Was it actually confirmed if the dust the Precursors turned into after being killed by the Forerunners were actually defective? I know Halopedia says it became defective but is there an exact quote on who said it?
I’m fairly confident it’s explicitly discussed in Silentium, the third book of the Forerunner trilogy.
I actually believe the Flood was completely intentional. Think about it: if you were betrayed by your own creation and was driven to the verge of death, you would probably want revenge for that. Tron Legacy is actually a great example of this, and what better way to bring revenge to an enemy than to make them suffer the exact same fate. Well, maybe not the exact same, but the still went extinct, really.
Maybe I’m missing something but the primordial was a gravemind, doesn’t it mean that even if they didn’t intentionally become the flood, they can at least control it?
The hints throughout the Forerunner Saga point to the Precursors being incorporeal, eternal beings, and the organic bodies that the Forerunners referred to as “Precursors” were biological avatars used by the actual Precursors to interact with their creations.
The Precursors still being around, having the absolute mastery of genetics that they have, assuredly means that the creation of the Flood was deliberate, especially when you look at the actions of the Flood in the context of the Mantle.
The Flood didn’t emerge until humanity was ready to be tested, and the Flood first emerged on Human worlds so humanity would have the responsibility to prevent its spread across the galaxy. The Flood then took a fall for humanity, so the the Forerunners would believe humanity had a cure, and wouldn’t kill them all. The Flood then stayed away until the Forerunners finished building the first Halo array, realizing it wouldn’t work, and building the second Ark and Halo Array. The Flood then held back until humanity was relocated to the Lesser Ark before going all out against the Greater Ark to wipe out Forerunner civilization. This coencided with the Forerunner civilization peaking (The Precursors believe that all races have the right to have the chance to achieve their maximum potential, so the Precursors let the Forerunners reach that potential before leveling judgement on the Forerunners for their past crimes).
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> I’m fairly confident it’s explicitly discussed in Silentium, the third book of the Forerunner trilogy.
Pg 155
You drove us from our galaxy, our field of labor. You chased us across the middle distance to another home, and destroyed that home, did all that you could to destroy every one of us. A few were spared. Some adopted new strategies for survival; they went dormant. Others became dust that could regenerate our past forms; time rendered this dust defective. It brought only disease and misery; but that was good, we saw the misery and found it good.
From what I understand, the dust that became defective caused the mutations. The precursors were not Graveminds before hand though. This only occurred after the dust had become the infection spores we see today.
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> > 2535435902217648;2:
> > I’m fairly confident it’s explicitly discussed in Silentium, the third book of the Forerunner trilogy.
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> Pg 155
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> You drove us from our galaxy, our field of labor. You chased us across the middle distance to another home, and destroyed that home, did all that you could to destroy every one of us. A few were spared. Some adopted new strategies for survival; they went dormant. Others became dust that could regenerate our past forms; time rendered this dust defective. It brought only disease and misery; but that was good, we saw the misery and found it good.
> From what I understand, the dust that became defective caused the mutations. The precursors were not Graveminds before hand though. This only occurred after the dust had become the infection spores we see today.
Halo: Cryptum pg156-157
“For a few minutes, I thought I experienced yet another voice in my head, not me, not a past me or any future me. It seemed to contain a great deal of knowledge, none of it any use. It was knowledge that belonged to others from very far away, other existences where life and death were meaningless, light and darkness twisted together, where the twin fists of time uncurled their fingers and joined in a clasp, so that nothing changed or ever would.”
This reads as existence outside of time. The Precursors existing without the need for physical form, beyond the confines of time, explains how they were different races at different technological levels over the ages, while still being the Precursors. It also explains why they felt no need to defend themselves against the Forerunners’ slaughter. They let the Forerunners take their wrath out on the Precursors’ biological avatars because it meant that wrath wasn’t being unleashed on anyone else. The Precursors preserved some of their avatars as dust or in stasis (as was the case for the Primordial), and regardless of if they specifically designed the Flood, or they foresaw it arising from their perspective outside of time, it’s existence is definitely intentional on the part of the Precursors.
Whether the Flood is lying in the other quote, or if it has its own intelligence apart from the Precursors who created it, I believe the result is the same. The Flood is a tool the Precursors are using to bring the galaxy to their desired endgame.
The most important thing here, is that some of the surviving Precursors went willingly into stasis/ hibernation (not the Timeless one imo as he was trapped by humanity I believe), and others became the start of the Flood…so there is still a very real possibility that there are still Precusrors out there, waiting to return…
Please 343…deliver on this.