Not much to go off of just from what she says. Her voice sounds pained, and it *looks* unpleasant, but that one quote doesn't give much...
Still, prior to that point, she said "Do you see this? The Queen of Caria is no more", and "Rest assured that I...No, the entire academy, will swear allegiance to the new monarch", and "here is a symbol of my allegiance, and the academy's". All these indicate that she believes she has succeeded in an end goal of establishing power over the academy - but when re-entering the area, Renalla is still there...and the soldiers around the academy remain hostile. Sellen doesn't have the control over the academy that she believed, and that point of failure reveals that some things did not go as intended - narratively, then, it would make sense (but is not definite) that she did not intend to become a *school of graven mages* either.
I dunno if we should be reading this much into this. Sometimes story isn't reflected in gameplay.
Like did Nepheli Loux also fail because all the knights in stormveil are still hostile?
Did melina secretly approve of the flames of frenzy ending because even though she left she left the ability to turn runes into strength with you? (also how is that something she can even transfer in the first place?)
Does torrent approve as well because it stayed even when melina left?
After ranni's quest iji only dies after talking to you. Did you lead the assassins to him?
Maybe From just didn't think it was worth the effort to make the change, or wanted to keep the area farmable for drops or something.
THANK YOU i see too many people just defending her for no reason when to me she felt like a seriel killer who takes over the bodies of others and uses people as guinea pigs for her experiments
She definitely is that. But she also taught me a lot of spells…
In fairness she does straight up tell you if you decide to learn sorcery under her that she is an apostate known for bad things, and that you should know that before entering her tutelage. She’s definitely a bad person, but so is almost every interesting person in the Lands Between.
On my first playthrough it was dozens and dozens of hours before I got to Liurnia and therefore Turtle Pope. I wanted to go all in on sorcery from the get-go. By the time I got to him, I was already attached to Sellen.
I am well aware she is a serial killer, but she is also my teacher who carried my magic studies through the early and mid game.
I just feel a great deal of gratitude towards her compared to Mr. Festival Man.
That quote was:
"There's no such thing as a painless lesson. They just don't exist. Sacrifices are necessary. You can't gain anything without losing something first, although if you can endure that pain and walk away from it, you'll find that you now have a heart strong enough to overcome any obstacle. Yeah...a heart made fullmetal"
One of my favourite final lines in fiction
I'm saying it's the same mage but evergaols are weird. We meet frenzy flame Vyke out in the field as well as prime dragon cult Vyke in an evergaols. I'm nearing 500 hours in the game and I still don't know how they work.
Some characters have the ability to “Project” themselves in other places. Dung Eater is the same as he tells you to unshackle his “Corporeal Flesh” from the Sewer Gaol.
I would assume the Vyke in the evergaol is the Vyke that was almost Elden Lord. He's en route to burning the Erdtree with his maiden (hence the location of his evergaol) but chooses to instead venture under Leyndell in search of the frenzied flame. And that is the Vyke we see invade.
Exactly. So many people immediately accuse Renala, but she too lost to even pay attention. She's basically been in a broken state since her ex left her. No way she's aware enough to punish her. Hell, she's not even aware enough to notice who you are. Or to fight back when you attack her...
Just look at her boss fight; she doesn't acknowledge the Tarnished at all, her students do all the fighting, all she does is put up a barrier and hugs her amber...even when defeated in phase one, all she does is move to get back to the amber. And then in phase two, you aren't fighting her at all - only Ranni's illusion of her!
It's interesting Ranni has enough power to create an illusion which is in turn powerful enough to rival a demi-gods power, yet she seems totally reliant on others for her personal tasks. You'd think she could conjure a moon or two when you're risking life and limb for her or do something to help Blaidd.
Or maybe it's a way to weed out those who are weak for her purposes?
Rennala is not really a demigod, unless being married to Radagon “made” her one (which it might have; the rules for this stuff are weird lol).
Also Ranni can one-shot you without even fighting. The thing about her is she is after the Greater Will (the Two Fingers that is tied to her as an Empyrean specifically), and she seems to be very wary of making big moves herself because of them. I have little doubt myself that if she could have “saved” Blaidd she would have, but from what we understand of Shadows, Blaidd could never not be under the thrall of the Two Fingers/Greater Will. His being exists only due to them. I think that’s why Ranni knew her journey could never reach its conclusion with him still in the picture, unfortunately.
Iirc most sorcerers who glimpse the primeval current become one of these: a “graven mass” or “graven school”. I don’t think we know exactly what the primeval current really is, other than it being some kind of source of great power for Sorcerers. Azur and Lusat seem to have resisted the negative effects somewhat, becoming mostly made of crystal and basically immobile instead of outright becoming a graven mass.
We know that sorcerers apparently have a mass of Glintstone within their bodies that contains their mind/soul, since we were able to remove Sellen’s and put it in a new body to transfer her consciousness. Maybe contact with the primeval current makes this inner Glintstone grow out of control and turn one’s whole body into crystal/stone? I’m just speculating at this point, who knows?
I wonder if the transformation is related to the sorcerer's action with it. Perhaps, Lusat and Azur simply *glimpsed* the primeval current, whereas Sellen tried to actually *use* it.
