Scholar of Scholar 5: The Last Scholar

Table of Contents is here.

This post took a while to write. I'm at the point where it's essentially impossible to continue discussing Dark 2 without most of the discussion being about 1 and 3, and I've had to cut several sections. These will appear later in posts about the third game.


[04/21 update skip this unless you're re-reading this -- I really don't need to say these things take a while to write. I have a child, I'm a good father, taking screenshots takes fucking all day. You know how fun spending all damn ass day in FoFGs is? Not to try out weapons or hunt sunlight medals or anything normal like that; just dying over and over to trash enemies trying to get a screencap that illustrates some kind of broader metaphysical point I'm trying to make about the significance of Halberd placement across the series and then spending the next day getting screencaps and chasing down clues in Fort of Not Fallen Giants and the next day in Shulva trying to get to the bottom of Rockshield because WHY IS THE BERENIKE SET THERE Like I think I know but that's where actually sitting down and writing the post comes into it, which is the only fun part of any of this process and usually takes a day, two if I feel like proofreading it, then another day hunting down another set of screens because I'm off on some tangent that seems monumentally important but usually isn't. then comes the most funnest part of all: hunting through PS4 screenshots which, and I'm letting you in on a little secret here, aren't organized into like monthly folders so you kinda just hope you can find the cool picture of Najka in the goddamn miles of thumbnails then transfer it to a thumb drive and walk it across the room to here where it gets added and usually fucks the formatting all up just like I'm fucking sure this text only update will because I accidentally hit shift+enter which is the 4pt font shortcut, evidently, and then eventually I sometimes hit publish.


See, almost did it there. Anyway, look, if you somehow are reading this and are into the lore, I don't care if you agree with it or me but I bet you would agree very very very very few people have a functional understanding of DS2:SotFS's actual story. But then it's like, it's near a decade old game who gives a shit how tragic Venn really was or what the Promised Walk miracle really signifies between here and Lothric.

Well, if you're reading this I assume YOU give something of a shit so, as a favor please: if the topic of DS2's lore comes up and people start with the 'lol b-team shitty story doesn't matter' shit: fucking please, I beg of you, try to work against some of that shit. Doesn't take much "DS2 best lore", "DS3 doesn't make sense without DS2", "You're saying Tanimura can't write?", {APPROPRIATE MEME HERE}, simple as that. Don't bring me into though, please, I beg you I am so bad with people. On the other hand, if you have like questions or whatever I'm not that hard to get hold of, but if you need to you can reach me by messaging me in the Fort20 guild chat of Crush Them All and I'll respond if I see it and can think of a response. I probably won't be able to think of a response but imagine me leaving a thumbs up on your comment if you do and I don't.


I need to start a podcast I've done podcasts before I know how I just fucking actively don't.


End update.]


I'd like to say this ties everything together neatly, but it generally doesn't. I'll outline some of the critical stuff here, but most of the stuff gets picked back up in the Ashen Idols and Prisoner of Ash series.

Big plot points, condensed as much as I can I swear:

• The two major powers in post-Drangleic are Elana's Neo-Olaphis/Proto-Lothric kingdom and Mytha's Neo-Alken/Proto-Carthus kingdom.
• Elana is ascendant and has a blue aspect. She consolidates power following the True King (sit on the Throne) ending.
• Mytha is stagnant, but building power until the Last Scholar (walk away from the Throne) ending at which point Alken begins to evolve into Carthus.
• General Ivory Queen, King of Venn is/was a red oni version of Gwyndolin and probably Vendrick's mom.
• Alsanna and Nadalia may be twins. Cuz of eyeballs.
• The three summonable endgame NPCs (Benhart, Bradley, Vengarl) may represent different 'canonical' timelines moving forward, with each possibly tied to a different Lord of Cinder in the third game. These characters represent the canonical True King from the perspectives of the third game.
• Proto-Lothric, although it made a lot of posturing about reviving the Knights of Sunlight and making the Blue more like the White, this was mostly done for political reasons, as the power of the Throne, unlike the Kiln, seems to be derived from the Dark Soul, therefore Bradley, or whoever, could be viewed as the Dark Lord that ushered in, I think, the Age of Dark in Drangleic. This event may have been what led to the bonfires going out in Lordran. 
• Neo-Alken, Mytha's Kingdom, represents Dark's Curse. Just as Fire is cursed by Light (Izalith being usurped by Gwyn,) Light is cursed by Dark (Gwyn to the Pygmy, as represented by the True King outlined above,) and Dark is cursed by Death (Mytha, Agdayne, and their blood-crazed skeletons eventually driving the proto-Lothric faction out of Drangleic and back to Lordran, where oops the Fire Went Out).
• Proto-Lothric is composed of factions from Shulva, Heide, Volgen-Lindelt, fallen Forossa & Mirrah, probably Carim, and possibly Anor Londo semi-directly via Melfia-Lanafir.
• Proto-Carthus is composed of factions from Alken (Huntsmans Copse to Brume,) the Undead Crypt, Jugo, darker aspects of Mirrah, with probably the Kingdom of the Rat, with various hollow, forlorn, exile, bandit, refugee, and unquiet dead characters constantly swelling their ranks as Neo-Olaphis burned through its high period. 
• When Neo-Alken begins to overpower Neo-Olaphis Mytha's empire becomes known as Carthus, this leads Neo-Olaphis to abandon the ship of Drangleic and attempt to colonize what they saw as their ancestral homeland: Lordran. 

Dark Souls 1 Stuff
Look at this guy:

Source

Vagrants, or 'drift items,' were rare enemies in the first game. They spawned when a player lost a lot of humanity or dropped certain items. Importantly, they don't spawn in /your/ world. They're phantom enemies, coming in either white or black versions, and they spawn in other online players' worlds. Allegedly, they grow more powerful, and their item drops more valuable, if they manage to escape from the world they spawn in. In addition to being phantoms, they come in 'good' and 'evil' varieties.

The good versions are spawned by abandoned items, look like an egg with legs, have a clump of feelers sprouting from the upper pole, and will attempt to flee if spotted by the player. An important point about them, at least from the pictures I'm looking at, is that they have a small resonance circle around the base of the clump of feelers. Actually, looking at the evil versions, they have the same thing, it's just more hidden by the feelers.

Evil vagrants are spawned by losing 5+ soft humanity in a world. These vagrants look like a broken egg, and are almost identical to the egg Filianore holds. They also have mismatched crablike pincers, their feelers are spread haphazardly across the top of their 'head,' and they have a 'homing soulmass' attack that can reportedly one-shot unsuspecting players.

When the player abandons an item, say Rubbish, it will result in a drift item bag carrying Rubbish appearing in another player's world. If the bag isn't picked up it moves to the next world for ten worlds, at which point it begins to spawn as a good white phantom vagrant carrying a Purple Moss Clump. If the white phantom manages to escape 20 times it begins spawning as a good black phantom carrying a Blooming Purple Clump. There's an entire chart showing item evolution and spawn conditions here.

Aldia saw the undead as key to uncovering the secrets of life. We learn this from the Malformed Claws item, which belonged to a crustacean, which aren't exactly common enemies in the first two games. Aldia experimented with time-and-dimension traveling, and the Forlorn were born of this 'sinful infatuation.' I bring them up because Forlorn and Vagrants are both creatures without a homeworld. A vagrant is a drifter or wanderer. The vagrants are born perpetual drifters, probably the same is true for crystal lizards. Forlorn, maybe forlorn too, some of them, are creatures born and raised in a world that is then lost, or at least lost to them, and are thereby turned into perpetual drifters between worlds. 

