Do you think Gharnef knew about Grima?

[Jotari]

Gharnef established his base in Thabes in Shadow Dragon. Alm, just dicking around, explores Thabes and discovers Grima living in the basement. Gharnef, with his obsession with magic and Thabes being the historic pinnacle of human magic, we can bet he explored the hell out of that place. Wait, let me see if I can find a quote.

Malledus:
“Thabes is an old city… None in recent memory have gone there and returned alive. Within its walls remain many powerful apparatus crafted of long-forgotten magic. Lord Gotoh believes Gharnef is harnessing their power, and that is why he wields such influence over the continent."

So yeah, if Alm managed to find Grima just by sleuthing around for fun, surely Gharnef must have found the giant ass dragon when he was actively looking for powerful magic stuff to control? Not sure if there's any discussion to be had on this, it's just something I kind of logiced out the other day (and really feel like I should have noticed sooner). So I guess just post a fan fic summary of you think interaction between these two characters would have went down and what possible plans Gharnef could have regarding Grima (man, Gharnef even had a falchion on hand! Though he personally wouldn't have been able to use it).

Also I guess we can take Malledus's comment about none ever being able to visit and return alive as a retcon (or just faulty information for someone living so far away) as there's a town right beside Thabes and the city itself is filled with looters.

Edited April 18, 2020 by Jotari

[Acacia Sgt]

Unless Gharnef had the means to remove the seal, he won't be able to reach Grima.

Malledus's comment can be chalked to the latter. Furia Harbor seems isolated enough that the rest of the continent can be genuinely mostly ignorant about it.

Edited September 17, 2019 by Acacia Sgt

[NobodiePichu]

40 minutes ago, Acacia Sgt said:

Unless Gharnef had the means to remove the seal, he won't be able to reach Grima.

i could see him being able to do it honestly. this is the dark wizard who got thabes up and running again, and he is very talented with magic in general considering he made imhulu and bound his soul to the darksphere and was largely responsible for both medeuses resurrection and transformation into the dark dragon/shadow dragon at the end of the war of heroes. being able to break a seal is hardly outside of the realm of his capabilities, though if that is the case it does raise the question of why he never really bothered with it. Either he took the warnings to heart which seems unlikely considering who he is, or he never bothered with grima because it wasnt strong enough for his ambitions or something along those lines.

hell maybe gharnef was secretly responsible for grima getting loose at all, either inadvertently or intentionally.

[Gregster101]

If Gharnef knew about Grima, this is quite the Voodoo Shark

[Acacia Sgt]

24 minutes ago, NobodiePichu said:

i could see him being able to do it honestly. this is the dark wizard who got thabes up and running again, and he is very talented with magic in general considering he made imhulu and bound his soul to the darksphere and was largely responsible for both medeuses resurrection and transformation into the dark dragon/shadow dragon at the end of the war of heroes. being able to break a seal is hardly outside of the realm of his capabilities, though if that is the case it does raise the question of why he never really bothered with it. Either he took the warnings to heart which seems unlikely considering who he is, or he never bothered with grima because it wasnt strong enough for his ambitions or something along those lines.

hell maybe gharnef was secretly responsible for grima getting loose at all, either inadvertently or intentionally.

It would depend on the nature of the seal. The seal was meant to last "until the city crumbles into the sand", so I doubt even someone like Gharnef could do it (even he has his limits, otherwise, why would stuff like the Starlight and the Lightsphere affect him?). Alm (and perhaps Celica too?) simply just take out the Sage's Shield (which is the seal) from the doors; but they have the blood and power of divine dragons, so that has to mean something.

Gharnef actually is capable to err on the side of caution. He may work for/with Medeus; but he's quite willing to betray him if needed. That's why he was the one guarding Falchion and Elice (this latter one may have been done without Medeus's consent, even), because he intended to use them eventually if he felt he needed to topple Medeus. Therefore, I can see him not bothering to get involved with Forneus's experiment, if it sounds that it would be A LOT more troublesome to deal with than Medeus.

