Issue 5.5: Elden Lore, Part 1
The Politics of Power, Magic, and Religion in Elden Ring [A Narrative, Historical, Theological, and Metaspiritual Analysis]
Game & Word Volume 5, Issue 4: Tuesday, Dec. 3rd, 2024
Publisher: Jay Rooney
Author, Graphics, Research: Jay Rooney
Logo: Jarnest Media
Table of Contents
Summary & Housekeeping
Feature: “Elden Lore, Part 1” (~84 minute read)
Food for Talk: Discussion Prompts
Further Reading
Game & Word-of-Mouth
Footnotes
Summary:
Throughout this Volume, one of my main arguments has been that the difference between “religion” and “magic”—or, on a more granular level, between a “prophet” and a “sorcerer”— often comes down to nothing more than power.
And Elden Ring, FromSoftware’s 2022 open-world masterpiece, provides an excellent allegory of how this process has played out throughout history in the form of the game’s fantastical setting of The Lands Between, and its dominant religious institution, the Golden Order.
This context sets up the key themes our analysis will explore throughout the following multi-article series:
1. How the Golden Order established and maintains control in the Lands Between;
2. The survival and resistance of the realm’s myriad marginalized practices;
3. The role of institutions like the Golden Order and the Academy of Raya Lucaria in controlling spiritual knowledge;
4. The inherent tension between orthodoxy and alternative practices, and how each navigate it;
5. The player's potential role, as the Tarnished, in maintaining or challenging these systems.
Just in time for the Game Awards (which Elden Ring swept in 2022, and in which its 2024 DLC, Shadow of the Erdtree, was nominated for this year), this is a packed and truly dense deep dive.
It was born from over 200 hours of playing the game and countless more diving into the intricacies of its lore, as well as my own personal and academic knowledge of the topics we’ll discuss.
If you’re an Elden Ring scholar, you’ll have a blast chewing on the themes and theories I’ll present to you here. And even if you’re allergic to Souls games, don’t fear—I also provide enough of a foundation to understand, follow along with, and appreciate the lore without ever having to boot up the game (though I do recommend doing so, if only just to try it).
This week, we’ll start by examining how the Golden Order establishes spiritual control by defining what constitutes permissible spiritual activity, and how it enforces this control with a theological carrot-and-stick, while also drawing parallels to real-world history.
So go forth, Tarnished, and dive into the rabbit hole which hath just opened up. I will meet thee on the other side.
~Jay
Previous Issues
Game & Word’s most recent issues (currently, all of Volume 5) are available to all, free of charge.
Older issues are currently archived and only accessible to paid subscribers. Paid subscriptions are currently paused, and I’ll lower the paywall once I can afford to refund my current subscribers. In the meantime, you can always DM me if you want access to the full archive:
Volume 1 (The Name of the Game): Issue 1 ● Issue 2 ● Issue 3 ● Issue 4
Volume 2 (Yo Ho Ho, It’s a Gamer’s Life for Me): Issue 1 ● Issue 2 ● Issue 3 ● Bonus 1 ● Issue 4 ● Issue 5 ● Issue 6 ● Issue 7 ● Bonus 2 ● Issue 8 ● Bonus 3
Volume 3 (Game Over Matter): Intro ● Issue 1 ● Issue 2 ● Issue 3 ● Podcast 1 ● Issue 4 ● Video Podcast 1 ● Bonus 1 ● Issue 5 ● Podcast 2 ● Issue 6 ● Issue 7 ● Issue 8 ● Issue 9 ● Podcast 3 ● Bonus 2
Volume 4 (Tempus Ludos): Intro ● Issue 1 ● Video Podcast 1 ● Video Podcast 2 ● Issue 2 ● Issue 3 ● Issue 4 ● Issue 5 ● Podcast 1 ● Issue 6 ● Issue 7 ● Issue 8 ● Issue 9
Volume 5 (AbraCODEabra!): Intro ● Issue 1 ● Issue 2 ● Issue 3 ● Issue 4
Feature: Elden Lore, Part 1
🚨🚨🚨 SPOILER ALERT 🚨🚨🚨
This series (including this post) contains MULTIPLE huge, bigly, and absolutely GINORMOUS story, lore, thematic, and visual SPOILERS for Elden Ring, including the late game, multiple endings, and its just-released DLC, Shadow of the Erdtree. We’re digging deep here, and almost no stone will be left unturned. You've been warned!
⚠️⚠️⚠️ READER DISCRETION ADVISED ⚠️⚠️⚠️
Elden Ring is an M-Rated game, and one that sprang from the twisted minds that gave us Dark Souls and Game of Thrones. Some of the events and themes we discuss are very dark, bloody, and gory, with examples of murder, dismemberment, torture, genocide, and the desecration of corpses. So if you’re squeamish, exercise extreme caution before reading ahead.
🔥🔥🔥 THIS ARTICLE MAY MAKE YOU ANGRY 🔥🔥🔥
There are three things you must never discuss in polite company: religion, politics, and the Great Pumpkin. This post, by thematic necessity, will deal extensively with that first one.
The examples I bring up mostly involve the historical harms propagated by organized Christianity, particularly early and medieval Catholicism. So, it’s going to seem as if I’m “bashing” the religion. But I’m not.
I’m providing an overall quite critical take, sure. But that’s not the same thing as bashing or picking on it.
Faith is overall a beautiful thing, and the Church still does a great job in giving purpose, meaning, community, and moral guidance to millions around the world. But faith—particularly institutionalized faith—does have a dark side. Just ask the countless souls who were on the receiving end of the Crusades, the Inquisition, and the forced conversions of Jews and Indigenous populations throughout the medieval and modern eras (not to mention more recent events, like the covering up of sexual abuse by clergy).
Shying away from honestly and unflinchingly examining these faults does no favors to either the individual practitioner, the Church at large, or the billions of other people whose souls they’re trying to save. Indeed, none other than the late Pope John Paul II recognized this when he apologized for the historical sins of the Church back at the turn of the millennium.
So, if you have a problem, maybe take it up with him in the life beyond.
As to why this particular faith, there are two main reasons:
I was originally born into the faith, and while I no longer practice or even affiliate with Catholicism, I am much more familiar with its historical and theological nuances than with those of other applicable religions (particularly other missionary religions, like Islam or Mormonism), and thus feel more qualified to render commentary on it;
Elden Ring is a work of High Fantasy, with all the distinctly Medieval European aesthetics and themes that come with the genre. And the dominant religion of Medieval Europe was… the Catholic Church.
So, as you read this piece, be mindful of your own feelings, and think before you start hammering away at the keyboard.
Sure, if you notice a factual discrepancy, feel free to correct me in the comments. Also feel free to respectfully disagree with my analysis.
But if you find yourself getting angry or disturbed, first try to examine your own feelings, and where they might be coming from. God may be trying to tell you something.
The fact that the Church has deeply erred is, again, something that even the highest levels of the Vatican acknowledge. You’d do well to adopt a similar approach.
On the other hand, if you’re a rabid Richard Dawkins-esque Reddit atheist, I’d also encourage you to recognize that the Church also does a lot of good—indeed, we’re now seeing the first-hand effects of a diminished role of organized religion on the world. Without God, we instead get political polarization, soul-crushing estrangement from each other, spikes in mental illness, rising suicide rates… you get the picture.
Remember: seek balance in everything. This is The Way. One can acknowledge both the flaws and the virtues of religion, and hold both to be true at the same time.
The world is complicated, and nuanced. I’ve always intended this to be a space where I can highlight this. Please help me keep it that way. If you’re unable to do so, then please take your diatribes somewhere else.
🫠🫠🫠 AMBIGUOUS LORE WARNING 🫠🫠🫠
Elden Ring is the brainchild of FromSoftware, a studio notorious for stuffing its games with layers upon layers of cryptic, ambiguous, and multi-faceted lore. Much about the lore, especially when you start reading between the lines, is deliberately vague so as to encourage player theorizing and discussion.
As such, this series will contain my own interpretations and occasionally speculation, which may very well differ from yours—sometimes, very noticeably so. While I do my best to ground these interpretations in evidence from the game, I sometimes have to fill in the blanks with my own headcanon.
If you disagree, feel free to challenge these theories and offer your own counter-explanations in the comments. All I ask is that you be respectful about it. After all, while I can’t definitively prove or disprove my interpretations, the same goes just as much for yours.
💡💡💡 POINT OF CLARIFICATION 💡💡💡
To more easily distinguish between “stage” magic and “for realsies” magic, most practitioners spell the latter with a “k” at the end, as “magick.” However, this is a fairly recent convention, having mostly been popularized by the notorious 20th Century British
philandereroccultist, Aleister Crowley.As we’ve seen and will soon see some more, “magic” is already enough of an “othering” term as it is, and I believe that adding the “k” subtly contributes to the further marginalization of an already heavily marginalized spiritual practice.
Therefore, while I acknowledge people’s preferences as to how to spell it, I’ve opted to use the original spelling. If you’re used to spelling it as “magick” or are unclear if I’m referring to the stage or supernatural variety, remember that I’m talking about the latter, unless otherwise noted.
📜📜📜 ERRATA 📜📜📜
12/11/24: A previous version of this newsletter stated that Rykard was the demigod child of Marika. He’s actually the demigod child of Rennala. Game & Word regrets the error, though in a sense, it was technically correct. Please don’t make me explain why.
Introduction
“What is faith if not an affirmation?”
~Flock’s Canvas Talisman (item description)
Elden Ring is a special game. It is a masterclass in tight yet expansive game design, featuring the robust worldbuilding, richly textual lore, seamless use of environmental storytelling, and brutally difficult yet surprisingly engaging gameplay that have all become FromSoftware’s hallmarks.
FromSoftware (or “FromSoft” for short) is a Japanese studio helmed by acclaimed game designer Hidetaka Miyazaki (not to be confused with the other Miyazaki1), which birthed the SoulsBorne or Souls-like genre of Action RPGs, starting with Demon’s Souls (2009), Dark Souls (2011) and its two sequels, and Bloodborne (2015), continuing to this day with Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice (2019) and finally Elden Ring (2022).
Souls games are primarily known for two things:
Their infamously punishing difficulty and steep learning curves, to the point where hard games in other genres are often referred to as the “Dark Souls” of its respective genre;
The almost fanatical following and loyalty they inspire in their player bases, despite (or, indeed, because of) the aforementioned difficulty.
Elden Ring is no exception. As such, it’s not a game for everyone.
“But wait!”, I hear you protesting at your screen, “Don’t you always say that games are for everyone?! So, what gives???”
Which, yes, I do still believe. But I don’t believe that every single game out there is meant for every single player. No single game can appeal to every player—it’s literally impossible. If that weren’t the case, there’d be no such thing as genres! And, indeed, even nearly universally beloved classics like Mario and Zelda have their detractors (not many detractors, but certainly more than zero).
Game developers must pick their audiences, and try to cater to their tastes. This is something that FromSoft deeply understands. They know who their audience is, and they know what they like. And what their audience likes is controller-smashing levels of difficulty.
As such, gamers with a low skill level (and I don’t mean this in a derogatory fashion, truly) or a low tolerance for challenge will not enjoy Elden Ring. This game will chew you up and spit you out, over and over again.
So if this sounds fun to you, if you enjoy overcoming such steep levels of challenge (or at least find the lore compelling enough that you’re willing to endure it), then you’ll have a blast playing this game and untangling The Lands Between’s complex and tragic web of intrigue, turmoil, and conflict.
