As per usual, I’ll be posting lore links and quotes to support what I claim. [b]Let’s start with the who.[/b] [spoiler]The Traveler houses the Gardener. Anything attributable to the Traveler is actually the Gardener. Think of the Traveler’s Shell as a vessel, containing the domain of The Pale Heart (also referred to as The Field of Possibility/ The Garden) and the one who rules it, the Gardener. Allowing her to be safe and influence the outside at the same time. When the Witness went in, Zavala and Ikora both said “the traveler is gone”, this was her withdrawing that watch to combat the Witness inside. Osiris also says something similar in Veil Containment, that it went dormant to focus on the battle within. [/spoiler] [b]What is The Gardener? [/b] [spoiler]The Gardner is the Creator tier type of entity in Destiny. Either in the form of a preexisting god-like entity who made the cosmos or a deity like figure BORN by the Creation of the Cosmos itself as a manifestation of the now paracausal nature of the rules that govern reality. It’s much like how we were told that the Veil is the physical manifestation of Darkness and the Traveler is a manifestation of Light. The Gardnener could also be a Post-Creation manifestation. I wanna explain that second option better, cause I think it may be closer to the truth and it relates to the Flower Game and The Winnower. But first, let’s finish explaining what she is.[/spoiler] [b]A manifestation of what, exactly? [/b] [spoiler]Dark and Light are separate groups of cosmic rules that Bungie referred to as Consciousness and Creation in their livestream. That means Mind and Body, put them together and you have a sentient entity. Just as the Veil and Traveler were manifested to represent their particular collection of rules Ontological Principles and the Flower Game The idea is that The Gardener is a manifestation of the collection of Ontological Principles that devised not just the laws the cosmos would operate under but but also the things the cosmos would make; stars, planets, lifeforms, etc Everything. The game refers to this as The Field of Possibility. More commonly known as the speck of energy and matter that existed before the Big Bang. Within this speck Ontological Principles “simulated” a set of rules and what didn’t work was discarded and what did was kept. Over and over until everything was worked out, each rule working “properly” and seamlessly with each other and the creations therein. Otherwise referred to as the Flower Game. This is where paracausality comes in. Because one of the creations wasn’t playing nice with the others. [/spoiler] [b]Why was all this necessary? [/b] [spoiler]The Vex. The universe exists to create, in fact if you look at cosmic history, it’s been an ever expanding wave of creation. The speck turns into protons and electrons, which form atoms, which form gases, that form suns, which form heavier elements, eventually planets form and basic life grows. Then sentient life and culminating with the creations they make that nature never could. (Yes. The cosmos was made so we could make plastic. George Carlin made that joke. Funny huh? ) So the Vex completely disrupt this process and can do so in a way that forever eliminates that nature flow. And thus paracausality was added to give other species a way to survive them but the powers very nature disrupted the Field and the Principles harmony, creating a major conflict. This unsolvable problem was so disruptive that Creation was forced to happen without resolution, allowing this new power to exist. [/spoiler] And that about sums it up. Now where’s the proof? Let’s start with showing the only lore whjch shows the Gardener herself actually speaking. Not only does this establish her existence but also her personality. Bungie thought they were smart hiding it in weblore. I have the start of the section you want to read highlighted but I’ll post it in a spoiler since it’s a long entry. https://www.ishtar-collective.net/records/clovis-brays-logbook-missing-pages?highlight=Third+vision [spoiler]NOTE-THIRD VISION
Something else happened while I was in surgery. It returns to me only now that the anti—traumatics have eased the terror of Sundaresh’s presence. While I was dead, I had another vision. I was with Clovis II’s mother. She was a wolf, and one of her eyes was a star. I was also a wolf, and I knew that I was the alpha—the false alpha, the pack leader who fights for dominance and rulership. A misconception created by bad research. In the wild, wolf packs are families, and “alpha” simply means “parent.” Wilhelmina told me that. She was the true alpha. She was the mother. I was not the true alpha, because I was not a true father. I panted at her. My muzzle dripped blood. She looked down sadly at the mess between us. And I realized that in my raging need to prove my dominion, I had savaged our cubs. I had killed little Clovis II. I had killed Alton and Wilhelmina and Anastasia. I had killed Elisabeth. I whined in dismay. The alpha wolf stared at me with one sad wolf eye and one bright eye that dimmed and grew with the exact flux of a variable star. “What did I do?” I asked her. “Why did I do this?” She lay her head down in the bloody snow and looked up at me. She seemed weary. She had seen this happen many times before. She had seen many of her pups murdered by wolves like me. The voice of Clovis II’s mother came from her jaws. “You did the same thing someone always does. You saw that there was plenty, and gathered it to yourself, to make yourself one above all others. And when others threatened your plenty, you struck them down to keep your own station.” “You grow the enemy in my garden and eat of its bitter fruit. Each time, I hope it will be different. Each time, I lose a little of myself as the bitter fruit blossoms. Now that fruit will flower in you, and in all your people. I do not want it to happen. I want anything else. But the choice is not mine.” “Why didn’t you stop me?” I tasted blood on my long tongue. “Why would you let me do this?” She blinked sadly at me. She had been trying. I hadn’t listened. “You never said a thing to me,” I snarled. “Not once. You never told me I was doing wrong. At least Clarity sends me dreams—the exobody and the eel. At least it shows me what I can become.” “You think Clarity sent those dreams? Why would it speak to you, when you are dead and furthest from its influence?” “Liar.” I howled. “You never did a thing to help me. Not when my son died. Not when my granddaughter fell ill. I had to do it all myself. You never even spoke.” “The best voices,” she said, with infinite grief and unending hope, “never let themselves be heard at all. This lesson is worth teaching again and again. The choice is never mine. It is always yours.” [/spoiler] As you can see, the last line about choice and lessons being taught over and over can be seen as alluding to Elsie Brays looping and everyone having to make the right choices to get us into a winning position. Two Veil Containment transcripts need to be read almost in full. https://www.ishtar-collective.net/transcripts/parting-the-veil-research-log-14? https://www.ishtar-collective.net/transcripts/parting-the-veil-research-log-15? Ghosts coming from the consciousness of the Gardener. https://www.ishtar-collective.net/entries/the-we-before-us What the Speck was: Unveiling, Gardener and Winnower: “* It was once before a time, because time had not yet begun.
** We did not live. We existed as principles of ontological dynamics that emerged from mathematical structures, as bodiless and inevitable as the primes.
*** It was the field of possibility that prefigured existence.” https://www.ishtar-collective.net/entries/gardener-and-winnower#book-unveiling Bonus feature How the Gardener and Winnower are the same: Lorebook Inspiral, page Winnowing also states the necessity for a Gardener to wield the knife. https://www.ishtar-collective.net/entries/winnowing#book-inspiral Hope y’all had fun!