The most striking sight related to the dead white trees is at the source of Siofra and Ainsel rivers where you find the ancestral infant head. The reoccurring motif in Miyazaki's games of myriad primordial trees in a sea. The two rivers were a large part of the pre-writing culture in lands between; the ancestral followers even specifically eschew writing. The time before there was the one tree to worship, instead of the many. To them, the moving waters are a force balancing life and death. An imbalance brings about corruption and stagnation. This ancient animistic culture of many gods and many spirits rooted strongly in real-life Shintoism and the efforts to preserve it is very much a parallel to the attitudes of many Japanese ever since the introduction of monotheism and organized religion to their lands by outsiders. With all this Shinto inspiration in Miyazaki's work, I'd wager the wisps might even be partially based on raiju, the thunder beast spirits who are often depicted as enveloped in ball lightning. They are naturally calm and passive but are easily agitated by loud noise. Thus when Raijin the storm god creates thunder, the raiju zip across the sky in rage.
Great comment! I know of raijin, but not of raiju if thats distinct/also havent heard of thunder beasts/spirits as opposed to just a god. But it does present a strong parallel
I'm surprised there was no mention to the real life phenomenon of "ball lightning", that might be what visually inspired these enemies and I hadn't given these guys much thought more than that but the lore implications fit pretty well now that I saw this video.
I saw one once, half a second it was bright, It sounded like electricity, no effect afterwards, that was very weird but felt pretty common, it was during a storm
These things have single-handedly ended 50% of co-op sessions with randoms. The host gets to Siofra for the first time, summons me and then proceeds to walk into one because they didn’t know what they did. Also kinda hoping to get the ability to summon these with a spell, like the pyromancy the demons used in Dark Souls 3
I believe those monsters are called smoldering preachers, and we do get that spell in the Ashes of Ariandel it's a severely gimpy spell called Floating Chaos 😂🤣
@@skydonkey9515 yeah, forgot the name of them. Floating Chaos was a massively disappointing pyromancy. These wisps feel like they’d be a lil more effective, so I’m hoping if we get them as an incantation or whatever, they’ll actually be useful. There’s only one ice lightning incantation atm and it feels weird being by itself as its not connected to a particularly singular boss.
@@elijahcafazzo-joyette8226 I agree with everything you said, I'm honestly kind of surprised they don't have dark damage in Elden Ring, we have Magic, Holy, Lightning, Ice, Fire, and even Gravity but no Dark damage at least to my knowledge lol
Couple of points: 1. You're right that these are the only 2 locations of the wisps 2. The trees are called ancient bowers by cut NPCs, and they seem to be a stand-in for the Nimloth in the Tolkien mythology.
I had a theory that the ball lighting was a byproduct of whatever the process of making the Dragonkim is. My only support for this is: they're blue lighting like ice lighting, and they're found where the Dragonkin are (underground, and the Consecrated Snowfields where their ghosts are). Very minor connections but in game there isn't much to go on
The lands between rune description (the starting item) specifies that runes are the grace that dwells in the eyes. They're more like gold eye lenses than energy balls, the lord's rune even looks like an iris. And few side notes: 1) Rennala has gold eyes during the first phase but later has her natural eye color (blue) which suggests she becomes a tarnished after we take her great rune 2) if Melina is still alive for the chaos ending her gold eye appears blind because we've destroyed the source of grace and the lack of natural eye color implies she's not human 3) Kenneth Haight and Thops who aren't tarnished have the yellowish gold color of golden rune 1~13 whereas strong characters like Millicent and demigods have the amber color of numen's, hero's and lord's runes 4) the grace that the tarnished lost is likely what is gathering at the table of lost grace
My best guess on the tree thing is that it's kinda like the people in this area. The Nox had their potential, their ability to grow, cut off. The stars were bound, and they were attacked by fallen stars
They kind of do lead you astray in the consecrated snow fields so it seems they are connected to most of the folklore including the spirit idea for the ancestral followers and the spirits that lead you astray as well. There are also spirts in the town north of the snow fields so more spirit connections
I honestly immediately registered them as Wisps, I called them that the moment I saw one, asking "Is that a wisp? Are they aggressive?" Before being blasted. One guy I met called them Anomalies or Dark Stars, after Metro 2033s roaming orb of lightning.