Edited September 17, 2019 by Acacia Sgt

[NobodiePichu]

5 minutes ago, Acacia Sgt said:

It would depend on the nature of the seal. The seal was meant to last "until the city crumbles into the sand", so I doubt even someone like Gharnef could do it (even he has his limits, otherwise, why would stuff like the Starlight and the Lightsphere affect him?). Alm (and perhaps Celica too?) simply just take out the Sage's Shield (which is the seal) from the doors; but they have the blood and power of divine dragons, so that has to mean something.

Gharnef actually is capable to err on the side of caution. He may work for/with Medeus; but he's quite willing to betray him if needed. That's why he was the one guarding Falchion and Elice (this latter one may have been done without Medeus's consent, even), because he intended to use them eventually if he felt he needed to topple Medeus. Therefore, I can see him not bothering to get involved with Forneus's experiment, if it sounds that it would be A LOT more troublesome to deal with than Medeus.

true, though medeus isnt exactly suppose to be a push over either since at full power hes supposedly capable of fighting equally against full power naga. then again, being weakened for the war of shadows and heroes would make him easier to control...

though i believe the lightsphere and starlight are suppose to work so well agaisnt him due to being the antithesis to his darksphere power? thats definitely conjuncture on my part but it would make sense, so if the sages seal shares similarities to it it would probably work against him though i doubt it would share similarities to them since the shield of seals is a naga thing well the sages shield is more a thabes thing which ran independently of each other. plus he was apparently able to get everything else in the city up and running that still worked anyways so he clearly knows his way around thabian sciencemagic.

[redlight]

I think this might be a case of the Grima retcon explanation introducing a plothole.

[Interdimensional Observer]

1 hour ago, redlight said:

I think this might be a case of the Grima retcon explanation introducing a plothole.

Same.

Gharnef could have had control of Thabes for five years, maybe more. Gharnef could have explored every inch of it in that amount of time.

Imhullu grants him invulnerability to everything, or at least 99% of beings and magic, he wouldn't have to fear the enemies therein. Or, he could have his army of dark mages do the recon.

A seal? We're talking about the man who broke taboo by stealing the soul-taking Darksphere. A magic seal would only tempt Gharnef to break it, because you don't hide Iron Swords and Heal staffs behind seals.

[vanguard333]

4 hours ago, redlight said:

I think this might be a case of the Grima retcon explanation introducing a plothole.

Agreed. Gharnef would undoubtedly have figured out how to make his own Risen and he would have had no need for Medeus if he had access to Grima. 

[Jotari]

17 hours ago, NobodiePichu said:

i could see him being able to do it honestly. this is the dark wizard who got thabes up and running again, and he is very talented with magic in general considering he made imhulu and bound his soul to the darksphere and was largely responsible for both medeuses resurrection and transformation into the dark dragon/shadow dragon at the end of the war of heroes. being able to break a seal is hardly outside of the realm of his capabilities, though if that is the case it does raise the question of why he never really bothered with it. Either he took the warnings to heart which seems unlikely considering who he is, or he never bothered with grima because it wasnt strong enough for his ambitions or something along those lines.

hell maybe gharnef was secretly responsible for grima getting loose at all, either inadvertently or intentionally.

Plus, all it takes to break the seal is to take the proto Fire Emblem off the wall. Hardly an intricate thing. Alm and co were able to do it after all.

17 hours ago, Acacia Sgt said:

It would depend on the nature of the seal. The seal was meant to last "until the city crumbles into the sand", so I doubt even someone like Gharnef could do it (even he has his limits, otherwise, why would stuff like the Starlight and the Lightsphere affect him?). Alm (and perhaps Celica too?) simply just take out the Sage's Shield (which is the seal) from the doors; but they have the blood and power of divine dragons, so that has to mean something.

Does it? Does anything in the sealing description mention that blood of the dragon is needed to unseal it? In either case, Gharnef was successfully able to ressurect Medeus twice, once after Gharnef himself had been killed, so I'm sure he'd be equal to the task. A better question, is would Gharnef be able to reseal Grima? Because the Seal is unbroken when Alm gets there, which means either Gharnef never broke it, or if he did, he was able to patch it up again.

