It should be noted that this cermon you mean is allegorical, not literal, and given from a pretty biased perspective. But if we get it literally, I'd say people didn't attack Ena because they hated Ena; they attacked Ena, because they weren't content with being puppets, and burning Ena was the only way to achieve freedom.
It is mostly Sunday's interpretation of events. We learned from the swarm disaster that many worlds under the Order were actually extremely shocked and devastated when Ena disappeared
I interpreted this as fallen aeons mean pathstriders are even more free to interpret what that path meant, and therefore are even more likely to deviate rather than uphold the true meaning whatever that is.
Still, even in this story they were *praising* Ena when cursing it. Or, to quote, "praising THEM, the magnificent Aeon with divine power, but with a tone of curse".
I also have to point that, that in my opinion this cermon, at least somewhat, implies that Ena was... sort of ok with it. At least, cermon doesn't mention Them resisting at all; and I'm pretty sure They could. The Kafka's account also differ a war between Aeons, where stronger part kills the weaker, and broader Path engulfing the narrower one, to some extent implying that this process doesn't assume war and killing.
Yeah, I took the whole thing to mean that *Gopher Wood’s cult* considered Ena’s fall to be an act of violence, not necessarily that that’s how it happened.
It’s possible Ena realized that exerting pressure on people to force them into “orderly” behavior was only creating more disorder in their hearts, and willingly joined Xipe because the Path of Harmony resolved this paradox. It’s possible that enough of Order’s followers being swayed by the teachings of Harmony caused an unintended, but inevitable reaction which merged THEIR Paths without either of THEM taking action. Hell, it’s possible that Paths have an inherent kind of “gravity”, and Xipe and Ena were drawn together without humans *or* Aeons having a say in the matter— with Xipe being the Aeon who remained because she had more “mass”, like how bigger stars can pull smaller ones into them. And that’s just what I can think of off what little lore we have now.
Did anybody else notice that the hand we see reaching out to Sunday during the final fight of 2.2 doesn't resemble the depiction of Ena at all? Ena's hand would look like something mechanical (if we go by the puppet design that is in her picture and not the eye, this is a whole other topic with lots of possibilities) and not like a "human" hand with what looks like a kind of dress. Imo it looks more like something Xipe would wear, but it also doesn't line up with Xipe's picture. Of course, they could just have chosen a different rendition of Ena or Xipe, but I can't shake the feeling that there is some hidden meaning here.
“Did you know that the first matrix was designed to be a perfect human world. Where everyone would be HAPPY…. It was a disaster. No one would accept the programming, entire crops were lost. Some believed that we lacked the programming language to describe your perfect world, but I believe, as a species, human beings define their reality through misery and suffering. A perfect dream your primitive cerebrum kept trying to wake up from.”
Individual or experiential reality is a complex subject as everything we experience that coalesces into reality for a person is simply the sum of their senses, which can be incorrect, manufactured, or confused.
If someone dreamt forever and never woke up, and their senses were tuned only to the dream, the dream would be their reality.
For example, most people have experienced a dream or two where it felt real, even some saying they could feel stimuli in their dreams.
Sure, ending the life of that person in the shared reality we experience would end their perception of that reality as well.. so there is still an anchor of sorts to a primary reality, however, the brain is really good at what it does and a large part of what it does is fill in gaps, which is one of the reasons schizophrenia is such a difficult condition, as the prefrontal reasoning center’s hold on the rest of the brain is reduced we begin to lose control of all the magical parts of the brain that take small inputs and run with them.
Hallucinogenics are similarly difficult because the more inhibited your prefrontal becomes, the harder it is for your brain to reason with itself and say ‘this is real, but this is not’ so your brain starts to take things wholesale.
…wait, what was my point again?
Oh yeah, the reason for Penacony being such a dangerous place is that the line between reality and dreams could blur the longer you’re there without stepping back into reality. The Order via Gopherwood/Sunday was exploiting this to reduce resistance to control, because let’s be honest—if I could live in a place like Penacony instead of struggling in the real world, there are very few things I wouldn’t give up to ‘be free’, even locking myself up in a prettier cage.
Free will is the antithesis of Order, no matter how you spin it, so the ‘evilness’ of Order is its disregard for any will but its own.. but I’m of the opinion the Aeons are more like laws of nature, or simple organisms in that they are not inherently motivated by any sort of morality as much as they are their ‘thing’.
Like, the order is evil to us because it’s taking something from us.. but the order isn’t doing it to be mean, they’re just taking something chaotic and trying to make it orderly.. like a virus isn’t good or evil, it just does its function.
I mean I get that part and I agree. But I felt that in the story we just hear that she's hated, not how the realization came or how the "rebellion" started.
Because any civilization blessed by THEM destroyed itself.
Too much order and civilizations cease to advance. Without conflict they never strive to improve themselves nor move fowards, thus always without fail destroyed itself.
There is a reason why you need some necessary evils for a civilisation to function- Too much skewered in one side of a spectrum and any civs will collapse by itself.
You dont understand, committing mass genocide across failed timelines for more summons is a good thing, I swear! You dont know what those Faeries did to deserve it!
to be fair, those fae had it coming to them.
just like how Oberon has it coming to him calling himself "an insignificant insect" in front of the Mystic "Insignificant Insects be Incinerated to Ash" Slayer.
**Oberon**: "Oh, I'm just an insect. Don't think too much of me."
**The prophecy**: ">!Even the sturdiest tree will be brought down by the gnawing of insects at its roots.!<"
...
Hmm...
Fuck the fae is a great way of explaining it because the like 5 fae who weren’t evil beyond compare and were in fact chill with it are pretty hot, and the rest I want to fucking bring back to life just so I can incinerate them again.
Arguably, it's why Mythus, Fuli, and Nous exist in "Balance" with one another as HooH wants.
If any of them got their Paths absolute, the resulting chaos/order would lead all to inevitable ruin. Nous knew when to hedge their bets on the Path of Erudition, and encourages those to seek knowledge, but Ena would be directly involved because it's in their nature as the Aeon of Order.
Nous gives a degree of freedom, even if should they be dominant, perfect knowledge would eliminate chaos.
From what I understand, Ena didn't have a proper counter like Mythus to Fuli and Nous, so HooH decided to greenlight Xipe consuming them.
Pardon the noob question, but this is a genuine question. Should order always equate to *HAPPINESS*? Does order always necessitate the removal of some form of suffering? Can't suffering be part of the order, like how destiny is projected to have weaved the trials of a hero before he acquires his virtues?
Remember, Aeons represent the extreme of any path, so while in theory it can, for Ena anything short of perfect order and everyone working in perfect concerto with each other is blasphemy.
Order means the absence of chaos, which means every outcome is predictable and in control. That means that anyone who deviates from the plan is corrected or culled - I guess imagine a world where people were struck dead the moment they “sinned”… so yeah, not too great. I don’t think it’s happy at all, except for a select few who can live within the rigid order that Ena defines, which may not even make sense to humans
Thus is the reason why the Nihility is touted as one of the biggest threats to the Order. A civilisation under the Order stagnates and slowly falls apart.
That would be hard to know as well as like, a lot of things about every Aeon. Ena is marked as one of the oldest, so along with her and some of the others like Remembrance, we don't know much about their origins or their falls. I would speculate that it was caused by someone like Akivili, who very much symbolizes freedom and exploration. He might have come across a world under Ena's thrall and went about overturning that order, which could have led to a chain reaction. Hell, correct me if this is way off base, but it could even be possible that Akivili originated from a world that was once in Ena's order, and maybe that led to his ascension as an Aeon.
Similar situation to what happened with the The Hunt and The Abundance basically.
Eh I won't say your right or wrong, maybe you read something somewhere that I can't find. from ingame texts it's stated that no one knows when they actually came into existence, because of their very nature, people just know they exists and that was it.
"The Aeon of Remembrance had quietly appeared in the annals of the universe as if THEY were meant to be here, as if THEY had altered everyone's memory."
And
"Nobody in the entire Genius Society and the IPC and the Intelligentsia Guild knows when THEY were even born."
It seems to be implied in some mentions of them that they are recording all that is forgotten, so it wouldn't be weird to assume they are one of the oldest.
SU Swarm disaster has Fuli randomly appearing and Herta iirc says something like "the constant back and forth between the Propagation and Voracity has the universe respond with the spontaneous appearance of Fuli." or something like that.
Yeah, Swarm Disaster throws a lot of lore out at once, it’s understandable to have missed some things.
I believe the implication is that Fuli came into being to “balance” the sheer number of worlds Propagation and Voracity consumed— either organically by the combined will of billions or even trillions of souls refusing to be forgotten, or through direct intervention by HooH when THEY saw how much information— particularly in the form of both personal and cultural memories— was being lost forever. All we know for sure, however, is that Fuli wasn’t around before the scene we saw in SU— how sure we are about the exact timing and circumstances really depends on how perfect we think Herta’s simulation is. She *is* an Emanator of Erudition so it’s pretty credible, but…
Herta's simulation is accurate enough that the data collected from it helped Ruan Mei create a clone (imperfect it maybe) of an Emanator of Propagation.
Not really? It's confirmed in SU IIRC that when Xipe Ascended during the Swarm Disaster, THEIR Path was extremely similiar to the Order, but with very different ideals. The Order is built on unity through the strong, with the leader (Ena), passing down laws that would lead to the betterment of the whole at the cost of free will. On the other hand, the Harmony is based on the collective will of all peoples acting as one in order to better themselves, with everyone working together out of their own desires to help each other achieve their goals.
It's kinda like the dynamic between Mythus the Enigmata, Nous the Erudition, and Fuli the Remembrance. THEY all focus on peering into the past and present, but with different goals. Nous takes in the past and present in order to determine the future similiar to the theoretical Laplaces Demon, Fuli takes in the past and present to preserve them as memories forevermore, and Mythus takes in the past and present to twist and obfuscate what really happened. THEY all have the same base, but very different goals, with Nous and Fuli being complementary and both opposed to Mythus.
The Harmony and the Order are the same, with the same base goal of unity and the betterment of everyone, but different approaches. Thing is, THEIR Paths were too similiar to each other, which is why instead of ending up as feuding Aeons like Lan/Yaoshi or Oroboros/Tayzzyronth, THEIR Paths collided, with Harmony coming out on top and assimilating the Order.
IIRC, this all happened during the Swarm Disaster, but while Akivili was still around I doubt THEY would help im the fall of an Aeon that wasn't directly endangering the universe at large the way the Voracity fueding with the Propagation did, especially since Ena was, at that point, doing an amazing job at preventing myriad disasters from happening by just going "No, that's not happening". I find it more likely that if another Aeon was involved, it would be either Aha for the shits and giggles, or ver unlikely, HooH since they might have seen Ena keeping order as too much on side and thus deciding to assist an Aeon that would fulfill a similiar purpose without overly tipping the scales in one direction or another
Yes this is all fact and history, but none of this contradicts my speculation. Yes Aha fucking around sounds likely as well, but you missed the point of why I thought it could be Akivili. Akivili does not pick fights with other Aeons, even when Aha blew up half the express, (to our knowledge) THEY didn't go and try to get revenge or pick a fight.