Bones, bone marrow specifically (I suspect,) is the medium that binds an undead to its home (or its bonfire). I say that because the Forlorn were probably created, I would guess, by destroying all the bone marrow in someone's body while their phantom is out for invasion. So for the Forlorn it's like they're playing an invader-only version of the game, which each death or victory causing you charater to rematerialize in a different location with a different host. 

Kind of thing would make you go mad after a while right? Red, Blue, help the host, kill the host, friend, foe, what's difference?

So this single unregarded (from a lore perspective,) DS1 creature ties Aldia, the Forlorn, Filianore's Egg, the Great Crabs of Lothric, the strange growths we find on Oceiros & the Ghru high priestesses, and possibly even the Mound Makers, all together. Maybe.

ARE YOU FEELIN IT

Sword Dancer

Dark Souls' story, the first game, as far as the front-and-center parts, deals with the conflict between the Light and Dark Souls. The reason for this is because the story is centered around Gwyn sealing the Age of Light at the expense of everything else, the pygmy most of all.

For this reason the humors of Life and Death are back-burnered. The Age of Life preceded Gwyn's rule, while the Age of Death will follow the Age of Dark. 

The four humors - Life, Light, Dark, Death - act as both supernatural forces and natural processes. Fire is passion and birth. Light is thought and growth. Dark is emotion and decline. Death is peace and the end of the journey. 

The Age of Fire saw the death of the Ancient world and the birth the modern age. Izalith, after her brief rule over Flame, ran its course (or was perhaps prematurely usurped by Gwyn,) was doomed to eventually wither and 'die,' just as a child 'dies' in order to become an adult.

New life is still being created in the Age of Light, but not life as it was. New configurations of Fire occupy and re-occupy new hollow vessels. We don't know if they're born as the fruit of trees or hatch out of eggs or are instilled into golems or undergo something like mammalian birth, but new people happen. Similarly, people die, and have died since shortly after the beginning.

Nito was the first of these. He will also be the last.

Nito, in addition to being a big skeleton made up of skeletons, is unseen. The Numbness miracle implies that, despite not figuring heavily into the apparent story, the First of the Dead is at work behind the scenes, and not just in the 'quietly overseeing all death' sense, because 'overseeing all death' means making sure that everyone eventually dies. so he's gonna have some pretty powerful interests to work against.

I should point out that I don't think Nito was a male, but a group entity like the Rotten. I keep saying 'he' out of habit. None of the lords, really, exist as individuals, but as groups. Queen Izalith was also her family, as was Gwyn. The pygmy were a group of individual lords treated as equals, while Nito is both the leader of the group, and the group itself: Dozens of people (and by extension all dead people,) 'embraced' by the Dead Soul that became a kind of aggregate entity based on commonalities.  The Rotten, a kind of incarnation of Nito, was made up of the disposed-of corpses of Shulvan/Olaphian clerics & nobles, so it/they still worship Elana as both head of the church and rightful queen under Olaphis.

Retroactively, we can see in Nito this same kind of aggregate consciousness also working for the same group purpose: to embrace all within the Dead Soul.

The Gravelord Sword was crafted from the bones of the fallen, and is a toxic weapon wielded only by servants of Nito. The Gravelord Greatsword Dance is described as having claimed many lives and eyes in order to be realized which is a fucking weird thing to say. Probably the most important thing to say about the spell is that it might be the first incarnation of blood magic.

Nito is described as waiting for his servants to proliferate bane and usher in the Eye of Death. Bane is a synonym for death, but one with an underlying meaning of death as a result of prolonged or extreme suffering, affliction, curse, or poison, and is the thing Mytha seems concerned with spreading as well because she's an evil enchantress snake queen of the dead.

Nito is associated with the basilisk enemies, as they drop Eyes of Death in the first game. It's unclear what 'Eye of Death' means, but it may be related to the Evil Eye, a dark creature that assaulted, ravaged, and nearly destroyed Astora before being 'defeated by 'the sword of one most noble,'' and its spirit contained in a ring.

Alternately, 'Eye of Death' could be more metaphorical, something like an eye of the storm, or refer to an opening of some kind, as in the eye of a needle. Personally, I think this means 'the Age of Death,' which is the Age that will follow the Dark Age and precedes the Age of New Fire.

Nito likes swords. Scythes do symbolize death in the games, but in a much less Nitoian sense. Scythes are, like, folk symbols, rather than religious symbols. Swords are literal tools of death, after all. in addition to the Gravelord Sword, he (or entities related to him) are tied to the Darkdrift katana and the Crypt Blacksword.

Skeletons really like curved swords.

His primary attack in the first game, apart from being protected by an army of puppets he has friendly fire against, is to stab the ground with his Gravelord Sword, scream, and spawn a phantom Gravelord Sword at the player's location. He's also surrounded by an aura that looks like a robe made of humanity, but may not be accurate, as developer interviews make it seem like they never got the 'aura of death' right in the first game.

Nito's role in the story seems more important the more I learn about the story, but I'm also less and less clear on what his role is, exactly. Bonfires, literally fires of bone, keep undead shackled to them via the hi-jacking of some principle, exploited by clerics, that connects one's bones to one's homeland or birthplace.

In other words, when an undead is first 'shackled' to the bonfire by the Darksign, the undead's humanity is burnt as kindling, and the undead itself is bound to the system. Whenever the undead dies it returns to the last bonfire rested at, or nearest bonfire if none have been rested at.

If the undead /hasn't/ been branded by the Darksign, then what do we think happens when they die? They Groundhog Day awake into their own bed, only they're all zombified screaming about things that haven't happened yet and will never happen because they're here explaining it instead and scaring the shit out of their family? I could see how that could give the undead a bad reputation.

Bonfires are the result of the first four lords entering some kind of covenant before everything started going more wronger. The bonfire system seems to be a network of archtree roots terminating in lordsvessels buried in various 'campsites' around the land. Important bonfires were attended by firekeepers.

Bonfires might offer warmth, but they don't burn (torch item, DS2,) and it's implied that they can't be seen by those not bound to them (Friede).

The bonfire itself contains the fire of life (Izalith,) the bones of the dead (Nito,) a coiled sword (Gwyn,) and the Dark Soul offered as Kindling (and presumably the active ingredient in Estus, at least in the first game).

In other words, it's a big irrigation and water reclamation system, with the Light Soul as water. The bonfires collect and reatomize the light soul into the ecosystem, while collecting and storing humanity in the firekeepers. Whenever a chosen undead succeeds Gwyn the Light Soul is redistributed into the world via the bonfires (along with whatever else the CU picked up that wasn't filtered out).

Nito's role in the system is, or was, the Rite of Kindling. In other words, Nito was in charge of the Dark Soul in Lordran after the pygmy lords were 'banished.'

The Undead treasure estus, and Nito was in charge of granting more estus. Humans were thereby further shepherded into skipping their turn as Lord.

Except that 'skipping one's turn' isn't possible, you just end up with an increasingly unbalanced system. But they didn't know that at the time.