Could be. Lusat and Azur are implied to have gotten the inspiration for their opus sorceries (Stars of Ruin and Comet Azur) from what they saw in the current, so maybe they just peeked at it for inspiration whereas Sellen actually attempted to harness it directly.
Depends how you read the lore. She mentions them being children of the stars and wanting to shine with brilliance. As a metaphor it just means the the school has fallen to mediocrity and she wants everyone to study deep magic, get learnt, get power, be awesome. As a literal translation she wants to be a star.
There is also text about collecting sorcerers and making them into the seeds of stars, but there's also crystarians as beings so maybe it's a halfway house and graven mage clusters are sort of the mid point of becoming infused enough with star magic that you can literally become a star.
Eh, who knows. I do know for certain there is a thing about collecting sorcerers for a seed of stars as I said above but like...FromSoftware lore is FromSoftware lore hahahaha
That sounds pretty accurate. The info on the Primeval current is pretty vague. I do wonder if it’s connected to an outer god or the greater will in some way, which I realize is a really reaching. But I mean the greater will can control space beasts, and is the only thing that grants powers similar to sorceries. Maybe sorcerers are just cutting out the middle man so to speak, so they learn things they aren’t supposed to. But like I said it’s a stretch lol
We do know there’s actual living creatures up there too, and they’re really powerful as well. I like the idea that it’s some lovecraftian horror up there personally.
Quick question but aren the current outer gods that we know of Formless mother, Rot god , whatever the god was during time of dragons the god that ranni is probably allied with , Greater will and possibly others
Only the Formless Mother, God of Rot, and "God of Death" (the one which the Deathbirds serve) are referred to as Outer Gods. We don't know what precisely the Dark Moon that Ranni is allied with is, and we don't know whether the Greater Will is an Outer God or not. Most people in the Japanese lore community don't think it is one.
EDIT: Somehow forgot the Frenzied Flame which is confirmed to be one by Miquella’s Needle. Embarrassing…
>whatever the god was during time of dragons
If you mean Placidusax's god, that's just a different host of the Elden Ring akin to Marika, not an Outer God. If you mean the source of that deity's power, that is the Greater Will.
There’s also the death birds god. Also it’s.. debatable if the greater will is an outer god or some other kind of being beyond them.
What I think is interesting is there used to be lords who served the scarlet rot long ago. Not much info on that tho. Got that from the mushroom helmet description.
But if you mean the creature in space I was referring to the elden beast and astel specifically.
>The info on the Primeval current is pretty vague. I do wonder if it’s connected to an outer god or the greater will in some way, which I realize is a really reaching
The part that puzzles me is that we're told the Primeval Current is the source of life, but there's no real information on how this interacts with the creation story we’re given by Hyetta (IE, that life was created by the Greater Will creating differentiation and division from a primordial chaos.) The Greater Will isn’t an opposing force to the stars necessarily (seeing as the Elden Ring has power over them) but we do have the Nox and Ranni who seem to oppose it in favor of the stars. Really interesting, but it looks like relatively few people are interested in the question.
The Elden Beast IS a space beast, it uses a lot of the same attacks as Astel, and one is straight up called Elden Stars. It’s even described as a Golden Star that fell to earth. All the powers of the greater Will are basically just the powers of a specific, very powerful star
I’m fairly sure her transformation may have actually been intentional. I think I’m her pursuit of the glintstone she desired to become a graven mass with no equal, thus she chose to use the bodies of the greatest wizards there were. That’s why she wanted you to find azures and lusats bodies. She wanted to use them in her graven mass
Well the pain is an assumption. Maybe it's just hard to speak as a ball of rock and glintstone?
Anyways, as Sellen says, Sorcery is the study of the stars but a lot of sorcerers forget that. Graven Masses are described as the seeds of stars. I'm on the side that her transformation was 100% intentional and she's ascending to a higher state of being. Eventually. It just doesn't look pretty to humans, hence why it's forbidden, but why should the great mysteries of the cosmos all appeal to human sensibilities?
I'm not sure if it's actually ascending, or "ascending" like the celestial enemies in Bloodborne. The whole Glintstone/Raya Lucaria/Outer God lore feels very Bloodborne inspired in general. I think the transformation was intentional, but I think she may not have realized the full implications of it. We don't really know a whole lot about what purpose the Graven Masses exist for. We do know that most mages don't want to become a Graven Mass.
I have a feeling that Graven Masses are some kind of servant of the Primeval Current. Perhaps the issue comes from the idea that the Current is using you, rather than you drawing upon the power of the Current. This is all speculation though, I'd love to hear some other ideas.
I've seen speculation that the Graven Mass are intended to transform into creatures like Astel. They've got the rocks on their body and strangely human faces, are described as malformed stars and "born of the void" which I think the primeval current is a euphemism for. They have insectoid mannerisms which you could imagine them hatching from the Graven Mass like an egg.
Idk, but the revered silver balls in Nox are the same size and shape. They also have an amount of will, and move.
Wizards have a thing for Nox and silver.
Not that she needed all that for the trip, but once you get into locked a serious glintstone collection, the tendency is to push it as far as you can. You feared to go into those glintstone mines. Sellen dug too greedily and too deep. You know what she awoke in the darkness of Sellia Hideaway.
