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Let a new epoch begin. An epoch glistening with life. Brandish the Elden Ring, for the Age of the Erdtree! - Queen Marika the Eternal — as quoted by Melina
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Queen Marika the Eternal is a god and the current vessel of the Elden Ring. She reigns as the divine sovereign of the Lands Between, and her Demigod offspring are shardbearers in possession of the Great Runes. She is the most influential figure in the world of Elden Ring.
Overview[]
Early Life[]
Marika at the Gate of Divinity
Marika was a Numen, as well as a Shaman from the Shaman Village in the Hinterlands.[2] The Hornsent considered the flesh of Shamans to meld harmoniously with others,[3] and utilised this property in the jar rituals conducted on persecuted criminals, who were sliced up and stuffed into the jars to be reborn as saints instead.[4][5] The people of Marika's village were stolen away from their home to be used for this purpose.[6]
Marika was at some point recognised as an Empyrean by the Two Fingers and gifted a Shadowbound Beast: her half-brother Maliketh. She later ascended to godhood at the Gate of Divinity atop the tower of Enir-Ilim,[7] becoming the vessel for the Elden Ring.[8] This affair led to the birth of the Erdtree and Scadutree,[9][10] and was considered a betrayal by the Hornsent.
Prior to or following her ascension, Marika came into conflict with another Empyrean known as the Gloam-Eyed Queen. After emerging victorious, and desiring a world free of Destined Death, she removed the Rune of Death from the Elden Ring,[11] using Maliketh as a vessel to lock it away,[12] thus establishing the Golden Order.[13][14]
At some point during this period, Marika took the warrior Godfrey as her consort, who became both the first demigod and first Elden Lord.[15][16]
Eventually, Marika returned to the abandoned Shaman Village for the last time. After cutting off a braid of her hair and leaving it as an offering to the Grandmother, she bathed her home in the healing light of gold, knowing full well that there was no one to heal, and would never return.[2][17]
Age of the Erdtree[]
In the early days, everything was in opposition to the Erdtree.[18] With Godfrey’s aid,[19] Marika waged a War Against the Giants atop the frigid northern mountains, whose Flame of Ruin was capable of burning the Erdtree.[20] Ultimately victorious, Marika was believed to have slain the Fell God of the Fire Giants.[21] Upon learning that the Flame of Ruin would never die, however, she cursed the last of the giants to tend to it for eternity.[22] Marika declared the path the mountains as Forbidden Lands and excised details of the war from history.[23]
Marika and Godfrey would rule together and have at least three children: Godwyn the Golden and the twins Morgott and Mohg. The twins were both born as accursed Omen and were hidden in the depths below the capital. Even so, Godfrey and his Golden Lineage would be counted as the first of the demigods.[24] Godfrey went on to conquer many lands for the Erdtree.
Liurnian Wars[]
Queen Marika desired to conquer Liurnia of the Lakes, the land of the Academy of Raya Lucaria and the Carian Royal Family. She declared war on the glintstone sorcerers and sent a golden host led by her secret other half: a red-haired champion named Radagon. The champions of the moon, led by Rennala, repelled the glorious warriors of the Erdtree for a time but it ended in a draw. In the second Liurnian War, Radagon invades again but this time, he uses the Celestial Dew at the Church of Vows in a ritual to recant his aggressions and seek absolution. The Carian Queen accepted and their wrongdoings were washed away. The two were wed and produced three children: Radahn, Rykard, and Ranni.
Godfrey's banishment[]
With her rule secure, Marika announced her intention to search the depths of the Golden Order, declaring the early days of blind belief a thing long past.[25] When Godfrey's last foe fell it was said the hue of his eyes had faded.[26] Marika banished him and his kinfolk from the Lands Between, robbing them of their grace,[27] thus creating the first Tarnished, all in the hope that they would grow stronger by waging war in lands outside her rule, dying, and then eventually being revived with their guidance of grace returned.[28]
Marika sent her son Messmer away on a crusade into the lands of the Hornsent. Despite her precautions, her fear of the Abyssal Serpent sealed within him led her to trap him within the Realm of Shadow, where he would wage war to exterminate the Hornsent and devastate their lands. No matter how many of her enemies burned in his flame, however, Messmer received no sign from Marika to end his crusade. To hide away these actions and the true nature of her godhood, Marika hid the Realm of Shadow behind a magical veil to obscure it from public knowledge.
