Linking the Flame and The Darksign

Hey, nice to have you. It's been a while since I was last on the forumns, and this goes against my last theory of the Darksign quite a bit. It mostly has to do with how the darksign was created, and why I think so. So, basically, I think that the Darksign is a nasty side effect of Gwyn linking the first flame. I think that because the Undead only popped up after Gwyn linked the flame, and the Darksign looks like a flame, especially when seen on the hollows in game. The Darksign is called the Darksign because it is a sign of the incoming dark, not because it has to do directly with the dark. I just shows how the dark is about to arrive. Anyways, I also think it looks like a ring of flame with seemingly nothing in the center because it is burning the branded's humanity away, which causes them to go insane or hollow with no humanity to govern the body, seeking more humanity in an attempt to reverse the hollowing. I also think that the reason we don't have everyone hollow at the same time is because the hollowing process differs with other people. I think I'll leave it at that, if you see some way this doesn't hold up or you think something different, I encourage you to speak up! Vereor Nox, and I hope to think differently soon!



Edit: I also forgot to mention that the reason why I think the Darksign is a side effect of linking the flame is as if everyone's humanity started burning in the wake of the greatly rekindled flame. And I also think the Link the Fire ending is bad because I feel it would make the hollowing process/ undead curse even worse, because of the reasons I mentioned above.

Your idea follows the same line of thought as mine. I think the darksign is a mutation caused by the flame. Because the flame was brought back from the dead, death is no longer an absolute. So the world has responded to this by creating the darksign to show death can be beaten.

Every time this topic comes up I want to reach through the internet and smack Dough because there is no way to consolidate the differences in our theories.

My theory is that the dark sign is simply a "survival tactic" implemented by the world since the flame is fading (intro strongly implies the curse is new). It's trying to suck in any extra fuel to survive that it can, and humanity seems to "burn" pretty dang well. I also believe that due to the similarity of souls to sparks or fires, the flame is likely the soul of the world itself.

Your response times have frankly frightened me. I am impressed. Also, I just realized; The reason people can preserve their sanity as Undead is because the humanity within them will change in power depending on their hope and actual sanity. This is why undead who feel no reason for further life (Failing their mission essentially) will hollow quickly, because their human soul is too weak to stall the fire burning it. Oh, and people who are physically hollowing but not yet hollow (The undead merchants) are insane, but still feel a reason to stick around (The male loves Yulia, and the Female enjoys where she lives) It might also have to do with regular souls, but oh well.

The flames are which give creatures clarity and a soul. The dark sign is a mutation in dead humans caused by humanity that attempts to continually convert humans into a state where they crave humanity (Hollow). As such, its a violent countermeasure to the bonfires, which attempt to continuously burn the humanity into life energy, instead of releasing excess quantities of raw humanity.

Think of it as cutting an addict from his source of "sustenance" and you're kind of close in understanding what the dark signs purpose is. As the hollow shells of undead humans crave humanity but almost exclusively shun fire, trapping the largest sources of humanity into a fuel for the bonfires serves a very simple purpose:

It gives undead humans a safe way to restore their humanity without consulting to practices that easily drive humans wild. That is, murdering their own kind in craving for humanity (and souls, both which are traits of demons) and it rewards undead with life energy when they use humanity to kindle a bonfire. In short, the first flame was ignited in an effort to keep humanity in check. That means that in retrospect, Kaathe is simply twisting the truth, its true that Gwyn coddles fire for fear of humans, but the reasons are rightly justified as Oolacile has demonstrated.

In such, Gwyn took the plunge in reigniting the Kiln by becoming its cinder and set Kingseeker Frampt to the task of finding a successor when his time runs out and BOY has it ran out, as Lordran is a complete waste by the time we begin our journey as the Chosen Undead.

I think maybe you guys are correct in thinking that humanity is fuel. Perhaps the Darksign is just an indication that the humanity is being drained from someone.

I don't know how we consolidate that with the rest of the lore though. Considering Gwyn needed a chosen "undead" to link the fire, it seems strange that somehow the Darksign would be making that harder.

Maybe it's a way of weeding out the weak, so only the true chosen undead achieves the goal, and not just some dude who got lucky.

That is also what I thought. The Dark Sign resembles an Eclipse and is a symbol for the downfall of the Gods and the rise of the human age - albeit (maybe) temporarily.

I never noticed the eclipse, that's an interesting idea.

The gods basically ruled over humans, perhaps the undead were meant to oppose them or, rather, existed as anathema to the gods.

There's evidence to suggest that the gods were originally undead, perhaps the darksign signals a shift in the power structure. New gods to take their place?