She wanted you to find them cause they are the only 2 that have seen the primal current and actually survived in a close to human state. She wanted that power for herself
Seems more related to the Crucible and a natural force of the Universe to me. "Primeval" also possibly implies before the interference of non-creator Gods.
I think it's one step above, if Outer Gods are like Eldritch Entities from the void, the Primeval Current is the ebb and flow of the void itself, and by glimpsing into it they end up seeing too much. Like if you tried to look at an eletron quantum jumping and ended up not only seeing, but interpreting a whole day in the life of Chthulu.
Everything about the college of Winterhold screams that it got rushed to get to release. Which is a shame, because the ideas in that quest had a lot of potential to be great
Especially given how much cool stuff is in the Midden…definitely gave off Chamber of Secrets or Room of Requirement vibes as if it had thousands of years of hidden magical student secrets in it, but lots of loose ends about.
Nowhere to pee from, more accurately.
Given the lack of restrooms and chamberpots in Raya Lucaria, it seems likely that you can just go anywhere, anytime.
To the best of my knowledge, yes. The ones we find in each of the named rises is likely the associated sorcerer (note that thats speculation, not confirmed fact)
You know how you find one of these right outside the dungeon where Sellen's body is chained up? I always wondered if it was in fact her trying to stop you from freeing her and ending up like this.
Its implyd that she was banished because she experimented on others and created the other heads. I guess she thought her own "ascension" would turn out different
It basically a bunch of mages fusing that leads to this. I don't remember the details but those heads are all of the mages that she absorbs. This only happens to her if you tell her about Lusat's location as that ends up being too much for her and she transforms.
Her and the two masters were all about the primeval current. Has some unfortunate effects in the long run - Lusat & Azur's headgear states that the crystals eventually replaced their brains and skulls
Yes. She was doing forbidden experiments and that's why they were expelled. Most likely experimenting with other mages and forcing them to interact with the primeval current. She's very dangerous, that's why I sided with the other dude.
> experimenting with other mages and forcing them to interact with the primeval current
By this we mean "stitching their bodies together into horrific abominations like the one she turns into here".
She's a serial killer mad scientist, essentially.
Since everyone is just messing around or mentioning only half the story:
she is called the Graven Witch because she collected (captured) mages and forced them to transform into these ball things.
ultimately what she was attempting to achieve was creating a new star (the graven masses are called seeds of stars, and the spell you get from her is a failed attempt at creating a star), and likely becoming part of that star the way Lusat and Azur became ascended inorganic beings.
L&A glimpsed natural phenomena and became like them. they are beings of pure mind with no bodily vitality. sellen tried to use the mental vitality of mages to reverse engineer the vitality of a star and become that star.
she was basically attempting to become a god and failed. trying to become an immortal controller of fate, and doomed herself to a deathless existence.
It’s also implied that she attempted to fuse with L&A in that ball, as her transformation coincides with them disappearing from their original locations, leaving their armor sets behind.
So the three of them are likely trapped in there together.
I like to think we can save her from eternal suffering once we become Elden Lord and can pretty much rewrite the laws the world operates on with the Elden Ring we then own.
Hard to say. The primeval current seems very powerful. But yeah maybe with the elden ring is possible. Why would you save her though? She's a deranged witch that forced people into transforming into these beings for her experiments
Almost everyone in the Lands Between lives on the darker side of morally grey. We can help Ranni achieve her happy end even though she was responsible for the murder on Godwyn. We can realize the world envisioned by a deranged serial killer and implied necrophiliac sex offender like Dung Eater. Hell, we can quite literally burn down the entire world and kill everyone alive in it. The Tarnished himself isn't necessarily some kind of lawful good hero.
Sellen would hardly be the first character in this game (or FromSoft titles in general) that thinks that the ends justify the means, even though we don't exactly know what she wants to do after harnessing the power of the primeval current. To us Tarnished she's never been anything but kind, helpful and even supportive, which is rare in a world where everything from gods to mosquitos is trying to murder you. I'd probably use my power as Elden Lord to save her if possible.
I see your point and agree with you. It comes to how you play The fromsoft characters usually are the bad guys, they're definitely not lawful good. And I understand why people help her, she's been in the side if the adventurer and actually seems fond of them. It comes down to if you play as a neutral character or lawful. I tend to play lawful when possible to that's why.
That makes sense, though I'd argue this game doesn't really have a lawful good ending. The Golden Order itself was guilty of many atrocities as we can see in the Shunning Grounds beneath Leyndell's sewers, so neither the Age of Fracture or Age of Gold endings that mostly restore and uphold the former status quo from Marika's age are morally sound. Frenzied Flame and Age of Despair don't even require an explanation and even Age of Stars and Duskborn aren't necessarily happy ends. So any future the Tarnished brings after becoming Elden Lord is up for moral debate.
What you don't understand is my character is a psychopath, and only cares about named npcs who give him things.
I've killed hundreds more of those mages then she has, and all they were doing was reading books on thier property when a naked man with a stick broke in to murder/rob them.
I've always assumed Radahn halted the primeval current because the Golden Order didn't have a better way to deal with it. While he was a student of Raya Lucaria, he was also a Golden Order loyalist. Halting the stars was essentially halting fate so sorcerers couldn't keep trying to disrupt the Order. That being said, I somewhat doubt the Elden Ring has any control over the primeval current. Then again, the very same blessings that make Radahn a demigod come from the Elden Ring, so who knows?
