Can The Paths And Aeons Be Considered Good? | Honkai Star Rail Lore

Whenever the subject of aeons and paths come up, its often we hear that neither are evil. They are almost like a part of nature and thus immune to any moral compass. Despite this, whenever we meet opposing factions, either or both of them will claim their opponent as evil. So that got me thinking, can the paths and aeons be considered good or evil or are they just simply like natural disasters and cant be grouped into such thinking

This is what this video will try to answer and mostly discuss, can the paths and aeons be considered good or evil

Some part of this video comes from the actual lore while others may be speculation on my part as we currently do not know the full story. As such take it with a grain of salt as the point of this video is just a deeper dive into Honkai Star Rail lore.

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#honkaistarrail #starrail #lore #aeon

[spiderdude]

I’d mostly view them as amoral. They exist outside of the concept of good and evil. They are just an embodiment of a certain ideology. You wouldn’t get mad at the concept of thermodynamics just because you got burned once.

[idontspeakjapanese]

NGL Mythus and Ho oH's design are top notched, was actually expecting Ho oH to resemble the Yin and Yang symbol.

[kanade]

Since the aeons are meant to be manifestations of their path/ideal, i believe they are not able to stray from it or discriminate who is at the mercy of it. For example, it would be weird for Yaoshi to want to rid all life of sickness and death but only saves certain people/species. They want to rid ALL life of sickness and death, whether these people are “good” or “bad” is none of their concern. As long as they’re healed, I don’t believe Yaoshi cares. So, I believe the aeons are not able to stray from their path even if they wanted to. I don’t believe any aeon is good or evil, they are just a pure representation of the ideal itself.

[zigazav]

A thing used in many MiiHoYo games, is that it isn't always black and white. We've seen many cases where a villain is not pure evil, and still retains some sort of good morality among their siding with evil. Childe from Genshin Impact for example. He may be a Fatui Harbinger, someone evil, but he isn't going to slaughter an entire town due to him being evil. As such, it's generally safe to be around him as long as you don't give him a reason to target you. Despite his evilness, he cares more about his own brother than his job as a Fatui. As seen when he botches his tasks as a Fatui, to protect his brother from getting involved with the Fatui. He also lies allot to his own brother, to protect him from the danger from the truth. Likewise, in Honkai Impact 3rd, Otto Apocalypse, who was the main antagonist of the story of HI3rd for quite awhile, everything he did was out of a selfish desire to find a way to bring his beloved Kallen back from the death she faced 500 or more years ago before the game. He may been willing to sacrifice everything and anyone for a chance to bring Kallen back from the dead, but he isn't pure evil. His actions, although without good morals, helped pave the way to give humanity the power to confront Honkai. And his Kallen clone, Theresa, instead of discarding her because she didn't actually become Kallen, he adopted her as his granddaughter. And Otto knew he was going to die, so, ahead of time, he finally resigned from the role of Overseer, and handed that position to Theresa, who would lead Schicksal in a more good moral direction than Otto's selfishness. Otto even intentionally gave the ones trying to stop him reversing time back to before Kallen was executed, the chance to defeat him. The sense that most villains in Hoyo games are not pure evil, and has some good in their hearts, I think can also be applied to most Aeons and Paths that aren't considered "good" by the story. Every villain has a past that motivates their evil acts afterall. Be it grief of a lost loved one, or a traumatic experience, every villain has a reason they are evil. Nobody is evil starting from birth

[Humster]

AHA is Always 100% GOOD!




Always a Good Laugh!

[chaddickhaut]

Moral concerns are born of Law. The aeons are all above any and every law but the paths they embody. Thus, they are blind to the moral consequences of their actions; to them, there is only their given path, and deviating from it for any reason is unthinkable. Now, some paths are easier to use for either good or evil; Destruction, for instance, wants only to destroy, whereas Preservation wants to protect and preserve. Star Rail's central conceit seems to be that any path taken to the extreme and/or used without discretion can do evil. After all, destroying a monster threatening a planet would probably be good, while protecting a murderer and thus allowing them to kill again would likely be evil.

[billdecou]

I don't think so. That's our perspective so far but they are basically (as far as I understand them) a conceptual being of the natural order. Kind of like Undead Unluck if you saw that last anime season, in the season if they kill the target, it's concept ceases as if it was never there.

It would be cool if we meet those who follow the Hunt far too aggressively (maybe one of the other Generals) or an Abundance/Destruction that makes a reasonable argument. Earliest could be Duke Inferno in 2.x since they already introduced/hyped him up in 1.6.

[caficafe]

Really love all of your content! Hoping you would cover Gold and Gears story too <3

[ridolilirkurnia]

Pathstriders are the people who gained power from the path that they're following, I wonder how would these pathstriders would use their powers, will they have supranatural abilities and summon elements out of thin air? Or will they use it to fight monsters just like in the game?

[KudaGeatsune]

Honestly feel like HSR shows that they can be both & neither
To some its the preserving of life to others its delaying the inevitable
While the abundance represents healing, the Xianzhou natives see it as a plague
Just as the harmony represents
Coming together peacefully penacony could just as easily represent harmony as control of what is and isn't allowed to happen to maintain that peace
Genshin showed the Erudition could be intelligence but just as easily arrogance(herta funilly enough shows traits of both sides of the path)
The Aeon's are the extreme of the archon's they are an ideal personified. But are still divine beings who don't have personality
Technically, the IPC does the opposite of qlipoth, the preservation through its planet networking but he doesn't intervene becuase it is not part of his ideal its also why nanook the destruction doesn't support the annihilation gang he doesn't support them as they don't respect his ideal (destruction is a natural process not mindless violence)

[meneedayato...]

Are you going to cover the G&G story soon?

[eldritch]

Paths are ideologies ultimately, and you can judge an ideologies.most have nuances, but are all ultimately too absolute to be anything but detrimental

[maccavann]

I remain skeptical of Xipe; the more insights I gain into "The Family", the more uneasy vibes I get. While I don't necessarily attribute malicious intent to her actions, there's something about her that strikes me as suspicious, if you catch my drift. On a broader note, I'm inclined to believe that Aeons, by their inherent nature, aren't inherently evil. Instead, they seem bound to the paths they've forged in their ascension, essentially becoming the living embodiments of the concepts they represent. Our human-centric notions of "good" and "evil" may not be applicable to them, as they act in alignment with their designated paths. It's a bit like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole when we try to impose our moral framework on these vast beings.

However, it's worth noting that the factions and followers surrounding Aeons can introduce a different layer of complexity to the ethical equation. Another point to make is take Nanook, for example; despite the MC's goal of defeating him, there's a nuanced interaction that transcends our conventional understanding of good and evil as he gazes at the MC giving them his blessing of the path.

[Jojokun]

Keep the lore deep dive coming man. Love it to bits.