What Nunus' Story is ACTUALLY About
The story is shaping up to be about acceptance more and more as we get new stuff
I think Nunus' mom is actually dead and Nunu is trapped at stage 2 of the cycle of loss: Denial.
Childlike naivete and innocence leads him to believe that he can find his mom if he follows her "song". That's the purpose of the story with Nunus' mom, Frozen Hearts she tells Nunu that they will always have each other and Nunu takes it to heart.
Riot keeps telling us that Willump is incredibly wise. In Nunus' dialog, in Nunus' bio and even in Gnars' new story Riot is characterizing Willump as wise. Willump KNOWS the truth but isn't telling Nunu because he sees what Nunu represents: hope
Even in the bleakness of the Freljord where there are 100 ways to die each day as long as people hang on to hope they can see another day. The allegory in the second story Stone cold is pretty obvious.
Nunu and Willump happen upon a village of stone people who are very much dead, but Nunu believes they can save them. They destroy the Krugs dam and flood the vilage but this does nothing to save the people from the unliftable curse
"'Did you see that, Willump?!' Nunu asks. But my eyes are already closed.
I can feel a magic more powerful than the curse welling up to fill the village, casting shivers through my fur and bringing warmth to a world that is cold. It is the only magic that can save the Freljord. Even the frozen dreams of my people, coveted by the Frostguard, pale in comparison to this magic, held in abundance by a child.
Hope. His arms are around me now, and I hug him back with all four limbs, looking away so he does not see the snowflakes falling from my eyes."
Riot is trying to tell us that the Freljord has an overabundance of "heroes". People that name themselves to a cause and kill each other for the "greater good". In "Frozen Hearts" Layka illustrates this.
"Avarosans, Winter’s Claw, Frostguard, they are the same. They use statues, chains, secrets, to push men down onto their knees. But you… When I look out onto the road, I see your future, Nunu. The joy you will bring to so many, as you have brought me. "
Willump too.
"Here is where even heroes of song would question how they could fight, blades powerless against ancient magic.
But Nunu is no mere hero. He is something better.
He is a boy! "
Willump and Layka both recognize that Nunu can be so much more than a fighter, something that the Freljord is in overwhelming abundance of. He represents peace, an end to violence.
I believe that though Nunus' mom is dead this story will have a happy ending. The cycle of grief is much like the Freljords' cycle of violence in that way: eventually it must turn. Eventually Nunu must accept what happened to his mom and when he does he will turn around and find that even though she is gone forever, he has something new to fill that void. All that running around not realizing that Willump is the closest person to Nunu now. If he hadn't lost her he would never have met him. After realizing that he can use his powers to change the Freljord for good.
What really sells me on this theory is that at the end of Stone Cold even Willump can hear Laykas' song too even though he never met her
Where waters Once roared, Winds whisper To stone. In shadow, Naljaäg lies. SILENCE SINGS HOPE SURVIVES
Silence Sings, Layka is dead/the stone villagers as well, but Hope Survives the Freljord has a new hope in the form of Nunu
