but not one we can answer without speculation so upon producing the coiled sword the chosen ash can now war between bonfires not unlike the effect of the Lord vessel so she uses the bonfire and is taken to the high wall of lothric it is here that she meets High Priestess Emma she tells the chosen ash that lords are not here that they've returned to their churning home to the base of Lockard castle she gives the chosen ash a banner and says to raise it just past the great gate to proceed forward this gate is naturally guarded by a horrible beast named board but the ashen one does make quick work of it she raises the banner and is escorted by the same demon that escorted the chosen undead to an Orlando to the undead settlement the chosen ash fights her way through the settlement and arrives at the road of sacrifice so from here there are a lot of directions that can be taken there isn't a canonical order in which the Lords are slain so again I'll just have to wing it there so for this story the ashen one will head to the Cathedral of the deep first to find Aldridge arriving at the cleansing chapel right outside the grand Cathedral of the deep the chosen ash stumbles upon an older man this man is praying to a merciful goddess and mother of the four now there is a bit of speculation in the community here as to who that goddess can be and I obviously won't get started on it in this video series but y'all can already bet your ass I'm gonna say Belkin because who the hell else that gonna be no one but it is in canonical so I'm just going to hakuna matata and carry on so this man is praying for fire for Aryans l before he notices you he rudely does not introduce himself to the astron one but for the sake of knowing who I'm talking about his name is Gayle upon meeting the ashen one he becomes quite excited he says that she doesn't know how long he's searched for her he then asks for a favor he says that his lady lives in the cold land of arendelle and he needs the ashen one to show her flame a proper flame that will burn the rot away the chosen ash agrees to help and Gayle pulls out an old rotted scrap of a painting and tells her to touch it upon touching it the chosen ash is sucked into the painted world of ariamis El Sol the painted world is an interesting place it is obviously in a painting now I'm unsure if this painting is actually an original van Gogh that's what I heard at least I'm kidding I'm kidding so in this painted world a rot has begun to set in and well it's rot so we know that that can't be a good thing the painted world was led by a being named father Aryan down and eventually he would be joined by a woman named Belle Freida so something we learn about the painted world from one of the denizens is that when the raht arrives they burn the world away for the sake of the next one something unlike how those people in the outside world do obviously this is in reference to how the flame is linked time and time again regardless of what it's doing to the world the people here in the painted world understand that things aren't forever so they accept the inevitable so the next world isn't a [ __ ] show where was this dude when Gwyn was around am i right but the rot is here and the flame to burn it away isn't anywhere to be seen well what happened was when lady free that came to the painted world she convinced father Aryan Zell to bury the flame so father area and else it's below the chapel in the painted world over top of a large bowl that contains the flame and whips himself to use his blood to appease it because Aryan Zell knows that only blood can appease the flame so the rest of the world is left to rot this is where the ashen one comes in and gales search to find her in the painted world the ashen one finds a young looking girl locked away she is a painter and she must paint the next world this is a lady of whom gales said to show flame for when the flame arrives the rot will burn away and this painter can paint a new world of course the ashen one sets her free and she's off to go get ready to paint so there is still a lot going on in the painted world but since in this series we're trying our best to follow a linear ish main storyline we don't really need to go into everything else so I just gave you a rundown of sorts anyways the shows in a she goes and kicks Frida and Arian Dale's teeth in and then the flame begins to burn the rot away before leaving the chosen ash checks on the painter who is now in the top room of the chapel sitting before her massive canvas she thanks you for showing her flame and states that she is waiting on Gale to bring her the pigment to paint the next world she then reveals that the pigment she will paint with is the dark soul of man itself so that was a pretty huge bombshell and of course incredibly interested so the ashen one returns to the cleansing Chapel where she found Gale to begin with but he is no longer there so back to slaying Lords of cinder it is she makes her way through the Cathedral of the deep now but it alters coffin she discovers that he isn't here but it is guarded by his deacons of the deep the ashen one slays these deacons and discovers amongst one of their corpses a peculiar doll listening carefully she can hear the doll speak it says wherever you go the moon sets in IRRI Phil wherever you may be aerosol is your home naturally she hangs on to this weird murmuring doll and to her luck it will be a tea later on in her journey so of course the ashen one is successful on her mission to slay all the Lords of cinder she finds the abyss Watchers inside Ference keep your mists holed up in the profaned capital amongst the death and destruction he caused upon leaking the flame and then there's Aldrich the only Lord not technically where he should be with the help of pontiff Sullivan a dude straight out of the painted world he devoured the god of the dark moon gwyndolin Lord Gwyn's youngest son himself and eagerly awaits the chosen ash inside the very room of anor londo that the chosen undead fought Ornstein and smoke so the world is falling apart everything we know is dead and gone but this is a nice little bit of nostalgia if you can look past all the bad [ __ ] the ashen one then seeks out prince lothric who is waiting inside lothric castle and of course whipped this little weirdest ass so with all the lords of cinder slain and their ashes ready to produce upon their thrones the end kindled one means to take her leave back to Firelink shrine but first she stumbles upon something interesting