[TGO SPOILERS] Head on a pole

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« Reply #45 on: October 05, 2016, 11:42:07 am »
Alright, I get what you are saying, that Onkis is essentially an avatar of the Head on the Pole.  I'm still not really buying on it, because I feel like the Darkness that Comes Before is the Gods and the Head is your own head, reflected.  I mean, I could be wrong, but that's how I am currently inclined to lean on it.
I am a warrior of ages, Anasurimbor. . . ages. I have dipped my nimil in a thousand hearts. I have ridden both against and for the No-God in the great wars that authored this wilderness. I have scaled the ramparts of great Golgotterath, watched the hearts of High Kings break for fury. -Cet'ingira

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« Reply #46 on: October 05, 2016, 01:17:41 pm »
Alright, I get what you are saying, that Onkis is essentially an avatar of the Head on the Pole.  I'm still not really buying on it, because I feel like the Darkness that Comes Before is the Gods and the Head is your own head, reflected.  I mean, I could be wrong, but that's how I am currently inclined to lean on it.

H, come on man, you gotta give somewhere. I can't make this shit up, you know this.


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The idol was worked in white marble, eyes closed with the sunken look of the dead. At first glance she appeared to be the severed head of a woman , beautiful yet vaguely common, mounted on a pole. Anything more than a glance, however, revealed the pole to be a miniature tree, like those cultivated by the ancient Norsirai, only worked in bronze. Branches poked through her parted lips and swept across her face—nature reborn through human lips. Other branches reached behind to breakthrough her frozen hair. Her image never failed to stir something within him, and this is why he always returned to her: she was this stirring, the dark place where the flurries of his thought arose. She came before him.

By the way, I'm loving that Serwe bit. Saubon? What about the Captain, Bakker said we're not done with him yet. What makes all that very interesting to me, is we know Kellhus has created his own Ciphrang/sorcerer hybrid running to Zuem right now. We obviously, know that the Captain was one also, how many more have done the deed and went on to the Outside? Intriguing. Very.

Not to go off on a tangent here, we might have start some new threads with all these ideas popping up. But check out the Circumfix scene with Serwe  and how Kellhus is obsessed with preserving her and denying what he really feeling. Emotion. Its when he first falls into his dream. I forget how good all of PoN actually is. Its great.


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Bound to a circle, swinging from the limb of a dark tree. Bound to Serwë. Cold and lifeless against him. Serwë. Spinning in slow circles. A fly crawled across her cheek, paused before a breathless nostril. He puffed air across her dead skin, and the fly was gone. Must keep her clean. Her eyes half-open, papyrus-dry. Serwë! Breathe girl, breathe! I command it! I come before you. I come before! Bound skin-to-skin to Serwë. What have I … What? What? A convulsion of some kind. No … No! I must focus. I must assess … Unblinking eyes, staring down black cheeks, out to the stars. There’s no circumstance beyond … No circumstance beyond … Logos. I’m one of the Conditioned. From his shins to his cheek, he could feel her, radiating a cold as deep as her bones. Breathe! Breathe! Dry … And so still! So impossibly still! Father, please! Please make her breathe! I … I can walk no farther. Face so dark, mottled like something from the sea … How had she ever smiled? Focus! What happens? All is in disarray. And they’ve killed her. They’ve murdered my wife. I gave her to them. What did you say? I gave her to them. Why? Why would you do this? For you … For them. Something dropped within him, and he tumbled into sleep, cold water rinsing bruised and broken skin. Dreams followed. Dark tunnels, weary earth. A ridge, curved like a sleeping woman’s hip, against the night sky.
« Last Edit: October 05, 2016, 01:27:46 pm by MSJ »
“No. I am your end. Before your eyes I will put your seed to the knife. I will quarter your carcass and feed it to the dogs. Your bones I will grind to dust and cast to the winds. I will strike down those who speak your name or the name of your fathers, until ‘Yursalka’ becomes as meaningless as infant babble. I will blot you out, hunt down your every trace! The track of your life has come to me,

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« Reply #47 on: October 05, 2016, 02:49:53 pm »
H, come on man, you gotta give somewhere. I can't make this shit up, you know this.