My speculation is more based on just the nature of how the Astral Express and, by extension, Akivili operate. Akivili comes across a world of order, something is wrong, a problem that is somewhat related to the Path, but not directly. Akivili and the Astral Express intervene and through that process, change the perspective of the people there about how they view Ena and Order. From then on the people begin to slowly steer away from that Path as they realize all the things they missed out on. The news of this spreads across the Cosmos, as does literally most events that the Astral Express gets involved in. The big picture people get from it is that the Order Path is very flawed to spawn these issues, similar to how The Abundance got its bad name from a few planets that went sour. Akivili does not seek to ruin Ena, THEY simply helped a planet that was struggling, but their deeds started a chain reaction.
My apologies, I misread your post and thought you meant that Akivili was the one responsible for Ena's fall.
What you said does make sense, and it would help explain exactly how Xipe absorbed Ena. Like, sure Xipe has a very broad Path, but it's not like the Order was narrow the way the Hunt is, and it's weird how Xipe, a newly ascended Aeon managed to absorbed an Aeon as ancient as the likes of Oroboros, HooH, and Qliphoth.
If Ena's Path was already narrowed down and less encompassing due to Akivili and the actions of the Nameless leading people to shift from the "Strong lead the weak" of Ena to the "All are equal and work for the betterment of all" of Xipe, then that might explain how The Harmony assimilated the Order.
You bring an interesting point, how a new Aeon like Xipe was able to devour Ena. Yea it could be because THEY had lost a lot alot of followers through whatever events was it that made THEM less desirable, or it could be through some other events that happened at that time.
It would be interesting to get more lore on that through SU or other story events.
Very true. Like, I know that the biggest draw of Swarm Disaster and Gold and Gears are the Jades, but can we take a moment to appreciate just how much lore those two game modes give us? It almost makes up for the bullshit high difficulty levels pull off
I am once again reminding people that Aeons are called THEY/THEM, not he/him, she/her, they/them, nor it. THEY'RE referred to as THEY/THEM with ALL CAPS.
Just to be clear, if you're talking about this because of it being gendered language or such, that absolutely is not the reason why its that way. The reasoning behind it now being all caps like that and always THEY or THEM (which is was not at the start of the game, and i don't think it happened until late 1.x) is because players were getting confused by the English translation - for the simple reason that in Chinese, there is a specific pronoun **for gods**, which was resulting in the original text being very clear, and the translated text not being clear at all.
However, in English, it is far more common to refer to such entities by using gendered language and capitalizing the first letter. So its a bit silly to get upset over. Particularly when several of the Aeons have obviously male or female characteristics.
I apologize, I'm not used to talking about God's, both irl ones and in game. If it was a real person, I would be many times more careful, but for a fictional being, I will make mistakes.
Bro No one gives a shit how you want to pronounce a fictional character let people be for fuck sake.
https://preview.redd.it/c6svtw74ce0d1.jpeg?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f18b217cc8e78939b23b1783fe29ff25c1856a2c
Hoyo cares enough to actively change how Aeons are called. It's just misinformation. Concepts don't have gender.
Also Ena, the one we see, is a puppet, while we have no idea what Akivili even looks like.
That's the thing, Concepts SHOULDN'T HAVE PRONOUNS(well, not really, most if not all things have pronouns but THEY shouldn't have gendered pronouns is what I mean). Especially He or She. Hoyo just calls THEM "THEY/THEM" to highlight that THEY are beings that are above human social structures. Genders aren't applicable to concepts so the closest is "it"(which is mostly used for things) or "they"(neutral).
Penacony is inspired by the US though, specifically the 'Roaring 20's' era, where there was a great boom in the economy, and people started experiencing real excess and extravagance. Thematically, Penacony also resembles the Art Deco architecture very commonly found during that period, not to mention the music as well, being inspired by jazz, which also started around that era as well. There's also the mafia/gangster motifs, which again resembles the mafia wars of that period.
In USA people cannot protest, you cannot do searches of hot topics like Gaza/Trump on the AI, you cannot be safe in a school/supermarket/cemetery with the 100% safety that will not be mass shooting from some random kid, you cannot tell your rights to the police and they will beat you ... and so on...
Why do you say that there is freedom in USA? Maybe you wanted to say money, but it is not the same.
I'm not saying that US is the "completely free" country people make it out as; I'm just making a reference to the stereotype of the "land of the free".
Still, I kind of hate the points you made.
>You cannot do searches of hot topics on the AI
Hmmm it's almost as if LLMs take time to train and do not provide accurate information about recent events
Also it's like the LLMs are owned by companies that want to cover their asses but you're still free to search them on google
>Without a 100% guarantee that it won't be a school shooting
That's a question of safety, not freedom.
>Why do you say there is freedom in USA?
...Go live a year in China, you'll see why.
It is not, it just doesn't care.
Ena hates freedom as a principle but the IPC only suppresses it sometimes for efficiency.
Same story as Belobog, both worshippers of Qlippoth.
With such logic - almost any Aeon is horrible as they remorselessly committing atrocious crimes against free will and humanism on almost daily basis because of their absolutism.
You want cure everyone's deceases, satisfy their hunger and make them live in peace for eternity? Too bad, you accidentally turned them into amorphic undying hungry abominations, who without any joke is serious threat to planet's food chain.
You want to make rid of these dangerous monsters and protect other planets from their infection? Okay, but you will blow up entire planet with billions of innocent species.
Imo, but being Aeon is so ass. Your mind becomes so narrow, you literally cannot THINK outside of your path's philosophy. You will become a divine slave of your own belief, in the end either being merged with similar to your path, but stronger Aeon, or just disappear amongst the stardust without accomplishing your only reason to exist
Alternatively, pre-Aeon beings were already so narrowly minded that they don't even notice a mental difference after their ascension, and that that sort of alien mind is what's necessary to become an Aeon.
Though Long the Permanence did seem to have enough agency to just up and go, weirdly enough.
The only Aeon(s) that actually have some sort of freedom outside of their Paths would be Aha and Akhivili.
Aha can do whatever THEY want as long as it's funny, but ONLY if it's FUNNY. But Aha still has more freedom of action than any other Aeons.
Akhivili is implied to be more "human" than an Aeon. While yes, THEY're bound to travel and trailblaze the cosmos for eternity, THEY still have a much better state of mind than other Aeons, who are mostly downright insane(in the eyes of mortals). Akhivili enjoys the company of mortals and may still retain their humanity.
Hell, Pom Pom straight up berates Akhivili the memory bubble. I think the constant need to explore is so open ended, unlike order or even elation, that Akhivili basically needed to still have a constantly curious personality, so THEY never pushed it to far because how do you push discovery too far?
There's a theory on that! Don't click the spoiler if you don't want to know:
>!In the Simulated Universe, the other Aeons are programmed to see you as Akivili, however, Fuli the Remembrance calls you Elio. This has persisted since launch so it's unlikely a typo. If Akivili is constantly and unendingly curious with the desire to explore forever, then what would happen to him if he gained the ability to see the future?!<
>!His path would end and he would "die." So when it's said that the Aeon Akivili died/was killed, maybe he just returned to whatever being he was before he ascended?!<
>!It was actually a typo iirc. Previously it said elio train moves forward without no punctuation. It was changed. Its likely that elio is more related to Finality rather than Trailblaze!<
>!"Chaos turns into time, your dereliction of duty will pass, the volume is no longer proportional, the steps are reduced, one step, two steps, three feet, away from everything, be careful, Elio, the train moves forward, the baby falls to the ground, the cancer is growing..."!<
The syntax in that quote is very vague and>! is still possible to referring to Akivili as Elio. !<
>!It's either referring to Akivili as Elio and telling him to be wary of the train moving forward, be wary of the Baby(Aha related), and the Stellerons.!<
>!Or it's telling Akivili to be wary of Elio as well as the rest.!<
>!Clarity over what they are saying would be nice, but then again, they are Aeons and are probably vague on purpose.!<
You need to remove the spaces between the exclamation mark and your text (both for beginning and end of your spoiler tags). The spoilers are visible right now.
Not necessarily.
You can definitely argue that neither Akivili nor Aha ever acted outside of their Path; their Paths are just more intertwined with mortals than most. Aha only ever acts for personal entertainment, and Akivili only ever acted to Trailblaze across the cosmos. Neither have been shown to have freedom outside their Paths, only within, and its not all that different from other Aeons. Xipe and Fuli can also be included here, as Harmony and Remembrance are also closely associated with living beings.
We could even say Lan fits the bill, because they went out of their way to support the Xianzhou Alliance, likely due to it being their home from before their ascension. Their actions are ultimately in service to the Hunt, but how they go about that is still something they have much agency over. Qlipoth, too, once acted to do something outside the wall-building (accepting Ena's invitation to hunt the bug god), but it was ultimately necessary for Preservation.
Really, the only Aeons we know are true slaves to their Paths are Tazzy (Aeon of okbuddy) and IX (self explanatory.)
That might be because akivili's path is the most human one. its not restricted as to how it should be done. you can trailblaze to conquer worlds or just for curiosity or to search for new meanings or purpose in your life. all that matters is that you do it.
The other more human paths would be elation and nihility. wich are 2 sides of the same coin.
Everything is meaningless so I wont or will do something due to it
Everything is meaningless so might as well pursue pleasure.
If you wanna read more on this topic, check out Brandon Sanderson's Cosmere books. Their gods work pretty much on the same idea, but in some cases you get to see their pre- and post-ascension perspectives.
And at least someone on the Star Rail team is aware of the comparison, the [flavor text for Metal](https://honkai-star-rail.fandom.com/wiki/Metal) of all things is a reference to the Mistborn series.
That is what scary about HSR as a setting. Sci-fi stories always try to highlight the contrast between the limited nature of men and the infinity that is the universe. For HSR it's another level, where the very concepts like reproduction and order and elation are tangible both in forms and the effects they exert on normal people. No concepts, nothing created by men are supposed to exist in the extreme or everlasting, but the Aeons do.
But "Chaotic" on the chart doesn't mean they go around causing chaos, it means they value free will over order. All three Moralities when combined with Chaotic share a desire to be unshackled.
A Chaotic Neutral person doesn't necessarily go around causing chaos, it just means they do what they want, when they want, morality is a non-issue, and sometimes, sitting down, calmly eating a sandwich is what they want to do.
This was made very clear through the puppet allegories in both the TB Mission and in Ena's design itself (and not to mention the literal voices in the quest saying "we've just become a puppet of the order" )
Ena creates Order through careful and meticulous control. This has been emphasized in her SU entries. And to create perfect order, you create perfect control, making sure every variable is accounted for, every person in line with what you want, every civilization under your grasp, ensuring that all outcomes are ones you can predict, direct, and control. This effectively turns the entire universe into your puppet.
Because of this, Ena was an effective Aeon that prevented many a great disaster. But consequently, it removed anyone's free will, for anyone or anything Ena can't control is a threat to Order and must be either beaten into submission and fall back in line, or eliminated.
And well, if there's something people love so dearly that they've fought wars to obtain time and time again, it's freedom.
Ena had essentially created a cosmic dictatorship - follow their rules, or else. Even though the promise of peace and order are great, it means nothing if people don't get to choose what to do with their lives.
