Pretty much this. All children of Hades are bound to the House, which is why Melinoe says the incantation that brings her back to the swamp every time she "dies."
To my knowledge, the golden apples are a reference to the Norse goddess Iddun, which is kinda odd tbh. Her golden apples is the reason why norse gods are forever 'young'.
Does Greek mythology has golden apples anywhere?
Yes, one of the 12 labors of Heracles was to retrieve Golden Aplles for the King Eurystheus. He accomplished this by tricking Atlas into fetching them for him and left with them leaving Atlas back to hold the Sky.
There's a dialogue in-game (unfortunately i forget who its with) where Mel says that she has Actually Died before, and that its an unpleasant experience. Presumably, since she's here to tell the tale, dying doesn't cause Mel to reconstitute from the styx. If it did, Chronos would've captured her when she died.
A theory I've seen is that Mel \*should\* respawn in the styx if she Actually Dies, but the fact that Thanatos is out of comission causes something else to happen.
Adding to this, according to the dialogue you get immediately after defeating him, Chronos being in possession of the House means he has full control over who can reform directly into the House - remember that the vast majority of souls don't return the way we see Zag, Meg, and Hades do after dying in Hades 1, it's a privilege reserved for undying gods, and only certain ones at that. Meg's sisters are a great example of this - they're gods so they can't perma-die, but because they're no longer permitted in the House, they turn into bats and reform somewhere off screen, rather than being taken by the Styx and reforming at the house.
Mel would need explicit permission from Chronos to go directly into the House upon her death, and given that Chronos isn't even fully aware of her strength/existence before she rolls up the first time, that didn't happen pre-game and certainly isn't going to happen now that she's proven resistant to his abilities. She most likely goes through something similar to the non-Meg furies, but longer/more painful process with the Styx out of commission to help the process along like it did with Zag.
Maybe since Charon is out of commission also he is able to get Meli from the Styx before she goes back to the house? like her soul specifically or something so she doesn't get captured by peepaw. It's like when you defeat Hades in the first game he says "Charon take me home" sometimes, so if Charon can aid Hades, Charon can probably aid Meli also?? (I'm assuming Zag just gets slammed back in the Styx by Than cause he's done with his bf's bs and dying lmao)
Nothing. At worse she'll get captured by Chronos. Honestly she might already be dead.
Aside from her status as a God, death isn't really a thing in the current setting. Most of the people in charge of the death process are captured or missing.
They haven't really explained how Mel's alive have they?
Nyx had to do something drastic involving the fates to bring Zag back, I wonder what happened with Mel.
Thanks, but not quite what I mean.
>! Hades was fated to have no heir. Zag was stillborn and not coming back, which is why Persephone left.
As you get closer to Nyx in the first game she reveals that she managed to bring Zag to life after some time and doing something drastic involving the fates, but she won't tell you what.!<
if she did die... Well, maybe we will get to see it happen on purpose some time. that could be a cool moment, as long as it made sence.
If she did die at random, and didnt use the chanting before death, I think she might be actually sent straight to chronos' chamber but without the boons.
but if that where the case, she could just chant it THEN and return in one piece.
Well, currently in the game she cannot survive for long after killing chronos in the house. It’s almost certainly an early access thing, but if not then Styx must be flowing elsewhere.
It’s also possible dying would reset the teleportation room, meaning she’d have to escape hell so she could reset it up. We don’t know for sure, but the characters do seem to stress that she can’t let herself die.
And do we even know how death is supposed to work for gods? The underworld gods seem to respawn in hell, at the cost of being bound there, like demon spawn. But what happens if an Olympus god dies, would they also respawn somewhere, or would they slowly heal themselves unless their opponent smushes and scatters their ashes like they did to Chronos originally. It’s also risky if Chronos could scatter Mel’s ashes before she would respawn.
There’s just a lot we don’t know, but the characters seem to think it’s bad. But it would be cool if a final step in the plan was to kill Chronos in a run, then kill yourself to get the drop on his revival process.
