i think i’ll first start by sharing my thoughts on the constant mention of BLOOD relationship in imperial thronesong.

first, let’s be clear that this is not a translation error. in chinese it says 血脉相连 which means blood connection—literally bound by blood.

it seems to almost always be used in a familial context, however i have seen some native speakers (i’ll link these below) share that it isn’t EXCLUSIVELY so. what’s important about this phrase is the importance it places on a shared origin. being made of the same thing. being from the same source. all things we are used to with calebmc.

my initial read on this line was sort of a “blood thicker than water” vibe, but reversed. “you’re my blood, regardless if we are related or not. this is how near and dear you are to me. this is how much i love you.”

to me, i still see calebmc as pseudo, but i think imperial thronesong is setting us up to finally learn about their shared origin. whether that means they were truly born from the same source (for example, being born of the remnants of the same collapsed star).

we’ve seen adam and eve tossed around a LOT, and let’s remember that eve was born from adam’s rib. she was born from him, they are made of the same genetic material.

calebmc are likely cosmic siblings/twins of some sort, and they have the same origin. they are made of the same material, whether that’s the same blood, cosmic dust, whatever.

he is her brother by blood. their existences are bound by their creation.

their specific omission of any information of EITHER of their parents i think supports this idea—they don’t have tangible parents that can be spoken of.

of course, this could as easily be a loophole on cn censorship laws about incest. i do also see the “blood-related” siblings angle of this. imperial thronesong takes on a “royal/medieval” AU in which this kind of thing is a common theme, english, chinese, and others. it would fit here, and i won’t deny that ESPECIALLY since…that’s how it was written.

but for me, the former theory makes a bit more sense.

side note, i was once again reminded of the idea that maybe they are related as a result of being born from two stars (or one star) when mc talks about the cryostalis

let’s talk about mc.

caleb’s mc in imperial thronesong is spoiled, greedy, ambitious, detestable even (caleb’s words). she’s unabashedly forward about what she wants and holds nothing back.

this is like our modern caleb’s mc, except seemingly more exaggerated. she gets what she wants at all costs.

as a result, caleb is the same. modern caleb’s actions and desires have always been “limited” by mc, in which caleb will always put her, her comfortability and boundaries, first.

but imperial thronesong mc has virtually…no boundaries. and this allows caleb to in turn ALSO be unabashedly himself.

it’s like, in this reality, we can see caleb and mc be MORE unapologetically themselves.

in this AU, we’re really able to see what mc and caleb’s true desires are—in a world where their relationship isn’t taboo due to their shared blood, but because of their opposing allegiances.

the difference between caleb and mc though is that mc’s greed does not just stop at caleb. she wants EVERYTHING. however, she wants caleb to be a part of these things.

she wants the throne, with caleb standing by her side. she wants victory and peace over caleb, but not to destroy him. she wants to rule a greater cosmos, with him supporting her.

her greed is born from caleb himself, and lowkey we see this in the puppy he gets her in which all her aides see the tayby as misbehaved but mc sees it as adorable, and so doesn’t train him.

of course this is an anology for mc and caleb themselves—we saw how much caleb spoiled her in imperial thronesong, and how caleb encourages it.

mc’s greed and desires are a cycle caused by caleb, and solved only by him.

what caleb wants boils down to mc. if he cannot be with her romantically, he is happy to be by her side. he ONLY wants her. his ambition seems to be driven from mc too.

to me, caleb joined the federation as a result of his ambition, just like how modern caleb became a pilot. but his ambition stems from mc. i feel there are many hints he joined the federation in hopes of creating peace WITH the empire/mc. their conversation in the greenhouse supports this

he wants her to always be his willful little sister, and with him leading the federation, he can make sure they will never pose a TRUE threat to her, as the conflict between the federation and empire started LONG before them. with him leading the federation, she can still be his little sister, and not the empress who belongs to everyone, the entire empire, and not just him.