If highly challenging games are not fun for you, then you’ll be miserable—and there’s no shame in recognizing this. You can still, after all, immerse yourself in the lore through YouTube videos, Reddit rabbit holes, and articles like this one.2
Oh yeah, speaking of lore… besides their difficulty, Souls games have also cultivated a reputation for crafting dizzyingly deep, rich, and textured worlds with equally deep backstories and lore.
Which brings us to today’s article.
The Lore of Division
“The Shattering has caused us—all of us—to lose sight of something very dear.”
~Miriel, Pastor of Vows (dialogue)
Elden Ring’s lore is a treat to discover and take in. In true FromSoft fashion, it almost completely eschews advancing the narrative through cutscenes and dialogue, delivering it through sublimely subtle item descriptions and truly masterful environmental storytelling.
You can learn a lot about the story and its setting by just paying attention to things as you explore, from the placement of landmarks to the mechanics of individual spells and weapons. Item descriptions can fill in the rest. And in areas where there are still unknowns (which is, to say, a lot—Souls games revel in ambiguity), countless fan theories abound on Reddit and Discord.
And one of Elden Ring’s central themes—one which pops up again and again throughout the lore—is that of the ways in which spiritual branches clash with each other.
The Lands Between (the fantastical world where Elden Ring takes place) presents an utterly fractured metaphysical landscape—spiritual traditions clash with, splinter from, and marginalize one another.
It’s a fantastically complex and apropos metaphor for a perennial fact of spiritual life in our world, one which I’ve repeatedly invoked in this volume: which spiritual practices are condoned, and which are prohibited, often boils down to nothing more than the arbitrary declarations of whoever’s in power.
This is a common theme throughout history. Condoned spiritual practices receive the (quite literal) blessing of the dominant religious institution(s), and their practitioners are revered as prophets, priests, and medicine men.3 Meanwhile, everything else gets condemned, and those practitioners are sneered at, persecuted, and executed as witches, sorcerers, and heretics.
These practices are right, and those practices are wrong. The actual substance of the differences between them (even if they’re superficial, and both are in the service to the same deity) be damned. No pun intended.
Quite brilliantly, Elden Ring explores this tension not just through the in-game narrative and lore, but also through its gameplay. And it all points to the overarching tension between the Golden Order and the Outer Gods, which we’ll also explore in all its deliciously complicated nuance.
Are you ready, Tarnished? Then giddyup your spectral steed, because we’re diving deep into the rabbit hole today!
Prologue: The Gods Between (A Theological Overview)
Actually, before I start examining these themes, I should set the stage with a quick (relatively speaking) overview of the game’s relevant lore.
But first, a disclaimer: being a FromSoft title, Elden Ring’s lore is mind-meltingly complex, multilayered, and deep. This shouldn’t come as a surprise, given that this is the brainchild of both Miyazaki and George R.R. Martin—yes, that George R.R. Martin.4
So there’s no way I can touch on everything in the game (not to mention the fact there are huge areas of disagreement in the fandom as to how to interpret most of it).
However, I do want to cover at least the broadest strokes, for the benefits of my readers who:
Might be a bit fuzzy about the lore which we’ll discuss;
Missed these pieces of the lore entirely (Elden Ring is a huge game; it’s very easy to miss huge parts of the story, especially on your first playthrough);
Are interested in the lore but are not good enough at Souls games to actually advance in the game enough to discover it organically;
Those who’ve never played Elden Ring, because they’ve never played a Souls game (and never will play a Souls game), but are nevertheless intrigued by the lore or would be interested in the themes we’re about to discuss.
This will just be a high-level overview. If you like what you read here and want to dive deeper, YouTube is a fantastic resource for that.
Meanwhile, if you’re already an Elden Ring PhD, feel free to skip ahead to the analysis section.
The Age Before Order
Before the current religious order we see in Elden Ring, the Lands Between was governed by different forces, mostly primal powers and local deities. The most relevent ones include:
The Crucible, a primordial force associated with life’s multiplicity, and which long predated the current order;
The Ancient Dragons, who ruled the prehistoric era as immortal beings with stone scales;
The Fire Giants, gigantic beings who tended an ancient flame from an ancient god (though depending on your interpretation, the flame itself could also be considered said god);
The Outer Gods, greater-scope deities who are never seen in the game itself, but whose fingerprints are everywhere and whose influence is undeniable;
Keep these in mind, they’re very relevant to our analysis.
The Coming of the Golden Order
“I declare mine intent, to search the depths of the Golden Order. Through understanding of the proper way, our faith, our grace, is increased.”
~Queen Marika (as quoted by Melina at the Minor Erdtree Church)
In the beginning, a long time ago, deity named the Greater Will5 sent a golden star to the Lands Between, in effect staking its claim to the land. This star contained the Elden Ring—a configuration of runes that served as a physical manifestation of the laws and order in the realm—as well as Metyr, the mother of the Two Fingers (gigantic eldritch hands with only two fingers) whose purpose was to interpret the… um, will of the Greater Will.
Queen Marika (aka The Eternal Queen) was an Empyrean, a candidate chosen to ascend as the One True God—the Greater Will’s chosen vassal.6 At some point, she did exactly that, and some time after ascending to godhood, she created the Golden Order: a political and religious system based on her chosen configuration of the Elden Ring.
The Establishment of Control
“The Erdtree governs all. The choice is thine. Become one with the Order. Or divest thyself of it. To wallow at the fringes; a powerless upstart.”
~Queen Marika (as quoted by Melina at the Grand Lift of Dectus)
Queen Marika—acting as a sort of divine architect— quickly moved to consolidate the her hold on the Lands Between, through both physical and religious control.
She established physical control based around the Erdtree (pictured above): a golden, sacred tree which contains the Elden Ring at its core.
Towering over the Lands Between and visible from practically everywhere in the realm, the Erdtree serves as the most direct physical manifestation of the Golden Order’s (and, by extention, the Greater Will’s) primacy and dominion.7
Along with the Erdtree, the Two Fingers were also instrumental in establishing control, in their case through their roles as divine interpreters. Under this system, the Two Fingers interpret the Greater Will’s dictates and communicate them to Finger Readers, who then relay these directives to the rest of the realm.
Finally, Marika also controlled the distribution of Grace—basically, divine favor—as a means of control. In the Lands Between, to be divested of Grace was to be condemned as an outcast, shunned, or even killed. In this analysis’ first historical parallel, it was much akin to being excommunicated from a church or religious order in the real world.
“The Fire Giants borrowed from the power of a fell god,
and still they were defeated.”
~”Burn, O Flame!” Incantation (item description)
To establish religious control, Marika codified acceptable spiritual and religious practices (shown in-game as Fundamentalist incantations), then relentlessly persecuted those who followed alternative faiths.
Perhaps the most famous and consequential casualties of this persecutation were the Fire Giants, who fell in a prolonged war of extermination that saw their god slain and the sole survivor stripped of his power and cursed to tend to their fallen god’s flame (which itself can never be extinguished) so that it would never threaten the Golden Order again.
But there were others… oh so many others. We’ll touch on those a little later.
The Shattering
“This land has been tainted by madness since the shattering of the Elden Ring.”
~Merchant Kalé (dialogue)
At some point, for reasons unknown and very much up for interpretation, Marika shattered the Elden Ring, and disappeared from the Lands Between along with her consort, Radagon.8
Seeing as the Elden Ring was the physical manifestation of order in the realm, this predictably led to the proverbial dung hitting the fan.
Marika’s demigod children began fighting over the fragments—the Great Runes—and in doing so, plunged the Lands Between into chaos. The wars they fought, collectively known as The Shattering, are described as “a war from which no lord arose,” which left nothing but destruction and a huge power vacuum in its wake.
But most importantly, the opening cutscene points out that the Shattering led to the Greater Will abandoning the Lands Between.9
The Lands Between at Game’s Start
“The current imperfection of the Golden Order, or instability of ideology, can be blamed upon the fickleness of the gods no better than men. That is the fly in the ointment.”
~Mending Rune of Perfect Order (item description)
The game proper begins some time10 after the Shattering, after the Lands Between has been wallowing in chaos, stagnation, and decay for some time.
The player character is a Tarnished, a class of warriors formerly under the command of Godfrey, the “First” Elden Lord.11 The Tarnished, along with Godfrey, were divested of Grace by Marika following the war with the Fire Giants (supposedly because, with no more wars to fight, the warlike and bloodthirsty Godfrey became bereft of purpose) and exiled to fight and die far from the Lands Between.
But suddenly, long after the Shattering and for reasons unknown, Grace was restored to them, bringing them back from the dead and calling on them to return to the Lands Between to repair the Elden Ring. Whoever succeeded would become the next Elden Lord and restore order to the realm once again.
The player assumes control of one particular Tarnished of no renown,12 as they return to the Lands Between, a fractured land where several factions vie for control:
Golden Order Fundamentalists who seek to restore the old order (including fellow Tarnished like Goldmask and Sir Gideon Offnir);
Those exploring alternative orders and powers (these include demigods like Ranni, Miquella, and Mohg, as well as fellow Tarnished like Fia and even the Dung Eater);
Revolutionary forces (like Rykard and his Recusants, as well as Shabribi and his adherents of the Frenzied Flame);
And ancient powers seeking resurgence—mainly, the Outer Gods (especially the God of Rot, the Formless Mother, and again the Frenzied Flame).
More on these in due time.
I should also point out, that the realm hasn’t descended into complete anarchy. Indeed, there are many big institutional powers who continue to wield significant power, though none have a complete hold on the realm:
The Golden Order: The “official” religious hierarchy which controls “legitimate” faith. Though greatly diminished since the Shattering, the Golden Order’s adherents still wield considerable power and influence, especially in and around the royal capital city of Leyndell (built at the foot of the Erdtree).
The Academy of Raya Lucaria: The nexus of sorcery education in the Lands Between, since long before even the Age of the Erdtree. The Academy of Raya Lucaria regulates magical knowledge and practice, particularly sorceries derived from the use of glintstone, a type of meteoric crystal said to contain the very life essence of the stars themselves. It’s based in the Liurnia region, where it’s going through a falling out and civil war with its co-rulers, the Carian Royal Dynasty.
Underground Groups: Several groups and factions that are either unaligned with or in direct opposition to the Golden Order. Some of these are organized enough to, if not pose a threat, then at least look out for their own interests and survive. These can further be broken down into:
Servants of the various Outer Gods: Such as the forces of Miquella’s Haligree,13 the Bloody Fingers, the Volcano Manor Recusants, and adherents of the Frenzied Flame;
The remnants of fallen orders or civilizations: Such as the Ancient Dragons of Farum Azula, the Black Knife Assassins of the Eternal Cities, and the dreaded Godskin Cult;
Those who live outside of Grace: Groups and even entire species denied Grace by the Golden Order, and who as such are shunned, subjugated, or even genocided for their “crime” of existing. These include, but are not limited to: Those Who Live in Death, the Nomadic Merchants of the Great Caravan, the Misbegotten, the Omens, the Albinaurics, and even the Tarnished themselves (to a certain extent).
Again, more on these in due time.
Overall, the game presents a world where multiple “valid” spiritual traditions exist, power determines legitimacy, resistance and preservation take many forms, and no single perspective holds a monopoly on absolute truth.
So, what will become of this world? Who will exercise dominion over the Lands Between? Which of these warring factions will come out on top—if any, at all?
That’s for you to decide, Tarnished.
As an open-world game, Elden Ring gives you a lot of leeway to pick which factions to align with, whose interests you’ll advance, who you leverage for your own ascendancy, and who you eventually betray. In fact, there are six different endings (of varying ambiguity), as well as countless side quests involving a veritable poutpourri of memorable NPCs.