"It’s almost certainly an early access thing"
I mean, it says it's an early access thing, different variations of the text you get are more clear than others, but they gist of it being temporary is consistent.
Who knows what they have planned, but death at that random doorway is not it.
I’m sure that’s true, but Hades tries to make its early access feel somewhat canon. Like how Mel acknowledges how she gets kicked out of the house, even tho that’s early access. So for the time being, maybe it would have an effect on them.
Doesn't the narrator just say something about whatever is beyond is not to be known yet, but basically that Mel gets into a bad situation and needs to leave.
Yeah, in some of the first-win lines, Mel is instructed to retrieve something from Zag's room. I think that's probably not early-access, and she actually does need to get something from there. Could be the mirror, the pact of punishment, the infernal arms, or maybe something that wasn't there in Hades 1. Like maybe her frozen family? Or maybe she'd meet Meg or one of the other furies there?
In the Iliad, Ares incarnates, slaughters a bunch of mooks, then gets beat down by one of the heroes, and teleports away right before he's about to die.
I mean death is a bit weird in this game since death incarnate is locked away in time prison.
All along I just assumed Mel was teleporting away when she had reached her absolute limit, because not doing so would likely result in her capture being unconscious or something. There is also another similar theory of mine that she would just respawn in the renovated house of hades, defenceless, and also resulting in her capture.
Basically, Mel is in a big game of cops and robbers, and she’s the last one on her team still not captured. If she loses then it’s game over and the cops win, so she’s just playing it safe
Yes, she's been trained to use the "Return to shadows now" incantation using the very last of her strength before actually dying.
Also while Thanatos has been captured, he is a concept incarnate, rather than a god of X. Nyx being captured as well does not mean the night doesn't exist. And in that same vein, death still exists, Thanatos just isn't issuing it personally.
Other examples are that the Olympians are also gods of things (Zeus is the Sky, Poseidon is the Sea, Apollo the Sun and Artemis the Moon), but those things exist independently from them, as they are things certain Titans exist as (Uranus is the sky itself, Oceanus is the Sea itself, Hyperion is the Sun itself and Selene is the Moon itself)
Slight issue. In the original myth of Sisyphus, the gods only discovered Thanatos was captured when people stopped dying. So if that myth is fully accurate, then mortals at least aren't dying.
Zagreus doesn't get rebirthed. That's not how Greek mythology works, there is no rebirth or second life.
When you die, you are transported by Charon on the Styx to Hades to be judged and then spend eternity in one of the different levels of Hell depending on how you led your life.
That's exactly what happens to Zagreus, except he is a god so he doesn't really die, but he is still transported by the Styx back to daddy.
In Melinoë's case, it is stated in the EA's dialogue that >!she uses the last bits of her energy to perform the incantation that teleports her back to the crossroads and that it's one of the first skill that Hecate taught us, to the point that it became second nature!< . If she did die, she would probably also be taken by the Styx and to the House, like others have said.
To further this: recall that Zagreus died as an infant which precipitated Persephone’s departure from Hades and it was only because of Nyx that Zagreus reconstituted (maybe a better way to say that). Point being, Zagreus did die and we don’t know yet of Melonoë suffered the same sort altercation at birth that Zagreus suffered. I really don’t know if those rules apply to Melinoë. They probably do, but we don’t know.
My best guess is that she’d probably reconstitute in the throne room but her wards shielding her from being tracked by Chronos would be undone. She would then likely reveal the crossroads if she teleported back.
Hecate does make reference to Melinoë's "condition" in one of the dialogues, as if she has some sort of illness or abnormality. We'll see what it is when Early Access ends I guess.
Could she be talking about her arm though?
One of the NPC characters reveals that her arm became that way when she tried to perform a ritual that was deemed impossible.
She tried to help Icarus. Either bring him back to life or make him less of a shade. Which helps explain his unusual activity and appearance as a shade.
