#cotl theory

[rainbowolfe]

The way NariLamb blew up is honestly kind of funny, cause if you really look at their dynamic, their relationship really reflects that of a parent and a child. The creator and the created. The provider and the dependent. There's lots of little things, but the big thing that really reinforces it is the bell collar.

Maybe the bell collar speaks more to the nature of how eggs are created and what's actually inside of them, but every follower born in your cult is born with that bell collar. And growing into adulthood, they'll keep it unless you give them a necklace to replace it.

[dykedvonte]

In the trailer for the update the lamb seems so out of their depth with all the sins and debachuary going on. It’s funny at first glance but actually makes sense when you think about it.

Lambs were being hunted and killed in mass. They either didn’t have time or the conditions to copulate or just saw it as a waste of time seeing as they’d be killed shortly. Drinking, drumming and especially dressing in loud flashy manners just draws more attention to yourself and that’s the opposite of what any species trying to avoid being wiped out would want.

Actually indulging in traditional sins is probably a foreign concept to the lamb or has weird associations in their mind making them adverse or hesitant even as a god. They mostly partake in adjacent ways to keep their followers happy.

[pessimisticshapewithablog]

This structure is referred to as "OLD GOD" in the files!

It looks insectoid. The giant mushroom on its head makes me think it may have suffered the same fate as Sozo. What are menticide mushrooms to be able to take down a god...

Also it looks like a coconut rhinoceros beetle...

Sorta...

[lil-deach]

The bishops did a sans theory: (warning, spoilers for the game)

I noticed something whilst playing the game, so I just wanted to give my own take on what exactly happened

Shamura didn’t want to take any chances with the lamb, and so had the two most powerful bishops (Leshy and Heket) at them first as a means of ‘i don’t want you alive, I’m not taking any chances because I KNOW my brother’

This can be seen as, when the two turn into their boss forms, their wounds are completely healed, but neither Kallamar and Shamura dont? This shows that not only are Leshy and Heket are physically stronger, but also have much more magic/crown potential, showing that they are, indeed, the two strongest, Leshy most likely being the strongest of the two, as he seemingly completely regrows his eyes.

The two also complete change shape, becoming these eldritch like beings that have unfathomable power, whilst Kallamar only gets some weapons + a fancy new outfit, and shamura’s butt gets bigger (dubiously big butt from the old love hotline canon?) and they have weird sword arms now.

Jokes aside, Heket and Leshy gain this almost primitive like strength and look when they tap into the crown’s full potential, but I don’t think it’s because of their crown, because most crowns are the same, say for a different shape and eye color, so I don’t think it’s because of the crown itself. What I think it is is that Leshy and Heket are physically stronger (as said above), and so they are able to handle the crowns true power more than Kallamar and Shamura. Shamura KNOWS this, and uses it to everyone’s advantage, put the strongest up first, if one dies, at least the anger from the death of a sibling with fuel the other to finish off the lamb, breaking the prophecy which was foretold.

It also makes sense, Shamura being the god of knowledge and the oldest, they would know that this is the best option, don’t give the enemy a chance to wound the empire that is their religions, and instead kill the lamb while they have the chance to in the first place

Of course, this backfired, and now Kallamar and Shamura ended up having to fight the lamb on their own, which is most likely why Shamura was at peace with their demise, they knew that with Heket and Leshy gone, there wasn’t really anything else they could actually do to stop the lamb’s mission to free the one who waits.

Ik this is all over the place but eh idc, i had fun typing this out, have a good one, i promise I’ll draw more waah

[dravikso]

Was doing my second playthrough of cotl when i encountered Haro and I realised something about the dialogue that I hadn't originally.

This is an interesting choice of words. The others are described with adjectives delineating their personality: "temperamental", "cowardly", and "brightest". Given what we see and hear from them in our encounters I would even say that these words are the pillars of their characters, their singular most identifiable traits (that don't relate to their domains).

But hapless? I don't feel like our encounters with Leshy really get this idea across to us, and I suppose how could they from dialogue alone? To save anyone who doesn't know from a trip to google, hapless means unfortunate, or unlucky. My first thought was that this could be referring to how Leshy, generally speaking, is the first to die in a playthrough... but I also feel as though that would be an odd contrast to the adjectives we get for the other bishops - surely dying first alone wouldn't warrant Leshy's entire character to be distilled into "hapless". I'm also not sure if you even need to have defeated Leshy to get this dialogue from Haro either (I don't really feel like checking), which would render that point null.

