“Spoken echoes of Queen Marika linger here as well. Shall I share them with you?

In Marika’s own words: Hark, brave warriors. Hark, my lord Godfrey. We commend your deeds. Guidance has delivered ye through ordeal to the place ye stand. Put the giants to the sword and confine the flame atop the mount. Let a new epoch begin. An epoch glistening with life. Brandish the Elden Ring, for the Age of the Erdtree!”

-Melina

To introduce what the Erdtree is at this point would probably be more than a little repetitive. We have cover the topic of the tree, the Greater Will and The Gods in detail on my lore explanation post from 1 to 3. So, with all of that already said, we need to answer the question: What does becoming Elden Lord means to us as players. As Tarnished. 

For the Elden Lord ending, the game offers us 4 variants of the ending which we will be quickly glancing and explaining. However, the main purpose of this is not to explain them, but rather what it means to sit on the throne at the end of the game. Where the ending of the frenzied flame meant the nihilist view of a meaningless existence, the endings of us as Lords mean the preservation of life, be it for the better or the worse. So without further a do, here are the four endings where a new lord sits the throne. 

1. Age of Fracture

I want to start off with what to me is probably the worst ending in terms of consequences to the world as a whole. A double sided blade as it is both the easiest ending to get yet the one who does the least for the world. You become the Elden Lord, the objective that has been beaten into you over and over, the purpose to which all tarnished stride to become. 

Yet what truly changes upon you becoming Elden Lord?

The gods are dead and now you have become as a god, yet the Greater Will still rules over you. 

The golden order remains flawed.

The world continues it’s cycle of falling leaves and everlasting life that leads to stagnation, falling lives and a philosophical death of the soul. The Elden Ring was shatter for what? There is no change for the better, nor the worse. There is a true lack of purpose. Queen Marika shattered the elden ring, after the death of her beloved Godwyn, in order to understand its secret and to know the flaw within her golden order. Yet we as players have rendered her sacrifice purposeless. 

For without prompt, without action and without a fire to seek our own truth, we became nothing more than puppets for the greater will. Willing to let an age of fractured minds, hearts and even the very world continue on. Until some day the sun will set on us as well. 

2. Age of the Duskborn

“I will soon lay with Godwyn.

And it will surely stir within me.

the new life of the golden prince, and first Dead of the demigods,

as the rune of Those Who Live in Death.

Please, do one thing for me.

Brandish this child, my rune, and take for yourself the throne.

Stay the persecution of Those Who Live in Death.

By becoming our Elden Lord.” – Fia, the deathbed companion. 

The age of the Duskborn ending brings about a question: Is death, the end of all things, really something to be feared? 

Destined Death had been originally removed from the Elden Ring and given to Maliketh in order for Marika to become a truly ascended being, in the process causing a process of death and rebirth that would send, upon the death of the physical body, all the souls to the Erdtree. 

Godwyn the Golden was the first true death that happened after many millenia. Ranni was the cause of this, for whatever the reason might of been. We know that she used this process to destroy her mortal body completely and send her soul to the doll we know in the game. However, with Godwyn it was different. Godwyn’s body remained while his soul was destroyed. This is why when we see Godwyn he is unrecognizable. A twisted being, looking almost as if he is trying to escape the roots of the erdtree. He became the Prince of those who live in death. For while the body lives, they have already faced the true death of the soul. 

Yet, even with all these conflicts and titles that Fia and the murder of Godwyn are treated, like a cursed bunch who people would much rather leave forgotten in the depths and abandoned as blasphemers, there is some truth. This immortal living, this cycle of death and rebirth, it’s what caused so much fracture and such a stagnating and broken kingdom to flourished. Given everything that we’ve seen, can we really called death evil? 

It isn’t like the Frenzied Flame, where your purpose is to burn everything to ground and turn it into ashes, to kill everyone young or old without remorse and let the world die. Rather, it is returning the very important cycle of end to life, so that people are able to live, experience and take with them to the great beyond. A way so that life can flourish without it becoming stale to it’s meaning in the first place. 

Away from the desire of the Greater Will and away from the principals of the Golden Order. 