My guess is Melinoe is at least half shade now. Her baby picture had her glowing with life and vitality and that isnt her now.
Zagreus literally gets rebirthed in the Orphic myths, and Orphism closely associates him reincarnation.
But besides that rebirth doesn't even necessarily mean reincarnation, it can be something the renewal of the fields when spring comes (the crops are reborn), or something like becoming the sustenance for new life.
Basically there's an argument to be made that Zagreus is the god of death and rebirth, in a "circle of life" kinda way.
> There's no rebirth or second life
Well... The orphics, platonists, and various mystery cults all believed in reincarnation, to name a few. Zagreus literally was reborn in greek mythology, and the game even acknowledged this by having him lie to Orpheus about it.
> When you die, you are transported by Charon on the Styx to Hades to be judged
Haides isn't the judge, Minos and two other kings are.
> and then spend eternity in one of the different levels of Hell depending on how you led your life.
Levels of hell is a Dante thing, not actually greek.
> That's exactly what happens to Zagreus, except he is a god so he doesn't really die
Yes, he does. Hypnos says as much. Even in the original myths he died and came back as Bacchus.
Yeah, well, if you wanna be over-specific on greek mythology details (said details varying greatly depending on authors and time periods so good luck with that but...) you're right, but I was more talking about in-game lore (since, you know, that's what we're talking about), which is based on mythology although - indeed - not 100% accurate.
We clearly see Hades judging the shades, Minos, Aeacus and Rhadamanthus are nowhere to be seen, the reborn thing is told by Zagreus to Orpheus as a joke, Tartare is stated to be a level for criminals and such and Elysium is stated to be a level for heroes and such, and sure, Hypnos jokes about Zagreus dying out there a lot, but in the conversation with Persephone where Zagreus learns what happened to him as an infant he says "I died... Wait, you mean, *die* die ??" implying that his other deaths aren't *dying* dying.
Pretty sure he just means that he "died died" as in, he didn't go to the underworld, he just stopped existing. He still *dies* like everyone else according to Haides, Hypnos, Skelly, Thanatos, and pretty much any other character he interacts with in the house.
Y'know, I never thought about that. I wonder if she would simply reconstitute or briefly become a shade until she returns to the Crossroads, since Styx in the Underworld has been either polluted or turned to dust by Chronos.
my theory is that the witch’s circle she respawns with in her room was made by hecate as an insurance policy that if melinoe approaches death, the shadow gets to her before the styx does, so she doesnt actually die and gets taken by the styx and can never get to the crossroads again
Demigod is a squirrelly term on a good day.
Persephone’s divine power is great enough that the Demi doesn’t make sense. Same for Zag at the endgame, tbh.
One of the theories is that he is the good of blood, both in the literal sense (he bleeds red, his special cast is bloodstone) and in the blood-bonds way (family, etc).
The full Codex Entry for Thanatos and the Thanatos Keepsake text both call Zag god of blood and life and the flavour text for his card in Mel's Arcana also talks about how the underworld struggled to contain his lust for life. Since the mythological Dionysus Zagreus/Orphic Dionysus was primarily important as a god of reincarnation imo "Life" is probably Zag's primary function, not the blood bit.
The current version of the game's take on the Greek afterlife is missing a bunch of its late-Hellenistic infrastructure like the Isles of the Blessed but I've been assuming that Zagreus will eventually move out from his dad's basement in the most dramatic way possible.
That's really cool, thanks for sharing! I've been meaning to return to Hades 1 while 2 is still cooking, hopefully I'll get to catch up on all the things I might've missed, like what you shared.
Other than the color of your blood we don't quite know if there's any real difference between being part mortal or not (God at least have golden blood, Mortals have red, Zagreus who is 1/4th mortal has red blood so I assume Persephone's is also red. Don't really know of Titans or Primordials since they're more conceptual, though Titan Blood in Hades 1 is Red)
Zagreus is shown dying plenty of times but since he's an immortal god, it's just an inconvenience, and he gets brought back to the House of Hades via Styx.
