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Breaking The Code - Part 6
Markuz, May 19th, 2018
So, You thought our Breaking The Code series was over. But it's not! That’s true, our series of articles is not over yet! We have, indeed, analyzed all the six Isu messages that were part of the Empirical Truth section of Assassin’s Creed Origins, but there is still one last message that we are missing. A… hidden one, if you will.
So get ready, sit back, relax and enjoy our final article of the series! I swear it’s the last one! The Seventh Message
Location: Temple of Amun, Siwa Availability: Originally only when Bayek had the Apple of Eden in his inventory (after Flavius’ assassination and before Bayek puts the Apple in a chest in the “Last of the Medjays” main quest) - now it's available at any time for everyone. Main theme: The First Civilization Vaults, the Pieces of Eden and their past and future use by the humans Dialog by: “Narrator” Full text: Here they are, awakened from their slumber. One by one. So many. A library. A Repository. We extinguished the flame. Knowledge will return. Eventually. The Eye. The Temples. The Vaults and the Apples. Until then, how much benighted use will this power serve? It may take ages until your Kind becomes Enlightened. Who stands in this chamber? At long last, a light has been cast. But I fear your blood is the thickest of shadows. Analysis of the message The most hardcore among you surely knew about this message already but if you didn’t, I hope this surprised you as much as it surprised me. The message was discovered by Redditor NightmareT12 and then was made public by Youtuber Leo K and Redditor Taranis-55 on January 20th, 2018 and got so much interest around it that it got picked up by Kotaku. That is three months after the game released and it raised some suspicions among the fans about the fact that it could have been added sometimes after the release of the game. A Ubisoft representative confirmed this to Kotaku by saying “It is indeed true that this message was added after the game launched. When correcting a bug with the Vault door, our team added the message.” So, here we are with an Isu audio message located in an Isu Vault (possibly the most important in Origins), which seems to be completely unrelated to the six that are part of the so-called Empirical Truth for a few different reasons: the name of the location doesn’t change when Bayek enters it and it’s not consistent with the other ones, there is no picture supporting it and its text isn’t copied on Layla’s PC. Still, it’s Isu lore and something that Bayek and Layla saw (and didn’t react to), so it’s worth a brief analysis nonetheless. The message is voiced by an Isu who, presumably out of a lack of more fitting and original names (…) is called “Narrator”. His voice is much deeper than the ones of all the other narrators from the Empirical Truth message, making the Narrator from the Siwa Temple seem older, possibly wiser than them. To analyze the message, I think we need to understand its context. The message takes place in the vault inside the Temple of Amun in Siwa. A vault that the Order of Ancients thought would give them “the power of gods” and for which they went so far to be able to open its door.
The door itself has its own interesting details, with humanoid figures that seem to be worshiping the three hexagonal symbols that usually represent the Apples of Eden and the bigger symbol standing in the upper part of the door, which appeared in the picture of Segment 4 (and in several other occasions in the AC franchise), and that I hypothesized could represent the Earth.
If that interpretation was correct, then it would mean that when building the temple the Isu knew that all three characters would have come to the Vault and that two of them (Septimius and Flavius) would have been able to open it with a combination of Staff and Apple (in a situation akin to the ending of Assassin’s Creed II). As we all know, entering the Vault Bayek and Aya get to see the huge and virtual world map that Septimius and Flavius activated thanks to the Apple (and the Staff). The globe is actually rotating and also has a satellite revolving around it, representing the Moon (which… as our Sorrosyss points out, for some reason is shaped like a tiny Earth?). That also basically confirms that the big symbol on the upper part of the door of the temple did represent the Earth, especially because the same symbol can be found on the ground exactly right under the world map.
What’s even more interesting is that the map contains several dots that point at specific locations that probably represent the whereabouts of other Isu Vaults and Pieces of Eden, in a very similar way the world map which appeared at the end of the first chapter of the Assassin’s Creed franchise.