It's possible that Gharnef did encounter and even fight Grima, but Grima was powerful enough to break through Imhullu, which prompted Gharnef to make a retreat and reseal Grima, putting a pin on that particular avenue of power grabbing until he figured a way to get Falchion under control. Because as far as canon seems to go, it's basically impossible for a human to beat a Divine/Earth Dragon without using a Falchion. Hence why the Nagi gaiden exists.

11 hours ago, vanguard333 said:

Agreed. Gharnef would undoubtedly have figured out how to make his own Risen and he would have had no need for Medeus if he had access to Grima. 

Gharnef not making use of the masks is another matter entirely. There's be significantly less risk for him doing that as opposed to controlling Grima. My only explanation for that is that he did in fact use them, we just never discovered it during the course of Marth's games. No explanation is given for the people who fight with Gharnef in Thabes, after all. I think they're just listed as Khaden. Maybe they were all zombies and no one really noticed.

Edited September 18, 2019 by Jotari

[Etrurian emperor]

He's completely nuts so I think he would have tried to free Grima if he knew of him. Especially in New Mystery Gharnef and Medeus just want to destroy the world and setting loose an insane dragon experiment would achieve just that. 

[Jotari]

1 hour ago, Etrurian emperor said:

He's completely nuts so I think he would have tried to free Grima if he knew of him. Especially in New Mystery Gharnef and Medeus just want to destroy the world and setting loose an insane dragon experiment would achieve just that. 

Alternate theory. Dark Dragon Medeus actually is Grima. Gharnef just decided to call him Medeus as he didn't want to bother explaining to everyone that this is in fact a separate super powerful dragon he's ressurected. The name Grima is never actually used in Thabes after all (so how would Gharnef know what to call it?), and Dark Dragon Medeus is characterized very differently to regular Medeus with his ALL CAPS TEXT. He also looks nothing like Earth Dragon Medeus (let's ignore the fact that he also looks nothing like Grima and that we see Anri fighting Dark Dragon Medeus).

Edited September 18, 2019 by Jotari

[vanguard333]

2 hours ago, Jotari said:

Gharnef not making use of the masks is another matter entirely. There's be significantly less risk for him doing that as opposed to controlling Grima. My only explanation for that is that he did in fact use them, we just never discovered it during the course of Marth's games. No explanation is given for the people who fight with Gharnef in Thabes, after all. I think they're just listed as Khaden. Maybe they were all zombies and no one really noticed.

Weird; I made note of a similar point in my comment, but when I checked, it wasn't there. Maybe I had deleted it, but I'm pretty sure it was there. 

I had made a point that, if he had gained control of the risen, it would explain the Gharnef duplicates in Shadow Dragon (i.e. Gharnef made look-alikes using risen dark mages or something like that). 

[Acacia Sgt]

5 hours ago, Jotari said:

Does it? Does anything in the sealing description mention that blood of the dragon is needed to unseal it? In either case, Gharnef was successfully able to ressurect Medeus twice, once after Gharnef himself had been killed, so I'm sure he'd be equal to the task. A better question, is would Gharnef be able to reseal Grima? Because the Seal is unbroken when Alm gets there, which means either Gharnef never broke it, or if he did, he was able to patch it up again.

It's possible that Gharnef did encounter and even fight Grima, but Grima was powerful enough to break through Imhullu, which prompted Gharnef to make a retreat and reseal Grima, putting a pin on that particular avenue of power grabbing until he figured a way to get Falchion under control. Because as far as canon seems to go, it's basically impossible for a human to beat a Divine/Earth Dragon without using a Falchion. Hence why the Nagi gaiden exists.

I'd rather avoid making assumptions without enough hard evidence or a sufficient base. Gharnef doing A doesn't mean he can do B. Also, the seal was meant to last for a long while; and was done by a very advanced civilization that the rest of Archanea maybe has or is still far from reaching them by the time of Awakening. Even with how much time has passed, the fact Grima still spend a thousand years down there points more the seal remained intact and only truly lost its power by then. After all, nothing says its canon that Alm and company explored the place. Or that if they did, they removed the seal.