King Consort Radagon[]
After Godfrey's banishment from the Lands Between, Marika took Radagon as second husband and King Consort, elevating him to become the second Elden Lord.[29] Radagon already had three children with Queen Rennala of the Carian Royal Family, and after his union with Marika, she would raise her new step-children, Radahn, Rykard and Ranni, to demigod status.[30]
Marika and Radagon would go on to have two more children of their own, the twins Malenia and Miquella,[31] who like Marika herself and Radagon's daughter Ranni, were Empyreans,[32] and were thus potential successors to Marika. However, Radagon and Marika were in truth the same. Radagon was described as Marika's male "other self".[33] Thus the twins were the children of a single god, and they were both born afflicted: Malenia with rotting sickness and Miquella with eternal childhood.[34]
Night of Black Knives[]
On the Night of Black Knives, a fragment of the Rune of Death was stolen from Maliketh.[35] For a long time it was not known who was behind the plot,[36] but it is finally revealed it was in fact Ranni who stole the fragment of the rune to forge god-slaying black knives through a fearsome rite.[37]
The Black Knife Assassins, Numen women purported to have close ties to Marika herself,[38] used these knives to slay Godwyn the Golden, the first recorded death of a demigod in all history.[39] Queen Marika is said to have been driven to the brink by this event,[40] and some time later she shattered the Elden Ring using her hammer.[41] She had already instructed her demigod children to fight for the positions of Elden Lord and that of godhood.[42]
The Shattering[]
Marika shattered the Elden Ring
Fragments of the ring splintered into Great Runes and spread across the Lands Between, starting a conflict between her demigod children. War after war was fought, but there was no victor.[43] For her part, Marika would be imprisoned inside the Erdtree,[44] possibly by the Elden Beast or the Greater Will itself.[45]
True to her promise to Godfrey and his warriors, grace was restored to the banished Tarnished.[46] They would rise from their graves, and journey to the Lands Between to once again brandish the Elden Ring. The Tarnished formed the Roundtable Hold, where they worked to realize the goal given to them by Marika. They would be served by a Misbegotten blacksmith named Hewg, whom Marika herself had charged with smithing a "god-slaying weapon" before his imprisonment in the Hold.[47]
Endings[]
Marika shattered and imprisoned inside the Erdtree
Eventually, a Tarnished champion manages to fight their way into the Erdtree, where the shattered Marika lay imprisoned. Marika is suddenly released from her bonds, with Radagon asserting control of their shared body and confronting the Tarnished. After defeating Radagon and the Elden Beast itself, the Tarnished may choose what to do with the fractured body of Marika. Marika's head is restored to her frame if the Elden Ring is mended, either by itself or with a Mending Rune. If Ranni is summoned, she picks up Marika's head gently, peacefully dissipating along with the rest of her body. If the Tarnished is the Lord of Frenzied Flame, Marika's head breaks apart and crumbles into ash.
By choosing to go down the Elden Lord path, whether the regular one or using any of the three Mending Runes to fix the Elden Ring within Marika, the Tarnished champion ushers in a new age. They become the third Elden Lord and effectively Marika's new consort in every one of them,[48] except in the Age of the Stars (where they become consort to Ranni) and in the Lord of Frenzied Flame ending (where they make the whole world burn). However, Queen Marika remains shattered and unresponsive, with only the Elden Ring itself shining brightly within her body.