I’ve seen a Marionette in the Mountaintop of the Giants playing with (or studying) some small blue spheres. I wondered then if those blue spheres were connected with the wisps. Maybe they contain them? Hard to say, and it’s a stretch since the similarities are just round, blue and magic.
There is also a Marionette with those orbs in Hands near the south gate that leads to Sellia. It drops them once it engages with you and I think I heard a breaking Sound like glass, maybe those are glintstone devices. Maybe like a Palantir, to receive orders or something?
So this is probably just a cute coincidence but something that stuck out to me during the video is the fairy thing - namely that it instantly reminded me of the blue dancer charm which represented the fairy (speculated to be the Siofra river itself in some form) that bestowed the flowing sword onto the blind swordsman who went on to teach Malenia. We know that Malenia's weapon is highly dex-based, and the flowing sword definitely favours it... which then reminds me that in this game, lightning weapon skills scale with dexterity. And wouldn't you know it, instead of fire and ice like in most fantasy games, the wisps in Elden Ring use lightning.
It's possible that the white trees in Siofra and in the Snowfield are part of the primordial crucible, which was shunned with the tarnishing of Godfrey. In the Nameless Eternal City, there's a crucible knight in a hollowed tree trunk, and the water around the ruins of the city is white, like those trees. This color connection is admittedly thin, but the ancient nature of Siofra, the Mountaintops, and the Eternal Cities seems like they could all have a crucible connection.
The past almost year of my life has literally been the rabbit hole of[ Elden ring > Hermeticiscm > quantum mechanics > ... ] *skipping a few* It's all connected, but seeing the connection is actually what inspires faith or understanding of the "micro-macrocosm model" , or "as above so below", or the "flow" and that is what I believe the creators of this game are trying to provide us, challenges that inspire us to notice, that these themes of rebirth, fire, stagnation, corruption, etc., but to feel them inside you as a real human being.
@@KitsuneShapeShifter I've beaten everything but demon souls and Sekiro, which reminds me Buddhist themes are super relevant too and the themes in From Software are reused in every game yet make them new in such profoundly interesting ways each time.
@@sterquiliniis7583 I think Bloodborne was the most esoterically nuanced game (I love the ''moon, blood, womb, matrix, mind, dream, reflection, water, ID, beast'' rabbit hole), but Elden Ring has such a huge body of information within it's insane. Sekiro really goes heavy on the stagnation/flow symbolism, makes me wish I knew more about Japanese cultural references
5:26 I think the best alternative option for the Fairy reference would be that of the Blue Fairy, the one referenced in the Blue Dancer Charm in association with the Warrior in Blue who taught Malenia and sealed the Outer God of Rot. It's possible that this fairy was a spirit of the river (flowing waters) that taught the Warrior in Blue his fighting style, as the Ancestral Followers also seem to have some connections to the Lake of Rot through cut content
I'm almost certain "blue fairy" refers to the river itself, not these. the blind swordsman learned from the blue fairy (again siofra means fairy) that they only way to fend off rot is to be constantly moving and flowing
The ancestor followers indirectly worship death birds. “golden winged envoys” “reap” Intentional wording. Check winged scythe and eclipse shotel as well. I’ll also point out that death does not oppose the erdtree, so much as the Golden Order has removed the rune of death and cast them out relatively recently. There’s a reason only certain holy spells dismiss undead and those are of the golden order. Eternal life has caused stagnation, a blight or rot on the erdtree, starting with Godwyn. The wisps are fairies and the nomadic warriors, warrior starting class, fight stagnation. A fairy helped the blind swordsman seal the rot God who entered Siofra. Check warrior starting gear, blue dancer charm. It is interesting to note that lightning scales off dex for a very specific reason that’s been unspecified. Fast water and water boosts lightning damage? Pure speculation on the last part of course... but it has little to do with dragon cult.