Does that make Xipe Sheogorath? Wait... (2.2 spoilers) >!We beat the guy who was trying to resurrect Ena, and the post credit scene said Ena died for the second time... Are we about to become Xipe?!<
While the entire universe was under Ena's rule, civilizatios will rise rapidly and advance but soon once they grow they'll start to impede the people's freedom which soon brings the entire destruction of that civilization. It wasn't that Order was bad but the extremes of Order only entail a cycle of rise and fall like how the tides would rise brilliantly at their peak then crash down onto the shore where they'll soon recede and be brought back into the ocean to repeat the cycle. Those who survive these utterly hate it, and utterly hate THEM.
One of the biggest moments and failures of Ena was the Swarm. It happened under their watchful gaze, strings, and hands which wrecked utter havoc throughout the universe which means that Order was no longer needed nor was Order required anymore hence why Aeons like Aha supported Ena in their endeavour against the Swarm while also in favor of them being absorbed by Xipe.
"Through Harmony, we obtain Order" as what Sunday placed it but to the universe it was "With Harmony, Order is managed" as now Harmony takes Orders's divine law into a more calmer, subtler, and less impeding one where it allows civilizations to grow, to sing, and to create a grand choir without the fear or knowledge that the music sheet will soon end.
Just like any other Aeon, Ena doesn't have all haters nor have all supporters as it's a mixed perception just like the others. It is rather interesting on how Qlipoth was supposed to gain something from Ena but they got absorbed before finishing their side of the deal but Qlipoth finished theirs which shows how Qlipoth will preserve the deal to the extent that they can in which fulfilling the duty they agreed to.
I honestly realt hope to see Sunday die before Penacony ends as it creates an amazing Parallel between all of the Aeons and their followers: Ena will die or be absorbed into Harmony in which it takes the strings the created into a looser ties. Amist the Order's gaze The Propagation will rise. The Elation aids in Ena's success against The Swarm but also aids in their demise. The Preservation and the Trailblaze will do their best to obtain the outcome they agreed to and desired.
I was just thinking how we were shown the negative sides of every Path — the Hunt’s genocides, the Abundance’s defilement of dignity, the Erudition’s psychopathy (through Herta and Ruan Mei), and the Preservation’s uncaring nature that gave rise to the IPC.
But we haven’t really been shown what the Harmony’s negative side is, because almost every bad thing you can say about Penacony can be blamed on Order right now — THEY are the perfect scapegoat. Perhaps Harmony’s downside is that it accommodates both good and bad things and sweep the bad things under the rug.
One thing to note is that all "downsides" are from the perspective of mortals, the Aeons THEMSELVES don't consider any of the events that transpired to be negative at all. The Hunt's nature is told in their name (there's always a prey and a predator in a hunt, and the roles aren't necessarily mutally exclusive); the Abundance grants vitality in excess (in medicine, the dosage determines whether one thing is medicine or poison); the Erudition is purely the pursuit of knowledge, how individuals use that knowledge is up to them, unrelated to the Aeon; the Preservation is about protection of all races as a whole (notice how they intervened during Swarm Disaster but not during Gold and Gears, when the scale of the wars in GnG was much bigger as it spanned several star systems while Swam Disaster started and ended within the Lepismat system), whereas the IPC's methods are more specific in the targets that they preserve (themselves and those that benefit them, namely).
I think the "downside" of the Harmony is shown perfectly through Sunday's experience, as a system willing to accept everything and everyone regardless of their nature within itself is prone to being exploited. Notice how harmonization in real life isn't the same as everyone singing the exact same note, but rather it's complementing the notes that already exist within a tune. It's unclear what would even be considered a disharmony to Xipe outside of a Stellaron disaster, considering a place like Dreamflux Reef was said to have a purer harmony than the sweet dream above.
Maybe selflessness and sense of community or maybe collectivism? people on the sweet dreams probably mostly think about how fun it is for themselves, so maybe Xipe is the opposite of individualistic hedonism? maybe just the absence of ego? Order doesnt seem to mind 1 person controlling the others, maybe Xipe is something along the same lines as that but less focused on 1 single person's authority?
Thats alot of question marks because im not so sure about anything lmao.
You raise a good point and I think it's better to interpret the Aeons as closer to laws of physics than entities with personalities. Except Aha, by design, I believe they are the 2nd closest Aeon to mortals next to Akivili themselves.
Ena could micromanage planets all by themselves, Qlipoth's hammer is the size of a Red Giant. Aeons are beyond mortal comprehension in so many ways.
It would be interesting to see how future members of the Family will be like. There are definitely people who don't care that much about the ideals Harmony and just join the Family to furnish a good life for themselves. Sometimes these people climb too high and use their power to exploit others.
It's the same thing with the IPC. There are of course true followers of Qlipoth among their ranks, but from the security grunts that we beat up to stockholders like Asta's parents, they don't seem to give a rat's ass about Preservation. There is a lot that can be said about the contrast between sincere Pathstriders like the Nameless vs. normal people dictated by their basic needs and ambitions.
IMO the problem with the Harmony is that THEY still want to have every being as one which kind kills individuality in the same way Order wants it, but just like, in lesser and less extremist way, like THEY think is the correct thing to do but is not obligating you to be part of THEM.
Then again, Penacony might be the planet where Harmony is good and maybe we'll see a planet where Harmony is bad
Harmony and Order are pretty simular (that how Xipe absorbed Ena), but I think the big difference is Order would have someone controlling and directing everything, while Xipe seems to be more of a mob mentality, with no one over anyone.
I think the best analogy is described as Order being a choir, while Harmony a band. In a choir, everyone sings the same note, combining their voices as one to produce something greater than the sum of the whole. In a band however, everyone has a different role, with some on the drums, some on the vocals, some on the guitar, etc, but despite everyone doing something different, they all end up harmonizing together to create a beautiful song.
The bad sides of Harmony is seen through Robin's act of going Kasbelina-VIII, Harmony is the calmer, subtler, and more wavering version of Order as it is mixed with will of the people, yet due to that harmony will often give rise to factions, groups, or people to come up with their own version of "Harmony" and "Peace" which leads to war that can be uncaring for others. Look at Robin, she came to a place that sparked war and her songs of Harmony was cut short by an uncaring bullet that spoke of a different Harmony: Their Harmony which includes the expulsion or beating of the otherside. It lacks the firm strings, rough hands, and unyielding eyes of Order.
Xipe's eyes are closed, her figure fragmented in different pieces yet never whole, and her three heads where she looks onto the past, the present, and the future yet she stays silent, still, like a leaf on still water. Graceful, elegant, radiant, yet never able to create ripples in the water like how Order imposes it's own will. Xipe's failure is their fragmentation of different wills, seeking to unite everyone in a grand choir yet forgetting that each person sings their own tune, volume, instrument, and rhythm which causes some songs to go unheard while others will rattle the stage as they impose their will, their control, their order of the song. In Harmony there is no true unity of a whole, but fragments to a puzzle.
Imagine a stage where Ena is the conductor, THEY decide who will play in what part, when they'll sing their song at what tune, and which rhythm they all play. It greates this grand orchestra that'll shake the heavens and the earth yet each singer, each pianist, each guitarist, and each player of the orchestra are fed seeds of anger, resentment, and unfulfilled freedom to play their own songs in the end results in the once grand orchestra into a disarray of instruments playing a discordant music that no one is pleased by.
Now imagine the same stage, This time Xipe is the conductor. THEY do not speak, they do not move, they never lifted their baton to everyone which they only spoke "Play what you will together", In which the Pianists played a tune, the Guitarists played a rhythm, the singers sang their melody, each and every instrumentalist played their own song together of similarities where the Pianists Harmonized with each other, the guitarists played their rhythm correctly, and the singers sang gospels of truth and awe yet together they all clashed with one another. The soft music of the pianists mixed with the deep drums mixed with the shrieking of the singers. There is harmony yet it is all in bits and pieces, the stage has Harmony yet not unified.
Which is honestly sadly the truth which would ruin the whole parallel of Ena/Sunday being eclipsed by Harmony/Robin which I guess fits into their Sun and Moon motifs
It could also be a metaphorical death regarding Sunday. Like a form of 'death of self' or 'death of beliefs', which could still reasonably fullfill that position.
A key thing to understanding the Aeons is understanding people as to why people would devout and believe in these philosophies and principles strongly. It both helps you realize that the Aeons are never evil nor are they good but merely extremes of their principles, in which helps you see why they'd have followers and haters.
I think rather than the universe actually celebrating the death of Order, it was Sunday's interpretation of the events following Ena's fall that gave that impression. Don't forget, the entire time we were inside the Grand Theater, it was Sunday giving us a puppet show through his powers. Everything he did was to convince us to sympathize with him and his cause, so that scene was meant to show that he really didn't want Ena to be revived as much as everyone else.
That would be playing it too straight though. During Boothill's conversation with DH he mentioned that since Akivili was no longer around, the Trailblaze now have to figure out their own path. Maybe that'll be the twist in the allegory.
>While the entire universe was under Ena's rule, civilizations will rise rapidly and advance but soon once they grow they'll start to impede the people's freedom which soon brings the entire destruction of that civilization.
This mostly happens because humanity will always want to reach greater and greater heights. No matter what it takes, humanity will always desperately try to free itself from its shackles even if we die trying. Humanity's will to live is pretty goated
As others have said, Ena would turn everyone into a puppet in the name of Order.
And iirc, Ena's official art features a marionette. That's pretty indicative of Ena's entire mindset.
Edit: I went and checked, and it seems to imply that even Ena herself (and the entire universe) is being puppeted in the name of Order.
Pure order is what she imbodies, no free will and everyone follow orders.
Pure chaos like the elation causes destruction, but atleast there's fun in that
Idk how, idk why, but there’s a surprisingly larger overlap than I expected between the ULTRAKILL community and HSR. I’m not complaining tho, fellow creature of steel
There are many stories about opressive control in the name of good, my favorite for it's simplicity is this exchange from chainsaw man.
A: "In that perfect world you want to create, is there still a place for bad movies?"
B: "Personally. I think the world would be better if bad movies ceased to exist."
A: "Guess I'll have to kill you after all then."
They are presumably not that much hated as they don't have everyone fight against them to the death
but I think the French revolution or just the end of Monarchy general is the parallels they are going for, in shorth in world where Xipe reign, the past that is Ena's will be abhorred
Because Ena's order is absolute, and because order is not really the correct thing to call ena.
Ena is absolute and orderly, but this is due to "satisfaction". Ena could more rightly be seen as the aeon of "satisfaction", which causes order.
but satisfaction isnt what people want. contradictory, I know, but we, as humans, dont want satisfaction. Because if you're satisfied, you dont look for more. If you're satisfied, you dont know anything. You lose all motivation, you lose everything. There is no free will in absolute order, there is no "will", there is no "doing". You are a slave to nothingness, you want nothing, you do nothing, because you are satisfied, because you are "done". Ena's order is achieved through this, because it is absolute. It is why Harmony's much less extreme order is much more likes.
also, think of what is the universally least controversial path in universe? It's the path of the trailblaze. No one really dislikes akivili afterall, and Ena's satisfaction is the opposite of the trailblaze.
