The true nature of Empyreans, their physiology and spectrum between them and regular people

I have been thinking about the nature of Empyreans and how the different way their bodies and personalities work, compared to regular beings, affects the meanings of common terms to describe familial relations - offspring, offshoot, sibling, parent as well as why godhood requires you to be an Empyrean

Let us examine what we sort of know so far about their nature (although nothing is ever 100% certain):

Their people of origin:

1. Most if not all are, to begin with, already descendants of a particular people that different from most - the Numen, the people that Marika come from. And in particular, Marika came from a village of shamans which may stand out even among the Numen. We do not know for sure if the special qualities that "shamans" stand out even among Numen. What we do know about them is:

2. There are architectural similliarities between the eternal cities and the stone coffins, and Elden John (the sage with the stone tablets depicted in statues) was some sort of leader of these ancient pre-Numen people. He seems to have been some sort of Moses-like character and there are two different types of depictions of him - one holding a single stone tablet, and one holding a second tablet depicting a tree and surrounded by roots, while the old one is dropped on the floor.

It seems to depict him transitioning from whatever original creed they had, to tree-worship.

Numen or whatever their predecessors were called seemed to have survived a massive cataclysm in stone coffins, with many of them getting stuck underground in what seems like dried magma, and perished inside the coffins.

But those who survived turned to tree worship.

Mix this with the depiction of a shaman woman turning into a tree in Shaman Village and Marika's affinity for trees, and it seems that tree worship had become a part of their culture.

So:

- Some if not all Numen have properties that their flesh can meld with other living matter, including trees

- Sacred trees, big and small, were a thing. And possibly they cultivated a single great tree that predated the Erdtree

- Their flesh can merge with trees as well, or become them, seems to have become a part of their culture at least in some places like the Shaman Village

- We have depictions of bodies in the Eternal Cities, similar to those in Enir-Ilim. If the Nox and the Shaman are genetically the same people, it makes flesh that whatever was done to the Shaman in the Shadowlands, convergently the Nox also figured out they can do to themselves, in an attempt to create divinity

- This is vague, but it seems that main effect from melding numen is that their living energy can be channeled into one spot, empowering a single being

So what is the point of all of this and how does it relate to Empyreans?

Well, we have a foundation that, to begin with, the Numen already have a sort of malleability - both in flesh and in their capacity to have either have their life force transferred in horrific rituals or into trees. So we are looking in both the property of physical malleability and spiritual. Regular humans can not do this - their flesh does not merge with anything else that is living, in fact they reject organ transplants. Their souls and personalities seem to be encapsulated as a single thing bound to the body and does not seem that they are in touch with or, or can in any way control the shape of their soul or to separate parts of their personality as separate entities.

Shamans may very well be the epitome of the Numen people when it comes to these abilities - and they seem to have done it willingly and benevolently. Tree worship is usually associated with harmony with nature and peace. Shaman Village is depicted as beautiful and the "Grandmother" that has become a tree (or fused with) looks peaceful.

We can only speculate what this ritual does - maybe life force is needed to grow a great tree, which in turn nourishes the community.

So while some - the Nox have resorted to experimentation in attempt to create divinity, the ones in Shaman Village seem to have a more humble culture.

But in both cases both cultures have a shared origin and shared biological properties that other beings (non-numen or non-shaman) do not seem to have.

How do Empyreans differ in physiology and soul from others:

Building up from their Numen or Shaman origins, at least the offspring of Marika (I do not know for certain who the Gloam Eyed Queen was or if the Empyrean Grandam is an actual Empyrean or if her name means she was a carer of Empyreans), we could see that what makes them differ from other demigods and powerful beings is that whatever made the Numen (and Shamans in particular) different from others, is super-expressed in Empyreans.

They have malleability of both the spirit and the soul that is rare and extreme to the point that they can separate aspects of themselves, or assume these aspects back and forth.

Let's look at a regular person in real life - your personality is mostly integrated, yet there are aspects of you that are compartmentalized, everyone has their "sides". Some psychologists have even theorized that everyone has aspects of them that they initially repress and should integrate - like the Anima, the Shadow, etc. The point is that you yourself are made up of aspects but they are tightly integrated into one and unless you have dissociative identity disorder, they usually stay tightly bound enough that they look like a single person.

But now, imagine an Empyrean - a being that has the malleability of spirit and flesh that is so great, that they can split apart parts of themselves.

It does not seem that Empyreans just have a "duality", they are not limited to just being two parts. It seems they can split apart aspects of themselves with different granularity and it seems it can happen unwillingly. Combine this with their ability to meld with others and the options of what and Empyrean can become or split from themselves, become endless.

In this case, what do things like sibling, offspring and parent mean for their kind?

Let's look at Malenia - she ejected offshoots of herself like Millicent - literally her warrior's pride that wants to return to her.