Of course, we don’t have nearly enough time or space here to go over them all in detail, but we’ll touch on the more relevant ones as we go along.
Ok, now we’re ready to dive in!
Part 1: The Golden Order and the Politics of Divine Power
“The noble Goldmask lamented what had become of the hunters.
How easy it is for learning and learnedness to be reduced to the
ravings of fanatics; all the good and the great wanted, in their
foolishness, was an absolute evil to contend with.
Does such a notion exist in the fundamentals of Order?”
~“Order Healing” Incantation (item description)
Tale of the Three Fingers (and the Two)
We’ve already glimpsed at the Two Fingers as physical heralds of the Greater Will.14 These strange beings’ purpose is to communicate with the Greater Will, then relay these messages to the Finger Readers, who in turn interpret them for the masses.
But there is another such creature, which serves another god. One that the Golden Order finds so repulsive, so foul, and so frightening, that they sealed it away where stray heroes would be least likely to stumble onto it: deep in the Frenzied Flame Proscription, in the deepest underground, beyond the sewers and catacombs beneath Leyndell, beyond where the Golden Order shunted even their most forlorn undesirables (like Omens, Nomads, and the Dung Eater15).
I’m talking, of course, about the Three Fingers, who serve the terrifying Outer God known as the Frenzied Flame and are a physical allegory of the schism between orthodoxy and heresy in the Lands Between.
Of course, Elden Ring being an open world game (and a FromSoft title), there’s absolutely nothing stopping a sufficiently determined player from undertaking and completing the grueling journey to meet the Three Fingers and carry out their plans.
But unusually for a game (and a studio) that revels in ambiguity, the developers all but hammer home to the player that contacting the Frenzied Flame is a horrible, terrible, no-good idea:
Throughout your travels, you’ll occasionally encounter adherents of the Frenzied Flame, all of whom have flames coming out of their empty eye sockets, act like deranged maniacs, and are either overtly hostile or harbor sinister intentions towards the player;
Occasionally, you’ll also stumble onto entire towns and villages that have succumbed to the Frenzied Flame, becoming cesspools of decay, insanity, and misery. Even the animals nearby attack the player like rabid beasts (nearby NPCs will also warn you to stay far, far away from these places);
One such village has an ominous crumbling tower where adherents shine a madness-inducing ball of fire from the top, frying the minds of unsuspecting passersby. The color and shape of the fire sphere looks suspiciously like the Eye of Sauron;
Shabribi,16 the character who actually encourages you to seek out the Frenzied Flame, is clearly insane and obviously up to no good. Still, he’s remarkably honest about his intentions and doesn’t try to hide the fact that he’s pursuing a plan that will end in all living things dying in a huge fire;
Items and incantations associated with the Frenzied Flame inflict insanity on both the target and the caster, and their item descriptions are grimly descriptive of the horrible fates awaiting all who attempt to wield its power;
The underground path to the Frenzied Flame Proscription is itself a grueling slog through winding, laberinthyne, and interminably long sewers, crypts, and tunnels. These accursed halls are easy to get lost in, filled to the brim with powerful enemies, and dotted with vivid reminders of the tunnels’ sordid and bloody history (including one huge catacomb where almost the entire Nomadic Merchant people were intombed alive);
Indeed, more players die on this journey than they do to most bosses;
Speaking of bosses, there’s a really big one guarding the final leg of the journey—Mohg, The Omen—fought in the ominously-named Cathedral of the Forsaken;
And finally, as if all of that wasn’t obvious enough, your Finger Maiden, Melina—who is almost unconditionally supportive of your actions and will agree to just about anything the player will do, up to and including the cardinal sin of burning the Erdtree—straight up warns you against contacting the Frenzied Flame, and her pleas become more impassioned, dire, and urgent the closer you get to the Three Fingers’ chamber;
Oh, and if you follow through and actually do contact the Three Fingers and the Frenzied Flame, she’ll straight-up ditch you, only re-emerging in the ending cutscene to swear vengeance and death upon you.
In short, this is something a player has to very much intend to do, which again, is highly uncharacteristic for a studio famous for sprinkling its games with vague hints and not giving players any indication as to their potential significance or the future effects on their choices on the story.
But what happens if you DO follow through and unseal the Three Fingers?
The Three Fingers then wrap the player in their fiery embrace, bestowing the power of the Frenzied Flame onto the Tarnished. From that point on, the player character’s eyes glow a sinister yellow—the hallmark of those afflicted by the Frenzied Flame—and gnarly burn marks cover their body.
Also, from that point on, the player is locked into the grim Lord of Flame ending, one of the game’s most unambiguously “bad” endings.
Should the player wish to undo this, she’ll have to undertake another grueling journey to another optional area and fight an optional superboss, Malenia, widely considered to be the hardest boss fight in the game (even moreso than the final boss!) to purge the Frenzied Flame from their body and soul.
But if the player is unable or unwilling to exorcise the Frenzied Flame, and then proceeds to beat the final boss and trigger the ending cutscene? Well, then this happens:
Chaos takes the world. Everything burns. Nothing is left.17 The Frenzied Flame triumphs. The End.
Turns out that even for all of the Golden Order’s excesses in enforcing its orthodoxy and hold on the Lands Between, they did have a very good reason for trying to stamp out (or at least seal away) the Frenzied Flame.
Doing so is very much in the interests of not just the Golden Order, but every living thing in the Lands Between (and even, as the DLC shows, in the worlds beyond).
Death, Magic, and Institutional Authority
“In the time when there was no Erdtree,
death was burned in ghostflame.
Deathbirds were the keepers of that fire.”
~”Explosive Ghostflame” Incantation (item description)
Similar justifications abound for the Golden Order’s heavy-handed supression of other spiritual paths. And not all of them carry the same moral weight as, say, the sealing away of the Three Fingers and the shunning of the Frenzied Flame’s adherents.
The most egregious of all these persecutions are of groups and people who live outside of Grace. These are various peoples and species whose life was bestowed by means other than the Erdtree—as such, according to the Golden Order, the very existence of these beings is blasphemous to the Greater Will.
This, naturally, provides a theological framework and justification for the suppression, persecution, and even extermination of these (very much alive) spiritual “others.”18
Take the Albinaurics, for instance. These are artificial lifeforms, created by the denizens of the Eternal Cities. There is some ambiguity as to whether they were created specifically to challenge the Erdtree and the Golden Order—but regardless, that is the reason the Golden Order gave when punishing the Eternal Cities by burying them in the depths of the earth.
The Albinaurics, ever since then, have consistently gotten the short end of the stick, being hunted, tortured, and killed en masse—again, just for existing.19 The Tarnished even witnesses the aftermath of one of these fantasy pogroms when happening upon the hidden Village of the Albinaurics, which had just been razed to the ground and its inhabitants massacred by agents of the Golden Order.
Then there’s the treatment of many primorial beings, which had existed prior to the Erdtree—which, as such, also placed them outside its purview and thus marked them for suppression. Bloody wars and massacres inevitably followed, though some of these groups ultimately fared better than others.
The Ancient Dragons, though eventually defeated and supplanted as rulers, were still the original vassals of the Greater Will. Therefore, the Golden Order agreed to coexist with them, and their own faith—that of the Ancient Dragon Cult—was even brought into the fold (however begrudgingly).
Others, like the Crucible Knights, were more simply looked down upon and sidelined, much as a petty parent would do to a red-headed stepchild,20 basically shunted aside as anachronistic and embarrasing reminders of a past, less enlightened age (despite this, the Crucible Knights remain surprisingly devoted to the Golden Order).
Still, these groups fared much better than others, namely the Fire Giants and the Great Caravan.
Indeed, both of these groups were simply wiped out. The former in a war of extermination (after which, as we’ve covered, the sole survivor was cursed to tend to the neutered remnants of its fallen god, for all eternity), and the latter by being intombed alive, en masse, beneath the catacombs of Leyndell.
In both cases, the justification given by the Golden Order for basically genociding these two races (and supressing the rest) was the same: they existed outside the purview of the Golden Order. There’s even a word for this, one that’ll be familiar to all of you reading this: heresy.
📜🚫🙅♂️SIDE QUEST: Holy Heresy, Batman!
This parallels our own history. The stamping out of heretics by the early and medieval Christian Church almost needs no introduction, as it’s become almost legendary for how effective it was in enacting and enforcing orthodoxies that held strong for millennia.
Early Christianity was a melting pot of complementary, competing, and contradictory theologies with the divinity of Jesus (a messianic archetype) at the core of them all. Of all of these, the most radical and unorthodox were the Gnostic sects, which posited the path to salvation as the practitioners’ attunement with their own inner divinity (“gnosis”), and viewed the material world as the flawed creation of a lesser deity.
Gnosticism was a thriving spiritual current in the early Christian days. And yet, just a few centuries after the life and death of Jesus, Gnosticism had been all but erased as a viable mainstream (or even fringe) theology. In fact, were it not for comparatively recent archaeological finds such as the Nag Hammadi Library and the Dead Sea Scrolls, we likely would still know practically nothing about it, to this day.
So, how did this come to be?
In short: through the systematic elimination of Gnostic thought, via several powerful mechanisms.
First and foremost was the establishment of a formal church hierarchy, crystallized during the time of Constantine starting in the 4th Century CE.
This hierarchy, centered in Rome, understood that theological diversity posed an existential threat to its institutional unity and power. Thus, the Gnostic emphasis on personal revelation and direct spiritual experience fundamentally undermined the Church's claim to be the sole mediator between humanity and the divine.
The Church Fathers, particularly Irenaeus in his work Against Heresies, responded by launching a sophisticated theological and rhetorical assault on Gnostic teachings. They portrayed the Gnostics not merely as mistaken, but as actively dangerous to the soul's salvation.
This framing was crucial—it transformed theological disagreement into a matter of spiritual life and death, justifying the Church’s increasingly harsh measures against Gnostic communities and teachings.
Then, the Council of Nicaea in 325 CE marked a decisive turning point. While primarily known for establishing the Nicene Creed, it also represented something far more fundamental: the codification of orthodox21 Christianity, and the institutional power to enforce it.
From this point forward, this wasn't just about theological preferences—it was about creating a unified Christian identity that could serve as the backbone of imperial power.
In the service of this goal, suppression intensified.
Some of it took physical form, through the destruction of Gnostic texts and communities. Bishops were empowered to search out and confiscate "heretical" writings, while church edicts made the possession of such texts a punishable offense.
The thoroughness of this destruction is evident in how few Gnostic texts survived—the aforementioned Nag Hammadi Library was preserved only because some prescient individual(s) buried it in the Egyptian desert.
But perhaps the most effective tool was far more subtle: controlling of the narrative. The Church's version of Christianity became the only version taught, copied, and transmitted through generations. Gnostic ideas, when mentioned at all, were presented only through the lens of orthodox criticism.
This created a self-reinforcing cycle, where each subsequent generation was less and less equipped to even conceive of alternative Christian interpretations.
This multi-faceted approach—institutional, theological, legal, and narratival—proved devastatingly effective. It not only eliminated Gnosticism as a viable alternative, but served as a template for how the Church would handle theological dissent for centuries to come.
The message was clear: there could only be one Christianity, and it would be defined and controlled by the institutional Church.
Sound familiar?
So, yeah. And just like its historical counterpart, the Golden Order was just as zealous about stamping out heresy within its ranks as it was about eliminating outside heretics. Prophets who saw visions of the Erdtree burning, for instance, were often banished for their trouble.
