Musings on Emet-Selch (MoES) #1: Idiotic and Inexplicable
Introducing Musings on Emet-Selch (MoES)
Because I think about him.
A lot.
Sometimes I think that having an entire series of posts dedicated to him is obsessive in the extreme.
And then I laugh at myself.
As if this can be helped.
Why did Emet-Selch, as he put it in Endwalker, “do something so idiotic and inexplicable” at the end of Shadowbringers?
Turns out?
There is a character in Endwalker who answers this question.
Idiotic and Inexplicable
A confession to start.
In the weeks after I finished Endwalker, I found myself doing Google searches for “fiction” and “Emet-Selch.” At that point, I had never read a single piece of fanfiction. I didn’t know Archive of Our Own (AO3) existed. And I certainly didn’t anticipate that I was about to immerse myself in a whole set of cultural practices about which I knew almost nothing. Here were new communities, lingo, and rules of engagement. And, oh my word, “discourse” aplenty.
As for said discourse, I learned very quickly that my shipping Emet-Selch with a blonde, pale-skinned, straight, cis-gendered Hyur was, at best, “cringe,” and, at worst, “fascist.”1
Nevertheless, there was something specific I was trying to find. Obviously, yes, in the first instance, I sought tales of romance. Like any other warm-blooded adult would.
But I also was curious if other fans were as eager as I was to discuss the story and, to chew on the very question asked by Emet-Selch himself in Elpis:
Worse still, I even invited you there - literally invited my own downfall. Why would I do something so idiotic and inexplicable?
When I finished Shadowbringers, and especially after finishing Patch 5.3, I was consumed by the following question:
Did Emet-Selch orchestrate his own demise?
When I couldn’t find any fanfic wrestling with this question - most writers rightly kept their lust-filled eyes on the prize - I penned one myself. It has an entire chapter where my pajamaed Warrior of Light mulls alone in the Pendants about the end of Shadowbringers’s story.
Hot, amirite?
What follows is a less fanfic-y version of that mulling.
All-Things-Azem
A lie of omission suffuses every interaction with Emet-Selch in Shadowbringers. As named, this “Angel of Truth” reveals to the Scions the truths of the Ancient world – of the Final Days, Hydaelyn’s true nature, the costs of the sundering to mankind, and of the Ascians’ goal of restoring that world at the expense of existing life. But for every truth he does reveal, he conceals the most fundamental one: who the Warrior of Light is to him.
I’ll have a lot to say in the next post about the possible (likely? assuredly?) romantic subtext of all of this, but, for now, suffice to say that it is canon that Azem was his, to borrow his own words, “dearest friend.”
We also know, especially after finishing Endwalker, that Emet-Selch is pathologically bound to his sense of duty as a leader of a civilization whose only purpose was stewardship of the star itself. Within such a worldview, Azem’s defection was deemed so disgraceful that the three unsundered Ancients elected to not create the crystal for Azem that would allow them to restore that soul to its memories and its Convocation seat.
But Emet-Selch created it anyway. In secret. Thus, we learn that his enduring depth of feeling for Azem is his Achilles’ Heel, a singular vulnerability that causes him to betray his most bedrock values – duty, loyalty, service.
Prior to the events of Endwalker, it’s therefore reasonable to interpret his downfall as precisely the result of this flaw – his inability to externalize away his feelings for Azem, so much so that the Warrior of Light’s proximity dooms his mission.
There’s another important point here that I think gets missed in discussions of Shadowbringers: The Tempest was not some forever home for Emet-Selch. The Ondo explain that the lights came on only a few days before the Scions’ arrival, and it’s fair to assume that he built it after spying (via the shoebill) on the Exarch’s final private conversation with the Warrior of Light. Like his familiar’s modus operandi, he was lying in wait until the Exarch revealed his plans. At literally the last possible moment, another sign of his reluctance, Emet-Selch wounds and then kidnaps the Exarch to force the Warrior of Light to pursue them.
Why do that?
Taking him at his word, he wanted to grant the Warrior of Light privacy when they succumbed to the light.
But he also clearly needed the Warrior of Light to know.
Of the most important point of knowing – his relationship to Azem? He leaves only two possible outcomes: the Warrior of Light dies never knowing, or the Warrior of Light learns after Emet-Selch is dead. Either way? He prevents any kind of meaningful reconciliation.2
Damn.
