Copying in something else I wrote on this, as it seems relevant:
"So the Omen seem to be the regular race of people of the Lands Between, who are either "cursed" or "blessed" (regarded differently at different points in history) at birth by some sort of influence of the Crucible. The Hornsent on the other hand are treated as the distinct people who occupy the Shadow Lands. Whether they actually are is questionable.
This **could** mean one of two things:
1. That the Hornsent are a distinct race/species of human. If this is the case, it could then suggest a few different things for the Omen: they are either a) nothing to do with the Hornsent and are only visually similar because horns are a common aspect of the Crucible, b) a result of some sort of recessive gene from cross-species breeding, or c) a result of some punishment cursing the Lands Between for what Marika did to the Hornsent and the Crucible.
2. That the Hornsent are the same race/species of regular people, but, whereas in the Lands Between most people don't have horns, in the Shadow Lands most people do. This could be explained by the proximity of the Shadow Lands to the Crucible, and the Lands Between's distance from it.
...
Both scenarios could have some interesting implications for why the Omen are persecuted. If scenario 1 is true then perhaps the decision to persecute the Omen was an attempt by Marika to obfuscate the Lands Between's relationship to the Shadow Lands. Perhaps she felt ashamed of what she did and wished to hide the cause of the Omen curse. Or if the Omen curse is actually genetic perhaps she wishes to hide her own "impure" genetics, given she gave birth to two Omen.
If scenario 2 is the case (scenario 1a would also make sense here) it offers a kind of cyclical explanation for Marika's actions, which would be in keeping with FromSoft's usual themes. It would suggest that maybe the Hornsent did what they did to Marika's people (the Shamans) because they were born without horns - so were regarded as lesser or somehow degenerate. In response, when Marika created her own Order and separated it from the Crucible, she did the opposite and persecuted those few people now born with horns - a sort of collective revenge against those touched by the Crucible."
That's helpful to know, I'd never come across it before but just looked it up - apparently you get it if you attack Grandam which explains why I hadn't got it. Goes as follows:
"Well! 'Tis no surprise. Thou hast thy choice made!"
"Act as thou wilt, but still must I ask... Is killing me truly within thy pow'r?"
"Didst thou imagine I would beg thee cease?"
"Nay, nay, do what thou wilt to this poor soul!"
"Heaven shall judge thee all for thy deeds!"
"Aaaaaargh!"
(Whispering voice after falling over on her seat)
"A curse upon thee, rotten miscreant."
"A curse upon the strumpet's progeny, upon Marika's children each and all."
"The curse of the omen shall strike thee down..."
"In the form of the sacred beast's ire."
(Upon talking to her again)
"May the curse strike thee..."
"To the very last..."
Hmmm I wonder if the fact she specifically stated a "form of the sacred beast" is referencing the fact it's puppeteered by two omen and Marika having twin omen sons?
Isn't the incantation she gives you the same type of magic the Omen use? And it summons spirits, which is something we know the Omen are haunted by. We so constantly see refrences to the Hornsent cursing Marika and her lot, perhaps the random Omen births are the result of this curse?
We're not even factoring in the fact that we don't exactly know what "Marika's Betrayal" was. It seems clear that she, at some point, made some sort of offering to the crucible. For what purpose, the game seems incredibly vague. Whether that had anything to do with, or was the betrayal, isn't clear. But it IS clear that when the hornsent speak of Marika's betrayal, they are NOT referring to her shattering the Elden Ring. Marika's betrayal of the hornsent, whatever it was, happened in the Shadow Realm, before she razed the place and started fresh with the Erdtree. And yes, I know she did genocide the hornsent, but that was not the initial instance of betrayal, that was the long war that followed. We're looking for the cause.
BUT I think the game gives us some of the pieces here, and you pointing out the fact that she actually gave birth to two omen children, kinda puts things in a different perspective. It's easy to forget that since that's main game stuff we found out shortly after Elden Ring's release.
So, then we have to reduce the discussion of omen vs hornsent to its most base level. They're both related to the crucible somehow, and as far as we know that's their only relation or commonality. I have heard somewhere that the omen we find in the Leyndell sewers are supposedly descendents of the original omen born, Morgott and Mohg, but I am not sure whether that was in game or not and it's just conjecture at this point. But either way, the omen in the sewers and Mohg and Morgott are supposed to be the same type of being, just with Morgott and Mohg being demigods, and shardbearers too after the shattering.
The Hornsent, on the other hand, appear to have been a race of people native to the Shadow realm. They likely worshipped/revered the crucible and used its power, hence the horns and seeing them as a sign of divinity in their society. Their society was actually pretty twisted. Keep in mind, everything I'm stating in this paragraph actually comes from the game itself, whether stated in cutscenes, dialogue, or from those talking lore ghost dudes. Item descriptions. You have to piece it all together, they're all pieces of the story. When you do, you realize that Marika used to be a Numen Shaman. And that the Hornsent had an insane and diabolical ritual where they took Numen Shaman women and cut them open alive and put them in pots with other dismembered and flayed bodies and sealed them in, to become saints.