3. Age of Order:

Perhaps though, you have the opposite point of view. Perhaps you yearn for the purpose of Order and believe that it is a necessity that this order is forever lasting. Golden Mask seems to believe so, after all, his mission and ending revolve around the very fact that he seeks to restore the Golden Order to a higher glory that it has ever been before. Reading from the Rune of Perfect Order reveals:

“Rune discovered by the noble Goldmask.

Used to restore the fractured Elden Ring when brandished by the Elden Lord.

A rune of transcendental ideology which will attempt to perfect the Golden Order.

The current imperfection of the Golden Order, or instability of ideology, can be blamed upon the fickleness of the gods no better than men. That is the fly in the ointment.”

In the eyes of Golden Mask, the problem was not the order itself, but Marika and the gods, who were fickle in their beliefs and allowed the world to fall into the state that we see it fall into. 

“I’ve been gripped by a terrifying thought.

The rhythms and calculus of the master’s finger…

betray a suspicion of the holism of the Golden Order.

A conceit, I am afraid, that cannot be overlooked.

Oh, but how could this be?

I dread to even entertain the possibility…

but somehow, I cannot cast aside my doubts about the master.

Tell me, have I simply lost my head?

Only, if the master were true to the Golden Order,

why would he think to breach this forbidden mount of fire?” -Brother Corhyn

Imagine that someone came to a church, or a college. This man then expresses that the belief system (be it spiritual or scientific) is not only flawed, but that the reason for the flaw is the people who study it or serve within it. Its headmaster or pope. The person would be branded as insane, a blasphemer. Yet in their eyes, they speak truth. And if you follow the path, you will find that the end of your road, when you finally sit upon the Elden Throne will be golden. Yet this light is brutal, so bright that it blinds any who see. And at the end of it all, you are still a puppet of the Greater Will, only this time, the stagnation will be for the rest of eternity. 

4. Blessing of Despair:

And finally we reach what is, in my personal opinion, probably the worse ending of this list. Yet in some ways, it serves as almost a type of retribution against the Golden Order and it’s views of life and perfection. All of this is represented in its central focus character, the accursed Dung Eater. 

Without diving into too much detail of his story, the Dung Eater is regarded as the most vile and evil being that exists in the world. Yes, in a world full of gods, demons and monsters, this human being with rusted armor of broken horns is described as vile enough to make spirits tremble in fear. And it is no wonder why.

 You see, the accursed Dung Eater is a defiler, not just contempt with being a murderer but corrupting and defiling the bodies and souls of his victim, cursing them to never return to the Erdtree and be reborn in the rightful order of the world. However, unlike the calm and sleep-like death offered by Fia, the age of knowledge offered by Ranni, or even just a feat of destruction offered by the three fingers of the flame of frenzied, the curse of the seedbed is hated by all.

All that is, except for the misbegotten, the omen, those born outside of grace. 

In a way, the seedbed curse is a reflection of the hate and bigotry that the golden order had against those who suffered from the crucible. Those who, with their strange horns and wild sizes, reflect a time when the great tree was still in its primordial state. When Godfrey and his soldiers imprisoned the misbegotten, making them servants or burying them underground to live forever. Hated and loathed creatures, from which the Dung Eater finds his inspiration and cruelty. 

The Blessing of Despair is simply this. To curse the victim in body and soul so that they can never be lighted by grace again. Their rebirth shall be in this putrid state, turning them into like that of the Omen and the misbegotten, and such will the curse be, that even those born after them will receive this accursed blessing. To be born and reborn endlessly, in a cycle of cursed, sickly despair. 

The Blessing of Despair is the idea that hate brings only with it hate. And the result of it will be that everyone in the world will suffer for the actions of those who hold the power. The actions of the Dung Eater are a small fracture of what was done to those born outside of grace. A human with the mind of an Omen who is ready to curse the world with that which they hate and fear so much. 

The fear of being without grace.

Thank you for reading.

Next week we come to the final chapter of this little challenge I put to myself, as well as the ending I am most looking forward to talk about. 

Next week, Elden Lords Ending: Stars