inside the corridors of Lawford castle following this route she encounters a very peculiar beast a pale drake of sorts this is osiris the former king of lothric and through his desire to create an heir to the flame and his fascination with the studies of seethe the scaleless he was transformed into a pale Drake himself though it does seem likely he's gone mad and in the Dark Souls fashion he wants to murder our protagonists succeed he does not go and the ashen one has triumphed over another foe something is off though it seems that osiris was either hiding or protecting a doorway and of course our hero marches right on through it this is where things get a little weird the champion of ash finds herself back in the cemetery of ash where she was arisen from at the beginning of the game and you have no idea how many takes it took me enough to say cemetery of ass yet these graves are untended now if you've played the game you'll get that magnificent pun if you haven't played the game and go play the [ __ ] game but something is off about this place though it's the same cemetery but it's completely dark almost like she is in another dimension or perhaps traveled either backwards or forwards through time Gunder is still in the same arena he was in before but this time he has no sword through his gut and he's much more powerful than he was before so perhaps this could be the past but the ashen one naturally defeats Gunder here as well and she takes it to nothing lead in their best of five series so after defeating him again our hero makes her way into the dark and Firelink shrine he or she finds in the bonfire a broken piece of the same coiled sword she placed in at the beginning of her journey so perhaps this could be the future but like with most things in Dark Souls will never know without a doubt and that's okay but trying to perceive which timeline the ashen one is a part of here isn't the most interesting thing about this place the most interesting thing is what she finds in a back corridor of Firelink shrine amongst several corpses belonging to old fire keepers she finds a pair of eyes which is peculiar because if you remember what I told you in the previous video about fire keepers being forbidden to have eyes then you'd find this interesting so naturally the ashen one puts these eyes in her pockets and heads back to the normal for all intents and purposes Firelink shrine it is here that she gives the eyes to the fire keeper looking for some sort of explanation the fire keeper tells her again about how she is forbidden to have eyes but she thanks her for the eyes either way and says that they were revealed to her a frightful image of betrayal and a world without fire she asks if that is what the ashen one wishes to which she replies yes the fire keeper tells her that this will be their private affair then that the ashen one should stay her path and that she will blindly tend to the flame until the day of their grand betrayal which real quick I think it's [ __ ] badass that the fire keepers just immediately on board with all of this anyways the fire keeper continues to say that the eyes show her a world without fire a world that is ended the Ling of the fire a world that is just a vast stretch of darkness but in the far distance she senses a presence of tiny flames like precious embers left to us by past Lords of cinder linkers of the fire now this is incredibly interesting and something we've actually seen before but I'll talk about this again when we get the final piece of info we need the fire keeper ends with telling the ashen one that if she changes her mind that she should kill her and strip the eyes from her corpse and that she will return to the fire keeper that she once was so the ashen one continues her duties she places the ashes of each Lord upon their respective Thrones the fire keeper steps to the bonfire and tells the ashen went to kneel before our hero kneels before the bonfire and the ritual begins noble Lords of cinder the fire fades and the Lord's go without Thrones surrender your fire to the true heir let her grant death to the old gods of Lordran deliveries of the first flame it is then that the ashen one arises from the bonfire but yet again at a different Firelink shrine this one is broken down and shows us the true nature of the world around us the chosen ash travel through time were dimensions again or where she's simply being revealed what the world truly looks like from behind the mask of what Firelink shrine previously showed her I guess that's up for you to decide how you want to perceive it for your story so she steps outside and uses the bonfire there to warp to another bonfire down below because repelling down cliffs isn't a thing in this game in front of her now is the kiln of the first flame where everything began and everything will end yet something else catches her eye behind her is yet another bonfire which seems a tad out of place she investigates this one before proceeding forth and can you guess what happens next it warps there somewhere else for the love of God fret not though this rabbit trail is actually quite important she has arrived in Jurek heap what does dregg keep you asked well there's a nice old lady our heroes about to talk to that will explain she tells the ashen one that at the close of the age of fire all lands meet at the end of the earth and that's quite literally what dregg keep is it's where all the lands have converged in on each other it's quite a big [ __ ] and I won't go on a rant or anything but I think it's super interesting that she says at the close of the age of fire because when the chosen undead Lynx the flame the world was not doing what we're seeing it do here but the chosen undead was prophesized to lick the flame so perhaps the ashen ones grand betrayal is prophesized because we see the world evidence that the age of fire is coming to a close just something to chew on I suppose anyways here in the drej keep the ashen one discovers clues left behind by Gale in the last she heard of Gale he was looking for the Dark Soul itself which is kind of important you know so she follows the clues he left behind his guidance these clues lead the ash and went to the ringed city the same city if you remember from the first video in the series that Lord Gwyn gifted to the humans along with his youngest daughter as part of his schemes as she makes her way through the Ring City she learns of a woman named Fillion or who apparently sleeps for the sake of man now I don't know if I