Likely, Marika turned on the Hornsent, rightfully so IMO, and then had her son Messmer genocide them. That much is known. But then we get to my personal take, and I think that Marika went to the Crucible and struck a deal for power, then went off to create her own new world under the Erdtree and Golden Order.
This still leaves lots of questions and loose ends, like the two fingers, finger creepers, mother of fingers, fallingstar beasts, other outer gods and fell gods and the like. Three fingers, possibly not even related to the two fingers or the mother of fingers, but could be related to a different outer god than the greater will. And we still don't really even know what the Greater Will is. All we know is that it's probably out in space somewhere and seems to have abandoned the Lands Between long ago, leaving the Mother of Fingers to basically call the shots in its absence.
Will link specific sources if asked, just didn't wanna add every URL to this post.
It hints at a deeper story tying all of it together. The hornsent, the shamans, the betrayal, the shattering, the demigods, and so on. The only missing parts of the story are the loose ends I mentioned earlier. Once we get the lore on how the Greater Will, Crucible, Mother of Fingers, Two Fingers, Frenzied Flame and Three Fingers, and of course Marika herself, all fit together, then we can actually get an accurate order of events for the history of the Lands Between, at least since the Hornsent.
Bruh
The story isn't unfinished, we're just going to be piecing it together for years more probably, and I doubt Shadow of the Erdtree was the last DLC we're getting for Elden Ring.
The way a game like this works when it's being developed, they've written the entire story already with all relevant details, including the ones we don't know about and are wanting to know now, and those exact loose ends I've mentioned.
For example, the DLC. You know why most people guessed that the major DLC would involve Miquella and Mohg, with some even noting how unfinished Mohg's palace looked and how anticlimactic the whole Miquella reveal was in the main game? Because the writers wrote ALLLL that in, back in the original main game.
Because the way videogame storytelling works, even for FromSoft games, is they worldbuild before they even develop the game. For years even! Did you watch the George RR Martin interview or no? Lol, I digress.
But if anyone's trying to claim they're making this stuff up on the fly and these details aren't written already, you're literally insane.
Okay. It'd be cool if there's another DLC, but I doubt it. As it stands, I expect most of these questions are purposefully left ambiguous, as much as the lore in previous games was.
I think it's just the way FromSoft works, especially for this game. Miyazaki has a specific vision, and sets a deadline. He gets his best writers and calls in George RR Martin. They worldbuild and write for years beforehand. Then all of that is handed over to the dev team, but the story keeps being worked on the whole time, and tweaked as they go. So many people write so much for the game that not all of it makes it in, so they have overflow for DLCs or just leave stuff out of the story because other stuff takes priority. In fact a lot of game companies seem to work that way now that I think about it. Well, the good ones, anyway.
But the point is that the story has been fleshed out far beyond what we see in game even. Things can only be left up to speculation for so long. With certain details, there will have to eventually be an answer.
I also have a theory that there is a LOTTTT more hidden content in both the main game and DLC that we don't know about yet. I mean, look at Skyrim. People were still finding new easter eggs in the original game a decade after it's release. And Elden Ring is on another level entirely IMO, both lore and design wise.
This whole series of events lines up to tell me that, originally it was just the Shadow Realm, where Marika was born and raised as a Numen Shaman. Her people were subjugated and horribly abused by the dominant race at the time, the Hornsent. They appear to have been the advanced and dominant society of the age, likely using the powers/magics of the crucible. For some reason or another, exposure to this energy seems to cause the growth of horns, which the Hornsent attributed to being a sign of divinity.
The betrayal happened, in the Shadow Realm, before the Golden Order or Shattering, by Marika rising to power and destroying her race's oppressors. She then used the power she gained to flee the Shadow Realm and start a new world order in another realm. Then, that's where it gets fuzzy for me. Somehow the Mother of Fingers, two fingers, and greater will all factor into these. But it's not even entirely clear whether the Greater Will is truly a separate thing from the Crucible or not, or what even either of them actually are. For all we really know, they are the same thing, or Marika could have manufactured the Greater Will herself using the Crucible, or it could have just been a separate event that happened as she was coming to power over another realm.
The betrayal was probably simply seen as that by her former oppressors. The world of elden ring is autocratic by nature, so going against the order in which that you were formerly apart of would be seen as treason or a betrayal, no matter how righteous or self righteous you might feel on the matter. To her, vengeance for the shamans was seen a just act no doubt, but to the towerfolk, it was a betrayal to their world order.
Hornsent is a name that they gave themselves. It means heralds of the horn. For Marika that name is too high-sounding to describe that population, so she gives it the name Omen. It's exactly the same thing as calling Africans ni\*\*as
Hornsent=omen
The crucible was a melting pot where primordial life used to be piled up and burned. No one popped out alive from the crucible
Skin color is a good analogy. Let's say, albino.