Essentially, this system created a linchpin in the physics of...well, physics, around which time has become pinned. Until the Dark Lord 'takes the throne' and ushers in the Age of Dark, the Dark will continue to pile up in the ecosystem, getting thicker and thicker, while the actual Light of the Age of Light gets dimmer and dirtier. Around this pivot we see the Life soul as going functionally extinct, with even the toxic lifeboat of the Chaos Flame gone cold and still at the hands of children of Light and Dark. As for actual 'life,' one first needs to understand that Nito is supposed to oversee all death, but until the Age of Dark begins Death will never be ascendant, if you see, and until Death is ascendant new life can't begin to truly emerge.

In order for Darkness to wane it has to stop waxing, and the Dark can only stop waxing after the Light stops waning, and Death can only /start/ waxing after the Dark starts waning, when the Lord of Light relinquishes his throne and the King of Man ushers in the Age of Dark. Death, in other words, has not yet 'truly' begun in the first game, and is only beginning to amass her armies in the second, as I hope I've outlined with this series.

After the Cursebearer ushered in the Age of Dark in Drangleic by linking a /different/ first flame, the dead finally had an 'eye' through which to pour forth.

The Nameless War
In Anor Londo, in the nobles' quarters, are two bedrooms on opposite sides of the castle. One is red and the other is blue. On one side of the castle we find a small chapel of blue, haunted by a titanite demon. On the other side we find a dragonslayer's trophy room, full of the heads of very young dragons.

[UPDATE: I don't think the following right. I suspect Nameless, as King of Anor Londo, was a lot more like the Iron King and was given the boot for being a big ole Joffrey]

In Anor Londo, after Gwyn named his firstborn King of Anor Londo and left to link the flame, a civil war broke out over dragons. the King, the leader of the Red faction, saw what the once noble dragonslayers had become - essentially shooting caged animals for sport - and wanted the kingdom's stance on dragons reevaluated. It's not clear if Lightning Spear wanted to try to use the infant stormdrakes as potential steeds or not, but his views were seen as treason for a kingdom founded on the idea of dragonslaying.

This schism between the red and the blue, the 'sunbros' and the 'darkmoons,' has played out across the entire series in a dozen different permutations, but always with a fairly obvious surreptitious wizard priest vs headstrong punchkicker dynamic. Generally, this tale goes something like

• White is stricken by fear of the curse and loses power (Gwyn, King Olaph,) leaving or losing control to a Red faction. 
• Red is given or takes control (Nameless, Yorgh, Iron,) 
• Red fails or betrays his duty, is replaced by a Blue faction as civil war breaks out (Gwyndolin, Elana, Venn,)
• Blue maintains control through machination and propaganda (DmB, Frampt, WoW, Lindelt, Sentinels) 
• Blue becomes disconnected, isolated, and loses control of their shadow network through attrition 
• Red, reborn, builds a kingdom to rival the Blue (Forossa, Olaphis, Alken,) 
• Red, disillusioned with their throne, abandons his kingdom to chase dragons*
• Blue, forced from her role as hidden trickster god, is reborn as a brave and selfless hero in the new order**

* If they make it this far.

** With the understanding that 'brave' and 'selfless' and 'hero' are relative terms.

These two tales of the gods, which I refer to as Lightning Spear and Darkmoon Blade, are first outlined by the Firstborn and Gwyndolin, but both are repeated so often across the games that they become a meta-tale I refer to as the Twin Dragons. It is a dynamic so central to understanding the power relations of Souls that I'm tempted to say that any time a kingdom falls some permutation of the twin dragon tale will play out with the 'princes,' whether it's Alken and Venn, Mytha and Elana, or Emma and Sulyvahn.

Questions I don't have an answer to:

Does the Twin Dragon story hold true for Kaathe and Frampt, or Seath and Kalameet?

Are Lothric and Lorian twin dragons?

The Three Kingdoms
People steal armor.

Benhart is from Jugo, but wears Mirran armor. Creighton carries a Forossan axe and wears what may be counterfeit armor and may, in fact, be a counterfeit Creighton (although the real Creighton is said to be weirdly devoted to his armor).

I say that to say that any conclusions I draw about these places are not meant to be final, just a guideline for understanding the story as presented well enough to hopefully one day resolve the narrative into something like a 'final' form.

Forossa

Weirdly, you can find both of these armor sets in the same room.

Forossa could mean almost anything. The closest root I've found that may match is the proto-Indo-European word b^herH which means to carve, strike, bore, pierce, cut, or force.Forossa seems to be the northern-most of the three kingdoms, and likely shares Drangleic's northern border. Eleum Loyce is in Forossa, but far to the north and as-accessible from Drangleic. Forossa features heavily in the third game and is associated with Lothric, so it will likely be discussed in a future post, as well.

I thought that I would have more to say in this section, but really, only two or three storylines I feel need to be fleshed out, with characters like Azal and Fabian seemingly acting as flavor.

Nameless, Shieldless
I could copypaste information about gallant Lothian and the Lion Knights' two-handed swordplay, but let's just assume you're familiar and cut straight to the sensationalism.

First and most importantly, Forossa seems to be the place the Nameless King fetched up in after his godhood was stripped. We should remember that being 'stripped of his deific status' likely meant 'had his portion of the Light Lord's Soul forcibly removed by Seath,' and that he would have therefore entered exile as something like a slightly-better-than-base-level STR/FTH 'starting character,' but with a particularly interesting back story.

The Northwarders' robes are bordered with the language of Anor Londo.

He may have gone by the name Faraam, or Lothian, but I don't think that was necessarily the case. I do think that Lothian was a Lion Knight, though, and I do think that Nameless founded the Lion Knights, and I believe he and they were closely tied to the Northwarders.

He rose to the rank of general before becoming disillusioned with mortal foes and leaving to 'slay the legendary dragon.'

Given Forossa's position, this could mean 'went to drangleic following rumors of Sihn,' or 'went on a journey that eventually took him to Archdragon Peak by way of Lothric - how or whenever that happens - likely following rumors of a Black Dragon that scourges the lands beneath Anor Londo, whereupon infant stormdrake and more tearjerkers in the Valley of little lost hares.

Or he could have taken a different path entirely. The important fact is that the Great Lightning Spear, having fallen from heaven, builds a kingdom of his own, only to relinquish it in order to 'cast aside the prop of life' and seek greater glory.

From here, the spear turns from dragon slayer to dragon rider, finally making peace with their own curse, atoning for the sins of the father, and transcending the cycle. Vendrick's Blessing is likely a mockery of this - in that it cures you and ONLY you of the curse - owing to whatever missteps Aldia and Vendrick made along their journey of intentionally trying to game the system.

So, a big, simple answer (not that I like big, simple answers,) is: Nameless, after his exile from Anor Londo, was 'reborn' as Lothian the Shieldless, lived and 'died' as a Foross peasant that became a general, grew disillusioned with mortal foes, passed his axe on to another deserter during his last battle (Creighton,) and left the kingdoms of men to attempt to slay a 'real' dragon. Lothian then sets out to found Lothric with elements of Forossa and Drangleic before moving on to Archdragon Peak.

Or.

Lothian is Nameless' son.

Or.

Lothian and Ivory gave us the old switcheroo at some point.

Or.

There's no deeper narrative, and Ivory and Lothian are simply meant to be representative of the Foross psyche. Speaking of

Ivory the Great
I've made a big deal about the Princess of Venn becoming the Ivory King. I should justify that.

