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phainon the fool; anaxa the magician: potential manifested

i’ve had this on the brain for at least 3 months now but i’ve been thinking about phainon and anaxa and tarot, how it mirrors their influences on each other and their own relationship and journey in the amphoreus story. similarly, you could tie the heirs to tarot quite easily, (mydei to strength, cas to death, tribbios to the high priestess etc etc) but primarily i want to talk about anaxa and phainon.

anaxa in his as i’ve written has been referred to as the hanged man very clearly. but the other thing i feel like a lot of people overlook is his role as the magician, the first of the major arcana.

phainon with his title as the chrysos heir of worldbearing and his role in delivering the new world is a clear reference to the world, but the world is simply the culmination of the fool’s journey. more under the cut bc i yapped too much.

let's start with anaxa.

first, his e1 is literally magician, isolated by stars. his other epithet, the great performer also traditionally evokes the image of a magician (or used to anyway) because prior to film being a thing, most people considered magicians to be the ultimate performers. cyrene refers to his card, the scholar by a number of titles, including the grand magician. if you also think about what used to be considered magic, alchemy was certainly one of those things. and what else is anaxa? an alchemist. the magician embodies all of these things in the imagery as well. the wands, cups, pentacles/coins, swords to represent the elements (fire, water, earth, and air, the basic elements required for alchemy) and the suits of the arcana, the infinity symbol (amphoreus), the position of his arms to say ‘as above so below’. the concept of ‘as above so below is’ is also incredibly fascinating because it ties into anaxagoras’ (the philosopher) thought and hsr anaxa echoes: everything is in everything; that we are formed of seeds (atoms) that then take the shape of what we are. on the flip side of it, it is also a declaration of anaxa’s ultimate discovery that the chrysos heirs become titans, that they take on divinity in full.

the magician represents potential, or as i like to interpret it in my own readings, possibilities. being the first major arcana means it marks the beginning of the fool's journey. all of the elements in the imagery, and the magician is the one to distill them and then bring them together. the magician is about separating all the elements and bringing them together to manifest potential. the other interesting aspect of the magician is that the magician brings together the divine and the earthly, which is again referencing something anaxa does in his own many experimentations with his own blood, with cerces, with kephale. and ultimately, anaxa manifests this potential in himself⁠—the latent potential to become a titan. he of all the chrysos heirs is the first to achieve divinity in full⁠—like the titans, he loses his life once he forfeits the coreflame.

the next one that everyone saw and said immediately when his as i’ve written came out was hanged man. which is so terribly anaxa in many many ways, but one of the things to remember about the hanged man is that he chooses to be there to gain new perspective. like odin who hung on yggdrasil for nine days and nine nights, sacrificed his eye for wisdom, the hanged man is there because he wishes to be. from there, he views everything differently from everyone else. anaxa who had a different view from everyone else, being called heretical and blasphemous for holding them and wanting to test his own hypotheses.

the other fun tidbit is that in aristophanes’ the clouds, socrates is depicted as hanging from a basket. there's a whole other tangent one could go into about socrates here in relation to anaxa, but suffice to say there's a number of parallels between socrates’ teachings and how anaxa appears to teach. let us not also forget that socrates was forced to suicide for his impiety (the refusal to worship the gods, same as philosopher anaxagoras) and for corrupting the youth.

subtly but also because the trailblazer is also this, the star. anaxa has been compared to the stars many times, his design elements referencing an eclipse, the stars (both in shape and the void in his chest), but also in juxtaposition with phainon’s sun and cyrene’s moon. and the star is one of the kindest cards in the tarot deck always, gently shining and offering hope, reminding you that within you there is everything you need to keep going.

with regard to phainon, the cards that would describe him best are the fool and the world. the fool and and world sit in tarot as the beginning and the end of the journey through the major arcana, two sides of the same coin, where one ends another begins, and we see this in flame reaver passing on all his memories and his will to phainon at the end of a cycle.

the fool is naive when he sets out upon this journey and traditional depictions normally have him walking toward a cliff. but he also sits outside the major arcana in a very strange way, a part and not. phainon, or khaslana, who sits within the cycles and without. he is at the start and he perpetuates the cycles, but by breaking the proverbial fourth wall and understanding that this is simply a simulation that has run over and over again, he sits outside of it, knowing the truth and trying to prevent the ending. but each cycle he starts anew without the knowledge, pushing forward into a fate he has stumbled upon. also if you’re into cards, you know the fool is also the only other card that makes it into the regular playing card deck as the joker. the joker that can be a stand in for any card, or can be a trump card.

the world is the card of completion. similarly the prophecy makes demands of phainon to bear the world and bring about era nova, thus completing the cycle so a new one can begin. imagery in the rider waite decks also feature infinity symbols (yay more amphoreus references), and a wreath (guess what phainon has ten of!) that is sometimes depicted as an ouroboros. there’s also representation of the four elements in the card, but also if you’ve been paying close attention, the wand held by the magician at the very start of the fool’s journey. if you want a jojo reference as well, ZA WARUDO is a time stop, and that’s what khaslana does. he holds the entirety of amphoreus in a loop, holding it in this slice of time so that irontomb doesn’t awaken. reversed, the world is a hollow victory, a partial success. one could argue all the cycles so far have been exactly that. a victory burned hollow by all the losses that he has to endure.