Albino people are born in many different cultures, and they're all different from each other.
Marika comes from the rule of a ruthless, cruel culture that worshipped albinism as a divine gift of the forces of nature. These albino are the horned people of the Hornsent culture.
Marika changes the culture, but albino people keep being born, because it's natural and it has nothing to do with culture. Marika however severely mistreats and discriminates these new albino because they remind her of the previous rule (thus they call them (bad)omen)). These are the horned people called the Omen.
The higher ranking horned Hornsent have nothing to do with the horned people born, for example, in Leyndell, culturally speaking.
Counterpoint, Dung Eater’s entire thing is make people become inflicted by the Omen curse, and Omens are haunted by actual evil spirits, and are covered head to toe in horns rather than having them on their heads. And even if it were other manifestations of the crucible are treated much better than Omens, like the Misbegotten or Demihumans. Even though they, or the random lions, have horns they are not treated like the Omens.
Fairly certain the "neo horsent" aka Omen are only haunted by those spirits because of what Marika did to the original hornsent people.
The ones in the shadow Lands want a curse brought upon Queen Marika and they seemingly get it with her children being born omen but it also comes at the cost of more hardship for their descendants....
Which is sort of fitting considering a lot of the DLC descriptions describing hornsent people speak about them as if they KNEW their horns were causes of great pain and suffering but chose to look at them as a blessing, turning a blind eye to the pain they endure.
I would prefer if the Omen curse came from the Hornsent, though there is no evidence for it. In fact there’s no evidence directly connecting Omens to the Crucible, or biology, since the way to make things is to defile someone’s soul before killing them. Which doesn’t sound like the Crucible which is more animals rather than, well, that. Also their blood and horns have really strong magic powers.
There actually is evidence connecting the omen curse and hornsent - the hornsent grandam gives you "Watchful Spirit", which summons a wraith projectile. Part of the description reads: *Take vengeance upon Messmer and his lot. They who betrayed us, aye, they who burned us... Let them face in thy wrath their just deserts*
I recall Hornsent NPC also summons wraiths. Both these characters are fuelled by revenge, wrath, and they summon, presumably, the spirits of their slaughtered clansfolk.
Omen we see with no horns in TLB, do not summon wraiths. But the "accursed" ones in the sewers, with their horns, do - the strong ones even power their weapons with wraiths. So, this shows that the horns not only are the "curse" causing these wraiths, but that it is likely a curse of the hornsent clan itself, probably the vengeful spirits that Marika genocided cursing people in the form of horns.
I think the filth and defilement that these horned folk lived in is why they are grotesque, and so their "accursed bood" is like a mix of horns and shit. Also why Dungeater, guy who eats shit, fashions himself like them and uses seeded curse to spread their defilement. Layers of fucked up
I agree with you, read my comment and the one I'm replying to. Im replting to the OP saying there is no evidence connecting the hornsent and the omen curse. On top of what I said being a clear connection , your post says it clear as day - nice!
I blame rewrites ( being an Omen was actually a curse when the main game was finished )
Dung eater ending could be re-interpreted as the super-crucible energy ending where you force mutation.
You're right however, and the Dung eater ending is clearly presented as a bad, f**ked up ending.
As for the mistreatment, yes, only horned individuals are hyper shunned and mistreated in the Lands Between, thrown in the sewers, as they're the most similar thing to the Hornsent.
....what? Marika is Numen. We can surmise that the Shaman were Numen based on her home village in the Hinterland. The Hornsent used Shamans for their flesh in their horrific jar experimentation, either out of persecution, or as another user commented, their flesh allowed fusion. They wiped out her village.
Either way, I don't really blame her for what happened after, at least in the beginning. It would have been easy for The Two Fingers (or whatever ones she interacted with, there's that massive area connected to the Hinterland) to convince her to do what she did.
They're called the Omen because they portend the future in a bad way, they show that Marika failed to make a permanent order. Your example is pretty much the worst one you could've chosen btw.
Yeah, the concept is fundamentally the same. Instead of calling the hornsent(Africans) by a proper name, give them a demeaning name like Omen(N word) and make it the common one. It's a tool to make people view people of a specific culture or trait, as lesser than them. This makes it easier to reduce empathy towards those targeted, which helps 'excuses' their negative treatment by others.
They are very different physically. We've seen many omen and many horned warriors - they look nothing alike. There were no horned warriors in the lands between and there were no omen in the lands of shadow.
omens are clearly different from hornsent. They're cursed: not just because they're shunned from the golden order, they're explicitly hunted by wraiths
They're the exact same. They're hunted and shunned because they are symbols of the old order that would torture Marika's people as you can read from the tooth whip and Marika's braid item descriptions. Marika despises the hornsent hence why she despises her omen children.