Hey, I gave!  ;)

I mean, I see it.  I get it.  I'm just not really buying it, per se.  I'm apt to take Bakker at face value here, which could well be a trap, but could also be a fact.  To me, he said, "the head is not Onkis" and the Head is, essentially, a reflection, your own head.  I'm buying that those two things really do go together.  Sure, he might be misleading us, but I just don't feel like that's the case here.

I think the real trail to follow with Onkis is the Copper Tree-Siöl connection.  That I think has more to do with the nature of her representation than the Head does, honestly.  I'm keen to be disproved, but for now, I have doubts.
I am a warrior of ages, Anasurimbor. . . ages. I have dipped my nimil in a thousand hearts. I have ridden both against and for the No-God in the great wars that authored this wilderness. I have scaled the ramparts of great Golgotterath, watched the hearts of High Kings break for fury. -Cet'ingira

Hiro

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« Reply #48 on: October 05, 2016, 03:02:45 pm »

By the way, I'm loving that Serwe bit. Saubon? What about the Captain, Bakker said we're not done with him yet. What makes all that very interesting to me, is we know Kellhus has created his own Ciphrang/sorcerer hybrid running to Zuem right now. We obviously, know that the Captain was one also, how many more have done the deed and went on to the Outside? Intriguing. Very.


MSJ, sorry, it was not obvious for me, regarding the Captain being a Ciphrang. Was this concluded based on Mimara's Judging Eye?
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Wilshire

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« Reply #49 on: October 05, 2016, 05:36:23 pm »
People think that those that mimara sees as particularly damned, like Ironsoul, are in fact ciphrang.
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Monkhound

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« Reply #50 on: October 05, 2016, 06:52:13 pm »
People think that those that mimara sees as particularly damned, like Ironsoul, are in fact ciphrang.

Indeed. And I'm not sure that is a correct interpretation.
Before TGO, I was under the impression as well. But despite the description by Mimara being "I have never seen anyone so damned", I'm almost positive both Cnaïur and the Captain are not Ciphrang as such. Just men so much consumed by their passions/emotions that it eclipses all their other deeds, and them therefore being lives of choice (literally) for the "Sons of this place" as described in the Head on a Pole passage.
The other scalpers were on their way to be the same, but we're killed before reaching that stage.
I also think the Meat is having the same effect (that of a catalyst) on the Men of the Ordeal: Emotions come much more to the surface because of it. That is quote clearly described in TGO. Maybe the Qirri had the same effect on Akka and Mimara. It's suggested multiple times born in WLW and TGO.
Cuts and cuts and cuts...

MSJ

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« Reply #51 on: October 05, 2016, 08:28:21 pm »

By the way, I'm loving that Serwe bit. Saubon? What about the Captain, Bakker said we're not done with him yet. What makes all that very interesting to me, is we know Kellhus has created his own Ciphrang/sorcerer hybrid running to Zuem right now. We obviously, know that the Captain was one also, how many more have done the deed and went on to the Outside? Intriguing. Very.


MSJ, sorry, it was not obvious for me, regarding the Captain being a Ciphrang. Was this concluded based on Mimara's Judging Eye?

Well it isn't once or twice, Mimara talks about it a few times throughout their journey, Sarl remarks a few times that he HAS been to hell. He doesn't sleep and even Akka notes that. There are a bunch of clues and thats off the top of my head.
“No. I am your end. Before your eyes I will put your seed to the knife. I will quarter your carcass and feed it to the dogs. Your bones I will grind to dust and cast to the winds. I will strike down those who speak your name or the name of your fathers, until ‘Yursalka’ becomes as meaningless as infant babble. I will blot you out, hunt down your every trace! The track of your life has come to me,

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« Reply #52 on: October 05, 2016, 08:35:37 pm »
Also, yes I have may of gotten ahead of myself. He probably wasn't a Ciphrang. He could have been. He could be been more closely to related to what Cnaüir is, on the way there.
“No. I am your end. Before your eyes I will put your seed to the knife. I will quarter your carcass and feed it to the dogs. Your bones I will grind to dust and cast to the winds. I will strike down those who speak your name or the name of your fathers, until ‘Yursalka’ becomes as meaningless as infant babble. I will blot you out, hunt down your every trace! The track of your life has come to me,

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« Reply #53 on: October 05, 2016, 09:30:41 pm »
Also, yes I have may of gotten ahead of myself. He probably wasn't a Ciphrang. He could have been. He could be been more closely to related to what Cnaüir is, on the way there.

