Orda's origins & the Elder Gods

[anonymous]

Ever since Die Maschine we have been introduced to a giant creature of some kind, something stalking in the dark woods. We quickly learned that there was more than one of such creatures. We also learned that they were worshipped by others.

Quote

 

Pyotr: "I have heard its guttural roar echo through the forests like a wounded animal screaming out in pain. I fear they are becoming an army."

Stranger: "There is talk here that one of the "Overlords" is hunting the rest. Sounded like crazy talk, especially because some now worship the giants. But I have seen enough to believe it."

Stranger: "Saw something new today. Something big. Tall as building, walking through fog. Difficult to see details. Kept my distance as it passed. I heard talk from others that "giants" roam this land but dismissed it as madness. Heard one call them "Elder Gods." Thought I catalogued all creatures here and their pecking order. I was wrong."

 

In Firebase Z, the behemoths were finally revealed to us as the "Orda's". Giant monstrosities that seem to roam the landscape of the Dark Aether, composed of the corpses of fallen humans. But where do they originate from? Notice how the Stranger uses the words "Overlords" and "Elder Gods" in his documents to describe the Ordas, both words being used to describe the giant Apothicon creatures as well. But their appearance looks so different, so how could that be?

 

Now it should be said that the Apothicon Overlords were never really attached to any physical shape. Residing in the Dark Aether beneath creation, the entities initially likely didn't possess any physical shape at all. The only times we encounter an actual Overlord is when they have re-entered creation once more: In Revelations where they have entered Agartha and are quickly pumping rocks of 115 through portals of space-time, the monster in the distance at Zetsubou no Shima, the Apothicon corpse at the bottom of the ocean in Tag der Toten, and the cephalopod that appears in the sky in Shadows of Evil.

Now bear in mind that ever since the ending of Tag, the Dark Aether is not non-physical anymore. By single-handedly using the Agarthan Device to destroy the Aether, many realms and objects of seperate universes got banished to the eternal void, like a landfill of old dimensions. The Elder Gods saw this as an opportunity to become physical within their own realm and thereby increasing their abilities and power.

 

The Stranger describes his observation of worshipping of the Orda's. This could be done by living humans, as @SilasBlackfyreproposed the idea that the Elder Gods may trick people in believing they are some kind of traditional god like Czarnobog in Poland or Quý Lúa in Vietnam, similar like how the Shadowman/Nyarlathotep tricked people into performing Apothicon rituals. The rituals may also be performed by mindless undead, sacrificing their own dead bodies to become components of the Elder Gods' new vessel: the Orda's. Like one massive body but lacking the common veins and connecting tissue, merely seperate corpses acting as components of this larger being acting under the Elder God's Hivemind, all connected through it's dark energy.

 

Now we have discussed how the Apothicon Elder Gods could possibly have become the Orda's, you may still be curious to the true origins of these entities. I was planning to make a video on that, and although my PC has crashed in the meantime, I do hope I can continue working on that soon and post it on CoDZ's Youtube channel. If you would like to read it in advance, you can find the script here:

Spoiler

When we talk about the Apothicons, the supposed 'Ancient Evil' of the Aether story, there was always one thing that I couldn’t understand: How could a humanoid race like the old Keepers or Vril-Ya ever evolve into the enormous monstrous abominations that we call the Apothicons. The Timeline explains this with one word: Evolution.

 

“Trapped in the Dark Aether, the corrupted keepers contort and evolve over Eons, ultimately becoming the Apothicons.” - Monty, Revelations

 

But this just didn’t really work out for me. This is simply not how evolution works. For evolution, one needs natural selection, survival of the fittest, and how can we have that in a realm without physical matter and where all beings serve the same hivemind? Apart from that, we do encounter more humanoid Apothicon types that resemble the ‘handhead’ species of Doctor Monty, the Shadowman, and also the corrupted Keepers as Apothicons. How can it be that they changed relatively little over time whereas some proto-Keepers have changed into giant universe-consuming worms and cephalopods?