 

• She never unmasked in public, nor did her 'men.'
• Her Loyce fighters gained HP regen from fighting members of the opposite sex.
• Forossa, like most Souls states, was a /very/ patriarchal country.
• She was a general. She doesn't seem to be the king of Forossa, although this too is possible.
• Look at her crown compared to the other three.
• The primal Golems and Flexile Sentries in Eleum Loyce are originally from Olaphis.
• There is a Bellkeeper in Eleum Loyce, Twiggy Shea, and he has a name not unlike another bellkeeper, Titchy Gren.
• The advanced golems would have had to have been created by a puppeteer.
• Ivory made peace with the Curse of Manus, something the other three kings were unable to do.
• There's a covetous demon around, implying that Ivory was both as desirable and unavailable as Mytha GODDAMNIT WHO WROTE THAT IT'S THE LEAST INTERESTING THING ABOUT HER

The Princess of Venn would have been the rightful heir to the throne of Olaphis, as she was a descendant of the Sunken King. She was also the mother of the bastard Vendrick with the Iron King of Alken. These also need justification, but you can see previous posts for that. Point is, this may not be enough to make the case that Princess Venn = Ivory = descendant of Gwyn, but it's at least enough to justify the possibility.

Tigers, as an aside, are the animal associated with Ivory.

Mirrah

Mirrah is a sacred land, and probably the most ecologically habitable of the three kingdoms.

Mirrah is a land known for its knights, and is represented by the antler crest of, presumably, the royal family. 'Represented' may be a strong word. Benhart, who features two copies of the crest, apparently picked his armor up sometime during his travels, as he's originally from Jugo, a nation Mirrah was at war with. Creighton also wears the crest, but at best the armor he wears is an imitation and at worst it's being worn by a murderer and deserter.

The official order is characterized by Lucatiel and Aslatiel, proud swordsmen willing to give their lives for their country. Social mobility was tied to military service, with the idea being that if you distinguished yourself on the battlefield you'd be promoted to the knighthood and escape from hardship. This was possibly seen as a joke by most of the country, as the escape from the frying pan of wartime poverty was, in the unlikely event it was attained, was to enlist as fodder in the fire of the frontline. Even so, someone has to be the best, and in Mirrah the best was Aslatiel. The most decorated swordsman in the country, and brother to another knight of similar reknown, he one day vanished without a trace. His sister, Lucatiel, set off in search of him. This search brought her to Drangleic, where Aslatiel had gone in search of a cure to the curse. This was fortunate, in a soulsian sense, because the road delivered Lucatiel to the curse as well.

Lucatiel's name may come from Luke or Lucas, a name that generally means 'bright one' or 'the great light' or 'light of the morning.' Biblically - and I'm always leary about drawing direct connections to Christianity for Reasons - 'Loukas/Lucius' relates to one of the most 'good' and one of the most 'evil' characters in the New Testament: Luke ('Light') the Evangelist (presumed author of Luke and Acts) and Lucifer ('Morning Star').

Aslatiel's name may come from Aslan, a turkish word for lion. Normally I wouldn't go with a Turkish word, because From doesn't seem to use any intentionally. From likes Norse and Old English and proto-Germanic and Gaellic and Welsh and Latin and Greek, and there's a strong case to be made that they [link to fauntus] like Tolkien. But beyond that, they don't seem to borrow from other languages in a consistent enough way that I feel confortable using the translation. So, while I would normally rule aslan out,

- It's the word lion

- Aslan was the name of the Lion in The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis, who was a titantic Christian apologist despite being clearly smart enough to realize how easy making up and defending something like a religion is and, in fact, invented something much more interesting and philosophically informed than his own religion in an attempt to drum up interest for his clearly crazy and impossible and (worse) and boring 'real' religion.

The reason I make this connection is because it lines up with what I feel is an important through-point regarding Mirrah and the third game: it is a land of religious forest people that both harbor and oppose flame. Mirrah probably comes from a combination of the words for 'lake' (mere) and 'mirror.'

Creighton

Creighton was apparently a member of this official order. Unlike Lucatiel, who wears the dress armor used for travelling, Creighton wears the battlefield set, but with some modifications that imply it may be an imitation. Creighton is also one-half of the Ring of Thorns storyline with Pate, something that plays into his evolution to the third game, and is a wanted murderer in Mirrah (Cale,) where he was also known as a deserter (third game set description).

Which brings up a big obvious question: why not just take the mask off, since that's clearly how you're being identified as a horrible person? I mean, it could well be that Crei Crei is simply too dumb to think of that, or he's waiting until he's 'done' exacting his revenge before demasking and trying to pretend to be just a regular Joe and let someone else be Creighton for a while. In fact, whichever Thorn survives seems to be doing exactly this by giving the Cursebearer their armor.

Which makes us further consider: is this really Creighton, or an impersonator? Cale said the resemblance was striking, but also expressed concern that it didn't /quite/ look like the same guy.

Creighton carries the Dragonslayer Axe. Lightning infused axes wouldn't have been unheard of, one would imagine, in a religious place like Mirrah. This is not a Mir axe, though. It's a Forossan axe. A Forossan general's axe. A Forossan general that deserted his command's axe. A Forossan General that deserted his command's axe that, at some point, ends up on the body of a falconer near the Shrine of Winter.

Creighton may come from the Latin word credo or the Norwegian krasa. Credo means 'creed, belief, or conviction,' while krasa means 'to shatter, crack, crush, or break into pieces,' and is the word from which we get craze and crazy - a madness characterized by a cracked belief system, or a belief system that leads to violence.

Shadow Knights and anti-magic Wizards
It's not entirely clear how it relates to the 'two' orders of knights, but the Wizard Knights further embody this 'I am the thing I hate' mentality of Mirrah. Described as only relying on magic in order to combat magic, Great/Magic Barrier is their primary spell, and also connects the country to both Havel and the Way of White, assuming that was the church he was a bishop of. The religiosity of Mirrah is further expressed by their holy water, initially intended to be a soothing balm that scalds the flesh of the undead: "In the old capital...an ancient, well-protected spring produces holy water, but the water has been difficult to acquire ever since Mirrah became embroiled in war."

I can't prove it, but I think Holy Knight Aurheim is one of these wizard knights. He 'uses' magic in the sense that the hunter's tools in Bloodborne cast 'spells,' an idea that not only agrees with the 'but don't be tryina get smart about it' philosophy of Havel, but also as calls attention to the underlying dissonance by having him 'cast' the kind of sneaky fucker spells that give casters a bad name to begin with. The wikidot page says he carries the Ruler's Sword, which scales with the number of souls held. It might be worth checking to see if his attack values change if you rush him or fight the mobs on the way first. If so the idea could be that he invades you early not only so he could play hide and go seek, but also so he could let you buff him while he waits.

Mira, cuervos.

He also may provide a material link between the fall of Mirrah and the establishment of the Undead Settlement. So put a pin in that for later, internet.

Conversely, rather than an official order, 'wizard knights' may have simply referred to 'individual Mir knights that weren't /total/ teetotalers about magic.' I say this because whenever you get assassins in souls you generally get 'spooks' showing up (Fall Control, Hush, Magic Weapon,) and if Aurheim (Light Home or Bright Helm could be translations) uses Chameleon-like trickery, then we'd have to assume the shadow order would as well. This shadow order - mostly assassins and bodyguards - are represented in-game by the suspicious shadow enemies, whom Vendrick hired as mercenaries to help put down undead, but who are at this point really fast mindless hollows. Except maybe the one in EP.

