u/pleasedlurker

Today I offer a different reading of the Shadow of the Erdtree trailer, though as usual, without looking for concrete in-game lore answers. Like most of everything I write, this post is also about Miquella and how parts of the lore seem designed to fit him on a symbolic level. 

The thing is, I find some truly fascinating parallels between Marika's ascent narrated in the trailer and Miquella's crusade in the base game. It feels like a kind of allegorical synthesis of the revelations we are about to experience regarding Miquella in the DLC. 

If you have read any of my previous posts, I completely understand if you are blown away by my fixation with Miquella. I am blown away too, because I find him in far too many places wherever I look. I step into The Lands Between and I see him everywhere. I see the medallions used to activate the Grand Lifts and I think it makes perfect sense that Miquella is so easily linked to them; after all, he is the one who wants to ascend. I see horned lions, red-maned lions built by fusing different bodies together, and even perfumers working with flowers, and I just keep seeing him and the demigods he needs dead. 

But don't think I am reaching too hard. It is just what the game evokes in me. And it does so so directly that I find it impossible to believe there isn't a deliberate intention behind it all. That is my headcanon: that all of this is intentionally designed to fit together, and some specific parts of the lore take on the form we know in order to achieve that. 

Whatever the case may be, let's dive into the trailer.

“Miquella the Kind spoke of the beginning” 

And we see a hand reach into the folds of what looks like dead flesh and extract some golden threads. As soon as I see those golden threads, what comes to my mind are Miquella's unalloyed gold needles. Because Miquella could have made necklaces, bracelets, diadems, fibulae… but he decided to make unalloyed gold needles. The beginning of his crusade was the creation of this gold. It was right then that Miquella abandoned Fundamentalism and he began to seduce people. 

“The seduction and the betrayal. An affair from which Gold arose. And so too was Shadow born" 

The shot widens and we see a massive amount of blood as Marika ascends to divinity. And I think of the Secret Rite Scroll and its a lord will usher in a god's return, and the lord's soul will require a vessel and how Miquella needed a soul and a body. Immediately, those golden threads come to my mind as the symbol of a soul (the golden essence extracted from a dead body, just like the power we get by defeating enemies in the games we call “souls-likes”), and I cannot help but think of Mohg, his blood cult, and the tragic fate of his body upon seeing all that blood and those putrid remains. 

At the end, we see Marika in front of a divine gate from which only light emerges. And what comes to my head is the place through which I originally thought we would access the DLC: that mysterious half-open gate in the Haligtree from which a golden light shines. 

But let's look at the dialogue, which speaks of seductions and gold, and of betrayals and shadow. Unalloyed Gold is intrinsically related to seduction. As the description of the Bewitching Branch reads, tree branch blessed with an incantation of unalloyed gold. The Empyrean Miquella is loved by many people. Indeed, he has learned very well how to compel such affection. Miquella managed to learn how to seduce people using Unalloyed Gold. 

And from there, evidently, arises the betrayal. Mohg is the one who best embodies all of this. It was he who, bewitched by Miquella, believed he had achieved ultimate triumph by having the support of the Empyrean. But he ended up suffering the worst possible ritual once the divinity awakened. As the Lord of Blood's Exultation states, render up your offerings of blood to your Lord. Drench my consort's chamber. Slake his cocoon's thirst. His awakening shall herald the dawn of our dynasty. 

Those collateral damages form Miquella's shadow. Which is exactly what we see next: a bloody war.

“What followed was a war unseen. One that could never be put to song. A purge without Grace or honour”  

This strikes me as especially poetic when we think of Miquella, because it is in the DLC where we truly understand the origin of the war he unleashed after the Shattering, and his absolute centrality in it despite his apparent absence. And the truth is, no matter how good his intentions were, devastating an entire continent for a greater end is not particulary honorable, specially if it implies performing horrendous rituals on the bodies of your stepbrothers through seduction and betrayal.

If Messmer's crusade was hidden physically, Miquella hid the execution of his plan by altering wills and bending minds. 

“The tyranny of Messmer’s flame” 

From this point on, we are going to see the tyranny of Miquella's seduction, which replicates the clash between Radahn and Malenia in Caelid and the true purpose behind it. As if looking into a mirror, you see everything in reverse. 