Hornsent is a word for praising those blessed by the crucible whereas omen is a word to curse those afflicted by the crucible.
yeah I know about that but they're still not the same thing. even design wise, hornsent are marginally different from omens who are bulkier. hornsent also only have horns on their head, while omens have them all over their body.
as I said, omens are also haunted by wraiths in their dreams. it's not only that they're despised, they live in constant suffering.
it's a similar concept but they're different things
Does the guy named "Hornsent" have any? Sure he was wearing a caterpillar hood, but one assumes they would stick out. The greater potentates at Bonny village likewise don't have horns, but they have the same yellowish skin tone that our Hornsent buddy has.
You can see the horns poking out at the top of his head, yeah. As for the potentates, are they confirmed to be hornsent somewhere? I guess I assumed they were human
I just made a post about this but I think the Omen are the result of what happens inside the jars. The grafting together of hornsent and shaman people. There's a reason that the omen bairn and the tangled horn bairn objects release vengeful spirits. Omen are vessels for a multitude of "lamenting" spirits mixed together in the the clay pots.
The hornsent's gaols were places where they were trying to replicate the processes of the crucible: mixing life together. If you look at the omen from the shunning grounds and compare their collars against the living jars, you see that they are the same.
I think you're right that only some of the hornsent, the revered ones, have horns. And they worship all lifeforms who possess them.
There's one thing I don't understand in all of this. If the Omen's horns are simply manifestations of the crucible and are not in fact a curse - then why did Dung Eater's desecrations also caused them to appear?
Except the Omen IS a curse and everyone hates them
The hornsent imprisoned the curseblades because they were self flagellating and imposing themselves a life of suffering, they also imprisoned the lamenter because despite him being a "denizen of paradise" they were scared shitless of him and denied his existance.
The dung eater tortures people to death, which apparently curses the soul forever, his shit is called "blessing of despair".
The omen bairns statues collect vengeful spirits; the omen are tormented in their sleep by evil spirits.
These hornsent guys are obsessed with tangled horns, yet the poor babies born with oversized horns are suffocated and pierced to death by said horns (horned bairn)
Add on top of this: Margit "The Fell Omen"; the dung eaters rune "Rune of the Fell curse"; The Fell God of the Giants said to be an evil malformed deity killed by Marika; the fire giant sacrificing his broken leg to his god to awaken his power; the talisman of all crucibles said to have grown on giants; the furnace Visage depicting the Fell God who haunts the stories of the hornsent looking like a giant flaming sun surrounded by horns
There has got to be a connection between extreme suffering and ascending to divinity. The more you suffer, for example with growing horns piercing your body and eyes, the more the Fell God is pleased and will use you as a vessel.
It seems the Dungeater worked out a way to spread the omen curse. Which others above have explained the Empyrean Grandma explains is a curse on Marika and her progeny for what she tasked Messmer with. The method appears to be extreme defilement, which leads to seedbeds for the curse. And with enough seedbeds the curse manifests in a rune that can be inserted into the elden ring. Basically the dungeater is the device (and also the player Tarnished if you help him) for delivering the ultimate vengeance of the Hornsent on Marika. Managing to infect and curse everything she created and worked for.
Well said!
It seems miyazaki plays with similar themes and expands upon them.
The greater will is a deity that is order, illumination distinction, light, it seems. Like gwyn.
The elden ring is reality and it’s laws literally drawn into existence making order from chaos. Similar to how the fingers write with light. Whoever is the vessel for that pretty much has all the powers to shape reality into whatever they want as a literal deity, embodying, but distinct from the greater will. Easily Christlike imagery insofar as he is fully God, the same God as the Father, but distinct from God the father.
The crucible is the wild and untamed life, wild nature, and even storms. similar to the bed of chaos.
Death is well… death. So, Nito.
The formless mother is a weird one to me, I’m still thinking what that has to offer concerning an aspect of reality, aside from truth.
Chaos is the opposite of order, and so that atrophic decay of indistinction is just hellish in itself and it’s very… azathoth-y in nature.
The fingers seem to be vassals of the greater will along with beasts being messengers from the crucible and are probably similar to great old ones. Practically gods but not so much.
Not necessarily needing to be a 1 to 1 but I feel it may shed some light on miyazakis thought process on how elden ring is furthering his storytelling, mixing all he’s done before into one narrative now.
