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what do you think of the "Heathcliff is Iori's son" theory?

Ok so I have two things to say about this theory, the first is that I don't agree with it (as in see it as plausible) and I don't think it really adds anything to the story other than tying back into a previous game.

1. Timeline

Ignore for a moment what is either a timeline mistake (one of a few in Ruina's artbook) or implications that have their own place to be unpacked with the fact that Iori, is 52.

Heathcliff is very unlikely to be 40 years old (42 at least if timeline were to match up, Limbus taking place 2 years or so after the ending of Ruina if memory serves)

I shall grant that there is no definite timeline of when Heathcliff was found/left the Heights. however it is important to note that our Heathcliff takes the role of Hareton Earnshaw (and the Erlking Heathcliff more the role of Heathcliff Heathcliff), who is of the second generation in Wuthering Heights' characters, and thus ends the novel in his early 20's. (Note about Heathcliff taking role of Hareton, abused and despised by Heathcliff Heathcliff for taking after/being similar to Hindley (Hareton's father), who is raised in the same manner as Heathcliff Heathcliff to be illiterate and short tempered but who genuinely wishes to change for the better, and who marries Catherine Linton (Daughter of Catherine the first)).

On the topic of Erlking's age for those who would point to it as Heathcliff being older than Hareton and closer to Heathcliff Heathcliff's age: We know that different mirror worlds may take place at different points in a person or characters lifetime (eg. Molar office IDs take place in different points of the same character's story, or the children of Cathy and Heathcliff standing on the Hill at c6's climax), and we also know that Erlking Heathcliff has been hunting Heathcliffs for at least a little while, which necessitates that he is older than our Heathcliff as he started after Cathy's funeral, meaning that Erlking's being the role of Heathcliff Heathcliff does not mean that ours must match his is age as well.

1.2 Heathcliff is not dead dead

If Iori's sole purpose in continuing to live is to reunite with her lost son, to the point that she has been laying plans and domino effects for at least the past (at time of Ruina, ~39, at time of Limbus current, ~41) years (Oldest event we know of in the timeline which plays into this plan is the training of Argalia and Angelica, which takes place somewhere in the past 39 years as by Argalia's age (39) but while they are still children)

(Iori's keypage line discussing how seeing her son is quote "all she wants")

(Dialogue as by Iori and Argalia confirming that her helping of Argalia and Angelica as children was for this purpose in Ruina)

Note also that dialogue within Ruina suggests that Iori trained Kali as well, however a timeline is not given for when in her life this exactly was, however if we assume that it is what allowed her to become a fixer to begin with (eg. child), alongside the fact that Kali has been dead for at least 10 years (Length of Lob Corp) + Indeterminate length of the First Smoke War, and the artbook lists her age (pre-Head intervention) as 30, means that the timeline checks out for roughly 40 years of planning once again (assuming that this is the same intention which we can due to Kali's association with the Light factoring into her plan).

Note as well that while Iori's abilities are not well defined with their limitations, functions, mechanisms, effects, extent, really all we know is what she spake in her book and

really this tells us very little other than there are in fact limitations and that she travels to parallell timelines/spaces, and that while potentially possible she is not willing to grandfather/bootstrap paradox herself with the timeline effects of this power.

We can assume that this is the reason such that she cannot un-lose her son, however we know that there are multitude, potentially and implied to be literally infinite versions of Heathcliff in the different possibilites (implied by A) the nature of Mirror Worlds B) The manner she describes in the first of the three images above). That and the fact that Iori has seen events including the events of Ruina multiple times as by the in combat dialogue lines towards especially Binah:

(I'm going to run out of images at this rate so time to start quoting)

Well… It’s no surprise that you’re here. I’ve seen you a few times before, so…

When entering floor of Philosophy

thought things would be different this time.

When killed by Binah

This too implies that there is something which stops her from being able to, in the past 40+ Years (we can make the assumption that her age is weird because of time travel BS and make the argument that she's potentially lived much longer than such as we don't know if she has an anchor point at a specific time to return to or if she may choose) which prevents her from redoing the events that caused her son's death in the same roguelike-manner as she does with the Library.

If that were the case, why not appear in Canto 6, or go to Wuthering Heights in the past 20 years, or fulfil the Library. If so, why does Heathcliff live on, why does he have infinite versions of himself that are too living, unlike Iori's son wherein the Book of Iori she states:

there’s always a price you need to pay, and there is a world I yearn to reach, no matter that price. I’m doing this so I can find the world where I can see that possibility.

with specific mention of *A* world where she may reach her goal of reuniting with her son. If Heathcliff is in every world, or at least infinite worlds, why does it Iori's son only exist in the single one. Or if we are to assume that her powers are distinct and isolated from Mirror Worlds, the two points from before remain, there is a living Heathcliff in this continuity, he's very clearly not dead.