While Caelid is devastated by rot, the lands of the Realm of Shadow are being devoured by fire. Messmer is not Radahn, of course, but Radahn's Great Rune burns to contain the rot; we find the Red-Hot Whetblade and the Flaming Strike in his castle, and the Flame of the Redmanes alongside Flame, Grant Me Strength in Fort Gael (a fortress that foreshadows and symbolizes Radahn). 

And if in the base game we see how a man had lost everything amidst Malenia's scarlet rot, here we see a woman who, after having lost everything to Messmer's fire, finds salvation in that scarlet rot. That woman is not Malenia, nor is she Saint Trina, but she is Romina, the Saint of the Bud, whose form is split into three parts: a woman's body and the legs of both a scorpion and a centipede. We see her rolling like a kind of ouroboros, for time in this world is a wheel that repeats itself. The exact same shadow that tarnished Marika's gold did the same to Miquella's. 

The thing about this obsessive fixation is that you start notice some really deep cuts and convoluted details. If you look at Romina's presentation through the lens of that battle between Malenia and Caelid, things start making a lot of sense. 

For instance, her scorpion half can be linked to the symbolism of scorpions in the game. As the description of their charms reads, it is a talisman carried by assassins who strike unseen, which fits Miquella perfectly. He delivers the blow without anyone ever seeing him, hiding behind the strings of everyone acting on his behalf. 

Her human half mirrors the design of a bud… and I don't think it is necessary to elaborate further on that when we literally access the DLC through the very cocoon Mohg thought would fulfill his highest omens if I think in spanish. We have a single word that refers to both the plant covering that protects the flower and the silk covering that protects certain insects (such as silkworms and nascent butterflies). So the bud here is linked with the insect-like creature, and the guy tied to plants (Miquella's Lilies, Trina's Lilies, Sacramental Buds, the Haligtree) does so in a cocoon.

And her centipede half also acquires a fascinating meaning. In the base game, we learned that the centipede is the Cursemark linked to the imperfect death of Godwyn and Ranni; the macabre, unnatural separation of body and soul, which the Golden Order Fundamentalists later adopted as a fetish to hunt down Those Who Live in Death. We know that Malenia, at the very least, had to put an end to Radahn so that Miquella could separate his soul from his body. Perhaps she was supposed to do the same to Mohg later to secure the vessel her brother needed. In any case, what we have here is a direct reflection of the macabre deaths of Godwyn and Ranni, who also lost their soul and body, respectively. 

Other protagonists here are the Divine Beast Dancing Lion, which end up dominating a shot where they appear impaled. I have explained their symbology better elsewhere, but when you fight it, it feels as if a horned lion is resurrecting before you, only for you to later realize it is a puppet operated by two bodies.

That is exactly what awaits us at the top of Enir-Ilim: a horned lion acting under Miquella's orders. Symbolically, the deaths of Mohg (with his horns) and Radahn (the lion, even roaring like a beast in his intro cinematic) act as a repetition of Marika's sins against the Hornsent and their divine leonine beasts. The past seems condemned to repeat itself, one way or another. And that is why the Divine Beast Dancing Lion, in combat, foreshadows a future bound to the ghosts of the past. Ranni's frost, Godwyn's lightning, the Deathblight generated by their unnatural deaths… everything is there to make you remember, to make you see time as a ring spinning eternally, driven by whirlwinds. 

Before the fade to black, the shot finally lingers on the Scadutree, where we can see the sap acquiring the whimsical shape of Marika's rune and the spear that pierces her inside the Erdtree. 

But you notice something else. That sap flows exactly from the point where the tree twists due to the pressure exerted by another trunk. And what comes to my mind is how badly that tree could have used a support... a brace like Elphäel was to the Haligtree.

“And so Kindly Miquella would abandon everything. His golden flesh, his blinding strength”  

The transition is brilliant, because that crescent moon and crucifixion shape formed by the arms and body of Marika’s rune with the Scadutree’s sap are mirrored right after in Miquella’s cross. Those are the very places where he will abandon everything, and that is how we see him from behind, bathed in gold, leaving it all behind. We won't see his face until his ascension; hardly surprising, considering he has always hidden behind his enchantments.

“Even his fate”  

And then Saint Trina appears. She does so by falling, and now we know she falls into the absolute deepest depths while Miquella walks the exact opposite path, framed by an absolutely genius color palette.