 

So here’s the thing: I think the creatures that we name Apothicons are not the Apothicons. Of course, they are classified under the name of that faction, but what I mean is that they have a different origin than the defeated proto-Keepers, or the Fallen Angels under the Shadowman. In Lovecraft’s Cthulhu mythos, the most powerful entities in the Multiverse are the Great Old Ones, the Outer Gods of other Hells and the Elder Gods. These are enormous creatures existing outside our observable universe and in the “space between spaces”. However, their great weakness is the fact that they cannot form a stable and consistent form of matter in our 3-dimensional Space-Time. This is why they have not yet dominated our universe and why they even have any dealings with humanity. Humans need to provide them with something, whether its “opening a door” on this side of reality or providing a part of us, such as our souls.

 

While  the story of the proto-Keepers sounds really similar to the mythos of the Vril-Ya, Ancient Aliens and even some passages of the Bible, the existence and abilities of the ‘Great Apothicons’ seems to resemble more the story of the Lovecraftian Elder Gods, and their inability of entering our universe by themselves. By the Shadowman, they are referred to as their 'Overlords'. By the Keepers, they are called the 'Elder Gods'. This is further confirmed in Tag der Toten, where the Apothicon corpse on the bottom of the ocean is referred to as an ‘Elder God’, and in a Shadows of Evil cipher, stating that "the Elders continue to seed space-time", which refers to the entities blasting rocks of 115 to Earth. The word 'Elder God' relates to something old, something ancient even for the Keepers.

 

What does this say about their backstory? The deciphering of the Apothicon language clearly showed that the Apothicons function under a Hivemind. Now prior to the Civil War of Agartha between the proto-Keepers, before the schism between Dr. Monty and the Shadowman, the Elder Gods already existed. They were already out there, in the space between spaces, the Aether. At a certain point, the proto-Keepers came in contact with them by constructing the Aether Pyramid Device, initially honouring them as 'Elder Gods'. Their Hivemind was passed over on the corrupted Keepers, corrupting them and making them one of them. The corrupted Keepers now called them their 'Overlords', and the schism between Monty and the Shadowman began. So the Elder Gods and corrupted Keepers act under the same mind now, the same interests. But their origin is different, and they are different types of entities.

 

 

In the recently translated Gorod Krovi cipher, the full name of Shadowman's alter ego was stated to be Tony "Hale" Rapt, which can be scrambled to the name Nyarlathotep. Also known as the 'Black Man', Nyarlathotep in the Lovecraft stories is the harbinger of the Outer Gods. Being a shapeshifter, he wanders over the world as a false prophet, gathering human followers who get an impression of the world's collapse. This is similar to how the Shadowman tricks the four characters of Shadows of Evil to follow his will, in his own words to "prevent the destruction of their world". In the Lovecraft mythos, the Outer Gods need Nyarlathotep as their messenger because they themselves cannot exist in the physical world of matter. The Shadowman, once an alien species with a clear physical shape, can simply enter Morg City whereas the Elder Gods require a set of rituals before they can do so. Rituals involving the sacrifice of four souls and the opening of the Apothicon Rift Stone, similar to how Lovecraft's Outer Gods require human souls to access our universe.

 

The Elder Gods are older than the Apothicons, even more ancient than the Keepers. This is why Doctor Monty refers to the Apothicons as the most powerful entities in all the existences that ever existed. This is what Samantha refers to when she noticed the Elder God entities during her time in the pyramid.

 

"The blackness will swallow your pride! Something far more terrible than you lies here!"- Samantha, Moon

 

The Shadowman is not the head of the Apothicons. He is merely their tongue, their pawn. Before a part of the civilization of the proto-Keepers got corrupted and turned into what Monty calls the Apothicons, before the existence of the Shadowman, the Elder Gods were already there. And after the defeat of the Shadowman, and the Elder God's banishment into nothingness at the end of Revelations, they are still out there somewhere...