#but in away old agartha looks like Adrestia or what it became

[randomnameless]

May I request some headcanons for Nabatea and Agartha, before the mole people went apeshit and tried to kill god?

I'm really sorry,

I really tried my best, but unfortunately I never really thought a lot about Nabateans and Agarthans before the Nuke Wars !

But here goes -

From what we can see in the opening CG (Sothis's FB?) there used to be buildings and skyscrappers like our modern ones. Sothis apparently brought "elevators" with her from her spaceship - wherever she came from - since they are mentionned in the Holy Tomb.

So I guess before the Nuke Wars they'd be pretty advanced, more than what I usually write about/play in terms of background cities - save for maybe Xillia's Elympios, where you are warped from a traditional medieval (albeit with a lot of central asia imagery!) magitech world to a world where people live in buildings and complain about their government and taxes lol

Granted if Sothis brought Nukes, elevators and IA (to make robots!) I suppose Agartha should have make a fucking giganormous jump in time/the technology tree, so maybe they adapted to it quite fast, spent 5k years getting used to it - to the point where they now complain about their taxes - or didn't get used to it, and the second they managed to get their hands on high-end weapons/nukes, they started vaporizing other countries.

Granted, given what Solon says to the Summoner in FEH, I'd rather believe the original Agarthan World - with their shiny Sothis tech - was closer to Elympios, thus to our own, than some sort of steam punk/ultimate technological one.

(in B4 Thales was a random salaryman who filed papers every day, until he decided to join a terrorist group to rule over the world, because his firm wouldn't give him free healthcare)

Now, as for Nabateans...

I'd say the first "city" they lived in - near Sothis's landing site - was still the Oghma Mountains, but it wasn't the Zanado Village we see (in ruins) in the game.

What their first settlement looked like then? In the FB, we see Sothis overlooking a lot of people from a city below, and there's a huge tower behind her - but it's still a desert.

I wouldn't say all those people looking to her were Nabateans, some humans would also be there - maybe the city was fitted with elevators and travel commodities and stuff to accomodate humans? (remember, Rhea can jump 50 meters in one jump, even after her 5 stars resort vacation in Enbarr, so I'm pretty sure Nabateans don't need elevators!).

So as much as I want to copy-paste the fantasy lands of Shangri-La and Shangdu (per Marco P), given the tower and the setting, I was thinking of something more in lines with the “mythic Babylon”, the tower of Babel in the background and the Hanging Gardens etc etc. Pre Nuke Wars, the Nabatean Settlement would be a hub, not of trade, but a site of pilgrimage and where people, humans and nabateans, could freely move in and out, etc etc. 

Sothis would gift her wisdom and tech kind of freely, and everything was well (or so she thought)

Of course it would create "difficulties" with the humans who were busy filling their taxes and wondering about healthcare, because in Nabatean land, people are free to come and go, they can get food for free, water etc etc, without paying taxes or being part of a community/society like Agartha is (tfw Nabateans, with their magic, don't need agrary planification, roadworks, reforms and what not, they plant whatever they want, use magic to make it grow and share the fruits with everyone who wants some. Thales's dental care? A Light Dragon could heal his cavities without needing him to pay any insurance or something).

Nabateans can live more "easily" than humans because they are different and have their magic to help in their daily lives, happens what happens, Nabateans are seen as "superior" to humans and asked to rule, or at least are looked up to.

Agarthans with their complex socio-political (?) organisation see more and more of their people refusing to pay taxes and participate in the life of their city/state to migrate to a land ruled by lizard hippies who can afford to be so generous because their magic is, well, magic. Nabateans are thus, inherently superior to humans, and that's not something that makes people happy - especially humans.

Their first reaction would be to flatten the rest of the world, to display their might and show everyone that no, they're still in the game and are more important - or maybe they can also live as "freely" as Nabateans do, if they have randoms from other cities to work for them (let them be the ones to pay the taxes).

