Shadowbringers replay making my brain spin with more Azem and ancient days thoughts and theories to incorporate into a wol backstory...
- Azem was the one to bring word of the effects of the Final Days to the Convocation, having seen and fought them firsthand...then had to shake with frustration as Amaurot debated whether or not it was their role to intervene;
- Perhaps Azem and co were the ones who captured Archaeotania and brought it to Lahabrea to study?
- Tensions already rose between Azem, Emet-Selch and Hythlodeus because Azem was discomforted by how readily people sacrifixed themselves for desperate solutions that often did not work. Azem felt these sacrifices were meaningless and there had to be another way, Emet-Selch and Hythlodaeus still saw the nobility and naturalness of these acts;
- Above doubts leads Azem to briefly form a closer bond with Fandaniel, but though they agreed that willing death was meaningless, they differed on how to respond to the feelings these thoughts conjured;
- The break between Azem and the rest is that Azem comes to believe that the ancients should turn away from creation magics altogether to craft their mind's wonders with their hands, not conjure, but to physically build. This is so anathema to ancient life that no one who could do anything about the situation accepts it. They cannot even envision it. Loghrif accedes that it is possible but ultimately impractical;
- Emet-Selch agrees with Gaia, and notes that a speedy solution would involve some sort of voluntary mass disabling and cause no end of suffering akin to what they are already suffering...and worse, to remove their most powerful trait while monsters still roam the land;
- Azem wants the convocation to do the looooong work of convincing their society to adopt manual crafting and guide everyone through the painful transition;
- Elidibus ultimately sides with Lahabrea and Emet-Selch. He decides that the Zodiark solution would spare their people the most pain. Best case scenario, the sacrificed would not be permanent, and none would be wasted as all would return to the star. Worst case scenario, they are lost but their willing sacrifice saves everyone and everything that is left. But Azem's plan, maybe would avoid the untold sacrifice from the beginning but ultimately would cause untild hardship to change their society so much that it would be akin to the death of them anyway. Another version of "it is selfish to refuse to lose anyone" or "in saving everyone you propose the death of what makes us who we are"
- Azem leaves, Emet-Selch cannot convince them to stay, Venat tries to recruit Azem but is turned down. Azem ends their life doing what they do...fighting to defend people from the beasts, but also teaching the people they save to create with their hands...one-by-one, slowly but steadily. It isnt enough to save them all from Zodiark's summoning and the later Sundering, but their messages back to Amaurot that report that the plan is not impossible, that people took just as much or more pride in creating and even had a closer relationship to their star...are ignored because the Convocation has decided to forget Azem. Emet-Selch reads these of course, but his objection was not that it would not work, (okay maybe this proves it would not be as terrible a hardship as he thought), but the Convocation needs to save a whole star and quickly, Azem's last report showed they reached perhaps only a few thousand.
- In anger and curiosity, Emet-Selch experiments with the Garleans in the far future - a people who can only build with their hands - to see what they are capable of. He is disappointed and hopeless after his son dies, he still feels betrayed by Azem. His goal instead becomes proving to Azem's shade how badly that road could have also gone.
Gosh, I think I finally have my Azem's backstory!