Also, considering how Thabes is described in Shadow Dragon's Ch23 intro, even in its crumbling state there's still enough of the city present. It's more reasonable to think Gharnef simply didn't explored the Labyrinth, or even aware of its existence, depending on how much he bothered to explore of Thabes. Also, as I mentioned earlier, Gharbef was wary of Medeus. IT's also more reasonable to think that, in the case he did explored the Labyrinth, that he opted to not remove the seal, since he already had Medeus to worry about. As the saying goes, "Better the devil you know." Medeus is at least something Gharnef knows about. Forneus' experment... it's all a big unknown to him. Unless he breaks the seal; but at that point it's a big-risk gamble.

This would also explain about the masks. If he never goes to Forneus' lab, he wouldn't be aware of the thanatophages.

3 hours ago, vanguard333 said:

Weird; I made note of a similar point in my comment, but when I checked, it wasn't there. Maybe I had deleted it, but I'm pretty sure it was there. 

I had made a point that, if he had gained control of the risen, it would explain the Gharnef duplicates in Shadow Dragon (i.e. Gharnef made look-alikes using risen dark mages or something like that). 

No, that one has a different explanation. It's explained in Shadow Dragon that Gharnef is using some magical apparatus located at the top of the tower:

Malledus:
“Sire, we’ve pinpointed where Gharnef is keeping the magical apparatus that gives him his power.”

Marth:
“Where?”

Malledus:
“The Tower of Thabes atop this very temple.”

Marth:
“Then we don’t need to fight Gharnef…If we find those apparatus.”

Malledus:
“Gharnef’s power- a great deal of power- will be sealed forever.”

Marth:
“Then let’s hurry and seize the entrance to the tower!”

Malledus:
“A word of caution, sir. Stopping the apparatus will not undo Imhullu power- only Gharnef’s. He still has Falchion in his keeping; if you want the blade back, you must defeat him now, before seizing the tower.”

[Jotari]

4 minutes ago, Acacia Sgt said:

I'd rather avoid making assumptions without enough hard evidence or a sufficient base. Gharnef doing A doesn't mean he can do B. Also, the seal was meant to last for a long while; and was done by a very advanced civilization that the rest of Archanea maybe has or is still far from reaching them by the time of Awakening. Even with how much time has passed, the fact Grima still spend a thousand years down there points more the seal remained intact and only truly lost its power by then. After all, nothing says its canon that Alm and company explored the place. Or that if they did, they removed the seal.

Assuming Gharnef can't break is just as much an assumption though. Especially when Alm could break the seal. Attributing Alm's ability to break the seal to his brand is then adding theory to assumption. As opposed to occum's razor which would suggest breaking the seal is as easy as removing a shield from a wall, given the information we're given.

Edited September 18, 2019 by Jotari

[Acacia Sgt]

5 minutes ago, Jotari said:

Assuming Gharnef can't break is just as much an assumption though. Especially when Alm could break the seal. Attributing Alm's ability to break the seal to his brand is then adding theory to assumption. As opposed to occum's razor which would suggest breaking the seal is as easy as removing a shield from a wall, given the information we're given.

That's why I say it's more reasonable to think Gharnef simply didn't went in. Or if he did, he didn't bothered with the seal. It would be in-character for him. Or at least, in-character would be to not bother while he still has Medeus to worry about. That's why he'd bother acquiring Falchion and Elice. It's something that would be manageable to him. Releasing a possible big threat to counter Medeus that he may or not be able to control afterwards meaning he just replaced Medeus with something worse would go against what we know on how Gharnef operates.

[Jotari]

1 minute ago, Acacia Sgt said:

That's why I say it's more reasonable to think Gharnef simply didn't went in. Or if he did, he didn't bothered with the seal. It would be in-character for him. Or at least, in-character would be to not bother while he still has Medeus to worry about. That's why he'd bother acquiring Falchion and Elice. It's something that would be manageable to him. Releasing a possible big threat to counter Medeus that he may or not be able to control afterwards meaning he just replaced Medeus with something worse would go against what we know on how Gharnef operates.