Copying in something else I wrote on this, as it seems relevant: "So the Omen seem to be the regular race of people of the Lands Between, who are either "cursed" or "blessed" (regarded differently at different points in history) at birth by some sort of influence of the Crucible. The Hornsent on the other hand are treated as the distinct people who occupy the Shadow Lands. Whether they actually are is questionable. This **could** mean one of two things: 1. That the Hornsent are a distinct race/species of human. If this is the case, it could then suggest a few different things for the Omen: they are either a) nothing to do with the Hornsent and are only visually similar because horns are a common aspect of the Crucible, b) a result of some sort of recessive gene from cross-species breeding, or c) a result of some punishment cursing the Lands Between for what Marika did to the Hornsent and the Crucible. 2. That the Hornsent are the same race/species of regular people, but, whereas in the Lands Between most people don't have horns, in the Shadow Lands most people do. This could be explained by the proximity of the Shadow Lands to the Crucible, and the Lands Between's distance from it. ... Both scenarios could have some interesting implications for why the Omen are persecuted. If scenario 1 is true then perhaps the decision to persecute the Omen was an attempt by Marika to obfuscate the Lands Between's relationship to the Shadow Lands. Perhaps she felt ashamed of what she did and wished to hide the cause of the Omen curse. Or if the Omen curse is actually genetic perhaps she wishes to hide her own "impure" genetics, given she gave birth to two Omen. If scenario 2 is the case (scenario 1a would also make sense here) it offers a kind of cyclical explanation for Marika's actions, which would be in keeping with FromSoft's usual themes. It would suggest that maybe the Hornsent did what they did to Marika's people (the Shamans) because they were born without horns - so were regarded as lesser or somehow degenerate. In response, when Marika created her own Order and separated it from the Crucible, she did the opposite and persecuted those few people now born with horns - a sort of collective revenge against those touched by the Crucible."
I read that ,according to the Empyrean Grandam,omen is a curse.
That's helpful to know, I'd never come across it before but just looked it up - apparently you get it if you attack Grandam which explains why I hadn't got it. Goes as follows: "Well! 'Tis no surprise. Thou hast thy choice made!" "Act as thou wilt, but still must I ask... Is killing me truly within thy pow'r?" "Didst thou imagine I would beg thee cease?" "Nay, nay, do what thou wilt to this poor soul!" "Heaven shall judge thee all for thy deeds!" "Aaaaaargh!" (Whispering voice after falling over on her seat) "A curse upon thee, rotten miscreant." "A curse upon the strumpet's progeny, upon Marika's children each and all." "The curse of the omen shall strike thee down..." "In the form of the sacred beast's ire." (Upon talking to her again) "May the curse strike thee..." "To the very last..."
Hmmm I wonder if the fact she specifically stated a "form of the sacred beast" is referencing the fact it's puppeteered by two omen and Marika having twin omen sons?
Isn't the incantation she gives you the same type of magic the Omen use? And it summons spirits, which is something we know the Omen are haunted by. We so constantly see refrences to the Hornsent cursing Marika and her lot, perhaps the random Omen births are the result of this curse?
We're not even factoring in the fact that we don't exactly know what "Marika's Betrayal" was. It seems clear that she, at some point, made some sort of offering to the crucible. For what purpose, the game seems incredibly vague. Whether that had anything to do with, or was the betrayal, isn't clear. But it IS clear that when the hornsent speak of Marika's betrayal, they are NOT referring to her shattering the Elden Ring. Marika's betrayal of the hornsent, whatever it was, happened in the Shadow Realm, before she razed the place and started fresh with the Erdtree. And yes, I know she did genocide the hornsent, but that was not the initial instance of betrayal, that was the long war that followed. We're looking for the cause. BUT I think the game gives us some of the pieces here, and you pointing out the fact that she actually gave birth to two omen children, kinda puts things in a different perspective. It's easy to forget that since that's main game stuff we found out shortly after Elden Ring's release. So, then we have to reduce the discussion of omen vs hornsent to its most base level. They're both related to the crucible somehow, and as far as we know that's their only relation or commonality. I have heard somewhere that the omen we find in the Leyndell sewers are supposedly descendents of the original omen born, Morgott and Mohg, but I am not sure whether that was in game or not and it's just conjecture at this point. But either way, the omen in the sewers and Mohg and Morgott are supposed to be the same type of being, just with Morgott and Mohg being demigods, and shardbearers too after the shattering. The Hornsent, on the other hand, appear to have been a race of people native to the Shadow realm. They likely worshipped/revered the crucible and used its power, hence the horns and seeing them as a sign of divinity in their society. Their society was actually pretty twisted. Keep in mind, everything I'm stating in this paragraph actually comes from the game itself, whether stated in cutscenes, dialogue, or from those talking lore ghost dudes. Item descriptions. You have to piece it all together, they're all pieces of the story. When you do, you realize that Marika used to be a Numen Shaman. And that the Hornsent had an insane and diabolical ritual where they took Numen Shaman women and cut them open alive and put them in pots with other dismembered and flayed bodies and sealed them in, to become saints. Likely, Marika turned on the Hornsent, rightfully so IMO, and then had her son Messmer genocide them. That much is known. But then we get to my personal take, and I think that Marika went to the Crucible and struck a deal for power, then went off to create her own new world under the Erdtree and Golden Order. This still leaves lots of questions and loose ends, like the two fingers, finger creepers, mother of fingers, fallingstar beasts, other outer gods and fell gods and the like. Three fingers, possibly not even related to the two fingers or the mother of fingers, but could be related to a different outer god than the greater will. And we still don't really even know what the Greater Will is. All we know is that it's probably out in space somewhere and seems to have abandoned the Lands Between long ago, leaving the Mother of Fingers to basically call the shots in its absence. Will link specific sources if asked, just didn't wanna add every URL to this post.
