I’ve noticed something about Vittorio’s lore.
I apologize to anyone reading this in case this turns into long rambling, but bear with me. Halfway through Vittorio’s backstory, I’ve noticed this little tidbit about the death of his uncle Renzo. Here’s the quote...
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“As they exited the vault, Renzo stepped on a black serpent. The serpent sank its fangs into Renzo’s leg and disappeared as quickly as it appeared. The venom spread fast and within minutes he passed away.”
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Now, in the Archives, there has been lore a few tomes back about a group called the Black Serpent Society in the Redcrane segments. This is an excerpt from the “Things in the Fog” section of Tome 10: Saw, which contains one of those segments.
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“The enemies to her clan, The Black Serpent Society, served a nine-headed serpent made of black mist. They believed the black serpent would grant them powers and boons beyond human comprehension in this world and the next in exchange for unquestioning devotion. They were convinced that the black-mist serpent was a demon that slithered through these wooded cursed areas creating doorways into what they called The Belly of the Serpent, or just, The Belly.“
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Now obviously, the Black Serpent Society is another alias of the Black Vale and the black serpent in question is really the Entity. If you’re not convinced, in Élodie’s backstory, the Entity had other names such as the Abyss and the Hole.
Now, normally when we’re given descriptions of the Entity, it would usually be depicted as giant spider legs and has a spider motif. And to a degree, the black serpent is described as being multi-headed - very similar to the multi-limbed Entity.
However, whenever word of a black serpent comes up, it is mostly in the Redcrane storyline in the Archives, which takes place in Japan. But when Vittorio’s lore was revealed, it’s the first time we heard of anything regarding the serpent outside of the Archives and in a different country. So here’s my theory...
I think it was the Entity itself that killed Vittorio’s uncle, Renzo, and kickstarted the series of events that would lead to Vittorio and the Knight crossing paths, Vittorio accidentally sending himself into the Realm and the Entity adding the Knight and his Guards to its twisted menagerie of killers that now serve the Ancient.
That in mind, is it possible that the Entity is going have a more snake-like motif in the future, along with the spider theme already going on with it?
What are your thoughts on all of this?
P.S. Before you ask... yes, I am aware that there is a yokai that fits much of the description of the black serpent in the Redcrane called Yamata no Orochi - and interestingly enough, it’s not that dissimilar to the Entity. And that got me thinking... it could be possible that, in-universe, the Entity might be mistaken for the yokai. Hell, the devs could have easily been inspired this take of the Entity by the mythological monster...