The potential tie to the scarabs sound is they are teleporting. I always saw them as a spell that fades after using it's power. Now I feel they attack then flee.
Something interesting about the locations, both Siofra and the mountaintops where the wisps are have those sickly, slender silver trees/spires. I wonder if there's a connection between them? Edit: just saw this part in the vid, lol. Nvm
Yeah i mentioned it but really dont know what their significance/meaning is. The tree connection is obv important in ER but i dont see any immediate explanation. Other than them being in anti-erdtree areas. Maybe theyre attempts to grow new trees
I feel like anyone who knows about folklore enough or plays games like D&D or World of Warcraft where Wisps/Will-o-Wisps appear would know exactly what these are...
What's interesting about those white, dead(?) trees in Siofra and the Consecrated Snowfield is that both of these places are close in proximity to places or peoples that exist outside of or in opposition to the Golden Order and the Greater Will. The Ancestral Followers are close to these trees, and have found a way to exist away from the Erdtree. But more notable, the Nox also exist underground, awaiting their Lord of Night. Miquella's Haligtree is accessible through the Snowfield, and is like a mirror of the Erdtree. It could be these dead trees are or were the beginnings of forming their own Erdtree, in both these respects, or in the case of the Haligtree, the beginnings of Minor trees.
They also have the same kind of stoney calcification we see on the Erdtree’s textures. The importance of the botanical aspects can’t be understated in Elden Ring. Wherever an Outer God’s/force influence is strongest you see the plantlife adapt those traits and I think the nature is both physical and metaphysical: Altus has literal golden plants except where Godfrey’s influence is starting to affect the lands, where there’s tinges of gold but also Black Death. The plant life in areas where his roots sprout (revealed by zullie) tends to also appear to being dying. Mt. Gelmir being the site of a burned minor Erdtree displays almost no plant life, similarly the plant life the closer you get to the Giant’s Forge is almost non-existent. The trees near the crystalline structures in Liurnia tend to have more cyan/aquamarine coloration than pure green, which is inline with the Primeval Current. Caelid is obvious with the red form the scarlet rot, but what I find more interesting is that we see Greyoll’s Barrow, connected to the rest of Caelid which is more heavily affected by the rot, has dying plantlife everywhere. Seeing as the rot turns most life into fungus, and that there is no reddening of the plantlife there yet or fungal manifestations, this actually leads me to another theory: What we see with the haligtree and the CSC trees red leaves isn’t actually rooted in Malenia’s rot influence. What I think is happening with them is as Miquella is being transformed by Mohg using the influence of the Formless Mother, who we know the Bloodflame stems from, the leaves of Miquella’s haligtree and it’s minor trees are turning blood red, further cementing the metaphysical aspect (Another thing brought up by Zullie for example when they talked about Godfrey’s influence as prince of death somehow reaching Faram Azula despite no physical connection unlike everywhere else his influence sprouts up in the lands between, including Stormveil). Siofra is also an interesting case all on its own, plantlife is also tinged by something, from the appearance and description of the gatherable plants to the coloration of trees. It is verdant but the plants don’t look Limgrave green.
"i dont think siofra river has any better candidate for a fairy" i want you to tell me right now the dragonkin soldier wings arent a spot on fairy cosplay.
alright hear me out. The erdtree used to be far more prominent, but its reach/influence has been dwindling for quite some time. When this began to show, the carian royals began attempting to capitalize on this, looking to the outer reaches where the erdtree's influence was already weak. But moving traditional forces to these distance regions just wasn't feasible, so they began trying to find ways to ahcieve their goals over long distances. One of the creations was the wisps, creatures made with souls that never reached the erdtree (anthesis of the golden runes). They, along with other soceries, blocked out the erdtrees influence in certain regions, leaving behind empty husks of the erdtree saplings with the golden aspect of them (the leaves) being stripped away, leaving just the souless white trunk.