Biologically, what is Millicent to Malenia - she resembles her with red hair and is probably close to her genetically. If you were to examine their DNA, would Millicent come up to being Malenia's daughter, sister, or mother? My hypothesis is that she would exhibit whatever biological traits Malenia split from herself - in this case her pride and honor as a warrior, and she also resembles her physically. It is impossible to say for sure if an offshoot of you is a sibling or an offspring of you as we have no such equivalent in the real world. The answer could be "both".

Miquella rejected st. Trina and then went on to divest other parts of himself that are not full personalities. Which means his mastery over this ability they have allows him fine-grained control to remove selected parts both in large chunks (Trina) and small chunks, adjusting his final state with high precision.

Let's look at Melina, Marika, Radagon and Messmer.

How does Melina know what Marika said in he private moments with Radagon, when she called him a hound of the Golden Order, while also knowing what she said to the Tarnished when she took away their grace, and when she told the demigods that they will become sacrifices if they fail to become anything else.

If she was Marika's daughter in a regular sense, does that mean she was tagging along physically in those moments? If she had a demigod daughter physically next to her, during and after the war with the giants, and right before the shattering, how is she never mentioned, there is no throne for her, Margit doesn't mention her. She should have been royalty like all other, she is not an omen and was not banished. Furthermore, even Messmer was known by many to be Marika's son, but no mention of Melina.

It is implied that Melina is Messmer's sister too.

So - here is a big problem that arises - if we look at what we know about Empyrean physiology and all the big theories about Melina:

- that she is an offshoot of Marika like Millicent and all other examples of Empyreans splitting

- or that Marika was the GEQ and split that part of herself into Melina

- or if the GEQ was someone else, but aspects of her went into Marika which she then passed to her daughter via birth or via creating an offshoot

If the properties theorized here about the Empyreans are correct, then just by examining Melina, it would be impossible to tell which one it is.

If you were to create an offshoot in real life of yourself, it would be a being that genetically resembles you to high degree, yet some traits that you have will be removed and passed onto the offshoot.

So if you want to separate your anger, if you have anger issues, you create an offshoot that has anger issues and you become more passive. Then, biologists examine you and then what will they determine? Are you siblings or parent-child? And who does the test say is the parent and who the child? It may very well all be true.

So just by looking at Melina, all theories seem plausible.

So an examination of her would not be enough to say for sure, we would need to examine the chronological events too, which unfortunately we are not shown in the game - we do not know her exact birth. But it seems like all the theories of her are plausible, due to what Empyreans can do physically and spiritually, which blurs the lines of things that in real life have exact separate meanings - siblings, offspring, etc.

Why can only Empyreans use the Divine Gate?

So, point 2 builds on point 1, and now we build up on point 2. Take this with a huge grain of salt, as since nothing is 100% certain in point 1, then the premises that point 2 are not rock solid, so neither are the premises for point 3. We are dealing with probabilities here based on the incomplete puzzle pieces of lore we are given.

If we assume that the properties Empyreans have are as discussed in point 2, then this allows them to perform a quantum leap of sorts above all other beings, to do something impossible to others, but required to reach divinity - the ability to purify themselves by divesting "impurities", similar to the alchemical process of creating the philosopher's stone.

There are two big questions here:

- The qualities that Miquella divested himself of seem to relate to personal attachments, ability to love, doubt, fear, etc, but why specifically those?

- What happens if you use the gate before purifying yourself, before becoming the "philosopher's stone"?

For the first one, it seems to be a not so uncommon trope, that to achieve a greater good and change the world, you must become more ambitious ruthless and may eventually lose yourself. Maybe this is just another cautionary tale - that a being with regular human doubts and attachments you could not reach that level, and yet by losing them you become no better than the tyrants you wish to overthrow

For the second one - all I really have is baseless speculation, but let's make some wild guesses:

- Taking up the life force of countless shamans and sinners grafted together may require focus and determination that regular beings do not possess, therefore only some who has rid themselves of all regular human qualities that would interfere with their ambition and long-term goals, could maintain the process at all

- Maybe an Empyreans fine-grained control over the malleability of their body and spirit is needed to "interface" with the device, as it is a machine made of bodies and does not seem to have any actual switches to turn it on or off. Maybe even amongst Empyreans, you need to be a complete master over your Empyrean properties to even activate the gate

- Maybe an un-purified being walking into an activated gate would short-circuit and explode or the lack of focus would cause them to just mutate horiffically

Miquella is certainly a complete master off all things related to malleability of flesh and spirit. If Godrick was a poor imitation, Miquella has shown he is the real deal - not only can he divest parts of himself with extreme precision, but can work with the bodies and spirits of others - like putting Radahn in Mohg's body.

It seems that at a certain point an Empyrean can become a complete master of all things body and spirit and is able to shape living beings and souls to their liking, as clay.

This is already god-like even before walking in the Gate of Divinity and taking in the Elden Ring.

I think the final form of Miquella would have been something truly terrifying - like a god-like version of Mahito from Jujutsu Kaisen. For those who don't know, it's a fictional character, a cursed spirit that can perceive his own soul and reshape his soul and body and reshape the souls and bodies of others.