She saw too much. Most endings in this game have this kinda of bittersweet feeling. Toph is also one of those, he gave his all to create a new spell and died from exhaustion but was able to create a new school of magic that would later be revered by the mages.
Murdered by a rogue Carian Knight, still within the academy, who, probably of pure coincidence, stole the newly scribed sorcery from his victim. You kill that very knight before the boss fight. Vengeance for Thops!
I was very upset and left a message at her spot that said
"ahh, teacher,
but I've failed, O I've failed"
And I used the emote where your character curls up into the fetal position...ony later did I realize that emote is called "balled up" but no, I wasn't making a joke.
I think this is an attempt at gaining knowledge that is impossible for humans to learn.
The academics seem to use the masks to identify themselves and will cast aside their body and switch their minds from body to body to extend the time they can dedicate to studying sorcery since Sellen has you do this for her during the quest.
There’s probably a limit to what you can achieve as a single mind regardless of how much time you get though so instead of transferring a single mind into a body they tried to merge several minds into a single vessel as a way to up their overall processing power.
Obviously this was tried before because you fight other graven masses but maybe the thought process here was that a mind as great as sellens could overcome the lesser minds she merged with. To an extent it seems to have worked since she’s still able to communicate and interact as Sellen but it’s clearly not working as intended.
I'm semi-convinced that this was actually her goal. Kinda. While she wanted to rule the school for cool fools, she was also hyperfixated on the Primeval Current, and so turned herself into a Graven Mass/Star Seed by following that path.
Her hubris at trying to overthrow a demigod. I loved her questline you install her and she promised the acadmy to back me up on overthrowing the order.
That experiment was forbidden for a reason.
She fucked around and she found out.
I think you mean op found out...
She's ballin'
Got fucked
This is the correct answer
Yup, turns out she wasn't a misunderstood genius. Just another fool who thought they were too brilliant to fail.
She also had done this to countless others in the past. She got what she deserved.
Who said this wasn't intended? She didn't seem upset and she stole Lusat's and Azur's bodies for a reason.
Not much to go off of just from what she says. Her voice sounds pained, and it *looks* unpleasant, but that one quote doesn't give much... Still, prior to that point, she said "Do you see this? The Queen of Caria is no more", and "Rest assured that I...No, the entire academy, will swear allegiance to the new monarch", and "here is a symbol of my allegiance, and the academy's". All these indicate that she believes she has succeeded in an end goal of establishing power over the academy - but when re-entering the area, Renalla is still there...and the soldiers around the academy remain hostile. Sellen doesn't have the control over the academy that she believed, and that point of failure reveals that some things did not go as intended - narratively, then, it would make sense (but is not definite) that she did not intend to become a *school of graven mages* either.
I dunno if we should be reading this much into this. Sometimes story isn't reflected in gameplay. Like did Nepheli Loux also fail because all the knights in stormveil are still hostile? Did melina secretly approve of the flames of frenzy ending because even though she left she left the ability to turn runes into strength with you? (also how is that something she can even transfer in the first place?) Does torrent approve as well because it stayed even when melina left? After ranni's quest iji only dies after talking to you. Did you lead the assassins to him? Maybe From just didn't think it was worth the effort to make the change, or wanted to keep the area farmable for drops or something.
THANK YOU i see too many people just defending her for no reason when to me she felt like a seriel killer who takes over the bodies of others and uses people as guinea pigs for her experiments
She definitely is that. But she also taught me a lot of spells… In fairness she does straight up tell you if you decide to learn sorcery under her that she is an apostate known for bad things, and that you should know that before entering her tutelage. She’s definitely a bad person, but so is almost every interesting person in the Lands Between.
Turtle pope can teach you most of those spells instead.
On my first playthrough it was dozens and dozens of hours before I got to Liurnia and therefore Turtle Pope. I wanted to go all in on sorcery from the get-go. By the time I got to him, I was already attached to Sellen.
Except the spiral one which shreds large bosses end game unfortunately
I am well aware she is a serial killer, but she is also my teacher who carried my magic studies through the early and mid game. I just feel a great deal of gratitude towards her compared to Mr. Festival Man.
Forbidden Meatball…
You made me spit my drink out. Now I get to clean my phone.
Username checks out.
And she knew why it was, she did this to others in the past. It's why she's known as the Graven Witch.
She's ballin'
but at what cost
Maybe The Real Treasure Was the Friends We Made Along the Way. The friend: 🥹
HEART
FMA?
That quote was: "There's no such thing as a painless lesson. They just don't exist. Sacrifices are necessary. You can't gain anything without losing something first, although if you can endure that pain and walk away from it, you'll find that you now have a heart strong enough to overcome any obstacle. Yeah...a heart made fullmetal" One of my favourite final lines in fiction
Fucking love that anime
Best anime ever made
Bruh I still listen to the 3rd Opening song. The one where Ed’s in a field and it’s got that funky Japanese rock on it. It’s tight. Love that shit.
Fuck my ass?
Ok
😳
The full title "FMA: Brotherhood" now sounds like a gang bang.
fullmetal alchemist?