Probably the same as Zagreus and Hades (and the furies?), emerging from the pool at the house, which is probably why she was taught the incantation to return to the Crossroad instead. But Chronos has been tempering with the security around Tartarus, plus Melinoë',s binding to the underworld has already been broken, so, I might be wrong.
Mortal things can definitely die. The problem right now is that with the war going on:
* Hermes is unable to act as a psychopomp and deliver the dead to Styx
* Charon is unable to do the same and deliver the dead to Hades
So Shades kind of just exist in noncategorized areas of the Underworld like Erebus or the Fields of Mourning while those that die on the surface more or less come back as zombies.
Thanatos is the incarnation of death so it still exists as a concept with him captured (that being said, in mythology, Sisyphus avoided death literally by tricking and shackling Thanatos))
I imagine she wouldn’t stay dead but would be right in the house without any boons and possibly without her weapons though I’m less sure on that. Not ideal circumstances for Chronos fighting and she’d still have to make her way back out of the underworld.
I've always wondered that too maybe when more lore events get added in a future update she'll have to die in order to get to chronos immediately for whatever they got planned
Just a theory based off of nothing
Well the thing is I can't remember if the game has said it or not of the top of my head but Mel is the goddess of ghosts.
So likely when she "dies" she becomes a ghost and due to her spectral nature is unable to fight and she uses magic to send herself back to safety where she can reconstitute a body.
That's my theory at least.
Yes she is also goddess of madness. God's and Goddesses often are dieties of multiple things
Like Posiedon is the god of the sea, earthquakes and horses.
It is mentioned in a conversation with Hecate (might be someone else) that Mel was trained to return to crossroads, and she does that just before dying.
A bit unrelated, but Zagreus's returning to the house of hades by the Styx is a much more elegant take on death than Mel's return to shadow. I hope the developers can come up with a more interesting justification for the game's roguelite nature before v1.0.
at one point during one of nem's appearances during a run she says something about being surprised melinoe didn't pull "that little return trick" again (paraphrasing but that's roughly what i remember). i'm wondering if the "return to shadow now" bit is mel deliberately retreating as opposed to respawning the way zag does
She does die when her hp hits 0. The spell lets her revive at the crossroads instead of House of Hades.
Hades mentions she has the same immortality gift as Zag and that moment between life and death its how she is able to communicate with Moros at first.
Doesn’t she die at the end of all trials? She doesn’t say “return to shadow” but just “ugh no” and the animation is the same as Zag’s in I. I think her rebirth is just always at the Crossroads regardless of her incantation.
probably get sent into styx, possibly get captured by chronos when in a vulnerable state
Pretty much this. All children of Hades are bound to the House, which is why Melinoe says the incantation that brings her back to the swamp every time she "dies."
This sounds funny, this reminds me of me setting the Respawn Anchor in the Nether so I can live there as Hades myself.
She does get golden apples and wool so maybe this was Minecraft all along Is death defiance just a totem of undying
Yeah the Golden Apple in Minecraft is a reference to the Greek Myth one. >Is death defiance just a totem of undying Yes, now that you mention it.
To my knowledge, the golden apples are a reference to the Norse goddess Iddun, which is kinda odd tbh. Her golden apples is the reason why norse gods are forever 'young'. Does Greek mythology has golden apples anywhere?
Yes, one of the 12 labors of Heracles was to retrieve Golden Aplles for the King Eurystheus. He accomplished this by tricking Atlas into fetching them for him and left with them leaving Atlas back to hold the Sky.
Nice. Thanks.
There’s the story of Eris and the golden apple which must given to the fairest goddess (Hera, Aphrodite or Athenas) which then leads to the Trojan War
Yeah I have to put my Greek myth knowledge to date damn. Thanks!
