#Elden ring dlc spoilers

[eggslamwich]

shitposting is how i cope

[actual-haise]

Igon may legit be in my top 5 Fromsoft NPCs, definitely my fav from Elden Ring after Blaidd

[fiddlesqueak-fables]

I’m being driven to kill.

Read the Crusade Insignia talisman, I beg of you.

[thewisecheerio]

Messmer's actually terrible at his job. (affectionate)

Messmer is a fascinating villain, because he is strangely compassionate. I would go so far as to argue that this same compassion that is so at odds with his villainy is the very thing that drove him to become that villain in the first place. Hang with me; this is a long post.

Spoilers for Elden Ring DLC. Obviously.

Messmer tells us himself that his purpose is to purge all those stripped of the grace of gold. "Yet...my purpose standeth unchanged. Those stripped of grace of gold shall all meet death...in the embrace of Messmer's flame." We can piece together who gave him this genocidal purpose from his armor set's description, which tells us directly that he's working on his mother's behalf *and also* taking all the blame for it.

So he's playing war criminal on Marika's behalf. And I do mean playing. I'm not downplaying the fact that he is a war criminal; he has murdered on entire people. But here's the thing: he's *terrible* at playing the sole part of the spiteful, hateful overlord. He's *awful* at reveling in war and its victories.

Why? Empathy.

Messmer is strangely empathic for what could have otherwise been a cut-and-dry villain:

1. His relationship with Gaius, an Albinauric: We learn from Gaius's Remembrance that he was Messmer's bestie. We also know that Gaius was an Albinauric both from his armor as well as the location "Albinauric's Hut" in the direction he comes from at the beginning of his fight. Albinaurics are despised by the Golden Order, but Messmer didn't seem to care. In fact, he cared so little that he gave Gaius command of either a huge chunk or perhaps his entire army, second only to him. And what is given as the basis of this friendship? The fact that they were "both cursed from birth", i.e. a mutual understanding of what it is to be despised. They're trauma bonded because they have empathy for each other's predicament.

2. His relationship with the Jar people: Even though the Jar people were used as weapons of war against his own people, he doesn't seem to resent them. How do we know? There is a hospital where the Jars and their innards are being cared for in the Storehouse, a stone's throw away from where Messmer spends all his time. There are even a few baby Jars running around in it. Strange thing to do to what is essentially an enemy of your people, unless you consider them to also be victims of the same conflict.

3. His relationship with his soldiers: Messmer shares his own flame with his army. Yeah, that absolutely could be interpreted as a utilitarian move for the sake of war. Power up the troops, boost your chance at victory. But it's a strange choice when he could have just armed them in the traditional way of handing them sharp, pointy objects and pointing in the desired direction of stabbing. Instead, arming your soldiers with your own power could also be interpreted as something you do when you care about their survival and are potentially working directly with them to ensure it.

4. The mourning of people who betray him: Speaking of his soldiers, Messmer gets betrayed by at least a few of them. We learn this from the ashes of Andreas and Huw. Huw's ashes further tell us that Messmer *mourned their loss* as brothers-in-arms. Weird thing to do to someone who has betrayed you, unless you care very deeply about them to begin with.

5. The implications of the Storehouse: Even though he is actively genociding Hornsent on Marika's orders, he somehow has preserved an entire library of their history. At first, I thought this was maybe just British Museum vibes: steal all the artifacts and refuse to give them back. (And that could still be a correct interpretation.) But in context of the rest of these points, if you're truly hellbent on erasing a culture, why would you bother to preserve any of it? Would you not burn the libraries along with the people? It's a fairly common thing to do in our world's wars--destroy the art and history to ensure full erasure. And yet, it seems he can't even bring himself to avoid some small amount of sympathy for the people he was explicitly tasked with killing. If you really *think* about the basis for his sympathy for Marika, this does make a lot of sense. Messmer is following Marika's orders because he knows about what the Hornsent did to the Shaman. Wouldn't it then also be the case that once Marika's reign became nothing but genocide, i.e. an exact reversal of what was done to her people, he would have the same kind of sympathy for them? Perhaps this is a form of harm reduction in the only way he could square with what he thinks is his purpose.