In fact, the recently released (in only a few selected countries) book Assassin’s Creed Graphics confirms that the Apple in the main game of Assassin’s Creed Origins and the Apple in the first Assassin’s Creed are one and the same. Here is the actual translated text from the book: APPLE 2 An Apple that was reactivated by Bayek; once combined with Alexander The Great’s Staff of Eden, it opens the temple of the Oracle of Amun in Siwa. Possessed by Al Mualim, the old wise man, Mentor of the Masyaf Assassins. Altaïr found out about Al Mualim’s betrayal and retrieved the Apple. It reappeared in the 16th century in the hands of Elizabeth I of England and later on, possessed by Gandhi. Known owners: Bayek – Al Mualim – Altaïr - Elizabeth I, queen of England – Gandhi Current location: destroyed in the Denver airport incident (2011) Appearances: AC1, AC Revelations and AC Origins Even if I disapprove having such pieces of information in a book available only in few countries, this speak volumes about why the world maps in Assassin’s Creed and Assassin’s Creed Origins look the same. It’s because they ARE the same. Or *should* be the same, as we’ll see later. There’s one last thing I’d like to highlight before getting into the actual text of the “seventh message”. In the quest “The final weighing” in Origins, Bayek and Aya reach Siwa and its underground vault, and after seeing the virtual world map for the first time they react as follows: Aya: Bayek. Are we dreaming? Bayek: We have entered the Duat. Aya: Who could imagine such a land as this? Bayek: No man should approach this close to the gods. Aya: Who created this? The gods themselves? Ah! Here is the story of mankind... Bayek? Bayek. Interestingly enough, in a few seconds not only Aya understands a 3D spherical map and believes it to be actually a map of the world, but she also believes that this world map tells the story of mankind. A line that was never really explained (or did I miss something?) Anyway, now that we have some more context about the Siwa Vault and what it contains, we can go back to the “seventh message” which, mind you, originally could be activated only when Bayek had the Apple of Eden in his inventory and thus, somehow, was meant to be triggered by it: Here they are, awakened from their slumber. One by one. So many. A library. A Repository. We extinguished the flame. Knowledge will return. Eventually. The Eye. The Temples. The Vaults and the Apples. Until then, how much benighted use will this power serve? It may take ages until your Kind becomes Enlightened. Who stands in this chamber? At long last, a light has been cast. But I fear your blood is the thickest of shadows.
In my opinion in the first part of the message the Narrator is talking about all the different types of First Civilization technology and more specifically he’s talking about the ones whose locations are marked on the world map. In fact, he says “Here they are” and “One by one. So many”, probably hinting at what Bayek, Layla and the player are looking at while the message is playing. Then, the Narrator describes the Siwa Vault and, more specifically, the world map as a library, a repository, a sort of visual database that could give the observer the known positions of every (most?) Isu Vault and Piece of Eden (unless they were moved from their original location). “We extinguished the flame”, the Narrator says. And it obviously reminded me of the lyrics “We kill the flame” of Leonard Cohen’s “You want it darker”, the background song for Origins’ cinematic trailer. In this case, the Narrator by mentioning the flame, in my opinion, is actually talking about knowledge (fire has always been a symbol / representation of knowledge in several myths and legends such as that of Prometheus). Thus, the Narrator is saying that the Isu extinguished the knowledge connected to all the Pieces of Eden shown in the world map (by hiding or destroying them). That is very consistent with what Juno said towards the ending of Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood: “But you broke our tools. Or turned them against one another. We have destroyed what we could. Sealed away what we could not. Most. Not all.”. Another, and more literal interpretation by our Sorrosyss, considers the “We extinguished the flame” sentence as a reference to the coronal mass ejection that caused the Toba catastrophe that almost eradicated the Isu race. Even in this interpretation the Isu knowledge was “removed” after all. Knowledge (and thus, maybe, a proper use of the Pieces of Eden), will return eventually, according to the Narrator, and by saying this he provides a few examples of “knowledge”: the Eye, the Temples, the Vaults and the Apples. Basically all the major examples of First Civilization technology (the Eye being the divination device that Minerva and Juno used to send the messages to Desmond through time).
As it has happened a few too many times, the Narrator doesn’t mention how and when such knowledge will return, after introducing it, so he could be teasing a new event in the future where all the Isu technology “wakes up” and causes something to happen or he may be more likely simply hoping that the humans find a way to finally understand the First Civilization technology (“It may take ages until your Kind becomes Enlightened”) instead of using it for its own gain. In fact, he says “Until then how much benighted use will this power serve?” which sounds very similar to Juno stating that the humans broke their tools (the Pieces of Eden) or turned them against one another (as mentioned earlier) or to Minerva’s “You and the Templars have squabbled over our refuse. You have wasted centuries. And so you have lost your chance” from Assassin’s Creed III. And thus we get to the end of the message. The Narrator asks himself who is standing in the chamber inside the Temple of Siwa (those calculation tools don’t always work apparently :P). The interesting question, actually, would be whether he is talking about Bayek or Layla and the answer would be important because right after he states that (I suppose by getting into the chamber and looking at the globe) a light has been cast, possibly thanks to the person he’s referring to (Bayek or Layla). The Narrator could indeed reference Layla by saying that a light (as in a spark of enlightenment / knowledge) has been cast in the future as she now may be able to use / gather the knowledge (which we theorized consisted in being able to understand the Code and Time in the second article of this series) from one of those Pieces of Eden / Isu