Fia’s ending in Elden Ring raises more questions than answers. Also known as the “Age of the Duskborn,” Fia’s ending causes a mist to descend onto the Lands Between. Given Fia’s association with Godwyn the Prince of Death, players have suspected that this mist represents - and even causes - the end of immortality in the Lands Between. However, diving deeper into the lore behind the Duskborn ending makes it clear this is not the whole story behind this mysterious mist.
[Warning: The following article contains spoilers for Elden Ring.]
The Age of the Duskborn is one of the more complex endings in Elden Ring. To understand it, one must first understand what happened on the Night of the Black Knives. In that event, Godwyn and Ranni were the first demigods to be slain with a curse mark. However, Godwyn and Ranni were only half-slain in Elden Ring because their killers left half of the curse mark of death on each of them. This resulted in Ranni’s body dying while her soul lived on, whereas Godwyn’s soul died and his body lived on. In the Age of the Duskborn ending, the Tarnished and Fia bring the two halves of the curse mark of death together to make the Mending Rune of the Death-Prince. This rune is then used on the Elden Ring and restores the principle of death in the Lands Between.
The return of death suggests a lot about the mist in the Duskborn ending. The Rune of the Death-Prince has a dramatic effect on the appearance of the Erdtree in Fia's deathly ending to Elden Ring. The Erdtree becomes pallid and barren and emanates the mysterious mist. In this way, it seems that the Death-Rune causes the Erdtree to die. This is a huge deal, as the Erdtree absorbs the souls of those touched by Grace, allowing them to live eternally. Thus, if the Erdtree dies, so too do the souls that live in it. This then suggests that the mist that emanates from the Erdtree is actually the dead souls that were once a part of the living Erdtree.
Those Who Live In Death, Godwyn’s Curse, & The Mist In Elden Ring
The idea that the mist is made up of dead souls may sound farfetched at first. However, there is already a connection between the Age of the Duskborn and the souls contained in the Erdtree, and this connection is Elden Ring's Those Who Live In Death. After Godwyn’s soul died, he was buried at the base of the Erdtree’s roots. The curse mark on Godwyn’s flesh corrupted its root system, though, which resulted in Death Root. Death Roots give rise to Those Who Live In Death, according to the Death Root item description. This confirms that the curse mark that killed Godwyn acts similarly on the Erdtree, killing the souls contained within it while resurrecting the physical bodies of the dead.
This fact becomes important to the mist when Godwyn’s curse mark is combined with Ranni’s to make the Mending Rune of the Death-Prince. Since the curse marks are combined, the rune can cause both the souls and bodies of living things in the world of Elden Ring's Lands Between. This is why the Erdtree turns pallid and leafless when the Rune of the Death-Prince becomes part of the Elden Ring: the souls and bodies buried in its roots face permanent death, removing the life force from the tree. And just as Erdtree’s leaves die and fall as a result of this, so too must the tree shed the dead souls it contained. And since the Erdtree emanates a mist in the Age of the Duskborn cutscene, it appears the mist is precisely how the Erdtree sheds itself of these dead souls.
The comparison between fallen leaves and the mist is even made explicit by the cutscene’s narration. Like the other non-Duskborn Elden Ring endings where the player becomes Elden Lord, the narrator states, “The fallen leaves tell a story” about how a Tarnished became Elden Lord “In our home. Across the Fog. The Lands Between.” However, the Age of the Duskborn ending is the only ending to intercut these two lines with “Our seed will look back upon us and recall.” This line emphasizes that the fallen leaves and fog represent death. Furthermore, it makes it explicit that the “seed” or future generations will only be able to remember the Tarnished through stories because the souls or “Remembrances” the Erdtree used to contain are now dead.
The Mist Being Dead Souls Explains A Lot In Elden Ring
The mist being dead souls explains a lot about this Elden Ring mystery. One of the biggest things it helps clarify is what the Lands Between is. Both in the Age of the Duskborn ending and in the prologue of the game, the narrator repeats the line “In our home. Across the Fog. The Lands Between.” This fog is literal, as the distant ocean is obscured in mist all around the Lands Between. Should the mist be souls, it would explain that the Lands Between is some sort of Edenic promised land related to the afterlife. The souls of the Tarnished who were banished were forced to leave, and now that they are no longer touched by Grace, their souls cannot make it back to Elden Ring's mysterious and coveted Erdtree. They instead seem to only come close to it, obscuring the world of gods and the afterlife from the living.
What’s more, the mist being souls explains the few areas in the game where mist exists before the Duskborn ending: the Mistwood and the forest of the Altus Plateau. The Altus Plateau’s woods are directly above where Godwyn is buried, so it would make sense that his curse mark would have infected the area's roots and killed the souls they contained. As for the Mistwood, this is the first area in the game where players have access to the ancient world buried beneath the Lands Between. This ancient world was rejected by Elden Ring's Golden Order, so it would only make sense that their souls were rejected from the Erdtree and thus smothered the Mistwood in fog.
Finally, this mist being dead souls is the theory that makes the most sense for what happens in the Age of the Duskborn cutscene. Some have speculated that the mist is essentially what is conjured in Fia’s spell “Fia’s Mist,” which casts a mist filled with Death Blight. While this seems like a logical connection to the Age of the Duskborn ending, it doesn’t fit with what happens. If Fia’s Mist were to envelop the Lands Between, it would kill all Tarnished including the player. But since the Tarnished lives, it is made clear that the mist is not Fia’s Mist in Elden Ring. Instead, it must be the dead souls once contained in the Erdtree, because this better reflects the principle of death being integrated back into Order.
Though this is only speculation, it provides the best explanation for what happens in the Age of the Duskborn ending. Furthermore, it clarifies important facets about the Lands Between that otherwise have no explanation yet. Even so, true confirmation for what the mist is will likely remain another Elden Ring mystery.