Radagon Tried To Fix Everything

Does anyone else find it interesting that Radagon gifted a Great Rune to Renala? Before the shattering, the only other removal was my Marika herself to bind destined death. So, before the shattering, two Great Runes were removed from the Elden Ring, the Rune of Death, and the Rune of Rebirth. Interesting pair. As if they removed the cycle itself. No wonder the world is in such a stagnant state.

We know from the Rune of Death that Marika can remove pieces of the Elden Ring. My guess is that she removed the Rune of Rebirth in an effort to create a change (for whatever motivation you ascribe to her) and rebirthed herself into Radagon. However, she was still the vessel for the Elden Ring so she remained as both herself and a reincarnation - the One True God becomes Two.

I think Radagon's sense of automony comes partly from the giants curse than Miraka transfered onto him over her, hence his red hair. Radagon was always meant to just be a puppet, but through the giants curse, he gained a sense of self, beginning to pull back pn the strings that moved him.

I now want an Elden Ring lore novel, with an audiobook narrated by the turtle pope's voice actor. I could listen to him infodump about lore for hours

I think that what Miriel says, "... and why a mere champion was chosen for the seat of Elden Lord..." means the strength was NOT the only requirement. Godfrey was strong, sure, but he was NOT a mere champion, which is why Miriel found it strange that someone whom everyone thought was just a very strong warrior of the Golden Order.

I also want to note that Corhyn sort of loses his mind when everything is revealed, and earlier on when you give him a prayerbook he calls it heresy and is very hesitant to teach its meaning. Miriel on the other hand says this: “Heresy is not native to this world, it is but a contrivance. All things can be conjoined. Let us learn together.” Not only that but he teaches you both sorceries and incantations. I think this furthers the idea of Radagon’s intent of conjoining, the Golden Order Fundamentalism of combining intelligence with faith, and working to bring all together. Even further, at the end of Goldmask’s questline, he has reached full understanding of fundamentalism, and his mending rune of perfect order is said to have been DISCOVERED, not created by him as with the other two runes. I believe this was left by Radagon in an attempt to fully fix that which was broken, and perfect the Order. The current order has lead to such destruction and pain: the misbegotten, omen, and all “graceless” beings are treated as inferiors, leading to rebellion and mass death, like castle Morne. The people blindly worship gods no better than men. The lords all scramble desperately for power. Fundamentalism seeks to incorporate learning, growing, moving past blind faith. Making right that which was wrong

What I find interesting is the relationship between Radagon with his children. Malenia and Miquella were apparently cared and nurtered despite suffer the influence of other Outer Gods, unlike the Omen twins, while his children with Renalla are elevated to the status of demigods. Is like he was trying to do what his can for his children, even if was not possible for himself. Is unfortunatte which we don't have Marika view on the children, expect that Godwyn was apparently the favorite and the speech that she give for them all.

I think SmoughTown had the right of it - Marika and Radagon are an alchemical rebis. They're two minds sharing one body, that form a yin-yang relationship. Marika likely began life as a member of the Numen race, and was selected to be an Empyrean by the fingers, and eventually became the chosen vessel for the Elden Ring, becoming a god in her own right. It's likely that her ascension to godhood either fractured her mind or separated what was already in there, another personality. Marika was herself rash, defiant, and unpredictable, but her other half, Radagon, was leal, pious and loyal to the Golden Order to a fault. When they waged war upon Caria, it was the body of both that led the golden armies, though obviously in the bodily form of Radagon. Both Godfrey and Rennala were likely "duped" in that they had no idea that their spouse was one of two distinct personalities inhabiting a singular body. I believe that after she sent Lord Godfrey and the Tarnished away, that Marika was already formulating plans to defy the Elden Ring. She recalled the body shared by herself and Radagon, leaving Queen Rennala without a spouse, under the guise that Radagon was to become the next Elden Lord in the wake of Lord Godfrey's disappearance. Radagon essentially becoming husband to himself was never fully "required" for Marika's plan, but it did help create a reason for Radagon to leave Rennala and return to the Erdtree. I believe that their shared body needed to be within the Edrtree itself in order to potentially bring harm to the Elden Ring, hence the need for Radagon's return. Before the shattering, Marika/Radagon would go on to have at least two children, Miquella and Malenia, the cursed twin prodigies. I think it likely that Marika wanted as many demigods born as possible to potentially be chosen as Empyreans, so that she could one day be properly replaced and put out of her misery. She eventually enacted her plan to shatter the Elden Ring within the Erdtree, fighting with her other half, Radagon, all the while, as he attempted to fix it. She was punished and trapped within the Erdtree for her sin, where she reached out to her original contingency plan - the return of Lord Godfrey and the Tarnished.