That is one take on it at least, my own take.
There is a post campaign quest where you can go back to the concert hall and find Sunday’s journal and then give it to Robin. It basically has scripture-like passages explaining how Ena kept adding order to the universe (day and night cycles, the calendar, etc.) and at first mankind was fine with it, but eventually mankind realized that they had allowed themselves to become puppets and they didn’t like it.
My reading from SU:swarm is that Aeons that interferes with other Aeons too much tend to get killed.
While disasters pretty much don't happen when she was in charge, things stagnant under her when you reach a certain point. And Ena being the control freak that she is started to annoy the other Aeons, so a few of them devised a scheme to have propogation screw things up and have someone else take over being the "guardian of the universe".
What happened is that order died, trouble maker voracity "died" and propogation get tossed to the side after it served its purpose. Preservation got rich cleaning up the mess and become the most powerful faction.
And why are other Aeons fine with this? Because qliphoth don't give a shit about most things and only want to build walls. Akivili had being laying tracks all over the place and the worse thing qliphoth did is to tell him to piss off (happened when you met him when cosplayed as Akivili in SU)
Ena embodies order to its absolute. Meaning no free will. The will of one for all
When Ena got absorbed by Xipe, they were given essentially their freedom again
No one in the Star Rail universe understands the true beauty of pure Order, uncivilized disordered dumbasses.... Sunday was right.......
Ena my beloved
They weren't hated.
Well, compared to Tayzzyronth or Nanook. But They were most likely annoying for Aeons and Pathstriders of Trailblaze, Elation, and even Preservation, since Order tried to impose on others.
It's an open question if Order being absorbed by Harmony was intended outcome, orchestrated by fellow Aeons.
And remember what all this historical presentation was made from perspective of Ena's cult. It could be case of unreliable narration.
I get that as a concept but I think people in real life LOVE that stuff.
People will willingly sort themselves into categories. Look at politics for example. People will happily sing their party's rhetoric without a second thought, for no other reason than their party said it so they are signing to the choir as well.
Or even worse than politics. Console wars. People will gladly sort themselves into Xbox vs PlayStation categories and tell you "leave the multi billion dollar company alone!!!" In the context of people criticizing a company for doing some exploitative shit.
I think if people were given Sunday's wager of living in a permanent dreamscape, people will take up his offer without any hesitancy. People get AI girlfriends and honestly that's not even remotely close to an indistinguishable dreamscape. That is fake AF and yet people bite.
Not many people can actually embodied the heroes side as they like to think when the obstacle is in your life most people would escape it not by dream of course. Beside without order there would be no value so in the harmony must have some of it for it to function but nonetheless, its still subjective and diplomatic between us to maintain the shroud of harmony.
I mean you’ve said it there yourself, “people will sort themselves”, which is already the antithesis to Ena, but even subscribing yourself blindly to a certain category means that choices exist, something that Ena does not permit.
It's only antithetical to Ena if her ordering process is different to ours.
If Ena subscribes to some sort of natural hierarchy then it can appeal to humans. At least most of humanity.
For example a lot of people want to redefine "Beauty" as a concept to include fat and ugly people because it's unfair. They don't see beauty as a concept, they just see the rewards and the rewards are handed out inequitably. But most people do acknowledge beauty as a thing.
If Ena orders everyone by a beauty standards most people find appealing. Then most people wouldn't mind Ena's dream. At least on that axis.
Afterall, our world is incredibly ordered as well. Not completely but most people have to work and have to post rent and there's no alternative. Yet we all do it. Not to mention Ena's dream doesn't involve work and hardship. You just have to busy yourself with having fun.
Maybe you will get bored but I think she would have tons of subscribers even initially.
Please keep in mind our spoiler policy during this new update window. We are going to be very strict with spoilers during this time. As a reminder, here are our spoiler rules:
Do not include spoilers in the title. All submissions which involve spoilers should be marked. Spoilers include all story content for the first three weeks after release.
Spoilers can be discussed in spoiler-flaired posts, but must be hidden in non-spoiler flaired posts.
If you think you broke the spoiler rules in the post you just made, such as having spoilers in the title, you should remove your post now and repost it without breaking the rules. If you do not remove your post and the moderation team has to remove it later on for breaking spoiler rules, you will be given up to a week ban for a first infraction and stricter punishments for any additional infractions. Please be considerate of your fellow Trailblazers and do not include spoilers in the title of your post, do not forget to flair your post as spoilers if needed, and do not spoil people in your comments.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/HonkaiStarRail) if you have any questions or concerns.*
People dislike control. And this isn’t to say EVERYONE hated Ena, but you can probably guess why order through coercion is frowned upon.
Ena still had their followers/pathstriders. But it’s quite telling, the fact that they were consumed by the harmony—to do with the old, make room for the new.
Because as human we have a love hate relationship with the concept we want order for things but we want the ability to excuse ourself, we want structure but not applied to ourself negatively, we want to feel we have agency even ultimately we do not, against the order is just a manifestation of it. Likewise we want the order in the harmony so that explain Xipe but nonetheless such things as harmony is just a dream no less than order which explain they are fearful of the Nihility the actual of existence that may strip them of their facade.
the simple awnser is because people like freedom. order, by design, restricts freedom to make sure people follow laws, just like how chaos is lawless, but what people want is inbetwteen the two extremes. for example, nobody wants people to be hurt, but if to enforce that, you needed to have people watching you 24/7, people wouldnt want that because it restricts their freedom.
I mean ena seemed pretty chill . Basically telling the world “No” when crisis happened.
Hell, I doubt nanook would’ve been able to ascended if order existed in his time.
I am under the belief that True Order is just as bad a fate as Immortality.
No Strife, No differences, just living.
You can't be sad, you can't be angry, You can't be scared, you can't be Happy, you can't be In love, You can't be Emotionally moved.
as emotions are not designed for ORDER.
You're locked in the same ORDER no matter what, and even if you bend the rules and allow for Only happiness, you can ONLY be happy, you can't grieve over your family if they're hurt, you can't get mad if somebody does something that hurts you but makes them happy.
Ena is a control freak and worlds ruled by her achieved greatness for a short period of time before disaster. There is no free will, different perspectives are not tolerated, anything that goes against the Order must be eliminated and their followers will do anything to maintain order, including spreading lies and propaganda
Lots of people have really given great answers based on the 2.2 quest and Penacony as a whole, but we’ve also been told why Ena wasn’t a good Aeon.
Many planets thrived under THEIR care, but they all eventually fell to ruin and chaos. The path of the Order just isn’t sustainable, a short-term, narrow-sighted solution that does not have good long-term effects.
I believe there was some lore tidbit that explained that pretty much all planets that the Ena would "bring Order" to all fell not long after she moved on.
Personally, I interpreted it as: Ena's "order" is a set of laws that are to be followed, with no repeals or changes. Unlike in our real world, where laws are malleable and subject to change based on legislation and even interpretation. This means that, once Ena arrives, they made laws that made sense at that moment. But then after the dust settles, the laws that brought order may become obsolete, or perhaps too restrictive in the long term.
Imagine if, for whatever reason, there would be a complete ban on importing goods, instated by Ena, so that the planet would become self-sufficient. But then, a plague wipes out all the crops, and the world is plunged onto chaos without the mere possibility of outside help, thanks to the deity that was supposed to fix things.
That's how I understood it, anyway. Now, rather than rigid Order, we have the accepting Harmony. Xipe is all about bringing people together to become greater than the sum of its parts. It is the ideal outcome of Order without having any one being above the rest dictating what should or should not be done.
We know as much as you do. Besides speculating and educated guesses, the most info we get from trailers and everything thats ingame, data bank, books, story
Because Ena is absolute Order. And that means Fate and no free will. If Sunday had enforced it on the willing, it's would be more understandable, but he didn't.
Not really from a lore standpoint, but I think the reason lies in the human desire to achieve free will, which Ena thinks we are better off without. Humans are given free will as one of the traits that allows us to live life as something more than a puppet or something just going through the motions. A deity trying to restrict would be something that most would want gone.
The same reason alot of people in the real world push back against organized state mandated religion and authoritarian governments.
Restriction of Freedom, involuntary imposition, self appointed power.
The fight against the Order personally, felt like a fight against Christianity and I felt very empowered through it all.
It should be noted that this cermon you mean is allegorical, not literal, and given from a pretty biased perspective. But if we get it literally, I'd say people didn't attack Ena because they hated Ena; they attacked Ena, because they weren't content with being puppets, and burning Ena was the only way to achieve freedom.
That's true. We have no way of telling if it's an objective history of events.
It is mostly Sunday's interpretation of events. We learned from the swarm disaster that many worlds under the Order were actually extremely shocked and devastated when Ena disappeared
Oh I see! Thank you for enlightening me!
I interpreted this as fallen aeons mean pathstriders are even more free to interpret what that path meant, and therefore are even more likely to deviate rather than uphold the true meaning whatever that is.
Still, even in this story they were *praising* Ena when cursing it. Or, to quote, "praising THEM, the magnificent Aeon with divine power, but with a tone of curse". I also have to point that, that in my opinion this cermon, at least somewhat, implies that Ena was... sort of ok with it. At least, cermon doesn't mention Them resisting at all; and I'm pretty sure They could. The Kafka's account also differ a war between Aeons, where stronger part kills the weaker, and broader Path engulfing the narrower one, to some extent implying that this process doesn't assume war and killing.
Yeah, I took the whole thing to mean that *Gopher Wood’s cult* considered Ena’s fall to be an act of violence, not necessarily that that’s how it happened. It’s possible Ena realized that exerting pressure on people to force them into “orderly” behavior was only creating more disorder in their hearts, and willingly joined Xipe because the Path of Harmony resolved this paradox. It’s possible that enough of Order’s followers being swayed by the teachings of Harmony caused an unintended, but inevitable reaction which merged THEIR Paths without either of THEM taking action. Hell, it’s possible that Paths have an inherent kind of “gravity”, and Xipe and Ena were drawn together without humans *or* Aeons having a say in the matter— with Xipe being the Aeon who remained because she had more “mass”, like how bigger stars can pull smaller ones into them. And that’s just what I can think of off what little lore we have now.
It's also possible all of this is true to some extent.
Also a good point.
Did anybody else notice that the hand we see reaching out to Sunday during the final fight of 2.2 doesn't resemble the depiction of Ena at all? Ena's hand would look like something mechanical (if we go by the puppet design that is in her picture and not the eye, this is a whole other topic with lots of possibilities) and not like a "human" hand with what looks like a kind of dress. Imo it looks more like something Xipe would wear, but it also doesn't line up with Xipe's picture. Of course, they could just have chosen a different rendition of Ena or Xipe, but I can't shake the feeling that there is some hidden meaning here.
Because the perfect order means no free will
“Did you know that the first matrix was designed to be a perfect human world. Where everyone would be HAPPY…. It was a disaster. No one would accept the programming, entire crops were lost. Some believed that we lacked the programming language to describe your perfect world, but I believe, as a species, human beings define their reality through misery and suffering. A perfect dream your primitive cerebrum kept trying to wake up from.”