Going from the spectrum of a normal person to a shaman to an Empyrean, we go exactly to this point - a being for whom spirit and flesh are like clay, a complete mastery over life and death.

Unfortunately, to use the divine gate, he has rid of him of all warm qualities we could like in a benevolent leader, thus he had to be put down.

I wonder if Marika went through the same thing and went from a regular Numen girl to an ambitious and ruthless tyrant. I wonder where she divested her love, or maybe she did the opposite. Maybe Radagon is her desire to rule and to dogmatically enforce the golden order, while she kept her ability to love in herself? Why else would she defy the GW and shatter the ring. Could be that the end she was good after all and Radagon was all her tyrannical aspects that tried to overpower her.

One more thing I may add is that it doesn't seem that extremely powerful characters may develop these traits. Powerful sorcerers have shown to cast great spells, to be able to transfer themselves to other bodies, etc, yet we have no example of anyone ever becoming an Empyrean. It seems to be determined by fate from birth, is an innate trait that you either have or don't. This is why our Tarnished can never use the Divine Gate no matter how powerful we become, even if we physically managed to overpower Radahn and Miquella.

Empyraens have one eye sealed - always the left one

We have never seen Marika's open eyes, not even in statues except ONE - the one in the roundtable hold (see below). In cutscenes her hair always obscures her face, the exact same with Miquella.

We have never seen Malenia's eyes either, we do not know if she lost them due to the rot or never had them in the first place.

It may be that Empyreans have only one eye, for whatever reason.

Remember what Ansbach said:

"I can hardly believe it, he's divested himself of his very eye. Tender Miquella's eye is no mere morsel of flesh. It is a vessel of soaring grace, proof of his empyrean lineage. I wonder, does Miquella the Kind intend to sever his very birthright? His fate as a child of the Erdtree?"

His eye, singular.

Ranni, an Empyraen, in her doll/spirit for seems to have one eye sealed. Her original body is too burned to make out details in her face.

Marika, in-game is partially shattered, you can not tell what one side of her face was supposed to be.

Messmer and Melina, havily implied to be siblings and children of Marika, have one eye sealed to begin with. Then Messmer had the other one replace with a seal due to the serpent.

What is it about this part of their nature? Why would they seal one eye?

- It is heavily implied grace is stored in the eyes, and furthermore, when you attain powers of different outer gods - like the Frenzied Flame, Formless Mother, etc, the influence shows physically in your eyes.

- Those given grace by Marika or the Erdtree have golden eyes.

- It seems it's ALWAYS the left eye

- Marika's statue in the roundtable hold has ONE eye close - the LEFT one

- The Grandmother in shaman village has her left eye missing

- Some have pointed out - the Haligtree statue of someone embracing child malenia with her limbs still intact, and Miquella, has the exact same mesh shape as Marika's face in all her other statues, even tho people speculated it's Godwyn. The statue also has closed eyes

- Examining Marika's ingame model before the Radagon fight, the left side of her face is still somewaht intact, but her eyes are both closed and look extremely sunken and tired, plus the stone-like texture makes it impossible to say if there is an eye under that eyelid

- Radagon has no right eye, however this could be a red herring, it may simply be petrified due to him being broken, turned to stone, etc

It seems that characters in the Lands Between or Shadowlands are somewhat knowledgeable - at least Ansbach seems to know something about the significance of Empyrean eyes.

I very strongly believe that for whatever reason Miquella removed his one right eye, Marika did the same, to become a god.

So why do Empyraens have only one right eye, and why must you remove it to become a god?

And how does it relate to the fact that it seems runes and grace are stored in the eyes?

Let's look at what Ansbach said:

"It is a vessel of soaring grace, proof of his empyrean lineage" - if grace is stored in the eyes, then in addition to other qualities of Empyraens, it seems their capacity to store grace is greater than that of other people. But how would it benefit Miquella to sever it, is it to sever all ties that the agents of the GW may use to control him? Grace could guide people, but what it if also can subjugate them? Assuming Radagon is only missing an eye due to petrification and Marika's statue in the Roundtable hold is her last true depiction, then Marika still had her Empyraen right eye, yet Miquella is removing it. So to him it's a hinderance - either his enemies can use it against him, or he had to sever his ties to his lineage and mother so it may be easier to defeat her without feeling sorrow-

- "his very birthright? His fate as a child of the Erdtree" - this just adds to the previous point. We already have a precendent where an Empyraen burned her entire flesh - Ranni, to escape her "fate". Fate in this case seems to be trapped in the plants of cosmic monsters like the fingers, their mother Metyr and the Elden Beast. Possibly Miquella discarding his eye is similar to what Ranni did, but due to his mastery of the body and soul he could do it in a more fine-grained manner instead of having to burn his entire body.

I think the part about the eyes is the most interesting mystery, we simply do not know why sealing or removing the left one is needed, but it seems to originate before even Marika's divinity.

The "grandmother" seems to have the left eye missing. She may very well have been what is later called Empyraen. Maybe the greatest shamans of each generation, the village elders were Empyraens and used their power to benefit their community.