i mentioned this in another post (https://x.com/xyzfy26/status/2006549308599054608?s=20), but what’s interesting in imperial thronesong is that the taboo nature of their relationship seems to be born from their opposing allegiances, him to the Federation and her to the Empire

their shared blood/siblingship seems to not really have EVER held them back. when she kissed him for the first time in the greenhouse, it wasn’t hesitant. it wasn’t shameful or guilty

and yet, they find themselves in the same scenario where theyre kept from what they want and must alter their fate, similarly to decoherence where they reject their fate of being opposing forces—not meant to ever be together, by choosing each other even if it means destruction.

we see a lot of similarities between imperial thronesong and the main story (same as we saw it with tainted cuts).

i think imperial thronesong does a REALLY good job at expanding on caleb’s line in indulgent scheme “i can’t say it’s always about you.”

spoke about that line here: twitter | tumblr

mc comes to the realization that she cannot and will never be able to control or own caleb. of course, we see that during the velytio warp betrayal. it’s not until the very end of the memory do we find out that the reason he did that was to protect both the federation, the empire, and her.

it’s a really good example of what he meant in that line. he does things selfishly. where she will never know what’s happening until after. and because of that, he is doing it for himself—he didn’t ask the empress’s opinion, permission, or allyship in it.

he just did it and yet again he did it FOR her. ALL his actions stem back to her, even if he does it for “himself”

another similarity i made another tweet about was between imperial thronesong and farspace bloomfall (here)

the similarity here is that famous line: “you can’t convince yourself to hate me with every fiber of your being. wouldn’t you agree?”

in all versions of calebmc that we’ve seen, they are adversaries of some sort (opposing goals like in lucid dreams, weapons to destroy each other in decoherence, or literal political enemies). but they will never be able to stay confined to that fate

she will never be able to hate him, even when fate, the empire, everyone around them DEMANDS it. they’d rather “kill” this fate, bend the rules of the universe so they can define their own path.

their attraction might not necessarily be for mutual destruction.

they’re on opposing sides but they want the same thing. they want each other. they want to be the only one who owns the other.

it’s a level of greed we’re only able to physically see in this specific au, yet it applies to every version of calebmc.

this level of greed is specific to this au where they seemingly belong to not JUST themselves. caleb belongs to the federation and mc belongs to the empire—their respective faction rely on and need them. versus in decoherence, X-02 and A-01 really belonged ONLY to each other.

but in imp. thronesong, they DO belong to other people (they both admit and….accept? that), and yet still will go to great lengths to make sure they can also belong to one another.

i could talk about so much with imperial thronesong because it literally reads like a myth. it has enough worldbuilding and conflict to constitute one. they isolate and touch on calebmc tropes in a way that a myth would, in a different au that allows us to then see those tropes in a different angle.

the constant theme of fate as the cosmos, in which the cosmos can never be controlled. how they’re not meant to be together, yet always find a way to be—even if they can’t stand beside each other that way (similar to the main story in which he found a way to be by her side, but as a result wasn’t “allowed” to be be WITH her).

the violent attraction and conflict that serve as a cycle that fuels their undying passion for one another. their twisted version of love.

these are all common themes we’ve seen from calebmc in the main story, decoherence, tainted cuts, really any version of them.

i will likely add onto this thread in the future. i need to read it a few more times—it’s a HEFTY piece of content. really, it should’ve been its own myth (or multi chaptered story some how)

there’s SO many different facets to dive into.

here are the sources to the above i mentioned for the blood brother line translations from native speakers:

So, if you haven't caught on already, all seven deadly sins are mentioned throughout this card.

I like to imagine the progression of the sins as the shape of an upward spiral that slowly grows in intensity. At the base of the spiral is pride, and we end with lust at the top. (Plsssss forgive me if any of this is worded wrong bc its the only way I can explain it 😭) This fits imo, because pride is the primordial sin (ty oomf @/ loreloe on ladstwt for helping me connect the dots) and the other six derive from it.

But here's the thing, this works. And honestly, it works pretty damn well.

What I find incredibly satisfying about the inclusion of the seven sins is that the exploration of them through MC's desires doesn't feel "sinful." Not once is she made to feel bad for her desires, because they are a part of her and should be accepted rather than immediately demonized like I have seen countless times with female main characters in other stories, especially romance stories that have similar themes.

