Earwa > The Unholy Consult

[TUC Spoilers] But seriously...what was the plan?

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seitzandsounds:
Hi All! Long time lurker, first time poster.

Overall I really enjoyed TUC. This was actually my first time reading a Bakker novel (I'd literally listened to the series up to this on a few cross country trips). Where I think the book fell down though was in showing the reader a clear plan on the part of Kellus. it left me with a bunch of questions so I figure I'll post them here and maybe, like this board has many times, it'll allow me to get a better grasp on this story.

First though, because I haven't seen it anywhere yet, I want to put together a timeline. I'll skip over a bunch of parts of the book that I don't think are central to the questions I have about the overall plan. Needless to say this will be the spoileriest spoiler that ever spoiled, so stop here if you're not done.

...

TIMELINE
TGO

-Kellus leave the Great Ordeal, returns to the Three Seas, kills Fanayal and Psatma.
-Before beheading Malowebi, declares he is "weary"
-Beheads Malowebi, replaces his head with one of the decapitants, instructs it to kill Nganka’kull. Malowebi's head goes on the girdle.
-Teleports to the Palace.
-In the Palace he sees Esmenet. Demands to know "what did you do?"
-The White Luck Warrior fails to kill him when Kel interrupts the unerring grace

TUC
-Kellus teleports away with Esmi and Kel

TIME WARP

-Kellus attacks Aurang and forces him to open a door in the Ark.
-Aurang is killed.
-Kellus enters the Golden room and encounters Mekeritrig before gazing into the inverse fire.
-When asked by Mekeritrig what he sees, Kellus responds ""I see...myself...yes."
-When Mekeritrig describes what he sees in the Inverse Fire as torments, Kellus responds "But I suffer no torment."
-Kellus describes what he sees within the fire "where you fall as fodder, I descend as hunger."
-Kellus demands to see Shauriatis
-Shauriatis appears but Kellus immediately reveals him to be an illusion
-Serwa and Kayutas meet in front of the Intrinsic Gate.
-Kellus calls out the Mutilated
-Serwa, sensing that the Consult has placed the Wracu here to keep them from joining Kellus, decides to confront Skuthula.
-The mutilated explain how they have subsumed the Consult to Kellus.
-Serwa begins her battle against Skuthala
-The Mutilated explain that damnation is the impediment to the Absolute, and that in order to attain it, the world must be shut.
-One of the Mutilated uses sorcery to bring the Sarcophagus to Kellus.
The Mutilated explain that Scald used at Daliash was the last working of those devices and that culling of souls must be done by the No-God in order to shut the world from the outside.
-Kellus responds to the Mutilated declaring him the salvation "but I am already saved...I have walked the infernal deep. I have struck treaties with the pit."
-Kellus explains that he is an inverse prophet, set by the living to the eternal to tell them of the Consult.
-Malowebi looks at the other decapitant.
"For the first time he noticed the same obscuring distortion that marked the Anasurimbor-like globules of ink hanging in quicksilver-marring it.
...
Antlers, savage and knuckled, rising mangled as if scribbled by a drunk or a child. Four of them..."
-Kellus stomps his foot, rocking the room but not using sorcery to do so. He declares "I am Master here"
-Serwa's arm is salted off. She attacks Skuthala as the Mandate destroys the chamber he is in. She falls.
-Kellus speaks to the Mutilated. Tells them their goal is to shut the world againt the outside, his is to conquer hell. His head explodes in flame and becomes a black, four-horned image within the fire as he becomes Ajokli
-Kellus/Ajokli decapitates Mekeritrig
-The Skin Spies in the room suddenly have their chorae holding hands pulled and stuck to the ground
-Kellus/Ajokli declares the golden room "my place".
-Kellus/Ajokli declares to the Mutilated "you shall be my angels. You shall be my goad, the scourge of nations. Children shall keen for the simple rumor of your coming. Men shall rage and weep. And whatever horror and anguish you sow, I shall reap."
-Kellus/Ajokli kills the one eyed Dunyain
--Kellus/Ajokli declares
"Four brothers, four horns. Together we shall gore this World, drink of it as a pierced fruit raised high. The Inverse Fire is not but a window into my house. You have seen what awaits you. Adore me, or suffer eternal damnation. I alone...brothers...i am the absolute."
-Malowebi sees Kel running between the skin spies.
-Kel declares "He can't see me either"
-The fire that had consumed Kellus/Ajokli's head sputters out leaving Kellus swaying.
-A skin spy grabs Kellus' ankle with a hand that has a chorae.
-Kellus turns to salt
-Kel is seized by the remaining Mutilated and put into the Sarcophagus.
-The Sarcophagus raises and climbs from the room

