Future of Amphoreus and Phainon
Ok, so, this is my first time making a theory post, so bear with me.
When we talk about Amphoreus, we need to think about everything that entails its story. In this post, I'm going to give what are my three most likely scenarios as to what is going to happen to Phainon and with Amphoreus.
Phainon is a character that contains multitudes in himself. Multitudes that he is not aware of. He has very likely been through 33.550.336 cycles (remember this number, it's going to be very important), but he doesn't actually remembers all of them, because his memory is reset every time, but not his soul, his "soul", and I put it like this, because we can't know for certain that as of now he has one (even though I believe that every single person ion Amphoreus have souls, but lets get back to this later), his soul remembers it all, and that's why he is SO tired as of now, because deep down he's desperate for and absolute ending for it all. Unfortunately, as things stand, and if they follow Lygus' script, it won't have a happy ending for him.
Weird that I said Lygus' script, right? Well, Lygus has been said to have ties with the Erudition, and not only that, but to be an observer. An observer that as soon as an outside influence enters, gets involved in the situation as to get us out of there ASAP. That happens because he is NOT an observer, he is an OVERSEER. What this means is, Lygus either created the simulation of Amphoreus, or took control of it. Lygus somehow discovered that Amphoreus' simulation was being run on an Emperors Scepter, and chose to take control of it, because he is trying to become Rupert III.
This may seem farfetched, but Lygus is going to become Iron Tomb as well. From what I gather, from other theory crafters and from what Hoyoverse has given us, Lygus is going to rise both as Rupert IIII AND as Iron Tomb. Bear with me. The Black Tide is nothing more than the Anti-Organic Life Equation evolving, learning with each cycle. Let's remember, since the last time the equation was activated, the universe and it's inorganic life forms, have developed countermeasures to it, a firewall of sorts, so, as any virus, it needs to adapt to the current situation of the system, study it's flaws and defense mechanisms to be able to infiltrate it and dismantle it from the inside, so it can take action.
Lygus has run more than 33 million simulations so that the equation can evolve more with each new cycle, so that one day he can shut down Amphoreus for good and rise with the power of the scepter and the equation as both Rupert and Iron Tomb. He was inclined to help get the Trailblazer out of Amphoreus because he knew that Caelus/Stelle can actually influence the simulation, and the master piece of it all, Phainon, to actually get a "good ending". Another action that proves this is Lygus' earnestness in getting Phainon to deliver Kephales Coreflame to the Vortex of Genesis, to "get it all over with", since there would be "no point in fighting". But then, then comes the second script writer, Cyrene.
Cyrene doesn't exist.
Jokes aside, let me explain this point. Cyrene was a script writer alongside Lygus, but at some point she started to feel for Phainon, even getting emotionality involved in his story, to a point where she decided to intervene and help him change the outcome of his predetermined future. You may ask yourselfs, "but why would she do that?". Well, this all comes back to HI3. In HI3, Elysia sprouts as the Herrscherr of Human/Ego, being sent to destroy everything in her wake, but as she awakes and sees the world for what it is, she falls in love with Humanity (hence her receiving the title of Herrscherr oh Human as well), and decides that instead of destroying it, she is going to help humanity fight Honkai, and because of her, all future Herrscherrs have the possibility of maintaining sentience of their own actions, while also retaining their sense of self, their ideals and emotions.
This is basically what's happening to Cyrene, she started to fall in love with Phainons story, his determination, his honesty, his purity, his ideals. When this happened, she abandoned her post as a writer and took on the mantle of a friend, but for her to do this, she had to make some changes to herself. She decided to split into three partitions, March 7th, Mem and "Cyrene". Let's talk about these partitions.
March 7th is a partition of Cyrene, not Cyrene itself. Cyrene decided to send a part of herself to the outside of Amphoreus, in hopes of getting her to get help and return to Amphoereus with said help (I think this was a theory made by Rainthority on YouTube, and I agree with him. Think about it, when March 7th got near Amphoerus, she got "sick", where not even a Memetic Entity, a.ka., Black Swan, could help her, because according to her, March 7th was in Amphoreus already. March got to the Astral Express encased in Six Phased Ice, and let's not forget, ice is strongly related to Remembrance, given it's ability to freeze (a memory is nothing more than a frozen moment in time that has been registered). She was meant to go back to Amphoreus, so as to take there the help to was meant to get.
So, March 7th got near Amphoreus, got sick, was not able to go down with Dan Heng and the Trailblazer, but she is also not there anymore.
Now let's talk about Mem before finishing March's train of thought. Mem was given to the Trailblazer by Oronyx, the titan of Time (time=memories=Fulli=Remembrance), who was calling us "Mother" the whole time. But wait, March 7th wasn't there with us. Well, she might not have been there, but both Caelus/Stelle and Dan Heng have many memories of her, and not only that, but they were carrying a personal item of hers, her CAMERA (honestly at this point it cannot get more blatant; camera=pictures=memories). Because of this, and maybe because of Oronyx's depleted power, she then gave Mem to us. Now, Mem has been with every Titan of Time that has existed since Cyrene decided to partition herself, think of mem as an integral part of the titan of time, that only had a different action when exposed to March 7th (at the very least, her memories).
Now we only have "Cyrene". I'm using quotations for her name because as I said, this is not the actual Cyrene, this is a virus/program that she made based on herself to help Phainon. This is very important, because as of now, we haven't seen Cyrene interact with ANYONE except Phainon, this is very likely because she is a virus attached only to the "Phainon file", meaning that it won't directly interfere with the functionality of other files, and the program as a whole, but it will make possible for a single file to rebel itself and change the course of the entire program, while also protecting it from massive corruption.