The conflict grows, some people run to the Lizard Hippies for protection, which prompts Agartha to try to nuke them - they want to be the ones on top in Fodlan, and not be subservient to some other party - and here goes.

As for their cultures...

Agartha would be MAGA - and hell bent on making Agartha great again, even if it means they have to flatten other humans to do so, but some people just wanted to live normal lives and when the Agarthan lifestyle was too much for them, they safely ran away to Zanado 1.

After the realisation that Nabateans can do things they do because they have magic and all, some Agarthans would really be obsessed with developping new technologies to finally be "superior" to them (funded by, as you can guess now, lot of taxes). 

Why couldn't they just accept Nabateans were different and leave it at that? 

Because Agartha would have been a very prideful nation, maybe it was the leading one on the continent before Sothis landed, and even if they were the first with whom she exchanged tech - they were at the “top”. Growing jealous at Nabateans who are inherently “stronger” than them causes them to try to gather more and more allies - nuking some in the way - until the Nuke Wars.

For Nabateans in Zanado-1, life was pretty chill, some humans came and asked for their help, they provided and I suppose before humans started to do human things, there used to be several humans living in Zanado-1 (which prompted them to build elevators and all).

There were a lot of humans and half-humans there, still, was Zanado-1 an utopia? Well... I don’t think so. Just like Nabateans aren’t evil because they have pointy ears, I don’t see them “good” because they have pointy ears, they are people, and people can be good or bad regardless of their race.

So, of course, some Nabateans would get cocky and grow arrogant (tfw modesty isn’t Sothis’s forte) and some might see humans as inferior, or things who need their help - obviously, because humans always need help and guidance. Maybe those ones would leave Zanado-1 and try to spread “civilisation” or “help” some other country, and they’d be the ones “revered as gods” the interview mentionned. 

Of course some of them were happy living with humans, and I HC there used to be a lot - well not a crapton but more than 10 - hybrids in Zanado-1, showing that at least, some Nabateans thought humans were fine enough to be “life partners” or to get babies with.

Until the end Sothis wanted to believe in coexistence, and how Nabateans and Humans (and herself!) could live in Fodlan, she even named her last born in the way the most hostile humans - Agarthans - name themselves and tried to raise her as human does, being called “Mother” instead of “Progenitor God” and all.

But things don’t happen like expected, she didn’t foresee how humans from Agartha would resent her because of the imbalance of power between her kind and, well, their own kind and in turn grow fearful, or how her attempts to “help” would be seen as scorn instead, from a being who flaunts her power over powerless people.

Morale of the story?

Uh... a lot of power imbalance creates resentment and fear? Maybe the Nabateans should have tried to adapt their lifestyle to the one humans had, or not provide a free utopia to everyone who asked, idk.

The playable (lel) Nabateans wouldn’t have lived long in Zanado-1, Cichol would maybe have been a tad bit younger than current Flayn, and Rhea would have been somewhere like as old as a kid who entered elementary school a few months ago and still needs a plushie to sleep when the first Nukes were launched.

As a result, Rhea wouldn’t remember well Zanado-1 - but she remembers hiding in what would become the Holy Tomb to hide from the “flashing lights” outside, but Cichol would remember it better as pre-teen (maybe that’s where he got his tendency to give lectures, he saw older brothers giving lectures and providing advices and counselling to humans who asked?), Indech would have been part of the forces Sothis had with her to fight against the Agarthans while Macuil would be at that age where he is in his dinosaurs phase, save that dinosaurs was “magic”, and he never grew out of it.

Macuil would remember Zanado-1, only because it was the place where he was supposed to do a lot of “magic” and learnt how to do it and how it was his kind’s gift from the Progenitor God (cf magic meta) but then humans turned it against them, and they suck.

(Then Zanado-2 happens and he’s pretty sure they’re ultra sucky).