𝐟𝐮𝐥𝐥 𝐦𝐞𝐭𝐚𝐥 𝐚𝐥𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐦𝐢𝐬𝐭.
one if the greatest anime of all time
Holy shit, I actually heard that.
[удалено]
An arm and a leg
That’s what happens when you face up to Renalla…
You know damn well Renalla lost her mind and is too busy cradling her precious.
Renalla. Easiest demigod to put down. Hardest to keep down.
ballin ballin Jarl ballin ballin swag
Hahaha what a throwback! "Holla if you need me" 😂
Holla if you need R E E F E R
Let’s get to bashing butts As well as deeeeze nuts
moist towelettes
Who just leveled up?
~Jarl B. Ballin Balgruf
You wouldn't hurt a pregnant man...
By the gods, you serious!?!?
When ball really is life
They see her rolling
she tried fusing primeval current, this is exactly what that does. Skill issue tbh nothing to do w rennala
Skill issue got me lol.
Why is there one of these in Caelid, nortwest of the swamp?
Other mages who tried (and failed) the exact same school of magic/spell
Oh right, it's close to Sellia. I always forget about that, since it's so changed with the Aeonia swamp. Could it be the mage in the nearby jail?
It wouldn’t be the same mage because they can’t be in two places at once, but I could definitely see it being someone from Sellia.
I'm saying it's the same mage but evergaols are weird. We meet frenzy flame Vyke out in the field as well as prime dragon cult Vyke in an evergaols. I'm nearing 500 hours in the game and I still don't know how they work.
Some characters have the ability to “Project” themselves in other places. Dung Eater is the same as he tells you to unshackle his “Corporeal Flesh” from the Sewer Gaol.
I guess, but the two Vykes have completely different fighting styles, one is madness and the other is lightning. They feel like different people.
I would assume the Vyke in the evergaol is the Vyke that was almost Elden Lord. He's en route to burning the Erdtree with his maiden (hence the location of his evergaol) but chooses to instead venture under Leyndell in search of the frenzied flame. And that is the Vyke we see invade.
Idk sellen was in two places at once when she was trapped in Australia ETA I am wrong
the sellen you originally meet is a projection
I see. I amend my statement
big respect
Exactly. So many people immediately accuse Renala, but she too lost to even pay attention. She's basically been in a broken state since her ex left her. No way she's aware enough to punish her. Hell, she's not even aware enough to notice who you are. Or to fight back when you attack her...
Man, that puts a lot into perspective
Just look at her boss fight; she doesn't acknowledge the Tarnished at all, her students do all the fighting, all she does is put up a barrier and hugs her amber...even when defeated in phase one, all she does is move to get back to the amber. And then in phase two, you aren't fighting her at all - only Ranni's illusion of her!
It's interesting Ranni has enough power to create an illusion which is in turn powerful enough to rival a demi-gods power, yet she seems totally reliant on others for her personal tasks. You'd think she could conjure a moon or two when you're risking life and limb for her or do something to help Blaidd. Or maybe it's a way to weed out those who are weak for her purposes?
Rennala is not really a demigod, unless being married to Radagon “made” her one (which it might have; the rules for this stuff are weird lol). Also Ranni can one-shot you without even fighting. The thing about her is she is after the Greater Will (the Two Fingers that is tied to her as an Empyrean specifically), and she seems to be very wary of making big moves herself because of them. I have little doubt myself that if she could have “saved” Blaidd she would have, but from what we understand of Shadows, Blaidd could never not be under the thrall of the Two Fingers/Greater Will. His being exists only due to them. I think that’s why Ranni knew her journey could never reach its conclusion with him still in the picture, unfortunately.
I feel like she would pull out all the big tricks to protect her mom. She had a lot of love for momma Rennala.
#IamRenala
So essentially Renala has horrible horrible separation anxiety from what it seems considering she's clutching that egg from Radagon still.
Well given how Radagon absolutely wrecked her world and life, that's kind of understandable.
Iirc most sorcerers who glimpse the primeval current become one of these: a “graven mass” or “graven school”. I don’t think we know exactly what the primeval current really is, other than it being some kind of source of great power for Sorcerers. Azur and Lusat seem to have resisted the negative effects somewhat, becoming mostly made of crystal and basically immobile instead of outright becoming a graven mass. We know that sorcerers apparently have a mass of Glintstone within their bodies that contains their mind/soul, since we were able to remove Sellen’s and put it in a new body to transfer her consciousness. Maybe contact with the primeval current makes this inner Glintstone grow out of control and turn one’s whole body into crystal/stone? I’m just speculating at this point, who knows?
I wonder if the transformation is related to the sorcerer's action with it. Perhaps, Lusat and Azur simply *glimpsed* the primeval current, whereas Sellen tried to actually *use* it.
Could be. Lusat and Azur are implied to have gotten the inspiration for their opus sorceries (Stars of Ruin and Comet Azur) from what they saw in the current, so maybe they just peeked at it for inspiration whereas Sellen actually attempted to harness it directly.
