Book VII Discussion Thread

[vikingsfan92]

On 7/20/2023 at 11:00 PM, Lemmy said:

Based off the trailer we know Nerthus will grant us a power up, we will power up Seither but since she’s Gullveig, that should prove disastrous. And the book 1 trailer showed Nerthus crying which I can’t remember her doing.

Brave Gullveig is a thing pretty soon (cyl is not that far off) and this might simply be how IS writes her being a part of the larger story.  All cyl heroes in the past have made vauge references to being voted in. This could be the one time it is a main plot device of the story chapter without being a stretch.

Also having a second version of Gullveig means we have a way of countering her own shenigans with her own powers. So no matter what there should be a way to make the ending not unbelievable. The big question is if they can make the Brave version of Gullveig entrance to the story good and make sure she doesn't do to much damage.

[DefyingFates]

1 minute ago, vikingsfan92 said:

Also having a second version of Gullveig means we have a way of countering her own shenigans with her own powers. So no matter what there should be a way to make the ending not unbelievable. The big question is if they can make the Brave version of Gullveig entrance to the story good and make sure she doesn't do to much damage.

I think you may be setting your expectations too high considering the story is likely already set in stone. We'll likely only ever get the usual "Hi, I'm X" dialogue from Brave Gullveig with maybe an acknowledgement that she's staying out of the fight with her alternate self in the accompanying Forging Bonds. I'd love to be proven wrong, of course!

[Othin]

Seven months was enough time for them to make the CYL characters and all their art and dialogue. By the time Gullveig was voted in, they would have already had a plan for Book 7's progression that didn't involve Brave Gullveig, but I could see them making adjustments to account for her presence.

I don't expect it to be a particularly big part of the story, but I can see her having more involvement than typical New Heroes.

[vikingsfan92]

4 hours ago, DefyingFates said:

I think you may be setting your expectations too high considering the story is likely already set in stone. We'll likely only ever get the usual "Hi, I'm X" dialogue from Brave Gullveig with maybe an acknowledgement that she's staying out of the fight with her alternate self in the accompanying Forging Bonds. I'd love to be proven wrong, of course!

Could be but if there was a time for cyl to be more a role in the story  it would this time around. Simply because its the story relevant charcter of the book. 

It is more likely to be some other thing but I an just bringing up options 

[Mercakete]

OKAY so I couldn't get to this right away and then there were a lot more posts to read. That coupled with other things I was dealing with irl kind of killed my motivation to respond to this thread. BUT it's bothering me that I have all this I want to reply to, so I'm just going to tackle this one post at a time. (Sorry if anyone else already addressed any of the things I'm going to say. I'll edit or post more as I'm able to.)

On 7/22/2023 at 2:44 PM, Seafarer said:

@Mercakete Yeah, I see where you're coming from, and I'm sure you're right about where IntSys is headed, but that's still thoroughly unsatisfying to me, and that's because of how changes to the past propagate. There are two common versions of it, right? Either changes to the past alter the future, erasing anything from that future, or changes cause a new timeline to split off.

If we take us killing Njörðr in the past as the victory condition, what happens? If it's a future-altering event, we erase everything of the old future with Gullveig, including our motivation to kill Njörðr in the past and our ability to time travel to do it. That's a paradox - killing Njörðr leads to us being unable to kill him, leading to us needing to go back and kill him, and so on forever.

So what if we make a new timeline? Well, now there's nothing to stop Gullveig travelling from the old timeline in an attempt to put our new timeline back on her schedule. If we can do it, so can she.

So we either need super time powers on our side to smooth out the paradox and allow us to continue to exist into the future of the altered timeline (which would kinda be a deus ex machina at this point, since paradoxes haven't been discussed throughout this entire time-travelling Book), or Gullveig needs to be convinced to stop. Or some other explanation of temporal propagation would be needed.