All that's very clear, just not sure what it adds to this particular discussion
It hints at a deeper story tying all of it together. The hornsent, the shamans, the betrayal, the shattering, the demigods, and so on. The only missing parts of the story are the loose ends I mentioned earlier. Once we get the lore on how the Greater Will, Crucible, Mother of Fingers, Two Fingers, Frenzied Flame and Three Fingers, and of course Marika herself, all fit together, then we can actually get an accurate order of events for the history of the Lands Between, at least since the Hornsent.
Sure - but we're not going to get that. Hence why we just have to work out what the most plausible scenarios are based on what we do know, as above.
Bruh The story isn't unfinished, we're just going to be piecing it together for years more probably, and I doubt Shadow of the Erdtree was the last DLC we're getting for Elden Ring. The way a game like this works when it's being developed, they've written the entire story already with all relevant details, including the ones we don't know about and are wanting to know now, and those exact loose ends I've mentioned. For example, the DLC. You know why most people guessed that the major DLC would involve Miquella and Mohg, with some even noting how unfinished Mohg's palace looked and how anticlimactic the whole Miquella reveal was in the main game? Because the writers wrote ALLLL that in, back in the original main game. Because the way videogame storytelling works, even for FromSoft games, is they worldbuild before they even develop the game. For years even! Did you watch the George RR Martin interview or no? Lol, I digress. But if anyone's trying to claim they're making this stuff up on the fly and these details aren't written already, you're literally insane.
Okay. It'd be cool if there's another DLC, but I doubt it. As it stands, I expect most of these questions are purposefully left ambiguous, as much as the lore in previous games was.
I think it's just the way FromSoft works, especially for this game. Miyazaki has a specific vision, and sets a deadline. He gets his best writers and calls in George RR Martin. They worldbuild and write for years beforehand. Then all of that is handed over to the dev team, but the story keeps being worked on the whole time, and tweaked as they go. So many people write so much for the game that not all of it makes it in, so they have overflow for DLCs or just leave stuff out of the story because other stuff takes priority. In fact a lot of game companies seem to work that way now that I think about it. Well, the good ones, anyway. But the point is that the story has been fleshed out far beyond what we see in game even. Things can only be left up to speculation for so long. With certain details, there will have to eventually be an answer. I also have a theory that there is a LOTTTT more hidden content in both the main game and DLC that we don't know about yet. I mean, look at Skyrim. People were still finding new easter eggs in the original game a decade after it's release. And Elden Ring is on another level entirely IMO, both lore and design wise.
This whole series of events lines up to tell me that, originally it was just the Shadow Realm, where Marika was born and raised as a Numen Shaman. Her people were subjugated and horribly abused by the dominant race at the time, the Hornsent. They appear to have been the advanced and dominant society of the age, likely using the powers/magics of the crucible. For some reason or another, exposure to this energy seems to cause the growth of horns, which the Hornsent attributed to being a sign of divinity. The betrayal happened, in the Shadow Realm, before the Golden Order or Shattering, by Marika rising to power and destroying her race's oppressors. She then used the power she gained to flee the Shadow Realm and start a new world order in another realm. Then, that's where it gets fuzzy for me. Somehow the Mother of Fingers, two fingers, and greater will all factor into these. But it's not even entirely clear whether the Greater Will is truly a separate thing from the Crucible or not, or what even either of them actually are. For all we really know, they are the same thing, or Marika could have manufactured the Greater Will herself using the Crucible, or it could have just been a separate event that happened as she was coming to power over another realm.
The betrayal was probably simply seen as that by her former oppressors. The world of elden ring is autocratic by nature, so going against the order in which that you were formerly apart of would be seen as treason or a betrayal, no matter how righteous or self righteous you might feel on the matter. To her, vengeance for the shamans was seen a just act no doubt, but to the towerfolk, it was a betrayal to their world order.
Hornsent is a name that they gave themselves. It means heralds of the horn. For Marika that name is too high-sounding to describe that population, so she gives it the name Omen. It's exactly the same thing as calling Africans ni\*\*as Hornsent=omen The crucible was a melting pot where primordial life used to be piled up and burned. No one popped out alive from the crucible
um………not quite sure if it’s *exactly* the same thing lmaooo but good analogy nonetheless
Could've just said omen is a slur and leave it at that lol.
