ANALYSIS OF TWO EMBERS CHAPTER 4 AND HOW IT HINTS TOWARDS GAME MECHANICS AND UPCOMING PART 2 STORY
This document is a compilation of random thoughts and discoveries found (not only) in chapter 4 of the Two Embers Part 1, MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD.
The Vault of Knowledge & ascending someones spirit
One of the first vault scenes shows a lot of dead bodies of various sizes, there are children, teenagers and adults alike. All the bags seem to be branded with what looks to be either darkstone “brand” symbol originating from Hidden Forest or Vault of Knowledge one. They look pretty similar.
We then can see Lamed (Vault Elder) use darkstone on her head tablet to view the memories of Dusk Ember, possibly hinting on her being able to communicate through telepathy in a similar way too. It is unknown if all Elders or even all ancestors are able to perform telepathy or if it is exclusive just to Vault Elder and maybe Vault of Knowledge acolytes.
Dusk Ember is brought to the upper floors of Vault of Knowledge to have their memories recorded. For whom do they record all those memories? I don't know! Maybe for us Sky kids! Maybe they saw the end is near and wanted the next generation/civilization after them to know what the past was like. The memories seem to come from blue colored light motes that form into spiritual projections upon touching from individuals. It is possible that all those glitters we see in the current Vault of Knowledge are unused “memory motes” ready to record someone's memories.
We see memories flash around as they are recorded. From toymaker with young Dusk Ember to having fun with the manatee. The overlapping memory with real Dusk Ember could be just artistic choice but also yet another hint on them being Hopeful Steward.
The last memory we see is the manatee dying. A lot of people seem to hate this whole memory sequence. I personally see it as Lamed offering Dusk Ember a chance to say proper goodbye to their friend and also to offer this child some reassurance and be here for them when they need it the most, caringly patting their back as they cry. Nothing was forced, Dusk Ember went into this willingly.
After touching the spirit manatee while saying goodbye, we see it turn from blue to golden, possibly hinting to the spirit ascension we do in game. That also means this manatee has a chance to be reborn once the Light gets restored.
We see the manatee turn into a golden light mote. It could be because the whole memory is finished recording or it can be the manatees spirit itself. All of the other motes around glow golden too, was Dusk Ember able to ascend all of those? Or did they enter the floor of Vault of Knowledge where only finished memory motes are stored? Or something completely different maybe?
Dusk Ember body suddenly starts glowing just like a light creature and they pull the wooden moth toy from their chest and turn it into an actual butterfly that flies inside the mote. Could that butterfly be their manatee friend? Were they somehow able to make a “mini rebirth cycle” from their own light? We know mantas start as butterflies in their first form, does that mean manatees do too?
Shattering did not happen yet. We still see the diamond in one piece, half of it is peeking out from the ground at the bottom of this image.
The darkstone illness
The Last City uses a lot of darkstones for a lot of things and we saw some of them being directly used to drain light from light creatures, causing them to grow stones both on and under the skin and eventually die if exposed to it too much. Not only light creatures but also ancestors can be affected, growing it not only on their bodies but also masks (which could mean the masks are part of the ancestor bodies rather than accessory, they can grow facial hair from it too after all). Prolonged exposure or direct contact causes the condition to worsen. We saw the stones grow instantly on Resourceful Recluse right after knocking down the light extracting device.
“But we do see Elders using darkstones and they don't have any illness on them!” Well, of course we do. But Elders are not the same as ancestors are, they are closer to us Sky kids than to ancestors, both of us coming from the Megabird. And we do seem to be much more resistant to being affected by darkness and won't die that easily.
Maybe it is a special darkstone or there's some other magic behind it. We can see not all darkstones drain the light or not that much. Memory lanterns for example are powered by darkstones too and they don't actively drain light or cause harm. If you consider memories and everything we saw happen in the Vault of Knowledge in chapter four to be light substance, then yes it might to some degree "suck" light but it is unlikely. It still glows so it is not dead darkstone like that shard Dusk Ember picked up. And both Lamed and Dusk Ember are light creatures as well.
