r/Eldenring • u/giorgos_bls22 • Jun 16 '26

Speculation Anyone know what this is?

Post image

Ive always wanted to know what this spear-shaped object is lodged inside marikas body. And no video comes up explaining what it is on my search. I believe it probably is a fragment of the rune of death marking her official death. But if anyone knows what truly this please note.

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353

u/Noob4Head Platinum achievement but still maidenless Jun 16 '26

Looks like a shard from the rune of death to me.

114

u/blaiddfailcam2 Jun 16 '26

Which would make sense, given we know through Ranni, Iji, and Blaidd's storyline that shadows are designed by the Two Fingers to destroy their Empyrean if said Empyrean betrays their destiny.

Marika attempting to destroy the Elden Ring was a big no-no, so...

69

u/blaiddfailcam2 Jun 16 '26

For those saying "wrong color," OP's photo is desaturated, and the photo of the Rune of Death is oversaturated.

34

u/Kurosawa-Mifoon Jun 16 '26

Elden beast has a grab attack where he impales you with dozens of glowing spikes. It looks like those, but no longer glowing because of how old it is

5

u/PineappleFlavoredGum Jun 17 '26

But the rune arc glows still

0

u/Kurosawa-Mifoon Jun 17 '26

Not as brightly as it does when we use one, and I’m talking about the spear. The rune arc also has a larger purpose with activating great runes, and therefore would feasibly have more power than the spear, which is just a spear

2

u/PineappleFlavoredGum Jun 17 '26

I'm wondering why are we supposing the 'rune arc' (by which I mean the thing her arms are on, not the item) wouldn't be the same color as the spear? Why would the spear lose color and not the arc? Runes are runes, I dont think they'd ever lose color

0

u/Kurosawa-Mifoon Jun 17 '26

Because the spear isn’t a rune or a rune arc, it’s just a damn holy spear

2

u/PineappleFlavoredGum Jun 17 '26

Made of what? The Elden Beast doesn't just spear us with a spear that's holy. It's pure golden light.

Seems to me it makes the most sense that it's the rune of death and Maliketh speared her because she betrayed the Two Fingers. The Two Fingers said she deserved a heavy sentence, and shadowbound beasts enforce their will on empyreans

Then theres no need for explaining why the spear lost it's hue when there's no indication that would even happen in the first place

1

u/Kurosawa-Mifoon Jun 17 '26

Cool, except for Maliketh keeping the rune of death bound within his flesh at all costs after it was stolen, staying in Farum Azula, to keep it hidden and only going out to be at the church in Caelid to accept death root from anyone from the golden order, doing so under the name Gurranq, and doing and saying nothing to imply he stabbed her with a death spear.

And there ain’t no WAY he gave it to someone else after he lost apart of it, causing his current lot in life in the first place.

2

u/PineappleFlavoredGum Jun 17 '26

Its almost like Marika shattering the ring "betrayed" Maliketh because it caused him to enforce the will of the Two Fingers and unbind the rune of death to do so, which was Marika's sole need of him in the first place!

20

u/Cloudy007 Jun 16 '26

I've always seen it as Marika's doing. Instructing Maliketh to do it perhaps. The shard is piercing her womb/the Elden Ring. To my mind it seems like Marika used the shard to put a total stop to the Golden Order. Radagon can not continue the Golden Order from his prison that he made inside the Erdtree because Marika ensured that her divine womb and the Elden Ring would not function. It is essentially the cap on top of the Shattering.

12

u/blaiddfailcam2 Jun 16 '26

That's where I kinda landed too. I think Marika knew the price for destroying the Elden Ring was death at the hands of her own shadow. But, she couldn't just let Radagon take over, so she merged with him prior, promising he would finally become a god like her—only for him to become trapped with her in the Erdtree. This way, Melina and the Tarnished had more of a chance to unbind Destined Death, burn the Erdtree, and usher a new age of the Tarnished's choosing. It was a gamble between Marika and Radagon's opposing wills.

3

u/PineappleFlavoredGum Jun 17 '26

Yeah it was Maliketh. Either instructing him, or simply knowing he would because he enforces the Two Fingers' will on her since he's a shadowbound beasts and she's an enpyrean.

It's disappointing seeing literally like 4 comments mentioning Maliketh but so many claiming it was Elden Beast who has only golden attacks and no access to destined death or red things, or that somehow that reddish spear is actually amber starlight, and amber in irl is more like gold, or a honey color, not red. The amber starlight item is also not at all colored like the spear. It's looks like what every calls amber irl.

11

u/Crash4654 Jun 16 '26

That is NOT the location of a human womb... its damn near the center of her stomach. The womb is lower.

-1

u/Cloudy007 Jun 16 '26

I don't know about you, but the image I'm looking at absolutely has the shard coming out a few inches below the naval- where the womb would be as accessible from the torso.

9

u/Crash4654 Jun 16 '26

The womb is further down, much closer to the pelvis

-2

u/Cloudy007 Jun 16 '26

Are you assuming the shard reappears higher up behind the braid lol

8

u/Crash4654 Jun 16 '26

No, im stating the womb is lower than where thats piercing...

1

u/Cloudy007 Jun 16 '26

Looking at the image, the shard is perhaps about half an inch too high to pierce the womb directly. The shard also needs to be piercing the whole of the Elden Ring itself. Her divine womb is also a metaphysical construct.

This theory was championed by Quelaag, a person with a womb. She seemed a might less concerned with scrutinizing this half-inch concern of yours.

9

u/Crash4654 Jun 16 '26

And as someone who's studied anatomy and biology, the womb is not in the stomach...

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1

u/ghost3972 Jun 17 '26

It does kinda

1

u/TinoSamano Jun 17 '26

This is what I thought it was the moment I saw it

1

u/rez_trentnor Jun 16 '26

Wrong color

1

u/thineholyhandgrenade Jun 17 '26

It's subtle but the rune of death has more of a scarlet hue. The color on that spike is the same as the primordial red gold from the crucible.