And let’s not forget the Tarnished, who were exiled after Marika divested them of Grace—basically, they were excommunicated because their lord, Godfrey, lost his warlike zeal. So Marika basically pulled a gender-flipped King Henry VIII to get rid of a husband she’d lost respect for, and neutralize his warriors as an additional contingency plan.22
Whether in fantasy or IRL, stamping out heretics is really quite par for the course when it comes to dominant religious institutions, particularly newly ascendant (or currently threatened) structures. We very much see this in play with the Golden Order.
For some targets, like the Fire Giants, the hammer came down due to a not-unfounded fear that they (and their god) could pose a credible threat to Marika and the Erdtree. After all, the Fell God of the Giants is a fire god, which is obviously problematic considering the Erdtree is made of wood, and wood tends to burn quite easily.
In fact, by the time the player finishes the game, this fear will have actually come to pass, as the player (through Melina) has to actually burn the Erdtree—using the Fire Giants’ dreaded Flame of Ruin, no less—in order to access the final boss.
Same goes for the Frenzied Flame. And if the player goes down that route, it’s not just the Erdtree, but everything in the Lands Between that gets put to the flame.
The Golden Order applies a similar justification for its disgustingly relentless massacring of the Albinaurics, who they banish, hunt, torture, and kill just for the “crime” of existing beyond their purview.
This is a state of affairs in which Albinaurics didn’t have any say. But the Albinaurics were created by the Nox in the Eternal Cities, who had also carried out an attempt to dethrone Marika (which we’ll explore shortly).
And while the game’s ambiguous as to whether the Albinaurics were created expressly for the purpose of deicide, their mere association with the Nox and their history lends the Golden Order’s persecution of them at least some logical consistency, from its point of view (not that this in any way justifies its brutality, mind you).
Similarly, the Godskin Cult was stamped out due to their role in yet another attempt to usurp Marika as the One True God—and in fact, it was this failed coup that led Marika to reconfigure the Elden Ring to create the Golden Order.
Flimsy theological justifications aside, you can see the practical logic. From the Golden Order’s point of view, stamping out heresy is literally a matter of self-preservation.
But the most interesting of the groups branded as heretical by the Golden Order is, by far, Those Who Live in Death.
The Golden Order’s Sanctioned Death
“The Golden Order was created by confining Destined Death. Thus, this new Order will be one of Death restored.”
~Mending Rune of the Death-Prince (item description)
Marika’s theology—which is, by extension, that of the Golden Order—explicitly controls death itself. In fact, the above quote spells this out very clearly: the Golden Order was created by confining Destined Death itself.
In Elden Ring, Destined Death is another name for the Rune of Death, the codification of the process by which things… you know, die. Some people consider Destined Death to be an Outer God. Personally, I’m not so sure (like so many things in Elden Ring, this is very much in the eye of the beholder23), and I see it more as the natural process through which death occurs, made physically manifest as a Great Rune.
Regardless of these particulars, Destined Death is what causes living beings to die in the Lands Between. And not just mere mortals—but also gods and demigods, as well.
Marika, terrified of being usurped, killed, and overthrown as the One True God of the Lands Between,24 decided to remedy this by removing the Rune of Death from the Elden Ring and entrusting it to her Shadow-Bound Beast, Maliketh.25
Thus, the Rune of Death’s removal shows how the control of death was a matter of institutional policy for the Golden Order.
🪦🧟♂️🪬 SIDE QUEST: Dead by Rites
You guessed it! There’s another historical parallel here.
Like the Golden Order’s monopoly on blessed burial in the Lands Between, the IRL Medieval Church's iron grip on death and burial practices represents one of history's most complete monopolies over a fundamental human experience.
While religious institutions have traditionally been society's primary mediators of death—indeed, ceremonial burial is one of the earliest archaeological markers of human civilization—the medieval Catholic Church elevated this control to unprecedented levels of institutional power.
Central to this dominion was the Sacrament of Extreme Unction, the "last rites" administered to the dying. This wasn't merely a spiritual comfort—it was positioned as essential for the soul's journey into the afterlife.
The Church's exclusive right to perform this ritual created an extraordinary power dynamic: at life's most vulnerable moment, both the dying and their families were completely dependent on ecclesiastical authority.
Meanwhile, those who died without these rites—whether through circumstance, choice, or punishment—faced the terrifying prospect of spiritual abandonment.
This monopoly was reinforced through the aggressive criminalization of unauthorized death rituals. Folk practices, ancient customs, and family traditions that had coexisted with early Christianity for centuries were systematically outlawed. Local authorities were compelled to treat unauthorized funerary rites not merely as religious infractions, but as crimes against the social order itself.
The message was clear: there was only one legitimate way to die in medieval Christendom.
Perhaps most tangibly, the Church also maintained absolute control over burial grounds. The consecrated earth of the churchyard wasn't just a physical space—it was understood as a crucial waystation between this world and the next. To be denied burial in consecrated ground was to risk eternal damnation, a fear the Church wielded with tremendous efficacy.
This control extended to minute details of burial practices: the orientation of the bodies, the types of graves, and even the prayers that could be spoken over them.
This system created a perfect closed loop of power: the Church controlled not only the spiritual narrative of death, but also its physical infrastructure and social practices.
Families who might have questioned Catholic doctrine in life found themselves compelled to conform in death, lest they condemn their loved ones to spiritual peril.
Meanwhile, the few who dared to challenge this monopoly faced both legal consequences, and the profound social stigma of "improper" burial.
The financial implications were equally significant. Burial fees, memorial masses, and indulgences for the dead became major sources of Church revenue.
This economic dimension helped cement ecclesiastical power by creating a vast infrastructure dependent on maintaining this monopoly. Local priests, gravediggers, and countless others derived their livelihoods from this system, giving them a vested interest in its continuation.
The genius of this control lay in its totality: by positioning itself as the exclusive mediator between the living and the dead, the Church created a power structure that was nearly impossible to challenge. After all, who would risk eternal damnation—their own or their loved ones'—to question these practices?
This monopoly over death rites thus became one of the most effective tools in maintaining the Church's broader social and political authority throughout the medieval period.
Meanwhile, back in the Lands Between, the Golden Order takes death and burial very seriously. The “proper” way to bury the dead in the Lands Between is via an "Erdtree Burial,” with the corpse interred in an underground mausoleum or catacomb so that the Erdtree’s roots (which run deep throughout the entirety of the Lands Between) can eventually reabsorb the body for later reincarnation.
This is contrasted with pre-Golden Order burial practices, which involved burying the dead in graveyards or burning the corpses via Ghostflame.
In any case, the Rune of Death’s removal had the effect of (…can you guess?) removing death from the land. This secured Marika’s position, but also led to an age of stagnation for the Lands Between. Unable to die or be reborn, the realm’s denizens were reduced to aged, shambling husks mindlessly milling about the lands.
And that was before the Night of the Black Knives.
On that fateful night, Black Knife Assassins from the Eternal Cities stole the Rune of Death from Maliketh and used it to assassinate Godwyn the Golden, Marika’s oldest son. This event sent shockwaves through the Lands Between, which still reverberate to this day.
For starters, the sudden and shocking loss of her son shook Marika to her core, and is strongly hinted to have even led directly to her fateful decision to shatter the Elden Ring and plunge the Lands Between into chaos.
But most relevantly to this analysis: due to a hitch in the assassination, Godwyn’s soul was killed, but not his body.
So when he was interred in the roots of the Erdtree, Destined Death metastazied within him. It horribly disfigured his body, and then spread throughout the land via the Erdtree’s roots, leading to previously dead and interred bodies throughout the Lands Between rising up as undead zombies: Those Who Live in Death.
Naturally, the Golden Order immediately got to work trying to wipe them out.
Ghost Busters
"Those Who Live in Death fall outside the principles of the Golden Order. Their mere existence sullies the guidance of gold. Tainting its truth. And so it is the vermin must be exterminated... Down to the very last."
~D, Hunter of the Dead (dialogue)
As part of the player’s quest, she eventually meets a fellow Tarnished who goes only by “D,” self-described as a “Hunter of the Dead.” Following D’s questline and listening to his dialogue shows how the Golden Order’s institutional violence is justified through doctrine, as illustrated in the quote above.
The Tarnished will encounter Those Who Live in Death quite a bit on his journey, especially if he makes a habit of exploring catacombs and mausoleums. While doing so, it’s hard to see them as much of a threat.
Shambling skeletons, shambling zombies, shambling ghouls. Even the stronger and more powerful ones could not hope to meaningfully challenge the Golden Order. Not only are they felled quickly, but even the ones who keep rising can be quickly put to rest with Golden Order Incantations or holy weapons. The power imbalance is incredibly lopsided, and obviously so.
And yet, Those Who Live in Death are walking reminders of the fundamental theological faults in the Golden Order. They are also a visceral representation of the Golden Order’s failure to keep the people under its charge safe. These are things they’d rather people not think too hard about.
Or, as the Sorcerer Rogier puts it:
“The very notion of life in death defies the Golden Order.
By D's account, these defiled fiends must be expunged…
[…]
[But] these souls have committed no offence. They have every right to life, only, they happened to touch upon a flaw in the Order.”
~Sorcerer Rogier; dialogue (emphasis mine)
And as we all know by now, you can’t have people pointing out such a glaring flaw in the world’s dominant spiritual institution, however inadvertently they do so.
Therefore, the Golden Order says, Those Who Live in Death have got to go. And so, the Order’s followers carry out their task with zeal and gusto.
"Heretical" Death Practices
“I am the guardian of Those Who Live in Death.
They call me a foul and rotten witch.
Yet you still wish to be held by me?”
~Fia, Deathbed Companion (dialogue)
But not everyone agrees with the Golden Order’s heavy-handedness here. The Sorcerer Rogier, for instance, points out that Those Who Live in Death did not reanimate on their own accord—and therefore strongly disagrees with the Golden Order’s treatment of them.
But one character takes this a step further: Fia, the Deathbed Companion, is a fellow Tarnished from another realm who’s deeply sympathetic to Those Who Live in Death, and takes her…. ahem, sympathies… to a whole other level.
She also opens a window into many other death practices, some of which long predate the Golden Order.
“I lay with the remains of an exalted noble, to grant him another chance at life. To do so is the purpose of my being.”
~Fia, Deathbed Companion (emphasis mine)
Oh, yeah… when I mentioned Fia’s “sympathies,” I really did mean exactly that. She’s very sympathetic to the dead. The game is ambiguous as to what, exactly, she means by the words “lay with,” but either way, it involves getting far more up close and personal with a literal corpse than most people (whether in-game or IRL) would feel comfortable doing.
In fact, Fia specifically points out the taboo nature of her craft, and one gets the sense that it’s a defense she’s had to use many times:
“Do you think it vulgar, perhaps? Where I come from, it is a sacred act.”
~Fia, Deathbed Companion
This cuts to heart of this section—who or what determines whether an act is sacred, or profane?
In the Lands Between, as we’ve seen, the answers to that are mostly “because the Golden Order said so.” Remember, a recurring theme throughout this Volume has been that—whether in fact or fiction—the supposed sanctity or blasphemy of an act has more to do with power than any other practical or theological reason.
And in Fia’s case, her laying with corpses really doesn’t appear to be a fetish or motivated by self-interested gratification—she strongly implies that this role was chosen for her, that she was called to it, and she dutifully fulfills that role despite the high personal cost to her.
No wonder, then, that Fia holds great sympathy towards Those Who Live in Death, and an equal amount of disgust and contempt towards D and the rest of the Golden Order’s enforcers, whom she even refers to as “dogmatic brutes.”