I think we’re going to have to loop in Goldmask’s calculations about Marika and Radagon to understand more about their relationship. The way I see it, Marika is the aspect of destruction, of fighting, of death and rebirth. Radagon is the aspect of nirvana, of freedom from the cycles of violence. It’s no wonder that Marina’s offspring with Godfrey and Radagon are corrupt/omen-cursed/rotten/inbred—she can only breed destruction. Radagon, however, breeds creation, making demigods whose less pure bloodlines actually help them overcome the effect of Marika’s influence. I see Marika as an interesting inversion of the Christ myth—rather than a being that takes on death in order to usher in a new kingdom of life, Marika takes lives in order to usher in a kingdom of death, one that Radagon is staunchly opposed to in his desire to create and to mend. It’s no accident that each of the Elden Lord endings has a “mending” rune attached to it, because our job (like Radagon) is to mend things. Yet, in order to do that mending, we have to kill the remaining older order (like Marika wants). If Marika is Radagon, then Radagon is Marika—creation is destruction and destruction is creation. Like the theme of the Painted World DLC of Dark Souls 3 being to destroy the game world in order to have the material ashes to paint a new one, this game demands that we mend the pieces of the shattered game order into a complete whole game by conquering the parts of that game.

Wow, this really changed my perspective on Radagon… I honestly thought of him, as nothing more than a terrible individual who only cared about the golden order and nothing more. But after watching this video, I can now fully believe that he may have actually been a very good person, who actually didn’t want to leave Rennala and his first 3 kids. If anything, it feels like Marika is the terrible one not Radagon

Definitely the best and most complete lore video about Radagon, thank you for such amazing work Now Radagon seems like a WAY more human character...I'm even saddened bc of it

I think there could be a strong chance that the misbegotten warriors could somehow be from Radagon’s malformed lineage of sorts. With a definition of misbegotten as “poorly conceived”, the red hair is a striking resemblance. Perhaps a primordial essence resides in Radagon same as Marika. She had omen kids and a nasty golden grafted lineage after all, Radagon may have had some misbegotten ones down the family tree. I don’t think they’re his actual children, but there appears to be some connection. They seem to love their swords of royalty for some reason. They also have lion-like features and snake-like features that remind me of his other two kids. Could be somethin, could also just be a ton of symbolism. It’s hard to tell these days.

I think that Mr. Miyazaki consciously looped the lore by combining 2 different story lines of 2 initially different characters - Marika and Radagon. I think that the idea of Marika and Radagon being literally the same "something" was not always the pillar of the lore. But such method allows players to speculate endlessly because the idea of Marika and Radagon being the same just makes no sense and it was Mr. Miyazaki's purpose. Just an unsolvable conundrum...

I think Millicent and Malenia are the key to understanding the relationship between radagon and queen marika

What if Radagon was a twin of Marika. However, Radagon was consumed or absorbed by Marika in their mother’s womb. As a result, Radagon was left unborn. So, by this logic, what if Radagon received or had the “great rune of unborn” because he was never born to begin with. Don’t know if he receives the great rune when Marika was chosen to be the vessel of Elden Ring or when he was separated from Marika. Maybe he had it from the moment Marika consumed him. A little out there but it kind of makes sense.

What if Marika had possession of the amber egg and, in an attempt to free herself from the golden order, used the egg to be reborn as Radagon? A completely new being. But Radagon couldn't keep the secret that he was Marika and so was called back the capital.

Radagon is Marikas mimic summon who got to op and started his own family. When they both shaked the bed malformed kids were born.

Well presented as always, Jake. I love how you try to piece it all together and interpret it as best you can. The Radagon/Marika twist doesn't seem like a big deal on the surface when you first play it. Like, huh, cool. But the deeper you dive, the crazier it is.

Radagon along with radahn, morgott, and miquella is one of the few characters in ER that I can confidently say is a good person, or at least tried to be

I may be reading too much into things but I believe that the Golden Order Sword might prove that Radagon didn't really love Rennala. It was a custom among the Carian family to gift a magical sword as a wedding present to the consorts, the same way Ranni gives us the Darkmoon Blade when we put a ring on it. The sword was supposed to represent the union between Radagon and Rennala and yet he reforged it to instead embody the Golden Order. To me this indicates that Radagon, at the very least, cared for the Order more than he did for Rennala.