2. Heathcliff's eyes.

Yes they are purple, yes that is Iori's colour, yes Iori has purple eyes and there are certain card arts which draw attention to their similarity to Snake eyes.

However, we can't just consider this in a vacuum. The other sinner(s) which have had plot relevant to their eyes have had specific attention drawn towards them over time. Don's Shi ID is more Sancho in personality and has red reflection in her uptie art. This connection to bloodfiends was also foreshadowed in other points reinforcing the same idea that her eyes would.

Every Hong Lu ID has the Jade eye barring Lord, drawing attention back to it as central to his story/plot/character. In addition, there is a S1 EGO that draws more attention to it being Roesate Desire, which for all other appearances colours the eyes pink, but does not effect his Jade Eye (note that we know from Gregor that EGO can effect at least bio-prosthesis and from Ryoshuu that it can change the colour of eyes with implants, one could also consider this the case for Yearning Mircalla Don Quixote).

Rysohuu has 3 different references to the E.G.O Red Eyes and her eyes actively glow in several different sprites.

Meursault, who is not specifically eyes but rather perception and surrounding concepts, has a large eye and several smaller ones present in his base EGO. Additionally he has the Pursuance EGO which carries eye-symbolism due to Gnosticism and biblical angels however his corrosion in contrast to Rodion's lacks the selfsame eye-wings.

While Heathcliff does indeed carry some recurrent themes surrounding his eye(s), its not their being purple but rather the fact that he almost always has an eye covered in EGO. (Base AEDD, Base Telepole, Base My Form Empties, Corrosion My form Empties, Base Move-in-Reg, Base Fell Bullet, Base Asymmetrical Inertia, Heathcliff of the Wild Hunt ID). This is almost certainly a reference to Odin's sacrifice of an eye, Odin being historically one of the leaders of the Wild Hunt.

Outliers to this are: AEDD Corrosion (Gives him more eyes however the left half of his face still remains covered). Asymmetrical Inertia Corrosion (Only has one eye, non humanoid face/form) Move-In-Reg Corrosion (Visor covers face but has one large glowing eye so could be still considered towards the trend) Binds Awakening/Corrosion (Both eyes covered). Fell bullet Corrosion (non humanoid) Telepole Corrosion (Heathcliff's eyes in this EGO, as is the case with all Telepole corrosion sprite/animations, are both not visible, but also have nothing visible to cover them, meaning this is either 2 eyes or is no eyes). Holiday: Festive Bodysack.

While it is true that his eyes resemble the same snake-eye slit fashion as Iori's, and they are (albeit a different shade) purple, this isn't a concrete link between the two of them especially considering the other aspects mentioned.

This too is conjecture on my part but I feel as if there would have been more attention drawn to his eyes or other serpentine aspects of his person/character, and/or that they would have given him a Snake Adept Heishou as more foreshadowing, or potentially for Hindley to compare him to a snake "trying to trick the Will out from under him" or something of the sort.

3. The Wild Hunt

Ok so we're all familiar with the fact that Heathcliff can just do that by now. The fact of the matter is that it is not what a lot of people portray him as being able to do.

Heathcliff being able to "just do that" is in reference to summoning the Wild Hunt, his innate necromany talent, at least is the more reasonable assumption in my eyes. Him being keenly aware of the nature of Mirror Worlds, with Erlking's realisation of "every heathcliff", the fact that he (as of Thumb ID, retroactively applies to 7 association ID as well; "Gut Feeling") is implied to have some level of innate knowledge or attunement to the flow like Kim Lib or Matthew, as well as the fact that his canto was the first to break the fourth wall very directly (arguably Ishmael beat him to it with the use of targeting), and the fact that he is the only sinner to at all interact with the barbed wire of the base EGO:

could for certain mean that he has some inherited manner of awareness of potentiality, which too links into the themes that Hohenheim discusses, however this does not innately mean that Heathcliff's aptitude for this is the same as or linked to Iori's.

I think that, as with the earlier discussed relations to Odin and his role in the Wild Hunt, the innate ability that Heathcliff holds over necromancy and death is linking back to this same idea of Valhalla or the souls of fallen warriors, and/or the fact that in some tellings of the Mythological Wild Hunt have wayward souls/spirits/specters of the sleeping and fallen join the hunt and/or be abducted to the underworld in some fashion.

This makes sense considering the linking that Norse Myth has to family in Project Moon insofar, with Laevatinn being owned by (formerly) The Middle and of course the phrase "What's a little sacrifice for the family", and the spear of Odin (Vespa's spear is named Gungnir) being used to fight against it, as well as the Eye of Odin being used by Valencina, who heathcliff directly fights in his section of the House of Spiders.

(One could potentially argue for Heathcliff's role too being that of Thor due to his connection to lightning with the Heights however that doesn't help connect to Iori unless one would assume that she is the World Serpent in which case they kill each other?)

