There are many possibilities regarding the ultimate fate of Aether’s Way, though several experts believe they may have simply journeyed too far into the Shroud, and ended up somewhere they should not have been. This may contradict the strange state in which they left their encampment, with supplies and even food abandoned completely, however there may be an explanation for this, as well.
“Most of the members of Aether’s Way weren’t from the Twelveswood,” said researcher Ebaut Shoucant during an interview a year after the disappearance, “Those who were weren’t adventurers. Constance Vuirant, for example, grew up in Gridania but worked as a part-time goldsmith in Ul’dah prior to joining. G’rhuhnu himself was from Thanalan, Forgotten Springs I believe. It’s possible they didn’t know what they were getting into.”
As for the abandoned camp, former member A.M. revealed interesting details that may be connected.
“G’rhuhnu would often request that members join him on what he’d call ‘flights.’ Everyone would drop what they were doing, no matter how important, and together they’d walk single file, following him wherever he went,” she said, “I never really understood it, but it was supposed to clear your mind or something. He said he was preparing us, but for what I do not know.”
One of the more prominent ideas to date, supported by a handful of researchers, is that Aether’s Way may have journeyed, for reasons unknown or perhaps by accident, into the West Shroud. However, limited investigations there turned up nothing.
“The West Shroud is not somewhere ordinary adventurers are allowed to go anymore, and certainly nowhere anyone would want to settle,” Vorsaile Heuloix, a Serpent Commander at the Adders’ Nest told me, “It’s a ruin. And very dangerous. Quiverman patrols keep watch over the area.”
Even before Dalamud fell, the West Shroud was known as a relatively empty, expansive place, with numerous lakes and caverns. Even its original entrance within the Shroud, located southwest of Lifemend Stump and northwest of Sorrel Haven, consisted solely of a long, winding tunnel.
“Before the calamity, there were strange areas in the West Shroud, stones bewitched with black magic.”
After the calamity, the fallen moon Dalamud impacted the West Shroud, leaving it essentially obliterated. Vantage points from the North Shroud and western Central Shroud show remnants of what’s left. Corrupted crystals and fragments of the moon are all that remain. Kan-E-Senna herself ordered the casting of a glamour upon that area in order to hide the true nature of its destruction from those looking within the Twelveswood.
However, adventurers who find themselves in eastern Mor Dhona will see the reality.
Jile’zi Tchoca, another former memeber, believes the West Shroud Hypothesis could be the correct one, but he remains unsure, citing both the lack of evidence for any journeys into the west, and the many contradictory elements of the Aether’s Way story.
“They weren’t stupid, and never reckless,” he said during a rare public appearance last year, “G’rhuhnu wasn’t the type to put anyone into danger, at least not while I was there, during our time in La Noscea.” Still, he as a feeling things are not as they seem.
“A lot of people were fixated on the holes. Personally, I think they were looking in the wrong direction.”
Read Part Five of The Mystery Of Aether’s Way in next week’s issue of The Babbler.