Jugo

This thing always looks so happy to see you.

Jugo is a desert land, founded by Aurous, who is described as heroic, despite looking like Sauron. Jugo has about what you'd expect from a fantasy desert, such as flame sorceresses and giant insects, and not a lot of other information about it.

Alonne - described as being from an eastern land, wears armor with what looks like the head of a giant bug as a pauldron. This isn't a lot to go on, but could potentially single Jugo out as the eastern land from which all the 'Japanese' gear has been appearing.

Jugo is associated with pyromancy, whereas Forossa was known for its sorcerers and Mirrah its anti-magic knights. Pyromancy, it should be said, is associated with katanas. Shiva, for example, was a weapon collector who specialized in both katanas and demon weapons, and the Chaos Blade is treated as the greatest of katanas. This complements the theory, I feel, as Jugo is a land of pyromancies.

So, if Shiva is from the same place as Alonne, and this place is Jugo, then we suddenly have a much fuller picture of what Jugo may have been like: the place all those scumbag katanamancer builds come from.

If you're with me about the events that set up the third game, then you'll definitely see the significance of this, even if there's a disconnect between the general rule that katanas=Izalith and scimitars=Nito.

[I'd just like to interject with some maniacal laughter at Past Me's expense - FM]

Lanafir
Although it's not one of the three kingdoms, Lanafir hasn't really been discussed yet, so here goes.

Lanafir is framed as the state most culturally dissimilar to Drangleic, with the eagle - representing strength in Drangleic - representing wealth in Lanafir. The color blue represents knowledge in Lanafir, with it being the color associated with faith (Way of Blue, Sentinels,) in Drangleic. This would seem to be polar opposite meanings, but it isn't actually that weird, as Blue factions are generally led by INT-favoring sorcerer characters that pretend to be FTH-based religious characters (Gwyndolin, Queen Venn, Suly). Similarly, strength is often synonymous with wealth, but upon closer examination it seems like Strength is the producer of wealth, while wealth tends to wear away strength through indolence. This sets up a kind of cycle we see described by the Rusted Coin items, where wealth is won through strength, the wealth leads to weakness, which leads to the loss of wealth, which leads to a reemergence of strength.

Lanafir is an isolationist country, and one of the only tales we have of the place describes a hero, Blue-Eyed Durgo, fighting off aggressors with his brother-in-law. Durgo was a bowman, and described as nomadic, with his effects found as far afield as Eleum Loyce and the Fort of Fallen Giants. That the text specifically mentions his brother-in-law, we could seemingly assume that there is a wife involved somewhere, and that the wife is probably someone more important than either Durgo or his BiL, not that I think we'll figure out who she it.

the Twin-headed Greatbow originated in Lanafir, and may have been Durgo's primary arm, as it has an extended range, which Durgo's accoutrements would have augmented. The animal skull is apparently there to instill fear in adversaries.

Durgo (possibly durus [hardy, swift, or tough] + urgo [urgent need] carries the Hawk Ring, which was associated with Hawkeye Gough in the first game. This may not be significant, but Magerold also sells the wooden carvings created by Gough. This, combined with the 'fine craftsmanship' that mark goods from the country, could indicate some kind of relationship to the giants of Lordran.

I took like 100 pics of Iron Keep but somehow managed to miss Mags every time.

Magerold (possibly a combination of magus and gerald [spear],) is nominally a treasure hunter, and may be nothing more than a treasure hunter, but the trinkets he hunts follow a certain pattern relating to both Alken and dragons. His inventory would take too long to discuss, but it is worth noting that he sells the Jester Set, leading some to theorize that he has a secret 'second face' as Jester Thomas.

Thomas, as outlined in earlier posts, is set up in opposition to Mytha and in alliance with Elana, or at least in alliance with the Imperfect. It's a long-shot, but this could provide a link to a character that, like Gwyn's assumed wife and queen, is conspicuous in her absence: the original queen of Olaphis. 

Source

A jester is a member of a royal court, one that, in popular culture at least, is viewed as the only member of the court allowed to openly speak against the ruling family. If Thomas, a pyromancer, and Mags, a sorcerer, are the same person (or even if they just came into conflict in the recent past,) it would seem to indicate that Magerold is more than a simple treasure hunter.

Magerold has several connections to Anor Londo that can't be readily explained, as Lanafir would seem to be the land most distant from Lordran. And yet, he sells Gough's carvings, informs us that he believes Benhart's 'Moonlight Greatsword' is a fake. He's crazy about dragons, a trait he would seem to share with Thomas, and his end-goal seems to be locating the Dragon Shrine. This tells us that the Iron Keep is probably the furthest east he's been, as if he had found the route to Tseldora (and the Shrine,) he would have likely come across the true MLGS.

Volgen

Volgen and Lindelt are used in a way that makes it clear that either they are two cities in the same state, or that one is the name of a city, and the other is the name of the state. I refer to Volgen as the state and Lindelt as the city, but openly admit I could be wrong on this point.

Volgen is much like Astora, but an Astora after or during a Renaissance period. The nobility would seem to be in an extended decline (Ring of Restoration,) with their control likely corroded by both the church of Lindelt and merchant lords like Fiorenza. Volgen is located somewhere off the west coast of Drangleic.

Domestic Vol soldiers are infamously timid, possibly an echo of Astoran Nobility, and the country is primarily defended by mercenaries like the Falconers and (presumably,) Blue Sentinels.

I was stumped on the name, thinking maybe it shared a root with Wolnir or Velka somehow, but then I just typed 'volgen' into wiktionary and it led me pretty directly to the German word 'folgian' ('volgen' in Dutch,) which means 'to pursue.' I think that fits.

Lenigrast and Chloanne
Lenigrast seems to be a male variant of Elana. Lenny-grast. I'm not sure what the modifier is, but since Leni is another word that means light/bright/lion I assume grast means something like 'the place of.' Interestingly this would make a variation of his name Leningrad. I'm sure that's coincidental, but apparently Vladimir Ulyanov took the moniker Lenin after a river (Lena,) in imitation of Georgi Plekhanov, who went by the rap name 'Volgin.' I'm sure that's all coincidental though. Chloanne is a variant of Chloe (budding sprout,) and clan (children or family, but it comes from the word 'plant').

"No, I don't know who or what a Stonefang is."

Leni looks hollow, but in actuality he's sharp as a tack. Likely his aversion to adventure ensures he isn't in a position to be killed very often, meaning he's unlikely to hollow further, and that's why he's still completely lucid about everything from plying his trade to caring for his family and community.

Lenigrast is law-abiding - he could easily break into 'his' workshop, but wouldn't dare do something so blatantly criminal, and probably not out of fear of Sentinels. He is honorable to a fault - Maughlin has set his armory up in an actual blacksmith's shop, even though Maughlin clearly isn't doing any smithing, and Lenigrast settled for the much smaller hut because he isn't the type of person to question the sense or legitimacy of Maughlin's claim. He doesn't like 'flirtatious vagabonds,' adventurers, treasure hunters, or anything of the sort. Keep your spoony bards and dreams of glory: Leni is a man that sees the value in finding one's place and fulfilling one's role in society in as respectable and decent and fair-handed a way as possible. Harrumph.