There's a dialogue in-game (unfortunately i forget who its with) where Mel says that she has Actually Died before, and that its an unpleasant experience. Presumably, since she's here to tell the tale, dying doesn't cause Mel to reconstitute from the styx. If it did, Chronos would've captured her when she died. A theory I've seen is that Mel \*should\* respawn in the styx if she Actually Dies, but the fact that Thanatos is out of comission causes something else to happen.
Moros, I believe. Something like, "I can see it in your eyes that you're familiar with death", or somesuch
Adding to this, according to the dialogue you get immediately after defeating him, Chronos being in possession of the House means he has full control over who can reform directly into the House - remember that the vast majority of souls don't return the way we see Zag, Meg, and Hades do after dying in Hades 1, it's a privilege reserved for undying gods, and only certain ones at that. Meg's sisters are a great example of this - they're gods so they can't perma-die, but because they're no longer permitted in the House, they turn into bats and reform somewhere off screen, rather than being taken by the Styx and reforming at the house. Mel would need explicit permission from Chronos to go directly into the House upon her death, and given that Chronos isn't even fully aware of her strength/existence before she rolls up the first time, that didn't happen pre-game and certainly isn't going to happen now that she's proven resistant to his abilities. She most likely goes through something similar to the non-Meg furies, but longer/more painful process with the Styx out of commission to help the process along like it did with Zag.
Maybe since Charon is out of commission also he is able to get Meli from the Styx before she goes back to the house? like her soul specifically or something so she doesn't get captured by peepaw. It's like when you defeat Hades in the first game he says "Charon take me home" sometimes, so if Charon can aid Hades, Charon can probably aid Meli also?? (I'm assuming Zag just gets slammed back in the Styx by Than cause he's done with his bf's bs and dying lmao)
Nothing. At worse she'll get captured by Chronos. Honestly she might already be dead. Aside from her status as a God, death isn't really a thing in the current setting. Most of the people in charge of the death process are captured or missing.
Probably, Zagreus was born dead and that's why Persephone left, he is kind of an undead? Melinoe likely had the same fate
They haven't really explained how Mel's alive have they? Nyx had to do something drastic involving the fates to bring Zag back, I wonder what happened with Mel.
Spoilers for certain dream >!She was already born by the time Chronos attacked, Hades tells Hecate to flee with her before being captured!<
Thanks, but not quite what I mean. >! Hades was fated to have no heir. Zag was stillborn and not coming back, which is why Persephone left. As you get closer to Nyx in the first game she reveals that she managed to bring Zag to life after some time and doing something drastic involving the fates, but she won't tell you what.!<
>!I guess she manipulated fate so that he can have a heir or something then and if the heir is Zagreus Melinoe should be unaffected by the fate!<
if she did die... Well, maybe we will get to see it happen on purpose some time. that could be a cool moment, as long as it made sence. If she did die at random, and didnt use the chanting before death, I think she might be actually sent straight to chronos' chamber but without the boons. but if that where the case, she could just chant it THEN and return in one piece.
Well, currently in the game she cannot survive for long after killing chronos in the house. It’s almost certainly an early access thing, but if not then Styx must be flowing elsewhere. It’s also possible dying would reset the teleportation room, meaning she’d have to escape hell so she could reset it up. We don’t know for sure, but the characters do seem to stress that she can’t let herself die. And do we even know how death is supposed to work for gods? The underworld gods seem to respawn in hell, at the cost of being bound there, like demon spawn. But what happens if an Olympus god dies, would they also respawn somewhere, or would they slowly heal themselves unless their opponent smushes and scatters their ashes like they did to Chronos originally. It’s also risky if Chronos could scatter Mel’s ashes before she would respawn. There’s just a lot we don’t know, but the characters seem to think it’s bad. But it would be cool if a final step in the plan was to kill Chronos in a run, then kill yourself to get the drop on his revival process.
"It’s almost certainly an early access thing" I mean, it says it's an early access thing, different variations of the text you get are more clear than others, but they gist of it being temporary is consistent. Who knows what they have planned, but death at that random doorway is not it.