OK...so with that done, lets ask some questions

1) Why was Kellus "weary"? He claims that the empire dies in all incarnations of the thousandfold thought, so is he tired of having to keep leaving the ordeal to come back and delay its death?

2) What do you think the overall plan would have been had Skuthala not been guarding the Intrinsic Gate? Serwa and Kayutas meet up with Kellus in the golden room to face the consult? If Kellus has the ability to become Ajokli he didn't really need them.

3) What did Malowebi see when he looked at the other decapitant? He talks about a distortion like the one around Kellus, but I don't remember early in the book where he mentions a distortion the first time.

4) Does Kellus change plans while he's in the golden room. Originally the plan was to get to the ark and destroy the consult, ending the threat of the second apocalypse. But once he becomes Ajokli he tells the Mutilated he will use them as a threat of terror for the world. So what does that mean? It certainly sounds like he's decided to keep them around.

What does everyone think?

Madness:

--- Quote from: seitzandsounds on July 21, 2017, 03:05:12 pm ---Hi All! Long time lurker, first time poster.

--- End quote ---

Welcome to the Second Apocalypse, seitzandsounds. Great timeline summary.


--- Quote from: seitzandsounds on July 21, 2017, 03:05:12 pm ---1) Why was Kellus "weary"? He claims that the empire dies in all incarnations of the thousandfold thought, so is he tired of having to keep leaving the ordeal to come back and delay its death?
--- End quote ---

I don't think he's acted out each timeline and resets like the movie Next. I think he's weary because it's actually taxing for him to rush horizon to horizon from Dagliash to Momemn.


--- Quote from: seitzandsounds on July 21, 2017, 03:05:12 pm ---2) What do you think the overall plan would have been had Skuthala not been guarding the Intrinsic Gate? Serwa and Kayutas meet up with Kellus in the golden room to face the consult? If Kellus has the ability to become Ajokli he didn't really need them.
--- End quote ---

I don't think Kellhus knew that Ajokli was going to subsume him - though, I am a clear minority on this point

For my bet, yes, Kellhus actually wanted to overcompensate and have his chillens and the Ordeal rush up to meet him and confront the Consult and/or (especially) the Mutilated, if Kellhus surmised he would be confronting multiple Dunyain alone.


--- Quote from: seitzandsounds on July 21, 2017, 03:05:12 pm ---3) What did Malowebi see when he looked at the other decapitant? He talks about a distortion like the one around Kellus, but I don't remember early in the book where he mentions a distortion the first time.
--- End quote ---

He doesn't and this, for me, feeds into the "it doesn't matter which head was on Kellhus' shoulders when in the Golden Room." As per the Decapitants entry in the Glossary, Ajokli tried to manipulate a take-over of Kellhus' agency at Mengedda and save himself a trip to Golgotterath but that didn't work. Once in the Golden Room - the deepest Topoi in Earwa - he was able to go God-Mode and contradict basically all Earwan physics (mundane/sorcery) as we'd previously understood them.


--- Quote from: seitzandsounds on July 21, 2017, 03:05:12 pm ---4) Does Kellus change plans while he's in the golden room. Originally the plan was to get to the ark and destroy the consult, ending the threat of the second apocalypse. But once he becomes Ajokli he tells the Mutilated he will use them as a threat of terror for the world. So what does that mean? It certainly sounds like he's decided to keep them around.

--- End quote ---

Again, I'm basically alone so far in this interpretation, but I think all dialogue in the Golden Room by Kellhus should be attributed to Ajokli.

Kellhus didn't see Ajokli coming and got played. 'Nuff said ;).


--- Quote from: seitzandsounds on July 21, 2017, 03:05:12 pm ---What does everyone think?