What a window into the depth of this man’s burden and pathology. He has spent millennia externalizing his true feelings because those feelings were bedrock threats to his obligations to the star and his brethren.
Thus, from the all-things-Azem vantage point, it’s reasonable to conclude that he planned his own death at the Warrior of Light’s hands, both to release himself from his burden and to save the Warrior of Light’s soul from destruction. (This is textbook romance here, btw, but again, more on that later).
Because Who Doesn’t Like a List
Here are some other hints that he orchestrated everything:
Painstakingly Timed: In his introductory scenes in the Stormblood patches, he voices his exhaustion (“I’ve long grown weary of this mummery,”) his loneliness (calling Elidibus “an insufferable bore,”) and that his death as the Emperor was “painstakingly timed.”
Up Close and Personal: Watching the Warrior of Light in Lakeland, he betrays his own distanced language of referring to the Warrior of Light as “the hero of the Source” and then foreshadows his soul sight:
Then again, with a soul such as that, mayhap there is another way. One which does not require bloodshed.
It is seeing the Warrior of Light’s soul that prompts him to consider a peaceful alternative that, in light of the Ascians’ stated goal, makes zero sense.
Textbook Projection: Every insult, from the moment he shoots the Exarch until the final fight, are all straightforward examples of projection. Starting with the Exarch…
To think that he went through all this trouble for the sake of a single hero. It’s almost admirable in its absurdity.
… to saying that the Warrior of Light is “nothing” and has “no fight left to fight.”
Otherwise Nothing Makes Sense: If Emet-Selch’s first goal was to ensure the First’s rejoining with the Source, the second to co-opt the Exarch’s powers and knowledge, he could have absconded with the Exarch forever, leaving no means for the Warrior of Light to find them.
Omg, Did He Just Kill Ryne?: Despite his repeated declarations that he could kill the Scions with nary a thought, he immobilizes them rather than kill them. Further, he cannot look directly at anyone as he does so, just as he avoids the Warrior of Light’s gaze when he says, “My world will have no need for heroes.”
Dude’s a Planner: His plans had to have been in place before the Scions’ arrival in Amaurot. He must have instructed Hythlodaeus’s shade to bequeath Azem’s crystal to the Warrior of Light as Azem’s rightful successor. He also enchanted the crystal with his own essence, meaning that he anticipated his participation in the confrontation with Elidibus as the Warrior of Light’s ally (and, as signified by the white mask, he appears as Hades in that role, not as Emet-Selch).
Transforming = Transgression: If he was sincere in wanting to grant the Warrior of Light privacy as they transformed into a lightwarden, it is a shocking self-betrayal for him to transform before the Scions and reveal himself as Hades. (The intimacy of this is further emphasized in Endwalker in the scenes with Hermes’s transformation.)
Maybe You’re Overthinking This
So, done deal?
Not so fast.
There are plenty of counterpoints that suggest that this interpretation is too generous to him, a too-tidy interpretation born of (romantic) wish fulfillment. Here are some of those:
The Soul Sight Curse: Consider his genuine anguish in his final moments, specifically, what it means if he fails. Emet-Selch cannot not see his burden as a literal manifestation. He is the only living being who can see souls and the Aethereal Sea, meaning that he is not able to turn his eyes away from the cost of the sundering and from the knowledge that those Ancients who are responsible for the survival of the star itself are denied their rightful and peaceful return to it. Emet-Selch dies thinking that his brethren will remain trapped in purgatory within Zodiark for eternity. That is a singularly tragic failure for the very man charged with monitoring the Aetherial Sea.
Zodiark Made Me Do It: He confesses to you that he is tempered by Zodiark. There’s no reason not to believe him, especially given how the unsundered speak about Zodiark, and even if we don’t really know what line he couldn’t spiritually cross because of that tempering.3
Oh, Very Well, I’ll Kill You Then: He really “kicks the can” again and again in Amaurot in a way that seems like he’s reluctant to fight you because he cannot conceive of how you could possibly win. Further, he had no idea about Ardbert’s existence. When Ardbert’s choice to merge his soul shard with the Warrior of Light causes Azem to briefly “awaken,” he is genuinely surprised by this.4
No, I Meant It, I Will Kill You…Eventually: There is no reason to not believe him when he says that his ultimate plan is to sacrifice all existing life to release the Ancient souls trapped within Zodiark. It’s worth making a dividing line between being sympathetic for Emet-Selch’s suffering and still understanding that he must be stopped. The writers even point to this in Elpis by having Emet-Selch himself exclaim to Hermes, “[Meteion] means to destroy us all, and still you’d take her side?”5
No Redemption, No Way, No How: “The future you want is not the past we loved.” In his final words in Endwalker, Emet-Selch maintains that he fought the Warrior of Light because competing futures for the star were at stake. He adds that his “ideals” are both “inviolate” and “invincible.” It is important to note that in this speech, he asks for neither redemption nor forgiveness. Instead, he will only concede that the Ascians’ “methods” wouldn’t have succeeded against Meteion and her sisters. Even after being released by Zodiark’s hold, recovering his memories of Elpis, and being cleansed of his torment by the Aetherial Sea, he remains as brutally utilitarian as ever. In other words, as Hades as ever.