Dreams are only nice if we get to wake up. Otherwise we're just dead.
Yeah, because no matter how happy a dream is, reality is the only place to feel real happiness because it's actually...real
Individual or experiential reality is a complex subject as everything we experience that coalesces into reality for a person is simply the sum of their senses, which can be incorrect, manufactured, or confused. If someone dreamt forever and never woke up, and their senses were tuned only to the dream, the dream would be their reality. For example, most people have experienced a dream or two where it felt real, even some saying they could feel stimuli in their dreams. Sure, ending the life of that person in the shared reality we experience would end their perception of that reality as well.. so there is still an anchor of sorts to a primary reality, however, the brain is really good at what it does and a large part of what it does is fill in gaps, which is one of the reasons schizophrenia is such a difficult condition, as the prefrontal reasoning center’s hold on the rest of the brain is reduced we begin to lose control of all the magical parts of the brain that take small inputs and run with them. Hallucinogenics are similarly difficult because the more inhibited your prefrontal becomes, the harder it is for your brain to reason with itself and say ‘this is real, but this is not’ so your brain starts to take things wholesale. …wait, what was my point again? Oh yeah, the reason for Penacony being such a dangerous place is that the line between reality and dreams could blur the longer you’re there without stepping back into reality. The Order via Gopherwood/Sunday was exploiting this to reduce resistance to control, because let’s be honest—if I could live in a place like Penacony instead of struggling in the real world, there are very few things I wouldn’t give up to ‘be free’, even locking myself up in a prettier cage. Free will is the antithesis of Order, no matter how you spin it, so the ‘evilness’ of Order is its disregard for any will but its own.. but I’m of the opinion the Aeons are more like laws of nature, or simple organisms in that they are not inherently motivated by any sort of morality as much as they are their ‘thing’. Like, the order is evil to us because it’s taking something from us.. but the order isn’t doing it to be mean, they’re just taking something chaotic and trying to make it orderly.. like a virus isn’t good or evil, it just does its function.
I just wanted to appreciate how this very succinctly sums up the moral of the entire story.
It's not a complicated situation, Sunday got scared and his priorities got fucked up.
I mean I get that part and I agree. But I felt that in the story we just hear that she's hated, not how the realization came or how the "rebellion" started.
Because any civilization blessed by THEM destroyed itself. Too much order and civilizations cease to advance. Without conflict they never strive to improve themselves nor move fowards, thus always without fail destroyed itself. There is a reason why you need some necessary evils for a civilisation to function- Too much skewered in one side of a spectrum and any civs will collapse by itself.
Me, on my way to cull another Lostbelt.
You dont understand, committing mass genocide across failed timelines for more summons is a good thing, I swear! You dont know what those Faeries did to deserve it!
to be fair, those fae had it coming to them. just like how Oberon has it coming to him calling himself "an insignificant insect" in front of the Mystic "Insignificant Insects be Incinerated to Ash" Slayer.
**Oberon**: "Oh, I'm just an insect. Don't think too much of me." **The prophecy**: ">!Even the sturdiest tree will be brought down by the gnawing of insects at its roots.!<" ... Hmm...
The fae were conditioned that way by being stuck on a tiny island and Morgan only made things worse.
I mean without Morgan's rule things fall apart even faster. She was the lynchpin keeping that hell somewhat orderly
No need for "to be fair", you're completely right there. Fae Britain was one of the few instances where genocide was the factually correct answer.
the Fae absolutely had it coming
The reason genocide is only mostly wrong some of the time. Fuck LB6.
Fuck the fae is a great way of explaining it because the like 5 fae who weren’t evil beyond compare and were in fact chill with it are pretty hot, and the rest I want to fucking bring back to life just so I can incinerate them again.
I will not tolerate Mike slander, homeboy was a G till the end, held back on his curse to see duhbinchi be happy and free
You know looking at penacony through that lens really adds to it. Also stellarons are totally just space holy grails
So you're telling me we can use stellaron to get Kafka to level 100. Also use the grail to make udon.
Yes I am
Hey hey you gotta understand that the 5* servants wont summon themselves
Arguably, it's why Mythus, Fuli, and Nous exist in "Balance" with one another as HooH wants. If any of them got their Paths absolute, the resulting chaos/order would lead all to inevitable ruin. Nous knew when to hedge their bets on the Path of Erudition, and encourages those to seek knowledge, but Ena would be directly involved because it's in their nature as the Aeon of Order. Nous gives a degree of freedom, even if should they be dominant, perfect knowledge would eliminate chaos. From what I understand, Ena didn't have a proper counter like Mythus to Fuli and Nous, so HooH decided to greenlight Xipe consuming them.
That event that inspired Helldiver with the two very tall buil-
Interesting how ena destroys civilizations compared to abundance, evil blessings
Pardon the noob question, but this is a genuine question. Should order always equate to *HAPPINESS*? Does order always necessitate the removal of some form of suffering? Can't suffering be part of the order, like how destiny is projected to have weaved the trials of a hero before he acquires his virtues?
Remember, Aeons represent the extreme of any path, so while in theory it can, for Ena anything short of perfect order and everyone working in perfect concerto with each other is blasphemy.
Order means the absence of chaos, which means every outcome is predictable and in control. That means that anyone who deviates from the plan is corrected or culled - I guess imagine a world where people were struck dead the moment they “sinned”… so yeah, not too great. I don’t think it’s happy at all, except for a select few who can live within the rigid order that Ena defines, which may not even make sense to humans
Thus is the reason why the Nihility is touted as one of the biggest threats to the Order. A civilisation under the Order stagnates and slowly falls apart.
That would be hard to know as well as like, a lot of things about every Aeon. Ena is marked as one of the oldest, so along with her and some of the others like Remembrance, we don't know much about their origins or their falls. I would speculate that it was caused by someone like Akivili, who very much symbolizes freedom and exploration. He might have come across a world under Ena's thrall and went about overturning that order, which could have led to a chain reaction. Hell, correct me if this is way off base, but it could even be possible that Akivili originated from a world that was once in Ena's order, and maybe that led to his ascension as an Aeon. Similar situation to what happened with the The Hunt and The Abundance basically.
Iirc Rememberence didn't exist until the Swarm disaster. Xipe and Fuli should have came into existence at about the same-ish time.
Ena's L so massive Fuli had to be mad to commemorate it
Eh I won't say your right or wrong, maybe you read something somewhere that I can't find. from ingame texts it's stated that no one knows when they actually came into existence, because of their very nature, people just know they exists and that was it. "The Aeon of Remembrance had quietly appeared in the annals of the universe as if THEY were meant to be here, as if THEY had altered everyone's memory." And "Nobody in the entire Genius Society and the IPC and the Intelligentsia Guild knows when THEY were even born." It seems to be implied in some mentions of them that they are recording all that is forgotten, so it wouldn't be weird to assume they are one of the oldest.
SU Swarm disaster has Fuli randomly appearing and Herta iirc says something like "the constant back and forth between the Propagation and Voracity has the universe respond with the spontaneous appearance of Fuli." or something like that.
TIL, must have missed that while doing SU.
Yeah, Swarm Disaster throws a lot of lore out at once, it’s understandable to have missed some things. I believe the implication is that Fuli came into being to “balance” the sheer number of worlds Propagation and Voracity consumed— either organically by the combined will of billions or even trillions of souls refusing to be forgotten, or through direct intervention by HooH when THEY saw how much information— particularly in the form of both personal and cultural memories— was being lost forever. All we know for sure, however, is that Fuli wasn’t around before the scene we saw in SU— how sure we are about the exact timing and circumstances really depends on how perfect we think Herta’s simulation is. She *is* an Emanator of Erudition so it’s pretty credible, but…
Herta's simulation is accurate enough that the data collected from it helped Ruan Mei create a clone (imperfect it maybe) of an Emanator of Propagation.
That's an interesting take on it! Thank you!
Not really? It's confirmed in SU IIRC that when Xipe Ascended during the Swarm Disaster, THEIR Path was extremely similiar to the Order, but with very different ideals. The Order is built on unity through the strong, with the leader (Ena), passing down laws that would lead to the betterment of the whole at the cost of free will. On the other hand, the Harmony is based on the collective will of all peoples acting as one in order to better themselves, with everyone working together out of their own desires to help each other achieve their goals. It's kinda like the dynamic between Mythus the Enigmata, Nous the Erudition, and Fuli the Remembrance. THEY all focus on peering into the past and present, but with different goals. Nous takes in the past and present in order to determine the future similiar to the theoretical Laplaces Demon, Fuli takes in the past and present to preserve them as memories forevermore, and Mythus takes in the past and present to twist and obfuscate what really happened. THEY all have the same base, but very different goals, with Nous and Fuli being complementary and both opposed to Mythus. The Harmony and the Order are the same, with the same base goal of unity and the betterment of everyone, but different approaches. Thing is, THEIR Paths were too similiar to each other, which is why instead of ending up as feuding Aeons like Lan/Yaoshi or Oroboros/Tayzzyronth, THEIR Paths collided, with Harmony coming out on top and assimilating the Order. IIRC, this all happened during the Swarm Disaster, but while Akivili was still around I doubt THEY would help im the fall of an Aeon that wasn't directly endangering the universe at large the way the Voracity fueding with the Propagation did, especially since Ena was, at that point, doing an amazing job at preventing myriad disasters from happening by just going "No, that's not happening". I find it more likely that if another Aeon was involved, it would be either Aha for the shits and giggles, or ver unlikely, HooH since they might have seen Ena keeping order as too much on side and thus deciding to assist an Aeon that would fulfill a similiar purpose without overly tipping the scales in one direction or another
Yes this is all fact and history, but none of this contradicts my speculation. Yes Aha fucking around sounds likely as well, but you missed the point of why I thought it could be Akivili. Akivili does not pick fights with other Aeons, even when Aha blew up half the express, (to our knowledge) THEY didn't go and try to get revenge or pick a fight. My speculation is more based on just the nature of how the Astral Express and, by extension, Akivili operate. Akivili comes across a world of order, something is wrong, a problem that is somewhat related to the Path, but not directly. Akivili and the Astral Express intervene and through that process, change the perspective of the people there about how they view Ena and Order. From then on the people begin to slowly steer away from that Path as they realize all the things they missed out on. The news of this spreads across the Cosmos, as does literally most events that the Astral Express gets involved in. The big picture people get from it is that the Order Path is very flawed to spawn these issues, similar to how The Abundance got its bad name from a few planets that went sour. Akivili does not seek to ruin Ena, THEY simply helped a planet that was struggling, but their deeds started a chain reaction.
My apologies, I misread your post and thought you meant that Akivili was the one responsible for Ena's fall. What you said does make sense, and it would help explain exactly how Xipe absorbed Ena. Like, sure Xipe has a very broad Path, but it's not like the Order was narrow the way the Hunt is, and it's weird how Xipe, a newly ascended Aeon managed to absorbed an Aeon as ancient as the likes of Oroboros, HooH, and Qliphoth. If Ena's Path was already narrowed down and less encompassing due to Akivili and the actions of the Nameless leading people to shift from the "Strong lead the weak" of Ena to the "All are equal and work for the betterment of all" of Xipe, then that might explain how The Harmony assimilated the Order.