can say that canonically Fillion or is Gwen's youngest daughter he gave away the game basically all but specifically says yes she is that daughter but it's one of those things where everyone's like come on now just say it we already know so I guess you just kind of have to take it with a grain of salt the ashen one eventually makes her way to where Fillion or rests and we see her asleep leaning upon an egg what it means that she sleeps for the sake of man is kind of up for interpretation but we'll see sort of what it means at least here in a second the ashen one for all your curiosities walks up and touches Fillion or zeg yeah I know right the egg immediately crumbles Fillion or wakes up and then boom a big flash of light now all the sudden the ashen one stands before a very much dead and withered fillion or and the world collapsed around her almost entirely buried in sand now what all that means is up to speculation whether her sleeping for man is what kept the Dark Soul and check perhaps and we're seeing the extent of its power and what would happen if she didn't sleep or maybe we see a similar facade that we witnessed and Firelink shrine on the ashen one received the ritual of the bonfire we can't know for sure which is like the catchphrase of this series so the ashen one walks outside and sees a figure in the distance it is one of the pygmy Lords that took on Lord Gwyn's bribe and has sat here in the Ring City keeping the Dark Soul in check but he's dragging himself through the sand fearfully fleeing from something muttering about the Red Hood who has come see there Dark Soul so the ashen one follows the trail he is left in the sand she stumbles into what appears to used to be the throne room and there are dead pygmy Lords all over the ground it is then that she sees a very large and very deformed Gale devouring the dark soul of one of the pygmy Lords he becomes enraged apparently not remembering the ashen one and who would have thought it tries to kill our hero halfway through the fight Gale begins to bleed any states that it is blood of the Dark Soul itself the blood of the Dark Soul that would be the pigment for his lady's painting as per usual though the ashen one is victorious over her foe and from gales fallen Dark Soul corrupted corpse she takes the blood of the Dark Soul Gale had soft his blood out himself so that he could bring it back to his lady as the pigment for her painting but when he arrived he discovered that the pygmy Lord's blood had long ago dried so consumed the Dark Soul instead but Gale knew that he was no champion and that the Dark Soul would likely ruin him that he had little hope of a safe return and I guess that is where our hero comes in some think that Gale consumed the Dark Soul because he craved power some think he knew that him consuming the Dark Soul was the only way to create the pigment for his lady since the blood of the pygmy Lord's had long dried so he led the ashen one to him because he knew the ashen one was the only one who would help him and the only one who could slay him and bring the blood of the Dark Soul back to his lady and a final ultimate sacrifice for a new world but again that is up for you to decide so before heading back to the kill of the first flame the ashen one visits the painted world of arendelle for the last time and gives the painter the blood of a Dark Soul she thanks the ashen one and begins to paint this new world she says it will be a cold dark and very gentle place and that one day it will make someone a goodly home she did wonders when Uncle Gael will return sad I know right now it's time for our hero to finish things up she heads back to the kiln of the first flame to find it guarded by the soul of cinder an amalgamation of all the previous lords of cinder this is quite a long and difficult fight for the ashen one but she inevitably prevails and from the soul of cinder she receives a soul of the Lord so this is another one of those things that might technically be considered speculation because they don't outright say it in the game but because they're so close to just saying it and it's so incredibly interesting I'm going to briefly share it with you to ponder on so the soul of the Lords is something we've seen before if they Lord soul so we learned that a lord soul consists of the souls of Lords of cinder people who linked the flame in the past that's interesting sure but that isn't all I'm talking about remember what the fire keeper said that even after the fire is gone and everything is in a vast darkness that she sees in the distance a tiny flame appear left to us by past linkers of the flame that's almost quite literally what happened all the way at the very beginning of our perceived time and what I talked about in the first video of the series in the darkness a flame appeared one day and in it were Lord Souls aka souls of the past linkers of the flame that Gwyn nieto the witch of izalith and the furtive pygmy found the fire keeper is seeing all that happening again in the far distance after darkness has taken root so I don't know about you but I think that's super cool anyways standing over the first flame the ashen one summons the fire keeper so they can end the age of fire the fire keeper removes the flame from its mantle and slowly begins to burn out this is the end of our journey with Dark Souls so like the eyes suggest the age of fire will reappear one day through the embers left by all the past Lords of cinder so who knows it will play out the same or differently altogether that isn't for us to know because our time in this universe is over the age of fire has ended and as darkness begins to set we hear this the first flame quickly fades darkness will shortly settle but one day tiny flames will dance across the darkness like embers linked by Lords pass ashen one here I found my voice still

Channel: The Ashen Hollow

Views: 3,261,970

Rating: 4.6661372 out of 5

Keywords: dark souls 3, dark souls 3 gameplay, dark souls, dark souls gameplay, dark souls 3 lore, dark souls lore, the ashen hollow, the ashen hollow lore, dark souls 3 walkthrough, dark souls 3 ost, dark souls 3 dlc, ashen hollow, dark souls 3 guide, dark souls guide, dark souls canon, dark souls 3 canon, canonical story dark souls, canon story dark souls, dark souls what is canon, dark souls 3 canon story

Id: 0A4X_Kgf4Mk

Length: 57min 40sec (3460 seconds)

Published: Wed Jul 26 2017

Reddit Comments

[u/hellopeople666]

Hope there are sections on broken controllers and tears of frustration!!