To take all of this together, I had concluded that the most coherent interpretation of Shadowbringers is that Emet-Selch planned for all possible outcomes: (1) he would grant the WoL privacy as they succumbed to the excess light, thereby ensuring the rejoining; (2) he would be forced to defeat the WoL, thereby ensuring the rejoining; (3) he would deem the Wol worthy to take up his burden should they somehow defeat him. I concluded that he consciously intended to win while he continued to try to deny his affection for that “singular soul” who had forever tempted his better nature.
I think a single scene, however, offers a more satisfying and, if possible, even more tragic answer.
The Final Pieces Fall into Place
In the Aetherial Sea, Amon reveals to the Warrior of Light that Hermes enslaved his soul to the very memories he tried to expunge in Elpis:
Then it was you ─ in Elpis, with Emet-Selch. Ha! The final pieces fall into place.
In my halcyon days as the mortal Amon, I was haunted by a dream...Night after night, the faceless multitude. The voiceless cries. Shards of shattered memories. But slowly the fog began to clear. This was Elpis, and I...I was Hermes. Recurring though it was, I paid this dream little heed. It was only when I was granted the seat─and memories─of Fandaniel that I knew these visions to be true. They were the memories of Hermes, that he himself erased using the power of Kairos. Or so he thought. In his attempt to burn away the events of that fateful day, he succeeded only in searing them more deeply into his soul. My soul. Death failed to expunge them, no matter how many times it came. Rebirth after rebirth, from one Fandaniel to the next.
I wonder ─ is Emet-Selch adrift somewhere in this Aetherial Sea, in defeat finally remembering your time together in Elpis? How it must gall him ─ to be entrusted with knowledge of the Final Days, only to be rendered powerless to act upon it! So many lifetimes dedicated to restoring his beloved Amaurot in blissful ignorance. Oh, folly.
This means that Emet-Selch also had these memories buried deeper within his soul, that those memories could and likely did shape his behavior in ways he wasn’t consciously aware of. And, as such, Amon’s revelation - this single bit of dialogue - changes the entire story of Shadowbringers, offering a perfect - and perfectly tragic - explanation of Emet-Selch’s “idiotic and inexplicable” behavior.
Emet-Selch was unconsciously positioning himself to meet the fate the Warrior of Light revealed to him in Elpis.
Emet-Selch began fulfilling this destiny when he chose to sacrifice his memories in order to see the Warrior of Light to safety in Elpis.
Emet-Selch deemed the Warrior of Light the worthy savior of the star millennia before testing the Warrior of Light for the role in Amaurot.
And, just as Hydaelyn waited for millenia for the Warrior of Light’s arrival, so too did Emet-Selch. He just didn’t know that was what he was doing.
Which is the more tragic tale, I wonder? A modern, if subtextual, retelling of the Hades/Persephone myth? Or a tale of a man unconsciously positioning himself as an antagonist to allow for someone else to save him from himself?
For me? I’m still a sucker for the romance angle. But more on that… next time!
A topic for future exploration, to be sure!
Glori, my Warrior of Light, is infuriated by this realization. She can barely forgive him this, even after the events in Ultima Thule. And that brings up another interesting topic - how players relate to their OCs. In my case, Glori is most definitely *not* myself.
There is a lot of interesting fanfic exploring what this line might be!
There are different interpretations here, largely because the shade of Hythlodaeus speculates that he may have not recognized the Warrior of Light’s soul as Azem’s. I find that unlikely. I think it more likely that he’s denying everything to himself even as he’s doing it.
So much more to say on how Endwalker inverts iconic Emet-Selch moments from Shadowbringers. Another promise for another post!