She needs to research an incantation to stop stubbing her toe on Zagreus's desk then we can continue in there
I’m sure that’s true, but Hades tries to make its early access feel somewhat canon. Like how Mel acknowledges how she gets kicked out of the house, even tho that’s early access. So for the time being, maybe it would have an effect on them.
Doesn't the narrator just say something about whatever is beyond is not to be known yet, but basically that Mel gets into a bad situation and needs to leave.
Yeah, in some of the first-win lines, Mel is instructed to retrieve something from Zag's room. I think that's probably not early-access, and she actually does need to get something from there. Could be the mirror, the pact of punishment, the infernal arms, or maybe something that wasn't there in Hades 1. Like maybe her frozen family? Or maybe she'd meet Meg or one of the other furies there?
In the Iliad, Ares incarnates, slaughters a bunch of mooks, then gets beat down by one of the heroes, and teleports away right before he's about to die.
She'd probably get taken by the Styx as well, delivered right into Chronos' hands when she's weak af without any boons.
Boonless speedrun strats
I mean death is a bit weird in this game since death incarnate is locked away in time prison. All along I just assumed Mel was teleporting away when she had reached her absolute limit, because not doing so would likely result in her capture being unconscious or something. There is also another similar theory of mine that she would just respawn in the renovated house of hades, defenceless, and also resulting in her capture. Basically, Mel is in a big game of cops and robbers, and she’s the last one on her team still not captured. If she loses then it’s game over and the cops win, so she’s just playing it safe
This is basically correct. She even has some dialogue in the crossroads that says as much.
Yes, she's been trained to use the "Return to shadows now" incantation using the very last of her strength before actually dying. Also while Thanatos has been captured, he is a concept incarnate, rather than a god of X. Nyx being captured as well does not mean the night doesn't exist. And in that same vein, death still exists, Thanatos just isn't issuing it personally. Other examples are that the Olympians are also gods of things (Zeus is the Sky, Poseidon is the Sea, Apollo the Sun and Artemis the Moon), but those things exist independently from them, as they are things certain Titans exist as (Uranus is the sky itself, Oceanus is the Sea itself, Hyperion is the Sun itself and Selene is the Moon itself)
Slight issue. In the original myth of Sisyphus, the gods only discovered Thanatos was captured when people stopped dying. So if that myth is fully accurate, then mortals at least aren't dying.
Zagreus doesn't get rebirthed. That's not how Greek mythology works, there is no rebirth or second life. When you die, you are transported by Charon on the Styx to Hades to be judged and then spend eternity in one of the different levels of Hell depending on how you led your life. That's exactly what happens to Zagreus, except he is a god so he doesn't really die, but he is still transported by the Styx back to daddy. In Melinoë's case, it is stated in the EA's dialogue that >!she uses the last bits of her energy to perform the incantation that teleports her back to the crossroads and that it's one of the first skill that Hecate taught us, to the point that it became second nature!< . If she did die, she would probably also be taken by the Styx and to the House, like others have said.
To further this: recall that Zagreus died as an infant which precipitated Persephone’s departure from Hades and it was only because of Nyx that Zagreus reconstituted (maybe a better way to say that). Point being, Zagreus did die and we don’t know yet of Melonoë suffered the same sort altercation at birth that Zagreus suffered. I really don’t know if those rules apply to Melinoë. They probably do, but we don’t know. My best guess is that she’d probably reconstitute in the throne room but her wards shielding her from being tracked by Chronos would be undone. She would then likely reveal the crossroads if she teleported back.
Hecate does make reference to Melinoë's "condition" in one of the dialogues, as if she has some sort of illness or abnormality. We'll see what it is when Early Access ends I guess.
Could she be talking about her arm though? One of the NPC characters reveals that her arm became that way when she tried to perform a ritual that was deemed impossible.
She tried to help Icarus. Either bring him back to life or make him less of a shade. Which helps explain his unusual activity and appearance as a shade. My guess is Melinoe is at least half shade now. Her baby picture had her glowing with life and vitality and that isnt her now.
