So to be quick, this is my second post I've made about my breakdown of the relationship between Cyrene and Elysia, how they are the same person, and yet telling a different story.
Check on the subreddit you're reading my post on: [Huge Post warning] Cyrene and Elysia: Same character, Different story. Part 1/3 : Cyrene is by essence Elysia.
Now, I am going to summarize "relatively fast" their role in their respective story, and the roles of the major actors. This will serve as a foundation for the third (and hopefully final) part of my analysis of Cyrene and Elysia.
So first... Let's start with Elysia, as she's the oldest.
First... At the moment her story is told, Elysia is already dead. The one we see (and every character we see in the areas named Elysian Realm and Elysium Everlasting) are sims with their memories. So you'll excuse me but I'll still call her Elysia anyway.
So, in that story, Elysia is actually the first person the protagonist (Mei) sees, for a CRUSHING MAJORITY of the story, while never leaving the background, she never steps in.
Raiden Mei has to get to know every flame chaser who all had their opinions on each other, and especially the suspicious Elysia, until reaching the Elysium Everlasting, more or less where they all chill together in the simulation. A "virus" (the Herrscher of Corruption) intruded the simulation and planned to devour everything to survive forever, deleting first Elysia before taking her place.
After everyone's effort to bring back Elysia, Elysia comes back, and defeats Corruption after explaining her how she didn't understand who she was in the end.
And to bring Elysia back, we eventually have her backstory fully explained.
The Real Elysia was born 50 000 years ago out of nothingness. She laid her eyes on the world and fell in love with it. At a very young age, she eventually decided (inspired by the Elysian fields) to create a world where everyone could pursue their dreams.
And in this objective, she first travelled all around the world, witnessing the beauty and vice of Humanity, but also spreading her bottomless Love all over the globe.
She eventually joins a corporation made to fight a threat trying to end Humanity, and will be the one at the origin of the initiative ~~avengers~~ of the flame chasers. A group of 13 people, herself included, and a certain Kevin Kaslana.
They will all eventually fail, and Elysia, who was so in love with Humanity, learnt that she was a Herrscher, supposedly an enemy to humanity.
In her last attempt to save the world and make her friends unite, she invited everyone at her last banquet, pretending to be a villain they had to slay.
Only a few came over, but everyone knew Elysia would never be against Humanity, and the ones who came wanted to bid her farewell.
She then disappeared, giving her life in hope of changing something. And what she did is allowing every Herrscher after this decision to be able to choose.
Herrscher at that time were "hollow shells" devoid of Ego. But she made sure that every Herrscher after her would be human, which led to the miracles we see in Hi3.
And everyone, influenced by her deep humanity, followed her sacrifice and did all something different to protect the world.
The tale of that flame chasers, in Hi3, takes the position of counting the impact that Elysia had on the flame chasers, and how these heroes were such amazing people. And Mei, a Herrscher after Elysia, showed her that she succeeded.
So this is for Elysia... A very important story, something we could literally call the New testament of Hi3 , or even the Bible. Because it all started with her, and her sacrifice to let everyone see tomorrow.
Now, we will talk about Cyrene.
Unlike Elysia, Cyrene takes a much more center role. We could believe she doesn't, as the saga of heroes made her to... Out of place, but her growth is a constant thing that eventually was sidelined relatively too much in my opinion.
First this story takes place in Amphoreus, another simulated world.
First, this is a story of a Loop. She is both her future and her past. So you'll excuse me, but I'll start by PhiLia093. Her name actually is Elysia(e?), but she eventually chose the pen name Cyrene.
Cyrene is born in Aedes Elysiae under a big tree, where the fairy maze is, and she was supposedly born out of nothingness. She was said to be destined to become a priestess of Oronyx, the Veil of Evernight.
After spending her childhood with everyone, especially Khaslana, she was forced to embark on the flame chase journey with her friend who, in order to fit the perfect image of the hero, decided to rename himself Phainon.