One crack theory that I had after seeing Fionorde's post is that Njörðr is in fact trying to break the time loop by encouraging Seiðr to make Heiðr before Seiðr gets cursed, so Heiðr is also never cursed and cannot infect Seiðr. He's turned "evil" because he needs to convince Gullveig that he's on her side and his only hope now is to loop again and have another go at convincing Seiðr. In that case, he could be convinced to pull a Freyr and sacrifice his past self to prevent his Ár being used to create Gullveig, leaving us to kill Kvasir in the past in order to erase Gullveig completely (and we could have Njörðr's time powers on our side to break the paradox there, in theory). But that's pretty far out, and I don't expect it to happen (and it also either erases Seiðr or leaves her cursed).

Yeah, that theory wouldn't make any sense since Njordr's the cause of all this. He could've stopped Gullveig from coming into being by killing Kvasir when she showed up in the past, he could've just not given the Ar to Seidr in the present, or any other number of things if he really was one of the good guys all along. The plot only makes any sense if he's just what he said at the end of the chapter: the one behind it all, trying to destroy the human world. It also makes sense since he has a reputation for disliking humans, which was mentioned by Goat Aunt in the past and (if I'm remembering this right) Seidr in the present, when she was bringing us to meet him.

Anyway, a thing I forgot to mention before is that we're probably going to use Goat Aunt's powers to nullify the golden serpent curse, since the source of the curse was Njordr's powers, and IS likes empowering us with the opposite power as the big bad's (ice vs fire, for example) in order to counteract the big bad's power. Plus, she already likes humans since they're land creatures and she's the goddess of the land and Njordr's the god of the sea. (I know it's a bit silly, but I can't help but think of Team Aqua and Team Magma from Pokemon.)

Anyway, there's another thing that needs to be addressed here. I'll start out by saying that there's not only 1 way to write time travel and its consequences in fiction. There are a lot of ways to avoid (or include as plot devises) paradoxes, depending on the canon of how time travel works in the specific piece. If IS is going about this in the way that I see them doing so, then they've really landed on a fantastic way to handle this without leaving plot holes.

Here's the thing: killing Njordr doesn't actually make a paradox. The reason is because we actually have a couple of different kinds of timelines in play. There's the world history (past, present, future, able to be viewed linearly as what happens in the world) and personal history (what happens as per the experiences of an individual.) The way IS has written it, these are occurring at the same time, and are working independently from one another. It's tough to say for sure, but this could be because of the vision Seidr gave Kiran at the beginning of the story.

See, the goal has always been to make it so that Gullveig never comes into power. If personal history and world history were tied together intrinsically, then altering one would affect the other. However, the story has already proven that this isn't the case within this canon. Those who went through the events with the time traveling (Njordr (having used his Ar and thus knows about events going on, whether or not he traveled through time himself or just looked into the various timelines), Seidr, and the Askrans(time travelers)) have basically half-anchored the events of the book into place. The goal is, and always has been, to collapse the time loop so that none of the bad events ever occur. So, if the world history is rewritten so that the golden serpent curse never comes into being, those not involved in the time traveling would have never gone through those events, and would see it as never having happened. However, those who have and are aware of the time loop which never occurred in the world history, but did in personal history, would just continue on in their original times with the knowledge of it having happened.

This is where the genius comes in: living something that no one else did -- having real personal history that never counted as world history -- is very much like dreaming. And who, exactly, is Njordr, Seidr, Goat Aunt, and Heidr related to? Freyr and Freyja, whose realms are the dream and nightmare realms. Time that happened, but didn't happen: it's the same as dreams. It all fits extremely nicely into IS' preestablished canon, and them all being related makes perfect sense in terms of powers and domains this way, too.

So, Alfonse, Sharena, Anna, Kiran, Njordr (if he survives), Seidr (if she survives), and maybe Goat Aunt (since she was intrinsic to all this) should retain their memories of this time loop if it collapses and the golden serpent curse never existed in world history. Basically, yes, it would have never happened, and thus would not happen, because what caused it to happen would have been destroyed before it could happen...but it would be remembered by those who need to remember it.

I also began to wonder if something like this (a strong, established time loop collapsing) would wind up reviving or re-creating Freyr (or a replacement ruler of the dream realm.) Maybe that was how Freyr and Freyja came into existence in the first place: other time loops that collapsed. Anyway, it was a thought.

