Azem Explained (Final Fantasy XIV Lore)

What's up with Azem? They are a mysterious figure that we've never seen in game, but their connections to pieces of the larger story span far and wide. Let's break down everything we know about Azem, including how they know the Warrior of Light is meddling in the past.

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[hockey]

Is this a video on Azem, or an excuse to show off your A+ GNB glams?

[garbagebandit]

What little we learn about Azem makes them sound like a trickster god that likes to help people instead of screwing them over, and I think that's pretty cool.

[acgearsandarms]

I think one of the best parts of the character of Azem is that any player is free to interpret their own version of them and they’re not wrong for doing so. We just only have the barest framework of the character so that we can fill it in. Azem was adventurous, a good friend, and always did things their way. Maybe liked their grapes more than most.

I will however say is that I do hope eventually the devs will see fit to reveal Azem’s official mask or their glyph. It’s something that bothers me that I don’t know.

[Measos]

Azem is someone who will ask a lemonade stand "do you have any grapes?"

[TotoTheBest]

A small detail about the vulcano incident is that in labirinthos we see the exact same grapes that azem worked to save, the famous low poli grapes XD

[RiveroftheWither]

Personally? I say we shouldn't learn anymore about Azem UNLESS we manage to rejoin with more fragments like Ardbert. After all it wasn't until we joined with Arbert that Emet-Selch and Elidibus were able to see a hint of Azem in wol and not until defeat that they accepted it. So it's fitting that we the players only see a hint of Azem as well, unless we gain more fragments of our former soul and with it more memories of the past.

[wolvetica]

"I have a familiar?' - Azem on the phone to Emet

[Zaixven]

I kind of pondered on the relationship between our character and Azem. I mean, we are a reincarnated piece of their sundered soul, but the concept alone was always interesting to me. The more I've thought about it, I look at it kind of like when someone suffers complete and permanent amnesia. Effectively Azem's soul being split amounts effectively to ego death. While our WoL and the other pieces may certainly still hold mannerisms and quirks reminiscent of Azem, they have manifested into fully self actualized people separate of the original persona. The person Azem was is gone, but the person they became carries on.

[TsukiyoSpelldust]

I think of the whole “shard of so and so’s” soul as reincarnation. So for me my WoL is Azem reincarnated. They have the same personality quirks. Being a wildcard, mischievous and too kind for their own good. Luckily the Dark Knight quests taught this incarnation self care! 😂

[Salt_Mage]

I would love to hear more stories about Azem. Hythlodeus and Hades’s stories about Azem and their adventures - but no more than that.

[randymyt]

What I love about XIV is how it integrates us, the player, into the story and make us feel important. As far as knowing more about Azem, I would like to learn more about them through stories and accounts of their adventures. One thing I would love, however, is if we could take on the name of Azem in the future. I always found it silly when ppl call us "Warrior of Light" in conversations. By taking on the title, ppl could refer to us as "Azem", yet we could also retain our created names. Imagine a character meeting us for the first time, and the conversation can be like, "Did you say your name was [ insert name ]?! I'd never thought I'd meet Azem, the great adventurer, in the flesh!" And by taking on the name, characters can refer to us by name in voice acting as well. The writing team has done such an amazing job building this mythos for Azem over the years that every XIV player has accepted that we are a part of them. Owning that title for our own would help us tie us even more into relationships and stories in the future.

Great video, and I'm looking forward to more like this one from you!

[Dartanis]

If one stops viewing Azem as a separate character, and instead entertains the possibility that everything we are told about Azem is simply the retelling of our, the player characters exploits, a lot of the things we hear about Azem start making a whole lot more sense. Every time Azem is brough up ingame I become increasingly convinced of the fact that we are, or rather WILL BE Azem. We already hold (depending on if you have done the Dark Knight questline and count that) 8 or 9 thirtheents of a whole Amaurotine soul. And while this part is speculation on my part, I believe that just as the Ascians plan was to tip the scales to merge all remaining shards back into one, Azems soul will eventualy reach critical mass and simply reconstitute in full. We are already timetraveling to the past, so my theory is that the Azem of the past knows future events not because he/she can see them, but because WE are Azem. Azem doesnt see the future, the Warrior of Light simply remembers their past. Perhaps the biggest clue and supporting evidence for this theory, besides Azems gender and appearance changing to match the PC, is the fact that "The grapes are quite delicious, so Im saving the island" is something that would neatly fit both thematicaly as well as mechanicaly as a selectable anwser to a quest in a later expansion. Also summoning a "Deffinitely Not A Primal Fight" Ifrita and then defeating it to solve a problem sounds awfuly familiar. One could almost argue that Ifrita were a "trial" of some kind, one that you would probably need 7 of your bestest adventuring buddies to defeat. If my theory is correct, at some point in a future expansion we regain and reconstitute the remaining shards of our soul into one because we need to get back to the past for "reasons" similar to why we now return to the past to deal with the Pandaemonium raids. Yoshi-P never needs to worry about Azem not matching everyones headcanon if Azem IS the future "past" version of the Warrior of Light. Ordinarily I would argue that introducing timetravel into any story is VERY risky and thats why they wouldnt do it, since that ship has sailed... As far as Im concerned Elpis and Pandaemonium are both proof of concept and player introduction/warmup into this exact concept and idea.

