I cleared Ending A last week, and was a bit confused about the lore, so I did a but of reading. This is what I managed to come up with. I don’t think any of the sources I have seen so far (in-game documents, wiki, game articles) did a very good job so I thought I’d try giving my own summary of what I understand so far. Feel free to correct me where I’m wrong and see some of the questions I still have below.

SUMMARY

Due to a deadly pandemic (White Chlorination Syndrome) threatening to wipe out mankind, humanity decided to embark on Project Gestalt, which involved extracting human souls from their bodies (the extracted souls are called Gestalts) for the time being. Clones of the original body (Replicants) are farmed in these villages for the eventual time when the disease dies down, the Gestalts can be transferred back to their respective Replicants and everything resumes as normal. Androids Devola and Popola oversee this project and are responsible for this transfer (presumably using the technology of Grimiore Weiss and Grimiore Noir).

However, a technological glitch caused some Gestalts to “relapse” and turn hostile. These relapsed souls turn aggressive and become what we know as Shades. Shades can no longer return to their Replicant bodies. Replicants whose respective Gestalts have relapsed suffer from the Black Scrawl Disease.

Meanwhile, the non-relapsed Gestalts are part of some form of network with the original Nier (who we see in the prologue), also known as the Shadowlord (he presumably volunteered himself into this on condition that that admins/scientists find a cure for his sister who is relapsing). These Gestalts reside in an office complex which we know as Shadowlord’s Castle. We see them dancing to waltz in the ballroom scene.

Back to the Shadowlord and his sister. Gestalt Yonah is suffering from relapses so the admins put her into a deep coma to stall the progression, which explains why she does not turn into a shade. However, this also curses Replicant Yonah with the Black Scrawl. However, with around 1500 years having passed and still no progress, the Shadowlord has grown impatient and decided to take matters into his own hands by kidnapping Replicant Yonah and performing the transfer himself.

This sets into motion the events of Act II, we see that Nier and co. eventually storm the castle, and despite the twins’ best efforts to stop them, eventually killed the Shadowlord. Since the Shadowlord is the center of this network of Gestalts, all Gestalts and Shades die off, leading to the extinction of humanity. In other words, Nier’s actions combined with the twins’ failure to stop him resulted in the extinction of humanity.

We also see that the transfer of Gestalt Yonah to replicant Yonah has been completed, but Gestalt Yonah seeing the bond between Replicant Nier and Replicant Yonah, decides that she can not inhabit this body and vacates the body by exposing herself to sunlight and dying in the process.

QUESTIONS

What are Devola and Popola’s ultimate intentions? Why did they encourage Nier to collect the Sealed Verses, and later the stone keys? Is it to prevent suspicion, or is it part of a grander plan? Are they just trying to stop Nier from killing the Shadowlord, or are they trying to subdue him to transfer the Shadowlord to his body?

We saw some Replicants transform into Shades (Gestalts) in the Aerie, how does that make sense?

In Shadowlord’s Castle, despite being a haven for non-relapsed Gestalts, we see many Shades spawning to fight us. How does that work? Can non-relapsed Gestalts be shades as well?

Is there a reason why the keys to the castle have to be split into 5 different fragments and that you have to kill a particular Shade to obtain each fragment? Or is it purely for plot/cinematic purposes?

So some Shades are vulnerable to sunlight and others aren’t? How does that work? My understanding is that relapsed Gestalts are vulnerable to sunlight but the sentient ones aren’t, but some clarification is appreciated.