--- End quote ---

Indeed, let other - better - minds than mine own bend their souls to these thoughts.

Cheers, seitzandsounds, well met.

Walter:
My take on 'Kellhus Plan' is that it was something like:

"Put Ajokli in Golden Room.  Whatever he does there will be the end of the No-God.  Resumption will never happen."

I dunno if he thought he had a deal, or what have you, but I think it was his only play.  Can't beat a bunch of Dunyain, but Ajokli, on a Topos, probably can. 

Kellhus has always been about preventing the Apocalypse at any cost (Any wound, save the one that is mortal).  He'd let the world be savaged by a Ciphrang-God like his son lets his body be pared away by Sranc.  Any wound that doesn't kill is acceptable, if the No-God can be aborted.

Heavenfall:
I believe Kellhus planned to wage a war against the Outside because that is what he tells us. As long as there was an Outside he and everyone around him would never be masters of their own fate. They would never reach the Absolute, the ultimate goal of the Dunyadin, which was defined as having no "darkness that comes before". As long as there's a bunch of gods running around the humans are just playthings. Not only was the No-god a physical threat to his plan (it would conquer the world) but it was an abstract one as well since it planned to "shut the world" from the Outside. This directly contradicted Kellhus' plan of destroying the Outside.

Once the nuke had gone off and he began to speculate on whether the Mutilated existed, I believe he quickly reached a dead-end in his thousandfold thought. Planning against one or several Dunyadin was simply beyond him. He also admits to not knowing the Arc or the Tekne. That's why he asks a lot of questions from the Mutilated, to understand their goals and tools. So while the Mutilated are trying to recruit him, he's finding out their goals and they are incompatible with his own because they do not have any designs beyond the physical world. Kellhus through the Gnosis believes the Absolute lies in the Outside (the god in him later claims to be the Absolute, it is possible that the Absolute = godhood).

His plan going into Golgotterath never changed much, he brought every resource the half-world could bear to help him fight. His goal was to overcome any threat against his path to the Absolute. The fact that he learned more and more about those threats did not change his goal or much alter his plans to get there.

Ajokli was going to fight everything that Kellhus couldn't. Aurang, for example, is defeated by cheating the laws of physics. The one hundred skinspies with chorae are as nothing before Ajokli.

As for Kelmomas, I believe the simplest explanation is the most likely. Upon becoming possessed by Ajokli, Kellhus mostly lost the ability to perceive Kelmomas and calculate what part he would play. He failed to foresee Kelmomas as a threat against any god. Although Kellhus absolutely retains the ability to read Kelmomas' face as seen after Kel kills Serwal, Kellhus reading of Kel back in the palace is fairly haunting. Kellhus tells Esmenet that Kel is the most damaged out of all their children. This is effectively Ajokli speaking through Kellhus, I think. Kelmomas is just a huge itch that they can't quite figure out together because of Ajokli. Kellhus is literally incapable of making the decision to kill Kel (he rationalizes this to "because I love Esme", which he never ever fucking did), nor can he see that Kel is in any way significant even after Kel saved him from the White Luck Warrior and Serwal.

So to sum it up, Kellhus planned to overcome any threat in Golgotterath. Knowing his foe had many legendary monsters and several great unknowns he brought every force he could, including Ajokli. Ajokli was able to overcome any enemy except Kel. Ajokli and Kellhus got fucked up.

MSJ:

--- Quote from: Madness ---Again, I'm basically alone so far in this interpretation, but I think all dialogue in the Golden Room by Kellhus should be attributed to Ajokli.
--- End quote ---

I agree. After rereading the scene, after the foot stomp that is Ajokli talking until Kel comes and Kellhus is caught unawares...maybe.

So, you can have it one of two ways Kelly is went back to Momemn because he knew Kel was the No-God (which makes absolutely no sense, because he would kill him and end the threat there.), or he does love Esme, which I believe and have said all along.

I think Kellhus's plans got ducked and got caught unawares and it didn't go down like he wanted to. But, nevertheless, I believe he's still in the game on the Outside in his own little nitch, the one from the dreams. Which is why Ajokli cannot find him, he is not in the pit. Kellhus tricked the Trickster.

[EDIT Madness: Fixed a close quote tag.]

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