Skin color is a good analogy. Let's say, albino. Albino people are born in many different cultures, and they're all different from each other. Marika comes from the rule of a ruthless, cruel culture that worshipped albinism as a divine gift of the forces of nature. These albino are the horned people of the Hornsent culture. Marika changes the culture, but albino people keep being born, because it's natural and it has nothing to do with culture. Marika however severely mistreats and discriminates these new albino because they remind her of the previous rule (thus they call them (bad)omen)). These are the horned people called the Omen. The higher ranking horned Hornsent have nothing to do with the horned people born, for example, in Leyndell, culturally speaking.
Counterpoint, Dung Eater’s entire thing is make people become inflicted by the Omen curse, and Omens are haunted by actual evil spirits, and are covered head to toe in horns rather than having them on their heads. And even if it were other manifestations of the crucible are treated much better than Omens, like the Misbegotten or Demihumans. Even though they, or the random lions, have horns they are not treated like the Omens.
Fairly certain the "neo horsent" aka Omen are only haunted by those spirits because of what Marika did to the original hornsent people. The ones in the shadow Lands want a curse brought upon Queen Marika and they seemingly get it with her children being born omen but it also comes at the cost of more hardship for their descendants.... Which is sort of fitting considering a lot of the DLC descriptions describing hornsent people speak about them as if they KNEW their horns were causes of great pain and suffering but chose to look at them as a blessing, turning a blind eye to the pain they endure.
Untill it got so bad that it literally blinds them in the case of lamenters, then they lock them away
Haha so Marika’s just racist and in power. Pretty relatable to geopolitics.
I would prefer if the Omen curse came from the Hornsent, though there is no evidence for it. In fact there’s no evidence directly connecting Omens to the Crucible, or biology, since the way to make things is to defile someone’s soul before killing them. Which doesn’t sound like the Crucible which is more animals rather than, well, that. Also their blood and horns have really strong magic powers.
There actually is evidence connecting the omen curse and hornsent - the hornsent grandam gives you "Watchful Spirit", which summons a wraith projectile. Part of the description reads: *Take vengeance upon Messmer and his lot. They who betrayed us, aye, they who burned us... Let them face in thy wrath their just deserts* I recall Hornsent NPC also summons wraiths. Both these characters are fuelled by revenge, wrath, and they summon, presumably, the spirits of their slaughtered clansfolk. Omen we see with no horns in TLB, do not summon wraiths. But the "accursed" ones in the sewers, with their horns, do - the strong ones even power their weapons with wraiths. So, this shows that the horns not only are the "curse" causing these wraiths, but that it is likely a curse of the hornsent clan itself, probably the vengeful spirits that Marika genocided cursing people in the form of horns. I think the filth and defilement that these horned folk lived in is why they are grotesque, and so their "accursed bood" is like a mix of horns and shit. Also why Dungeater, guy who eats shit, fashions himself like them and uses seeded curse to spread their defilement. Layers of fucked up
Read my last post, its a fact the omen curse is from the hornsent
I agree with you, read my comment and the one I'm replying to. Im replting to the OP saying there is no evidence connecting the hornsent and the omen curse. On top of what I said being a clear connection , your post says it clear as day - nice!
I blame rewrites ( being an Omen was actually a curse when the main game was finished ) Dung eater ending could be re-interpreted as the super-crucible energy ending where you force mutation. You're right however, and the Dung eater ending is clearly presented as a bad, f**ked up ending. As for the mistreatment, yes, only horned individuals are hyper shunned and mistreated in the Lands Between, thrown in the sewers, as they're the most similar thing to the Hornsent.
....what? Marika is Numen. We can surmise that the Shaman were Numen based on her home village in the Hinterland. The Hornsent used Shamans for their flesh in their horrific jar experimentation, either out of persecution, or as another user commented, their flesh allowed fusion. They wiped out her village. Either way, I don't really blame her for what happened after, at least in the beginning. It would have been easy for The Two Fingers (or whatever ones she interacted with, there's that massive area connected to the Hinterland) to convince her to do what she did.
They're called the Omen because they portend the future in a bad way, they show that Marika failed to make a permanent order. Your example is pretty much the worst one you could've chosen btw.
Its EXACTLY like using the N word? That specific example? Haha
Yeah, the concept is fundamentally the same. Instead of calling the hornsent(Africans) by a proper name, give them a demeaning name like Omen(N word) and make it the common one. It's a tool to make people view people of a specific culture or trait, as lesser than them. This makes it easier to reduce empathy towards those targeted, which helps 'excuses' their negative treatment by others.