[Seafarer]

17 hours ago, Mercakete said:

See, the goal has always been to make it so that Gullveig never comes into power. If personal history and world history were tied together intrinsically, then altering one would affect the other. However, the story has already proven that this isn't the case within this canon. Those who went through the events with the time traveling (Njordr (having used his Ar and thus knows about events going on, whether or not he traveled through time himself or just looked into the various timelines), Seidr, and the Askrans(time travelers)) have basically half-anchored the events of the book into place. The goal is, and always has been, to collapse the time loop so that none of the bad events ever occur. So, if the world history is rewritten so that the golden serpent curse never comes into being, those not involved in the time traveling would have never gone through those events, and would see it as never having happened. However, those who have and are aware of the time loop which never occurred in the world history, but did in personal history, would just continue on in their original times with the knowledge of it having happened.

This is where the genius comes in: living something that no one else did -- having real personal history that never counted as world history -- is very much like dreaming. And who, exactly, is Njordr, Seidr, Goat Aunt, and Heidr related to? Freyr and Freyja, whose realms are the dream and nightmare realms. Time that happened, but didn't happen: it's the same as dreams. It all fits extremely nicely into IS' preestablished canon, and them all being related makes perfect sense in terms of powers and domains this way, too.

So... if I'm understanding this correctly, we need to change history at a point earlier than full-powered Gullveig has ever travelled to, because otherwise her personal history is intersecting with world history at some point and she therefore still exists?

Anyway, I don't think it's a time loop at all, now that I think about it. It's just... the history of Midgard. And we're trying to change it, while Gullveig is trying to keep it the same. But I did think of a way to make the ending make sense to me, and it involves us setting up an actual time loop where Seiðr comes to us when she did and takes us back to kill Njörðr (having taken his power as Kvasir when we defeat him), before bringing us back to the present.

Anyway, I feel a bit better about the story now. Thanks for discussing it with me!

[Mercakete]

7 hours ago, Seafarer said:

So... if I'm understanding this correctly, we need to change history at a point earlier than full-powered Gullveig has ever travelled to, because otherwise her personal history is intersecting with world history at some point and she therefore still exists?

Anyway, I don't think it's a time loop at all, now that I think about it. It's just... the history of Midgard. And we're trying to change it, while Gullveig is trying to keep it the same. But I did think of a way to make the ending make sense to me, and it involves us setting up an actual time loop where Seiðr comes to us when she did and takes us back to kill Njörðr (having taken his power as Kvasir when we defeat him), before bringing us back to the present.

Anyway, I feel a bit better about the story now. Thanks for discussing it with me!

Glad to help! Though, the important bits are as follows: break the time loop, destroy the curse. Since Njordr's the originator of the curse, he also has to go. If all this can be done in one go, all the better, and if Seidr is cured, she can just time warp us to whenever it is we came from so that the land can be at peace and stuff. She's a time goddess now, so once she's cured of the curse, it's okay if she doesn't get offed (which, given how things tend to go with the freebie characters, is basically guaranteed.)

[Lemmy]

Is Njorther Freyr's father?

I'm trying to think of some kind of motive for wanting to destroy everything.

I'm also confused why Kvasir is going along with this, perhaps she's getting a weird family out of this, Heither may not have existed without this.

 

When the CYL results were added I was speculating on a character with villainous parent theme for the forging bonds event, and then they reveal we're the parent, it's funny in a way.

[Mercakete]

On 7/27/2023 at 12:57 AM, Lemmy said:

Is Njorther Freyr's father?

I'm trying to think of some kind of motive for wanting to destroy everything.

I'm also confused why Kvasir is going along with this, perhaps she's getting a weird family out of this, Heither may not have existed without this.

 

When the CYL results were added I was speculating on a character with villainous parent theme for the forging bonds event, and then they reveal we're the parent, it's funny in a way.

