https://www.reddit.com/r/bakker/comments/7tl4ug/my_interpretation_of_the_golden_room_kellhus_vs/I feel like the OP of this r/Bakker post is on point re: the scenes in the Outside being Kellhus' perspective after salting and being inside of a decapitant. I also agree to an extent with the person who replied that the "seizing/ripping about the pole" and transforming here into here is somehow moving from Hell to Heaven (so to speak) and that the Other Sons are the gods/100.
Obviously, post-salting/death seems the most plausible "time/place" for Kell's Outside scene occur and ties in nicely with "The living shall not haunt the dead" if he is some form of "alive".
Putting lots of words on screen now-
1. Kellhus is in the place with Sons (we can call it Hell) and is apparently tempted by a random Ciphrang to eat from an opened-up baby. I think think this was just a demon tactic to get him to feel afraid/disgusted/angry/scared/sad/whatever since he then sees more Ciphrang descending like locusts lured by his "meat" which we must assume means they're craving whatever he's feeling and coming to try to eat him/tear at his seams again, which doesn't work because (whatever the mechanics are) he isn't "dead enough". Probably isn't pleasant for Kellhus, so he does the switcheroo and...
2. Now Kell is with the Other Sons who are reclining and drinking from the sky (in Heaven), they aren't desperate and ravenous and swarming like the Sons/normal Ciphrang because so many people (whether intentionally or not) offer/devote themselves to these gods (or the opposite, depending) and are received or "seized". We're told extra-textually by Bakker and I believe also somewhere within the books somewhere that the gods don't have agency which is a confusing concept for me. Well, I don't know what definition of agency we're supposed to be using but in this particular scene we have one example of exactly one of the Other Sons who directly "speaks" to Khellus: The most Crocodilian of (Other?) Sons - who can this be? Does speaking - which AFAIK is acting intentionally toward a specific end result - not imply agency? Didn't a Ciphrang speak to him in Hell as well? Presumably this Croc can't be Ajokli because (in theory) post-Khellus' salting Ajokli is/was/would be (stuck?) in the Inward possessing Cnaiur and walking into the Whirlwind (and.... from there ceasing to exist?). His ravings through Cnaiur make it clear he can't find Khellus insofar as he can "look for him" but we're unsure at this point if Ajokli is even capable of knowing whether Khellus is Outside or not.
3. Not sure if Kellhus' specific use of "heart beats still" is meant to be taken literally.... considering Khellus' salt-statue status I don't know what heart this could refer to other than perhaps Seswatha's? It could ofc just be a way for Kellhus to calm himself, but I mean he does make plenty of references to the head which from my read is basically just to calm himself. Why mention a heart at all if he knows his is salt?
4. Once in "Heaven" with the Other Sons, Kellhus refers to this place as "where he has always waited, always watched" - this makes no sense to me unless once Khellus is "Out there" he has the same all-of-time perspective as the gods do. I'm not sure how the mechanics for Decapitants work but as far as we know Malowebi is only experiencing things his fixed position on Kellhus'-body's hip allow him, and nothing of the Outside. This could mean Kellhus used a different Decapi-Cant on Malowebi than he did on himself, or having this Outside perspective (whether hes actually in a Decapitant or not) could rather be something that Kellhus is able to do now
specifically because of...
5. Subsumption. Subsume was a very specific word for the Mutilated to use in how they conquered the Consult and we generally assume Shae and the Mutilated are now one - without trying to truly understand how 4 individual living soul-filled bodies and 1 "living" disembodied "soul" can all "be one" or what it might mean to each individual's experience IF even able to be perceived by the "individuals" in question... I have no idea what Shauriatis' experience might be like, but it seems at least for Kelmomas and Samarmas you wouldn't be able to tell a difference which "soul" is performing or controlling your thoughts/actions. Getting to the point I'm trying to make - subsumption could be occurring with Kellhus and Ajokli rather than any "possession" of Ajokli over Kellhus. In some paradoxical way, maybe Kellhus would become and therefore always has been Ajokli? If that logic can apply to Kelmomas being the No-God I think it's fair play to apply it here?
6. I believe on another Reddit post, somebody raised an interesting point running with the obvious possibility that Khellus was aware of many things that we didn't know he was aware of (for lack of a better term, "everything"). He studied the Daimos and shortly thereafter came Kel+Sam who happen to be exactly what is required for TNG's Resumption. He saved Esmi and Kel, he chained Kel up and reverse-psychology'd Esmi into letting him loose. How he could have been sure Kel would show up at the Golden Room I couldn't guess, but if one were to accept the possibility that Kellhus planned (or had backups for) the exact events that occurred, it seems to line up okay. I know we have Bakker's word to the contrary, but that's no fun for theorycrafting and crackpotting!
7. It could be that the Son who talks to Kellhus, this Crocodilian Son, isn't one of the Other Sons, isn't a god. If that were to be the case, this Ciphrang(?) could just be someone who was devoted to or seized by one of the gods - still, who? It sounds like Cnaiur to me, which can make sense. Once Whirlwind-blasted, Cnaiur would go to the Outside and he could easily be offered to/seized by Gilgaol; alternatively he could be there because of how much he HATES Ajokli-who-is-Kellhus (don't remember if he's one who likes being worshipped or likes being hated), which would be extra spicy! If Kellhus wasn't destined-to-be-and-so-already-had-been Ajokli before the events in TUC, then who was Ajokli and who/what/where is he now? If he was "re-written", then from whom to whom or what to what?
8. TUC glossary on the Incu-Holoinas says scholars agree that the Ark was made for flight, but not between stars/not in space. They think it's from the Outside. So... surely the Ark has to have come from the Nail of Heaven, but I don't think I can believe that this material object "came from" the Outside as Acenjis believed. I think it has to have come from the future because nothing else makes sense.
The Ark is believed to have been sent by Ajokli no less, which makes me think Kellhus has something to do with it, not least of all because it is such an intrinsic part of the events that cause the outcome we reach at the end of TUC. Here again I'm assuming that Kellhus is in control of more than he fully understands at any given moment (After determining Before and all). I think his darkness could for sure include Greater Kellhus who could be MUCH, MUCH greater than lesser Kellhus may realize at any point during the first 7 books if in some paradoxical way he has always been (fated to become) Ajokli. Maybe the whole other continent is full of Dunyain-level intellects and knowledge of the Tekne.
Or maybe that's the future that the current story is headed to? Watch the "swarming millions" that the inchoroi cite having once been, end up being fucking Sranc.
Damn, just gonna hit post now before I keep going!
If there are rules against linking outside threads, my apologies.