Tiber Septim died 3E 38, yes? What exactly was the process of his apotheosis?

Was the enantiomorphic godhead Talos only complete after his mortal death? Or can we assume that after Zurin Arctus became the Underking/Ysmir that the god Talos came to be in a chronologically linear sense?

The problem I have is that when reading "The Arcturian Heresy" the clearest sense of the enantiomorph fully forming is when Ysmir blows out Zurin Arctus' heart, thus making them both the same. The problem is that Tiber Septim only arrives to retrieve the Mantella that now has a soul inside it with a conflicting identity.

I also find the questions asked at the end of "The Arcturian Heresy" odd, many of which I can't answer.


I'm guessing that this question alludes to the fact that after Tiber Septim/Ysmir/Zurin Arctus became one being, history changed as a result (reverse temporal engineering?), but I still don't understand the significance of the question. The youth that would become General Talos was born in High Rock, and Wulfharth was Atmoran, so after they become facets of the same godhead, both are true from a metaphysical standpoint but false from the point of view of mortal, linear-time-logic?


I suppose this question is the most blunt statement, again saying that because Tiber Septim became only one of three chiral souls. One quick question about the second part of this though: Did Tiber Septim and Wulfharth become the same (Shor?) after Wulfharth began to help him with his conquests? Similarly, "The Arcturian Heresy" would imply that Tiber Septim never had the power of Thu'um, that it was simply Ysmir pretending to be General Talos' power. On a side note, I seem to remember a source talking talking about Talos climbing High Hrothgar and listening to the Greybeards chant for and emerging with Thu'um and all the Nords seeing him as Ysmir. I had thought it was in "The Five Songs of King Wulfharth" or "The Arcturian Heresy", but I couldn't find it in either. What source was it exactly? Back to the point though. It's accepted fact that Talos had Thu'um, so is this another case of the godhead changing aspects of the past?


According to "The Arcturian Heresy" Tiber Septim never betrays Zurin Arctus while he's alive (unless he knew that Ysmir and Zurin Arctus would kill each other [do you all think this is the case?]). He betrays him after he's dead of course, but I find the key detail to be not in the events, but in the idea of betrayal by itself. I'm going out on a thin limb here, but does the act of betrayal reenact Akatosh killing Lorkhan (Suicide; a tearing apart in Akatosh/Lorkhan's case but a fusing together in the case of Tiber Septim/Zurin Arctus? [even farther out on that limb, but would this also corroborate the fact that Talos is filling Lorkhan's place in Aetherius by having two souls merge as one, while one soul split into two originally?])


The most confounding question of all in my opinion. If we look at the events from a linear point of view thus far we have this:

Wulfharth is born Shezzarine and has Thu'um > Wulfharth foils Orkey's plot to eat the Nord's years away and kills himself in the process becoming Ysmir, the Grey Wind > Ysmir is defeated at Red Mountain > Talos is born in High Rock > Ysmir helps Talos unify Cyrodiil and become crowned Emperor (point of first chirality [Tiber Septim and Ysmir]?) > Tribunal trades Numidium for autonomy > Zurin Arctus attempts to trap Ysmir in the Mantella, dies in the process (point of second chirality [Zurin Arctus and Ysmir]) and Zurin Arctus becomes the Underking.

So at this point why does the text question if Tiber Septim's soul is in the Mantella if logic, even metaphysical logic would state that it was Ysmir's soul within the Mantella since Zurin Arctus used the Mantella on him. Regardless, the Underking is alive to later destroy Numidium for good after Tiber Septim's destruction of the Aldmeri Dominion, and a soul must be inside the Mantella, so was there a switch? Here, I think the existential line between Zurin Arctus and Ysmir is gone. The Underking is both of them, but the soul inside the Mantella still illudes me. I'm well aware that all three are the same soul by now, but it all still lacks a sense of concreteness in my mind.

Then Tiber Septim dies in 3E 38. Where does this apotheosis happen. When I think of apotheosis, I imagine a mortal not dying at all but ascending before death. I'm sure the whole non-linear chronology thanks to all three people being the same comes into play here, but it seems like there should be a certain point in time where Talos the mortal becomes Talos the god, so does this happen upon his death, or did he ascend the second all three became the same?

I always thought Talos became a god through mantling Lorkhan (so it was more of a process than a definitive moment of "not a god, now a god" that ended when ge died". Though I have just recently delved into TES lore, so there are probably things I'm not clear on.

Edit: The Arcturin Heresy (and the TES metaphysics behind it) confuses the &@#% out of me.

I seem to rememhber that Vivec (at his trial) claimed that once he attained divinity, he had always been divine - though I'm not sure if that would be relevant to Talos given the vastly different circumstances. But, in that case, trying to pinpoint a moment of apotheosis might be an impossible task.

Mmph... I'm not sure if that's at all useful

The Tribunal altered the timelines after they achieved Godhood to make it to where they were always God's., effectively rewriting history you could say.

How could they alter the timelines?

And going back to the main post's topic - Where does Hjalti fit in?

They used the Power of the Heart.

The Many-headed Talos pretty much disproves this. His traditional ascension into the heavens or whatever else may have happened at his death, but he had godly powers while alive. I believe the exact moment was the activation of the Numidium and it's conquest of Alinor.



In addition to what you said about the multiple joined personalities, this is also good old propaganda. Highrock claims that they are the birthplace of the God-King for glory, the Imperial government claims that he is a true Nord from Atmora to cement alliances, etc.

How exactly does it work? Did they change the 'tempo' created by the Zero-Stone and the Red Mountain or something?

Makes enough sense, and it would fit well with trend of mortals achieving godhood at the expense of a Dragon Break. Talos' ascension could be a two-parter though, the first bit happening at Rimmen and the final ascension occurring after the attack on Alinor. I'd liken it to being handed a crown and then deciding to put it on.


If this were any other book, I'd agree whole-heartedly, but there's a certain straightforward nature about 5 Songs and Heresy that shouldn't be overlooked. Just as a god's plane(t) can't be perceived logically by starring at it, I think this Heresy is trying to do the same with the nature of Talos by presenting so many paradoxes. The same thing happened in 5 Songs, where early in the text it would read, "Ysmir (not the Underking)", yet later in the text, before the filling of the Mantella, Ysmir wasn't even referred to by Ysmir or Wulfharth anymore, just The Underking showing that a change had occurred in his identity. The more I think about time being rewritten and the problems in time caused by ascension, the more I believe that the general who fought for King Cuhlecain was from Alcaire; the champion who used Thu'um to unite Colovia was from Atmora; and the man who killed Cuhlecain and was crowned Emperor, who would conquer Alinor and betray his Battlemage was the enantiomorph of both. Isn't the fact that it's called a heresy imply that it's true? Otherwise it's truly a Roshomon Effect, where everything is a lie.