I feel like this is alluding to something in his character that we don't actually know about yet, or maybe we will never know about. Does it allude to the order in which Narinder maimed the other bishops (could be, Leshy's dialogue about trusting 'the chained one' is... interesting depending on how you choose to read into it)? Or is it something else entirely?

Am I overthinking this? Definitely. Am I going to take this tidbit of dialogue and absolutely fucking Sprint with it for my headcanons? yes, yes i am

[spidey-555]

I have a little theory about the CotL graphic novel

^This was the image accompanied by the discord announcement. The phrase "all will now down to my name" is presumably the Lamb talking about they will eventually rule the world or some shit. Also I don't think the crown and the sword can exist at the same time but whatever

However, on the announcement, there was also a link that led to the kickstarter page for the novel

And on it, was the same quote, but this time with an image of the Red Crown

Given that the crown is featured in both images, but the Lamb is in only one, I have a theory that the phrase "all will bow to my name" isn't being said by the Lamb, but by the Red Crown. And depending on how you look at it, "the time is nigh" could be the Lamb responding to the red crown!

[felizy]

Shamura’s Name Theory

Short version if you don’t have time to read the whole thing:

Shamura is a name of Assyrian origin meaning diamond. That said, it can also be understood as a toponymic name meaning “silk village” in Japanese.

And for you, my friend who decided to proceed, I present to you the long version.

So we know from the COTL wiki that Leshy is named after a Slavic forest deity, Heket is an alternative spelling of Heqet, Egyptian frog goddess of fertility, Narinder (Sikh variation of the Hindu name Narendra which is linked to the three-eyed god Indra) means “lord of men”, and Kallamar means “squid” in Albanian. There’s no info regarding Shamura’s name, but a Reddit user has pointed out that it is a name of Assyrian origin, meaning “diamond”.

That said, search results for the name Shamura also has a fair amount of unrelated Japanese content, but why? I dug around the Wikitionary for a bit and found out that mura is the romanized spelling of the Japanese word 村, meaning village, which is used in common surnames such as Nakamura (middle village) and Kimura (tree village).

And what about sha? Turns out it is one of the possible readings of the Japanese word 紗, meaning silk gauze, or gossamer–fine spider silk.

Have fun with this random piece of info!

[katapotato55]

cult of the lamb relics of the old faith theory: chemach

SPOILERS AFTER CUT

theory 1- Chemach is a reanimated corpse by ??? designed to guide the player into higher power or maybe something else in the story that has not been explained yet. theory 2- Chemach did some spooky magic stuff to try and create their own cult. maybe they stole power from ???, maybe ??? gave Chemach the crown and that ended badly, or maybe another unexplained reason. Either way there is a reason why this blitzed out owl is chained up constantly, either because they are a puppet to ??? or chained because they are nuts.

a few things to note first- Chemach's crown looks very similar to diseased hearts. Diseased hearts also look similar to ??? but with a slightly inverted color scheme. Second- Chemach's dialogue they randomly say is a bit suspect, here is stuff i posted from the wiki. Its a little concerning how Chemach seems to have no real followers but rather corpses they strung together with fabric. I don't see a lot of people talking about this so i thought i should post it!

[pikos-den]

i rambled about this in a server, but i have a headcanon that makes me very happy and im going to share it:

i believe helob and shamura are related. personally, i enjoy the "secret royal child" trope for him, but it could be a more distant kind of relationship.

most characters in cult of the lamb are unique in their own way. the named ones have their own colors, species, and tells to know they're their own things. except, well...helob and shamura.

they both can be described as "purple fluffy spiders that at least stick around silk cradle"- shamura is the bishop and helob's shop is near the entrance in game. so both have some level of importance.

to be a hunter, you have to be smart. you need to know where your prey tends to be, what is best to catch them with, and how to properly handle the prey in whatever way you are going to. you have to know what you're doing, and helob surely does with the amount of catches he will get. helob has a different form of intelligence than shamura, but i feel like helob prefers to "play dumb" in some regards.

back to the "everyone is unique" thing, i know some may be thinking "what about aym and baal?" "what about clauneck/kuudai/chemach?"

aym and baal are brothers and were narinder's disciples. (forneus fits in here too as their mother. the "narinder is the kits' dad" headcanon can be applied here, but i'm indifferent to that.)

clauneck/kuudai/chemach are siblings. they look vaguely similar to each other, and chemach is a self-made ""crownbearer"" of sorts, so she almost lends into the headcanon too.

helob and shamura are the only two with pretty decent similarities that don't have any canon connection. all we know is helob is scared of the mystic seller....which in itself is strange, considering he seems to know the mystic seller in some form(better than rakshasa does.)

this ends my little ramble but yeah

[waokevale]

Something Something Doppelganger~

As I promised, I shall explain my idea of Forneus being a former vessel of the red crown!