Yes, Miquella's characteristic gold in the immediately preceding scene is the exact opposite color of the purple in Saint Trina's scene on the color wheel. Saint Trina falls, and if she is Miquella's fate, Miquella will fall too. That is why there is no real alternative in being part of his order; it's a downward spiral. 

“But we are not deterred. We chose to follow. Will you walk with us?” 

The final irony is wonderful, with Leda expressing her group's genuine devotion to Miquella while they all worship one of his crosses. What is the actual margin of choice against unalloyed gold, the very material Miquella uses to seduce both friends and allies alike? 

 

But I am not Miquella. I actually let you choose, so maybe none of this is actually there, and it is all just in my head.

You won't find lore answers here. What you will find is how in my opinion that lore is structured to support the game's major narrative twist. It’s pretty much about examining Elden Ring as if you were rereading ASOIAF. For a while now, I’ve been pointing out what I consider to be clear foreshadowing from the base game of Elden Ring, all anticipating that Miquella’s ascension (backed by Radahn’s soul and Mohg’s body in Shadow of the Erdtree) holds up from the very beginning. 

I’ve already written extensively about this, and maybe you know all of this stuff (maybe even before me). For instance, the connections that can be drawn between the three demigods through specific enemies, the clues hidden within the Dectus Medallion (it's funny that the one who wishes to ascend is so easily relatable to elevators), and many other details in texts that are way too long. Now, I’m going to start posting short snippets of these curious details. 

While many might dismiss them as mere coincidences, in my opinion, they denote a clear narrative intention: anticipating the massive plot twist we got in Shadow of the Erdtree.

Today, I want to focus on the first five NPCs you can encounter in Limgrave. (Though I actually found someone else first! Truly wonderful. If two are placed to the north and two to the east, and those are the only two possible directions, it's clear the game intends for you to run into them sooner rather than later). 

Thus, the first NPC is Melina. We don’t even know she is a key NPC yet, but after defeating the Grafted Scion and following the path of Nascent Butterflies, a spirit riding a horned beast appears. Right out of the gate, within the first two minutes of the game, you already have the Nascent Butterfly, the incorporeal spirit, and the horns. The truth is, our horse might not have horns, but... just look at that highly symbolic detail.

If you head north, you run into Varré and Ranni. If you head east, you find Yura and Sellen. Miquella only needs two dead demigods, and we only need to kill two demigods. Out of seven demigods, maybe it’s no coincidence that Melina gives us Miquella’s horse while the other four NPCs are directly tied to the deaths of Mohg and Radahn. 

And with Varré comes the first surprise. He is a Bloody Finger, specifically the one who serves to guide you to the Mohgwyn Palace. In other words, he is literally the first person you can talk to in Limgrave, and right from the start, he’s the guy responsible for offering you an audience with Mohg. He will eventually give us the item to get there and beg us for patience: “For Mohg yet slumbers beside the Divinity. Be Patient. The new dynasty is nigh.” That divinity is Miquella, of course, and he was meant to sleep until the release of Shadow of the Erdtree. 

If you head east, you’ll reach Varré’s antithesis: Yura, Hunter of Bloody Fingers. Yura won’t just lead you to Eleonora, another Bloody Finger; he will lead you to the tear that allows you to counter Mohg’s devastating "Nihil!". There is no other tear in the entire game designed solely to counter a single attack. It’s quite a coincidence that it specifically affects the demigod Miquella wants dead. 

In case this seems too arbitrary, Yura will be one of the characters whose dead body you see possessed by another spirit (Shabriri) who covers his face to hide him. I don't think I need to elaborate on how Radahn later occupies Mohg’s dead, soulless body. Neither Varré nor either version of Yura shows their face. A mask, a hat, his own hands... a great symbol of the narrative intent behind Miquella’s characterization: elusive, absent, unknown. But one of them leads you to Mohg, and the other leads you to the perfect tear to defeat him. 

And, of course, it had to be the Carian NPCs who tied into Radahn. If Mohg has his own tear, Radahn is the only demigod you can fight while riding the horse that once belonged to the very demigod who wants him dead. We could have had references to Rykard or Rennala... but both Ranni’s and Sellen’s quests depend entirely on Radahn’s death. Not only that: it is Radahn’s death that allows us to progress our understanding of the conspiracy that caused the death of Godwyn’s soul (a clear parallel to the fate of Mohg, who even allows us to reach the corpse of the Golden one) and the death of Ranni’s body (just like Radahn). 