I think the red flowers around the trees in the snowfield are more linked to blood than the strange ancestor trees. You find the same flowers in Fort Haight where the blood-crazed knight took over, and the rose church where Varre and a Sanguine Noble hang out. The flowers in the snowfield are also concentrated around the blood-stained portal to Mohgwyn Palace. That note out of the way, this is a very interesting theory, with a lot of thought provoking ideas teased from so little concrete data. Well done!
Thanks for the nice vid :) My theory on the white tree stumps: - Initially thought these were attempts to create the Haligtree, since I noticed them first in the Snowfields. - Now I just think these are fossilized tree, showing that these areas haven't been civilized, hence landscaped, for a long time, unlike everything Leyndell and around.
the fur raiment description of their armor describes "The ancestral followers keep their distance from the Erdtree, awaiting new buds. They are certain to sprout from their very flesh, and indeed, their souls."
A whisp is a formless ghost... it's also why the other definitions say what they do... a WISP of smoke looks like a formless ghost, and the piece of hair whipping in the wind is formless as it flows in the wind... they're nudges to formless apparitions
Hi guy from Japan here I was pretty sure these are onibi which are like a clump of loose souls that are balls of light that are blue and float, but calling them wisp is almost exactly the same as I believe they are as you said a measure of life or I have also heard there is group of lost souls.
it's interesting that the wisp's lightning looks different from most of the other lightning in the game. the natural lightning that strikes near fulgurbloom is yellow; lightning attacks from humanoid enemies is yellow or yellowish gold; lightning attacks from some dragons have a reddish tint to them. lightning spells scale with faith usually, and various item descriptions say that lightning is closely related with holy powers and the golden order itself. and yet the wisp's lightning is white-blue, closer to real world lightning. i'm not sure what that all means, but there's definitely some color theory stuff going on here.
@@MadLuigi time. Mostly time. These trees are older than the Erdtree. Possibly they were grown from celestial dew, lunar silver, or were used in its cultivation for various magical practices. Maybe Miquela found some use for the trees too, grew a few while destroying the minor Erdtree that tried encroaching upon his power. There is probably just coincidence… maybe the leaves were somehow used in making mirror helms to block the influence of outer gods on the mind and the refinement of grace into unalloyed gold that prevents outer gods from influencing things. I recognize that Miqualla’s trees would be younger than the big Erdtree but yeah…
First time I wandered into Siofra River I saw them and wanted a closer look cuz I thought they looked cute and monkey brain went "OoOoOoOh favorite color!" My stupid under leveled ass quickly got nuked and then nuked again when I went back to try to kill it. Screw these little wisps...still pretty to look at though...
I doubt you’ll see this but I commented on another vid about the blue swordsman/fairy and Melania/rot. If I’m right about the fairy being related to the river, then the ancestor dudes’ cycle of life from death could be what the swordsman taught Melania, which could’ve changed her perception of rot and perhaps gain control of it (possibly explaining how she can gain health when damaging you? Death->Life) We also see this theme with the juxtaposition of Caelid and the Kindred of Rot vs the Haligtree. The Kindred despair that Melania has abandoned them, while with the Haligtree we see a sort of purposeful symbiosis of life and death. The Haligtree is also sort of a combination and rejection of both the Golden Order and the Rot God, a blasphemous yet beautiful mockery of everything they represent, hidden away past the snow where they can’t be reached. The snow also denies the Erdtree and possibly Rot (decay slows in the cold), is associated with Ranni, and of course is another form of blue water, tying back to Siofra/the blue swordsman and the ancestral worshippers. My headcanon is the blue horn guys and wisps are ancestral spirits called on to protect and nurture the big deer spirits on the spiritual side while their descendants do the same on the physical side.
wisps are energy in a way, just like the very very similar looking runes (when you pop them they look spherical) and the literal life energies the scarabs roll up into balls as well. I don't know if this is that strong of a connection, but I do think they wanted life energy to be represented in a different way than a flame for once so it can be more unique
Ha! Ive been running around the underground. I got hit by one of those yesterday. My spouse goes wtf hit you? Im like that blue thing. My spouse: "wait, thats an enemy? I thought it was some sorcerers magic".
