Hades II Theory Regarding Chronos

Hades II Theory Regarding Chronos

I have been playing a ton of Hades after the Hades II trailer got me hooked. Currently about 80 hours in, and I noticed something that made me speculate on the Chronos storyline.

Basically I think the Satyr Cultists that Zagreus encounters in the Temple of Styx are actually worshippers of Chronos, and their activity is directly linked to the titan's escape from imprisonment in the sequel.

This is the Codex entry for Satyr Cultists taken from the wiki:

When I first read it, I found it strange that Hades, the immensely powerful God of the Dead, would be worried about some goat-people freeloading in a temple so far above his residing domain in Tartarus. Also why is the satyrs' hatred for Hades so pronounced? This feels like one of the unresolved plot points in the first game that is more than likely to be expanded in the sequel.

Achilles's Codex entry calls satyrs "vermin-worshippers". I first assumed this to mean the satyrs worship the rats they share the temple with, but that just felt odd. Then during my runs passing through the Temple of Styx, I noticed that there are statues of vipers/snakes everywhere.

There is also the hostile Snakestone mob that sometimes can be found in the same room as Satyr Cultists. According to Achilles's Codex:

"..the boorish satyrs despoiling the surface seem to take up residence in the same spaces, and may well be to blame for these nuisances, as they are for many others."

So it is implied that the satyrs built the Snakestones, and by extension I suspect that the snake, and not the rats, is the actual subject of worship for this "cult".

And in Greek mythology, the snake is, interestingly, a symbol of Cronus, the King of the Titans.

Here is an article I found that mentions the relationship between Cronus/Chronos (Hades II is conflating these two figures it looks like) the snake, particularly in Orphic poetry. Apparently in some versions, Cronus has the lower half body of a snake.

The game tells us that the satyrs are openly antagonistic towards the House of Hades. Maybe their hatred comes from Chronos being defeated and eventually held hostage in Hades's domain?

Also worth mentioning that while the origin of the word "satyr" is unclear, it has been speculated that the name is related to the root "sat-", which means "to sow". Remarkably, it is also the root of Saturn, a.k.a. the Roman equivalent of Cronus.

TLDR: The satyrs cult Zagreus fights in the Temple of Styx may in fact be worshippers of Chronos, as evidenced by the abundance of snake motifs and artifacts in their lair. The satyrs may have a role in Chronos escaping imprisonment in Tartarus, leading to the events of Hades II.