What's the deal with Zote the Mighty, a knight of great renown? (Applause) Script

Ladies and gentlemen, Zote the Mighty. Arguably one of the most complex and developed characters in all of Hollow Knight. In fact, Zote has more dialogue than any character in the game with over 2600 words of dialogue, much more than Seer, Lemm or Elderbug. But despite all of this dialogue, Zote is still one of the biggest mysteries in Hallownest. Debates over his origins and impact on the story have torn apart friends, families and redditors alike. There are so many questions. Where did Zote come from? Where is he going? Who are his parents? Where was Zote on 9/11? Why won’t he submit to a polygraph test? Is he hittin’ thank? Well, today, we’re going to get to the bottom of these mysteries. Because what the fuck else would we be doing with our lives?

Zote shows up in the game pretty early. He is established as a comic relief character, constantly needing the Knight’s help to save him while also proclaiming that he is a Knight of great renown. Eventually the Knight fights Zote in the Coliseum of Fools and it’s fucking pathetic. It’s like shooting a fucking dog, jesus christ. So yeah, Zote’s a joke, and yet there’s one thing about him that causes a total shit storm for those of us trying to understand the game’s lore.

Zote looks an awful lot like the Knight, more so than any other NPC in the game. This is kind of a big deal. If you don’t know why this is important, I’ll give you a quick run down. The Knight is basically one of several hundred failed test tube babies created by the King and Queen of Hallownest in order to stop Mothra from taking over the world, who were then locked away in the basement because they had too much thought. So the fact that the Knight has several siblings mixed with its uncanny resemblance to Zote, has led to some interesting theories.

And the idea that Zote is one of these failed Vessels has been posited by some. If you go to the Hollow Knight Wiki page, which is where all Hollow Knight lore whores go to get their information, you can see that a few users have posted the idea. So I’m not making this shit up.

So yeah, that’s the big question. Some people think that Zote is one of the Pale King’s failed Vessels who escaped. And the others say that Zote is completely unrelated to the Pale King’s experiments. So what’s my shitty opinion? Well, I think that Zote is probably unrelated to anything involving the Pale King.  The idea that Zote came from the Abyss just doesn’t hold water when we look at all of his dialogue. But, in case you didn’t know, I’m the kind of person who pretends to hear both sides of an argument before continuing to cling to their biased decision, so let’s hear the evidence for why Zote is a sibling.

Now remember when I said that Zote has the most dialogue out of any NPC in the game? Well, while that is true, most of his dialogue is completely irrelevant to anything important. After finishing his sidequests, Zote winds up in Dirtmouth teaching Bretta his Fifty-seven Precepts. And most of these Precepts are either common sense or just plain bad advice. Like Precept Forty-four that says you can’t breathe water. Or Precept Nineteen that says only to attempt something if you know you will succeed. Or Precept Thirty-eight that talks about a mysterious force. Wait, what?!

[X-Files theme intensifies]

But within Zote’s dialogue, we do see a theme begin to emerge. Basically, Zote has daddy issues. During the fight in the Colosseum, Zote has Dream Nail dialogue that reads as follows. “I’ll kill a thousand more...Will that be enough, father?”. Zote mentions the word “Father” again in Precept Fifty-Two. The precept is titled “Beware the Jealousy of Fathers”. Zote explains in the precept that fathers believe that their children must “serve” them, and that fathers should be either vanquished or abandoned. The use of the word “serve” here is interesting. This word appears when the Knight dream nails the molds that were used to make the Pale King’s void constructs. Zote also mentions that mothers will always betray you, in Precept Eleven, which is titled “Mothers Will Always Betray You”. And we know that the White Lady isn’t exactly proud of her participation in the creation of the Vessels, maybe because she also views it as a betrayal.

Geez, sounds like Zote had a really bad father. Hey, you know who was a bad father? The Pale King! Zote is the Pale King’s son confirmed! Well, not so fast. What about the fact that Zote has a personality? Aren’t vessels supposed to be completely void of mind or thought? Isn’t that the whole point? There are two explanations for this. The first is that it is possible for siblings to have personalities and voices, since we know that Hornet is a sibling. The second argument is that maybe Zote was one of the really early experiments, so the Pale King didn’t know how to make Vessels that were empty. So in other words, Zote is just a really fucked up experiment.

Since we don’t know much about the finer details of the Pale King’s experiments, it’s hard to argue the second point, but the Hornet explanation is on shaky ground. Hornet was not created with the intention to be used as a Vessel. She was a gift to Herrah from the Pale King in exchange for her help with combating the infection. And no reason is given to explain why Zote would have been created differently from the rest of the Siblings.

Precept Twenty-Two also fits in nicely with narrative. Zote mentions that he left his birthplace as soon as he could. He says not to linger there, since there’s nothing worth staying for. And I’ll admit, the Abyss doesn’t sound like a very nice place to stay.

There’s also this dialogue from Zote. He mentions that Dirtmouth is dreary and ghastly, and that it reminds him of “home”. I think you could interpret this dialogue either way, but I’ll share it here since it seems relevant.

If this was all the information we had to decide if Zote was a child of the Pale King, then this theory would actually be pretty plausible. But once we look at some of Zote’s other dialogue, it becomes difficult to justify this theory. 

Before I get into what I think the biggest issue here is, I’d like to mention a few things. The Hunter’s Journal entry for the Broken Vessel mentions that it looks similar to the bugs of Hallownest. So, it sounds like the Vessels themselves might not be very unique in terms of their appearance.