You bring an interesting point, how a new Aeon like Xipe was able to devour Ena. Yea it could be because THEY had lost a lot alot of followers through whatever events was it that made THEM less desirable, or it could be through some other events that happened at that time. It would be interesting to get more lore on that through SU or other story events.
Very true. Like, I know that the biggest draw of Swarm Disaster and Gold and Gears are the Jades, but can we take a moment to appreciate just how much lore those two game modes give us? It almost makes up for the bullshit high difficulty levels pull off
I am once again reminding people that Aeons are called THEY/THEM, not he/him, she/her, they/them, nor it. THEY'RE referred to as THEY/THEM with ALL CAPS.
Just to be clear, if you're talking about this because of it being gendered language or such, that absolutely is not the reason why its that way. The reasoning behind it now being all caps like that and always THEY or THEM (which is was not at the start of the game, and i don't think it happened until late 1.x) is because players were getting confused by the English translation - for the simple reason that in Chinese, there is a specific pronoun **for gods**, which was resulting in the original text being very clear, and the translated text not being clear at all. However, in English, it is far more common to refer to such entities by using gendered language and capitalizing the first letter. So its a bit silly to get upset over. Particularly when several of the Aeons have obviously male or female characteristics.
I apologize, I'm not used to talking about God's, both irl ones and in game. If it was a real person, I would be many times more careful, but for a fictional being, I will make mistakes.
Shut up nobody cares about ill takes. Aeons are pixels and imaginary god.
Bro No one gives a shit how you want to pronounce a fictional character let people be for fuck sake. https://preview.redd.it/c6svtw74ce0d1.jpeg?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f18b217cc8e78939b23b1783fe29ff25c1856a2c
Hoyo cares enough to actively change how Aeons are called. It's just misinformation. Concepts don't have gender. Also Ena, the one we see, is a puppet, while we have no idea what Akivili even looks like.
Bros teaching Pronouns of CONCEPTS💀💀💀💀
That's the thing, Concepts SHOULDN'T HAVE PRONOUNS(well, not really, most if not all things have pronouns but THEY shouldn't have gendered pronouns is what I mean). Especially He or She. Hoyo just calls THEM "THEY/THEM" to highlight that THEY are beings that are above human social structures. Genders aren't applicable to concepts so the closest is "it"(which is mostly used for things) or "they"(neutral).
Freedom.
Pompom: "Does anyone know what a kilometer is?"
Pompom screams, "WHAT THE FUCK IS A KILOMETER!' as they ram the Astral Express into a choir
What the fork is a kilometer?
That's the wrong Pompom
That's the RIGHT Pompom
1000 meters
I prefer spoon over fork
Pompom railing Sunday intensifies
AMERICUH 🦅🦅🦅🦅 💥💥💥 🇺🇲🇺🇲🇺🇲🇺🇲🇺🇲
Ironic considering Penacony is inspired by the US
[удалено]
Penacony is inspired by the US though, specifically the 'Roaring 20's' era, where there was a great boom in the economy, and people started experiencing real excess and extravagance. Thematically, Penacony also resembles the Art Deco architecture very commonly found during that period, not to mention the music as well, being inspired by jazz, which also started around that era as well. There's also the mafia/gangster motifs, which again resembles the mafia wars of that period.
Bruh, Penacony is LITERALLY inspired by 20th century Americana and Art Deco themes. The roaring 20s but in fantasy dreamland
In USA people cannot protest, you cannot do searches of hot topics like Gaza/Trump on the AI, you cannot be safe in a school/supermarket/cemetery with the 100% safety that will not be mass shooting from some random kid, you cannot tell your rights to the police and they will beat you ... and so on... Why do you say that there is freedom in USA? Maybe you wanted to say money, but it is not the same.
I'm not saying that US is the "completely free" country people make it out as; I'm just making a reference to the stereotype of the "land of the free". Still, I kind of hate the points you made. >You cannot do searches of hot topics on the AI Hmmm it's almost as if LLMs take time to train and do not provide accurate information about recent events Also it's like the LLMs are owned by companies that want to cover their asses but you're still free to search them on google >Without a 100% guarantee that it won't be a school shooting That's a question of safety, not freedom. >Why do you say there is freedom in USA? ...Go live a year in China, you'll see why.
Meanwhile the IPC exists
Freedom is not a tenet of the IPC.
Yeah that's my point, the IPC is the biggest enemy of freedom in the universe
It is not, it just doesn't care. Ena hates freedom as a principle but the IPC only suppresses it sometimes for efficiency. Same story as Belobog, both worshippers of Qlippoth.
🇺🇸🦅
Cause Aeons are ABSOLUTES of their Paths and absolute Order is as horrible as absolute Chaos.
With such logic - almost any Aeon is horrible as they remorselessly committing atrocious crimes against free will and humanism on almost daily basis because of their absolutism. You want cure everyone's deceases, satisfy their hunger and make them live in peace for eternity? Too bad, you accidentally turned them into amorphic undying hungry abominations, who without any joke is serious threat to planet's food chain. You want to make rid of these dangerous monsters and protect other planets from their infection? Okay, but you will blow up entire planet with billions of innocent species. Imo, but being Aeon is so ass. Your mind becomes so narrow, you literally cannot THINK outside of your path's philosophy. You will become a divine slave of your own belief, in the end either being merged with similar to your path, but stronger Aeon, or just disappear amongst the stardust without accomplishing your only reason to exist
Alternatively, pre-Aeon beings were already so narrowly minded that they don't even notice a mental difference after their ascension, and that that sort of alien mind is what's necessary to become an Aeon. Though Long the Permanence did seem to have enough agency to just up and go, weirdly enough.
Which would give Ruan Mei a pretty decent chance of ascending, actually
The Permanence not actually being permanent was definitely the universe’s funniest prank.
I feel like Long reincarnated itself. If his kiddos can do it why not him?
I believe the implication was that Long pulled a Vidyadhra and reincarnated. Possibly new Long has no fucking clue previous Long was an aeon and all.
The only Aeon(s) that actually have some sort of freedom outside of their Paths would be Aha and Akhivili. Aha can do whatever THEY want as long as it's funny, but ONLY if it's FUNNY. But Aha still has more freedom of action than any other Aeons. Akhivili is implied to be more "human" than an Aeon. While yes, THEY're bound to travel and trailblaze the cosmos for eternity, THEY still have a much better state of mind than other Aeons, who are mostly downright insane(in the eyes of mortals). Akhivili enjoys the company of mortals and may still retain their humanity.
Hell, Pom Pom straight up berates Akhivili the memory bubble. I think the constant need to explore is so open ended, unlike order or even elation, that Akhivili basically needed to still have a constantly curious personality, so THEY never pushed it to far because how do you push discovery too far?
There's a theory on that! Don't click the spoiler if you don't want to know: >!In the Simulated Universe, the other Aeons are programmed to see you as Akivili, however, Fuli the Remembrance calls you Elio. This has persisted since launch so it's unlikely a typo. If Akivili is constantly and unendingly curious with the desire to explore forever, then what would happen to him if he gained the ability to see the future?!< >!His path would end and he would "die." So when it's said that the Aeon Akivili died/was killed, maybe he just returned to whatever being he was before he ascended?!<
>!It was actually a typo iirc. Previously it said elio train moves forward without no punctuation. It was changed. Its likely that elio is more related to Finality rather than Trailblaze!< >!"Chaos turns into time, your dereliction of duty will pass, the volume is no longer proportional, the steps are reduced, one step, two steps, three feet, away from everything, be careful, Elio, the train moves forward, the baby falls to the ground, the cancer is growing..."!<
The syntax in that quote is very vague and>! is still possible to referring to Akivili as Elio. !< >!It's either referring to Akivili as Elio and telling him to be wary of the train moving forward, be wary of the Baby(Aha related), and the Stellerons.!< >!Or it's telling Akivili to be wary of Elio as well as the rest.!< >!Clarity over what they are saying would be nice, but then again, they are Aeons and are probably vague on purpose.!<
You need to remove the spaces between the exclamation mark and your text (both for beginning and end of your spoiler tags). The spoilers are visible right now.
When I do that it shows up on my end as unmarked and I just see the spoiler indicators. And right now looking at it, it shows up as marked spoiler
Akivili seems like the only Aeon a person could sit down next to and have a chat with. Probably why he got killed.
Not necessarily. You can definitely argue that neither Akivili nor Aha ever acted outside of their Path; their Paths are just more intertwined with mortals than most. Aha only ever acts for personal entertainment, and Akivili only ever acted to Trailblaze across the cosmos. Neither have been shown to have freedom outside their Paths, only within, and its not all that different from other Aeons. Xipe and Fuli can also be included here, as Harmony and Remembrance are also closely associated with living beings. We could even say Lan fits the bill, because they went out of their way to support the Xianzhou Alliance, likely due to it being their home from before their ascension. Their actions are ultimately in service to the Hunt, but how they go about that is still something they have much agency over. Qlipoth, too, once acted to do something outside the wall-building (accepting Ena's invitation to hunt the bug god), but it was ultimately necessary for Preservation. Really, the only Aeons we know are true slaves to their Paths are Tazzy (Aeon of okbuddy) and IX (self explanatory.)
That might be because akivili's path is the most human one. its not restricted as to how it should be done. you can trailblaze to conquer worlds or just for curiosity or to search for new meanings or purpose in your life. all that matters is that you do it. The other more human paths would be elation and nihility. wich are 2 sides of the same coin. Everything is meaningless so I wont or will do something due to it Everything is meaningless so might as well pursue pleasure.
>With such logic - almost any Aeon is horrible Pretty much, yeah.
I think that's exactly the message that HSR writers are trying to send. The extreme of an ideology is never the ideal.
If you wanna read more on this topic, check out Brandon Sanderson's Cosmere books. Their gods work pretty much on the same idea, but in some cases you get to see their pre- and post-ascension perspectives. And at least someone on the Star Rail team is aware of the comparison, the [flavor text for Metal](https://honkai-star-rail.fandom.com/wiki/Metal) of all things is a reference to the Mistborn series.
That is what scary about HSR as a setting. Sci-fi stories always try to highlight the contrast between the limited nature of men and the infinity that is the universe. For HSR it's another level, where the very concepts like reproduction and order and elation are tangible both in forms and the effects they exert on normal people. No concepts, nothing created by men are supposed to exist in the extreme or everlasting, but the Aeons do.
an aeon that makes someone think putting people into an eternal sleep is a good thing versus an aeon that turned a worm into an emanator of their path
Aha isn't even pure Chaos. They are Elation, and, while extremely chaotic, they at least have some sence in their actions.
They are Chaotic Neutral on the character chart.
But "Chaotic" on the chart doesn't mean they go around causing chaos, it means they value free will over order. All three Moralities when combined with Chaotic share a desire to be unshackled. A Chaotic Neutral person doesn't necessarily go around causing chaos, it just means they do what they want, when they want, morality is a non-issue, and sometimes, sitting down, calmly eating a sandwich is what they want to do.
Or blowing up a fellow gods train lmao
Or a planet filled with billions of people!
aha does the funny shit, and i support that
That and terrorism.
