The profile picture for "The Founder" entry in the Active Time Lore.
The Founder is a legendary character in Valisthea, especially to Rosarians, in Final Fantasy XVI. He is said to be the founder of modern civilization on the Twins. His name lost to history, he has become known as simply "the Founder". Revered to this day, people may colloquially use his name as an intensifier.
According to legend, the Founder was a Fallen survivor who initially, like all other survivors, hid from the angered gods who had cast them down from the skies; they lived a nomadic lifestyle in the shadows of the realm, never staying in one place for more than one night. One day, the Founder began to build a settlement, and though others at first spurned his effort, he eventually built a following. The settlement grew into a nation, implied to eventually become the Grand Duchy of Rosaria. The Founder and his followers are said to have built a new civilization from scratch without the aid of magicks (crystal or Bearers). When the Founder died, his followers kept his legacy alive and continued his work.
Whether consciously or not, Cidolfus Telamon and his protege, Clive Rosfield, embody the spirit of the legendary Founder in their Bearer-emancipation efforts and their will to build a new world where mankind will live without magick or the exploitation of magic-users. Legacy is a recurring theme throughout Final Fantasy XVI.
Legend of the Founder[]
The Founder entry for Harpocrates's Thousand Tomes is unlocked at Level 3, after the player can visit him in the new hideaway.
- Fear and uncertainty reigned in those early years following the Sins of Dzemekys. Not wanting to further incur the wrath of the heavens, the few who survived the Fall took to wandering the land, spurning magic and staying to the shadows. And so they lived for decades.
- One man, however, grew tired of this life—if it could be called that—and after bidding his companions farewell, climbed a grassy knoll overlooking a forest of beech and alder. Here, he gathered a pile of rubble and used it to build a humble shelter in which he spent the night. The next morning, however, instead of abandoning his work (as was his people's wont), he gathered more rocks, adding to the structure until the shelter had become a shack. This, he continued for days, weeks, until the shack had become a home.
- At first, those few wanderers who passed the knoll would shun him, cursing the man under their breaths for his hubris. But as his estate grew, and one building became two, and two, three, the people began to slow their steps, and it was not long before some took to joining him on that knoll. Gathering stones. Building new lives. New destinies.
- This they did without magicks or machines. Without boon or blessing. They relied on naught but their hands, their backs, their wills, and each other. And slowly house gave way to a village, village to town...and town to nation.
- The man would one day die, as all men do, but those who remained continued his legacy—expanded upon it. And though his name was eventually forgotten, his spirit lives on to this day in the hearts of all Rosarians."