#morimens meta

[beastenraged]

Something I thought about Morimen Keeper. How they seem to wake up as other people in the past. Becoming them. Having their memories. Their Emotion. Considering who they are, those people and them might be the same being. The same Butterflies that were dreamed into existence. Past, present and future blurring for the dreaming butterfly. What comes first? The keeper of the present that dreams into the past? Or the past that already happened?

One instance was, Keeper dreaming as Tulu's crown. The one that connects him to power.

So. My thoughts are about this are, well, Morimens Arc One spoilers ahoy, but-

This fluidity is a hundred percent due to the Keeper being a fragment of a dreaming god dropping into the actual dream of that same god.

When you get down to it, what really is the difference between the 'reality' of Kadath and the 'reality' of a dream in Kadath? On our dumb god's scale, it's the same. A dream within dream if a difference has to be noted at all.

The Keeper remembers things erased by the Dissolution for the same reason, because Dissolution is caused by God looking too closely at the dream and noticing that things aren't 'quite' to the scale of the reality it's more familiar with.

Like when you try to read a book in a dream and you realize that hey, the words are gibberish? Same deal.

BUT it flips around the Keeper being able to make those erased memories more real IN THE DREAM OF KADATH because well, the Keeper IS the Dreamer of Kadath.

If you really want a mind twist, consider this: what if the memories we see in dreams and flashbacks of Awakeners don't exist until the Keeper dreams them up/'witnesses' them.

"But what about how the Awakeners have backstory before we do a Psyche Dive-" Look. You can have characters in dreams act a certain way and do certain things WITHOUT ever knowing what their apparent backstory is.

A dream isn't the same as a book or movie or video game, after all.

[beastenraged]

The tragedy of the relationship between Murphy and Miryam is that Murphy desires to be treated as an actual human being, a daughter, and Miryam literally cannot do that due to her backstory religious trauma.

(Like this is about Fauxborn Murphy specifically, but it pretty much applies to regular Murphy too.)

Murphy sees being the Divine Maiden, the Divine Mother, as a curse and becoming a human sacrifice. She's not wrong to do so, with the amount of people that have been discarded for failing to live up to the role. So she wants Miryam to say "I love you," to be able to call Miryam her mother, because that means Murphy is a person, not a tool, to Miryam.

On the other end with Miryam... Miryam was taught over and over, had it literally crushed into her, that you do not put anything before God. That you sacrifice your family to God without hesitation. So for her, to call Murphy her daughter would be resigning her to be the sacrifice Murphy fears she is. For Miryam, the best way she can show her love is put Murphy on the same level AS God, as something Divine, because that's what Miryam is supposed to value most in her life as High Priestess of Lemuria.

But they both end up talking past each other, even as they try to express their love for the other. And thus the tragedy.

[beastenraged]

From my observation of the "Genesis" Awakeners so far in Morimens, they tend to lean closer to what their source mythology is than the first version of them did and often more dangerous/more of an enemy due to them being more 'eldritch' like their source.

Examples from what we have so far being...

Doll- based off of Mi-Go, G!Doll has at least ONE confirmed case of putting another person's brain in a vat for study and storage like the Mi-Go are infamous for doing instead of storing only her own brain like normal Doll does. Also, the machine that she uses to poison you in her Boss Fights in Arc 2 looks a lot like a Mi-Go as sketched out by later artists. Mi-Go have a very alien moral system like Doll Inferno has, making them (and her) malicious to the human experience.

Murphy- based off of Cthylla, who is both the daughter of Cthulhu and births Cthulhu. Her Genesis version, Fauxborn, manages to do both as the mythology claims by giving birth to the False God who then in turn supports her Silver to be Awakened (as stated in her Story material). Her pale coloring also seems to match up to some art I've seeing of Cthylla specifically, though it is Original Murphy whose coloring that actually matches up Cthylla's description in In His Daughter's Darkling Womb.

Ramona- Now, Ramona is a touch more tricky, seeing how her origin story is basically a human that was heavily touched by an Outer God/Old One. BUT Timeworn Ramona very much takes after the Outer God that Tawil is based off of, Yog-Sothoth, which is a being that exists outside of space and time. Genesis Ramona exists in a space where she can pretty much always come when called to assistance by the Keeper, much like Yog-Sothoth's name is called upon in several Lovecraft stories for similar protective purposes. Her eye covering might be alluding to how Yog-Sothoth is also said to 'know all,' an attempt to limit knowledge that she is always being immersed in at her current locale.