Bugs like Elderbug are probably what the Hunter is referring to. Elderbug has a shell with features similar to Zote, the most notable one being his mouth. The Knight, Hornet and the other siblings don’t have mouths, even though Hornet can still talk?

[X-Files theme intensifies as mossbag realizes that calling Hornet a Vessel doesn’t actually make sense]

So maybe Zote and Elderbug are the same species, and their resemblance to the Siblings is just a coincidence. 

Anyways, here’s the one big problem with Zote being a Sibling who was made from the Void. If the player character dream nails Zote once he moves back to Dirtmouth, Zote mentions that he “came to this kingdom”. So Zote is not originally from Hallownest, or at least he doesn’t remember being from Hallownest.

At this point, we’re going to have to talk about the lands beyond Hallownest. The problem is, we basically know jackshit about the lands beyond Hallownest. While the player is never able to leave Hallownest during the game, we do get a glimpse into the outside world, thanks to the Quirrel comic that Team Cherry released to their Kickstarter backers. This comic follows Quirrel as he makes his way from the wilderness back into Hallownest. 

The comic starts off by establishing that the bugs of the wilderness do not have minds. They shed their thoughts and chose to rely on instincts as a way to survive. This jives pretty nicely with the lore tablet that can be found at Howling Cliffs. During his journey, Quirrel comes across Boon another bug who is able to communicate through speech. Quirrel eventually makes it to Hallownest where he is confronted by Hornet. Hornet tried to murder his ass, but discovers that Quirrel has some pretty serious plot armor and decides to let him pass into Hallownest.

So what’s going on with this guy? Quirrel was once an assistant to Monomon the Teacher. Quirrel lived in Hallownest, but eventually left the kingdom for unknown reasons. But in this comic, as well as during most of the game, Quirrel shows no recollection of his previous time within the kingdom. Why was Quirrel’s memory forgotten? Is it because the sands of the wilderness clouded his mind for so long that it took him a while to remember? Does leaving Hallownest cause bugs to lose any memories of life inside the kingdom? Is Quirrel’s memory loss entirely unrelated to leaving Hallownest?

Well, to better understand this, let’s look at the other bugs who travel to Hallownest during the game. Aside from Quirrel and Zote, Tiso, Cloth, Cornifer and Iselda all seem to have ventured to Hallownest from some other location. All of these characters seem to have all of their memories intact. They never suddenly remember things long forgotten, and what they do remember seems to imply that they have never lost their memories the same way that Quirrel did.

Cloth and Tiso are two other Kickstarter backer characters that the player can interact with during the game. Admitly neither character outright claims that they are from beyond Hallownest, but it’s heavily implied. Cloth is a cicada-type warrior with a big club who is on a quest to find Nola, a character that she mentions throughout the game. Cloth was designed by a Kickstarter backer named Noah Sturtridge. She was originally a male character named Burlap, who wore a burlap sack on his head. Team Cherry changed Burlap’s name after they realized that burlap doesn’t exist in Hallownest. Not sure why they changed his gender though. I guess it’s just Team Cherry trying to shove more of their progressive agenda down our throats.

Tiso was created by Tiso Spencer, and his design is pretty close to what made it into the final game. In the Team Cherry post that revealed Tiso, it was mentioned that his story would have an interesting conclusion, and well… he dies offscreen. Tiso travels to Hallownest because he wants to fight in the Colosseum of Fools, which he has heard rumors about. Tiso’s knowledge of the Colosseum of Fools and Cloth’s memory of her friend shows that these characters still have their memories.

Then there’s Iselda and Cornifer. Cornifer mentions that he moved to Dirtmouth as soon as he could, after he had heard about the Kingdom of Hallownest. You know, this being Cornifer’s kingdom to map does explain why the map of Hallownest he draws is so fucking shitty, but that’s beside the point. Iselda also mentions that she used to be a fighter, but gave it up to be with Corny. But this dialogue might be hinting at a future Iselda boss fight. But anyway, the point is, these two bugs must have lived somewhere beyond Hallownest before the start of the game

So yeah, there are examples of intelligent bugs beyond Hallownest. As for Quirrel, the best we can say is that he originated from Hallownest, lost his memory and his time back in Hallownest helped him recover his memory.

So, where does that leave Zote? Is he like Quirrel, or is he like the others? If he was from Hallownest before and lost his memory, why does he not remember anything about Hallownest during his quest? Is it because he’s not as inquisitive as Quirrel? Maybe, but doesn’t it seem more likely that Zote is just from a different part of the world? Zote has specific memories about his past, just like Iselda and the other travelers. There isn’t any evidence that Zote has lost his memories, and he doesn’t act like he has ever been to Hallownest before. So yeah, this “I came to this kingdom” comment is the nail in the coffin for me.

So why include all this dialogue about Zote’s father if there’s no connection between Zote and the Pale King? Does Team Cherry just like getting their jimmies off to pissing of their fans and making them confused as hell? Well, it might have been included as just another way to contrast Zote and the Knight. While they both have fathers who probably aren’t going to be getting any “World’s Best Dad” mugs at Christmas,the Knight continues with its quest regardless, while Zote rejects his family and lives a life of self absorption.

So yeah, I think that pretty much sums up what we know about Zote. If I missed anything, which I definitely did, someone will eventually come along and set the record straight in the comments, so go check those out.

And like I said before this is just my interpretation of the evidence. It’s definitely one of those things in the Hollow Knight lore that Team Cherry could definitely change by adding more stuff in through a content pack. And who knows, maybe one day we’ll get a Zote DLC, and my life will finally have meaning again.