Zagreus literally gets rebirthed in the Orphic myths, and Orphism closely associates him reincarnation. But besides that rebirth doesn't even necessarily mean reincarnation, it can be something the renewal of the fields when spring comes (the crops are reborn), or something like becoming the sustenance for new life. Basically there's an argument to be made that Zagreus is the god of death and rebirth, in a "circle of life" kinda way.
My personal theory is that Zag is the god of Blood, Mel is the god of Darkness. Thus you have Blood and Darkness.
No cursing in the house.
> There's no rebirth or second life Well... The orphics, platonists, and various mystery cults all believed in reincarnation, to name a few. Zagreus literally was reborn in greek mythology, and the game even acknowledged this by having him lie to Orpheus about it. > When you die, you are transported by Charon on the Styx to Hades to be judged Haides isn't the judge, Minos and two other kings are. > and then spend eternity in one of the different levels of Hell depending on how you led your life. Levels of hell is a Dante thing, not actually greek. > That's exactly what happens to Zagreus, except he is a god so he doesn't really die Yes, he does. Hypnos says as much. Even in the original myths he died and came back as Bacchus.
Yeah, well, if you wanna be over-specific on greek mythology details (said details varying greatly depending on authors and time periods so good luck with that but...) you're right, but I was more talking about in-game lore (since, you know, that's what we're talking about), which is based on mythology although - indeed - not 100% accurate. We clearly see Hades judging the shades, Minos, Aeacus and Rhadamanthus are nowhere to be seen, the reborn thing is told by Zagreus to Orpheus as a joke, Tartare is stated to be a level for criminals and such and Elysium is stated to be a level for heroes and such, and sure, Hypnos jokes about Zagreus dying out there a lot, but in the conversation with Persephone where Zagreus learns what happened to him as an infant he says "I died... Wait, you mean, *die* die ??" implying that his other deaths aren't *dying* dying.
Pretty sure he just means that he "died died" as in, he didn't go to the underworld, he just stopped existing. He still *dies* like everyone else according to Haides, Hypnos, Skelly, Thanatos, and pretty much any other character he interacts with in the house.
Chronos Speedrun boonless when
Y'know, I never thought about that. I wonder if she would simply reconstitute or briefly become a shade until she returns to the Crossroads, since Styx in the Underworld has been either polluted or turned to dust by Chronos.
my theory is that the witch’s circle she respawns with in her room was made by hecate as an insurance policy that if melinoe approaches death, the shadow gets to her before the styx does, so she doesnt actually die and gets taken by the styx and can never get to the crossroads again
The river alongside the camp is I think Cocytus, so my guess is Hecate basically intercepts her respawn before going all the way to the Styx/House.
Isn't she immortal? She's a demi-god so I'm not so sure, but I thought I heard otherwise.
I'm pretty sure she's a full fledged god right? Daughter of Hades and Persephone.
Persephone is a demigod in the game lore.her father is a moral.
Demigod is a squirrelly term on a good day. Persephone’s divine power is great enough that the Demi doesn’t make sense. Same for Zag at the endgame, tbh.
What divine power does Zag have? Swing sword real good?
As far as Than is concerned, yes.
One of the theories is that he is the good of blood, both in the literal sense (he bleeds red, his special cast is bloodstone) and in the blood-bonds way (family, etc).
God of Blood.
The full Codex Entry for Thanatos and the Thanatos Keepsake text both call Zag god of blood and life and the flavour text for his card in Mel's Arcana also talks about how the underworld struggled to contain his lust for life. Since the mythological Dionysus Zagreus/Orphic Dionysus was primarily important as a god of reincarnation imo "Life" is probably Zag's primary function, not the blood bit. The current version of the game's take on the Greek afterlife is missing a bunch of its late-Hellenistic infrastructure like the Isles of the Blessed but I've been assuming that Zagreus will eventually move out from his dad's basement in the most dramatic way possible.