SO, for future Genesis Awakeners, my bet is they are going to tie them even closer to their source materials as well and Genesis Tulu is going to be even MORE like original Cthulhu, thus being a monster in truth than a young king alone.

[beastenraged]

The concept of the Silver Core is so delicious. Because of the possible Meta Narratives.

It's implied that the Silver Core came into being, because of the Supreme Being. The Dreamer. Meta Narratively speaking, us.

If you develop the Silver Core, you become effectively immortal. You come back from the dead. You come back from Dissolution. From Non Existence. From being forgotten.

Narratively and Meta Narratively speaking, it's because We noticed them. Finding them memorable. Enough for them to exist in our memories. So as long as we remember them, they will continue to exist in that world. Only by us forgetting them, they will truly die.

It's about the MEMORIES! As long as you are remembered, you are not dead.

That's why the Dissolution is so insidious. Because it makes it impossible for people to be remembered, to come back.

Silver Cores exist in opposition to that. If someone else remembers, they can return. Live again, like you said.

Tbh, the world that exists around this, around the Dissolution just a thing and most people not knowing about it... it makes sense. Because how you know about something when you don't have any memories about it.

Like the Dissolution takes everyone in time. But it's the beginning chapters of Morimens that really get me, about how there is TIME to reclaim those fading memories before they're gone forever, but it doesn't always happen.

Because people don't care enough. Like the biggest targets in those first two chapters?

Homeless people. The sick. The orphans.

I'm pretty sure that for Silver to exist, there has to be exposure to the energies of Dissolution first. A soul must run the risk of erasure to be set in supernatural diamond.

And that too relies on the people that surrounds the one who dies, the one that could be an Awakener. Because it is up to them, to us, to wake them up in remembering.

[beastenraged]

Thais and Xu are really interesting when it comes to how they're both embodiments of Human Desire but also both really DESPISE being desired, it that makes sense.

Like Thais' Thing That She Hates, in her voicelines, is the 'faces of humans twisted in desire' and that could be either a) desire in people not fulfilled or b) people looking at her with desire. Maybe even both?

And Xu's Thing That She Hates, is beings/people commanding things from her, acting from their desires on her. Like she would prefer them to do that far away from her, thanks.

But both are very aware of how are they desired and use that to their own ends. Maybe something about how Desire isn't really Desire anymore if it becomes fulfilled?

[beastenraged]

The Blind God for Morimen was always interesting to me. They're not exactly evil. It's just that. Their percent alone is too much for the World to withstand. We never really know what they're thinking. Or if they're thinking at all.

But whatever it is, they must want to exist in this dream of theirs. So like Doll said, They held their breath, and carefully, leaned in close.

There are many media about Gods wishing to walk among mortals, and about how they put away their godly power and disguise as mortals. Or even incarnate as one.

But Morimen put a different spin on it. Gods still Walk amongst mortals. Putting away most of their godly power. But it's either still being too strong, not understanding mortals at all, or bringing unspeakable disasters just by them being here. It's interesting.

The Blind God in Morimens has been one of the few times I've been "oh yeah this is what cosmic horror is" and sincerely impressed by it.

Because most of the time when people try to showcase cosmic horror (including writers like Lovecraft, who can be argued made that a thing as a popular trope), I'm tilting my head and going "really? that makes people go crazy?"

Like I know it's supposed be beyond human understanding and the author is just trying to put it in terms that humans can understand and yada yada. But I don't really believe in knowing something being enough to drive someone crazy.

In most cases.

Because the Blind God makes sense for why knowing of them, seeing them would drive you crazy. The comparison of ant and human is made, of course, like it usually is in these things. But those are never strong enough for me, because an ant and a human are still on the same plane of existence. An ant just sees a human as a bigger threat, that's all. Not a threat to its awareness.

It's the dreamer and the dream that gets me! People are so bad with dealing with temporariness, the idea that your existence is a dream would drive most utterly mad! The Keeper can alone stand against the Blind God because they are the dreamer too! But the dreamer in the dream, and that's enough to shift an entire experience.

On the note of gods walking among mortals on Morimens and being shit at it, I'll say that what happened in Arc 2, Chapter 4, nails that for me.

Because why would a being that experiences time differently understand that the gift focused on time it handed out would screw up their followers so badly?

But it's all good in general, how Morimens does it.