Sylus is encouraging her to indulge because he wants her to gain a deeper understanding of her desires, which will allow her to understand herself more. MC experiences plenty of messy and complicated emotions as she's dealing with the results of suppressing her biggest desire in this card (before the kindled lol), which is revenge.

I'm assuming that because her aether core is in her heart, its dissatisfaction greatly affects her mood. And yay for messy emotions. Her life is insane, and I would love to see her snap more.

Sylus just lets her feel them and process them at her own pace—one of the many reasons why I find his character and his dynamic with MC so fucking refreshing.

Also, after giving it some extra thought and talking to some of my closer mutuals in the fandom space, it's looking like the seven virtues are also hinted at in this card. I will admit that I have my own interpretation of chastity/purity as it pertains to SylusMC, (kinda like how plenty of people have different interpretations of the sins and virtues) but it does look like there are solid examples in Darkbound Souls. Yes, MC's wounded pride keeps her in that city, but it can also be diligence. Wrath brings her face-to-face with Graymist, but temperance is why she's able to feel satisfied with her method of taking revenge without going all the way and committing murder.

The virtues aren't added as a way to compensate for the sins, because that is far too basic, and SylusMC's dynamic is far more layered and complex than, "Sin bad virtue good." Blah blah blah. They're there for balance. They already exist within both of them. Mirrors. Kindred spirits. Anything that these two see in each other is something that they've already recognized in themselves. The biggest takeaway from Darkbound Souls is that the exploration of your desire isn't sinful. There is no way that you can reach a full understanding of yourself if you are constantly suppressing your desires and trying to ignore that they exists. It is something that is a part of you, and sometimes you're going to have to get dirty to expose the root of it, then decide how you want to handle it.

As for MC, the process of acknowledging and satisfying her desires will be a lot for her to get used to, and it will sometimes require her to temporarily step away from the rules and restrictions she is bound to in order to perceive the full scope of them. That's where Sylus comes in. He is someone who has plenty of experience with desire, especially desire that is fueled by an aether core. Does he want her to join Onychinus at one point? Yes. Is he really beginning to lean into his fiendish side by whispering temptations over her shoulder? Yes (and it's so fucking hot.) But what he really wants is for MC to just fully confront her desires without hesitation and fear, and he will provide that safe space for her to do just that. Him removing the fear of consequence as she's in front of graymist so she can think cleary is perfect, and him respecting her choice to not kill graymist is even more perfect.

Just like her in this card, he expressed a clear limit and exercised restraint in Shared Bliss. "I don't give it (the aether core) what it wants all the time." He denies his aether core sometimes because not only does he want to protect the ones he cares about, he also wants to maintain his autonomy. If the core's desires are constantly being prioritized and indulged, how will he know what his own desire feels like? In what way does that feel free? So, of course he understands and doesn't judge her. Neither of them judge each other, and that's so lovely. With that being said, I don't see him leading her down a reckless and even violent path of overindulgence. As she continues exploring desire in future cards, she'll find that difference between satisfying desire and being enslaved by it all on her own. (And she'll answer her own question!) Sylus will give little hints and nudges, but he will mostly sit back and allow MC to figure out her limits and which desires she will satisfy.

I think what he wants is for her to get to a point where she can confidently say that desire is hers to command, just like he did. I think. Emphasis on think. Anything can happen in the current timeline, especially with their aether cores getting hungrier. We all remember how Sylus struggled with hunger when she absorbed the Spatium Core in death and rebirth. Future cards and main story is about go get interesting.

Meeting MC as a child - Year 2034

I'm not going to dwell much on his childhood just yet, because that would be much more broader thing and I still need to collect my thoughts on it on more detail from other cards.

What I can say is that according to the main story Chapter 7, Land Of Secret Flames and Nightly Stroll, Rafayel and MC met first time in this lifetime when they both were children. MC can place their meeting to be before "she was really sick".

Edit: Since Death & Resurrection was released, I absolutely have no idea when their meeting happened for now. The timeline is such a mess. My explanation would have made more sense if MC wasn't stuck in Gaia Research Center until the Chronorift Catastrophe.