Echoes of Marika[]
At certain Sites of Grace, the very words of Queen Marika yet linger.[49] Melina offers to share them with the Tarnished if she is traveling with them. The seven Echoes of Marika are as follows:
| English Dialogue |
| First Church of Marika |
|---|
| Hark, brave warriors. Hark, my lord Godfrey. We commend your deeds. |
| Guidance hath delivered ye through each ordeal, to the place ye stand. |
| Put the Giants to the sword, and confine the flame atop the mount. |
| Let a new epoch begin. An epoch glistening with life. |
| Brandish the Elden Ring, for the Age of the Erdtree! |
| Grand Lift of Dectus |
| The Erdtree governs all. The choice is thine. |
| Become one with the Order. Or divest thyself of it. |
| To wallow at the fringes; a powerless upstart. |
| Minor Erdtree Church |
| I declare mine intent, to search the depths of the Golden Order. |
| Through understanding of the proper way, our faith, our grace, is increased. |
| Those blissful early days of blind belief are long past. |
| My comrades; why must ye falter? |
| Third Church of Marika |
| My Lord, and thy warriors. I divest each of thee of thy grace. |
| With thine eyes dimmed, ye will be driven from the Lands Between. |
| Ye will wage war in a land afar, where ye will live, and die. |
| Outer Wall Battleground |
| Hear me, Demigods. My children beloved. |
| Make of thyselves that which ye desire. Be it a Lord. |
| Be it a God. |
| But should ye fail to become aught at all, ye will be forsaken. |
| Amounting only to sacrifices... |
| Church of Pilgrimage |
| Then, after thy death, I will give back what I once claimed. |
| Return to the Lands Between, wage war, and brandish the Elden Ring. |
| Grow strong in the face of death. Warriors of my lord. |
| Lord Godfrey. |
| Queen's Bedchamber |
| O Radagon, leal hound of the Golden Order. |
| Thou'rt yet to become me. Thou'rt yet to become a god. |
| Let us be shattered, both. Mine other self. |
| Japanese Dialogue |
| First Church of Marika |
|---|
| 戦士たちよ。我が王、ゴッドフレイよ |
| 導きに従い、よくここまで戦ってくれた |
| あの頂に、巨人たちを打ち滅ぼし、火を封じよう |
| そして、はじめようじゃないか。輝ける生命の時代を |
| エルデンリングを掲げ、我ら黄金樹の時代を！ |
| Grand Lift of Dectus |
| 黄金樹は、すべてを律する。選ぶがよい |
| 我らの律の一部となるか？それとも律の外にあり… |
| 何の力も持たぬ、辺境の傍流となるか |
| Note: She is asking them to choose to exist within the Order or outside of it. There is no implication of them already having Grace, as there is in English. |
| Minor Erdtree Church |
| 黄金律の探究を、ここに宣言する |
| あるべき正しさを知ることが、我らの信仰を、祝福を強くする |
| 幸せな幼き日々、盲信の時代は終わる |
| 同志よ、何の躊躇が必要だろうか！ |
| Third Church of Marika |
| 我が王よ、王の戦士たちよ。お前たちから、祝福を奪う |
| そして、その瞳が色褪せたとき、狭間の地を追放する |
| 外に戦を求め、生き、そして死ぬがよい |
| Outer Wall Battleground |
| デミゴッド、我が愛し子たちよ |
| お前たちはもう、何者にもなれる。王であれ、神であれ |
| そして、何者にもなれぬ時、お前たちは見棄てられる |
| …そして贄となるのだ |
| Church of Pilgrimage |
| そして、お前たちが死した後、いつか奪ったものを返そう |
| 狭間の地に戻り、戦い、赴くままにエルデンリングを掲げるがよい |
| 死を恐れず、強くなれ。王の戦士たちよ |
| 我が王ゴッドフレイよ |
| Queen's Bedchamber |
| おお、ラダゴン、黄金律の犬よ |
| お前はまだ、私ではない。まだ、神ではない |
| さあ、共に砕けようぞ！我が半身よ！ |
| Note: 我が半身よ means "My half-body." |
Notes[]
- Marika's Rune resembles the crowning Rune Arc of the Elden Ring and mirrors her crucified pose within the Erdtree.
- It appears prominently on Marika's Scarseal, Marika's Soreseal, and Messmer's implanted right eye. The numerous crucifixion crosses in Limgrave and Dominula, Windmill Village are modeled after Marika's Rune.
- It is strongly implied that the Elden Beast crucified Marika upon the Rune Arc and imprisoned her within the Erdtree. When the Beast successfully grabs the player, it mirrors this by crucifying them on an identical arc before piercing them with barrage of golden spears.
- When Marika's body changes into Radagon, her dress becomes his skirt.
- Most information about Queen Marika is provided by Finger Reader Enia or gleaned from dialogue where Melina echoes Marika's words at specific sites of grace.
- Melina the Kindling Maiden is a secret child of Marika as she states her mother is inside the Erdtree.[50] She is bound by Grace,[51] quotes ancient words of Marika,[49] and later gains freedom of movement upon reaching the base of the Erdtree.[52] Melina is associated with a Smoldering Butterfly, fated to fulfill a purpose,[53][54][55] and implied to be the younger sister of Messmer the Impaler.[56][57] Furthermore, Melina is internally referenced as "MaricaOfDaughter" or "DaughterMarika".
- After enduring an eternity of forlorness, Messmer disowns Marika and curses her with his dying breath.[58]
Trivia[]
- Marika and Radagon mirror the alchemical White Queen and Red King—a being divide into male and female halves, later reunited as a hermaphroditic Rebis. This reunion symbolizes transcendent power, embodied by a dragon (Elden Beast). This concept represents the culmination of the alchemist's quest to achieve balance and perfection.[59]
Gallery[]
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References[]
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