First of, the most obvious reason, Narinder might have grown frustrated with his siblings killing off all his former vessels, so he figured, perhaps one akin to him in resemblance the most, would make them more conflicted.

It worked perfectly of course, and his siblings hesitated moreso in harming her.

The only one who didn't hesitate as much was Leshy, due to obvious reasons, sensing her primarily off on smell, he could tell that she was a different feline.

However, Narinder didn't grow fond of her solely based on her appearance alone, she was a very competent and vicious one, (before pregande that is) and managed to defeat the youngest Bishop. Although, Narinder being merely a century or few into his imprisonment, still struggled with his guilt and ordered her to spare him. (Though, Leshy definitely got mocked for being weak by his siblings later) ✌️ 🐸)

Forneus was one of the most loyal vessels. Still is, despite all that had happened. (Which is also canon, she is one of the very few NPCs aligned with him. It is specifically stated that she is the only other character who's alignment is "Worships The One Who Waits" the other one being Ratau, who himself was a vessel)

Forneus VOLUNTARILY gave up the red crown, unlike Ratau who was (technically) demoted for his insubordination. When she had her kids she realized... maybe there's more to life than just that, so she seeked penance.

Narinder was upset with her choice, but decided not to punish her. Although, he did say that she would lose all her powers and semi-immortality. She was persistent.

Forneus begrudgingly, but willingly gave up her children, once Shamura promised they'd be taken in by her god. She doesn't know all the details though, as stated in canon.

Shamura made her immortal again, and gave her ||something || to hold onto, if she ever got a chance to see her kids again, it would be returned to its rightful owner.

She did! She doesn't fully begrudge Narinder for them being kinda fucked up, but she is dissapointed. To be fair, he did go insane in there. (He does eventually apologize to her for that, as does Shamura..maybe)

_____________

And that's all I have for now! I'll need to hyperfixate more on this. :>

@17magpiesinatrenchcoat

[rainbowolfe]

A scenario to consider:

Narinder wasn't sent to the Realm Beyond, that's where he's always been. And where he was meant to be.

He's trapped where he's chained, but there's definitely more to the Realm Beyond. There are bodies buried in there, marked with graves. And there are at least two "layers" of it. Unless there's another way to send things into the Realm Beyond, everything Aym and Baal have on them could only come from that realm.

The betrayal wasn't sending him to the Realm Beyond. It was leaving him there. Forcing him to stay.

If Shamura is adamantly against resurrection, then that would include the resurrection of Narinder. Which, that is what taking him out of the Realm Beyond is. A resurrection. He may not have been slain, but he's clearly been forgotten. And for a god, that's basically the same thing.

That's why he still has to sacrifice 'his most devout follower' to leave even after all the chains are broken. That bell around Lamb's neck is Narinder's Light/Dark necklace. (Notice how it/Lamb's fleece also 'does nothing').

Before he was chained, he likely had some amount of ability to interact with the "living world". Greater than what he has now. Before the Gateway was sealed, visiting him/The Realm Beyond was probably a much more common and casual affair. Pilgrim's Passage leads directly into the temple. And from the temple, the only accessible thing would be the Gateway.

This is where the Bishops come in. While they may love Narinder, the power dynamic at play means they also fear Narinder on some level. For a domain so consistent, Narinder has proven himself to be wildly unpredictable. There's the fear of the unknown facets of him, being something fundamentally different from the rest of the Bishops. Being something that has only known the Realm Beyond. The fear of what it means to let a being of Death out into the living world.

The fear of what it means to go against the traditions and wills of gods far older and powerful than you.

[ane-doodles]

This doodle deserves its own post.

[pessimisticshapewithablog]

Cult of the Lamb theory # 4

What action could Narinder have done that would have caused his siblings to turn on him so viciously? I theorize the conception of these two.

Narinder's tryst with Forneus was frowned upon by the other Bishops but the conception and birth of Baal and Aym may have been the act that caused the Bishops to conspire to seal Narinder away.

Inspiration and Analysis

"He was unalike the rest of his kin. While others dealt with flux; chaos, famine, pestilence, war. Things in which their constancy must transpose. And yet he was the inevitable; the obstinate and irresistible. The one who waits. Truly peculiar, 'twould then seem, has appetency to invite the novel and the new, break ancient vow and primordial bond alike. Traditions stagnate and appetites augment, nonetheless. Doubt tears faith asunder." -Haro

"He was unalike the rest of his kin. While others dealt with flux; chaos, famine, pestilence, war. Things in which their constancy must transpose."

