The Lore of Heart of Fire
We delve deep into the Heart of matters
March’s Heart of Fire Content Update brought with it a new Tall Tale and with this a wealth of new lore was brought to the world, pushing the in-game story forward. So what’s been introduced or expanded in the ongoing story of Sea of Thieves? Read on, dear reader, read on…
Catch up via the links below on the lore if you want to know how we’ve gotten to this point so far in the evolving world of Sea of Thieves;
Talking to Duke
This month Duke has been in contact with the Pirate Lord. How the two spoke it is not quite known, it may have been through the Pirate Lord’s emissary George, the Mysterious Stranger. It seems however that the Pirate Lord is worried about the rising influence of Captain Flameheart and seeks to find competent pirates through the means of the Thieves Haven Athena’s Run.
Duke still believes in there being a glimmer of goodness in Stitcher Jim’s heart…
Wanda over to the Reaper’s Hideout
It is quiet this month at the Reaper’s Hideout, with no visual changes happening to the island at all. Has construction taken a pause for a moment? Our friend the Masked Stranger doesn’t have a whole lot to say to us either. Her mind may be on other matters however…
Heading in to the Heart of Fire
The real meat of matters here this month is the latest Tall Tale, the Heart of Fire. If you haven’t yet completed the Tale and want a walkthrough guide, check ours out here.
The Tall Tale is started by voting on the book next to Tallulah, the Tavern host of The Charred Parrot. Here, she explains the situation with Flameheart and how Pendragon seeks people to help him in his cause to stop the returned Captain.Then she kindly asks the player to return Captain Grace Morrow’s journal, as she often misplaces it. Leaving the tavern and approaching Morrow begins her dialogue and shortly after Pendragon appears. He is on an urgent quest and recruits the player on a journey to rescue his crew from the clutches of Stitcher Jim and a ritual to summon an Ashen Lord. Talk between Pendragon and Morrow continues, and at the mention of Jim, she gives the player the journal that she has kept, where she has been making notes of all of Jim’s movements as best as she can.
This exchange confirms a few things; namely that it was Stitcher Jim who freed Pendragon from his canvas curse. So we can infer that Jim set Pendragon on the mission to ‘rescue’ the lost souls with the intent that he would unknowingly release Flameheart. More on this later though…
Grace Morrow’s Journal
The main journal in this Tall Tale is The Journal of the Forsaken Shores Alliance, penned by none other than Captain Grace Morrow.
It briefly retells the events of the Forsaken Shores Alliance and their fate, with Stitcher Jim being outed as the traitor. This is no new surprise though, what is however is the depiction of the Box of Wondrous Secrets in Morrow’s journal. Grace gives us perhaps the closest glimpse of what may lie inside that box with her notes of a nightmare she had about it.
“The box is empty. No, more than that. Where its bottom should be there’s a hole, like peering into a great abyss. And inside that… Flames. Endless, searing flames.”
It is a very alarming image of what may have been in the Box, especially as we do know it sent Jim mad for some time. It being full of endless flames could be an indication that this Box has ties to Flameheart, it’s certainly possible that this is how Jim first came into contact with ‘him’.
The Backbone of a Liar
The journal instructs players to seek out Jim at his hideout on Liar’s Backbone. Long has this location hinted at a secret beneath the dirt…
Entering Jim’s hideout, we are immediately greeted by a dingy cavern full of banners, runic carvings on the walls, and a bunch of opened boxes. Let’s start with the boxes…
Keen eyed viewers may notice the runes on the sides of the of the box and on the lids match up to those of the Box of Wondrous Secrets. And as such is it incredibly likely, unless stated otherwise by the developers, that these are the Box of Wondrous Secrets. Emphasis on Secrets. There are several found in this lair, all opened up. Was the Devil’s Roar littered with these things? Are these Boxes the ones pirates handed over to Jim when he used to stand watch on the beach of Liar’s Backbone? We may not know how he got them into his possession, or what he even used them for. Perhaps he became enthralled with whatever he originally saw in the box and needed to see if he could find others like it too. It continues to beg the question of what are these chests, who made them, and why are there so many of them?
The main feature of Jim’s hideout is the heart Altar that is in tribute to Flameheart. A small puzzle here requires players to arrange the runes in the correct order to open up the heart lock. The shrine is a pretty big commitment for Jim, showing just how much he has changed his alliances from the Gold Hoarder to the figure he fervently refers to as King Flameheart. Within the heart-vault rests a Mysterious Key, which is inscribed with the skeleton rune for ‘Flame’, and Jim’s Notes which point players to their next destination.
Scattered about and scratched into the walls of the hideout are various skeleton runes and some brief words about what they translate to and Jim’s thoughts.
As you can see, these runes outline how Jim switched sides after the demise of the Gold Hoarder, how Wanda rescued him once again confirming that the Masked Stranger, his love, is Wanda in disguise, and the preparation, purpose, and location of the ritual.
A journal is also found in the hideout, which we will be going over a little later.
A Devilish Thirst
Following Stitcher Jim’s notes and heading to the Devil’s Thirst will eventually lead you to be face to face with the underwater entrance to Flameheart’s lair. Just off the northern coast of the island and a short dive under the waves is a pedestal and a carving of what can only be assumed to be Flameheart’s face in the rock. Placing the Mysterious Key in the pedestal opens up the face, but let’s take pause for a moment. Inscribed above the face are four familiar runes.
What is their relation? Well, Captain Logun over on Twitter started their own thread trying to decipher them and who should join the conversation than none other than Design Director Mike Chapman. After a brief exchange Logun managed to get some info out of him. The four runes read “Pirates for All Eternity”. Does this phrase have any deeper meaning however? Or is it merely a rallying call for Flameheart’s followers? It seems obvious that the inscribing of these runes at the Reaper’s Hideout is in honour of them found here at the entrance to the Heart of Fire. This same phrase was etched onto the Flameheart coin that was previously available in the Sea of Thieves merch store.