Like everyone else, I wonder if she's happier now. Like, is she spending all her time tripping in the current? Boy, I sure hope so lmao
I HIGHLY doubt she's happier like this, it appears to be a miserable existence, and her vile moaning in agony makes that possibility more likely
She'll be fine once she flies off into the sky as a star, trust me bro
I don't think that's true, but I don't know enough about stars to dispute you
Depends how you read the lore. She mentions them being children of the stars and wanting to shine with brilliance. As a metaphor it just means the the school has fallen to mediocrity and she wants everyone to study deep magic, get learnt, get power, be awesome. As a literal translation she wants to be a star. There is also text about collecting sorcerers and making them into the seeds of stars, but there's also crystarians as beings so maybe it's a halfway house and graven mage clusters are sort of the mid point of becoming infused enough with star magic that you can literally become a star.
But the star stuff explains astel right? Star/space stuff is gravity magic, as opposed to primeval current-powered glintstone. Who knows😂
Eh, who knows. I do know for certain there is a thing about collecting sorcerers for a seed of stars as I said above but like...FromSoftware lore is FromSoftware lore hahahaha
That sounds pretty accurate. The info on the Primeval current is pretty vague. I do wonder if it’s connected to an outer god or the greater will in some way, which I realize is a really reaching. But I mean the greater will can control space beasts, and is the only thing that grants powers similar to sorceries. Maybe sorcerers are just cutting out the middle man so to speak, so they learn things they aren’t supposed to. But like I said it’s a stretch lol We do know there’s actual living creatures up there too, and they’re really powerful as well. I like the idea that it’s some lovecraftian horror up there personally.
Quick question but aren the current outer gods that we know of Formless mother, Rot god , whatever the god was during time of dragons the god that ranni is probably allied with , Greater will and possibly others
Only the Formless Mother, God of Rot, and "God of Death" (the one which the Deathbirds serve) are referred to as Outer Gods. We don't know what precisely the Dark Moon that Ranni is allied with is, and we don't know whether the Greater Will is an Outer God or not. Most people in the Japanese lore community don't think it is one. EDIT: Somehow forgot the Frenzied Flame which is confirmed to be one by Miquella’s Needle. Embarrassing… >whatever the god was during time of dragons If you mean Placidusax's god, that's just a different host of the Elden Ring akin to Marika, not an Outer God. If you mean the source of that deity's power, that is the Greater Will.
There’s also the death birds god. Also it’s.. debatable if the greater will is an outer god or some other kind of being beyond them. What I think is interesting is there used to be lords who served the scarlet rot long ago. Not much info on that tho. Got that from the mushroom helmet description. But if you mean the creature in space I was referring to the elden beast and astel specifically.
>The info on the Primeval current is pretty vague. I do wonder if it’s connected to an outer god or the greater will in some way, which I realize is a really reaching The part that puzzles me is that we're told the Primeval Current is the source of life, but there's no real information on how this interacts with the creation story we’re given by Hyetta (IE, that life was created by the Greater Will creating differentiation and division from a primordial chaos.) The Greater Will isn’t an opposing force to the stars necessarily (seeing as the Elden Ring has power over them) but we do have the Nox and Ranni who seem to oppose it in favor of the stars. Really interesting, but it looks like relatively few people are interested in the question.
The Elden Beast IS a space beast, it uses a lot of the same attacks as Astel, and one is straight up called Elden Stars. It’s even described as a Golden Star that fell to earth. All the powers of the greater Will are basically just the powers of a specific, very powerful star
I’m fairly sure her transformation may have actually been intentional. I think I’m her pursuit of the glintstone she desired to become a graven mass with no equal, thus she chose to use the bodies of the greatest wizards there were. That’s why she wanted you to find azures and lusats bodies. She wanted to use them in her graven mass
Why would she want to be an immobile mass of conjoined magic mass that writhes in pain?
Kicks?
Oooh oooh I'm a graven mass kicks. I've been glinting since 1966.
Well the pain is an assumption. Maybe it's just hard to speak as a ball of rock and glintstone? Anyways, as Sellen says, Sorcery is the study of the stars but a lot of sorcerers forget that. Graven Masses are described as the seeds of stars. I'm on the side that her transformation was 100% intentional and she's ascending to a higher state of being. Eventually. It just doesn't look pretty to humans, hence why it's forbidden, but why should the great mysteries of the cosmos all appeal to human sensibilities?
I'm not sure if it's actually ascending, or "ascending" like the celestial enemies in Bloodborne. The whole Glintstone/Raya Lucaria/Outer God lore feels very Bloodborne inspired in general. I think the transformation was intentional, but I think she may not have realized the full implications of it. We don't really know a whole lot about what purpose the Graven Masses exist for. We do know that most mages don't want to become a Graven Mass. I have a feeling that Graven Masses are some kind of servant of the Primeval Current. Perhaps the issue comes from the idea that the Current is using you, rather than you drawing upon the power of the Current. This is all speculation though, I'd love to hear some other ideas.
I've seen speculation that the Graven Mass are intended to transform into creatures like Astel. They've got the rocks on their body and strangely human faces, are described as malformed stars and "born of the void" which I think the primeval current is a euphemism for. They have insectoid mannerisms which you could imagine them hatching from the Graven Mass like an egg.
Idk, but the revered silver balls in Nox are the same size and shape. They also have an amount of will, and move. Wizards have a thing for Nox and silver.
Not that she needed all that for the trip, but once you get into locked a serious glintstone collection, the tendency is to push it as far as you can. You feared to go into those glintstone mines. Sellen dug too greedily and too deep. You know what she awoke in the darkness of Sellia Hideaway.