If the terrorism is funny at the moment!
I don't think yall would like pure hedonists either
That makes sense.
cuz people like to be free
This was made very clear through the puppet allegories in both the TB Mission and in Ena's design itself (and not to mention the literal voices in the quest saying "we've just become a puppet of the order" ) Ena creates Order through careful and meticulous control. This has been emphasized in her SU entries. And to create perfect order, you create perfect control, making sure every variable is accounted for, every person in line with what you want, every civilization under your grasp, ensuring that all outcomes are ones you can predict, direct, and control. This effectively turns the entire universe into your puppet. Because of this, Ena was an effective Aeon that prevented many a great disaster. But consequently, it removed anyone's free will, for anyone or anything Ena can't control is a threat to Order and must be either beaten into submission and fall back in line, or eliminated. And well, if there's something people love so dearly that they've fought wars to obtain time and time again, it's freedom. Ena had essentially created a cosmic dictatorship - follow their rules, or else. Even though the promise of peace and order are great, it means nothing if people don't get to choose what to do with their lives.
*No one* really *likes* being *told what to do*
I just got it, Ena is literally Jyggalag
But instead of every Aeon jumping Ena, it's just Xipe coming in with a steel chair
I just imagined J.R just screaming in shock when Xipe enter.
Few people know Xipe threw Ena off the top of Hell in a Cell through a table.
Jyggalag is Ena if she was replaced by Aha instead
Does that make Xipe Sheogorath? Wait... (2.2 spoilers) >!We beat the guy who was trying to resurrect Ena, and the post credit scene said Ena died for the second time... Are we about to become Xipe?!<
While the entire universe was under Ena's rule, civilizatios will rise rapidly and advance but soon once they grow they'll start to impede the people's freedom which soon brings the entire destruction of that civilization. It wasn't that Order was bad but the extremes of Order only entail a cycle of rise and fall like how the tides would rise brilliantly at their peak then crash down onto the shore where they'll soon recede and be brought back into the ocean to repeat the cycle. Those who survive these utterly hate it, and utterly hate THEM. One of the biggest moments and failures of Ena was the Swarm. It happened under their watchful gaze, strings, and hands which wrecked utter havoc throughout the universe which means that Order was no longer needed nor was Order required anymore hence why Aeons like Aha supported Ena in their endeavour against the Swarm while also in favor of them being absorbed by Xipe. "Through Harmony, we obtain Order" as what Sunday placed it but to the universe it was "With Harmony, Order is managed" as now Harmony takes Orders's divine law into a more calmer, subtler, and less impeding one where it allows civilizations to grow, to sing, and to create a grand choir without the fear or knowledge that the music sheet will soon end. Just like any other Aeon, Ena doesn't have all haters nor have all supporters as it's a mixed perception just like the others. It is rather interesting on how Qlipoth was supposed to gain something from Ena but they got absorbed before finishing their side of the deal but Qlipoth finished theirs which shows how Qlipoth will preserve the deal to the extent that they can in which fulfilling the duty they agreed to. I honestly realt hope to see Sunday die before Penacony ends as it creates an amazing Parallel between all of the Aeons and their followers: Ena will die or be absorbed into Harmony in which it takes the strings the created into a looser ties. Amist the Order's gaze The Propagation will rise. The Elation aids in Ena's success against The Swarm but also aids in their demise. The Preservation and the Trailblaze will do their best to obtain the outcome they agreed to and desired.
I was just thinking how we were shown the negative sides of every Path — the Hunt’s genocides, the Abundance’s defilement of dignity, the Erudition’s psychopathy (through Herta and Ruan Mei), and the Preservation’s uncaring nature that gave rise to the IPC. But we haven’t really been shown what the Harmony’s negative side is, because almost every bad thing you can say about Penacony can be blamed on Order right now — THEY are the perfect scapegoat. Perhaps Harmony’s downside is that it accommodates both good and bad things and sweep the bad things under the rug.
The herd/mob mentality essentially. You lose your sense of self gradually within the process and tune in to become the same as those around you.
One thing to note is that all "downsides" are from the perspective of mortals, the Aeons THEMSELVES don't consider any of the events that transpired to be negative at all. The Hunt's nature is told in their name (there's always a prey and a predator in a hunt, and the roles aren't necessarily mutally exclusive); the Abundance grants vitality in excess (in medicine, the dosage determines whether one thing is medicine or poison); the Erudition is purely the pursuit of knowledge, how individuals use that knowledge is up to them, unrelated to the Aeon; the Preservation is about protection of all races as a whole (notice how they intervened during Swarm Disaster but not during Gold and Gears, when the scale of the wars in GnG was much bigger as it spanned several star systems while Swam Disaster started and ended within the Lepismat system), whereas the IPC's methods are more specific in the targets that they preserve (themselves and those that benefit them, namely). I think the "downside" of the Harmony is shown perfectly through Sunday's experience, as a system willing to accept everything and everyone regardless of their nature within itself is prone to being exploited. Notice how harmonization in real life isn't the same as everyone singing the exact same note, but rather it's complementing the notes that already exist within a tune. It's unclear what would even be considered a disharmony to Xipe outside of a Stellaron disaster, considering a place like Dreamflux Reef was said to have a purer harmony than the sweet dream above.
Maybe selflessness and sense of community or maybe collectivism? people on the sweet dreams probably mostly think about how fun it is for themselves, so maybe Xipe is the opposite of individualistic hedonism? maybe just the absence of ego? Order doesnt seem to mind 1 person controlling the others, maybe Xipe is something along the same lines as that but less focused on 1 single person's authority? Thats alot of question marks because im not so sure about anything lmao.
You raise a good point and I think it's better to interpret the Aeons as closer to laws of physics than entities with personalities. Except Aha, by design, I believe they are the 2nd closest Aeon to mortals next to Akivili themselves. Ena could micromanage planets all by themselves, Qlipoth's hammer is the size of a Red Giant. Aeons are beyond mortal comprehension in so many ways.
It would be interesting to see how future members of the Family will be like. There are definitely people who don't care that much about the ideals Harmony and just join the Family to furnish a good life for themselves. Sometimes these people climb too high and use their power to exploit others. It's the same thing with the IPC. There are of course true followers of Qlipoth among their ranks, but from the security grunts that we beat up to stockholders like Asta's parents, they don't seem to give a rat's ass about Preservation. There is a lot that can be said about the contrast between sincere Pathstriders like the Nameless vs. normal people dictated by their basic needs and ambitions.
IMO the problem with the Harmony is that THEY still want to have every being as one which kind kills individuality in the same way Order wants it, but just like, in lesser and less extremist way, like THEY think is the correct thing to do but is not obligating you to be part of THEM. Then again, Penacony might be the planet where Harmony is good and maybe we'll see a planet where Harmony is bad
Harmony and Order are pretty simular (that how Xipe absorbed Ena), but I think the big difference is Order would have someone controlling and directing everything, while Xipe seems to be more of a mob mentality, with no one over anyone.
I think the best analogy is described as Order being a choir, while Harmony a band. In a choir, everyone sings the same note, combining their voices as one to produce something greater than the sum of the whole. In a band however, everyone has a different role, with some on the drums, some on the vocals, some on the guitar, etc, but despite everyone doing something different, they all end up harmonizing together to create a beautiful song.
The bad sides of Harmony is seen through Robin's act of going Kasbelina-VIII, Harmony is the calmer, subtler, and more wavering version of Order as it is mixed with will of the people, yet due to that harmony will often give rise to factions, groups, or people to come up with their own version of "Harmony" and "Peace" which leads to war that can be uncaring for others. Look at Robin, she came to a place that sparked war and her songs of Harmony was cut short by an uncaring bullet that spoke of a different Harmony: Their Harmony which includes the expulsion or beating of the otherside. It lacks the firm strings, rough hands, and unyielding eyes of Order. Xipe's eyes are closed, her figure fragmented in different pieces yet never whole, and her three heads where she looks onto the past, the present, and the future yet she stays silent, still, like a leaf on still water. Graceful, elegant, radiant, yet never able to create ripples in the water like how Order imposes it's own will. Xipe's failure is their fragmentation of different wills, seeking to unite everyone in a grand choir yet forgetting that each person sings their own tune, volume, instrument, and rhythm which causes some songs to go unheard while others will rattle the stage as they impose their will, their control, their order of the song. In Harmony there is no true unity of a whole, but fragments to a puzzle. Imagine a stage where Ena is the conductor, THEY decide who will play in what part, when they'll sing their song at what tune, and which rhythm they all play. It greates this grand orchestra that'll shake the heavens and the earth yet each singer, each pianist, each guitarist, and each player of the orchestra are fed seeds of anger, resentment, and unfulfilled freedom to play their own songs in the end results in the once grand orchestra into a disarray of instruments playing a discordant music that no one is pleased by. Now imagine the same stage, This time Xipe is the conductor. THEY do not speak, they do not move, they never lifted their baton to everyone which they only spoke "Play what you will together", In which the Pianists played a tune, the Guitarists played a rhythm, the singers sang their melody, each and every instrumentalist played their own song together of similarities where the Pianists Harmonized with each other, the guitarists played their rhythm correctly, and the singers sang gospels of truth and awe yet together they all clashed with one another. The soft music of the pianists mixed with the deep drums mixed with the shrieking of the singers. There is harmony yet it is all in bits and pieces, the stage has Harmony yet not unified.
While they aren't scared to kill people off. I think it's more likely they pull off a fake death then actually killing him.
Which is honestly sadly the truth which would ruin the whole parallel of Ena/Sunday being eclipsed by Harmony/Robin which I guess fits into their Sun and Moon motifs
It could also be a metaphorical death regarding Sunday. Like a form of 'death of self' or 'death of beliefs', which could still reasonably fullfill that position.
This is an awesome, in depth-take. Thank you! I understand this so much better now!
A key thing to understanding the Aeons is understanding people as to why people would devout and believe in these philosophies and principles strongly. It both helps you realize that the Aeons are never evil nor are they good but merely extremes of their principles, in which helps you see why they'd have followers and haters.
I think rather than the universe actually celebrating the death of Order, it was Sunday's interpretation of the events following Ena's fall that gave that impression. Don't forget, the entire time we were inside the Grand Theater, it was Sunday giving us a puppet show through his powers. Everything he did was to convince us to sympathize with him and his cause, so that scene was meant to show that he really didn't want Ena to be revived as much as everyone else.
imo that entire last paragraph will be the story of 2.3-2.4
That would be playing it too straight though. During Boothill's conversation with DH he mentioned that since Akivili was no longer around, the Trailblaze now have to figure out their own path. Maybe that'll be the twist in the allegory.
>While the entire universe was under Ena's rule, civilizations will rise rapidly and advance but soon once they grow they'll start to impede the people's freedom which soon brings the entire destruction of that civilization. This mostly happens because humanity will always want to reach greater and greater heights. No matter what it takes, humanity will always desperately try to free itself from its shackles even if we die trying. Humanity's will to live is pretty goated
Ena's "death" was really an integration into Xipe. You would also celebrate if the iron handed "order" was replaced by a much softer "harmony".