Well, we know that Njordr's sister is Freyr and Freyja's aunt, so Njordr is either their father or uncle. Also, with Ragnarok (the final battle between humans and the gods which "ends the world," but really just starts a new cycle of the world -- according to the mythology, Ragnarok happens every now and then) coming up and Njordr being able to see the future with his Ar (pretty sure the humans win), there's plenty of reason for him to want to end humanity.

As for Kvasir, it seems to me that she still has Gullveig's mindset since Gullveig becomes Kvasir (and then Njordr erases her memory so she can grow up as Heidr's sister as Seidr so that the time loop can keep looping.)

Edit: Just got my Nerpuz to lvl40 and indeed, she talks about blessing or having blessed Briedablik with the power of the land. Yeah, we're definitely using that to nullify the golden serpent curse.

Edit: According to one of the things normal Freyr says in the castle, Nerpuz is his father's sister. So, odds are really good that his and Freyja's dad is Njordr.

Edit: Well, in Brave Gullveig's Meet the Heroes page, Njordr is listed as "King of Vanaheimr, realm of light. His scheming brings about Gullveig's creation." So, pretty sure, yeah, she's his tool and he's the actual big bad. (Also, the snakes in that chibi form are ADORABLE.)

Edited August 15, 2023 by Mercakete

[Mercakete]

Okay, there's a new chapter out so it's time for me to give my analysis! Let's go!

Alright, looks like we were ejected and/or Njordr fled (since our location is different and Alfonse mentions Njordr going somewhere.) Also, apparently it's the snakes themselves which force a rewind in time if Gullveig/Seidr/whomever is infected with them...dies. So, that helps clarify even further why she submits to her fate. (When you lose the will to do anything, someone else's will can fill you since you become nihilistic. Also, Njordr's sort of the "one person she has" as well as an authority figure, so it makes sense that, in lieu of her own will, she'd fall back on his. At least until he stops inputting.)

Aaaaaaaaa my gooooosh immediately the Book 4 bad guy music starts playinnnnng when Njordr appearsss I love this integrationnnnn- And yeah, he hates humans. "What is it that a god should fear what is to come?" Hmmm hinting toward ragnarok? "The gods diminish, and the insects multiply and multiply to fill the space the gods leave behind... Abhorrent." Yeah, sounds like he knows about the incoming ragnarok. "If that is the way time will treat us, then time is best erased. I will end it myself." Okay, he's angrier than I thought he'd be, and instead of just destroying humans, he's trying to end time itself. Little crazier than I gave him credit for. Like, dude, you could just win and let time go on merrily for you gods. ... Buuut I guess if his light is fading over time, I get it. Makes sense for the "keeper" of a universal principle to try to strike a universal principle.

"It was not I who killed Heidr." Ohhh you punk. You truth-twisting little manipulator. ... Aaaaand Seidr was apparently completely brought in my that statement immediately. Okay, Seidr.

"Destroy the world and kill the mortals!" Okay, is that your goal after all or to destroy time itself? Clearly define your goals or you won't achieve anything, Njordr.

"I am here to end you as well." OH DANG WHAT? Okay, what's propelling this? Seidr's wish, huh? Maybe her being in proximity to Gullveig is "bleeding" her desires into Gullveig? It would explain all the hesitation, too. But is Gullveig confused about what she wants: Seidr's desires and Njordr's mixing together within her? Or maybe time itself has overtaken her mind (but not her sense of self, exactly) and is using her to deteriorate everything? Time eventually destroys all, after all, and Njordr picked a fight with it.

I need more data before I can properly theorize any more, but if she was just Njordr's killing machine, she would have just obeyed him. If she was subject to her own will, she wouldn't hurt Kiran (at least) or the world. Something bigger is compelling her, and time itself is the only component I can think of that could maybe do that that's been introduced into the story (unless is was Nerpuz all along.) But could that ditz really be such a mastermind that she manipulated her brother into being the evil behind the evil, but hiding the true evil? And why would she want to destroy the humans if she loves the creatures of the land so much?

There's still a lot we don't know. I'll just enter "wait and see" mode from here. I don't have enough info to go on right now.

[Xenomata]

Well, that's one pureed goldfish.