After all, as Rogier pointed out, it’s not like Those Who Live in Death had a choice in their rising from the dead—much like Fia didn’t have a choice in becoming a Deathbed Companion.
And Those Who Live in Death seem to live a tortured existence as beings not entirely alive or dead. Indeed, the funerary traditions that predate the Golden Order hint that the dead are usually frightened, confused souls in need of guidance to their next lives.
And that’s without being eternally stuck in an unnatural state halfway between life and death, never fully able to inhabit one or the other.
Which is a theme that actually comes up a lot in the real world, too!
👻🗺️🛶 SIDE QUEST: Psychopomp & Circumstance
The figure of the psychopomp—from the Greek psychopompós, literally “guide of souls”—stands as one of humanity's most persistent and widespread mythological archetypes. In cultures spanning every continent and countless millennia, we find this liminal being who serves as navigator between the worlds of the living and the dead, fulfilling humanity's deep-seated need for guidance through the ultimate transition: death.
But the psychopomp's archetypal significance runs deeper than mere mythological convenience! This figure embodies the human recognition that death, like birth, is a journey requiring guidance. Just as we enter life aided by others, our ancestors conceived of death as a passage requiring experienced navigation.
The psychopomp thus represents both the terror of the unknown and the comfort of not facing it alone—a paradoxical figure who, like Those Who Live in Death from the Lands Between, is neither fully of the world of the living, nor fully of the realm of the dead.
This archetype manifests across the world’s mythologies with remarkable consistency, with fascinating cultural variations.
The Greeks gave us Charon, the stern ferryman of the dead, who poles his skiff across the rivers of the underworld—but only for those who can pay his obol. This led to the practice of placing coins on the eyes or in the mouths of the deceased, so they could thus pay the ferryman his fare.
Hermes/Mercury, too, served this role, guiding souls in his capacity as a herald and boundary-crosser, showing how psychopompic duties often fell to the gods of liminality and communication.
In Egyptian mythology, we find Anubis, the jackal-headed god who guides souls through the weighing of the heart ceremony, determining their worthiness for the afterlife. His role combines the psychopomp's guidance with judgment, reflecting Egyptian concerns with moral accounting after death.
His jackal form itself is also significant—it signifies a creature that moves between civilization and wilderness, between life and death, much like the souls it guides.
Native American traditions offer us the Coyote, another canid psychopomp, though one whose trickster nature adds complexity to its role. In many tribal mythologies, Coyote helps the dead find their way to the afterlife while simultaneously teaching the living through his prankster exploits. This dual role as teacher and guide reflects a more integrated view of death within the cycle of existence.
Meanwhile, in Norse mythology, the Valkyries serve as psychopomps for warriors slain in battle, choosing who will rise to Valhalla. Their role highlights how cultures often created specialized psychopomps for particular types of death, reflecting social values—in this case, the Vikings’ glorification of warrior culture and their concept of a noble death (which are both recurring themes in fantasy, Elden Ring included).
Finally, Japanese mythology gives us the Shinigami, a comparatively more recent evolution of the psychopomp archetype. Unlike many traditional psychopomps, the Shinigami are often portrayed as a class of beings rather than individuals. And unlike in more western mythologies, the concept of a “death god” was actually quite foreign to Japan until it opened itself up to Western trade and exchange. Furthermore, the Shinigami can also be portrayed as helpful or malicious.
It all goes to show how these concepts and archetypes can shift and change time and cultural exchange.
And speaking of which… it is striking how the psychopomp archetype has evolved to persist into the modern era. We see echoes of it in contemporary death practices, literature, and even clinical settings, where hospice workers and death doulas (consciously or unconsciously) embody aspects of this ancient role.
The psychopomp’s enduring resonance speaks to humanity's unchanged need for guidance and companionship in the face of mortality. This universality suggests something fundamental about human psychology: our need to personify and thus make manageable the intimidating passage from life to death.
The psychopomp, in all its cultural variations, transforms death from an abstraction into a journey with a guide—terrible, perhaps… but knowable, navigable, and ultimately human in scale.
So, what are some of the examples of this archetype in Elden Ring? Two of the more prominent are the Tibia Mariners and the Deathbirds.
The Deathbirds are the keepers of the most ancient of death rites, which involved burning the dead with a type of fire called the Ghostflame, releasing their spirits for eventual resurrection. In-game, they serve as optional bosses in certain graveyards at night (they also heavily resemble crows, which—most likely due to their feeding on carrion—have been portrayed as IRL psychopomps since time immemorial).
Tibia Mariners, meanwhile, are aquatic spirits that ride a boat while carrying a red lantern, said to attract wandering souls to them to be ferried off to their next lives. This is obviously an instance of the “ferryman” varietal of psychopomp, akin to Charon in Greek Mythology. Tibia Mariners are also optional bosses, and tend to be found in and around flooded ruins.
As you might have guessed, neither the Tibia Mariners and the Deathbirds have a place in the Golden Order’s framework. So, they are persecuted as heretical. In fact, D’s first assignment to the Tarnished involves hunting down a Tibia Mariner.
But interestingly, the Golden Order has its own version of the Tibia Mariner’s “ferryman” archetype: Rosus. This particular spirit guide is land bound, but serves an indentical function of guiding souls to their next life. In this case, quite literally: in-game, Rosus statues point the way to catacombs, and as we’ve already explored, the Golden Order mandates catacomb burials so that the Erdtree’s roots can “absorb” the dead so they can be reincarnated.
The obvious historical parallel here is how the expanding Church would absorb local pagan rituals and deities and refashion them in a more overtly Christian manner, allowing new converts to (sort of) continue their old spiritual practices.
🧞🔛⛪️ SIDE QUEST: A God By Any Other Name
Meanwhile, back in the “real world,” the Church's systematic appropriation26 of indigenous and pagan practices represents one of history's most successful examples of cultural absorption and transformation.
Rather than attempting to completely eradicate existing beliefs—a strategy that had repeatedly proven counterproductive—the Church developed a sophisticated approach of selective incorporation, particularly regarding death rites and ancestral practices that were often the most deeply rooted aspects of then-extant spirituality.
This strategy was perhaps most explicitly articulated in Pope Gregory I's famous 601 C.E. letter to the missionary Augustine of Canterbury, instructing him not to destroy pagan temples in Britain, but to convert them to Christian use and to transform local festivals into Christian feast days.
This wasn't mere pragmatism; it reflected a deep understanding of how religious practices, especially those surrounding death and the sacred, become embedded in the cultural substrate of a society.
The transformation of local death-related deities into Christian saints stand as some of the most striking examples of this process. In Ireland, for instance, the goddess Brigid, associated with both death and renewal, was seamlessly transformed into Saint Brigid, with many of her traditional ceremonies maintained but recontextualized within Christian framework.
Similar patterns emerged across Europe: Thor's hammer became a variant of the Christian cross in Scandinavia, while death-goddess Hel's domain was reconceptualized as a Christian Hell.
Burial practices underwent particularly careful adaptation. The Church showed remarkable flexibility in accommodating local customs regarding the treatment of the dead, provided they could be overlain with Christian significance.
Traditional grave goods, while technically discouraged, were often tolerated when reframed as Christian symbols. Even the orientation of graves—traditionally aligned with local sacred landmarks—was cleverly reoriented toward Jerusalem while maintaining the essential concept of directional significance.
The timing of death remembrances proved especially amenable to this syncretization. The Celtic Samhain, for instance—with its focus on the thin veil between the worlds of the living and the dead—was transformed into All Saints' and All Souls' Days, as did the Aztec ancestral veneration festivals which became the Día de Muertos (Day of the Dead) in Mexico.
As this demonstrates, the Church maintained the essential understanding that there were times when the boundary between life and death grew permeable, but placed these moments under Christian oversight and interpretation.
Perhaps most subtly powerful was the Church's adoption and transformation of ancestral veneration practices. In many cultures, the dead were understood to remain active participants in the affairs of the living, requiring regular appeasement and consultation.
Rather than forbid these deeply held beliefs, the Church channeled them into the veneration of saints and the doctrine of intercession for souls in Purgatory. The familiar practice of leaving offerings for the dead was transformed into paying for masses for the deceased.
This process of appropriation extended to physical spaces as well. Sacred groves, springs, and hilltops associated with death rites or ancestor worship were consecrated as Christian ground, often with churches built directly atop them.
This created a literal palimpsest27 of sacred space, where the power of the original site was acknowledged and absorbed rather than denied. The practice was so common, that scholars of folklore often use the presence of saints' dedications to identify pre-Christian sacred sites.
This approach helped maintain apparent continuity while fundamentally altering the power structures governing death and the sacred. Local populations could maintain many of their traditional forms of death remembrance—but now these practices flowed through, and reinforced, Church authority.
And this wasn't simply a matter of superficial rebranding—it represented a profound understanding of how religious practices embed themselves in human psychology and society.
The effectiveness of this strategy is evident in how thoroughly it obscured its own workings. Many of these synthesized practices became so deeply embedded in Christian tradition that their pagan origins were forgotten, creating the impression of an unbroken Christian lineage where none had existed.
This spiritual amnesia itself obviously served the Church's purposes, allowing it to present itself as the original and sole legitimate arbiter of humanity's relationship with death.
Institutional Control, Resistance, and Adaptation
“The Flame of Ruin is anathema to the Erdtree. But prophets sometimes glimpse it within the faith all the same. Sadly when this occurs their sole reward is banishment.”
~”Catch Flame” Incantation (item description)
Much like the IRL historical church did, the Golden Order simultaneously accepted “miracles” while also condemning “necromancy” and hunting down its (suspected or actual) practitioners.
But people like D were just one way in which the Golden Order exerted institutional control over the realm of death.
The hunters of the dead were a form of physical control. Another aspect of this physical control was how the Golden Order conducted certified “Erdtree burials” in catacombs, as opposed to “heretical” burials in graveyards, or even more heretical Ghostflame cremations.28
The Golden Order also exerted doctrinal control through its definitions of “blessed” Erdtree burials of those who lived in Grace, compared to “cursed” heretics and those who died and were buried outside of Grace. By contrast, in the old death cults, there were no such distinctions. Back then, “even the remains of tainted flesh were given equal treatment in death.”29
Finally, the Golden Order exercised social control via “licensed” clergy—prophets and confessors in the Order’s good graces (pun intended) were bestowed spiritual authority over the masses, whereas those who stepped out of line were branded as heretics and cast out (we see an example of this in the section quote, above).
And yet, despite the Golden Order’s heavy hand, underground death practices persist throughout the Lands Between, all the way up to the events of the game.
The aforementioned Deathbirds—those ancient psychopomps from before the Age of the Erdtree—are still around. They can even be fought should the player wander into certain graveyards at night, though they’re mostly happy to leave you be (provided you extend them that same courtesy).
In a clever mechanical illustration of their marginalization, it’s actually entirely possible for a player to finish an entire playthrough without ever once encountering one, as was almost the case with me.
The Deathbed Companions, like Fia, also maintain their own ancient death traditions. And as Fia herself tells you if you gain her trust, she is directly antagonistic towards the Golden Order and its agents—including her fellow Tarnished (even you, should you instead choose to challenge her plans).
Indeed, Fia’s objective is to restore the Elden Ring (which, as a Tarnished, she has the power to do), but in a way that includes Those Who Live in Death as part of the new accepted order. And she’s doing so not just on behalf of them as a group, but also out of a genuine affection for the undead Godfrey in particular.
