Cazador Anyway, to bring talks in another direction, what do you think of the Lord of Blood's offer for a truce, and then a possible alliance? We've seen during investigations that he's got some Tower abilities, and he knows about conflicts to come, capturing goddesses, etc. He's not as irrelevant as he could be. Simon was pretty quick to think about stabbing him in the back at the first occasion tho. I wonder if it's going to give us some minor advantage later. But I also wonder if the LoB may have been the one working in conjunction with the Chosen.
you cannot make an alliance with him, you can or attack him (a switch recorded it) or make a truce (a short one for sure) if simon will blast him will be a unmissable story step, and since the only four shardholder remain outside simon (anak, mestan, lord of blood, fuzkao) i think in the end simon will the last [with mestan take a shard-role under simon, esthera like]. there is an high probability he is in the renthnor wild, a place we can explore in the next segment. he seem a smaller player compared the anak, tanurak or mister "third party". so the resolution of his storyline will be quick or as side effect of a larger event.
Cazador Let's assume an Incubus worked in conjunction with the Chosen, and play elimination. It's not Simon nor Esthera, for obvious reasons. It's not the Lustlord, since he's unimaginative and, well, dead. It's not Tanurak since we've seen that he's not Ivala's captor. It's also probably not the Anak, since in the prologue he's unaware of the Chosen's existence, we can assume he's the peaceful gray as opposed to the terrible light in Ginasta's visions, and he reacts quite abrutly to the whole thing. It's not Nyst since he's just a pawn of the Anak. That leaves us with Fuzkao and the Lord of Blood. Both would be cases of "it was King Kanfur all along!", but it's still possible.
why you think some (soul)shard holder will works with the one beyond the chosen? i don't find any reason. you miss two thing, first the crystal is crafted by the same entity and their effect is blocked by (soul)shard power and the same is working in malicious way, the only real effect we know is the increase in monster attack and ginasta fear the is endgame will negate life itself. fuzkao snatch a fragment of FL shard. he don't seem know how the tower is and in general it seem a bit of a moron in my option.
Cazador By the way, Xestris points out the Chosen and the Crystal of Ivala as things that were created by our Tower manipulator. She didn't mention the third big miracle, the Wall of Ivala made during the TAW. Hester seemed to know about the process by which it was made, altho she later complained to Sarai about Chosen still appearing, so it's possible that they were indeed created by different people.
the wall was a powerful craft, but isn't nearly the level of the chosen or the crystal. i find two thing more troubling things. first ivala hope had pinned to simon from long time ago, so it's reasonable think her captor if not know, at least were aware of the possibility, simon spend years babysitting chosen, without the power of the shard he can be easly killed and the "third party" isn't laking in expertise. the second is he actively protect aram team (vhala, carina, altina, orilise) from the FL frontal attack [he sent a chosen to distract the FL and sabitha giving the time to the team to leave the scene]. why? the only thing that make some sense is he realy want simon gather power to take done other shardholder, but he had done nothing in any other event.
Cazador Anyway, if the Ivalan tower walker has already been introduced, let's review the likely suspects. We know it's not the Goddess of Magic since she was supportive of Ivala against her captor. It's probably not the Mother either, given how she acts, both in general and towards Ivalans in particular. The Sage of Ghenalon might actually be plausible. Xerces might have taken him out to take control of the Chosen, and lied about a second hidden towerwalker on Arclent as a red herring. Both unstable Chosen and the Crystal of Ivala appeared after this, right? So his war in the Tower would be about something else. It's a long shot, but heh, worth mentioning.
It's probably not Alonon, since the Anak mentioned two hidden towerwalkers on Arclent and he's likely one of them. Plus, he's terribly apathetic towards the world, while the Ivalan towerwalker mainly acts upon the world.
i don't think the captior had a divine shard, or they don't have the need of ivala's power. likewise they don't have a sould shard or enslave ivala will be the most logical choice. the chosen exploding in stineford said something "they need a flawed vessel". so the chosen itself aren't the goal of the chosen project, at least i think so.
if xestris awords can be trusted (she can deceive simon, or the anak can have deceived her) the person we want is in one of the apical position of the church (can be or can be not high priestess hester).
Cazador Now, let's examine the High Priestesses. We can assume it's not Sarai, for obvious reasons. Probably not Nabith either, she got her place quite late in the game. Since the Crystal of Ivala also talks to succubi and Chosen are lustful, we can also be reasonably sure that it's not little old Annah from Stineford. Plus, there was a red herring in the Tower in Stineford. There was also one in Aram, so I'd say that it's unlikely that either of its high priestesses is our culprit. (But if one is, I'd say it's Kerannii, based on personalities and such.) So the two most likely ones would be Hester and Bertricia. As said before, Hester was quite clearly behind the Wall of Ivala, but later seemed concerned about Chosen, so it's pretty muddy.
if he is one of the high priestess is hester, but i'm not sold on her. (but with the new information that possibility bumped up a lot in the possibility scale.). a thing can be relevant or not, in stineford mine a seed of corruption was dwelling, they are rare and precious enough to induce iris to recover the one launced in the eleven forest, so who send it in stineford? [if had some relevance and not "put a fancy boss in the end of mine quest which can gate game progress" sort of thing]. the chosen are full of lust, they must be flawed and reckless. they gather strength very fast, but die fast as well [and the lustlord bind the power of a single chosen to prenvent it to return to the source]... the theory about they are an artifical way to produce divine energy to be used for... something can have some true inside.
DukeLeto7 I'll just speculate here that if Mestan gets a slot, it'll be because he turns the tables on Lilith and ends up "hollowing her out and wearing her like a suit".
about mestan, choose to help him or not had drammatic change in his dialogue, but a mechanical level it change nothing during the gathering. this led me think wathever the end of the mestan storyline will not be changed by that decision, but can change a minor outcome or something (like tell kalant to surrend the power during the war).