He was exiled. Probably because he's undead. He's been undead a long time from the look of things, but he's nowhere near going hollow. Sharpness of mind and grossness of skin don't seem to have a whole lot to do with each other, which is probably important.

Chloanne, Leni's daughter on the other hand, is almost hollow apart from her core obsessions with rocks and fossils. She came to Drangleic, judging by her description, under the influence of the Calling Dream shortly after becoming undead.

Chloanne: inspiration for a million 'try thrust' messages from very young men that hopefully grow out of it.

Interesting aside: Harvest Valley is 'nothing like [Chloanne] was told.' At first the dialogue seems to indicate Drangleic in general, but the following line about poison means specifically the Valley. This is particularly noteworthy because of my Dearly Beloved Baneful And Evil Seductress Snake Queen of the Dead theory, as Chloanne could, uh, fit right in with the Jugo Pyromancers.
Look, I didn't draw her.

Point is, she's mentally hollowed enough to not snap to Leni being her father, while Chloanne's father is too ashamed of his condition to be like 'Hey Chloe. Y'aight?'.

Gilligan, Fiorenza, and Maughlin
Across 'town,' in the upper-class 'neighborhood,' we have the Volgen criminal element. Gilligan is clearly a spy, clearly not a very good spy, and clearly spying out information on Alken and Venn. His short term goals include getting out of Drangleic following a run-in with his 'auld chums,' the Sentinels.

Gilligan is set up in thematic opposition to Leni, who paints Gilligan as a conniving troublemaker, wanted in their hometown. Leni does mention that Gilligan can nonetheless be helpful at times. Whether this is meant to convey that Gilligan is a good egg deep down (he sells 'Patches' Black Leather armor,) or a comment on Leni's desire to see the best in his countrymen, is unclear. As a smith and merchant, Gilligan is greedy to the point of idiocy, 'renting' ladders at prices comparable to a Silvercat Ring and selling useless geegaw miniatures at the low, low price of 7,999 souls.

Gilligan relates to us the story of King Alken's affair with Queen Venn, an event that apparently drove Mytha to madness. If we filter Gilligan's rampant sexism out of the picture we can surmise that her 'madness' was more related to Alken betraying the war effort as much as anything.

Since Gilligan makes an appearance DS3, the next bit will discuss how he relates to the meta-narrative.

Gilligan was spying on Mytha/Alken. Gilligan doesn't know who Elana is (he's ignorant as to who the poison statues represent, but does know that they relate to the Pit and 'auld pagan customs.' He has heard of the Rat King, and has heard that the King is incredibly wealthy. Gilligan mutters to himself, often expressing his desire to leave Drangleic, but one dialogue line is worth examining further:

That damned hag just can't let her old flame go.

She's going to get us all burned.

In context, this seems to refer to Mytha. I would also argue that it could refer to whoever compelled Gilligan to Drangleic in the first place, that his spymaster is the 'old hag,' and the 'old flame' in some way relates to the Throne of Want, even if Gilligan thinks he's talking about the Iron King. In other words, I'm saying Gilligan may be working for the Archdrakes and, unwittingly, Elana's Blue faction.

As a final note on Gilligan: his name is derived from the Gaellic word for boy or lad, and seemingly denotes a page in service of a knight.

Then, of course, we have Maughlin, who came to Drangleic seeking his fortune, and is the kind of dangerous mix of incompetent, selfish, cowardly, short-sighted, and arrogant that marks rentier-based startups in failing 'service' economies across history.

The quickly-hollowing Maughlin informs us of the Blue Sentinels' presence in Volgen, and says that they appeared somewhat recently but have gained quite a lot of clout. So much so that 'you can't even run a shop without their blessing,' implying that they represent, or claim to represent, some kind of welfare-state interest.

Branching off from this, we learn that Volgen is lively, with 'highly-competitive, vibrant trade.' This lets us know that, unlike somewhere like Forossa or Jugo, Volgen has extensive contact with the larger world.

I don't know where else to put this, but Syan's crest is a simplified Primal Crest, and the Greatshield of Glory seems to feature a similar 'four winged' crest as both the Mastodon GS and the Looking Glass armor.

Fiorenza is described as being the only legit 1%er merchant in Volgen. This is no surprise, since merchant states invariably end up mirroring the monarchic states they sought to usurp due to the nature of competition. Well, actually, it's a surprise Fiorenza is the only moneyed merchant, as it's hard to pretend the system isn't rigged when the same five people and their friends keep winning.

As such, it can be expected that Volgen has something like Steinbeck's explanation for why more Americans aren't socialists: people who the system has completely failed, who are in fact oppressed and exploited by the system down to an almost genetic level, who somehow don't see themselves as victims of tyranny, but rather as savvy future lottery winners. 

rather than savvy Cluster B afflicted psychotics, which is almost a prerequisite to even be entered into the lottery of success under modern capitalism. Which is why I'm about to kill Maughlin's balls off here.

Maughlin even acknowledges the corruption, saying one must grease the wheels to accomplish anything. In this sense, his decline into lazy parasitism and price-gouging upon attaining a modicum of success could be a commentary on how so many aspiring revolutionaries sell out the people at the first whiff of a big paycheck.

Looking at you, Generation X.

Fiorenza had a replica of the Avelyn crossbow commissioned 'after reading about it in an old book,' and spent years trying to secure the Engraved Gauntlets - said to grant good fortune - which he never found. He was eventually ruined by 'years of excessive debauchery.'

The church of Lindelt was founded by the Archdrake Sect, refugees of the Olaph church who buried their history but, importantly, continued the work begun in Shulva.

This potentially involves action on several fronts for the church. Primarily, Lindelt is concerned with keeping some version of the Way of White alive - possibly by borging the Way of Blue folk religion a la Saturnalia and Christianity. The Archdrakes were conerned with the business of dragon worship, particularly Sihn.

It would seem almost perverse to suggest that the Archdrakes don't realize their Queen and Matriarch is still alive, so I suspect the question is whether, in the Cursebearer's time, the Archdrakes are searching for Elana, or already have, and are seeking to carry out her will.

The Sentinels and the Way of Blue are related in Drangleic, so we might assume that the Lindelt church mirrors this relationship. This could possibly shine some light on the mystery of the Sentinels' presence as state-sanctioned enforcers.

I took like a million screengrabs of Tseldora and the Shaded Woods but somehow managed to not get a single Falconer, so here's a repeat because I have DS1 pics I gotta get next.

This brings us to the Falconers, and whatever larger agenda they represent, if any. They're not from Volgen, but are are tied to the Warriors of Sunlight, even if they only Sunbro in exchange for advance payment. It's possible they were hired by house Osteria in aggrieved response to Lindelt or the rise of the merchant class. Alternately, with their presence near an area seemingly of interest to Fiorenza, they may have been hired to help him locate the Engraved Gauntlets. Considering Falconers reputation, there probably weren't many more groups in Volgen that could have afforded to retain them.

Interestingly, the free market liberalism of Volgen seems to exist in contrast to the economic conservatism of the Old Guard of Melfia.

The Last Scholar
I've been using the phrase 'The Last Scholar' to refer to whoever chooses the 'leave the throne' ending. The King that seeks that which is 'beyond the scope of light, beyond the reach of dark.'