Spiritual paradigms like Fia’s and Deathbirds’ ancient death cult are fairly benign. But there are also more nefarious practices, like those of the Bloody Fingers.
The Bloody Fingers are a murderous cult of former Tarnished, centered around Mohg, Lord of Blood—one of Marika’s demigod children—who himself worships a mysterious Outer God known only as the Formless Mother.
The Formless Mother, the source of all blood incantations, demands bloodshed as a devotional practice. Whether the blood being shed is the practitioner’s own blood, or that of an unfortunate victim, matters not (that said, the Bloody Fingers seem to have a particular fondness for butchering their fellow Tarnished, though as far as I can tell, there’s no overt theological or doctrinal reasoning for this30).
The Formless Mother’s thirst for blood and pain is so insatiable and intense as to border on fetishistic, and the Bloody Fingers have claimed many innocent lives in their efforts to appease her.
But the Godskin Cult takes this a step further. An ancient cult formerly led by the mysterious Gloam-Eyed Queen, the Godskins—so named because they flay the gods they murder and stitch their skin to make the robes they wear—would literally hunt down and murder gods and demigods.
They did so through the power of the Black Flame, which at one point was imbued with Destined Death, giving the Godskins the power to kill their divine targets. And at one point, Marika was such a target.
Although their designs on murdering Marika ultimately fell through, the attempt rattled her enough to respond by removing the Rune of Death from the Elden Ring and sealing it in Maliketh’s blade—thus making him the sole arbiter and dispenser of death in the Lands Between—and in doing so creating the Golden Order.
(See what I mean about power, doctrinal control, and so forth?)
Anyway, the Godskins, leaderless following the Gloam-Eyed Queen’s defeat, scattered to the winds, and are only found in-game on the literal peripheries of the map.
But they’re far from dormant—one Godskin Apostle seems to have taken control of a creepy windmill village in the Altus Plateau outside of Leyndell. If the player wanders into it, he’ll witness a gruesome festival where the female villagers dance creepily while flaying the men alive with a cleaver.
And yet another Godskin Noble seems to have found common cause with Rykard, Lord of Blasphemy—yet another demigod, and a former inquisitor. Rykard, following the Shattering, renounced the Golden Order and started applying his gruesome inquisitorial methods towards overthrowing the old order in the most grotesque and gory ways possible.
But the most depraved death practioner, however, would have to be the Dung Eater. Quite possibly the most disturbed soul in the Lands Between, the Dung Eater is the realm’s most notorious serial killer.
His notoriety, sadly, comes not from him actually eating dung, but for so extensively defiling the corpses of his victims as to forever prevent them from reincarnating through the Erdtree.
And if it were up to him, every single soul in the Lands Between would suffer the same fate. Naturally, this being Elden Ring, this is something a sufficiently degenerate player can actually help bring about. But the less detail we go into here, the better.
Magical Proscriptions
“This… is a work of heresy. Its incantations bear no lineage from the Erdtree.”
~Brother Corhyn (in revulsion, after being handed a non-Fundamentalist prayerbook)
The dynamics of power, control, and resistance that we’ve just explored are deeply reflected in the game’s magic spells.
Elden Ring, like literally every other fantasy game and story, has a system of magic, which in this case consists of sorceries and incantations. And here, we can start to tie this analysis with the wider themes of this Volume, as magic can be further broken down into spells the Golden Order approves of, and spells that it prohibits.
And this is also where we diverge from IRL history a bit, as even approved spells are very recognizably the type of magic that IRL religious institutions tends to disapprove of. But the intent and effects of these spells do align more with what our own history tells us.
And besides, next time you go to a religious service, observe the officiant’s words and actions.31 Pay special attention to procession, directionality, gestures, repetition, and the use of objects and artifacts. These are rituals and incantations in all but name—and therefore, “approved” by the religion in question.
On a similar note, sorceries and incantations in Elden Ring can be broken down into “allowed” and “prohibited” spells. We don’t have nearly enough time or space to go over all of them here, but I do want to touch on a few “approved” and “not approved” categories that touch on some of the groups and themes we’ve covered so far.
Golden Order Approved:
Two Fingers Incantations
Ancient Dragon Cult Incantations
Glintstone Sorceries
Erdtree Incantations
Golden Order Incantations
NOT Golden Order Approved:
Death Sorceries
Black Flame Incantations
Dragon Communion Incantations
Blood Oath Incantations
Frenzied Flame Incantations
Giant’s Flame Incantations
Thorn Sorceries
Let’s dive into them, shall we? Let’s start with some which the Golden Order either explicitly approves of, or at least somewhat tolerates:
Two Fingers Incantations
“The Two Fingers has high hopes for the Tarnished; that even if they should be wounded, even should they fall, they will continue to fight for their duty.”
~“Great Heal” Incantation (item description)
These incantations come directly from the Two Fingers—specifically the Two Fingers that reside in the Roundtable Hold, which is the “field HQ” for the Tarnished who’ve returned to the Lands Between to repair the Elden Ring and become the next Elden Lord.
So, just like each of Marika’s Empyrean children had a Two Fingers backing them, so too do the Tarnished collectively count on the support of their own Two Fingers.
As an individual Tarnished becomes stronger and seems increasingly likely to take the Elden Throne, the Two Fingers bestow increasingly stronger incantations onto them.
Like most incantations, Two Fingers incantations are cast using Faith,32 reflecting both the faith that the Tarnished place in the Two Fingers to guide them to the Elden Ring, and the faith that the Two Fingers place on the Tarnished (as illustrated by the quote above).
These incantations pass muster in the Golden Order’s eyes for two reasons:
The Two Fingers are agents of the Greater Will—and, in fact, are among the oldest such agents in the Lands Between, predating the Golden Order, the Erdtree, Queen Marika, and even the Ancient Dragons. Only the Elden Beast itself—the physical manifestation of the Greater Will, and therefore basically the Greater Will itself, full stop—predates them.
The Tarnished are agents of the Greater Will, directly commanded by the Greater Will (through both Marika’s orders, as well as the Two Fingers’ guidance) to restore order in the Lands Between. And this is even more so now that Grace has been restored to the Tarnished, ending their banishment from the Lands Between.
Two Fingers incantations tend to revolve around healing and support, primarily through increasing resistance to different types of damage. That said, there are a few incantations with offensive applications such as aiding stealth (by silencing footsteps or blinding enemies).
Ancient Dragon Cult Incantations
“Long ago, Godwyn the Golden defeated the ancient dragon Fortissax, and befriended his fallen foe—an event that gave rise to the ancient dragon cult in the capital.”
~“Electrify Armament” Incantation (item description)
These incantations hail from the Ancient Dragons who ruled the Lands Between in the earliest of days, way before the Age of the Erdtree. Dragons in Elden Ring are ferocious and powerful beings who are nonetheless sentient and highly intelligent… and who also happen to be immortal.
Despite this, they’ve long since peaked. Truly Ancient Dragons are few and far between, mostly relegated to the skybound ruins of Crumbling Farum Azula, their ancient capital city. Their descendents, meanwhile, are far more numerous and can be found throughout the Lands Between, but they’re far less powerful, more feral, and more mortal than their Ancient forebears.
As legend has it, Godwyn the Golden (the one who eventually got murdered during the Night of the Black Knives) befriended the Ancient Dragon Fortissax after defeating him in battle, presumably in a struggle to determine whether the Ancient Dragons or Queen Marika would rule the Lands Between.
Godwyn’s gesture of grace and goodwill in victory is said to have deeply moved Fortissax, and the ancient dragons cast their lot in with Marika and the Erdtree ever since.
But this is just one of the reasons why the Ancient Dragon’s incantations are given the Golden Order’s seal of approval.
As the original stewards of the Elden Ring, the Ancient Dragons’ lineage traces directly back to the Greater Will. So, even though they pre-date the Golden Order, this pedigree helps explain why the Ancient Dragon Cult was allowed to be practiced, even in the capital of Leyndell.
However, there are hints that not everyone in the Golden Order is fine with this. Brother Corhyn—an archetypally dogmatic fundamentalist if there ever was one—reacts with revulsion if the Tarnished hands him an Ancient Dragon prayerbook, calling it a work of heresy.
Still, it’s a fairly minor expression of disapproval, especially when compared to the other type of dragon magic available in the game, Dragon Communion. But we’ll get there soon, so let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
Glintstone Sorceries
“Even during the blackest nights, sojourns underground, or imprisonment in gaol, the stars are never far from a sorcerer's side.”
~“Starlight” Sorcery (item description)
We’ll cover these sorceries in much more detail in my next article. But I do want to mention them briefly because they speak to the power dynamics we’ve mentioned throughout this piece.
Glintstone Sorceries are cast from Glintstone, which are crystals that fell to the Lands Between from space, and are said to contain the life essence of the stars themselves. Anyone can cast Glintstone Sorceries, as long as they know how—but the knowledge to do so is exclusively governed and dispensed by the Academy of Raya Lucaria.
But wait! Isn’t this a source of power and life that originates from outside the Erdtree? You know, kind of like the death magic that the Golden Order so relentlessly suppresses?
Yes, it most certainly is! In fact, the Sorcerer Rogier points this out at one point, saying that the Academy “obeyed laws which contravened the Golden Order.” And we all know how the Golden Order frowns on anything that contravenes it.
So, what gives?
Well, the short answer is… they allow it because they weren’t able to stamp it out! And it wasn’t for a lack of trying.
In fact, Raya Lucaria and Leyndell fought a ferocious war with each other, with Radagon leading Marika’s forces to try and quash or subdue the Raya Lucarians. However, Radagon failed in this objective for two reasons:
The Raya Lucarians, bolstered by the insanely powerful Carian Knights, was able to repel the invasion;
Radagon fell in love with Queen Rennala, the Academy’s ruler, whom he then married, putting an end to the conflict.33
You know how I keep saying that power is what ultimately determines what type of magic is allowed or prohibited? Well, there you have it! The Golden Order allows Glinstone Sorceries because, to put it (maybe a bit too) simply, it wasn’t powerful enough to suppress it.
Again, we’ll discuss Raya Luciaria and its signature Glintstone Sorceries in the next installment. For now, let’s move on.
Erdtree Incantations
“This is a manifestation of the Erdtree's primal vital energies - an
aspect of the primordial crucible, where all life was once blended
together.”
~“Aspects of the Crucible” Incantations (item descriptions)
This is another class of ancient incantations, that date to way back to the earliest days of the Erdtree, before it was even the Erdtree—back when it was still in its primordial form, called The Crucible.
The lore’s quite fuzzy as to what, exactly, the Crucible was, or the exact form it took. But the through line between the Erdtree and the Crucible is made pretty clear—just like the Erdtree is the “shell” enveloping the Elden Ring today, so was the Crucible the “shell” for earlier configurations of the Elden Ring. you could say that the Erdtree is the latest form or manifestation of the Crucible.
Back before the Crucible became the Erdtree, it was a much more chaotic and primal force, which is reflected in the more feral and primal nature of the Ancient Dragons and the Beastmen of Azula who ruled the Lands Between.
As such, Erdtree incantations—though primarily focused on healing and support—tend to be more “wild” than the pure Golden Order incantations (as seen in the screenshot above, which has the player sprout an actual tail).
As such, you can see how the Golden Order, with its focus on order (its name is not without meaning), would then feel like it’d have to sideline these more primordial and feral expressions of the Greater Will.
Still, they remain linked to the Greater Will regardless, so the Golden Order can’t entirely do away with them.
Hence, its somewhat begrudging toleration of these incantations and the old order’s agents (like the aforementioned Crucible Knights).
