Elden Ring Analysis - Tumblr Posts
Alright I have this theory about Miquella, Malenia and Trina that I need to float out there.
When we find her, Malenia specifically states that she was dreaming. She has in fact been dreaming.
I dreamt for so long. My flesh was dull gold... and my blood, rotted. Corpse after corpse, left in my wake as I awaited his return. ... Heed my words. I am Malenia. Blade of Miquella. And I have never known defeat.
It's hard to say whether or not Malenia was in communication with Miquella via dreams. I do think there's some meat to the theory that she split herself, however, very much the way Miquella and Marika did.
Malenia budded off daughters in Aeonia, and I think that in the same way Trina represents Miquella's love and Radagon might be Marika's sense of loyalty, Millicent could literally be Malenia's dignity.
There is something I must return to Malenia. The will that was once her own. The dignity, the sense of self, that allowed her to resist the call of the scarlet rot. The pride she abandoned, to meet Radahn's measure.
-Millicent
Considering how relatively willingly Malenia bloomed for us, I have to wonder if she did indeed literally lose her restraint.
And she had so many splits.
By the time we get to her, Malenia has rotted the entire Haligtree and she seems to be a hollow shell of herself, repeating who she is and what she stands for like a mantra until we make her desperate. She is frozen in time as that woman who bloomed in Caelid, I think, just a fragment made of raw determination to win at any cost.
It's also notable that the Scarlet Rot isn't just painful, it might actively cause nightmares.
Everything is as you said. Since inserting the needle, the scarlet rot has ceased to writhe. Even the nightmares have abated...
-Millicent
Malenia might've been experiencing Rot-induced nightmares for a few hundred years until we got to her.
Miquella's textual motivation for moving proverbial mountains all throughout his life was curing his sister. While he struggled to uproot it at the source, they did find several stopgap treatments: wearing Miquella's unalloyed gold, which conferred a limited amount of his own immunity onto the bearer; and the Sword Saint's flowing water techniques.
I think Trina, as Miquella's love and an aspect of his own affinity for forgetfulness/oblivion, might've become the saint of sleep specifically out of Miquella's urge to soothe his sister's unquiet dreams. She eventually expanded and gained more autonomy, moving on to the Cleanrot Knights, then the merchants and albinaurics. It's hard to say when the albinaurics were brought to her attention, but I think Miquella had a lot of dealings with Ranni, Rykard, and maybe even Iji.
(Side note: could the mirrorhelm have made Iji immune to Miquella's charm?)
Torrent's whistle in particular is delicate goldwork that I think is heavily implied to be Miquella's handiwork. Of the smiths and engineers in-game, I think Miquella's skill at making outright automail had to take at least some inspiration from Rykard's machinery, and a lot of the weapons associated with the Haligtree take inspiration from Carian weaponry. The Miquellan Knight's sword is basically a Carian sword with the glintstone switched out for Haligtree bloodstone amber. Why is that?
(Additional side note: I think Loretta might've been Radahn's teacher in the art of horsemanship and archery, considering she's the only other Carian character heavily associated with horses and archery. It'd provide a good reason for why her albinauric identity was a huge secret. And, once Radahn left for Sellia to learn gravity magic/get a new mentor, that gave her the free time she would need to champion the albinaurics and investigate the Haligtree.)
Either way, Trina would have had front row seats to the treatment of the albinaurics as servants and worse, and there's a chance that that was when she had her first encounter with the Flame of Frenzy.
Miquella's approach to excising gods was scientific, but I think Trina attacked the problem from an ideological angle. It's actually a pretty good idea, since the gods in Elden Ring seem to be ideologies made physical. Frenzy is despair- so those afflicted with Frenzy must be given hope, and they were given a "holy land" in the form of the Haligtree. And we can in fact still find their hope in the Apostate Derelict, Philia's promise of being able to birth albinaurics, in very close proximity to the largest amount of Trina's Lilies in the game.
Tl;dr: I think Trina is a saint of sleep specifically because Malenia was afflicted by Rot-nightmares, and Miquella wanted so badly to help her that he budded off an aspect of himself that could.
...Huh. Thiollier is seemingly the only other Tarnished to have arrived in the realm of shadow, yet instead of Miquella, he came in search of St. Trina.
St. Trina, who implores us to kill Miquella before he becomes a god...
Moreover, we were gifted the Spirit Summoning Bell by Ranni, under the instruction of "Torrent's former master." This was evidently Miquella, but... why would he call for the Tarnished if only to turn them away from his coming paradise?
But if St. Trina is Miquella's other half, and embodies his "doubt and vacillation," then perhaps it was actually she who gave Ranni the bell... After all, Ranni appears to have lulled Kalé and his donkey to sleep nearby, and one of her cohorts, Seluvis, was once familiar with another Tarnished who served St. Trina: Sleeping Arrow Dolores.
...Is St. Trina the real MVP of the entire goddamn game?
I need to check with all the NPCS just to make sure, but…
The fact that Ansbach, the Hornsent, and even arguably Thiollier seem to have forgotten certain things due to Miquella’s enchantment is rather curious.
Ansbach forgot that Mohg was bewitched. He forgot that he challenged Miquella.
Hornsent forgot about his need to specifically go after and kill Messmer— something arguably even more huge than the former revelation. Messmer has led a campaign where hundreds of thousands were slaughtered, where Hornsent’s own family was taken from him. His hatred was arguably dampened as well.
Thiollier seems to have forgotten about Saint Trina, immediately remembering her upon the charm being broken. Haunted by memories of her.
Meanwhile, it doesn’t seem that any other had forgotten anything. Maybe Leda one could say Leda “forgot” her paranoia, but it just seems like that was dampened. But regardless, those who had their memories altered are those Miquella would have felt would go against him for what he’s done— which makes sense, even for Hornsent. The guy can end up thinking that Miquella deserves to die too (if I’m remembering the end of his quest correctly). EDIT: Killing Messmer also means acquiring his kindling which means accessing the means to stop Miquella!
This revelation means that Miquella’s charm is strong on multiple levels. It doesn’t just make you like him and not want to hurt him, it’s intensity can vary from “forgetting the crush you have” to “forgetting your desire to kill the man who has tormented your people for hundreds of years at this point”.
Which is the kind of thing that makes me look at Mohg and consort Radahn and ask, “what exactly did you end up doing to them, Miquella?”
Elden Ring Accents
Something came over me. I've put together a spreadsheet of all ER characters with voice lines and figured out where each accent is from in the hope it could provide insight on the characters, storytelling and worldbuilding choices that went into the game.
It could also be a good resource for creatives in the community that want to get into the worldbuilding aspect of their stories/art and be more accurate with accents and regions.
I've put a little introduction in to give some info and context, as well as some conclusions I came to while putting it together. There's also a map to help visualise :)
Feel free to contact me with any suggestions/corrections, and it's fine to share the link. I hope you find it useful!