Can't help but feel not a whole lot happened this chapter. The old man's motives are revealed and shown to be pretty selfish, only for Gullveig to go and kill him off first. She then has a small recollection of her Seidr life...

And we still have three chapters to go. If any deus ex machinas wanna show their face, nows about the time to do so and I have doubts Gullveig is gonna be the one to end things willingly...

[Mercakete]

52 minutes ago, Xenomata said:

Well, that's one pureed goldfish.

There's something satisfying about your little goldfish arc you made here. Especially amusing since he's the god of the sea.

Quote

If any deus ex machinas wanna show their face, nows about the time

It's been fairly well hinted at that we'll get Nerpuz's power imbued into Briedablik in order to nullify the snakes, but nothing is certain yet.

Quote

I have doubts Gullveig is gonna be the one to end things willingly...

This is somewhat up to interpretation. We may yet get Seidr to reject becoming Gullveig and then, with the Nerpuz-Briedablik powerup, Seidr ultimately defeats her. It'd be really in line with the midpoint trailer, too, actually. We just need to give Seidr a friendship/hope speech or something, since the enemy is either time itself, or just nihilism, and since she was once full of hope, she could be again. Alternatively, we convince Gullveig to not cycle through anymore by the power of love, hope, and friendship, and thus the cycles naturally stop and Gullveig either is on our side now or disappears. Either way, we'll need to find a way to destroy the serpents, but like I said, that's probably just what Nerpuz is there for (if her power is the snakes' opposite) UNLESS she's actually the big bad and we need to go back in time and convince Njordr to give us his power to counteract his sister's. After all, Gullveig's power dries everything up (sounds land-ish, not water-ish) and is very sand-like. Serpents can live in the sea or on land, so really they could be from either goat. Could be her doing.
 

Edit: WAIT that can't be right. Nope; Nerpuz can't have been the force behind the snakes. I'm stupid --  we already know that Njordr "created" Gullveig and that the snakes came from his power, in addition to the time travel power. Nevermind about the "maybe Nerpuz made the snakes" theory. It was DOA.

Edited August 16, 2023 by Mercakete

[Xenomata]

12 hours ago, Mercakete said:

It's been fairly well hinted at that we'll get Nerpuz's power imbued into Briedablik in order to nullify the snakes, but nothing is certain yet.

Gonna be honest. I completely forgot about her.

12 hours ago, Mercakete said:

This is somewhat up to interpretation. We may yet get Seidr to reject becoming Gullveig and then, with the Nerpuz-Briedablik powerup, Seidr ultimately defeats her. It'd be really in line with the midpoint trailer, too, actually. We just need to give Seidr a friendship/hope speech or something, since the enemy is either time itself, or just nihilism, and since she was once full of hope, she could be again. Alternatively, we convince Gullveig to not cycle through anymore by the power of love, hope, and friendship, and thus the cycles naturally stop and Gullveig either is on our side now or disappears. Either way, we'll need to find a way to destroy the serpents, but like I said, that's probably just what Nerpuz is there for (if her power is the snakes' opposite) UNLESS she's actually the big bad and we need to go back in time and convince Njordr to give us his power to counteract his sister's. After all, Gullveig's power dries everything up (sounds land-ish, not water-ish) and is very sand-like. Serpents can live in the sea or on land, so really they could be from either goat. Could be her doing.

I honestly don't see Gullveig changing her tune much.
Even though she ends this chapter on the note of reflection that she once had the hope Seidr has/had, she seems pretty deadset on the inevitability of Gullveig regardless, as in she's simply doing what she was made to do and there is no other path. Not necessarily locked into their evil beliefs like Surtr or Hel, and not exactly trapped in an endless cycle of evil by an outside source ala Veronica/Bruno and eventually Fafnir, just someone so utterly jaded she's doing what's asked of her by "fate" because there isn't anything else for her otherwise.

I don't see Njordr being cooperative either, or the heroes being cooperative with someone they know has a low opinion of them as-is... so yeah, probably Nerbuz saves the day with Nerbuz power. Or Kvasir does something drastic, which itself would require her to pull a heel-face turn in the next 2 chapters or be killed by the end of the final chapter.

