#kindly miquella

[orcusivanth]

Cross the threshold

[eldrtchmn]

I abandon here the flesh of my body

[feukt-42]

After a bit of time and a hefty amount of thinking abt the lore, SOTE really brings this post to my mind.

It's like. Miquella did love Malenia and Godwyn, but couldnt cure them the way he was. He did want to better the world, but it didnt help him as he retraced his mother's footsteps.

Midra did love, and was loved, he endured for ages in memory of the love he shared with Nanaya, and her entreaty. This didnt stop the inquisitors from ramming the sword of damnation through his throat.

Messmer did love his mother, and he obviously cared for her people. He cared for his knights, even when they betrayed him. He even seems to have cared about the hornsent in some capacity, judging by the amount of hornsent culture that remains preserved in the storehouse. And yet, despite all that, he still is responsible for the slaughter, and utter genocide the hornsent suffered. He still couldnt save the jar saints. He still couldnt get his mother to answer his pleas.

Marika did love Messmer. The amount of blessings she gave him is proof enough. She did love him, but it didnt prevent her from sending him on an endless crusade.

Marika loved her people. It didnt matter.

"Marika bathed the village of her home in gold, knowing full well that there was no one left to heal." "What was her prayer ? Her wish, her confession ? There is no one left to answer, and Marika never returned home again."

By the way, small addendum that is only somewhat related bc i dont want to make a full post abt it

The shaman village ost is the elden beast theme with only the harp, without the grandiose melody.

"Only the kindness of Gold, without Order."

[mimocrocodilelol]

🍂🕸🐛🕸🍂

[nahobeanie]

Harbinger of Compassion

[jugemusequencer]

banger dlc btw

ref below ~

[prismatic-starstuff]

Peace.

— Tarnished!Reader and Miquella.

CW: reader is under the charm (though nothing sexual occurs.)

Flowers bloom around you, soft and delicate as the touch of the deity's fingers in your hair, brushing through the strands with all the gentleness of a butterfly's wings. The Haligtree and all life within have flourished since the curing of its rot; and so too has your relationship with the god whose rule you once opposed.

Miquella has been, true to his title, kind to you ever since you'd fallen under his charm. He'd carried you in his three arms on the journey back from the Land of Shadow, adorned you in flowers and lavished you in gifts, kept you by his side and given you everything you had asked for.

At first, you'd wondered if all these kindnesses were nothing but ways to keep you sweet, to get you on his side, to ensure your compliance.

But now, under the gentleness of his touch, in the warmth of his embrace... you simply cannot bring yourself to care.

With the back of your head resting against his chest, you can feel as much as hear Miquella humming softly as his nimble fingers work on your hair. It's a song dedicated to you, he'd told you once; to honour all that you have done, and all that you are.

You take a moment to turn your head. Miquella's eyes, pale and golden, do not widen upon this action; his long eyelashes do not blink. Rather, his lips curve into a faint smile, and one of three hands comes to rest upon your cheek.

"Are you well, beloved one?"

His voice is ever-serene, ever-soft; devoid of passion yet full of sweetness. You can't quite remember when 'Tarnished one' became 'beloved one,' but it's what you've grown accustomed to.

You nod your head. You are well. You always have been, ever since the moment his charm took root in you.

Miquella's smile widens by an almost imperceptible fraction, and his abundance of golden hair spills down his form as he leans in to press a kiss to your forehead.

"Wonderful," he murmurs, lips grazing your skin. "It is my most sincere wish that you will always be well."

And whether it's a matter of your own opinion, or the charm swaying it... you believe him. The god threw away his capacity for love when he threw away his other self, but he did not throw away his ability to care. You'd seen it time and again; when he'd shed tears over his formerly rotted Haligtree, when he'd smile tenderly upon its denizens, when he'd hold you close and tight as if he never desired to let you go.

Your head rests comfortably against his chest once more; and once more, his touch returns to your hair, and his song of praise for you resumes in earnest.

And it is here and now that you know peace; as gentle as a butterfly's wings, as soft and delicate as Miquella's fingers in your hair and the flowers that bloom around you.

[toweringclam]

Miquella's followers really just saying the quiet part out loud. Like "If you're here, you must be mind controlled too! Welcome to the Thrall Club! Don't worry about that one weird guy, he's as brainwashed as the rest of us."

[luminaryofblood]

Everyone hyping up Prime Radahn, mightiest of the Demigods, yet they conveniently forget the most important thing.

Morgott whooped his ass.

[madcat-world]

Kindly Miquella - Gido

[knightscanfeeltoo]

I don't think Ansbach Hates Miquella and even Radahn for taking Mohg's Body but I just couldn't Resist...