I am assuming this actually references to her intense death-resurrection-death-cycle that is described in "Sealed in Dust" World Underneath story. MC was around 7-8 years old during that time and caused her memory loss from the times before her experiments, and the experiments ended in the Chronorift Catastrophe, which happened in 2034. The high fever sounds like an "explanation" her grandma gave her from her memory loss.

In the official "Fish" video released by the devs, it's mentioned that Lemuria was unearthed by an earthquake in the end of 2034. This is likely when Rafayel and the rest of the Lemurians had to flee Lemuria for their own safety. As the game year is 2048 and Rafayel is mentioned to be 24 (most likely by human standard), it would mean he was ~10 years old when he met MC and had to flee Lemuria later.

It could be possible that their meeting could have happened in 2033, but I'm leaning towards 2034 as assumably MC would have remembered to go see Rafayel again before Chronorift Catastrophe happened when they agreed they would see each other in a year. I will make another post some time about the life we know so far in his childhood in Lemuria.

His teens and adult life

I need to categorize this quite differently since there are a few main happenings that we know some bits of, but are still hazy with the details. There are a few, clear sections of his life:

His life with his art teacher and the butler

His life in Verona

His life in Linkon and teaching in the Linkon University

I'll dig in these in a bit, but there's still quite bit of gaps in his story, like the exact moments when he had to flee Lemuria - in his memories, birthday card and birthday event he mentions about spending time in the ocean as a kid, but at some point he had to come to land. It's really hard to place his early teens anywhere really, but I'll continue that point in the next section.

His life with his art teacher and the butler

There is a bit of conflicting information about him living with the old Butler and his old art teacher, it could be that both BA and OP have different cities in them. The first mention about the old butler in in Omnipotent Perception, the "Antique Shop Owner" being the butler he mentioned.

There's no mention about the art teacher in Omnipotent Perception though - or that there would have been another person there. It's difficult to put a duration around this time how long he lived in this unnamed city. He mentions that he walked the one path for three years and being the youngest student in "that" acdemic year. He also mentions spending a lot of time looking people, going into theaters or museums.

The first mention about his art teacher is in his first birthday card, Unforgettable Adventure. The dialogue is too long to screenshot it in from a video, so I linked the timestamp to it. Rafayel tells that his art teacher was a Lemurian as well, and he taught Rafayel that nothing from Lemuria can live on land and nothing in land can live in Lemuria. This sounds one of those lies that adults tell kids to keep in check - they didn't want Rafayel to wander off the ocean to find MC.

Anyway, in BA it's stated that the old art teacher was an alcoholic as well - Rafayel had to sometimes drag him home when he was passing out from drinking. He also mentions that he wasn't out much - which conflicts with the details he says in Omnipotent Perception, especially considering the fact that in BA, it's mentioned this was the time he wasn't painting much and in OP he studied in an art school. Also, he wasn't "technically old enough" to drink, whatever that means. I'm going to assume he's referring by being technically underage to his own reincarnation/slumber cycle, where he doesn't really die, but falls into a deep slumber. But that's another detail for some other day...

Compared to what he says in Omnipotent Perception:

These details lead me to believe the cities mentioned in Omnipotent Perception and Banquet Ablaze are different places, but I am not 100% convinced either way until we get solid information on that, like names for these cities or if any of these actually happened in Verona. Ooor, he's lying his ass off in Omnipotent Perception, which I feel like is not the case.

In Banquet Ablaze, he mentions that the art teacher used his money to get Rafayel and the old Butler out of the city, which could mean 2 different things - he either left with the butler to the city in Omnipotent Perception to study art, or they went to Verona.

His life in Verona

So far we know fairly little about his life in Verona and how long he lived there. Talia lived back then and still lives there. In Siren's Song anecdote we learn he leaves to Linkon just a few days after his concert where he killed Mr. Fallon with his singing voice. Assumably he didn't live with Talia back then considering how they met up in a cafe to exchange the documents Rafayel had asked her to get and she asks if he have got used to Verona yet. It also indicates that he was there for a short time.