Edited August 16, 2023 by Xenomata

[Etrurian emperor]

7 hours ago, Xenomata said:

Can't help but feel not a whole lot happened this chapter.

I think that's the running theme of this book actually. A lot of events have the crew just going to places without much happening. Rather than having actual events happen the story seemed more concerned dropping clues to Gullveig's identity. I think that made the events of the book seem more boring since they made us wonder about Gullveig without giving us reasons to care. Before this chapter all Gullveig was, was just one of the many evil entities trying to take over/destroy Askr after all.

In that sense I think this chapter has the benefit of finally giving some context to the story.

Also uh....whatever happened to Veronica? Chapter 1 had Gullveig attack but not kill her, so you'd think Veronica would come help out Alfonse and co at some point.

[Lemmy]

I'm beginning to think that the snakes might not be important, that Gullveig wants to restart the cycle again to experience the happy, blissfully unaware part of it with her sister, and if her losing restarts the cycle, then everything is going great.

Kvasir is the last remaining piece of the puzzle, we never see how the loop restarts or her becoming Seithr, and other than loneliness, we don't get a motivation, but she's fully aware of this 

"That is when Gullveig will unwind the time bound up in her flesh and be drawn renewed into the world. She will become me, Kvasir, and the cycle will continue. On and on. An inescapable, never-ending loop. This is...the Golden Seer's curse."

I'm also growing suspicious of the 2nd glowing summoner weapon in chapter 2, there's a good chance we will use the same in chapter 1

[Tybrosion]

On 7/18/2023 at 11:39 AM, Tybrosion said:

Yeah, like Dr. Eggman in a lot of Sonic the Hedgehog games starting with Adventure. Spoilers, it usually never works out like Eggman hoped.

Well gee, would you look at that? Perfect Chaos (Gullveig) did indeed blow up Eggman (Njordr) and his second Egg Carrier. If only Njordr had the single brain cell needed to see this outcome coming.

Oh well, it’s off to Male OC Purgatory to join your brethren Grodus. Oops, that’s the wrong Intelligent Systems game with this plot setup.

[Seafarer]

I... am now confused about everyone's motivations here. What does Gullveig want?

She's not Njörðr's mindless tool, though that much was obvious the whole time. She wins - destroys the world - then... decides to un-win by going back into the timestream as Kvasir? Why?

Is she destroying alternate worlds each time? Like, every time an Askr gets past Hel, she pops in in time to manipulate that Askr down this timeline? She seems to be able to exist outside of time, after all, unless I've misunderstood something about her domain. But, one way or another, the whole thing is only a loop for her, and only because she chooses it to be. So what does she want? What's important enough to go back and risk losing this time every time she wins?

...and how are we going to fix her? Obviously, our Seiðr is going to be cured by goat auntie ex machina, but is that enough to write Gullveig out of our timeline? What's going to happen in Chapter 1? Still kill Njörðr? Kill Kvasir? Something else? And why did no previous iteration of Askr figure out what we're going to do (beyond narrative causality, obviously)? What's different this time that Gullveig has missed? I'm so lost...

[Tybrosion]

10 hours ago, Seafarer said:

I... am now confused about everyone's motivations here. What does Gullveig want?

She's not Njörðr's mindless tool, though that much was obvious the whole time. She wins - destroys the world - then... decides to un-win by going back into the timestream as Kvasir? Why?

I think the intent here is that Gullveig thinks that she has to continue the cycle. All the hope she had as Seidr is just gone now and Gullveig has resigned herself as being the Golden Seer who is meant to destroy everything.

At least, that’s the impression I got after looking through CYL Gullveig’s lines: https://feheroes.fandom.com/wiki/Gullveig:_Seer_Beyond_Time/Quotes?so=search

[Mercakete]

On 8/16/2023 at 9:38 AM, Etrurian emperor said:

Also uh....whatever happened to Veronica? Chapter 1 had Gullveig attack but not kill her, so you'd think Veronica would come help out Alfonse and co at some point.