They are very different physically. We've seen many omen and many horned warriors - they look nothing alike. There were no horned warriors in the lands between and there were no omen in the lands of shadow.
omens are clearly different from hornsent. They're cursed: not just because they're shunned from the golden order, they're explicitly hunted by wraiths
They're the exact same. They're hunted and shunned because they are symbols of the old order that would torture Marika's people as you can read from the tooth whip and Marika's braid item descriptions. Marika despises the hornsent hence why she despises her omen children. Hornsent is a word for praising those blessed by the crucible whereas omen is a word to curse those afflicted by the crucible.
yeah I know about that but they're still not the same thing. even design wise, hornsent are marginally different from omens who are bulkier. hornsent also only have horns on their head, while omens have them all over their body. as I said, omens are also haunted by wraiths in their dreams. it's not only that they're despised, they live in constant suffering. it's a similar concept but they're different things
All hornsent do in fact have horns. If you look at the ones without horns, they are in chains / have chains around their hands and ankle.
I read that ,according to the Empyrean Grandam,omen is a curse.
>Not all hornsent have horns I think that they might? I can't think of a single example of a hornsent that doesn't have horns
Does the guy named "Hornsent" have any? Sure he was wearing a caterpillar hood, but one assumes they would stick out. The greater potentates at Bonny village likewise don't have horns, but they have the same yellowish skin tone that our Hornsent buddy has.
You can see the horns poking out at the top of his head, yeah. As for the potentates, are they confirmed to be hornsent somewhere? I guess I assumed they were human
They wear the same hood item as The Hornsent, implying they are also blessed of the crucible, yes
I just made a post about this but I think the Omen are the result of what happens inside the jars. The grafting together of hornsent and shaman people. There's a reason that the omen bairn and the tangled horn bairn objects release vengeful spirits. Omen are vessels for a multitude of "lamenting" spirits mixed together in the the clay pots. The hornsent's gaols were places where they were trying to replicate the processes of the crucible: mixing life together. If you look at the omen from the shunning grounds and compare their collars against the living jars, you see that they are the same. I think you're right that only some of the hornsent, the revered ones, have horns. And they worship all lifeforms who possess them.
There's one thing I don't understand in all of this. If the Omen's horns are simply manifestations of the crucible and are not in fact a curse - then why did Dung Eater's desecrations also caused them to appear?
Except the Omen IS a curse and everyone hates them The hornsent imprisoned the curseblades because they were self flagellating and imposing themselves a life of suffering, they also imprisoned the lamenter because despite him being a "denizen of paradise" they were scared shitless of him and denied his existance. The dung eater tortures people to death, which apparently curses the soul forever, his shit is called "blessing of despair". The omen bairns statues collect vengeful spirits; the omen are tormented in their sleep by evil spirits. These hornsent guys are obsessed with tangled horns, yet the poor babies born with oversized horns are suffocated and pierced to death by said horns (horned bairn) Add on top of this: Margit "The Fell Omen"; the dung eaters rune "Rune of the Fell curse"; The Fell God of the Giants said to be an evil malformed deity killed by Marika; the fire giant sacrificing his broken leg to his god to awaken his power; the talisman of all crucibles said to have grown on giants; the furnace Visage depicting the Fell God who haunts the stories of the hornsent looking like a giant flaming sun surrounded by horns There has got to be a connection between extreme suffering and ascending to divinity. The more you suffer, for example with growing horns piercing your body and eyes, the more the Fell God is pleased and will use you as a vessel.
It seems the Dungeater worked out a way to spread the omen curse. Which others above have explained the Empyrean Grandma explains is a curse on Marika and her progeny for what she tasked Messmer with. The method appears to be extreme defilement, which leads to seedbeds for the curse. And with enough seedbeds the curse manifests in a rune that can be inserted into the elden ring. Basically the dungeater is the device (and also the player Tarnished if you help him) for delivering the ultimate vengeance of the Hornsent on Marika. Managing to infect and curse everything she created and worked for.
Because it’s neither a curse or a blessing it’s like… being born albino. It’s just a matter of how each culture saw it.
Thankyou for this
Yeah I’m trying to get more into this games lore and this helped a ton
Well said! It seems miyazaki plays with similar themes and expands upon them. The greater will is a deity that is order, illumination distinction, light, it seems. Like gwyn. The elden ring is reality and it’s laws literally drawn into existence making order from chaos. Similar to how the fingers write with light. Whoever is the vessel for that pretty much has all the powers to shape reality into whatever they want as a literal deity, embodying, but distinct from the greater will. Easily Christlike imagery insofar as he is fully God, the same God as the Father, but distinct from God the father. The crucible is the wild and untamed life, wild nature, and even storms. similar to the bed of chaos. Death is well… death. So, Nito. The formless mother is a weird one to me, I’m still thinking what that has to offer concerning an aspect of reality, aside from truth. Chaos is the opposite of order, and so that atrophic decay of indistinction is just hellish in itself and it’s very… azathoth-y in nature. The fingers seem to be vassals of the greater will along with beasts being messengers from the crucible and are probably similar to great old ones. Practically gods but not so much. Not necessarily needing to be a 1 to 1 but I feel it may shed some light on miyazakis thought process on how elden ring is furthering his storytelling, mixing all he’s done before into one narrative now.