Couple of other possibilities:
Potency Maybe the darkstones used for absorbing light are more potent (stronger) than the ones used in weapons. Just like you have different kinds of radiation or different qualities of gold. Something like that. There are darkstone powered lamplights everywhere in the Last City and so are up in the Eden castle as well. They glow much less than stones used for batteries. They might still drain a person's light, but at a much slower rate. Bright glowing darkstones used as batteries are encased in pieces of metal for safe handling. They are probably hot or harmful to be near when the case is opened (will drain someone's light) or maybe both.
Size The stones used for light absorption are noticeably larger than the small gems in the weapons. Tsadi (Wasteland Elder) obviously has a bigger one in his even bigger spear but maybe it is just "equal to his size", maybe if he was big as a regular ancestor or wasn't a light creature (or both), the stone on his spear would be deadly to him too.
The "chosen ones" We don't know when exactly the Elders got their darkstones. It could be during the darkstone era, it could be during the fire era, who knows. Maybe their darkstones are not the same darkstones used anywhere else. Don't forget they were always Elders, they were tasked by the Megabird to guide little Alef the Chosen One. Maybe the Megabird gifted them those stones, either from the beginning or later. It lowkey reminds me of visions and delusions from Genshin Impact. If a god gazes upon you, you obtain vision that grants you elemental powers. It does not harm you. But those who are not lucky enough can use delusions, artificially created visions that work the same, but they rapidly drain your life force. Vision holders are more (but not completely) resistant to delusions.
Artificially created (ties to chosen ones) Humans are able to simulate certain conditions with modern technology to create synthetic diamonds. Maybe originally the darkstones were harmless once charged with light, just like the unrefined darkstones in Prairie peaks are. Unrefined darkstones also glow unlike the completely dead ones. The industrial boom quickly made darkstone ore scarce, so the ancestors might have figured out how to make synthetic darkstone (they were also experimenting on and possibly trying to create synthetic light creatures too as seen in Treasure reef) but with downside of it being "radioactive" and deadly.
The candle
I don't care what others say, this scene was absolutely beautiful. Not only was it homage to exchanging light with strangers in game, it was also a reference to the very first Sky related picture TGC shared on social media!
The Megabird reference is there too! Look at the shape light from the candle makes between people!
But what are they even doing with all those candles? Bringing comfort? Maybe! But to me personally it looks like they are about to perform a long forgotten ritual. Which one? Well, it comes from very old concept art but it recently made its way to the game in the mural that we can find where? In the forgotten temple of all places! The same temple Dusk Ember learned about candle making! Just look at the bottom of this mural! The movie even zoomed on it during the first chapter!
It very much looks like this “flame bringing” ritual from old concept art. Maybe the people will try to bring the flame back on the sacred mountain and restore the light? Maybe the lack of sun in Last City is because the Megabird is very weak now because no light flows to them?
The candles also slightly glow in the dark because they are made out of light motes. Just a neat detail.
The final scene
I'm really surprised that from all the various theories, no one really caught the same thing I saw right away. I looked at the colors and how each part is visibly a different color and just knew something is fishy about it. Something that TGC is hinting at us. As the nebula kept going further and further away, it hit me.
Can you see it? No? What if I crank up the brightness and contrast a bit then?
Still nothing? Let me sketch over it for you what I see then.
Crazy, huh? It also reminded me of this scene from one of the trailers. I'm positive we will still see a clash between Dusk and Dawn Ember in part 2 considering how open ended part 1 was.
But how am I so sure this scene portrays the Two Embers and not just some random kids? Because if you zoom really close, you can see the resemblance between those two.
Okay but what ties this scene to what was hinted in nebula? Well, outside of the basic observations of ingame murals to make connections, we can see both Dawn Ember (Alef) and The Ruler (Resh) having three points coming out of their masks. Besides that, both Alef and Resh wear the same piece of fabric as Stargazer had. It is way more obvious when I change color temperature to match each other.
Versus non color edited Dawn Ember in two different lightings.
In conclusion, while a lot of people were disappointed we did not get to see any more of Resh, I think we will see it in part 2. That the second part will not be just about Alef as a child but will show the whole growing up from Prince to King, from the Prophecy to the Shattering.