Pretty sure the point of her showing up was to say the following:

1. Gullveig is after the whole world, not just Askr.

2. Gullveig is nihilistic and sad.

3. Embla and Askr are on good terms now, and Embla would have helped Askr, but here's why they didn't: they kind of already tried but couldn't beat Gullveig.

4. There's a strong sense of "everything in its time" establishing Gullveig as more or less the incarnation of rapid entropy.

So, what happened to Veronica? She was a minor point to explain why Embla didn't get involved despite the end of Book 6 putting Askr and Embla on good terms. She was not killed. She was not kidnapped. She was just a proxy in order to get more info out about Gullveig and a "here's why you don't see the other countries getting involved. The scope really is that big, but they're not main players in this story at all." Askr stands alone, and that scene was meant to establish that. It seems that, for most players, the goal backfired, but yeah. Otherwise I'd expect to see more Emblian involvement by now.

Still, that's just with the info I have. IS has thrown logical buildup totally out of the window before.

On 8/16/2023 at 9:41 AM, Lemmy said:

I'm beginning to think that the snakes might not be important, that Gullveig wants to restart the cycle again to experience the happy, blissfully unaware part of it with her sister, and if her losing restarts the cycle, then everything is going great.

Kvasir is the last remaining piece of the puzzle, we never see how the loop restarts or her becoming Seithr, and other than loneliness, we don't get a motivation, but she's fully aware of this 

"That is when Gullveig will unwind the time bound up in her flesh and be drawn renewed into the world. She will become me, Kvasir, and the cycle will continue. On and on. An inescapable, never-ending loop. This is...the Golden Seer's curse."

I'm also growing suspicious of the 2nd glowing summoner weapon in chapter 2, there's a good chance we will use the same in chapter 1

A couple points here.

The snakes are important because they don't let Gullveig die (inplying that she's tried to die before and explaining that it was never Gullveig herself who rewound her wounds, but rather the snakes who didn't want their host to die. So, this means that for some reason, they really want Gullveig specifically, since they DID let Heidr die. That, or the curse can only fully go into deities and not into mortals, which would just mean that there was no suitable host available when said mortals killed Gullveig at various points in the story, only for the damage to rewind.)

We actually did see the loop restart. The world was destroyed leaving only Gullveig right after she killed Kiran. She yoinked a piece of Kiran's (now disembodied) soul and made Heidr, infected her with the serpent curse, told her to grow up as Seidr's sister, and threw her into the past. (Heidr was quite beguiled.) Then, she went further back in time than Heidr did, becoming Kvasir again.

[DefyingFates]

Brave Gullveig's FB story and voice lines clarify much of her past. Building off of @Mercakete's observations:

Spoiler

Basically, she's in an infinite loop of Kvasir -> Seidr -> Gullveig -> Kvasir, and the result has left her a nihilist who's just going through the motions, though Brave Gullveig in particular

Spoiler

broke out of that loop by being summoned and actually feels something for the first time in (literally) forever as a result

.

tl:dr: She doesn't need to destroy the world, she desperately needs a therapist and a friend.

As someone who went into this book not expecting much, I'm surprised by how much Brave Gullveig has made me care about the character. But now that we have this Gullveig fleshing out her past, I'm really curious what the actual Mythic Gullveig's dialogue will say come November.

[Lemmy]

13 hours ago, Mercakete said:

The snakes are important because they don't let Gullveig die (inplying that she's tried to die before and explaining that it was never Gullveig herself who rewound her wounds, but rather the snakes who didn't want their host to die. So, this means that for some reason, they really want Gullveig specifically, since they DID let Heidr die. That, or the curse can only fully go into deities and not into mortals, which would just mean that there was no suitable host available when said mortals killed Gullveig at various points in the story, only for the damage to rewind.)

We actually did see the loop restart. The world was destroyed leaving only Gullveig right after she killed Kiran. She yoinked a piece of Kiran's (now disembodied) soul and made Heidr, infected her with the serpent curse, told her to grow up as Seidr's sister, and threw her into the past. (Heidr was quite beguiled.) Then, she went further back in time than Heidr did, becoming Kvasir again.