Each Bishops has a specific sphere of influence:

Leshy = chaos

Heket = famine

Kallamar = pestilence

Shamura = War

Narinder = Death

The Bishops embody and express these aspects in the way they interact with their cult. Their followers pray to them to alleviate these illnesses and conflicts caused by the Bishops. It is a self-perpetuating cycle subjugation with the bishops receiving fervor and devotion, and their followers get a slightly less awful existence and safety from monsters.

Whether the Bishops actually NEEDED to do any of this to exist is unknown. Although I believe they do not. If anything, they do these things because it was expected of them by the gods of the old faith or to validate their own existances. It gives them purpose now that their patron gods are gone. Those responsibilities were given to the Bishops by their Gods, and they will continue to do those actions until the end of time. Or these things would happen regardless of the actions of the Bishops, but then, who would take advantage of the fear and suffering of mortals to reap boundless devotion and fervor...?

"-And yet he was the inevitable; the obstinate and irresistible. The one who waits. Truly peculiar, 'twould then seem, has appetency to invite the novel and the new-"

Narinder's responsibilities are/were very different compared to his more fickle siblings'. Death is inevitable, it can avoided but only temporarily. Whereas his siblings have to work endless to accomplish their responsibilities, Narinder just has to wait. He can hold sermons and rituals if he wanted, but he had more free time to cultivate interests outside his station.

-break ancient vow and primordial bond alike."

"Break an ancient Vow."

The birth of children half god and half mortal might have been taboo or outright frowned upon in the Old Faith. Or the Bishops take a vow of celibacy, and Narinder breaking that vow and fornicating with a mortal was akin to a cardinal sin. This act may have been the start of the other bishops' concern in Narinder's actions. The Bishops seem almost blindly loyal to the Old Faith, even after the Old Gods have faded from the world. In the beginning, Narinder may have been just as loyal as the others, but that changed with time.

-And primordial bond alike.

This one is more difficult to decipher. I interpretate that this has something to do with Narinder being the God of Death in the world of cotl. So then how could a God of Death beget life, with a mortal no less. Or Narinder was dabbling in resurrection.

"Traditions stagnate and appetites augment, nonetheless. Doubt tears faith asunder."

I do not believe Narinder did anything to his siblings that would cause them to fear for their lives and safety. They were all assholes equally, but they didn't hate each other. It was Narinder's deviation from the old faith, the expected norms, his unrepentant heresy in their eyes, that caused his siblings to fear what his actions may cause. Narinder was arguable the more powerful of the bishops due to death coming for all things mortal and god alike. The others knew that if mortals began to be influenced by Narinder's heresy, he would be unstoppable, and their entire way of life would be changed or be lost forever.

As far as Forneus, Baal, and Aym are concerned, I can't say if Narinder actually cared about them. I believe he is capable of caring for another living being as he reminisces about his siblings when giving quests as a follower but those three specifically, I just don't know. Narinder and his siblings a near immortal and have had centuries, if not millennia, to develop a familial bond but, the mortals that he's only known for maybe less than a century? Not so much.

I feel like Narinder having children with Forneus was done more out of curiosity as to whether he could than actually caring about her and children produced. He or his followers did take her sons away never allowing them to see each other again. Nor does he ever mention her or them. Even when Baal and Aym die for him against the lamb, Narinder shows no concern or remorse. Given the way he speaks of followers, I doubt he saw his sons as anything but servants to use and discard as he saw fit...

"O what good are hearts if they cannot be given? I thought to keep mine to myself, once. Two kits I did have, true love found! And yet one lackadaisy summer day, my beautiful children were taken away… a gift, they said, for the one they loved most, the one that waits… I wept, I keened… But how can one say no to a God? Wherever they be, I hope they are as devoted and loving as I!"

-Forneus

Update: After reading Forneus' quote again, I am beginning to think that Baal and Aym might have been sacrificed to TOWW, specifically during the summer, maybe the summer solstice or equinox. 'They' could be refering to Baal and Aym or the ones that took them away. That could be how or why, they are found with TOWW in his inprisonment, similar to how the lamb went to him when they were first executed, and subsequent deaths after that.

[aellivi]

Still figuring out how I want to draw this guy.

[mx-metronome]

I AM STILL BEING 300% NORMAL ABOUT THIS JENOVA CHEN INTERVIEW, REVIVAL EDITION

Rehashed my old theory now that Revival is almost over and I’ve had some epiphanies

[thatskyjeibird]

Cat face theory, moth edition