We also know that... Erlking can't just hop between worlds like people seem to say. If we look back to Canto 6, he like any other ID needs to be taken on by a host or the dough of humanity in order to truly manifest into our world, such is how he comes back for more in act 3, and such draws a clear line between awareness of mirror worlds as the ability to travel between them. (again, if Heathcliff is present in mirror worlds as well that means that Iori's 40 year long search is for essentially nothing)

4. What would the impact of this connection be?

This is largely my second thought towards this theory. What active purpose or narrative role does this fulfil other than an extra callback to the story of previous games (+Leviathan I guess).

Heathcliff's narrative arc is not actively ruined by the revelation of "You're actually the son of a colour fixer and have a loving parent who has been searching for you the past 40 years"... at least not inherently harmed if done well, but at the same time it doesn't serve to build on the themes of c6.

Wuthering Heights and by extension c6 are about largely speaking the cycles of abuse that self perpetuate, the suffering that comes with myopia and stagnancy in life or thought, the consumption (Tuberculosis), the consumption of that which surrounds you in suffering, the futility of revenge, and the ability to let go.

I do genuinely try to steelman theories and analyses when possible because I think its the best practise for not only a community but also for retaining an open mind, but at the same time I cannot in good faith see any connection between the themes that Iori being his birth mother would add and the ones I listed afore.

If anything Iori is clinging onto something unchanging and stagnant, and too is dragging everything to the depths with her to achieve this, but if we grant her the satisfaction of Heathcliff being the wayward son, she is, if not redeemed, correct about her methods. The finale of c6 is about the Erlking's myopia, the fact that his desire for revenge and his methods were flawed not only in concept but in their fundamental basis. There was a happy ending.

Wuthering Heights has in part the same (but less explicit) realisation of futility and escape from the generation nature of harm.

While one could draw connection between our Heathcliff's search for Catherine post erasure and Iori's search for her lost son, this is not a genetic attribute to hold onto the past for the sake of someone else. At best I would consider this a narrative parallel which is served better if they are unrelated instances.

For example, imagine much later into the game's story, where Iori finds Heathcliff and realises their connection. Iori trains him, potentially helps him to unlock his innate abilities to a more true potential and in this same period, he loses an eye. He sacrifices his eye for wisdom and power just like Odin, and just like Odin he does it in an attempt to save both himself and others from their fate.

Potentially Iori is the world serpent in this scenario, taking sides with the N corp League of Literatures, forcing the collapse of mirror worlds into one true world where her son is still alive; One where Catherine is forever unreachable. This serves the narrative far more than Iori simply being his mother at least in my eyes, or perhaps even you could incorporate it as a third act twist when Heathcliff kills Iori and she reveals the truth and wishes they could have had more time together (in training him they would naturally spend more time bonding); Perhaps Iori is Heathcliff's grandmother, and that is why he was lost on the street, because her son, his father, died very young, this to some extent could solve our issues with the timeline (kind of?), and Iori's death could serve as another contrast to the Erlking or Catherine, or even to Ryoshuu's finding of a new purpose to live, as she didn't achieve her goals but still found a reason that let her live and subsequently die.

There are doubtless problems with my idle prose and speculation, and I won't speculate more because at that point I should just write paradiso fanfiction myself, but my point is, I don't think that the theory is likely and I think that it on some level could betray Heathcliff's arc within c6.

I think that being her grandson gives a better narrative, although there are still holes with the timeline to some extent and I think that the story would be better served with just their parallel.

To finish. I very much do not buy into the theory and I think that it betrays Iori's characterisation for him to be her son. I don't think that they would character assassinate Iori for this especially considering how it pokes so many holes in her prior established motives/actions and timeline. While I understand the basis of the theory I think that it doesn't act to serve anything which would not be in its absence added, and to some extent betrays both of their stories to intertwine them with such little cause.

I just don't see the point, or think that it's a good idea.

New law Limbus players legally aren't allowed to make theories until they know who Iori is

#limbus company #lcb #project moon #iori lor #library of ruina

Iori is so fucking cool, the symbolism???? Like her color fixer name, the Purple Tear, is a double entendre, Tear can refer to the noun (the water produced by the eyes) or the verb (pulling something apart). It ties back to the fact she uses her son as a method of manipulating people, tears bring sympathy which often lower people’s guards.

And you know what also is associated with her? That’s right, snakes, and y’know what snakes are also associated with??!??1?/?/?/ Yeah. Doublecrossing, backstabbing, all that stuff. But the reason she’s implied to have been associated with that is because her moves are like. just look at this

So yeah! Iori is pretty fucking cool

#iori lor #iori library of ruina #the purple tear #library of ruina #project moon #ruina #retina’sverycorrectandrightanalyses #lor spoilers #library of ruina spoilers