Kori Rambles

PART ONE: THE PRINCESS

Rythian’s old writing on tumblr gives us the story of The Princess, or the Ender Dragon. She was a smart, driven woman who was haunted by the power of death. When her father died she dove into her studies and attempted a ritual to stop death’s march.

She makes a ritual, and it goes horribly wrong. Her kingdom, the Realm of Dawn, withers and dies, and she is left corrupted but impossibly powerful, and also immortal.

She must retain some of her intelligence, as she is able to mourn her parents and her kingdom, and from further writing we know she started to devise a plot to invade the other realms.

Rythian is taken as a young child, and the now Queen is smart enough to raise this human boy, and also to train him to fight and use End magic. Her purpose is unclear immediately. Whether she seeks to drain these realms in order to restore her own, or whether she’s gone mad and purely seeks to destroy is unknown currently, but either way she raises Rythian as her instrument in this.

It’s not a stretch to associate this with a parental bond, and with the notable absence of the Dragon Egg in any of Rythian’s writings about Blackrock, it's possible he filled that role for the Queen. The Next Generation. If anything happened to her, Rythian, her smart warlord, could potentially take on that role. Not that I think she believed she would be killable.

She is, though, and we know Rythian has killed her. 

The Queen harbored all of the magic of the Realm of Dawn, and so killing her released that energy. In her attempts to stop death, she reverses this and sends out a wave of energy that kills everything in its path, the TEEF. This has been contained, though whether it still is by the time of Dawnlight we don’t know yet.

PART TWO: THE THRONE

The seat of power in a realm seems to hold massive power, not just over its people but its entire realm. The Twilight, likely Zoeya before her memory loss, are able to hold up a realm-wide barrier to keep out the invading Endermen, and it’s implied Zoeya and/or Rythian used this power again to contain the TEEF. Thrones have also been referenced again in Dawnlight, with finding the Twilight Throne being a major goal for KRB.

The Queen, as the throne of the Dawn, had similar powers, and its possible taking that power would allow the containment of its magic again.

This is the crux of this theory. Rythian, as the successor to the Realm of Dawn, must reclaim the realm's magic and contain it, becoming the new King of the End.

PART THREE: EVIDENCE?

Royalty. Between the Queen, Zoeya, and the Mushrooms, there’s a lot of royalty in Blackrock. For Rythian to also be of vaguely royal position just makes sense. Two kids who didn’t wanna be rulers being forced into that role as adults to save the world fits them. (Though, a counterpoint is the perceived plainness of Rythian before he was taken. He wasn’t chosen or anything, he just got taken because his parents were scientists. Normal ass kid.)

The Egg. As previously noted, the Egg is absent from all of Rythian’s writing. This could mean nothing. It just might’ve complicated the original story, or any other possible reason for omission that isn't relevant. Or, the lack of an Egg is to put Rythian as the sole successor.

This is potentially backed up by Rythian’s arrival in Dawnlight. He’s in a huge black and purple egg that glows with a strange magic. It’s literally the Dragon Egg, just person sized.

PART FOUR: STORY PARALLELS

Rythian is a smart, driven man haunted by the power of Death. 

Rythian also seems very caught up on his morality in Dawnlight. He fears he was a bad person, and while we know he’s not, it's easy to see how from small moments he could be perceived as an antagonistic force. Rythian has the capacity for violence, and outbursts of anger, and self destruction that parallel the Queen very noticeably.

We hit a blank spot in canon here, as after they head for the Twilight again we have no further info on those plans. We do know, however, that whatever happened led to Rythian being flung into another world without his memories. I feel there are three potential options here.

With the release of the TEEF, Rythian’s entire goal is to prevent it from spreading and killing everything he cares about. We know he performed a great deal of magic, “draining his reserves”, considering his hair is almost entirely lightened. Rythian would’ve been willing to try anything.

There is also the potential parallel between Zoeya and Rythian both losing their memories. If Blackrock is about the recovery of Zoeya's memories of her role as the Twilight throne, is Dawnlight about Rythian finding his role as the End Throne?

ONE: THIS IS ALL PART OF THE PLAN

Sort of. The memory loss doesn’t seem to have been anticipated, or at least not to the extent it currently is. Since he can’t read the runes he was given as instruction.

Rythian has been sent here for a reason, potentially to find something specific in this world, or to find someone specific like the scholar. The key to harnessing the Throne of the Dawn is in this world, and Rythian is willingly going along with this plan.

TWO: OOPS, ALL RUNAWAYS.

You know what else Blackrock has a lot of? Runaways!

Rythian escaped his role in the End, Zoeya ran away from her role in the Twilight, Teep escaped Lalna, Zoeya escapes jail, etc etc.

Rythian is in the wrong place, or accidentally the right place, after running away from the plan to harness the End Throne. I do not think he would abandon Zoeya, or go against his resolve to stop the TEEF, but this is a man who has made many many impulsive and rash decisions. This would entail him coming to terms with his role, with Kirsty and Briony’s respective stories both having themes of representing your home.

THREE: YOU EVER PLAYED BREATH OF THE WILD?

I mention this only because I know Rythian’s a zelda fan and the similarities haven’t escaped me, even if fully unintentional. This was a silly one, if you couldn’t tell.

The Princess holds back the great evil, her magic the only thing stopping the apocalypse. Far away, and without his memories, her blond knight must restore his memories and save the day.

Zoeya is acting as a battery to power this new barrier. I don’t believe she’s trapped in a crystal somewhere, I doubt Rythian would lock her down like that completely, but this does seem a very likely position for her to be in.

Rythian must restore his strength, find new information from the Scholar, and then return to the End to defeat Calamity- The Ender Dragon.

PART FIVE: THE LIGHT OF DAWN

Either way, I think Rythian will take the throne of the Realm of Dawn and become, at least temporarily, its new King. He will be able to return it to either its neutral End state and hold the magic himself, or entirely restore it back to the Realm of Dawn.

His appearance in the Dragon Egg, the Lotus being a symbol of Rebirth, the parallels of Zoeya and Rythian as rulers of the Twilight and Dawn. It just adds up. 

With the Dragon dead, and the realm’s magic destroying everything in its path, it will take her Warlord Mage to contain it.