You're interpretation of Gharnef is different to mine. I see him as someone who's trying as many avenues as he can to gather a bolster his power (Imhullu, the Dark Sphere, Falchion, Elice with Aum, brainwashing Tiki). His approach to Medeus is measured and cautious, but that's all the more reason he'd be exploring further options to garner ways of taking Medeus out (Shadow Dragon even implies he was intentionally utilizing Marth to take out Medeus's allies). Given his already substantial power, and his desire for more power, I don't imagine him taking heed of the warnings. Especially since none of them actually make reference to any kind of being on Medeus's level. All the tablets before the seal basically just say there was some alchemist dude working on shady stuff and when the government tried to investigate no one returned, so they locked him in his workshop. Resurrecting the dead? A perfect being? Hell yeah Gharnef would want to know more about that and add it to his collection of knowledge and power.

[Acacia Sgt]

3 minutes ago, Jotari said:

You're interpretation of Gharnef is different to mine. I see him as someone who's trying as many avenues as he can to gather a bolster his power (Imhullu, the Dark Sphere, Falchion, Elice with Aum, brainwashing Tiki). His approach to Medeus is measured and cautious, but that's all the more reason he'd be exploring further options to garner ways of taking Medeus out (Shadow Dragon even implies he was intentionally utilizing Marth to take out Medeus's allies). Given his already substantial power, and his desire for more power, I don't imagine him taking heed of the warnings. Especially since none of them actually make reference to any kind of being on Medeus's level. All the tablets before the seal basically just say there was some alchemist dude working on shady stuff and when the government tried to investigate no one returned, so they locked him in his workshop. Resurrecting the dead? A perfect being? Hell yeah Gharnef would want to know more about that and add it to his collection of knowledge and power.

One of the slabs pre-seal has this to say:

The second was the creation of a singular, perfect being.

So Gharbef would at least know that. Also, don't forget. Thabes was a mighty civilization that ended up being destroyed by the Divine Dragons because they feared they had become to powerful. It's not hard to think Ghanef put the clues together. Ift Thabes itself considered this "perfect being" as a threat... and then the Divine Dragons considered Thabes itself a threat that had to be taken down... what does that speak of the being? That it could be one of the reasons that drove the dragons to destroy Thabes. Therefore, said being has the potential to be even a threat to the divines, which are the top of the dragon hierarchy...

Simply put. Gharnef deduced and assumed things; but ultimately, it's not an unreason conclusion he could've gone to. YEs, he has a penchant to amass power to use for his needs... but all the things you listed were things he could reasonably take control of. All evidence surrounding the mysterious perfect being sealed up by a civilization even the divine dragons came to become wary of... not so much.

[Jotari]

11 minutes ago, Acacia Sgt said:

One of the slabs pre-seal has this to say:

The second was the creation of a singular, perfect being.

So Gharbef would at least know that. Also, don't forget. Thabes was a mighty civilization that ended up being destroyed by the Divine Dragons because they feared they had become to powerful. It's not hard to think Ghanef put the clues together. Ift Thabes itself considered this "perfect being" as a threat... and then the Divine Dragons considered Thabes itself a threat that had to be taken down... what does that speak of the being? That it could be one of the reasons that drove the dragons to destroy Thabes. Therefore, said being has the potential to be even a threat to the divines, which are the top of the dragon hierarchy...

Simply put. Gharnef deduced and assumed things; but ultimately, it's not an unreason conclusion he could've gone to. YEs, he has a penchant to amass power to use for his needs... but all the things you listed were things he could reasonably take control of. All evidence surrounding the mysterious perfect being sealed up by a civilization even the divine dragons came to become wary of... not so much.

