Falcom is pretty consistent with their theater-esque parallel two-act structure they like to use in kiseki games. At the end of every first ‘act’, Falcom introduces some concept or jargon that is relatively meaningless to the main conflict of that act, but will be important in the sequel. This is usually related to the Sept-Terrion of the arc i.e. the barrier system for the Aureole or the rivalry and stage needed to reform the Great One. In Kuro no Kiseki, this is the 5 Demon Lords which lead the 77 Devils.
This concept comes from the Book of Ezer in the Septian Church’s Apocrypha which was first shown in the prologue of Sky the 3rd. Discrepancies in records stored within the originally primal ground in Arteria suggest that there were originally 72 devils; however, after the great collapse, 5 new devils were created which ruled over the other 72. From the same book , we have this quote from the 3rd,
“That brief hesitation was all it took to spawn a great evil. It crawled through the fields, ran through the hills, and spread disaster in the skies above.”
—Book of Ezer, Verse 2, ‘Disaster Unleashed’
The ‘great evil’ mentioned in this verse doesn’t appear again until the finale of Kuro. Using the seventh genesis—which I assume is some type of simulation device regarding possible worlds not unlike Elysium—coupled with the Diabolic Core, Melchior summons forth the Pandemonium Shift, a world state where time stands still and devils run rampant, directly mentioning the ‘great evil’ as he summons it. It should be noted that there is no guarantee that this is the same evil from the 3rd because the kanji is different. In fact, the kanji in the 3rd more or less means the ‘wicked one’ or even general ‘wickedness’ compared to ‘great evil/satan/demon’ in Kuro. However, because both are connected to the book of Ezer, I’m going to assume they refer to the same thing anyway. This is Kiseki Crack for Aidios sake not my dissertation.
The Diabolic Core which brought it forth is part of the demonic essence extracted from Van Arkride who is the Zemurian vessel of Vagrantz-Zion, one of the big five. Vagrantz-Zion is both destined to eventually destroy the world (unclear if it’s just him or all five) and has power over time which explains why those connected to Van can move freely within Pandemonium. The people who are frozen in Pandemonium appear to eventually disappear from existence entirely based on how close they are to the origin (this is undone I assume because Pandemonium was stopped before Genesis Tower could finish its calculations). Based on this, the name Pandemonium (chaos), all the weird time shit, the Nothingness of All coming in 9 months or so, and the fact that the game’s name is a pun for ‘Chrono Kiseki’, I sorta expect that the ‘great evil’ refers to the Sept-Terrion of Time. I’ve already written before that the element of time appears to govern entropy, chaos, and destruction and has long been associated with darkness and devils. There’s also the big focus on fear and anxiety which according to my orbment slots theory is an attribute of time element aligned characters.
Anyway, eventually Pandemonium will cover the entire world, possibly destroying or resetting the world…or it would if it wasn’t for the primal grounds. As mentioned by Bergard, spreading pandemonium all over the continent is not as easy as Gerard makes it out to be due to special facilities all over the continent called primal grounds. Based on the name eternal recurrence, I assume the ‘great evil’ was going to destroy the world so that the next one could be created. This was supposed to happen 1200 years ago, but Arteria managed to stop it with the help of its primal ground. To prevent this sort of thing from happening again, Arteria built the remaining primal grounds.
Notably, there is not a primal ground in Edith and there potentially isn’t one in all of Calvard given that they make the comparison to Heimdallr instead of Oracion. So far we know exact locations of three primal grounds: Arteria, Grancel, and Heimdallr. We also know that one is located under Aster House near Emerose City, wherever that is. If you interpolate these primal grounds as points on a circle with many primal grounds, then they would completely surround Calvard. Assuming we have seven approximately equidistant points, then the remaining four would be in Remiferia, the Kunlun Mountains, Elsaim, and the southern Archipelago. All of these locations are suspicious:
Remiferia — I suspect Aster House/Emerose City is located here simply because the only countries in West Zemuria left that we don’t have full maps of are there, North Ambria, and Ored. Remiferia also has the closest relationship with the church of the three.
Kunlun Mountains — We know from Mare’s use of the CIA’s highlighter that something is sealed away in the Kunlun Mountains and Ikaruga is tasked with guarding it by their current employer (implied to be Gramheart). It’s also weird that a westerner and former Dominion is the current head and master of the Kunlun school of martial arts. Additionally, as shown in the Cold Steel arc, primal grounds can be used to seal away divine beings.
Elsaim — The center of Zemuria’s middle eastern culture and main religion besides the Septian Church. Despite this, they have a good diplomatic relationship and consider each other’s goddesses to be different aspects of the same divine being.
The Archipelago — The location is suspicious for even existing on the official map. One of the screenshots on the official website looks like a tropical location and another looks like an underwater island cave, so this place could be explorable in Kuro 2.
Looking at how we have a second Grendel in the trailer for Kuro no Kiseki II, it’s likely that the five lords and their vessels will serve the same narrative role as the Divine Knights in the cold steel arc. If their goal is to bring about the Nothingness of All—possibly through the Pandemonium Shift—then disabling the primal grounds would be the way to do it.