[Francis Buck]

Pretty sure something about finding out a Ciphrang's name lets you summon it.

Oh, good call! That also dovetails interestingly (in some way I cannot yet fathom) with the Nonmen's concerns that Kellhus might be a "substitution" or some agency of the Outside.

[mrganondorf]

Pretty sure something about finding out a Ciphrang's name lets you summon it.

hmmm....

[Monkhound]

Another interesting development in the Ishterebinth section:

In chapter 7, we have a PoV of Serwa in which we are explained that she sees everything as unreal/ false, and that only Father (Kellhus) is and has ever been real.

Chapter 12 ends with Serwa seeing Sorweel as real (it's even there in italics) after he intercepts the Chorae aimed at her in mid-air.

[Wilshire]

What do you think that implies?
What changed in sorweel and what made him similar to Kellhus in her eyes?

At first I was thinking it might be something metaphysical, but actually this might just be a case of mundane affection seen through the eyes of someone unable or unwilling to conconciously aknowledge it

[Monkhound]

We get explained that the Amiolas "weds" the soul of the one wearing it to the soul of a headstrong and self-punishing Ishroi. I suppose Sorweel's soul got "completed" in a way, making him real and thus unalterable.

Edit: ... because she can no longer see the tears in the fabric of reality that make him false.

[Wilshire]

Ah, the amiolas. Interesting.

[Monkhound]

Alternatively: When Oirunas breaks the Amiolas, Sorweel experiences death, in a way similar (yet different) to what Kellhus experienced in Caraskand.

I also only now see a weird parallel between Kellhus losing Serwë in Caraskand and going mad, and the Nonmen losing their wives/ daughters and going mad. Not sure what to make of that.

[Monkhound]

We get explained that the Amiolas "weds" the soul of the one wearing it to the soul of a headstrong and self-punishing Ishroi. I suppose Sorweel's soul got "completed" in a way, making him real and thus unalterable.

Edit: ... because she can no longer see the tears in the fabric of reality that make him false.

Also: On Page 296, Sorweel is referred to as "the in-between soul that had once been Sorweel". Two pages earlier, Immiriccas's love and wrath "made him whole ".

Edit: and a little later we get the description of Sorweel sharing his memories with Immiriccas's soul, where the last but if the boy Sorweel dies in the Weeping Mountain.

[mrganondorf]

I wonder if the nonmen near the bottom of the well achieved the objective of finding the darkness in between the gods.  The gods come across as eaters of souls (whether heaven or hell) and the nonmen whose souls were reduced to a personality-less fog (not the Tall at the very bottom but the nonmen just before that, the pig-catchers) might just be repugnant enough to avoid consumption.

[H]

I wonder if the nonmen near the bottom of the well achieved the objective of finding the darkness in between the gods.  The gods come across as eaters of souls (whether heaven or hell) and the nonmen whose souls were reduced to a personality-less fog (not the Tall at the very bottom but the nonmen just before that, the pig-catchers) might just be repugnant enough to avoid consumption.

That is an interesting idea, but I think I would maybe run it the other way: the chthonic isolation cuts the Subject off from being part of the Ethical Community (and the Ethical World) and also subverts Identity.  How so?  Well, if we take a basic sort of Hegelian formation, that Identity is Identity not just in relation to The Other, but through The Other as well, what happens where there simply is no Other?

(Also, glad to read you are doing alright in the current moment...)