During the first birthday event he had in last year. he mentioned that he used to work part time at the opera house to make posters. He isn't exactly truthful about it at that time, but he does mention that he was young back then. Though, In the anecdote Rafayel is described as a man, which could indicate being adult or close to it (18-20).

Something to note that the distance between Linkon and Verona takes several days by boat - and MC took a plane to Verona during Rafayel's 2nd birthday event this year. Also the note about his exquisite gold clasps indicates that he had some kind of money at this time, when in Banquet Ablaze it seemed he was financially dependable on his art teacher. He likely had some time to perform as a opera singer for a while until he set off to Linkon. During this time he still seemed not to be painting, as Talia mentions it in the cafe before they part ways.

His life in Linkon before the main story

In Addictive Pain, Rafayel managed to get his fame overnight with his painting "Illusion". When he got this fame, he wasn't living in his studio yet, as he lived in a hotel room at the time he was planning to take the teaching position.

It's not clear how much time passes between the chapters, but the last chapter indicates that he decided to stay in Linkon during that time he was an art teacher. The position only lasted for a year, and in the anecdote Rafayel thinks to himself that MC is still a college student, so around 18-22. In game he is himself 24 years old, and considering their age 2 years-ish age difference, it could be he was around 20-23 around this time.

He also met Thomas when he got to fame - Thomas being jealous of Rafayel's work, tried to get to know his secrets and ended up studying business to work and open the art gallery with him as mentioned in Unique Vermillion. Thomas has mentioned that he has been in Art management for several years already, so assumably he started his career with Rafayel. This leads me to believe Addictive Pain happened around 2-3 years before the main story, and Thomas's and Rafayel's meeting right after Rafayel accepted the teaching position at Linkon University, unless there's more information about that. Couple bits where Thomas talks about working with Rafayel (Unique Vermillion Anecdote / High & Low Culture WU story)

Assumably after the teaching position ended for Rafayel, he spent the rest of the time painting and waiting for the moment when he will meet MC again where the main story starts. Of course there are small bits we know, like how he tends to travel half the year around the world and him most likely seeking out other Lemurians and ensuring their safety.

Despite nearly every person we meet having an Evol, they are supposed to be rare. There is not really any information on how they evolve. They could have existed before the Catastrophe, which would make sense because everyone we meet is older than it, or be a mutation/effect of some sort from the presence of Metaflux. It is likely the former as Ever, a research company who seems to be older than the Deepspace Tunnel, was at least at some point, and perhaps still is, researching them. We know for certain that Ever has been around for a while researching Evols as there is abandoned equipment on the rooftop of the Solon Hotel, a place in the N109 Zone.

Due to this superpower, Evolvers excel in fighting and combat, which explains why Deepspace Hunters are also Evolvers.* We know that Evols grant their owners an array of different powers. Examples of different Evol powers that are cannon include; fire (Rafayel), light (Xavier), ice (Zanye), telekinesis (Caleb), energy manipulation (Sylus). It is unclear if Evols are unique to each person who has an Evol or if they come in various types (like benders in ATLA).

Evols can also be used to craft powerful weapons or have their power extracted from them, although it is unclear how either of these would happen. Ever, a powerful big name tech/research company, is the leader in Evol research and weapon development. 

On the note of energy extraction, a flux stabilizer (not to be confused with a flux nexus) is a tool that can use “stored Evol Energy to balance out Metaflux,” and is the primary tool for controlling the presence of wanderers. You can often find flux stabilizers in areas open to the public. It is unclear how many exist or how far their reach goes, but it is reasonable to assume that there are multiple, especially in any heavily populated areas. It is also reasonable to assume that there are redundancies too (multiple flux stabilizers with overlapping fields). Evol weapons, like the ones that Hunters use, also appear to utilize the energy of a Protocore, which reportedly strengthens Evols and Evol Energy. The Evol-enhanced weapons that Hunter’s used are designed to eradicate Wanderers without harming humans; how they do this is unclear. Hunter Weapons come in a wide variety (all of the weapons you can choose from are, including the one that Sylus tries to gift to you).