By snakes I meant the snaked face minions and perhaps even everything is a snake chapter 13, I'm now convinced that it's a means to an end and not an end goal, is there any greater hope than knowing everyone will be seen again, but it's mixed with the bitter despair that they will also die and suffer again, you can change that, but doing so may derail their eventual revival

I'm not convinced Heithr is or becomes Kvasir directly, Kvasir knows too much; although I question if the curse itself can be from the golden powder alone, or is Gullveig from a circle or kills, although most chapters do have golden power everywhere, and a lot more than these 3 cursed.

[vikingsfan92]

Could easily see Ascended Seior becoming a unit in the future after this chapter. Kind of like Fjorm and Laegjarn.

[Seafarer]

Well, that answers all my concerns. Gullveig goes back after she's "won" because her - or rather the curse's - end goal is increasing its own power forever, and we can break the loop because Gullveig didn't expect Nerþuz's plan to work on account of having seen it fail untold times before.

I now want to know why we need to kill Kvasir, who isn't all-powerful and probably can't force the timeline back onto the Gullveig path on her own, but this is overall a much more satisfying ending than I was expecting.

[Lemmy]

I suspect that Nerpuz plan will fail, it failed infinity times, Kvasir herself handed us the weapon, and killing Gullveig should reinfect Seithr

but I think we'll win through talking somehow, I guess talking to Kvasir would be enough, I doubt we'll kill her

[Mercakete]

It's a lot later than usual for me, but it's finally time for my impressions! Here we go!

"I warned you against returning the Ar to Njordr" wait- when? You seemed perfectly amicable about it to me, Nerpuz!

"Let's take a visit to Njordr's treasure vault. With his death, the seal should be broken." How convenient. Also, wow, you sure seem to not care at all that your brother just died. Dang, it's unsettling how cheery she is. Not even bothered at all.

Aaaaand she has an "Aurr." So, an Ar, but with a bit of uwu thrown in? Ah. And he took it from her, so instead of taking it back, she took his Ar. Wow. This just sounds petty... Annnnd yeah, so... She excuses it by saying they've "feuded since birth." Uh, grow up? ... And she, again, doesn't care that he's dead. Just finds it convenient so she can get her Aurr back. ... Dang, she's terrible.

"The curse of the gold serpent is the source of it all. That is where we must strike." No dur.

Also, all the talk of "killing Seidr wouldn't stop Gullveig since Gullveig is here too" is also in alignment with what I said in regards to paradoxes and why they don't apply here.

Okay, onto part 2. (Goat Aunt is one of 3 things, by the way. Either the McGuffin's guardian (a la her Aurr being able to defeat/cancel out Njordr's Ar, which granted time travel abilities), another terrible foe, or IS just trying to give a "comforting" good-guy character (and accidentally making her heartless. Like, Njordr's still her brother - come on. Have some mixed feelings here.) That said, she could be some combination of these, too.)

And yeah, the summoner is the only one who can save everything again. At least it's in line with the lore, I guess?

"It is the weapon of some other summoner from some other time - a now-dead [player name]." Well, isn't that grim?

Yeah, okay, so it's just "we keep applying the same blessing to the McGuffin as the bad power has." *sigh* This feels kind of obvious at this point.

Anyway, yeah, it comes back to "power overcoming power" again. Yup. Hmm I feel like I might be being a bit jaded (if I'm using that word right; I'll need to look it up to confirm what I think it means)? Still, yeah, it works (except for why Briedablik followed Kvasir into the past or why she took it with her. Either one.) Guess it can just be summed up as "legendary weapon" or whatever. Briedablik is the real hero of FEH.

Time to read other people's thoughts!

Edit: Regarding the concern of "our" Seidr getting reinfected, I think that was addressed by Nepuz saying that her power was "now inside" of Seidr. Basically, she got immunized. Hence, she's the only one who can kill Kvasir and Gullveig -- because the curse won't transfer to her anymore.

Edited September 19, 2023 by Mercakete