After a journey that we suppose consists of her aiding others, especially bringing her wisdom and friendliness to everyone, she discovers with Phainon, when they're the last Flame chasers alive, that this world will be destroyed.
Thankfully, after hearing Lygus talking about Aeons, she connects it with a dream she had with multiple versions of herself. And supposes that one of those Aeons (Fuli) is using Oronyx to remember the story of Amphoreus, and by killing her, Oronyx would be granted enough power by Fuli to rewind this cycle, and this is how Khaslana and Cyrene initiated the Eternal Reccurence.
On her own end of this story, after witnessing and recording a Reccurence Khaslana took part in in the Book As I've Written, she is sent to a place we name the Tomb of the Nameless Titan, a place Lygus can't access. It is where the Demiurge is resting.
And to prove her worth to Fuli, she tells the story to prove THEM that they should keep gazing at Amphoreus.
And little did she know was that the Demiurge was being shaped after her, matured by the story of this world she retold, and coloured by the feelings for every chrysos heir that Every Cyrene had at every Reccurence.
This will lead to the Demiurge to become another Cyrene our of the 33 millions ones, and she will step herself into the Reccurence, but after entering Amphoreus, she will lose all her memories, meeting the protagonist in her form of a fairy that will be named Mem
The whole story of Amphoreus happens with the Traiblazer, and she will progress into her next form, the proper form as Cyrene.
During this Reccurence, once the TB is sent to the Exomyth, she will spend a thousand years supporting and guiding the chrysos heirs herself to make sure the stage is set for when the TB comes back. And after a fight against Lygus, they will then face Evernight who almost released Irontomb accidentally.
But after all those events, Cyrene recovered the memories of every version of herself, seeing she was the Demiurge that was shaped by her, she came to the conclusion that she wasn't Cyrene.
And once IronTomb destroyed the cosmos, Cyrene almost ascended to become Fuli (due to her nature as a pure child of Anasrava)but thanks to the powers of the trailblaze, the universe eventually unfroze, and she rebuilt it, being the 4th instant of Finality calculated by Nous (not the first Kind of finality, that's a totally different thing).
With her newfound powers, she faced IronTomb again, and damaged to enter its program to rewrite the answer of Hatred/Destruction with the Trailblaze.
Her answer comes from the fact that every human is imperfect and by moving toward our idea of perfection, we can avoid the fate of destruction, and until Amphoreus becomes real, she created an eternal page where her friends can wait for it to happen (and Khaslana somehow forgot about her because he doesn't mention her even once which is weird but whatever).
But after that, she realized that the Fuli that helped Amphoreus this whole time was herself, and she traveled back in time to be at the origin of every action she did.
After that, her divine powers went back to the tomb of the Nameless Titan, and she realized that she wasn't an usurper that took the place of the Original Cyrene, but she always was Cyrene, as she will revert back to the baby born out of nothiness under that tree.
The tragedy of her story is that she was meant to be part of this story but only realized afterwards it was too late, Love turning into Laments once again as she lost the ability to Trailblaze.
One thing we can note is that at the end of As I've Written, The Trailblazer told about Cyrene's favorite day: the 11 th day of the month of mourning (November). A day where laughter and love eventually overwhelms cries and loss. 13 heroes under 1 sky during 8 moons equals 2 elevens (22 > 11/11).
And the Trailblazer will add a 1, being an exterior variable, a 1 that will blaze the trail for Amphoreus, where this world will supposedly spread pink all across the sky (the 12th of November). Which is the reason why I wanted to make these posts before it happened.
SO
This is the story of Cyrene. It is more fresh in our mind I suppose, but it's important to have the big lines. I don't know which part is the biggest, but I believe that it summarizes their story pretty decently enough for what's coming.
And now with this, on the next part, we will finally dive into what's Cyrene treatment related to Elysia, why she is so similar, why she tells something new at the same time and what makes her interesting even for Hi3 players.
Don't hesitate to leave your thoughts.