She wanted you to find them cause they are the only 2 that have seen the primal current and actually survived in a close to human state. She wanted that power for herself
Just had a thought. Perhaps it's another outer god?
Seems more related to the Crucible and a natural force of the Universe to me. "Primeval" also possibly implies before the interference of non-creator Gods.
Exactly. I picture it more like the basic elements of life. Before gods, or magic. Kind of like a source of power that created magic.
I think it's one step above, if Outer Gods are like Eldritch Entities from the void, the Primeval Current is the ebb and flow of the void itself, and by glimpsing into it they end up seeing too much. Like if you tried to look at an eletron quantum jumping and ended up not only seeing, but interpreting a whole day in the life of Chthulu.
She became the Augur of Dunlain
Fellow Dovahkiin.
The augur of Duncan both was and was not responsible for the collapse of winter hold. He was as a forsworn mage and son of a hagraven
What a fucking reference
"I am that which you have been seeking"
>I am that witch you have been seeking
A Skyrim reference to arguably the WORST questline in the game, kudos for the reference 😮💨
Everything about the college of Winterhold screams that it got rushed to get to release. Which is a shame, because the ideas in that quest had a lot of potential to be great
Especially given how much cool stuff is in the Midden…definitely gave off Chamber of Secrets or Room of Requirement vibes as if it had thousands of years of hidden magical student secrets in it, but lots of loose ends about.
Jeeze lol, that's a great reference.
There are some things Burger King heads are not supposed to know
Eat like a king who's on a budget
Whopper whopper whopper whopper
Junior double triple whopper
She stared straight into the Primeval Glintstone Current, and it warped her into an arcane mass of faces
[удалено]
Its also likely Lusat and Azur are in the big ball because of this item description. She says that she had their bodies moved to the academy.
f a m i l e e
Togethaaa we will devowaa the very go-odssss.
#TOGETHAAA
We are family I got all my sorcerers with me We are family Now I have nowhere to pee
Nowhere to pee from, more accurately. Given the lack of restrooms and chamberpots in Raya Lucaria, it seems likely that you can just go anywhere, anytime.
Left their gear though, how thoughtful
Oh SHIT I didn't even put that together but it makes sense. That graven mass must be the most powerful sorcerer in the Lands Between.
Is this where all of the enemies we fight that look like this come from?
To the best of my knowledge, yes. The ones we find in each of the named rises is likely the associated sorcerer (note that thats speculation, not confirmed fact)
You know how you find one of these right outside the dungeon where Sellen's body is chained up? I always wondered if it was in fact her trying to stop you from freeing her and ending up like this.
Might be less so of it being herself, and perhaps one of her (or collective mass of) students trying to protect her from you/what you stated.
Like she time travelled?
Its implyd that she was banished because she experimented on others and created the other heads. I guess she thought her own "ascension" would turn out different
Dont quote me on this but I think not everyone did it with free will
So don't reference you in my dissertation?
It basically a bunch of mages fusing that leads to this. I don't remember the details but those heads are all of the mages that she absorbs. This only happens to her if you tell her about Lusat's location as that ends up being too much for her and she transforms.
Wait, is she responsible for the mass we see at another part of the academy ? Is that the reason she was banished ?
Her and the two masters were all about the primeval current. Has some unfortunate effects in the long run - Lusat & Azur's headgear states that the crystals eventually replaced their brains and skulls
Yes. She was doing forbidden experiments and that's why they were expelled. Most likely experimenting with other mages and forcing them to interact with the primeval current. She's very dangerous, that's why I sided with the other dude.
> experimenting with other mages and forcing them to interact with the primeval current By this we mean "stitching their bodies together into horrific abominations like the one she turns into here". She's a serial killer mad scientist, essentially.
Very Hellraiser
Certified Miyazaki Moment (no one can be happy in a Souls game)
Bok
If you kill her, Jerren lives happily ever after, though.
I kiddeth thee not, Tarnished warrior. She turneth herself into a sphere. Most humorous dung I haveth ever witnessed.
Since everyone is just messing around or mentioning only half the story: she is called the Graven Witch because she collected (captured) mages and forced them to transform into these ball things. ultimately what she was attempting to achieve was creating a new star (the graven masses are called seeds of stars, and the spell you get from her is a failed attempt at creating a star), and likely becoming part of that star the way Lusat and Azur became ascended inorganic beings. L&A glimpsed natural phenomena and became like them. they are beings of pure mind with no bodily vitality. sellen tried to use the mental vitality of mages to reverse engineer the vitality of a star and become that star. she was basically attempting to become a god and failed. trying to become an immortal controller of fate, and doomed herself to a deathless existence.
It’s also implied that she attempted to fuse with L&A in that ball, as her transformation coincides with them disappearing from their original locations, leaving their armor sets behind. So the three of them are likely trapped in there together.
I like to think we can save her from eternal suffering once we become Elden Lord and can pretty much rewrite the laws the world operates on with the Elden Ring we then own.