[jtavington]

Crimson Wind: Sacrifice

TW: character death

They came to the circular chamber. The stone here was old, intricately carved in a style that hadn't been popular in either the Empire or the Kingdom for over a thousand years. Weapons and armor that were crude by current standards but looked as if they had been forged yesterday stood sentinel. Magic thrummed through the dead air and made her hair stand on end. Blood red stones, more than Edelgard had seen in one place outside the Holy Tomb. They seemed to call to her, to the blood that had been forced on her. Whispering of power and secrets. Only take us, they seemed to say, and you will have the power to make your dreams come true.

"You feel it too, do you not?" Ferdinand whispered. "There is power enough in this place to destroy all of Fodlan.”

"What are you guys talking about?" Caspar asked, a little too loudly. "Or is this one of those moments that I should be glad that I don't have a Crest?"

Edelgard stared at the light, entranced. This power made monsters of men, both literally and figuratively. Thales had used them to turn the condemned of Adrestia into fodder for her war, and the nobles bred humans like livestock to use them to their full potential. Dark power, but power all the same. She had been ready to wield it, not through Aymr but through her very body. Fatigue invaded every inch of her, but even one of those stones would allow her to have strength enough to take on all the forces Agartha could muster and more. Soldiers wouldn't be butchered as they had today. She cpuld protect them, protect Byleth.

If she didn't became another shrieking beast.

Ferdinand tore his gaze away. “Well, we seem to have beaten our enemy here, at any rate. But I confess that I am a loss as to what to do with these.”

“Destroy them.” That was what she had meant to do at the Holy Tomb, before Byleth had taken back most of the stones and Metodey had scurried off with the rest. The church and the Agarthans had fought  over them for centuries and they had only been tools of oppression against humanity. Break them and ordinary mortals would find strength.

Strength to turn the fields red with blood.

The sound of footsteps filled the corridor behind them. Caspar and Ferdinand looked at each other and then at her, their faces almost skeletal with exhaustion but resolute all the same. "Edelgard, destroy the stones,” Ferdinand said. “We'll hold them off and buy you time.”

"What?" Edelgard's own exhaustion must have been playing tricks with her mind. "You'll be killed."

"Probably." Caspar shrugged. "But if we don't destroy those stones, then a lot more people are going to die. Including Byleth.”

He was right. This great learn and her chest told her that much. There was a time she would have sent them to their deaths without so much as an eyeblink. But now... Dorothea's, Bernadetta's, Hubert's voices, all those who had died for her dream, swirled around her, yet more ghosts. She could not bear to add to their number. "I'll be the last of the Black Eagles. You can't.”

"I fear we must," Ferdinand said with a half-smile. "I know you do not care for such things, but I believe that I was wrong about you. You are a noble and not a tyrant after all. It has been an honor. "

Edelgard's vision blurred with tears and she moved hastily to wipe them away. It would not do for them to see her cry, not now. "An honor to fight alongside both of you for what was truly right. Your sacrifices won’t be in vain.”

"Then come, Caspar!” Ferdinand said with a little of the old brightness. "Let's show these ruffians what a true noble is made of."

They ran down the corridor, their shouts mingled with the clang of steel on steel. Edelgard turned on shaking legs back to the Crest Stones. Those thrice-cursed Crest Stones. Her classmates, her...friends were out there dying because of Thales and Cornelia's insanity. And she was permitting it because she wasn't strong enough. Just like Dorothea and Petra. She was tired of people dying because of her weakness.

The Crest Stones glinted. She had been ready to transform herself for ambition, once. If she could keep this from ever happening again... The sounds of battle grew fainter and then died away entirely. Her ears strained in the silence, waiting for Ferdinand and Caspar's victory shouts and for the miracles that had happened so many times.

But the silence stretched on. Edelgard grabbed the smallest stone and shoved it in her pocket. Then, with a last scream she sent a fireball at the rest and vanished as the flames consumed the last of those blighted rocks that had existed too far beyond their time. The remaining stone seemed to burn as well, searing hot even through fur and wool. But it was nothing compared to what she had already endured.

And, if the day ever came that it was Byleth in danger, endure it she would. She owed the dead that much.