[orsonsnow]

I'd be interested in a story that suggests that Azem did, indeed, meet with Venat before she did the sundering. And, together they worked out a plan. In Endwalker, Venat/Hydaelyn, admits to Y''shtola that the main purpose of the sundering was not to stop Zodiark. That was, in fact, secondary. The primary purpose was to dilute the aether of man such that they could interact with dynamis and have a fighting chance by learning to persevere. The problem being that it was a balancing act. The champion of Hydaelyn (WOL) had to be strong enough to fill the role, but not so strong as to negate the interaction with dynamis. This threshold was met following the seventh umbral calamity. With the addition of Ardbert to our soul (which I might add was somewhat orchestrated by 'Minfilia" (Word of the Mother)...we became 4/7th of what we had once been. Then, in Endwalker, we found out that Hydaelyn has the ability to separate out a soul of the dead before it returns to the Aetherial Sea. She did this with Emet-Selch (she tells you this in the Tower of Babil...where she says an ally waits for you....the watcher...and one other who might come into play (Emet-Selch). What I'm getting at is the confidante talking to Venat in the recording is stating that Azem didn't respond to him...and Venat says nothing. It could be deliberate and wished to keep their plans private for some reason. I find this theory intriguing because even though it takes place over thousands and thousands of years, the timing of their one chance at winning required intricate timing. And, the WOL had to take the lead as Hydaelyn's strength waned. An 8th Umbral calamity was just one too many. Seven was just right....and Minfilia just barely holding off the flood of light in a temporary fashion was the point in which the WOL surpassed Hydaelyn in effectiveness and the WOL became the lead. There is also the cool irony of Azem passing the torch to Azem once more.

[Dastreus]

I eat up what little Azem shit we can get. I love it. The kind hearted traveler shit is my jam. I got wanderlust at heart, so I relate on like a personal level. I imagine plenty of enjoyers of the game do, as well, making it brilliant what they did when writing them. They knew exactly what they were tapping into.

[scifisyko]

My understanding of why Azem didn’t sign onto summoning Hydaelyn was that Venat told them everything - and knowing the entire situation with how their soul would have to be split, Azem accepted that they couldn’t be spared from the Sundering without ruining the timeline convergence Venat was working so hard to maintain. They knew they had to get sundered so that the WoL could come into being and return to Elpis later on.

[JoelAnthony]

I feel like we have reached a perfect opportunity to learn more about who Azem was. Especially now that we've reached a point where our WoL is about to start adventuring again. To see what the universe has to offer and provide our aid where we can in lands unknown to us.

[Eppon]

I like that when Elidibus transforms the shape he has is the classic Warrior of Light armour that, in Elidibus' own memories is revealed as being something his idol, Azem, once wore. (shown from the back to hide gender and any features though) It isn't shown whether Azem wore that back when they were still an Ancient or if it was a shard of Azem who reincarnated as likely the first Warrior of Light. Elidibus admired Azem so much that his transformed shape is just him dressed as Azem. Although his version of the look was less bright. The colours were muted and faded likely because Elidibus was fading as a person, gradually losing his memories and personality. When we defeat him, all he had left was his purpose as the heart of Zodiark and his desire to be like Azem.

[AlishN]

Tenzen is heavily implied to be another of Azem’s reincarnations. A traveler who helped people, a trickster and wildcard who did things he thought were right. Suzaku is even having trouble telling us apart from him in her confused state - she might have sensed that the soul was the same.

[cameo_bitpart]

I would love to see more of Azem's past and character, as it ties directly to our persona's in FFXIV. But SE cannot play their whole hand. Poker game analogy, they should slightly lift their cards, to give their opponents a taste of what hand they hold, without fully exposing it. We need to know more about the original Azem, But need to be left with a sense of mystery to him/her as well.

[TheGeekShow]

Wasn't the final Azem's crystal created in secret by Emet Selch? I'm pretty sure that the shade of Hythlodaeus in Amaurot says that Azem's decision not to side with the convocation about Zodiark meant that they could never have a crystal bearing their memories. It's suggested in that scene that the summoning magic in the crystal is something that the final Azem could do as one of his/her specialities, and it was contained in the crystal by the person who made it, and that the person who made it had to do so in secret because the convocation would not allow "defectors" to be remembered and honoured.

Also, Emet Selch admits to being the bearer of the crystal for a while towards the end of Endwalker, and as the crystal was made during the summoning of Zodiark and the first Final Days, there would have only been one person who carried it - the person who made it.