i think its objectively hard to connect the scarabs to anything, but it is somewhat compelling to consider their connection to all this, especially thinking about how they disappear somehow maybe other people know more lore on them than i do but as far as im aware anything is possible for those little guys
also at least to me the white ashen trees in the CS and the siofra river always invoked images of ash lake from dark souls 1 and on top of that it also reminds me of the elden beast arena which is also eerily similar to ash lake and id suggest that their implication in elden ring is similar to that of ash lake in dark souls I WOULD LOVE to have the japanese translations for the lore surrounding ash lake and any of these other implications
I'm wondering if the Wisps have a connection to the Dragonkin. It's said that the Dragonkin are basically poor imitations of their skyborne kin. The Wisps have the exact same look as ice lightning, something only found through Ice Lightning Spear (which you get from defeating a Dragonkin Soldier) and Dragonscale Blade or Dragon Halberd, both of which have Ice Lightning skills. If the Wisps are truly made of Ice Lightning, could that be why the Dragonkin are only seen using Ice Lightning abilities, because they either learned it from the Wisps or because the Wisps are their source of power?
You got bro, I agreed on wisp. I was sold since the word manscaped came across my tv screen😅😅😅. I just called them lightning orbs…. Oh and Snow fields and underground. But I swear I bumped into the orbs in a dungeon somewhere
The only reason honeybees die when stinging humans is because our skin is real elastic. Let them do their thing and they wiggle right out like a corkscrew. It’s neat to watch
Adding a comment to say thanks for referring to my language as "Irish" and not "Gaelic" as some other content creators like to do, annoyingly. Subscribed and liked
Most likely fairies, was my guess. The dragon kin soldiers are a lot like the fairy-dragon experiments from Kings Field. Created by Seath, and the mysterious Black Moon of Nokstella shares similar themes and tropes that Seath did.
With reference to my last comment about a video about the Star caller enemies... Will you do one? I for my part and many others probably too would like to see them covered as they are one of those enemies we don't get much information about.
I still need to look into them more to see if ill do a vid. Their connection w the alabaster/onyx lords is def interesting, will just have to see if i find enough to warrant a vid. I appreciate the input!
Ok this is low key lit af. I've always recognised the wisps as ball lightning "magic land mines" As such, these are of great interest to me. Glad you researched them. And I'll have you know I'm already subscribed. However I do all my hair grooming with a small pair of scissors. Is that weird? Edit; changed some wording because I said "these" way too frequently.
Just here to say, I knew their name I don't care about your thumbnail, I win. I've been calling them wisps since before I knew that's what they were and i'm very proud of that fact. They just look like what the word wisp describes.
I don't really see the wisps as being related to the ancestral followers, they're much more closely associated with the dragonkin soldiers. the ancestral followers aren't associated with lightning anywhere else, and theres no followers in the consecrated snowfield, and i don't think there are wisps in the ancestral grounds either. meanwhile the wisps always appear in rough proximity to a dragonkin soldier, and they absolutely _are_ associated with lightning (and specifically blue lightning). also the fairy referred to by siofra river's name is _probably_ the fairy mentioned in the Blue Dancer talisman (which may in fact be the river itself or a manifestation of it, given the very strong association between the blind swordsman and flowing water)
I knew to stay away from the Wisps because of my knowledge from the Metro games. More specifically, Metro Exodus as, as in the first two games, the electric anomalies wouldn't hurt you as long as you stayed still.
A friend of mine says the wisps match the XZ position of another enemy on the Y. I have not been able to figure out a way to confirm this - especially as there is not a subterranean zone where the wisps are in the consecrated snowfield (at least as of this time, DLC might change that).
What if they aren’t sentient Like they don’t really “attack” they are just reaching out with their own energy like how static works normally . . Then they disappear because they just used themselves up
I think they just wanted to make a field hazard so they made one in the same way they would make a mob enemy and just took away it's ability to be hurt or killed.