That's even assuming that the perfect being was even created, or that it is something that can even rival a divine dragon (the perfect being wasn't the threat, the fact that nobody they sent came back was, which is a great big unknown). Bear in mind, this is a man who is actively brainwashing Tiki. A being said to be so powerful she can destroy the entire world even as a child. Gharnef, I think, would at least investigate further. If he was so cowardly as to shy away from such a warning, then I don't think it likely he would even set himself up in Thabes to begin with, a place where most known people to visit never even return (not just said by Malledus, but by chapter narrations as well). Thabes is a dangerous place filled with forbidden magic that modern humans can't understand and surrounded by feral dragons. If Gharnef had doubts about not being able to take control of these magics, he wouldn't have bothered with Thabes and would have just stayed in Khaden. This is a man who's actively challenging Gotoh, a divine dragon and the father of all magic in Archenea (though I'm not sure if Gharnef knows Gotoh is a divine dragon, he certainly knows about Tiki so it's probable, not that it makes much difference with Gotoh's divinestone being lost).

Edited September 18, 2019 by Jotari

[NobodiePichu]

11 minutes ago, Acacia Sgt said:

One of the slabs pre-seal has this to say:

The second was the creation of a singular, perfect being.

So Gharbef would at least know that. Also, don't forget. Thabes was a mighty civilization that ended up being destroyed by the Divine Dragons because they feared they had become to powerful. It's not hard to think Ghanef put the clues together. Ift Thabes itself considered this "perfect being" as a threat... and then the Divine Dragons considered Thabes itself a threat that had to be taken down... what does that speak of the being? That it could be one of the reasons that drove the dragons to destroy Thabes. Therefore, said being has the potential to be even a threat to the divines, which are the top of the dragon hierarchy...

Simply put. Gharnef deduced and assumed things; but ultimately, it's not an unreason conclusion he could've gone to. YEs, he has a penchant to amass power to use for his needs... but all the things you listed were things he could reasonably take control of. All evidence surrounding the mysterious perfect being sealed up by a civilization even the divine dragons came to become wary of... not so much.

i mean this also assumes that gharnef isnt going to act like gharnef and take the more cautious approach. remember this is a man whos fall was predicated on his inability to accept that gohto didnt trust him with auras power/responsibilities and who wanted to prove his own worth and talent/power by using the darksphere and creating imhulu from it. and its not like his corruption would make him any less cautious, the darksphere amplifies the dark aspects of ones personality as shown by hardin, and well gharnef has a perchance for planning and schemes hes also definitely the bold type who would see the warnings and think "what a bunch of babies, i could do even better then they ever could!" out of pride alone.

that all being said, if your looking for a plausible explanation as to why gharnef didnt use grima in anyway (aside from grima being a concept in the series that came after the game gharnef was in) one could say that since grima was hardly at full power yet and something of an unknown in full capability that gharnef decided to keep grima as a backup plan in case things with medues didnt work out well he worked out just what grima could do (which didnt pan out because of marth and the gang invading thabes and slaying his physical body before his plans could reach fruition)

[0 Def Cleric]

The pragmatic explanation is that Awakening and retcons related to it absolutely wreck Archanea's lore. 

The more interesting explanation is that Gharnef was more interested in the Risen, considering he works on coming back from the dead in Mystery, and put off looking into this "perfect being" until he'd done the research that was more immediately to his benefit. And then Marth came along before he finished, since he comes back in an incomplete (somewhat spiritual) state. I dunno, I think that could be interesting to go into in a Mystery remake. 

(Also, doesn't dark dragon Medeus look exactly like the Medeus from Anri's time, in Shadow Dragon's opening narration? I know the him-being-Grima thing is Joke but he's more often seen as a dark dragon than not!)

[Acacia Sgt]

9 minutes ago, Jotari said:

That's even assuming that the perfect being was even created, or that it is something that can even rival a divine dragon (the perfect being wasn't the threat, the fact that nobody they sent came back was, which is a great big unknown). Bear in mind, this is a man who is actively brainwashing Tiki. A being said to be so powerful she can destroy the entire world even as a child. Gharnef, I think, would at least investigate further. If he was so cowardly as to shy away from such a warning, then I don't think it likely he would even set himself up in Thabes to begin with, a place where most known people to visit never even return (not just said by Malledus, but by chapter narrations as well). Thabes is a dangerous place filled with forbidden magic that modern humans can't understand and surrounded by feral dragons. If Gharnef had doubts about not being able to take control of these magics, he wouldn't have bothered with Thabes and would have just stayed in Khaden. This is a man who's actively challenging Gotoh, a divine dragon and the father of all magic in Archenea (though I'm not sure if Gharnef knows Gotoh is a divine dragon, he certainly knows about Tiki so it's probable, not that it makes much difference with Gotoh's divinestone being lost).