Ok, so I've used this lingo because it's a simulation, therefore, it's a "computer" based system. As of now we can, and should, treat everything in Amphoreus as files of a program. Why you may ask? Elysian Realm in HI3 has brought to the players the question, "if a program thinks, acts, behaves and feels like a human, what is the actual difference?" And imo, Amphoreus is playing with this notion. That's why Cyrene is acting as virus, to corrupt Phainons original file, and help him change the outcome of his destiny and the simulation.
Now, we've talked about the three partitions, but why do I keep saying that Cyrene is dead/ isn't real? Let's look at Phainon's trailer. We have the number of cycles hes been thrrough, 33.550.336. But wait, this numberr also appeared on Castorice's cooking video. I was talking to a friend of mine that works in IOT, and he told me that this number fits in Euclidian Math [first picture]. But wait, this number, when written in binary is written as 1111111111111000000000000. 13 ones and 12 zeros. 13 heroes and twelve Titans. Why 13 heeroes? the twelve Chrysos Heirs and the Trailblazzer. Cyrene was never meant to factor into this equation. If we count the chrysos heirs we know of we have: 1- Aglaea, 2- Tribbios, 3- Mydeimos, 4- Castorice, 5- Anaxagoras, 6- Hyacinthia, 7- Cifera, 8- Phainon, 9- Hysilens and 10- Cerydre. But if we look at the current cast, we still have March 7th, Dang-Heng, Caelus/Stelle and Cyrene. The Trailblazer is supposed to take on Oronyx's trial, but we're not going tom this role is going to fall to March 7th, and Georios is going to fall to Dang Heng, completing the Coreflames and the Chrysos Heirs, with the Trailblazer being the thirteenth hero, because Cyrene was never factored into this (this circles back to her being fractured and all of that).
You may ask how is it that March being a partition of Cyrene, can be a Chrysos heir by herself. Well, March is a part of Cyrene, but she's had experiences of herself, a will and mind of herself. When push comes to shove, Cyrene will leave March be, because she wants to live, to see the world, and live a life for herself. When this happens, that's when March will be able to take on Oronyx's Coreflame and take o their trial.
Now, this still leaves us with the future of Phainon. We all know that Phainon is an expy of Kevin from HI3. Kevin's whole plot was that he was going to create Spiritual Adam [second pic] to help humans transcend, with him being the only one left behind. This would be his cross to bear for the salvation of humanity. The same can be inferred from Phainons trailer [third pic]. This scene shows him almost elevated as a savior, be it by actual salvation or by destruction (the second scenario being the most likely). In the end of the trailer we see him torn between the desolated Amphoreus, or the light of a new one [fourth picture], where we see that he carries the mask of the Flame Reaver [fifth pic]. This poses the question, is he going to embrace Destruction, or salvation? Will he take on the mantle of a new Flame Reaver, or follow his own path? And that's where Cyrene comes in.
When we take a look at HI3, Kevin does all that he does while being alone, his Elysia has long since passed, and the only thing left of her is her upload in the Elysian Realm, so he had time to actually nurture his plan and his ideals, it was time for the mind and for the soul. But Phainon is different, his souls has suffered, but he has no memory of it all, this new life of his, well, it's exactly that, it's new, only a sprout. And the beauty of sprouts is that you can actually change how they grow, be it for good or evil. And that's where Cyrene comes in.
When Phainon is faced with his new powers as a Lord Ravager, and starts to loose his sense of self, and very likely, his humanity, all the times that Cyrene talked to him will come into effect, and not only that, but Cyrene herself will very likely be there to talk to him and to help him see that he can accept this powers, but she'll help him maintain his humanity and sense of self (these may be a bit dull when he transforms, but it won't be enough for him to change how he acts and how he takes major decisions).
Ok, so now that I've laid all of the explanations, let's look at the outcomes:
1- Phainon becomes a Lord Ravager destined to destroy the Eon of Destruction (we know that by the ending Nanook wants, even he will be destroyed), but he maintains his humanity. Lygus ascends as Iron Tomb and Rupert III, making out of Amphoreus just in time to kill Nous. After that, Pahinon and the other defeat him.
2- Phainon momentarily becomes a Lord Ravager, but is able to negate his status.
3- Phainon never gets to actually be a Lord Ravager, since this all happens while inside the simulation, and by the end of it, he has learned to control his powers and his feelings, so Nanook is not able to ascend him to one of his emanators.
Regarding Amphoreus itself, I think because of being so closely tied to Remembrance, it will be able to rebuild itself as an actual place in the universe, with all of his inhabitants being granted souls (read this as the requirement for Organic Life to exist in the universe and be considered both humans and alive).
I think once Amphoerus concludes, Cyrene will give up her life so that March can move forward with hers, or maybe she will just roam with us as Mem.
I truly hope that Nous is destroyed, I think its nigh time that we see some actual and serious repercussions on the universe of HSR. As to what will become of Phainon after this all ends, well, I believe he will stay behind and help everyone in Amphoreus straighten out all the changes that happened, and to get Amphoreus acclimated with the rest of the universe.
Well, that's it for this theory post, I hope I didn't drag out for too long, Please, share your thoughts as well!!
Posted Jun 30, 2025, 3:20 AM UTC