Dark Souls is nice because it's intentionally set up as a multiverse, where everything that could happen did happen, somewhere, and we can even get glimpses at what can and does happen in nearby worlds via soapstone.

So, let's try to establish all the things that seemingly contradict, or at least run contrary to, the lore as it's generally understood:

• The "Dawn of the Age of Fire" was the time of Izalith and the Age of Life; included the War of Dragons and the period shortly after.
• Izalith creating the Chaos Flame occurred after the Age of Life, in the early Age of Light, both of which, along with the Ages of Dark and Death, are subsets of the Age of Fire. 
• The Dark Tales predate the Chaos Flame, and include Gwyn, and the Light Soul, becoming dominant. This tale involved Light acting as the curse of Life, as light is not a property of fire, but a product of fire. 
• The Dark Tales are also when the Bonfire and Estus systems were introduced. Astora and possibly Thorolund were involved with this. 
• The Dark Tales would seemingly also involve Artorias' first descent into the Abyss, when, through a pact with the beasts of the Abyss (possibly Frampt,) the Wolf Knight was granted the strength to traverse the Abyss and his sword cursed. This was done to combat the first outbreak of Darkwraiths, and may have pre-dated or been the precipitating event that led to the creation of the Ringed City. It would also, as Darkwraiths are seemingly synonymous with Kaathe's meddling, seem to be the first documented encounter of the primordial serpents taking sides in mortal affairs. 
• Izalith had both an established school of magic and state religion. These involved flame sorcery and 'life magic,' which could conceivably include things like resurrection and puppetry, as Izalith did seem to use hollows as puppets to begin with. 
• The Chaos Flame was an attempt by Izalith, using flame sorcery, to create a 'second First Flame.' The humanity involved seemingly went out of control, tainting the new fire. Unlike the First Flame (the bonfire, which warms but doesn't burn,) the chaos flame became a stew of humanity-fueled magma, which seemingly became the 'estus' of the demons it gave birth to. 
• The Nameless King is called the Nameless King because he still technically is the king of Anor Londo, since they didn't seem to bother crowning a new one. 
• The Anor civil war following the Firstborn's attempt to prohibit 'dragon' hunting (or whatever he did that sparked the match,) was ideologically based around dragons, and resulted in a Red and Blue faction being created among the Anor gods. 
• Nameless, obviously, but also maybe Havel (possibly giving an explanation for his occult club,) Velstadt and/or Raime (who would have been stricken from history,) the original church, and the queen dowager (assuming there was one,) formed the Red faction, identified with the Warriors of Sunlight, the Drakebloods, Alken (including Mytha's rule,) and the Knight faction of Lothric. The Red faction is generally characterized as favoring strength over dexterity and faith over intelligence, and functionally usually behave much more like paladins than clerics, in general fantasy terms. 
• Blues, then, are generally more cleric-like, are associated with Darkmoons, Princess Guards, and Blue Sentinels, generally favor INT and DEX, and included Gwyndolin, Gwynevere, the four knights of Gwyn (I'm assuming, but A and C both wear blue, G's punishment may indicate he was originally in Nameless' camp, and O eventually changed his mind and left to try to find his former commander,) and Seath (inasmuch as he was on anyone's side but his own). 
• Blue won the war (war may be a misleading term, it may even have been nonviolent,) and Nameless was stripped of his deific status (had his Lord's Soul removed,) was exiled, and stricken from the histories. It can be assumed that his compatriots met similar fates. 
• Flann wasn't from Lordran. Gwynevere marries him after the Anor Londo exodus, which follows either the flooding of New Londo or the fall of Oolacile. 
• For that matter: Queen Izalith is supposed to be the fertility goddess. Since she's not available, fertility goddess-ness would seemingly fall to the Fair Maiden or the Bed of Chaos, either of whom are responsible for birthing new life into the world. Although Gwynevere no doubt had children, her status as fertility goddess would seem to be questionable, if it wasn't already. 
• The Anor Exodus resulted in the founding of a colony that would eventually become Olaphis. 
• This would make Gwynevere and Flann the lead candidates for the original Queen and King of Olaphis. 
• The Lost Sinner, who was possibly a Daughter of Chaos and surviving flame sorcerer, attempted to light the First Flame of Drangleic but failed. 
• Elana is still Queen of Olaphis, and leads a faction of loyalists in preparation for her coming vengeance. Suspected allies include the Archdrake Sect, Jester Thomas, the Rat King, Gavlaan, Grandahl, the Blue Sentinels, the Rotten, and the old Firekeepers. 
• Yhorm and the Sunken King represent a split in the Olaphis psyche that led to a Red/Blue civil war mirroring the one in Anor Londo. 
• Yhorm's family crest is the twin dragons, and may have been a giant. 
• After the fall of Shulva, almost the entire church of Olaphis was executed and dumped in the pit in Majula. 
• Alken was the Red factions of the war, Venn the Blue. 
• The Prince of Alken was a Warrior of Sunlight and descendant of Yhorm that became the Iron King. 
• The Princess of Venn was a Sentinel/ Darkmoon Blade and after renouncing her claim to the throne relocated to Forossa, where she became a general known as the Ivory King. 
• It's unclear if Nameless had already left Forossa at this point, but his, uh, name no doubt was key in Queen Venn's 'rebirth.' 
• Mytha, Queen of Alken, began to rework Alken into a kingdom of blood and bone after her husband's decline into debauchery. Suspected allies include the Brotherhood of Blood and the Kingdom of the Hunted, Agdayne and the Grave Wardens, Drakebloods (in principle if not in fact,) Aldia 
• Queen Venn was the mother of Vendrick. As the father was King Alken and the nations were at war with each other this marked the child a bastard. 
• He did, probably, served in the Alken/Venn war. his name likely means 'Breaker of Venn,' so he might have been a kind of John Snow-esque character early on. Wellager says that Vendrick has watched over the kingdom for 'ages past.' 
• Mytha was the mother of Aldia, the elder brother. Aldia had a second, hidden 'father,' the Writhing Ruin. Aldia was rightfully king, as he was born of the queen and the eldest son of the king to boot. But he was a Blue, Vendrick ended up being the Red Prince, probably because of his upbringing. 
• We don't know, but it's possible Aldia tipped Vendrick off to the 'King of Man and Lord of Dark' Lordran thing, but it's equally possible Vendrick became the 'Dark Lord' of DS1 because he's a likewise genius plus an asskicker that gets shit did. (You can draw some pretty direct connections to Season 1 GoT here, which helped with how I put this stuff together). 
• There's no question that Aldia preferred dukedom, probably after being tipped off by an insider, so it was arranged that Vendrick would rule and it would be sold to the people as 'the rightful king of Alken AND Venn,' with Aldia obligingly stepping aside publicly to show what a nice chap he was and fucking off to this mansion to study bonfires and giants. 
• There's a LOT of stuff about dragons I'm leaving out of all of these posts. There will hopefully be a master post about Transcendence and Dragons at some point. Until then imagine I'm saying a bunch of stuff about dragons and overcoming the curse here. 
• Vendrick retreated from his role after seeing the Giant Lord. Fuck if I know why, but if I had to guess I'd say it's because Vendrick realized he was related (kin) to the giant and that meant something like the Profaned Flame would happen if Vendrick went through with it. This is the 'black and white' hollows version of the story (which I'm still very unsure of). 
• Alternately, it could be as simple as Vendrick thought he was going to be re-linking the Age of Light but realized he'd actually be ushering in the Age of Dark and that Nashandra was a skelingtons all along mwahahaha, which is basically the current understanding of DS2's climax and relies on everyone being dumb and shallow and taking the 'prettiest princess in the whole land, and a brave, gallant knight with a magical lance...' stuff at face value, which why would you this is Souls. 
• Some time passes, and in the outside world recent undeads begin to experience a prophetic dream of a 'murky, forgotten, walled-off land far to the north.' 
• Also, walled off in the sense that Lothric is walled off in the third game, and Lordran in the first. The Age seems to be marked with the literal rise and fall of certain kingdoms. 
• From here a Cursebearer emerges and eventually clears the hurdles and takes the Throne of Want. 
• The Age of Dark officially begins; Dark/humanity/Want begins to wane and Death/the dead/Peace begins to wax. 
• This process is possibly repeated many times, as Shanalotte - who is a dragon and therefore outside of time - implies that if you take a throne everything respawns and plays out again with a different Cursebearer, as may have happened in Lordran. 
• Eventually a Cursebearer clears the hurdles and walks away from the throne, intent instead on either acting for their own glory or to usher in the Age of the Dead. 
• I refer to this last figure as the Last Scholar.