Furthermore, it is Radahn’s death that allows us to obtain Sellen’s soul (known as Sellen's Primal Glintstone) so she can keep living in another body, just like Miquella will later do with his beloved brother using Mohg’s body. As if that weren’t enough, even Jerren, the castellan of Redmane Castle and organizer of Radahn's festival, joins the subquest later on. 

Thus, out of all the NPCs that could have been placed in these early stages, Miyazaki opted for a very specific set: ones that share an indirect involvement in Miquella’s plan. And that's all. But I could go on with Irina, Blaidd, Kenneth Haight, Alexander...

At first, none of this makes sense. Everything seems to be just what it is, like that direwolf dying from a stag's antler at the beginning of Game of Thrones, which was just a direwolf dying from a stag's antler when we were still a sweet summer child. 

But now that we know it is Miquella and his Promised Consort waiting for us at the end of Shadow of the Erdtree... everything takes on a different hue. Are these merely narrative foreshadowings of what was to come, or did they want to tell us something more about the role Miquella played from the shadows throughout our adventure? That is up to everyone's open interpretation. 

For example, we might feel special, but there's no way of knowing if Torrent actually chose us, or if (thanks to our blessed patience) we are just another Tarnished bound to end up crucified, foreshadowing Marika’s state in the opening area of the game. After all, in Frenzied Flame’s ending, we see her pick up Torrent’s ring... so I can’t be sure if that’s the first time she’s done it. So maybe we weren't even the first to ride Miquella’s steed, and maybe it wasn't us who Ranni actually heard about, and maybe (by breaking the fourth wall) Torrent simply chooses everyone who plays Elden Ring. Who knows. 

But that hardly matters. I think what really matters is highlighting all these environmental storytelling choices, which lend narrative coherence to the story's twists and turns while also allowing each player to form their own interpretations.

Aside from a mythology that, four years later, still seems inexhaustible, GRRM also left his mastery of foreshadowing in his work. And another genius, Miyazaki, managed to imprint that sense of symbolic revelation into a video game with environmental storytelling polished to the extreme, detailed to unthinkable limits: using enemies as symbols, items as lures, and NPCs and locations as pieces of evidence. 

Or not. Maybe it's all just a coincidence.

I’ve been pointing out what many consider to be mere coincidences regarding Miquella, Radahn, and Mohg in Elden Ring. You know, the exact kind of details that in a GRRM novel would function as the brilliant foreshadowing we ASOIAF readers love so much. 

A curious detail about this is the Dectus Medallion, which we use to reach Altus and Leyndell. As everyone knows, one half is found in Fort Haight and the other in Fort Faroth. And once again, many might dismiss this as a coincidence. 

In Fort Haight, the last guardian of the Dectus Medallion half is a knight who betrayed Godrick and now serves Mohg. We know this because of the Ash of War he drops upon defeat: Bloody Slash.

In Fort Faroth, we encounter those same blue spirit soldiers we previously saw in Caria Manor, except this time they are Redmane soldiers, just like the ones Radahn commanded. 

We only need to kill two demigods to access Leyndell, and coincidentally, the two medallion halves that grant easy access there are directly linked to the two demigods Miquella needed dead. So, we have the one who stands for the guy providing the flesh and blood literally cutting himself, and the one providing the soul represented by a bunch of incorporeal spirits.

Thus, out of the three medallions in the game, one (Dectus) is tied to te demigods Miquella needs dead. The second (Rold) is given to you by the exact same person who gives you Miquella’s horse (Torrent). And the third (Haligtree) straight up leads you to Miquella’s promised land. What does this mean? I’ll leave the interpretation up to you. 

Environmental storytelling isn’t just about looking at a relief, a cape, or shared visual patterns. The choices made when placing items and enemies, weaving connections between places and meanings, are also a powerful way to tell a story.

It’s tough to pinpoint GRRM's exact, original contributions to Elden Ring, and this post doesn't explain that. However, what I want to argue is that no matter what his material was or how much it was tweaked, Martin gave Elden Ring's lore way more than people think. I can't tell you exactly what he wrote, but even Miyazaki himself refers to his contribution as something absolutely fundamental. 