It had to be, otherwise how did the Council even knew?

The placement of the slabs are actually a bit anachronic. The ones pre-seal first talk they learned about the being before dispatching soldiers, which then made them choose to seal up the lab. However, Forneus's slabs first talk how he used the soldiers to craft the being in the first place, considering how its worded:

The Senate has granted me all I need to craft life anew. I've succeeded.

Brainwashing Tiki is honestly not that big of an accomplishment. Yes, Tiki is said to hold a lot of power to destroy the world... but it's not like she can use said power consciously. The threat is that her mind would destabilize/degenerate and that leading to her power going out of her control. Whenever we see child Tiki, she only has the power expected of a divine dragon child. Therefore, not a difficult task for Gharnef to brainwash her... which also means he can likely keep Tiki in check that way, since no fear of her loosing her mind if, well, it's under his control. So no, Tiki isn't as much of a threat as the unknown that is the being deep in the labyrinth.

We could then say Gharnef took enough of a risk to explore Thabes in his quest to acquire power; but kept it to reasonable levels. We know he did made use of stuff in Thabes, like that apparatus that created the clones; but again, "Doing A doesn't mean doing B". He likely first went for what he could use and keep under his control. He probably tested it first. He spent enough time in Thabes to reason he could've. However, once again, what information he could have of Grima already paints it as something that would unquestionably be out of his league.

9 minutes ago, NobodiePichu said:

i mean this also assumes that gharnef isnt going to act like gharnef and take the more cautious approach. remember this is a man whos fall was predicated on his inability to accept that gohto didnt trust him with auras power/responsibilities and who wanted to prove his own worth and talent/power by using the darksphere and creating imhulu from it. and its not like his corruption would make him any less cautious, the darksphere amplifies the dark aspects of ones personality as shown by hardin, and well gharnef has a perchance for planning and schemes hes also definitely the bold type who would see the warnings and think "what a bunch of babies, i could do even better then they ever could!" out of pride alone.

that all being said, if your looking for a plausible explanation as to why gharnef didnt use grima in anyway (aside from grima being a concept in the series that came after the game gharnef was in) one could say that since grima was hardly at full power yet and something of an unknown in full capability that gharnef decided to keep grima as a backup plan in case things with medues didnt work out well he worked out just what grima could do (which didnt pan out because of marth and the gang invading thabes and slaying his physical body before his plans could reach fruition)

Thing is, acting cautious isn't unlike Gharnef; and no reason to think that would also get amplified in his usage of the Darksphere. His desire to backstab Medeus if it proves his own existance is threatened by him. That's something that can't be ignored.

Yet there's no evidence he went down there. Unless the seal can be placed back, the fact it's still there in SoV means he didn't do it, or tried and failed. Without access to Grima, he wouldn't be able to tell if its too weak for his interests or whatever.

[Jotari]

23 minutes ago, Acacia Sgt said:

It had to be, otherwise how did the Council even knew?

The placement of the slabs are actually a bit anachronic. The ones pre-seal first talk they learned about the being before dispatching soldiers, which then made them choose to seal up the lab. However, Forneus's slabs first talk how he used the soldiers to craft the being in the first place, considering how its worded:

The Senate has granted me all I need to craft life anew. I've succeeded.

Brainwashing Tiki is honestly not that big of an accomplishment. Yes, Tiki is said to hold a lot of power to destroy the world... but it's not like she can use said power consciously. The threat is that her mind would destabilize/degenerate and that leading to her power going out of her control. Whenever we see child Tiki, she only has the power expected of a divine dragon child. Therefore, not a difficult task for Gharnef to brainwash her... which also means he can likely keep Tiki in check that way, since no fear of her loosing her mind if, well, it's under his control. So no, Tiki isn't as much of a threat as the unknown that is the being deep in the labyrinth.

