SLIME MOULD STAGE 4 - TREE
OVERVIEW
The central premise of this series is that Numen-kind (Numen and their descendants such as the Shaman, Marika and the demigods) have lifecycles very similar to cellular slime mould.
More examples of Fruiting Bodies further down.
Cellular slime mould goes through the following life-stages:
Amoeba -> Aggregation -> Slug -> Fruiting Body -> Dispersal
Slime mould stages after the amoeba undergoes Aggregation, which was discussed in my previous post.
Numen-kind, on the other hand, goes through the following life-stages:
Amoeba (Sap/Tears/Blood) -> Aggregation -> Serpent -> Tree -> Dispersal
This post is about the Slug (\"d\") turning into a Fruiting Body (\"g\").
PREVIOUS POSTS
In SLIME MOULD STAGE 1 - AMOEBA I set out evidence of Numen-kind having an amoeba life-stage where they are shape-changing blobs that enters into and takes over the bodies of a host.
In SLIME MOULD STAGE 2 & 3 - AGGREGATION AND SERPENT I provided evidence that, once all hosts have been infected, all amoeba in a colony Aggregate into a mass which acts like a single entity: a Serpent.
In this post, I will provide evidence that Serpents (aided by an Empyrean, a special kind of Numen-kind) transform into Trees, very much like the "slugs" of cellular slime mould transform into "fruiting bodies".
SLUGS & FRUITING BODIES
For cellular slime mould, a "slug" (and aggregate of hundreds of thousands of amoeba that acts like a single creature) ventures out away from its colony to find a suitable location to release its spores.
Once a slug reaches a good location, it does a funny little move called a "Mexican Hat" (which Ze Frank calls a "dump squat" in a youtube video about slime mold):
I think the Mexican Hat move looks a lot like...
NOTE: The 20% or so of the amoeba in a Slug die to form the trunk of the Fruiting Body. By doing so, they're essentially sacrificing themselves so that the remaining 80% can climb to the top of the trunk and float away as spores.
If they were an army, it'd be like if 20% of soldiers sacrificing their lives to build a Tree ("The Erdtree governs all. The choice is thine. Become one with the Order...") and the rest of the soldiers are exiled to invade the rest of the world ("...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.").
[Fruiting Bodies examples]
I believe that Numen-kind does the same thing.
NOTE: Please note: If it happens at all, a Serpent's transformation into a Tree happens very quickly. We never directly see a Serpent turn into a Tree. However, the following evidence suggests that:
- Serpents and Empyreans are both present when Trees are being formed;
- Serpents try to form Trees, even without an Empyrean; and
- Trees used to be Serpents.
Hopefully this will be enough to persuade you.
SHAMAN VILLAGE - EMPYREAN AND TREE
The first location in this investigation is Shaman Village where we encounter the Shaman Grandmother and her Tree.
[GRANDMOTHER AND TREE]
NOTE: The fact that Marika, an Empyrean, originated from Shaman Village and paid her respect to the Shaman Grandmother by giving her corpse a braid of her hair leads me to guess that the Shaman Grandmother may have held a position of authority amongst shaman, possibly as an Empyrean or some kind of proto-Empyrean.
Some people might argue that you need to be able to both be able to grow Trees AND chosen by the Two Fingers to be the vassal of the Greater Will to be an Empyrean but, for the sake of simplicity, I'll be calling any Numen-kind with the ability to grow Trees an Empyrean in this series.
Three things to note about the Grandmother and her Tree:
1. The Grandmother sits inside her Tree.
The Shaman Grandmother inside her Tree.
This suggests that the two of them are linked in some way.
What is the relationship between the Grandmother, an Empyrean (or proto-Empyrean) and the Tree? From the description of the Haligtree Knight Armor we know that Miquella, an Empyrean, can grow Trees.
I believe that the Grandmother grew her Tree.
2. The Grandmother is connected to her Tree.
The Grandmother and her Tree are physically connected by twigs and hair rising up from her and roots descending into her, particularly to the back of the Grandmother's head.
The fact that physical connections can be found between an Empyrean and their Tree:
- at Shaman Village;
- at the Swamp of Aeonia (where Malenia was physically linked to her Tree of Scarlet Aeonia when it bloomed); and
- at the Haligtree (where Miquella was both physically embedded inside his Tree and was feeding it with his blood in order to grow it)
supports the idea that a physical link is necessary for an Empyrean to grow a Tree.
