• A few considerations

Hello, I am Swittzy from the Pancateers family on BDO. Together with Lema from the Lakedaimon family, we decided to stream and make videos of our adventures through the story of Black Desert Online. After reading through a few posts and seeing the submissions made on the Event Page, I decided to write up this post to clear a few misconceptions regarding the Lore of the Great Mountain while exploring some of the curiosities.
This post is made after playing and reading through the main questline on the Drakania, Guardian & Corsair classes. Fun Fact, Main Stories sometimes have special interactions with certain classes!

• In the beginning...

We do not know exactly how much time the Mountain has existed for. All we know is that a LONG time ago, dragons used to live in these lands. These creatures are known to be gracious, strong, mighty, and most importantly of all very very greedy. One dragon, known as Labreska the scourge of the dragons, decided to challenge her kind to fight against the greediness of her fellow dragons. Countless fights later when no dragon dared challenge Labreska, she ruled freely over the Great Mountain. This brought an era of peace and prosperity and the Mountain was known as The Golden Mountain. When no one dared to fight the great dragon, Labreska found a peculiar flame within her heart, this flame is said to come from the deep abyss, and is able to burn (cleanse?) everything, from a dragon's greed all the way to the gods themselves. Labreska decided to challenge the gods with her newly found powers (we are currently not exactly sure which gods were challenged). Unfortunately for Labreska, the gods were all too mighty, and even if she wielded a flame capable of devouring the gods themselves, she was defeated. To punish the Great Dragon for her indiscretions, the gods murdered Labreska, tearing apart her limbs, and mighty wings plunging The Golden Mountain into a long, harsh, and cold winter. From this point forward the mountain is known as The Mountain Of The Eternal Winter. This event is also known as Labreska's First Death, resting inside the Haven of Slumbering Origin. Surprisingly, out of the First Death, seven witches, known as the Witches of Everfrost,  were generated. Marsh (Witch of Swamps), Awina (Witch of Ruin), Bronte (Witch of Thunder), Lesha (Witch of Fever), Sethra (Witch of Rifts), Kahelle (Witch of Blight), Erethea (Witch of Erasure). These witches had one goal in mind, prepare the weak humans and protect them from the mighty dragons who would seek revenge. 

W.I.P.

Quick question - how does all of that fit with markthanan's saying to Drakania, that Ynix fuels humans greed and that "Dragons paradise" cannot be restored until it is not extinguished? where does that concept of "Dragon paradise" fits that story in the first place?

As for the witches - the singular goal of preparing weak humans to defend against dragons seeking revenge seems to collide with the whole dragon slaughter that "witched whom held secrets of dragon slaying" lead that is noted during Drakanias succession questline, where even mercifull dragon got attacked and killed, with it's last dying breath regretting having spared any humans before.

According to Labreska (AKA Omua), the dragons are greedy. While for Markthanan the humans are greedy. Consequently, according to Labreska and her cult/children, dragons have to be extinguished and the Ynix represents the solution to it. On the other side, according to Markthanan, the humans are greedy and he blames them because they killed his children. Consequently, the Ynix has to be extinguished.

So, what's the truth? Who's right? Who's greedy? Humankind or Dragonkin?

The beauty of BDO lore lies in its effort to recall the complexity of reality. The truth is that it is no good or evil. There are greedy dragons, (like Garmoth, probably) and there are greedy humans, like those Sherekhans who killed innocent dragons.

I might add some considerations about the Ynix.

1) Just like the Black Spirit is the manifestation of your deepest desires, the Ynix might be its counter. In fact, when Silverfrond takes the Ynix away from Labreska, she starts to be devoured by what I think may be her Black Spirit. That's why Labreska's Ynix is now corrupted. Long story short, the Black Spirit won over the Ynix and that's why it's corrupted now.

2) The Ynix is not unique. Just like the Black Spirit, everyone can have one. In fact, the Guardian can awaken her own Ynix in Drieghan during her awakening. If the Black Spirit represents the deepest desires, the Ynix may represent a noble purpose or something like this.

NOTE: these are only my thoughts. Nothing is official.

only question remaining is ... how the hell did lafy bedmountain get out of O'dylitia ?

If anything the new questline for Eternal Winter + new drakania lore makes pretty clear who is right: Markthanan.

As we can clearly see the Ynix is of Hadum's making (dont wanna spoil it for anyone who hasnt finished the questline yet but you know what happened to the one who touched it) which tbh makes much more sense. Why would Labreska death breed witches and dark magic sorcerys if the Ynix was a benevolent flame? Most likely answer is that Labreska was corrupted by Hadum somehow and turned on her kind, after killing and consuming them their energies unified into a dark energy flame so powerful it could even kill Gods (hadum enemies).

Was there bad dragons? Sure. Was labreska another hadum pawn? Most likely. She used Labreska to kill the dragons, form the ynix flame and then used its flame to kill the most powerful god we had on this plane: kzarka.

That's a very good question.

Free to think what you want, but I stand in my position: the beauty of the lore is that there's no dichotomy between good and evil, right and wrong. Markthanan is not right, neither Labreska. As explained, both humans and dragons can be cruel.

About Labreska and the Ynix, we know she made a deal with a black spirit (probably to come back to life), and, probably, this corrupted her Ynix: that's why Labreska's Ynix is corrupted, while Guardian's one is not. Also, Labreska didn't turn against her kind because "she's bad", but probably because her own kind wronged her. 

About Kzarka, most likely he's been devoured when Silverfrond took the Ynix to him as the God required since without the Heart of Atomagia the Ynix would consume you. 

Funnily enough, even after gathering most of the notes and footage of the main story... we don't really know. He probably got the guards drunk hahah

This is also pretty interesting because, if you play the Awakening of the Guardian (at level 56), you will be taken to Drieghan where you will see the Ynix. It is a golden flame representing the might of Labreska, and it is where you get the Awakening Weapon for the Guardian. We are not exactly sure what dark flame you meet at the end of this questline is, but it is not the Ynix because you can already see it in Drieghan if you do the awakening of the Guardian. Fun fact, unless you have the Heart of Atomagia (The artifact Illezra steals from us at the end of AAtoraxion), you will get consumed by the golden flame. This is referenced at the beginning of the main story when you meet the Secret Guard.