#i've been both busy and sick today so wasn't able to log into the game until just a little while ago

[yes-no-maybe-soo]

⚠️Timelock Key Spoilers⚠️

Ok so visuals first...

The contrast between the previous card and this one is just... so impactful

The used and abused little boy has come so far... a sovereign on his throne, grown men kneeling at his feet.

And speaking of his throne... and of men kneeling before him... we've seen both before

As you can see, Kinglus has been canon all along 👑😌

And as you can also see by looking at the thrones side by side, they're very similar. The steps leading up to a platform, the color, the curved armrests, even what appears to be a large window behind both, a large object swinging like a pendulum overhead. So while not 100% identical, I do believe they are meant to be the same.

Which is in my mind significant to the – as always beautifully written – text and to placing the Timelock Key to a particular event

Bear in mind that this is all just my interpretations and that I am in no way claiming them to be accurate, but I believe that this is meant to represent Sylus' takeover of the N109 Zone. Partly because of the throne, but also because I feel like it's what makes most sense with the current information we have.

We know that after the Chronorift Catastrophe, there were violent gang wars and feuds over who would rule the N109 Zone. Sylus' takeover was not instantaneous, but took 2 years (he landed in 2034, and established his rulership in 2036). This slow (for Sylus, who's raw powers should have enabled him to win the crown much sooner considering how he'd conquered whole planets before) process would be in line with what is written above about him slowly approaching a throne. Why it took that amount of time, I do not know. Perhaps his amusement in watching the populace scramble and fight for power made it so that he was in no particular hurry to end it, perhaps he was busy with other matters (founding Onychinus, hunting down Gaia/EVER researchers, looking for the Protocore Map) to give it too much focus or energy. Maybe a combination. Or something else. We don't know exactly what he was up to in the immediate aftermath of saving little MC from Dimitri, after all.... except being jumped by 13 consecutive guys trying and failing to mug him, and obtaining his iconic biker outfit (and presumably bike, as well).

Going back to the text I think the last part is very very important because of what it doesn't say. "A crown vowen from schemes and ambition gently falls next to his feet". Notice how there is no mention of Sylus picking said crown up? Of putting it on his head?

I think that this is very deliberate by the writers. I think that this shows how Sylus, for all that he has amassed power and influence, is ultimately not interested in it for his own sake or desires. He doesn't care about wearing the crown, because the crown itself is not the reason for his machinations. MC is. His takeover of the N109 Zone was all for her.

As Sylus himself tells MC, him landing in the N109 Zone was no coincidence. Nor is his establishing himself there. There he could safeguard the experimental data on MC left at the Gaia Research Center, keep an eye on Dimitri, and prepare a way for MC to find the answers that he knew she'd one day seek.

If power and rulership for their own sake was what he was after then he could simply do so over any of the literal planets he conquered. But that was never his goal. Sylus does not give a flying fuck about that, conqueror and sovereign though he may be.

His driving ambition has always been in service of MC. To ensure not only her wellbeing and protection, but also that she will one day know the truth about herself and be strong enough to face the people – or forces – coming for her (hence his desperation in LAR to make her resonance "as strong as possible").

This?

All for her. Not himself.

There truly is no love purer than his.

Now for tomorrow's Timelock...

There is only one thing that comes to mind when looking at this immense pain "We were like flowers. We were meant to grow together in the same soil. Yet you were quietly moved to another garden in a foreign land"

Hahahaha ��... oh... tomorrow is going to hurt... 🥲