A Legend can also be a person striving for greatness... (Destiny)

by Ragashingo , Official DBO Cryptarch, Saturday, July 25, 2015, 13:54 (3646 days ago) @ Cody Miller

In putting together my absolutely massively academic post about story, narrative forms, and Destiny, something occurred to me.

What is a Legend? A tale told by someone who didn't live it. And so, it takes on a larger than life quality, as imagination and oration fill in gaps and expand the scope. But to the person who lived it? It's no Legend… it's just… what happened.

Think about it for a second.

You are correct, for many people, even those who accomplish great things, they aren't legends or heroes in their own minds. Think of the stereotypical WWII veteran who doesn't want to talk about the war or the dozens of lives he very clearly saved because to him he was just a kid just trying to survive and come home. It's others around him and society at large that makes him into a legend.

But just because that kind of person may be most typical does not mean there aren't those who actively seek to Become Legend. Thinking about it for a second, like you suggested, I came up with two types of people who don't fit into your version of becoming a legend:

1. Ash Ketchum (From Pokemon) - Ash was not at all like WWII veteran above. Life didn't just happen to him. He went out and actively sought to "be the very best. Like no one ever was." He was, in Destiny terms, attempting to Become Legend. And ultimately he did pretty well and earned the respect of those around him. I don't believe he was overly boastful about his accomplishments, but he actively enjoyed them and recognized that he was achieving things no one else had.

2. Gilgamesh (From Fate/Zero) - It the various versions of the Fate series, heroes from the past are summoned into the present to help their summoners try and be the last Master / Servant pair standing and thus win the use of a reoccurring magical wish granting device. Of all the heroes called back, Gilgamesh was one of the most powerful if not easily the most powerful... and he knew it... and he let you know it. He was extremely confident, extremely boastful both of his power and of his accomplishments, and he was right. No one in the series ever did more than fight him to a draw which he would have eventually won. And unlike the WWII veteran, or Ash Ketchum, or the people that life just happens to, Gilgamesh told his own stories of his greatness. He told of how he ruled with absolute authority, how he had amassed the largest treasure ever know, how he was undefeatable in combat, etc. Also completely at odds with your idea of a legend being something told by others, there were no others to tell legendary stories of Gilgamesh since his spirit had been transported from some 5000 years in the past to the modern day and by the end of the series literally everyone who had seen him in action, save one person, was dead. But again, he spoke enough about his own Legend to more than make up for all of that.

Ultimately, Cody, you've focused on one definition of legend while ignoring an important second definition. One definition of Legend is:

a traditional story sometimes popularly regarded as historical but unauthenticated: "the legend of King Arthur"

Even with this definition, your idea that a legend is always a story told by others is proven wrong by Gilgamesh's boastfulness and haughty "You are unworthy of me, peasants" type attitude. More importantly though is the second definition of a Legend:

an extremely famous or notorious person, especially in a particular field: "the man was a living legend"

A legend isn't just a story. Having others tell stories about things we think were just life happening isn't what Bungie's "Become Legend" slogan was offering! It's not urging us to have others whisper tales about us, it is urging us to strive for greatness and adventure and fun, like Ash Ketchum, and then to go out, like Gilgamesh, and boast of our stories of how great it was to raid the Vault of Glass without knowing what to do, or of the time we pulled off a spectacular come back in Trial of Osiris, or of the goofy stunt we managed to pull off on our sparrow.

And finally, while there are a couple of tucked away examples of Guardians striving to "Become Legend" within Destiny's story universe (it is said that some Guardians seek greatness in the Crucible, and Petra comments that some Guardians go where the glory and treasure is) the main thrust of the story in vanilla Destiny, The Dark Below, and House of Wolves is protecting humanity's last city and going out into the solar system looking for the means to take our planets back from alien enemies. Becoming Legend is never a focus of our Guardian's story or even that of those around him like the Vanguard or the legendary Guardians of the past. To claim that the phrase "Become Legend" was speaking strictly about in game events or motivations, like you already have, is absurd and is a stance that is difficult if not impossible to honestly support.