sites to be able to avert the catastrophe looming over the Earth. Another interpretation of the last sentence of the message is that the Narrator might still be talking about humankind in general. The Narrator knows or expects that the humans will use the First Civilization knowledge for their own gain but is still hopeful that by sharing this map “a light has been cast” and somehow, someone will be able to enlighten the rest of mankind. Still, at the very end of the message, the Narrator is still very worried about mankind. I fear your blood is the thickest of shadows. Even if a light has been cast through the display of the world map, the Narrator is worried that humanity and its generations (your blood) will still keep using the Pieces of Eden and the Isu Vaults for its own specific agenda (the thickest of shadows) instead of making an enlightened use of them. So there it is, that’s my analysis of the “seventh message", but there’s still one thing I’d like to share with you, courtesy of our admin Hephaestus. Did you really expect we wouldn’t have tried and isolate the location of each Piece of Eden / Isu Vault shown in the map? In fact, Hephaestus hasn’t just done that, he did even more. But let’s start from the beginning. Here are some of the pictures from the world map in AC Origins (click on the pictures to enlarge them):
Hephaestus tried to put all those locations on a flat map and this is the result:
The map highlights 50 locations, 4 of which are, at the moment, confirmed to be important Isu Vaults (as shown in the map drawn in Altaïr’s Codex and shown in Assassin’s Creed II) . This is the list of locations (or possible locations) according to Hephaestus:
Ironically, the Siwa Vault itself doesn’t seem to appear on the map, although there’s a possibility that the location in Cairo/Giza is referring to all the possible Isu structures and temples in that area, including Siwa. Going back to the topic, as mentioned before during the analysis, the Apple that created the world map in the Siwa Vault is the same, which would have produced a similar world map in Masyaf at the end of Assassin’s Creed 1. Because of that, Hephaestus tried to list all the locations highlighted in the world map of AC 1 and this is the result:
The map highlights 32 locations, 2 of which are confirmed important Isu Vaults (as shown in the map drawn in Altaïr’s Codex and shown in Assassin’s Creed II). This is the list of locations (or possible locations) according to Hephaestus:
From a quick comparison we can see that almost all of the locations in the AC1 map are contained in the ACO one, apart from Rennes-le-Chateau, Timbuktu and the location in Morocco. On the contrary, though, the Origins map contains 21 locations that do not appear in the AC1 one (the first ones in the ACO list of locations). That seems to make sense because Origins is the latest game in the franchise and thus the Apple may have shown an upgraded version of the map… but following the timeline it actually seems like the map showed less locations as time went on, so… Regardless, our Hephaestus tried to have a last comparison with another Pieces of Eden / Isu Vaults map that appeared in the AC franchise. I mentioned it before;it’s the map from Assassin’s Creed II that Ezio was able to see after reorganizing the pages of Altaïr’s Codex and having an Apple of Eden interact with them.
This is the only map that contains visual differences between the indicated locations. While the dots are implying the locations of several Pieces of Eden (and the Vaults that might contain them), the eight big Assassins insignias are, in theory, actually indicating the locations of even more important First Civilization sites. In fact, one of them is the Grand Temple of Turin, New York, which was shown in Assassin’s Creed III. The most hardcore among you will also remember that drawing a series of lines that connect all of the Assassin insignias / Isu Temples on this map will bring up the exact same symbol that was projected by the combination of the Apple and the Staff at the end of Assassin’s Creed II to open the Vatican Vault.
Thus, looking at the map Hephaestus tried to recreate the AC2 map in the same way he created the AC1 and ACO ones and this is the result:
That’s a total of 55 locations, 8 of which are the aforementioned important Isu Vaults. This is the list of locations (or possible locations) according to Hephaestus:
Comparing this map with the ACO one, we found out that only 21 of its locations are contained in the Origins map while the other 34 ones are missing from it. Once again, lore wise it feels strange because the map was drawn on the Codex by Altaïr and he had used the Apple from AC1 and ACO to draw it, so the maps should have been consistent but they are not. I wonder if that was ever intentional or not…
And that brings us to the conclusion of this analysis – and you are lucky we spared you from analyzing other, minor maps :D
And thus our Breaking the Code series come to an end as well! We hope you enjoyed following our analyses as much as we did while writing them and our anniversary was the perfect moment to end this series of articles. Let us know if you agree or disagree with the various elements of this article, we really want hear what you think about them! Thank you so much for following us each and every day and as always stay synchronized with us for the next article! 
In occasion of our anniversary, we have teamed up with The Ones Who Came Before to organize a Fundraising Campaign for the Eagle Heights Wildlife Foundation! Both of our projects usually gather information, create content and discuss the franchise with our fans but this time we wanted to try and have a positive and meaningful initiative that doesn't just deal with fan content but can also have a real impact. Eagles are such an important element of the franchise that we are accustomed to see them in every game of the franchise. Thus, we thought that this would be the perfect occasion to support an organization that takes care of them and to ask you all for some help in doing so. By helping this cause you will be directly helping the foundation in its efforts towards the rehabilitation of wild rescued birds, conservation of the environment, and bringing the animals to the schools to help children understand the environment that they will one day be responsible for. Even the smallest donation could make the difference! If you can, donate! Click on the picture if you want to reach the page for the Fundraising Campaign!
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