Golden Order Incantations
“The fundamentalists describe the Golden Order through the powers of regression and causality.
Regression is the pull of meaning; that all things yearn eternally to converge.
Causality is the pull between meanings; that which links all things in a chain of relation.”
~“Law of Regression” / “Law of Causality” Incantations (item descriptions)
These are incantations that directly and explicitly originate with the Golden Order, and are therefore regarded as the most “pure.” Tellingly, these are also known as Fundamentalist incantations.
In Elden Ring, the term “Fundamentalist” carries a slightly different meaning than it does in our world. In the Lands Between, a Fundamentalist is not necessarily a closed-minded dogmatist (though there is plenty of definitional overlap here), but rather a scholar who seeks to understand the principles of the Golden Order through rigorous study.
This is even reflected mechanically, as unlike most incantations, which are primary cast from Faith, Fundamentalist incantations are cast using both Faith and Intelligence.
Which is funny, because a lot of Fundamentalists seem to be willfully closed-minded, ignorant, and hostile to anything that falls outside of the Golden Order’s spiritual paradigm (in this sense, the Lands Between are not so different from our world, after all).
We’ve already looked at D, and his almost gleeful zeal for exterminating Those Who Live in Death, motivated purely by his rabidly fanatical devotion to the Golden Order.
Then we have Brother Corhyn, a scholarly monk who places himself under the tutelage of the noble Goldmask, a mystic who spends every waking moment staring at the Erdtree and trying to divine its mysteries.
But when Goldmask starts gleaning truths that contradict the Golden Order’s tenets,34 this causes Corhyn such great distress that he ends up shoving Goldmask off a cliff, quieting the cognitive dissonance tearing his mind apart by writing off his former master and mentor as nothing but a raving lunatic.
Life imitates art, so they say (or is it the other way around?).
In-game, these incantations primarily provide healing and defense, though a few can also mete out holy damage, which is particularly effective against Those Who Live in Death and other enemies positioned as adversarial to the Erdtree in the lore.
—
And now, let’s get into some spells that the Golden Order generally does not approve of:
Death Sorceries
“Sorcery practiced by the keepers of the spiritgraves, where all death ultimately drifts.”
~“Rings of Spectral Light” Sorcery (DLC) (item description)
The sorceries of Those Who Live in Death, as well as their servants. These spells are wielded by Deathbirds, Tibia Mariners, necromancers, and Fia herself, and draw on the power of Ghostflame to both directly damage enemies, as well as summon vengeful spirits which will then attack them.
We’ve already gone over this lot quite a bit, so I won’t dwell on them too much here. But I do find it interesting that death spells are sorceries, and not incantations. And like Golden Order incantations, they’re cast using Faith and Intelligence.
This puts these spells in a kind of class of their own.
I’m not sure as to why this is, but the Intelligence requirement does indicate that one could learn these spells through study (as one can for all sorceries), while the Faith requirement suggests that these spells are, to some extent, granted by some external force.
Probably the ancient death god (that’s separate from Destined Death, as if this lore wasn’t already confusing enough) which the Deathbirds and their priests serve and worship?
If you have any ideas, let me know in the comments.
Black Flame Incantations
“The black flame could once slay gods.
But when Maliketh sealed Destined Death,
the true power of the black flame was lost.”
~“Scouring Black Flame” Incantation (item description)
These are the signature incantations of the dreaded Godskin Cult, which draws from the power of the Black Flame (not to be confused with the Ghostflame used in Death Sorceries).
The Black Flame was once imbued with the power of Destined Death, and as such was able to slay demigods and even gods. So when the Godskin Cult, under the leadership of the Gloam-Eyed Queen, targeted Marika for assasination, they posed a real and credible threat to the realm’s “One True God.”
Marika responded by siccing her Shadow-Bound Beast, Maliketh, onto the Gloam-Eyed Queen. After defeating her, Maliketh sealed the power of Destined Death in his weapon, making him the sole entity capable of meting out death and thus cementing his role as Marika’s “enforcer.”
Then Marika removed the Rune of Death from the Elden Ring, birthing the Golden Order.
Though no longer carrying the power of Destined Death, the Black Flame is still insanely powerful. This is reflected in-game, as spells and weapons infused with the Black Flame deal extra damage to gods and demigods, up to and including the final boss.
So, no wonder why the Golden Order frowns upon this one!
Dragon Communion Incantations
“Incantation of those who have hunted dragons and feasted upon their hearts. This is a pure and overwhelming power.”
~“Dragonclaw” Incantation (item description)
This is the other class of dragon incantations. But unlike the Ancient Dragon Cult, the Golden Order explicitly frowns upon the incantations of Dragon Communion.
Why? Because the practice of Dragon Communion involves eating the hearts of slain dragons so as to absorb their power. You see the dragon head in the screenshot above? That was an actual dragon, slain to obtain the incantation being casted.
Obviously, this is a huge affront to the dragons themselves—who, remember, are not only sentient beings, but ones directly linked to the Greater Will. So the Golden Order’s prohibition of Dragon Communion logically checks out.
But there’s another, equally valid reason: Dragon Communion is highly detrimental to the practitioners themselves.
Each time someone partakes in Dragon Communion, they lose a bit of their humanity, becoming increasingly dragon-like the more they partake. “But wait,” you might be thinking, “being a dragon sounds awesome! What’s the problem with that?”
The problem is that you don’t quite become a dragon; instead, a foul and comparatively weaker imitation of a dragon. Those who go too far down this path will encounter one of two grim fates:
They could either become a Wyrm, a feral draconic monster made of rock (and not the immortal stone of the Ancient Dragons), with puny wings that can’t even fly, thrashing around the ground for the rest of their lives:
“Those who have performed the Dragon Communion will find their humanity slowly slipping away. Once they fully succumb to their fate, they are left no more than wyrms that crawl the earth.”
~“Magma Breath” Incantation (item description)
Or, they could become a Dragonkin Soldier. Which is a bit better than becoming a Wyrm, but still a pale imitation of what the Dragon Communion practitioner probably had in mind:
Alas, the Dragonkin Soldiers never attained immortality, and perished as decrepit, pale imitations of their skyborn kin.
~Dragon Halberd (item description)
The moral of the story: if you want to harness the power of the dragons, just stick to the Ancient Dragon Cult. It’s harder, sure, but much safer, more respectful of the majestic beings you’re trying to take after, and (as a bonus) won’t get you in trouble with the Golden Order.
Or, to put it another way: don’t mess with destructive forces beyond your comprehension.
Blood Oath Incantations
“The mother of truth craves wounds. When Mohg stood before her, deep underground, his accursed blood erupted with fire, and besotted with the defilement that he was born into.”
~“Bloodboon” Incantation (item description)
The Blood Oath Incantations come from The Formless Mother (also called “The Mother of Truth” by her followers), the sinister Outer God worshipped by Mohg, Lord of Blood, and his murderous Bloody Fingers cult.
These incantations are said to directly wound the Formless Mother (who is said to enjoy this), spilling her blood onto the mortal plane, which then turns ablaze, becoming Bloodflame, a deadly substance which inflicts burn damage and blood loss on those it touches.
Blood loss is a particularly lethal status effect, as it shaves off a fixed (and usually very high) percentage of your total health, which means it can damage and kill even very high-level players.
I probably don’t have to go into too much detail as to why the Golden Order isn’t a fan of these incantations. If the very grotesque nature of these spells doesn’t spell it out clearly enough, then the depravity of the Bloody Fingers who wield them certainly will.
If not, then I don’t know what else to tell you. Maybe go watch some Cocomelon instead?
Frenzied Flame Incantations
“It is the maddening pain and unstoppable tears of those afflicted with the flame of frenzy brought into being.”
~“Unendurable Frenzy” Incantation (item description)
Another lethal and volatile class of spells, and one that’s also based on fire (noticing a pattern here?), these incantations are bestowed by the Three Fingers and the Frenzied Flame, which we’ve gone over way back in the beginning of this article.
I’ll go over the Frenzied Flame in more detail later on in this series, but for now, let’s touch on why these incantations are particularly worrisome to the Golden Order.
First, there’s the fact that the Frenzied Flame is the Outer God perhaps most directly opposed to the Greater Will, seeking to undo the latter’s work in creating and separating life by burning it all to a crisp, returning everything to the nothingness from whence it sprang.
Then, there are the effects of the Frenzied Flame on its adherents and its victims alike.
Those touched by the Frenzied Flame quickly lose their minds, as reflected by the fact that Frenzied Flame spells inflict the insanity status effect on both the caster and the target of the spell.
Insanity is a deadly status effect—if procured, it slices off most of your HP and FP, and leaves you in a staggering, catatonic state, utterly defenseless to block or dodge enemy attacks.
In-game, enemies and NPCs touched by the flame act less like people and more like feral beasts, ravenously wailing on the player, and shooting the Frenzied Flame’s signature yellow-tinged fire from where their eye sockets used to be.
It’s as creepy and disquiting to encounter as it sounds. Wander into a village overtaken by the Frenzied Flame, and it’ll quickly become obvious why this particular class of magic is shunned—not just by the Golden Order, but by basically everyone not under the thrall of the Lands Between’s vary avatar of chaos.
Giant’s Flame Incantations
“The Giants' Flame is the flame of ruin,
capable of burning the Erdtree.
And so, following the War against the Giants,
its ruinous blaze was sealed,
and guardians were appointed to watch over it.”
~“Surge, O Flame!” Incantation (item description)
The Giants Flame incantations draw from the power of the Flame of Ruin, the fell god worshipped by the Fire Giants before they were slaughtered by Queen Marika in the early Age of the Erdtree.
By now, you’ve probably noticed how all these banned spells are fire-based. That’s not a coincidence. As we’ve covered, fire is explicitly stated to be anathema to the Erdtree, to the point that burning the Erdtree is considered the First Cardinal Sin.
In fact, there may have been precedence for this. If you get close enough to the Erdtree, you’ll notice it seems like an astral or spectral projection, its trunk fading away as it gets closer to the ground. Some fans theorize that, in the distant past the Erdtree or some prior incarnation of it (maybe the Crucible?) actually was burned, precipitating the war against the Fire Giants.
And while the Golden Order was a bit… heavy-handed in its treatment of the Fire Giants, you can kind of see the logic in trying to snuff out a real threat to its power. “All’s fair in love and war,” after all.
But there’s another twist to this saga.
Although the Fire Giants were decisively defeated, the Flame of Ruin itself cannot be extinguished.
So in addition to cursing the sole surviving Fire Giant to tend to the Flame for all eternity, keeping it contained way up in the Mountaintops of the Giants, Marika also assigned an order of Fire Monks to guard the passageway to the Flame, preventing anyone from entering or leaving the desolate peaks where the Flame’s embers still smoulder.
But in time, the Fire Monks became enthralled by the Flame of Ruin, with many of them succumbing to its allure and basically converting to the extinct religion of the Fire Giants. A few of them even developed (or re-discovered) abberant spells that draw power from the Flame of Ruin!
It’s unclear to what extent Marika was even aware of this (indeed, it could have happened long after she disappeared from the world following the Shattering). But maybe she need not have worried too much, as the Fire Monks still seem to take their duty very seriously.
In fact, when one of their own, Adan, Thief of Fire, absconded with one such forbidden spell, a cohort of Fire Monks followed him all the way to Luirnia (on the other side of the map) so as to hunt him down before he could cause too much trouble with it.
In another parallel to IRL history, the Golden Order appears very adept at inspiring near unquestioning devotion even from those to whom it constantly gives the short end of the stick!