6. His own self-hatred: Messmer despises his own flames, which we learn from the Messmer's Orb description. If you were happy to be Doing a Genocide, would you not celebrate your weapons of war? Wouldn't you take pride in them as tools of power? Unless, of course, you're not actually as happy as we think and maybe having regrets and come to be filled with severe self-hatred. Woops.

So then, if Messmer is this guy running around with a lot of Big Feelings (and probably a deep need for a Prozac prescription), why does he even agree to this genocide in the first place? Isn't that an *odd* choice for someone who seems to care pretty deeply about people, even people despised by his family's governing order? Why does he carry out these orders even to the point of developing a deep self-hatred?

This is where Messmer's sympathy, one of his best aspects, also becomes his fatal flaw.

I mentioned above in 5 that Messmer has access to information about both sides of this conflict. As much as he might have sympathy for everyone around him--including weapons used against the Shaman like the Jars--that means he *also* has sympathy for the Shaman. So if you have sympathy for the other side and sympathy for your side, and you are raised by your own side, then what is the natural outcome? Your side wins. If you must choose a side, then you fight on behalf of Child Soldier Fostering Mother Marika. She raised you, after all. It's inevitable.

In the end, that same sympathy he seems to extend to others also is what causes him to do war crimes. Out of an abundance of sympathy for what happened to the Shamans, he agrees to take up arms.

At the end of the day, he's still a villain that needs to be stopped so that he'll stop oppressing an entire people on behalf of his mother's misguided attempts at revenge. But making his reasoning to agree to become that villain in the first place *empathy* of all things? Fascinating.

[amberspacedf]

Frenzied Flame

[ketunhanska]

St. Trina

[leal-hound]

dead soul, dead body - thou hast killed thy siblings before, but canst thou destroy the face of thine favored brother, Kindly Miquella?

[ganondoodle]

the full page of radahn doodles bc i love him :3

(Radahn, Elden Ring)

[mistleaneous-chaos]

How Shadow Of The Erdtree Portrays Hate, and The Tragedy of trying to Escape

Elden Ring Spoilers(Hey! Been a while since i did this)

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I’ve gotten further into the DLC and this might just be one of the best stories of how Hatred is just a cycle that repeats which consumes innocent people in its wake.

This DLC has done so much to make us understand why Marika did the things she did. She lived in a peaceful village, only for people she loved and cared about to be taken and put into jars. And why is that? Because their bodies meld well with others, something she can’t control since she was just born with it.

And so she becomes the new God of the Lands Between, imposing her new order onto others, and having her own son be the one to lead it. But when the fire fades and the ash settles, the one who suffers of the two of them is Messmer. She leaves him in the Shadow Realm because he doesn’t fit in her new order, representing so much of what is considered “Sinful”. And he is left alone, because of something he can’t control since he was born with it.

And then, as years pass and she makes a family again, she has twins! She can finally begin to rebuild, to move on from the hatred she felt!… except, she can’t. Because of the fact that her children have horns, just as her oppressors did. And so do multiple families in the Lands Between, with this seemingly “cursed” blood spreading, she has a choice to make.

Let go of the hate, try to accept her sons and the Omens.

Or hold onto it, persecute them, cut off their horns, and drop them into the sewers, out of sight out of mind.

We know what she picked.

And it’s this hatred that sparka another ambition just like hers. Mohg.

Imagine you’re Mohg. You have no family save for your brother. You live in the sewers while only ever being able to watch the outside world with happy familes and children with parents who love them. But all the while, what do you have? Nothing. All because of something you can’t control because you were born with it.

And so you decide to build your own order. Away from it all. Your brother wants no part, he clings to the hope of being accepted by that damn tree. But it’s fine.