The following aren't timeline specific, but important if true 

• At least one mushroom scholar made it to Drang, maybe taking the underground route. Alchemy is incredibly advanced in Drangleic, and seems to have declined since Olaphis (probably relates to all the flowers going extinct because of chloranthy). The reason for this is possibly because they kicked all the clerics down a hole (WUT PATCHES)
• For that matter, Melfia - where the clerics sent all the nerds and hippies to - had progressed to astronomy.
• Raime (old church/guard) and Velstadt (Stone Knight) may be from Lordran, and may be colonists
• Alternately, they could be from Thorolund and Astora, respectively.
• Dragons dragons transcendence hollows slowly evolving behind the scenes.
• A Reddit user and loresmith, Sunlighthunter, brought to my attention that Straid has cut dialogue that refers to the King of Olaphis as 'Alvis.' The name means 'all wise,' and may also be a play on Alf (elf,) as iirc the citizens of Ool were originally meant to be more blatantly elvish, with Dusk originally having pointed ears. This would also seemingly be the root from which Alken and Aldia were later derived. If 'al' literally means 'all,' then that would make the later words something like 'all are ken' and 'dawn of all,' possibly a reference to Alken's early, impoverished peasant army that was set in opposition to the power elite of the Venn faction.
• Al- could also mean 'bright' or 'light.' This would swap 'light' for 'all in the above examples. In fact, both Alvis and Alva seemingly come from the word 'albus,' meaning a dull, matte, or grayish white.
• Aldia's pyromancies seem to be based on Eygil's school, and utilize the same Dark Flame color scheme as Nadalia's. Even Aldia's root-based attacks seem modeled after pyromancies (flame snake and firestorm). I don't know how or if that connects narratively, so am gonna explainer it with 'Aldia was Eygil's pupil.'
• Gavlaan works for or with Elana, but he probably isn't happy about it. Judging by what happened to his people, and by his drinking, he's probably not happy about much of anything.
• You...go home?

Dark Souls 1 had two endings, both of which happened in the Cursebearer's past. The Link the Flame ending happened, maybe more than once, with the Four Old Ones respawning (or reincarnating,) whenever the link is made by the Chosen Undead. In my mind Solaire was the first to re-link the flame.

Later, arriving from the eastern mountains of Drangleic by way of Forossa or Mirrah, young Vendrick takes the journey of the Chosen, Claims the Lords Souls, ignores the Kiln, takes the Strength of Lords back to fallen Alken and uses their strength to build Drangleic with his brother. This is done so that Vendrick can one day reclaim lost Olaphis and take the Throne of Man as Dark Lord, but the Curse emerges and we all know the rest.

It wasn't until some time later that the Cursebearer manages to make the link. The Age of Dark begins, but because the linking is done by way of the Olaph-Drang workaround the Age of Dark happens while Gwyn's Age of Light is still happening in Lordran.

We can look at final boss summons to get an idea of who could have accomplished this, apart from the player character. Benhart (brave or good heart) and Vengarl (Sword [protector] of Want [Vendrick]) both make it to the throne, with Ben's purpose being to hone his swordwork and Garl's to, possibly, avenge his former employer Vendrick. Bradley (nail or spike) of the Old Guard is also available, though his motives seem more mysterious.

Benhart wants to unleash Seath's Moonlight from his sword, even if he doesn't understand that's what he's trying to do. Moonlight acts as a curse against light, from which the Soul Spear/Arrow school of spells is derived. As Benhart was in Tseldora, it's possible that he was infected with the Writhing Ruin to some degree. If Benhart were to take the throne it's possible that the Age of Dark could be flavored by both Ben's unflagging resolve and diligence, as well as Seath's madness.

Vengarl remembers Vendrick and his mercenary brothers in arms fondly. After a long period of reflection, Garl's mind melts from... let's let him explain it, since it's some of the best and most moving dialogue in the game, if not the series.

Vengarl, then, were he to take the throne, would be Lord of a Dark Age flavored by bittersweet conflict, of a holy rage cooled to a dark tranquility.

Bradley is a cleric that belongs/ed to the same order as Alva the Wayfarer. His Heide Spear (made of bradden steel,) and catalyst would seemingly date him/them to Olaphis. Alva was presumably then also a cleric, one charged with the protection of Saint Serrata. While Alva eventually turned to the Dark, Bradley seems to have stayed true to his purpose, whatever that was. He's available to summon under some rather strange conditions.

• In No Man's Wharf he's available as a small summon sign, indicating that he's more concerned with killing Vendrick's hollowed forces (and probably darkstalkers,) than with killing the Sentry and gaining access to the Bastille.
• In the Shaded Ruins he is available to help fight Najka, but only after all of the shaded enemies are dispatched. Hell if I know why.
• At the Throne of Want he'll become available to summon if Aldia has been unlocked as the final boss.

This would seem to make it clear that Alva is in opposition to Aldia and Vendrick, and particularly Aldia. Additionally, it may help connect the Shaded Guardians to Aldia's experiments. Were Bradley to take the throne then the Dark Age would, weirdly, be ushered in by a really informed and competent Sunbro from Olaphis, a kingdom currently ruled by a Blue queen.

Regardless, once this Age of Dark is ushered in in Drangleic it will be both the Age of Light and the Age of Dark. The Age of Dark, however, will likely end 'naturally' and flow into an Age of Death, except that it will still be the Age of Light in a little bubble of light around the Kiln, with the actual First Flame 'stuck' at the point in which Gwyn sealed the flame.

And that's not even getting into the influence of Manus or dragons.

"lol we can't see down."

Closing
I think that about does it for this one. That means this series is over.

From here we will be 'officially' moving into the story of Dark Souls 3. Like I said at the top, I don't understand the story of 3 nearly as well as 1 or 2, so it may be a while because I don't want to get three posts in and realize I've got Yhorm and the Abyss Watchers the wrong way round, which I'm convinced I will no matter how long I try to figure it out. On the other hand, I've got a bunch of notes I've cut from the past three posts that might help hammer the first installment out fairly soon.

I might have an interim post outlining dragons or going hard on Oolacile or something, but it might be a month or so until the next post.

Thanks for reading.