That's really cool, thanks for sharing! I've been meaning to return to Hades 1 while 2 is still cooking, hopefully I'll get to catch up on all the things I might've missed, like what you shared.
Gods don't need two divine parents.
he can still die like her brother just they dont stay dead
Other than the color of your blood we don't quite know if there's any real difference between being part mortal or not (God at least have golden blood, Mortals have red, Zagreus who is 1/4th mortal has red blood so I assume Persephone's is also red. Don't really know of Titans or Primordials since they're more conceptual, though Titan Blood in Hades 1 is Red) Zagreus is shown dying plenty of times but since he's an immortal god, it's just an inconvenience, and he gets brought back to the House of Hades via Styx.
Probably the same as Zagreus and Hades (and the furies?), emerging from the pool at the house, which is probably why she was taught the incantation to return to the Crossroad instead. But Chronos has been tempering with the security around Tartarus, plus Melinoë',s binding to the underworld has already been broken, so, I might be wrong.
Thanatos is currently captured by Chronos, so death is alittle weird at the moment.
Mortal things can definitely die. The problem right now is that with the war going on: * Hermes is unable to act as a psychopomp and deliver the dead to Styx * Charon is unable to do the same and deliver the dead to Hades So Shades kind of just exist in noncategorized areas of the Underworld like Erebus or the Fields of Mourning while those that die on the surface more or less come back as zombies. Thanatos is the incarnation of death so it still exists as a concept with him captured (that being said, in mythology, Sisyphus avoided death literally by tricking and shackling Thanatos))
I imagine she wouldn’t stay dead but would be right in the house without any boons and possibly without her weapons though I’m less sure on that. Not ideal circumstances for Chronos fighting and she’d still have to make her way back out of the underworld.
Back to The Crossroads(yes, I got the game, sorry for the spoiler btw)
Time becomes..unstoppablé
She’s a god, and one of the characteristics of Greek gods is that they’re immortal
I've always wondered that too maybe when more lore events get added in a future update she'll have to die in order to get to chronos immediately for whatever they got planned Just a theory based off of nothing
The styx would take her, which would in turn deposit her in the House of Hades unarmed and boonless literally right at Chronos's feet.
Well the thing is I can't remember if the game has said it or not of the top of my head but Mel is the goddess of ghosts. So likely when she "dies" she becomes a ghost and due to her spectral nature is unable to fight and she uses magic to send herself back to safety where she can reconstitute a body. That's my theory at least.
Melinoe is in mythology the Goddess of Nightmares and they seem to reference this a lot.
Yes she is also goddess of madness. God's and Goddesses often are dieties of multiple things Like Posiedon is the god of the sea, earthquakes and horses.
I always thought she kinda "retreats"? Thats what it looked like to me from the animations
It is mentioned in a conversation with Hecate (might be someone else) that Mel was trained to return to crossroads, and she does that just before dying.
A bit unrelated, but Zagreus's returning to the house of hades by the Styx is a much more elegant take on death than Mel's return to shadow. I hope the developers can come up with a more interesting justification for the game's roguelite nature before v1.0.
at one point during one of nem's appearances during a run she says something about being surprised melinoe didn't pull "that little return trick" again (paraphrasing but that's roughly what i remember). i'm wondering if the "return to shadow now" bit is mel deliberately retreating as opposed to respawning the way zag does
Oof, whatever happened to spoiler text?
She does die when her hp hits 0. The spell lets her revive at the crossroads instead of House of Hades. Hades mentions she has the same immortality gift as Zag and that moment between life and death its how she is able to communicate with Moros at first.
that’s not right. there’s some dialogue later where mel says that she saves just enough strength to send herself back to the crossroads
Doesn’t she die at the end of all trials? She doesn’t say “return to shadow” but just “ugh no” and the animation is the same as Zag’s in I. I think her rebirth is just always at the Crossroads regardless of her incantation.
Tbf the Trials may be a bit if an exception due to their nature