We could then say Gharnef took enough of a risk to explore Thabes in his quest to acquire power; but kept it to reasonable levels. We know he did made use of stuff in Thabes, like that apparatus that created the clones; but again, "Doing A doesn't mean doing B". He likely first went for what he could use and keep under his control. He probably tested it first. He spent enough time in Thabes to reason he could've. However, once again, what information he could have of Grima already paints it as something that would unquestionably be out of his league.

It really doesn't though. The slabs don't paint a clear picture at all (and the stuff within the lab doubly so since that can only be accessed by breaking the seal). It just depicts someone working on something. This could be as mild as Nergal's perfect being Limstella, or as mighty as what we know it to be, ie Grima. But as far as the warning goes, it's just something very vague. For Gharnef as powerful as he is to not invesitgate, means he's either cowardly or completely devoid of curiousity, which are neither traits I'd attribute to him. And I'll reiterate, Gharnef's league is that of the Divine and Earth Dragons. He has no idea if his brainwashing of Tiki can work (and in fact Bantu does break it rather easily). I doubt anyone's ever tried brainwashing a divine dragon and using them as a guard dog before. But Gharnef is daring enough to try. Just as he's daring enough to use the Dark Sphere to create Imhullu or daring enough to resurrect Medeus.

Edited September 18, 2019 by Jotari

[Acacia Sgt]

59 minutes ago, Jotari said:

It really doesn't though. The slabs don't paint a clear picture at all (and the stuff within the lab doubly so since that can only be accessed by breaking the seal). It just depicts someone working on something. This could be as mild as Nergal's perfect being Limstella, or as mighty as what we know it to be, ie Grima. But as far as the warning goes, it's just something very vague. For Gharnef as powerful as he is to not invesitgate, means he's either cowardly or completely devoid of curiousity, which are neither traits I'd attribute to him. And I'll reiterate, Gharnef's league is that of the Divine and Earth Dragons. He has no idea if his brainwashing of Tiki can work (and in fact Bantu does break it rather easily). I doubt anyone's ever tried brainwashing a divine dragon and using them as a guard dog before. But Gharnef is daring enough to try. Just as he's daring enough to use the Dark Sphere to create Imhullu or daring enough to resurrect Medeus.

On the contrary they do. The Council learned about the thanatophages and the creation. It's right there in the slabs. Considering they use the terms of "army of the dead" and "perfect being", it sounds more that Forneus told them what he was working on. It's still fact the Thabes Council knew the general what, even if not the intricate details.

Eh, the script doesn't show Gharnef had any doubt when putting Tiki in a trance. To which I repeat, she's just a child. If anything, it would give the idea that it should be easy, Divine Dragon or not.

Edited September 18, 2019 by Acacia Sgt

[NobodiePichu]

12 hours ago, Acacia Sgt said:

Thing is, acting cautious isn't unlike Gharnef; and no reason to think that would also get amplified in his usage of the Darksphere. His desire to backstab Medeus if it proves his own existance is threatened by him. That's something that can't be ignored.

Yet there's no evidence he went down there. Unless the seal can be placed back, the fact it's still there in SoV means he didn't do it, or tried and failed. Without access to Grima, he wouldn't be able to tell if its too weak for his interests or whatever.

hes savy but i wouldnt say caution is actually a prominent trait of gharnef, hes a schemer certainly but he never actually fears medeus, simply doesnt want to share power, and the first time he actually encounters marth he quite fragrantly attacks him before leaving because he has better shit to do. his motivation for taking the darksphere was an overabundance of confidence and ego that was bruised by his mentors decisions, whatever caution he might have had is usually going to be buried under that massive ego. Hell its only after his body is destroyed that he starts showing some caution in regards to marth which is understandable since marths beat him once before and he isnt suppose to be stupid.

as for the sages shield being in place when alm and celica arrive, that is a good point yes though considering its literally a shield that needs to be put in place to manifest the seal i see no reason that the seal couldnt be put back in place if the shield was put back in place, especially by a skilled magician seeking to lock up shop for the day.