Of course, he didn't write anything that is directly in the game. There are no dialogues written by him, no item descriptions, nothing like that. In theory, he "only" described the world up to 5,000 years before the events of the game. That might sound like a small detail, but it’s actually almost everything: this game isn't about what happens after the Shattering, it’s about what happened before and what caused it. The narrative focus is entirely on giving you clues to piece together your own history about those ancient events, not just the historical milestones that followed the Shattering. 

In fact, the more recent lore events are relatively scarce (like the defenses of Leyndell, for example) and yet they feel incredibly distant. In other words, practically everything in Elden Ring is about the past, right up until you beat the game and achieve one of the endings. But those endings technically fall outside the game's actual content. 

So, what part of the past did Martin actually write? What is he referring to when he talks about those 5,000 years before the game starts? Our best bet is to make sense of whatever clues we can find. 

During their initial conversations, Miyazaki shared with Martin the core themes usually explored in FromSoftware games, which they wanted to keep building upon in Elden Ring. This is a very interesting point because it shows that the collaboration was born out of freedom, without rigid guidelines. We aren’t talking about specific plots or elements, but rather overarching themes and motifs. 

 

>"We started off by giving him these very vague and broad themes and ideas for the mythos that I had swimming around in my head, along with what kind of games we typically make, and the sort of themes we'd like to explore in our games. It was all very loose and quite vague. Then he would come back to us with a lot of ideas: how about this, this, and this? That back-and-forth started the exchange of ideas."

>“The actual collaboration itself begun with Mr. Martin ever so politely confirming what sorts of themes, ideas as well as many game-related aspects I had envisioned for the game. This allowed us to have many free and creative conversations regarding the game, in which Mr. Martin later used as a base to write the overarching mythos for the game world itself. This mythos proved to be full of interesting characters and drama along with a plethora of mystical and mysterious elements as well. It was a wonderful source of stimulus for me and the development staff.”

That "mythos" written by Martin is what other media usually call a "Lore Bible", the foundational narrative used to build a story. It is, so to speak, what Fire & Blood was to House of the Dragon. In my opinion, this is exactly why Miriel is a turtle. I think it’s a brilliant nod to use Martin’s personal symbol, put a papal tiara on him. 

Martin's role was strictly limited to worldbuilding. GRRM emphasized this by saying he wrote what happened in that world 5,000 years ago. Miyazaki, on the other hand, stressed that the story experienced by the player is his own work, not Martin’s. In fact, he has admitted that most of the in-game text comes from him, and that he supervised whatever he didn't write directly. In fact, if Miyazaki took charge of the game's narrative, it was partly because he didn't want the limitations imposed by the game itself to affect Martin. 

But what is the story the player actually experiences? If we stick to the present timeline, the player's story is just about becoming Elden Lord. That present experience consists of different endings achieved through various questlines, but Elden Ring’s lore goes much deeper than that, and we experience that depth too.

>“The player will be able to learn about Martin’s mythology through exploration. We are known for letting the player explore the game’s lore through fragments of environmental storytelling, and this time around Martin’s story is what you will be trying to unravel. The period the player actually explores is still connected to the old times, so as you slowly discover why the world has become the way it is, you will learn more about Martin’s mythology as well.”

For example, think about the Nox and the Eternal Cities, the war against the dragons, or the Night of the Black Knives. What counts as worldbuilding and what belongs to the story we players experience? Isn't Elden Ring a game where the biggest mysteries consist of uncovering what happened in the past? If so, is that past Miyazaki’s work, or does it belong to the history established in Martin’s "mythos"? 

To narrow it down even further, think about the main characters of this adventure: the great lineages and families that you drive to near extinction. Their present in the game consists of dying, and only a few have anything meaningful to say upon their death. The interesting part about them is their past; what drove them to the point where we find them. So, do these main characters come from that worldbuilding or from the current story that Miyazaki penned? 

 

>“When Martin wrote these characters, and when he provided that origin story, that mythos for the world of Elden Ring, these demigods were much closer to their original form, and maybe closer to human form back then, before the Shattering, before it all started.
So it was more up to us to interpret this and say, ‘how did they become such inhuman monsters [after The Shattering], and how did the mad taint of the shattered shards of the Elden Ring and its power affect them?’ So that was our job to take these grand heroes and sort of misshape them and distort them into something they were not.
And I think if we get a chance to show Martin and if he gets a chance to see the game and see these characters, I think he might be a bit shocked. When he wrote them, he was really envisioning something a little bit more human, a little bit more traditional human drama and fantasy characters. So I hope he gets a kick out of that.”