See, that grabbed my interest, since you were so straightforward, I thought, 'what did I miss...?'

With the theories here of reflections and past-future versions, I'm waiting for someone to come up with the theory that Kosoter is one of the two demon heads that Kellhus keeps around. Well. Maybe?
Mystery denotes darkness

Wilshire

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« Reply #54 on: October 05, 2016, 09:44:53 pm »
Haha Hiro, you never know. Come up with it yourself ;)
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« Reply #55 on: October 05, 2016, 09:49:46 pm »
Also, yes I have may of gotten ahead of myself. He probably wasn't a Ciphrang. He could have been. He could be been more closely to related to what Cnaüir is, on the way there.

ETA: though just setting here thinking. If he was a Malowebi like Ciphrang, when is head was chopped off, you think it would've went back to Ciphrang form. It does not. I'd be willing to admit a strike against Ciphrang Captain.
“No. I am your end. Before your eyes I will put your seed to the knife. I will quarter your carcass and feed it to the dogs. Your bones I will grind to dust and cast to the winds. I will strike down those who speak your name or the name of your fathers, until ‘Yursalka’ becomes as meaningless as infant babble. I will blot you out, hunt down your every trace! The track of your life has come to me,

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« Reply #56 on: October 06, 2016, 12:48:28 am »
Also, yes I have may of gotten ahead of myself. He probably wasn't a Ciphrang. He could have been. He could be been more closely to related to what Cnaüir is, on the way there.

See, that grabbed my interest, since you were so straightforward, I thought, 'what did I miss...?'

With the theories here of reflections and past-future versions, I'm waiting for someone to come up with the theory that Kosoter is one of the two demon heads that Kellhus keeps around. Well. Maybe?

Bakker said in the feedback thread we are not done with Kosoter. That's a distinct possibility.
“No. I am your end. Before your eyes I will put your seed to the knife. I will quarter your carcass and feed it to the dogs. Your bones I will grind to dust and cast to the winds. I will strike down those who speak your name or the name of your fathers, until ‘Yursalka’ becomes as meaningless as infant babble. I will blot you out, hunt down your every trace! The track of your life has come to me,

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« Reply #57 on: October 06, 2016, 12:37:10 pm »
Bakker said in the feedback thread we are not done with Kosoter. That's a distinct possibility.

I think I said it before, but there has to be something special about those two heads, right?  No way he just collected the first two ciphrang he met, or something else.

What if the other one is Saubon?  A fun idea, not all together implausible either.
I am a warrior of ages, Anasurimbor. . . ages. I have dipped my nimil in a thousand hearts. I have ridden both against and for the No-God in the great wars that authored this wilderness. I have scaled the ramparts of great Golgotterath, watched the hearts of High Kings break for fury. -Cet'ingira

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« Reply #58 on: October 06, 2016, 01:22:43 pm »
Thanks for joining this rocky boat, MSJ  ;D

I think I mentioned it earlier: I believe the heads are representations of Saubon's and Proyas's (ciphrang?) aspects.
It makes sense:
They're his favorite servants... his Exalt-Generals. Proyas is even his favourite and most loyal slave.
Also, the use of the head came right after Saubon's death, and there's something in his death that just didn't feel right.
Add to that the description we get from the bad stuff Saubon did during the Unification Wars.
I think he had to die at Dagliash in order to be awakened on Malowebi's body.
Cuts and cuts and cuts...

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« Reply #59 on: October 06, 2016, 01:35:20 pm »
I like it.  I mean, it's not provable as yet, but I like it.  It would explain why he is so certain that Ciphrang-Malowebi is going to do what he told him (it?).
I am a warrior of ages, Anasurimbor. . . ages. I have dipped my nimil in a thousand hearts. I have ridden both against and for the No-God in the great wars that authored this wilderness. I have scaled the ramparts of great Golgotterath, watched the hearts of High Kings break for fury. -Cet'ingira