The figure that Miquella was cut out of at the Haligtree.
NOTE: Anyone who's read the "A Song of Ice and Fire" series is familiar with the idea of people physically linking themselves to Trees.
Greenseers (extremely special individuals) "wed" themselves to weirwood trees by embedding themselves into their root system in order to obtain world-controlling magical powers.
A greenseer enthroned in the roots of a weirwood tree.
Every mature greenseer in the series have the weirwood tree roots growing through their bodies, trapping them forever in an underground world beneath the earth.
The parallels between greenseers and Empyreans suggest that:
1. Empyreans might gain special powers by binding themselves to their Tree; and
2. the physical link between an Empyrean and their Tree is permanent.
We will revisit the idea of Empyreans needing to be physically linked to the Tree they are growing when we look at Bonnie Village.
3. Both the Grandmother and her Tree are dead.
Since Marika is mostly likely a descendant of the Grandmother (hence her title), we can be reasonably sure that the Grandmother was able to successfully have offspring, that is: she a rare example of a member of Numen-kind that has successfully completed her lifecycle.
If so, it's notable that her corpse is still connected to her Tree. This suggests that even an Empyrean that's successfully completed her lifecycle necessarily survives the process. In fact, her death might have been a necessary step of her lifecycle.
NOTE: We'll revisit the role of death in the Numen-kind lifecycle in the next and last of this series: Slime mould theory - Stage 5 Dispersal and Death
To sum up what we learnt from Shaman Village:
- Empyreans and Trees are linked.
- Empyreans are physically connected to their Tree.
- The connection appears to be necessary for Trees to grow.
- The connection might grant powers to the Empyrean.
- Once connection lasts their entire lives.
- Empyreans die even if they successfully complete their lifecycle.
The next stop in our journey is Bonny Village.
BONNY VILLAGE - EMPYREAN, TREE AND SERPENT
At Bonnie Village, we once again we find the remains of another Shaman (possibly an Empyrean) and her Tree. This time, however, it appears that the Shaman was interrupted before the Tree could fully grow: the Tree is partially grown and the Empyrean has been decapitated.
Near the Empyrean and her Tree, we have evidence that the process of growing a Tree might require a third participant: the shed skin of a Serpent. [BV Serpent]
NOTE: If you've followed this series thus far you'll know that my theory depends on a Serpent to showing up at this stage: just as the "Slug" transforms into the a "Fruiting Body" for cellular slime mould, I believe that a Serpent (an Aggregate of hundreds of Numen-kind amoeba) transforms into a Tree.
Once more there are three things to note:
1. The Tree here is dead, smaller and bent at an odd angle.
[Tree of Bonny Village]
We know from Shaman Village what a fully grown shaman-Tree looks like. This tree looks like it died before it was fully mature.
2. Cutting off the Shaman/Empyrean's head also killed the Tree.
If Empyreans need to be physically connected to their Tree in order to grow it, severing the connection by decapitating her would explain why the Tree died before it could mature.
3. The Tree is pointing to Serpent's shed skin.
If the Grandmother and her Tree at Shaman Village shows the end of the Tree-growing process, the scene at Bonnie Village shows what the process looks like when it's stopped part way through.
[Serpent skin]
The presence of the Serpent skin here and its absence at Shaman Village leads me to (tentatively) believe that Serpents are present at the start of the Tree-growing process but disappear by the time the process is completed.
NOTE: My previous post in this series provides proof to support theory that Serpents are created when hundreds of Numen-kind amoeba Aggregate together into a single being, just like slime mould amoeba Aggregate to enter their "slug" life-stage.
This suggests that the hundreds of amoeba that an Empyrean somehow uses a Serpent as material to grow Trees.
This is just the first piece of evidence to support this idea. The next evidence can be found at Rykard's lair.
A forest of half-formed Trees.
RYKARD'S LAIR - SERPENTS FORMING TREES
When thinking about Rykard, one question I have is: "What's he been doing for the last five thousand years?"
My guess is that he's been living in his lair DEVOUR!ing a small handful of Tarnished every few years. If this is true, you'd expect that he's devoured tens of thousands of Tarnished by now.