Indeed, those characters are not from some remote past. They are the very characters you see in the game, only warped under the magnificent "Souls" patina that Miyazaki imprints. The Japanese director even shared these designs with GRRM to show him how they turned out, as you can see in some of the writer's online interviews. In fact, we know these characters didn't just emerge randomly from GRRM's mythos; Miyazaki explicitly requested their creation: 

 

>"When he wrote the mythos, we asked him to create these dramatic heroes of this ancient mythos that takes place before the events of the game. These dramatic and heroic characters weren’t really present in our previous titles, so this is something that was really appealing to me — how he would depict the mystique and heroic qualities of those characters."

This is one of the key points Miyazaki uses to set Elden Ring apart from Dark Souls. When he says "more human," he means he packed them with ambitions, motivations, and complex relationships with one another. If you've read ASOIAF (or even watched Game of Thrones), you already know exactly what we are talking about. Miyazaki pointed out to Weekly Famitsu that this focus on characters gave the story its depth and weight, heavily influencing the development of enemies, NPCs, and the map itself. 

When it comes to the map, there’s another major difference between Dark Souls and Elden Ring: the relationship between the narrative (lore) and the world. Unlike Dark Souls, The Lands Between is a setting that also springs from Martin's "mythos." This has a huge impact. While in Dark Souls level design was the cornerstone around which the story was built, the existence of this foundational "mythos" meant that Elden Ring's world construction revolved entirely around the pre-existing history. Thus, what in Dark Souls were just initial concepts to start building a world, in Elden Ring started from something much more developed and complex: a mythology, a history, and a poem, as Miyazaki noted. 

>“Elden Ring’s world was constructed using this mythos and stimulus as a base. Even I myself find it hard to contain my excitement from time to time. We hope that everyone else is looking forward to the world we have created.”

So, it wasn't that GRRM specifically pushed for an open world and predefined characters; it was that Miyazaki wanted to develop a game with those exact elements, and he knew exactly how to value what GRRM could bring to the table. 

One thing that actually feels like a "future" within the game is Shadow of the Erdtree. Even though it makes us travel to an even more remote past, Miquella's plot actively depends on the player's choices and intervention. 

Because of this, it’s fascinating to see how the loop of this collaboration between Martin and Miyazaki fully closed in Shadow of the Erdtree. While it might look like a last-minute addition, the truth is that a massive chunk of the adventure in the DLC was already part of the original mythos GRRM delivered to FromSoftware. 

As Rolling Stone pointed out in an interview with Miyazaki about *Shadow of the Erdtree*: 

 

>“Writer George RR Martin helped provide mythology and worldbuilding for the main game of Elden Ring, but wasn’t involved with Shadow of the Erdtree. He wrote the background lore of Miquella, who has the ability to ascend to godhood. While Miquella is referenced a few times in the main game, players never really come in contact with him. Miyazaki explains it was a story that FromSoftware wanted to revisit and tell fully, so Shadow of the Erdtree is where Miquella’s story expands.”

Or, in Miyazaki’s own words: 

 

>“The way George Martin's story has been incorporated is the same as it was with the base game with Elden Ring. And to avoid misunderstanding there, we just want to point out that he hasn't written anything exclusively and new for the sake of this DLC.
But it would still be fair to say that he and his mythos that he created for us are involved in the creation of Shadow of the Erdtree in the same way. And the reason for that is that in making the base game and making Elden Ring, we took from that mythos, but we only took one part of it. We took from a part that created the story of Elden Ring and created the world that we wanted to envision, and the Shadow of the Erdtree is yet another part of that original mythos that he wrote and that has inspired us to create the story of this DLC.”

If you haven't read Martin’s books, all of this might seem a bit too vague or insignificant, maybe just marketing. But if you've deeply read his work, you likely get the strong feeling that the author's impact on Elden Ring is massive. You might not be able to quantify or detail every specific aspect of that impact, but there is something in Elden Ring that directly screams his name. It’s not just the tree, the great lineages, the crests, and the castles. It’s not even just the betrayals, the ambitions, and the tragic mistakes. It’s something literary and narrative—like those unpredictable plot twists. There is something in Miyazaki’s classic storytelling style that fits perfectly with how Martin weaves his tales, and maybe that's why this collaboration was so incredibly fruitful and highly praised. Here is an example of what I mean.