(Thanks @_Mark_03...)

[santatrina]

"McQuella the Kind spoke of the hamburger.

The ketchup.

And the mayo."

"He wields Mc to shrive clean the wallets of men. There is nothing more yummy."

mcquella's brainrot cuz since i'm not understanding shit i'm going batshit insane

i'll probably share malenia blade of mcquella later today as well

[feukt-42]

Elden ring + Shadow of the Erdtree lore thoughts

Alright, so, first off, obviously, spoilers ahead.

I've been thoroughly enjoying and getting my ass kicked by SotE and what ive seen of the lore so i wanted to ramble about it.

I specifically wanted to talk about how Elden Ring explores power and godhood.

In the base game, godhood isnt seen as inherently bad. Marika's golden order is fucked up six ways to sunday, but the blame mainly rests on Marika's shoulders it seems. She's a genocidal homewrecking war-mongerer who threw two of her children in the sewers bc of racism, she's not a good god, but it doesnt portray the problem as her being a god, just her being a mess. The game provides several "solutions" to unfuck everything :

Ranni's ending has you completely throw the system in the trash. She says, fuck it, godhood's the problem, im out of here. She is kinda right, but the lands remain fractured and the power vacuum left behind is going to be immense. We're on the right track but could be better.

The frenzied flame ending is just pure concentrated nihilism so i think we can move past it for this one.

The bunch of other endings are fairly similar : you beat Marika/Radagon's ass and you impose yourself as Elden Lord to keep her in check and fix the issues you see as most important. This doesnt fix anything long-term, the god in power is still the exact same fucking mess but with a chaperone now i guess.

None of these endings are very satisfying, they all leave you with a sense of "it could be worse i guess" (except the frenzied flame one but you get the point). This is where Miquella comes in :

Everything we hear about Miquella sounds great. He's kind, compassionate, against racism, doesnt like violence, etc etc. Cherry on top, he's even one of the characters with a direct shot at godhood, brilliant ! Why cant we just put him in charge, he'll do much better than the absolute wreck we have right now.

And thats where the base game leaves us, Marika is a fucked up mess of a person, and the obvious solution is to put the much better Miquella in her place.

Shadow of the erdtree, on the other hands, aims to set the record straight. The problem wasnt just Marika, the problem is inherent to godhood in and of itself.

In SotE, we see the land of shadow, the realm where Marika came from and ascended to godhood, and the realm where Miquella intends to do the same. And the more we hear about who Marika was before in snippets of lore, and the more we watch Miquella tread the road to godhood, we realise something :

There is no such thing as a good god

It doesnt matter how kind and compassionate you were, what your morals were, who you loved, who you loathed, none of it matters because you cannot grasp the power to become a god without sacrificing who you were before.

In the dlc we see Miquella shed more and more of himself, his flesh, his arms, his eye, his heart, his doubts, his fears and even his love. Miquella has shorn so much of who he was that he formed an entire new person (St Trina) from it. Some of him remains, he still wishes for a kinder world, but he cant sacrifice anymore of himself for it. Now he has to start sacrificing others.

Miquella was always blessed with the ability to charm others, and he sees it as the least painful path to make others do as he wishes. And so he charms his sister, he charms Mohg, he charms Radahn, his followers, Leda, Moore, Thiollier, Freyja, the hornsent, Ansbach, and everyone he can convince to give themselves up for his dream of a kinder world, regardless of the pain they might cause or feel by being enthralled by him.

And oh boy do they feel pain. Mohg is used and discarded like a ragdoll, and his followers and dynasty slowly crumble to nothing as the last pureblood knight watches helplessly, himself entranced by the one responsible after he failed to kill him. Radahn's soul is shoved in a corpse so that he can play consort to a god that is his antithesis, depriving him of his glory and honour as lord of the battlefield. Malenia is left alone to rot after Miquella has no use or help for her, and she endlessly waits for her brother to return. Every one of Miquella's followers has to grapple with those feelings of betrayal, manipulation, and lost memories returning all at once. It is by no means painless.

And so we end up with a god that is not much better than Marika was. On his path to godhood, Miquella has caused as much pain to those along the way as his mother once did, in this very same land that still feels the scars of Marika's ascension.

The only way to gain power is to take it from everyone else, and that cannot be achieved without pain.

[moeggoi]

2 hour paintover Miquella from 2022, now that I've finished the dlc I have a really different perspective...

[cryptandcasket]

Miquella the Unalloyed. 2023(?)

Damien. 1994.

🎀 reblogs appreciated 🎀