[beastenraged]

Miryam's whole Fanatic belief is not helped by the fact that her ritual to revive her god IS sorta kinda Legit. Except that god was not the one she's trying to bring back. Rather, a close enough Kin.

I think, her mindset was that SHE has to be The One to bring Tulu back. Anyone else is not acceptable and must be fake.

That, and like you said, her ritual is almost Legit.

She picked up the Silver herself off of the ruins of Lemuria. Off the throne of the God-King. That Tulu has been awakened without that Silver is impossible in her mind. No wonder she denies him.

It's also kind of complicated, the entire God situation here. *tilts hand back and forth*

Like Tulu is God and isn't, he's the Voice of God, the God-King, but the God of the Spiral still exists outside of him.

He's the mortal representation of God. An Aspect. He exists before he becomes the God-King, before he's chosen by God to speak for them through its crown.

What Miryam wants from her ritual isn't Tulu alone. She wants the power that courses through Tulu, that Tulu used to put the people of Lemuria to sleep through their inevitable deaths.

The Divine Realm, as she puts it.

But the problem is that calling on the power alone gets...that. A close enough Kin, as you said. Not God.

And power without direction cannot be used to rebuilt a lost nation.

[beastenraged]

this is a VERY good meta, however curious minds wonder -- how would yo go about making a genesis sorel, or a genesis castor/pollux, for example? what about a genesis caecus, would he be even more fish-ified? (via @hallowed-nebulae)

My thoughts on this are too long to put into replies, so here's another post for it. Okay, ideas on the possibilities of Genesis Sorel, Caecus, and Castor/Pollux/Twins.

Thanks, of course, to the Morimens fandom as a whole who have gathered the information from the game itself to help determine which different characters are most likely a reference to what exactly in Lovecraft lore overall. Makes my life easier, though I still have to do pretty heavy diving for the facts here myself.

Sorel- She is most likely a 'The Queen in Red' reference, who shows up only as an Avatar of Nyarlathotep in some CoC (Call of Cthulhu) stuff. Now, the only issue with making a Genesis version from that, is that we already have a Nyarlathotep present in Morimens.

(That's N, by the way.)

We could go for mixing some more references to his various Avatars for her Genesis form, if not for another problem. That is, Ryker is also an Avatar of Nyarlathotep reference and is N's specialist boy in Morimens, so if anyone is going to get really heavy Nyarlathotep imagery/connection in the future, it's going to be him most likely.

(Pandia is also associated with N/Nyarlathotep btw, but no one gives a shit about her, let's be honest here.)

BUT since 'The Queen in Red' herself may refer to the original Red Queen from Alice in Wonderland (plus Sorel with roses!), Sorel could get some hefty Wonderland Imagery to a possible Genesis form. I would also think possible vampirisms as well, with all of her connection to Caro/blood and her general 'beautiful and young and rich forever' situation.

Caecus- Now, Caecus' problem is that we technically already have a more fishified version of him in-game and that's the fish-people Seafarer minions we fight everywhere.

His thing is that Caecus is a reference to the Deep Ones as displayed in The Dunwich Horror, people with fishy features that mix their blood/seed with humans that worship the Old Ones. Caecus is a realization of the fear of what if we have the blood of fish people in us that will make US fish people that the narrator of said book faces at the end of the story.

For a Genesis Caecus, I would lean heavy into his continued connection with Goliath. Goliath represents Dagon in-game, who serves as the god of the Deep Ones, and any power Caecus might gain would be derived from that.

Castor and Pollux- I'm pretty sure that they are meant to reference the twins Zhar and Lloigor from The Lair of the Star-Spawn.

As for who is who, hm, Lloigor is supposed to have 'sourceless winds' when he appears, so I think he's supposed to be Castor. Zhar is considered the more powerful of the twins, like Pollux is by the Lightbearers. Strong star association with them both, like the names Castor and Pollux are.

From the lore of Zhar and Lloigor, without getting too much into it, I think a Genesis version of the twins would be conjoined twins and thus seen as a single individual most likely. Plus conjoined twins are kind of considered a horror trope-type, as unfair as that is to the real deal.

To really lean into the god part of their inspiration, I'd go for a backstory of maybe the Genesis Twins saw freedom in taking over of the Lightbearers Cult instead of running away like their canon counterparts did.

So, possible title/naming of Castor-Pollux: Lantern! Or perhaps Starspawn. Like Fauxborn or Inferno and such for the others.