Thorn Sorceries
“The guilty, their eyes gouged by thorns, lived in eternal darkness. There, they discovered the Blood Star.”
~“Briars of Punishment” Incantation (item description)
Thorn Sorceries (also known as Aberrant Sorceries) are a bit of a wild card, as they’re the only sorceries cast entirely using Faith instead of Intelligence. They work by wounding the caster in order to cast thorns made out of blood, which then damage enemies.
They’re adjacent to the Fire Monk’s incantations, as Thorn Sorceries were discovered and developed by criminals who were exiled to serve with the Fire Monks as punishment.
So, I suppose that the Mountaintops of the Giants are the Lands Between’s equivalent of Castle Black in Game of Thrones.35
Not much is known about these sorceries, other than they’re considered aberrant, and that they’re “the sorceries most reviled by the Academy.” This hints as to why these are Faith-based sorceries, and not incantations—if these criminals were exiled from the Academy of Raya Lucaria, they would have likely already been somewhat proficient sorcerers.
And the “Faith” part is alluded to in the quote above. Apparently, these criminals were also blinded as punishment, and in their waking darkness, were able to make contact with an entity (perhaps an Outer God?) known as the Blood Star.36
This “Blood Star” gave them the ability to cast thorns from their blood. The Faith casting requirement reflects this, because (as we’ve mentioned), faith-based incantations draw on power from higher beings, as opposed to being unlocked through innate intellect.
You can see how even the game mechanics provide useful clues to the lore in Elden Ring. It really is a masterclass in environmental storytelling!
—
Coda
So, as we’ve seen, the Golden Order’s approach to institutional control in the interest of divine power mirrors that of the IRL European Christian Church during its ascendancy and peak.
But the Golden Order is far from the only institution in the Lands Between that purports to exert control over matters of the spirit. The other big one is the illustrious Academy of Raya Lucaria, which governs the study of sorcery in the Lands Between.
But we’re all out of space and time here. So, we’ll examine them next time. Until then, Tarnished, may the spirit of “git gud” find purchase in thee.
~Jay
Food for Talk: Discussion Prompts
While you wait for the next issue, I invite you to mull over the following discussion prompts. Please reply to this email with your answers, or post them in the comments—I'd love to hear your thoughts!
What do you think Marika’s endgame was in shattering the Elden Ring? What was she trying to accomplish? For that matter, what do you make of her as a character?
Setting aside the brutality of its methods, do you think the Golden Order is justified in trying to suppress alternative faiths and spiritualities, or not?
If you play a mage in Elden Ring, what’s your preferred flavor of magic? Intelligence (sorceries), Faith (incantations), or hybrid? Which are your go-to spells?
What other historical parallels can you think of for the Golden Order, and the way it went about consolidating its power?
What do you make about the fact that the Greater Will not only allowed the Shattering to happen, but also the fact that it’s apparently AWOL from the Lands Between?
Who’s the best Elden Ring waifu? If your answer is not “Fia,” “Sellen,” or “Roderika,” I hereby challenge you to a PvP duel for sullying their honor. DM me with your Steam username so we can set a time.
I don’t care what the in-game lore says or doesn’t say: in my headcanon, the Dung Eater actually does eat dung, and nothing can change my mind about this (this isn’t a prompt—just wanted to state it for the record).
Further Reading
The Elden Ring Wiki at Fextralife — An unparalleled resource for any Tarnished who wishes to dive into the game, whether to look up lore or weapon/build stats. — Link
The ENTIRE Lore of Elden Ring (videos) by SloughTown — This YouTube channel is jam-packed with thorough, well-researched, and thoughtful lore explanation and theory videos. If you really want to dive deep into the lore, this 36-hour long series will bring you fully up to speed! — Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Bonus (Shadow of the Erdtree)
Games Featured:
Elden Ring, developed by FromSoftware, published by BANDAI NAMCO — Steam | PlayStation | Xbox
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Tags
#history #lore #religion #spirituality #narrative #magic
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Footnotes
You know who I’m talking about! Hayao Miyazaki, of Studio Ghibli fame.
Truth be told, I used to be in this camp. I didn’t even make it past the tutorial boss in Dark Souls. For the longest time, I couldn’t understand the appeal. But playing Elden Ring really opened my eyes. Being an open world game, I always had the option here of simply backing off a boss that kept one-shotting me, and exploring the world.
In doing so, I not only acquired weapons and items that gave me more of an edge, I also gained valuable experience exploring the game’s mechanics, learning enemy attack patterns, and slowly adjusting my playstyle to optimize it for the challenges ahead.
To use Souls community parlance, I “got gud.”
And it worked! By the time I finished the game, over 100 hours later, I’d grown immensely as a player, and was able to confidently tackle bosses that would’ve intimidated me when I first started (and which still intimidate a lot of players, to this day), and even the somehow even more punishing DLC, Shadow of the Erdtree.
And let me tell you, it’s one of the most deliciously satisfying feelings I’ve ever experienced in gaming.
So, if you’re intrigued by this game but balk at the challenge, I encourage you to give it a go. Elden Ring is one of the best video games of this decade, and sleeping on it would be a big mistake. Step out of your comfort zone and try it out.
You can make it through, and you can enjoy yourself doing it, even if you usually balk at high-challenge games. I’m living proof.
And, as we’ve seen quite a bit so far, they usually are men.
Just in case you’ve been living under a rock for the past 20 years, he’s the guy who wrote A Song of Ice and Fire, the books on which Game of Thrones was based. For that matter, he was also heavily involved in the TV show in the earlier seasons (aka, the good ones).
There is some debate within the fandom as to whether the Greater Will is an Outer God, or a greater-scope deity that’s a tier above all the rest. I personally believe it’s the latter.
In support of my theory from the previous footnote: the apparent contradition between a “One True God” as the vassal of the Greater Will—which is also a god—can be resolved if you consider the Greater Will a “greater scope deity” above all the other gods, demigods, and Outer Gods in the setting.
Though the Erdtree predates the Golden Order, quite possibly by a lot (timelines are never precise in this lore), we’ll just have to disregard this nuance for now. In any case, it’s not particularly relevant.
Yes, I know. Don’t you worry, we’ll get there in due time.
“A war leading to abandonment by the Greater Will.”
That said, the DLC does introduce some ambiguity as to when, exactly, the Greater Will abandoned the Lands Between. It may well have been long before the Shattering.
According to George R.R. Martin himself, around 5,000 years.
The Elden Lord is the One True God’s consort, and basically the second-in-command. Godfrey, as Marika’s consort before Radagon, was thus the “First” Elden Lord.
The scare quotes are because despite Godfrey giving himself the title of “First” Elden Lord, he was not the first Elden Lord ever. We know of at least one before him: Placidusax, an Ancient Dragon. Godfrey was the First Elden Lord in the Age of the Erdtree, however.
After Godfrey’s exile, Marika then took Radagon as her consort, which itself opened up a whole other can of worms. But I’m getting ahead of myself here.
An intentional blank slate for the player to project himself onto, as is common in games like these.
Due to Melania being the (unwilling) vassal of the Goddess of Rot, as well as Miquella’s own designs on the Elden Throne as revealed in the DLC.
If you can’t recall, then you may want to re-read the lore introduction above!
Sorry… the Loathsome Dung Eater. Sadly, it doesn’t appear that this character actually eats dung.
To further reinforce his nefariousness, Shabribi is actually a demon in Jewish mythology that causes blindness. The word itself translates to “dazzling glare.”
Well, except for Melina, who (having abandoned you in disgust after your visit with the Three Fingers) vows to bring Destined Death on you. Even though supposedly everything was burned and reverted back to the primordial soup that preceded life, Melina is apparently still around to hunt you down (for that matter, you are still around as well).
I’m not quite sure how/why that is. If you have any ideas, do let me know in the comments, I’m genuinely stumped here.
A more practical justification is the fact that Marika and the Erdtree very much had to fight to secure their dominion, and thus would understandably want to nip any potential threats in the bud.
Sound familiar?
Fitting analogy, as the Crucible Knights are color-coded as red gold (versus the Golden Order’s white gold).
That’s a lowercase “o”, to distinguish it from the capital “O” of Orthodox Christianity, a formal denomination in its own right.
That said, there is evidence that the Tarnished’s literal fall from Grace was part of a 4D chess move by Marika, and that she knew she’d eventually have to call the Tarnished back to the Lands Between to try and reclaim the throne and restore order to the realm.
Made all the more confusing by the fact there does seem to be an Outer God that’s also associated with death, but is unnamned and by most indications a completely separate entity.
Most likely because she actually was the target of a usurpation attempt by the Gloam-Eyed Queen, an Empyrean, and the Godskin Cult. Usurping power is what an Empyrean is kind of supposed to do, and that is indeed how Marika herself ascended to godhood. So she essentially tried to kick the ladder underneath those next in line.
Marika, before ascending to godhood, was an Empyrean. And Empyreans are granted a Shadow-Bound Beast, created by the Greater Will as both a bodyguard (to guard against threats to its bound Empyrean), and a check on their actions (to ensure said Empyrean doesn’t go against the Greater Will, under threat of death).
I really hate using that word, as it’s become such a loaded culture war buzzword and semantic stopsign, so relentlessly and recklessly weaponized and deployed as to almost entirely sap it of meaning. But as a neutral technical term, it actually does apply. So I’m using it here.
And I do use the term neutrally—as this section will show, this type of appropriation wasn’t entirely negative in its results.
A what, now? A palimpsest is basically a written piece where the original writing has been written over, but in which its traces still perceptively remain.
Which is another IRL parallel, as cremation is forbidden in Catholicism.
“Mass of Putrescence” incantation; item description (Shadow of the Erdtree DLC)
Of course, this could serve a more practical purpose of preventing any skilled or promising Tarnished from fulfilling their goal of mending the Elden Ring and thus throwing a wrench in Mohg’s designs for his new order. I haven’t seen this explicitly stated in-game, but it does make a lot of sense to me.
I won’t point out or name any particular religion here, as this is so generally applicable that you’ll notice it in just about any religious service (though you may need to pay closer attention with some, more than others).
Faith is one of the main stats in Elden Ring. Stats govern your characters’ attributes, and can be increased by leveling up. The stats you can increase are:
Vigor (determines your maximum HP; ie, your life/health bar)
Mind (determines your maximum FP; ie, how many spells you can cast before you have to refill your meter)
Endurance (determines your stamina; ie, how many actions you can take (such as attacking, blocking, dodging, casting spells, and sprinting) before you have to take a breather)
Strength (increases the damage output of heavy melee weapons like greatswords, axes, and clubs/hammers, as well as your physical defense)
Dexterity (increases the damage output of light/agile melee weapons like rapiers, hookclaws, whips, and katanas, and also increases the speed with which you cast spells and fire arrows)
Intelligence (increases the damage output and potency of most sorceries, as well as magic defense)
Faith (increases the damage output and potency of most incantations)
Arcane (increases the damage output and potency of particular sorceries and incantations, holy and death resistance, and the player’s item discovery rate).
Well, until Radagon left Rennala to marry Marika, but that’s a fairly irrelevant detail for our analysis. And this article is getting long enough as it is.
Namely, that the Golden Order isn’t perfect or infallible, that Marika and Radagon are one and the same person, and that they’re as imperfect and prone to misdeeds as any human.
How many parallels can you spot between this and other George R.R. Martin works?
And, since it wouldn’t be Elden Ring lore without being even more confusing, it’s not entirely clear whether this “Blood Star” is just the Formless Mother by another name, or another, separate Outer God (or something else entirely).