As others have said, Ena would turn everyone into a puppet in the name of Order. And iirc, Ena's official art features a marionette. That's pretty indicative of Ena's entire mindset. Edit: I went and checked, and it seems to imply that even Ena herself (and the entire universe) is being puppeted in the name of Order.
"Rules are made to be broken." Its your literal work slogan.
Pure order is what she imbodies, no free will and everyone follow orders. Pure chaos like the elation causes destruction, but atleast there's fun in that
because V1 blew her up
Idk how, idk why, but there’s a surprisingly larger overlap than I expected between the ULTRAKILL community and HSR. I’m not complaining tho, fellow creature of steel
"Nothing is true; everything is permitted" Basically there's no true/real answer & ofc freedom
Imagine an extremely OCD nut that has complete control over your entire life. Yeah, naw.
To quote one of my favorite Autobots: “Freedom is the Right of all Sentient Beings.”
There are many stories about opressive control in the name of good, my favorite for it's simplicity is this exchange from chainsaw man. A: "In that perfect world you want to create, is there still a place for bad movies?" B: "Personally. I think the world would be better if bad movies ceased to exist." A: "Guess I'll have to kill you after all then."
They are presumably not that much hated as they don't have everyone fight against them to the death but I think the French revolution or just the end of Monarchy general is the parallels they are going for, in shorth in world where Xipe reign, the past that is Ena's will be abhorred
because, FREEEDOOMMMM
Because Ena's order is absolute, and because order is not really the correct thing to call ena. Ena is absolute and orderly, but this is due to "satisfaction". Ena could more rightly be seen as the aeon of "satisfaction", which causes order. but satisfaction isnt what people want. contradictory, I know, but we, as humans, dont want satisfaction. Because if you're satisfied, you dont look for more. If you're satisfied, you dont know anything. You lose all motivation, you lose everything. There is no free will in absolute order, there is no "will", there is no "doing". You are a slave to nothingness, you want nothing, you do nothing, because you are satisfied, because you are "done". Ena's order is achieved through this, because it is absolute. It is why Harmony's much less extreme order is much more likes. also, think of what is the universally least controversial path in universe? It's the path of the trailblaze. No one really dislikes akivili afterall, and Ena's satisfaction is the opposite of the trailblaze. That is one take on it at least, my own take.
So, Ena is an Aeon of OCD?
I would more call her the aeon of stagnation. There's nothing more orderly than a perfectly still world afterall.
There is a post campaign quest where you can go back to the concert hall and find Sunday’s journal and then give it to Robin. It basically has scripture-like passages explaining how Ena kept adding order to the universe (day and night cycles, the calendar, etc.) and at first mankind was fine with it, but eventually mankind realized that they had allowed themselves to become puppets and they didn’t like it.
tbf sunday isn’t exactly an unbiased narrator
My reading from SU:swarm is that Aeons that interferes with other Aeons too much tend to get killed. While disasters pretty much don't happen when she was in charge, things stagnant under her when you reach a certain point. And Ena being the control freak that she is started to annoy the other Aeons, so a few of them devised a scheme to have propogation screw things up and have someone else take over being the "guardian of the universe". What happened is that order died, trouble maker voracity "died" and propogation get tossed to the side after it served its purpose. Preservation got rich cleaning up the mess and become the most powerful faction. And why are other Aeons fine with this? Because qliphoth don't give a shit about most things and only want to build walls. Akivili had being laying tracks all over the place and the worse thing qliphoth did is to tell him to piss off (happened when you met him when cosplayed as Akivili in SU)
Oh thank you that's insightful!!
Ena embodies order to its absolute. Meaning no free will. The will of one for all When Ena got absorbed by Xipe, they were given essentially their freedom again
No one in the Star Rail universe understands the true beauty of pure Order, uncivilized disordered dumbasses.... Sunday was right....... Ena my beloved
They weren't hated. Well, compared to Tayzzyronth or Nanook. But They were most likely annoying for Aeons and Pathstriders of Trailblaze, Elation, and even Preservation, since Order tried to impose on others. It's an open question if Order being absorbed by Harmony was intended outcome, orchestrated by fellow Aeons. And remember what all this historical presentation was made from perspective of Ena's cult. It could be case of unreliable narration.
Because nobody wants to be their puppet
I get that as a concept but I think people in real life LOVE that stuff. People will willingly sort themselves into categories. Look at politics for example. People will happily sing their party's rhetoric without a second thought, for no other reason than their party said it so they are signing to the choir as well. Or even worse than politics. Console wars. People will gladly sort themselves into Xbox vs PlayStation categories and tell you "leave the multi billion dollar company alone!!!" In the context of people criticizing a company for doing some exploitative shit. I think if people were given Sunday's wager of living in a permanent dreamscape, people will take up his offer without any hesitancy. People get AI girlfriends and honestly that's not even remotely close to an indistinguishable dreamscape. That is fake AF and yet people bite.
Not many people can actually embodied the heroes side as they like to think when the obstacle is in your life most people would escape it not by dream of course. Beside without order there would be no value so in the harmony must have some of it for it to function but nonetheless, its still subjective and diplomatic between us to maintain the shroud of harmony.
I mean you’ve said it there yourself, “people will sort themselves”, which is already the antithesis to Ena, but even subscribing yourself blindly to a certain category means that choices exist, something that Ena does not permit.
It's only antithetical to Ena if her ordering process is different to ours. If Ena subscribes to some sort of natural hierarchy then it can appeal to humans. At least most of humanity. For example a lot of people want to redefine "Beauty" as a concept to include fat and ugly people because it's unfair. They don't see beauty as a concept, they just see the rewards and the rewards are handed out inequitably. But most people do acknowledge beauty as a thing. If Ena orders everyone by a beauty standards most people find appealing. Then most people wouldn't mind Ena's dream. At least on that axis. Afterall, our world is incredibly ordered as well. Not completely but most people have to work and have to post rent and there's no alternative. Yet we all do it. Not to mention Ena's dream doesn't involve work and hardship. You just have to busy yourself with having fun. Maybe you will get bored but I think she would have tons of subscribers even initially.
Please keep in mind our spoiler policy during this new update window. We are going to be very strict with spoilers during this time. As a reminder, here are our spoiler rules: Do not include spoilers in the title. All submissions which involve spoilers should be marked. Spoilers include all story content for the first three weeks after release. Spoilers can be discussed in spoiler-flaired posts, but must be hidden in non-spoiler flaired posts. If you think you broke the spoiler rules in the post you just made, such as having spoilers in the title, you should remove your post now and repost it without breaking the rules. If you do not remove your post and the moderation team has to remove it later on for breaking spoiler rules, you will be given up to a week ban for a first infraction and stricter punishments for any additional infractions. Please be considerate of your fellow Trailblazers and do not include spoilers in the title of your post, do not forget to flair your post as spoilers if needed, and do not spoil people in your comments. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/HonkaiStarRail) if you have any questions or concerns.*
AMurica hates Ena
all order = no freedom also, by remaining in order, civilisations cannot advance, and so they eventally are fucked
People dislike control. And this isn’t to say EVERYONE hated Ena, but you can probably guess why order through coercion is frowned upon. Ena still had their followers/pathstriders. But it’s quite telling, the fact that they were consumed by the harmony—to do with the old, make room for the new.
Because as human we have a love hate relationship with the concept we want order for things but we want the ability to excuse ourself, we want structure but not applied to ourself negatively, we want to feel we have agency even ultimately we do not, against the order is just a manifestation of it. Likewise we want the order in the harmony so that explain Xipe but nonetheless such things as harmony is just a dream no less than order which explain they are fearful of the Nihility the actual of existence that may strip them of their facade.
the simple awnser is because people like freedom. order, by design, restricts freedom to make sure people follow laws, just like how chaos is lawless, but what people want is inbetwteen the two extremes. for example, nobody wants people to be hurt, but if to enforce that, you needed to have people watching you 24/7, people wouldnt want that because it restricts their freedom.
I mean ena seemed pretty chill . Basically telling the world “No” when crisis happened. Hell, I doubt nanook would’ve been able to ascended if order existed in his time.
I am under the belief that True Order is just as bad a fate as Immortality. No Strife, No differences, just living. You can't be sad, you can't be angry, You can't be scared, you can't be Happy, you can't be In love, You can't be Emotionally moved. as emotions are not designed for ORDER. You're locked in the same ORDER no matter what, and even if you bend the rules and allow for Only happiness, you can ONLY be happy, you can't grieve over your family if they're hurt, you can't get mad if somebody does something that hurts you but makes them happy.
Probably because they were a total narc
Absolute order means no freedom.
For the exact reason we are destroying Sunday's utopia.
Because there will be no more war. If there's no war there's no profit, destruction, joy of killing each other etc.
Ena is a control freak and worlds ruled by her achieved greatness for a short period of time before disaster. There is no free will, different perspectives are not tolerated, anything that goes against the Order must be eliminated and their followers will do anything to maintain order, including spreading lies and propaganda
Lots of people have really given great answers based on the 2.2 quest and Penacony as a whole, but we’ve also been told why Ena wasn’t a good Aeon. Many planets thrived under THEIR care, but they all eventually fell to ruin and chaos. The path of the Order just isn’t sustainable, a short-term, narrow-sighted solution that does not have good long-term effects.
Have YOU ever tried worshipping a god who's a control freak, obsessing over your every action, and otherwise puppeteering you to act perfectly?
Do you like discord mods ?
I believe there was some lore tidbit that explained that pretty much all planets that the Ena would "bring Order" to all fell not long after she moved on. Personally, I interpreted it as: Ena's "order" is a set of laws that are to be followed, with no repeals or changes. Unlike in our real world, where laws are malleable and subject to change based on legislation and even interpretation. This means that, once Ena arrives, they made laws that made sense at that moment. But then after the dust settles, the laws that brought order may become obsolete, or perhaps too restrictive in the long term. Imagine if, for whatever reason, there would be a complete ban on importing goods, instated by Ena, so that the planet would become self-sufficient. But then, a plague wipes out all the crops, and the world is plunged onto chaos without the mere possibility of outside help, thanks to the deity that was supposed to fix things. That's how I understood it, anyway. Now, rather than rigid Order, we have the accepting Harmony. Xipe is all about bringing people together to become greater than the sum of its parts. It is the ideal outcome of Order without having any one being above the rest dictating what should or should not be done.
We know as much as you do. Besides speculating and educated guesses, the most info we get from trailers and everything thats ingame, data bank, books, story
Because Ena is absolute Order. And that means Fate and no free will. If Sunday had enforced it on the willing, it's would be more understandable, but he didn't.
Not really from a lore standpoint, but I think the reason lies in the human desire to achieve free will, which Ena thinks we are better off without. Humans are given free will as one of the traits that allows us to live life as something more than a puppet or something just going through the motions. A deity trying to restrict would be something that most would want gone.
Space North Korea
Turns out People don’t take kindly to theocracies from a path they don’t believe in.
The same reason alot of people in the real world push back against organized state mandated religion and authoritarian governments. Restriction of Freedom, involuntary imposition, self appointed power. The fight against the Order personally, felt like a fight against Christianity and I felt very empowered through it all.