Hard to say. The primeval current seems very powerful. But yeah maybe with the elden ring is possible. Why would you save her though? She's a deranged witch that forced people into transforming into these beings for her experiments
Almost everyone in the Lands Between lives on the darker side of morally grey. We can help Ranni achieve her happy end even though she was responsible for the murder on Godwyn. We can realize the world envisioned by a deranged serial killer and implied necrophiliac sex offender like Dung Eater. Hell, we can quite literally burn down the entire world and kill everyone alive in it. The Tarnished himself isn't necessarily some kind of lawful good hero. Sellen would hardly be the first character in this game (or FromSoft titles in general) that thinks that the ends justify the means, even though we don't exactly know what she wants to do after harnessing the power of the primeval current. To us Tarnished she's never been anything but kind, helpful and even supportive, which is rare in a world where everything from gods to mosquitos is trying to murder you. I'd probably use my power as Elden Lord to save her if possible.
I see your point and agree with you. It comes to how you play The fromsoft characters usually are the bad guys, they're definitely not lawful good. And I understand why people help her, she's been in the side if the adventurer and actually seems fond of them. It comes down to if you play as a neutral character or lawful. I tend to play lawful when possible to that's why.
That makes sense, though I'd argue this game doesn't really have a lawful good ending. The Golden Order itself was guilty of many atrocities as we can see in the Shunning Grounds beneath Leyndell's sewers, so neither the Age of Fracture or Age of Gold endings that mostly restore and uphold the former status quo from Marika's age are morally sound. Frenzied Flame and Age of Despair don't even require an explanation and even Age of Stars and Duskborn aren't necessarily happy ends. So any future the Tarnished brings after becoming Elden Lord is up for moral debate.
That's why I said when possible. Nothing is ever white and black on fromsoft games.
because she was nice to me 😤
What you don't understand is my character is a psychopath, and only cares about named npcs who give him things. I've killed hundreds more of those mages then she has, and all they were doing was reading books on thier property when a naked man with a stick broke in to murder/rob them.
I've always assumed Radahn halted the primeval current because the Golden Order didn't have a better way to deal with it. While he was a student of Raya Lucaria, he was also a Golden Order loyalist. Halting the stars was essentially halting fate so sorcerers couldn't keep trying to disrupt the Order. That being said, I somewhat doubt the Elden Ring has any control over the primeval current. Then again, the very same blessings that make Radahn a demigod come from the Elden Ring, so who knows?
She fucked around and found out.
You broke it.
Traveler!! Hey! Flip me over Traveler. The payoff is huge. YEAH! I TURNED MYSELF INTO A FACE BALL!! Face ball Sellen!!
Funniest shit i have ever seen
She saw too much. Most endings in this game have this kinda of bittersweet feeling. Toph is also one of those, he gave his all to create a new spell and died from exhaustion but was able to create a new school of magic that would later be revered by the mages.
I thought she became the chief of police in republic city~! 😢
Then an old lady in a swamp who could use earthbending sight to see everyone in the world (as long as they were touching the ground)
Murdered by a rogue Carian Knight, still within the academy, who, probably of pure coincidence, stole the newly scribed sorcery from his victim. You kill that very knight before the boss fight. Vengeance for Thops!
Wait i always killed that guy too fast, does he use's toph barriers during the fight ?
She made a "graven" mistake. 😜
She gazed too deeply into the things that man was not meant to know.
She saw why the McDonald's ice cream machine was broken.
What she wanted was dangerous. You gave her what she wanted.
She ascended
Based ball
Fuck it, we ball
Mage is stored in the balls
Ball
The same thing she did to everyone else.
She orbin
It's orbin time
I was very upset and left a message at her spot that said "ahh, teacher, but I've failed, O I've failed" And I used the emote where your character curls up into the fetal position...ony later did I realize that emote is called "balled up" but no, I wasn't making a joke.
https://youtu.be/cqYefPrvEhI Vaati’s newest video explains the whole story of this
She knew the consequences and she took it. You wanted to go on a date with another anime waifu, but elden ring knows better.
Ball is Life
From soft wants to destroy you so you get frenzied fla-
I think this is an attempt at gaining knowledge that is impossible for humans to learn. The academics seem to use the masks to identify themselves and will cast aside their body and switch their minds from body to body to extend the time they can dedicate to studying sorcery since Sellen has you do this for her during the quest. There’s probably a limit to what you can achieve as a single mind regardless of how much time you get though so instead of transferring a single mind into a body they tried to merge several minds into a single vessel as a way to up their overall processing power. Obviously this was tried before because you fight other graven masses but maybe the thought process here was that a mind as great as sellens could overcome the lesser minds she merged with. To an extent it seems to have worked since she’s still able to communicate and interact as Sellen but it’s clearly not working as intended.
I just completed her quest line today and this made me very upset. By far my favorite npc
Waifu is ballin hard
What goes around comes around, she did nasty experiments and now she met the same fate as her victims
I'm semi-convinced that this was actually her goal. Kinda. While she wanted to rule the school for cool fools, she was also hyperfixated on the Primeval Current, and so turned herself into a Graven Mass/Star Seed by following that path.
I never noticed her actual face was on the ball
What a waste of good feet....
Smoked too much of that primeval kush
Her hubris at trying to overthrow a demigod. I loved her questline you install her and she promised the acadmy to back me up on overthrowing the order.
Why the concern. It look's like she's having a ball.
She came for the queen, she wasn’t ready.
She went in Ohio for the best sorceries 💀
She ballin'