The Horrific Truth Behind Marika's Godhood

Marika ascended to godhood through manipulation and murder.
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TIMESTAMPS
00:00 Intro
00:40 What is the Gate of Divinity?
03:03 The Corruption of Power
06:10 The Visual Design of the Gate of Divinity
10:18 Marika Built the Gate
11:45 A Comparison to Bloodborne
12:52 What is Godhood?
13:55 What About Miquella's Ritual?
15:30 The Birth of Gold?
17:04 An Unreliable Narrator
19:15 The Hand Reaching Into the Flesh
20:55 What Was the Seduction?
23:30 The Great Golden Arc Rune
27:38 The Consequences of Power

[beholdnonsense]

The idea that the Gate of Divinity is made out of Hornsent corpses actually retroactively makes the Saint Jars make much more sense. It seems that their ritual actually CAN provide some kind of holy power, and Marika managed to get enough influence among the the Hornsent that she turned their ritual against them in a way

[Boss_Fight_Index_Channel]

One really interesting detail: if you slash at the Gate of Divinity's stone staircase, _it bleeds._ Kinda tells you a lot about Marika's mindset.

[walpurgisnight]

Marika chose to enact a flesh-warping ritual that mirrors how her people were tortured. She tore out the threads of life from countless hornsent, that becoming her final act as a human. I think that decision to be wrathful as she became a goddess is why her golden order was so hypocritical and flawed. She had chosen to make a perfect world by performing abhorrent blood magic.

[CPTWIGHT]

Frankly I think your Elden Ring videos alongside Vaati's are starting to make me think more critically about the characters in a setting more so than the greater theme of the setting itself, and I'm not just trying to glaze. Genuinely good work.

[benthebamboozler]

It’s worth mentioning that the Hornsent are very adept at molding flesh to suit their needs, having a variety of tools for just such a purpose. So, it stands to reason that Marika used the Hornsents’ own tools and techniques to mold the gate of divinity out of their bodies. But the thing about the hornsent’s flesh-melding is that it doesn’t kill. It’s likely that every body that makes up the gate was still alive during its formation.

[lorisceleste]

Enor Ilim is Akkadian for “The Bedchamber of God”, the spiralling architecture is reminiscent of early Sumerian monuments, as well as other Mesopotamian civilisations.
It’s also very important to point out that many armoured enemies in the DLC (Divine Lion/Divine Bird warriors) are inspired by these very civilisations.
The entire last area of SOTE is literally a Ziqqurat, at which peak gods walk amongst humans.

[unironicallylikesranger]

I feel like so many fromsoft lore channels are more concerned with the hidden lore than what the story itself tells you about a character and how it presents them to the player in a direct way. I’m glad we’ve got people covering this angle now!

[dorrianbrooks]

I always figured that Mohg handled the blood sacrifice aspect of the ritual. After he was charmed, he started making blood sacrifices in Miquellas name to turn him into a god. And Mohgs palace makes it very clear that they amassed enough blood to create literal rivers. So I feel like Mohg unknowingly handled the bloody aspects, and Miquella went the extra step of "purifying" himself with the different divestments he made, to be a pure god, one with his own vision, not one dictated by the will of another

[pancakes]

I feel like whatever she did at the gate is meant to be ambigious. Its something so terrible that your own imagination goes wild with ideas, and revealing what happened would ruin any anticipation of it. You're meant to picture your own idea of what a sin so fowl would be that it curses her entire bloodline. So awful that anything that she does with her godhood afterwards will be stained with this original sin.

[DzNutzOnyaChin]

All I know is.. Marika's body count seems to increase with every lore video ☠️

[Zhtrik]

Miquella: “Hey Mom, I got you this Jar-
Godwyn: “Miquella no!”
Miquella: “What’s the problem? It’s just a jar.”
Marika: (Horrifying Jar Related Flashbacks)

[michaelwalsh]

"Is there anything sexual about this scene?" Plays add for Monoply Go

[elderliddle]

Marika DID go through the gate. Look at the trailer footage again. Outside the gate, the sky is dark with heavy clouds. Inside the gate is a golden sky with thinner clouds. This gate is a dimensional portal. Marika here is likely opening the gate, hence why the wind suddenly picks up as she holds the threads

[efaristi]

but there was a god before Marika, the god of Placidusax. And there is the Fell God. So even if the Gate is Marika creation, there has always been a way for mortals to reach godhood.

[CaspianMidnight]

I think your reasoning that godhood is an equivalent to power and that makes the difference between them and "mortals" is spot on.

Runes perfectly encompass this. Power trickles down in the land between, showing even the most common rats (who drop runes) can grow to an unnatural size and ability.

This is further shown by your character the tarnished, a regular human guided by grace and given the strength of runes- through the Erdtree.

It's also why you aren't as strong in the lands of shadow, and have to collect Scadutree fragments to gain power in that land.

[Just_Adrian_]

I think Miquellas ritual did require a blood sacrafice as well, just that Mohg unknowingly handled it for him via his bloody fingers

[itsasecrettoeverybodyyy]

Worth mentioning: the Marika statues in the Land of Shadow have not just a more inviting pose but a bare leg forward and a specific emphasis on her hips that the more recent statues don’t. She’s also wearing less jewelry than the recent statues or even the story trailer. At risk of reading into it TOO much, she seems like an object of worship before she fully ascended to godhood, and a few item descriptions suggest she briefly had a cult within the tower society

[chrishewitt]

It's probably a bit basic, but the sexual element links Marika to the Whore of Babylon, and Enir-Ilim to the tower of Babel. You hit the nail on the head about this being a story of the triumph of evil and what would have happened if the Hebrew God had not smote the Tower.

[WobblesandBean]

I agree with your theory. *_Marika wanted to die._* She had learned what St Trina was desperate to prevent Miquella from finding out. That's why she conspired with her Numen assassins to merk her favorite son, she knew he would probably be the victor in the coming sibling battle and took his life as a mercy. Then she shattered the elden ring trying to sever the Greater Will's influence upon the lands between.

Marika watched as her beautiful utopia stagnated and crumbled, yet she herself was unable to change.

[yourethatmantis]

I’m not entirely discounting the idea of femme fatale Marika. But the idea seems like a stretch to me. Words like “seduction” and “affair” are not strictly sexual terms (even if they’re commonly used that way). It’s more likely, in my opinion, that Marika simply gained the Hornsent’s trust and admiration, then eventually betrayed them.

Marika being called a “strumpet” could just be a baseless insult. Since we have no reason to believe that Hornsent old woman ever knew Marika directly or indirectly. Yet we know she has a lot of reasons to hate Marika for what she did to the Hornsent.

While Marika being barely clothed in the scene seems more like the writers are symbolizing Marina’s rebirth as a god. Since nakedness is sometimes associated with birth and rebirth.