phainon is very obviously the fool (or we could argue tb is) but also with the title deliverer, the titan of worldbearing, can also be the world. the fool sets off on his journey to learn and understand the world, self-actualise and realise. upon completion, he understands his place in the world. he has gone from a fool that knew nothing to someone who has accomplished a harrowing journey, who learned resilience on fortitude, who gained knowledge and strength, learned to temper himself.

the next question then is what the role of the magician and the hanged man are on the fool’s journey? what role does the star play?

the magician is the first of the major arcana and also the first person the fool meets on his journey. the magician sets the tone for the journey by opening the fool’s eyes to the potential held by the universe and the potential within him, encouraging him to manifest it. anaxa does this for phainon as his teacher, and the (minimum of five!) years phainon spends at the grove go on to shape him and how he views the world. anaxa as a teacher is very much about teaching to think, to question, not to accept things as truth without determining it for yourself. it’s a principle anaxa applies to himself. he questions the unquestionable to draw his own conclusions, and it’s something he encourages in phainon and castorice.

the hanged man sits just after the halfway point at the 12th spot, inviting the fool to have a different perspective on things. another aspect of the hanged man that hasn’t been mentioned yet is stagnation. the hanged man is certainly there by choice, but he is also unmoving. the hanged man in a reading invites you to flip your perspective, but it is also a reminder you need to let go. it is a reminder that you have stood here long enough, that it is time to let go. letting go means falling, and falling means giving up control and bracing yourself for the hurt to come. death follows the hanged man, and death invites transformation and change. the literal depiction of this is when anaxa submits his coreflame at the vortex of genesis, where indirectly, he tells phainon to let go of him just as he himself is letting go. he has hung long enough that he has gained the clarity he needs, and finally anaxa is ready to let go and embrace death. in doing so, he imparts a final lesson to phainon as well.

and the star is hope. hope that comes after the destruction that comes from death and the tower. the reminder that despite all this, you can continue. you know what else is hope? the colour green. what is green? anaxagoras. therefore, in this essay, i will point out all the ways that anaxa is hope to phaino⁠— (no i’m sorry that's a whole other essay) but the point stands. when phainon is at his lowest in his trailer, who is it that comes to him? anaxa. who is it that reminds him that he is his own person and can choose his fate? anaxa. who is it that tells him to believe in himself and have confidence in his choices? anaxa. i would be remiss not to mention the cycle where phainon missed anaxa so much he was imagining anaxa with him at the end when we discuss anaxa as a guiding star. after all, anaxa is reason, but where he fails to reason with phainon/flame reaver, he then becomes phainon’s reason.

anaxa is so vastly important to phainon. when he is lost and in need of direction, he goes to anaxa. from the moment phainon knows anaxa is in okhema he goes to seek his advice, before going on to the debate at the citizen's assembly where he asks anaxa if this is the right choice at all, the trailer where anaxa asks him what his dream is—anaxa has always been the one to focus his thoughts. anaxa is reason, rationalising and questioning, challenging all the established viewpoints that phainon holds.

anaxa’s message in the chrysos interview to phainon also deeply reflects the message of the magician. the magician is about the infinite possibilities of the universe, and that is what anaxa brought out in phainon. he constantly reminds phainon he has other choices and other options, that he does not have to walk the path of prophecy. that he has a choice besides carrying the world and its many burdens, that he can decide for himself. he is the only one who doesn’t refer to phainon as deliverer. but sees phainon for phainon. just another person. not a chrysos heir, not a hero. one of his students but also human and flawed in his flawlessness.

anaxa literally tells phainon to flip his perspective (very hanged man) prior to the citizen's assembly when phainon asks if aglaea was right to entrust this to him. i think anaxa’s words are something he carries for a long time, because it then becomes less about how heavy those hopes and wishes he carries are, if he should be entrusted with them at all, and more about his own determination to take those into the tomorrow their prophecy promises. when he finally vocalises his wish, it is then ‘my wish is to fulfil the wishes of others, and failing that, i will carry them to tomorrow’. it is no longer about his worthiness, it is his promise to anaxa that he will remember and carry it forward.

and finally, hope. anaxa gives phainon the confidence to step out on his own. his message to phainon ultimately is go forward in confidence. he has taught phainon all he knows despite knowing it means phainon will walk away from him and onto a completely separate path. he says as much when added to a team with phainon, even as phainon still seeks anaxa’s guidance.

another fun thing to note is that phainon has gone through all the steps in an alchemical magnum opus. nigredo (flame reaver), albedo (phainon), citrinitas (khaslana), and irontomb has been depicted in red, thus giving us rubedo once the supposed merge with irontomb happens. i would argue that anaxa has been key in all of these stages. he names the flame reaver, he teaches phainon, and ultimately his words guide khaslana’s actions. anaxa is an alchemist and a teacher, what is his magnum opus if not his students, who he has taught and shaped?

i leave you with a final thought: what is the sun but a star? what is phainon but a seed anaxa has planted, sprouted, and nurtured? anaxa keeps haunting the narrative of amphoreus and even though he's been dead for two patches now, we’ve not gone without mentioning him and he still has a role to play. ship goggles aside, his influence on phainon, in guiding and shaping phainon is undeniable. this is not to diminish the influence the other chyrsos heirs have had on phainon, but anaxa, the grand magician, the great performer, demised scholar, allowed phainon to manifest his potential.

anyways, thank you for coming to my ted talk where i yapped about anaxa the magician and the hanged man and his influence on phainon the fool and how he’s led to his journey’s completion.

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