#not me infodumpinh about the clone theory

[fireglyphz]

ECLIPSE LAKE SPOILERS!!!

.

.

.

.

.

.

WOW WHAT THE FUCK

I am so weirdly interested now that the clone theory is taking off because I considered it in the past but it was more of a crack theory than anything without much to go off off, for me anyway CLONE HIGH HUNTER WHEN

I thought I would chip in my own thoughts after seeing this observation made by @matchamangotea and it confirms my exact thoughts!

anyway!!! it does looks like the ingredients Belos needed in the book was to literally build Hunter, with specific attention to his eye color and nose; it doesn't exactly confirm whether this is Belos recording his results or keeping notes of what he needs from Hunter (or both), but we know it has some connection to Belos given that he keeps it on his person. In the context of having it with him among his other supplies for the portal door, it's possible he's also using his notes to keeps tabs between Hunter's role and the day of unity.

the most immediate connection for me would be the Palistrom wood because right next to it in parentheses is "Keratin", which is normally found in fingernails and hair. From that, we can understand that these ingredients are being used as close substitutes for real organs. some of the ingredients - the galdorstone, stonesleeper's lungs and palistrom wood - are also seen on the left page which lends credibility to this theory.

so according to the book, we have an idea of what mishmash Hunter is made of: Galderstone (heart & power/bile sack), Palistrom wood (hair and fingernails), Stonesleeper lungs, selkidomus scales (skin???) and interestingly the Bone of ORTET, where an ortet is "the original plant from which clone plants are produced".

(the galdorstone was introduced as a relic used for boosting powers, but not necessarily acting as a power source; if Belos intended to use the galdorstone to substitute a witch’s heart & bile sack, I personally think this is why he flubbed that one because he failed to consider that the galderstone does not generate power on its own. This could be why Hunter claims not to have natural magic because the organ he needs to generate it can only be used as a magic booster, when he cannot generate magic on his own without a sufficient organ to do so)

However, these only perform the main functions of the body, and it would be too much to assume Belos would go through all the trouble of finding special ingredients for every single organ unless the process is meticulous enough for it, and this does not look like a recipe for a glorified abomination. At the very least, these pages outline the ingredients and growth stages and as matchamangotea pointed out, there is a checkmark on one of the growth stages to show Hunter is finished his childhood while Belos was monitoring his growth. It doesn’t stop there though; we can assume Hunter is currently at his adolescent stage at the moment since Belos hasn’t checked it off yet, but there is another sketch that is used to outline Hunter’s eyes if that has any significance in the future...

So from here, Belos would probably have to put in a placeholder like human blood to take care of the rest biologically - so this means that having a high concentration of human blood could also owe to Hunter's physiology rather than a weak lineage or the case of having a human ancestor (sort of). but if this were the case, what's the reason behind Hunter's eyes being a different color despite being a clone, if not to direct the audience's attention to the book? could it be a side effect of the ingredients, or maybe Belos recording more information about Hunter? or is it one of the things Belos needs to keep tabs on for the Day of Unity if this has to do with Hunter's purpose?

Alternatively, there is also a mystery substance in the top left corner of Hunter’s page, which happen to have the same colours as the markings on Belos’ face; I am not sure whether this was what Belos used in place of or in addition to Human blood to fill in the gaps, but considering it also seems to be directly attributed to Belos’ “curse” it has an unknown use at the moment. (EDIT: it could be possible that Belos attempted to mix these ingredients together in the past but only managed to get the mystery goo, so maybe he’s using Hunter to cultivate it for an unknown purpose? Whatever the reason, it’s on Hunter’s page for something even if we don’t know what at the moment)

how does this stack up to Belos' habit of withholding information, careful phrasing and possibly outright lying to Hunter? Hunter mentioned to Luz that "a lot of his ancestors were [powerless witches]", but if he were cloned he would have no way of knowing this unless this is the story he was brought up on, and he would also have no way of confirming it due to having no other "relatives". knowing Belos, this is probably his shady way of saying "you were cloned from me so you technically come from a line of powerless witches" in a half-truth kind of way. Hunter also mentions Belos found him, took him and and gave him a staff, which I see this as Belos raising him on the mindset of proving his worth as compensation which is just fucking messed up ok

and on that note!!! look at Belos' ears! they are far smaller and rounded similar to Luz, albeit a little bit pointed, which is interesting because along with the eyes, Hunter's ears bear little resemblance to Belos' because they are shaped like a regular witch's ears save for the exact same nick.

and while we could credit it to Belos having the same identity as Philip Wittebane, mostly because we don't have a ton of information about Philip nor Belos' backgrounds at the moment to make a solid confirmation, it could also be possible that Belos is a direct descendent of Philip rather than Hunter? in theory, we don't actually know what a witch with human blood would look like, and what differences it would lend to in terms of appearances, so I'd like to think it's not completely out of the question yet.

Also, if Belos were Philip, I think the first place he would look to for resources on building the portal door would be his own diary, considering the amount of control he has over the public and I doubt the library would be an exception of this. it's very complicated at the moment, considering he knew how the door could be used when he took it from Luz in season 1, but at the same time he chose to build his own portal door from the pieces instead of making another copy. it could just be that the resources used for the original door are less abundant now than when it was first built, but if he were Philip's descendant I figure he would have at least some knowledge of the door, and possibly used it, but not know everything.

These are all my personal opinions though! They can easily be disproved in later episodes, or could be disregarded completely, but I thought I’d like to share my thoughts. I also noticed Hunter’s magic(?) when fighting Amity was yellow and i only noticed when I rewatched that scene and I thought it was cool.

TLDR: I think belos made a modded clone of himself (Hunter) using other ingredients that we might be provided more information on in the future, Belos is more fucked up than he looks imo, and I have some doubts about the Philip-Belos theory.