I might be wrong, but I think this is where things are heading. So, here’s my headcanon. Maybe it’s the same for a lot of people, and I’m just repeating what’s already common knowledge or interpretation. Apologies for my English; this was translated using Gemini. If anything is unclear, I can reply in Spanish in the comments.

Those strange timelines are just the visual manifestation of something that was hidden in the original game: the Lifestream, and by extension, the planet helping our side. Basically, what back in the day was the casting of "Holy."

Everything is intentionally convoluted and messy, but the core meaning is simple: it’s the planet’s "aid," manifested through the help that certain companions and loved ones give to the party. Everyone who appears there with agency is dead. That’s why time doesn't exist, and why during one of the most revealing parts of Zack’s time there, the game decides to cut back and forth between his narrative and the Gi's one.

While their story centers on them being unable to access the Lifestream and return to the planet, Aerith dipping her hand into the Lifestream to establish a metaphysical link with Zack is the key. The Holy Materia will manage to override Sephiroth’s will within the Lifestream, making this intervention crucial for the party.

That’s why time doesn't exist there and the "worlds" bleed into each other, featuring a bunch of different versions of Stamp the dog. The Cloud that Zack remembers doesn't match up with the one Biggs recalls, and neither of them can say for sure when things actually happened. This is because everyone creates their own world in that limbo, and they all end up overlapping. The Lifestream's intervention in the "real" world, combined with Sephiroth tampering with its flow, will cause all these timelines to eventually cross paths. In fact, the Cloud we see with Zack will be key to helping the real Cloud find himself and discover who he truly is.

What’s still unclear is why this is happening, or why Lifestream is like that. Why Biggs and not someone else, just like he asks himself? There might not be a single reason: maybe because they haven't accepted their deaths, because they are chosen by the Lifestream, or because this limbo is proof that they can't return to the planet due to Sephiroth’s will, which manifests through the Black Whispers. Even though they seem to help at times, they are simply working to ensure everything goes exactly as it's supposed to until the right moment. We know he needs this infinity of alternatives to fulfill his plan, so this somehow makes him stronger. Imagine for a moment that the "strength" of the Lifestream depended on the density of its flow: all Sephiroth is doing with his manipulation is opening up tributaries and channels that weaken its power.

While it could definitely be a mix of all these factors, to me, the really important part is that the people surrounding the protagonists of these timelines haven't accepted their deaths. In Zack's case, Cloud himself is trying to live his life in the real world. He can't let him go because right now, Cloud "is" Zack. Perhaps the most ingenious detail of this entire plot is Cloud’s presence there, in that multiverse, because the true Cloud is metaphorically dead within the physical Cloud's memories. And something similar happens with Red XIII, who also takes center stage in that scene because at that point, he isn't being Nanaki (he only shows his true self to Aerith).

The climax of this manifestation of the Planet's aid is Cloud receiving the Holy Materia from Aerith in that realm, and she is someone else Cloud hasn't been able to let go of either for the moment. In essence, it’s the same as the original game. While the original went for a symbolic tone, here everything is made much more explicit. It's up to everyone to choose whichever option they prefer. Not accepting who we are leads us to create other worlds. There are imaginary places where we are who we want to be, while we act like impostors in the real world.

But this assistance or will of the planet doesn’t act on its own. You all know that important dialogue from the Cosmo Canyon NPC talking about the significance of memories and unfulfilled wishes. All those alternative timelines are nothing but our own desires as players for everyone to eventually be saved, as well as the characters' own wishes for their loved ones. Those memories, at the same time, act like guardian angels within the planet's will to help them. But surely, in Part 3, the time will come when we have to overcome that phase for this aid to be decisive. Maybe that’s the big Revelation waiting for us: coming to terms with loss and accepting who we are.

TL;DR: Rebirth's timelines are just the Lifestream made visible. This limbo exists because characters can't let go of their dead loved ones (and we can't either as players). Sephiroth is splitting the Lifestream to weaken it, and Part 3's big theme will be overcoming denial and accepting loss, and accepting who we are.