The Catacombs of the Heart
Opening the entrance way by placing the Mysterious Key in the plinth leads pirates to follow a series of tunnels underwater and through fiery caverns and almost immediately we are met with the voice of Flameheart directly addressing the unwanted guests. Curiously, they are titled simply as ‘Flameheart’, no Captain or King title, nor a Sr or Jr…
Deep within the twisting underwater tunnels of the Heart of Fire is a room with three branching paths. They all lead to the same place in the end, but vary in difficulty. Of more note is that each path has a particular name assigned to it. Colour-coded and from left to right is the blue door, the Path of the Eternal King, green in the centre is the Path of Forsaken Flame, and amber-red on the right is the Path of the Burning Flame. Were these once ancient trials? Do the names hold any particular meaning? Flameheart mentions that these catacombs have been here for a long time as he taunts the invader, so is this place not something he himself made? The symbols of course are “King”, “Flame”, and “Heart”, just like the code to Stitcher Jim’s heart-lock.
At the end of these tunnels is a doorway with a carving of Flameheart’s face with skeleton runes beneath, reading “Pirates for All Eternity ? to Flame”. As of writing the unknown rune’s (the fifth in sequence from the left) meaning is uncertain. It does however also appear on Stitcher Jim’s Chest of Rage, and on the covers of the Ashen Tomes Volume 1: Curses, so perhaps it has some meaning that connects it to binding or cursing.
Passing through this doorway is a large chamber with a lake of molten lava. It is in here that Stitcher Jim seems to be conducting the ritual, although not with the results or effects he was hoping to happen. Before seeing him however, the spectral form of Flameheart’s mighty ship The Burning Blade is in immediate sight, resting upon the lake of lava. Flameheart even proudly introduces his ship to the pirates who have made it this far into the lair.
Meanwhile the ritual is well underway on a ledge to the left of the Burning Blade. Jim looks to finalize the process as his specially crafted Chest of Rage erupts with flame and opens up, all is not well however, as he quickly reels back after reaching his hand into the chest. A burning sensation comes over his arm and he begins yelling in agony. Where Jim thought he would be summoning an Ashen Lord, it may be that he himself is being turned into one, as Flameheart declares “soon he will possess true strength- the strength of an Ashen Lord”. All while this plays out, the Masked Stranger can be briefly glimpsed overlooking the commotion from a high spot in the caverns.
After this little spectacle Stitcher Jim escapes through a doorway behind where the ritual was taking place, abandoning his Chest of Rage. Where does that doorway lead? We cannot know for now, but it bears the same design as the entrance to the lava lake. It is most likely that he will begin undergoing some form of transformation into an Ashen Lord.
Jim’s Journals
Throughout the Tale, Stitcher Jim’s journals can be discovered and they document what he has been up to the last few months. A notable detail is that the books are inscribed with the symbol of the Forsaken Shores Alliance (which Jim betrayed and destroyed save for Grace Morrow), and he has taken a knife and crossed out the symbol on each book, indicating that he has broken the Alliance.
We Need a New Plan
The first journal found in Jim’s lair on Liar’s Backbone gives us confirmation that he is the individual who originally stole the Dark Relics from the Order of Souls.
A Disorder of Souls
Bye Bye Blackwyche
A Chest of Rage
The Devil I Know…
A Burning Question
In the depths of the Heart of Fire, resting upon a lake of fire, is the spectral apparition of Flameheart’s Ship, The Burning Blade. This raises some very curious questions. For one, how does one create a spectral or ghost version of a ship? Do ships have souls or some kind of presence that can be summoned forth? Why is it simply not the ship itself unless the ship has been completely destroyed. But it bears two very distinct details, and raises a question.
The first of the details is that the ship is missing a cannon. This lines up nicely with current lore as Wanda and Salty found Flameheart’s cannon, dredged it up, and used it to reverse engineer the cursed cannonballs. So it makes sense that it would be missing a cannon, right? This detail was also brought up by Andy Preston during one of the Developer Streams.
The second detail is the figurehead. It matches with the figurehead, or potentially carving, found in the shrine area of Wanda’s Workshop on Wanderer’s Refuge. However, if the figurehead is in that cave, why does it appear on the apparition of the ship? As previously mentioned, it could be that what is in the shrine isn’t the actual figurehead but a replica of the real thing.
Now, for the question. Flameheart very clearly claims that this is his ship, that it belongs to him.
Does this indicate the Flameheart we are dealing with here is Flameheart Sr? A long-standing debate since the first mentions of Flameheart is which one is being referred to, Senior or Junior. This has only heated up since his ‘arrival’ in the Sea of Thieves. His claim to the Burning Blade sways the argument towards this being Senior, as it was Senior who commanded the Burning Blade, evidenced by an encounter recorded by the Pirate Lord in his journal found in the Shroudbreaker Tall Tale. The confusing matter here is that Flameheart Senior was never a Skeleton Lord (as far as we know), it was Junior who was cursed and turned into a Skeleton Lord. It is also entirely possible that Junior came into ownership of the Burning Blade sometime after becoming a Skeleton lord. For now we don’t have all the information to make a concrete decision on the identity of this Flameheart, and we shall have to wait for future updates…
There we have it, everything the Heart of Fire tells us about how the story is progressing and evolving, revelations about plots and the true nature of certain characters. But where will the story take us next, Flameheart’s physical arrival is looking incredibly imminent… as does the arrival of his Ashen Lords.