Given his taste in interior decorating, it's safe to say that he's devoured more than enough Tarnished to accomplish whatever his plans are: if five thousand years and tens of thousands Tarnished isn't enough, I doubt more time will accomplish anything. So why is he faffin' about in his lair and what's he been doing with all the bodies?
The answer is clear when you examine his lair while holding onto the idea that Serpents form Trees: for the past five thousand years Rykard's been endlessly devouring Tarnished and repeated trying (and failing) to form Trees.
Mounds of bodies (left) that eventually burst forth into lava-towers of bodies and snakes (right).
NOTE: What if the Erdtree isn't just absorbing the bodies in the catacombs? What if the Erdtree is MADE FROM corpses? It wouldn't be the first time that bodies are used to create larger forms and structures (e.g., Enir Elim, the Gate of Divinity, Farum Azula).
If Trees are made from bodies (much like the Fruiting Bodies of slime mould comprised of hundreds of thousands of living and dead amoeba) then these lava pillars human and snake corpses are exactly what failed Trees might look like.
Which begs the question: "Why are Rykard's repeated attempts to form Trees a failure?"
The corpses and snakes look a bit like the corpses and roots in the catacombs.
Two possible reasons:
1. Rykard is NOT a healthy Serpent.
Healthy Serpents should not have great big wounds along their length with semi-digested arms and legs are sticking out.
We know from the description of Rykard's Rancor that Serpents need to have an intact digestive tract to properly transform devoured heroes into "family": (how else are Rykard's victims going to reach the Serpent's bowels to be transformed if they keep falling out the massive holes along its body?) It's highly probably that the horrific holes bursting out of Rykard's guts are stopping him from properly being able to form Trees-made-of-bodies.
Please note the gaping tears along the Serpent's flanks.
- Rykard is Empyrean-less.
As noted from Shaman Village and Bonnie Village, you need an Empyrean to grow a Tree.
Rykard should know this: his step-mother was the Empyrean that grew the Erdtree and three of his siblings were Empyreans. He'd be tremendously stupid to feed himself to a Serpent without first getting an Empyrean to promise to help him transform that Serpent into a Tree.
From the Blasphemous Claw item description, we know that Ranni and Rykard conspired together to bring about the Night of the Black Knives, so it's possible that Rykard agreed to feed himself to a Serpent (possibly to distract the Golden Order forces while the Night of the Black Knives took place) and Ranni agreed to find him (after Godwyn was dead and grafted to the Erdtree) and transform him into the Tree that would replace the Erdtree.
NOTE: I'd like a believe that Ranni hadn't always planned to leave her brother as a half-snake abomination. I'd like to believe that she'd fully intended to keep her promise to Rykard but that losing her Empyrean flesh prevented her from doing so.
On the other hand, Ranni proudly confesses that "I stole the Rune of Death, slew mine own Empyrean flesh, casting it away." This suggests that she knew all along that she was condemning Rykard to an eternity of torture.
TREE SPIRIT - SERPENTS INSIDE OF TREES
One more piece of evidence that Serpents transform into Trees: Trees still have a Serpent's soul living inside them: consider the Ulcerating and Putrid Tree Spirits:
1. Tree Spirits look like fleshy, wood Serpents with arms.
The name of the AI package files for Tree Spirits is "SnakeSoul", strongly hinting Tree Spirits are actually Serpent spirits.
2. None of the Tree Spirits we encounter are healthy.
Tree Spirits are either "Ulcerating" (suggesting that they have damaged digestive tracts) or "Putrid" (suggesting that they are afflicted by another illness). The Trees that Ulcerating and Putrid Tree Spirits come from also are similarly sick, dying or dead.
Based on this, I suspect that:
- Tree Spirits don't leave their Trees unless the Tree is very, very sick; and
- that the Spirits of healthy Trees probably remain inside their Tree, likely as some sort of glowy, astral Serpent inside the Tree's spirit-realm.
Here's a picture of what I think a healthy Tree Spirit inside a health Tree looks like.
Note: A postscript to this post will explain the additional legs and wings.
SUMMARY
Numen-kind amoeba aggregate into a Serpent, which is transformed by an Empyrean into a Tree.
In my next post in this series, I will run through the last stage of the Numen-kind lifecycle: SLIME MOULD STAGE 5 - DISPERSAL AND DEATH
Thanks very much for reading.
Posted Apr 26, 2025, 7:27 AM UTC