You take some of the other Omens with you, and get to work. You even have help from an Outer God, so higher powers must want you to succeed! Others shave their horns but not you, no you proudly grow them out, even if it impedes your vision, because they are a part of you.

You take in all kinds, Humans, Omens, even Albinaurics, who had no home before. You give your fellow Omens real clothes, regal clothes. They’ve never had clothes after all, so don’t they deserve the best? You build and you build and eventually you have a beautiful part of the Underground to yourselves, you did it, you’ve won!

Mohg could have broken from the cycle, stayed in Mohgwyn, as he did even when chaos reigned above. People were strong under him, and had a home even if they were shunned in other places.

But that choice was taken from him.

Miquella used him to accomplish his own goal of godhood, robbing him of his own agency. Just like his brothers, Mohg was used by his family, but unlike the others, he wasn’t even aware of it. No matter how far he ran, no matter how much he tried to cut himself off from it. The hatred of his mother reached him, in the form of someone else using him to break away from the consequences of it.

Now I’m not saying Mohg was perfect. His group was no less sadistic than some of the others in the lands between.

But he was robbed of a dream, and told it was never his to have.

[r-aindr0p]

Elden ring art/shitpost dump hehee yeah I didn't see the boss being beaten yet !!! But saw phase 2.... so yeah sorry for that last pic, but this is literally what it made me think of

Thoughts before DLC : Miquella my beloved Thoughts after DLC : Miquella my beloved I am brainwashed from the beginning

Still my favorite character and I'm happy that I was right about him being a bit sus, love that character even more...

[elguritch-art]

KINDRED - 6/6

<<Previous |  END Start

Thank you everyone who's enjoyed this little mini-comic!! I hope to draw these two more in the future!!

[eggslamwich]

I was not expecting her questline to go this route

[hellyeahpancakes]

Elden ring, huh?!?!

kind of messy and not my usual style...... i never meant to take this piece this far lol but i might as well post it now that it happened

[mysterioussinkhole]

Honestly obsessed with decision to have Thiollier summonable for the Putrescent Knight fight when it is immune to both poison and sleep damage, which is pretty much all my boy can do. Fromsoft said summon this twink for plot relevance and emotional support ONLY. He will do fuck all.

[mossy-green-aka-ferrythem]

Thinking a lot about Romina...

Can't get over how she experienced something truly horrible. Even though Hornsent society was corrupt, nothing can excuse what Queen Marika did to them. Even while all the loreheads bicker with shit like "No wonder Queen Marika did what she did!", like, sure there is a reason to it, with how she and her people faced subjugation and prosecution in Hornsent society, but that cannot excuse what followed. Her "purging", her distaste for any and all Hornsent, her sheer disgust for her own children, when they bore horns, and how she abandoned them, the way she banished and severed the horns from the Hornsent, the way she gave them the dirty name of "Omen", everything that she's done, with all the cruelty that follows...

but that's a different story. What really matters here is what I will say about Saint Romina. What really gets me about her is that she really and truly does add so much perspective to the events that transpire. The way her entire world burned down around her, and all she could do is look on in shock, almost certainly traumatized by what she saw before her, all while she held onto a Bud. Her Bud. The Bud that would continue to spread, but never bloom. That Bud that embodied what she would become, her new faith. Her new beauty, being a Saint for the Scarlet Rot...

Rot has always been so interesting in Elden Ring, because you see how it gruesomely withers everything around it, but also gains purchase to life, life that is both twisted and beautiful... the way that Rot is both Life and Decay really does shine with Elden Ring's scarlet rot, I must say!

I am really happy to see that the Scarlet Rot has even more significance now through Saint Romina, and her breathtaking beauty, that leaves me stunned anytime I look upon her...

I absolutely adore her design and story and larger narrative implications of her, but I must profess to a truth about how I feel about her...

I carnally desire her. Her beauty comes in many forms, but I can't help but feel a special sensual desire for her when I gaze upon the whole of her form...

Oh Romina...

[saxspielercaderface]

I love them plsss let them have been in true love