Fire Emblem

[SirGauoftheSquareTable]

I believe it is basically implied by Dedue x Mercedes support in BL route. He explained to her about how the Duscur ppl worship different gods and invoke their blessings in different locations. And in their viewpoint, Sothis is part of a pantheon in which she represents war (which references the star Sirius being the symbol of war in some RL faith), thus they pray for her in times of war. So the Duscur people more or less knew about the very old version of the Sothis religion prior to Rhea coming in to retcon it into a monotheistic religion.

Considering there are a lot of references and parallels to Christianity for the Church of Seiros, such as Sothis speaks like God words from the Bible in some of her lines but was discarded in the Eng dub, the holy grail, the whole blood thing, Seiros being a Jesus-like figure, the sword of the creator in JP used the kanji for God and Sothis' weapon in FEH being called "God's Surge" in JP...Yes I believe it is like you said, Sothis went through a similar status shift like YHVH after her death, probably right when Rhea started her vengeance, then solidified the new version of the religion as she changed history and built the church at Garreg Mach.


I've yet to see the JP quote for that, but just base on the Eng translation alone, I believe that someone (probably the Nabateans who are about to go to war with the Agarthans) awakened Sothis and she joined the dispute.

From what I understood, the frame with prime Sothis in the beginning of the game is her standing in Thinis, and iirc prior to that we saw some explosions or a meteor falling. So it might be that was her memory of arriving in 3house planet from that meteor, and her landing place was Thinis. Then the Agarthans of Thinis had cultural exchange and such with her, coexisted for sometime until she went to sleep, and the Nabateans began to spread and rule all of Fodlan in her absence, thus they are the Old Gods. There might be some nasty dragons among the Nabateans who people wanted gone, so the Agarthans launched the propaganda campaign to raise awareness.

It sounds like the Nabateans asked mommy to help by "resurrecting" her, going by that description. Thus Sothis awakened (probably she was sleeping, kinda like Tiki in prev entries maybe, or if she was indeed evil that would be like Medeus lol) and obviously she is on her children's side. Then she dropped an Old Testament great flood on the world (makes senses considering Sirius is ancient Egyptian's way to detect the flood cycle of the Nile) and wiped the 4 lands they listed. To the Agarthans, she was basically SMT YHVH and the new humans who lived after her world reset are lowly beasts, thus they must destroy the remaining dragons and claim their "salvation".

A prequel focusing on this Agarthans vs Nabateans beef would be great...

I honestly thought the people of Duscur just imported her as a war god due to the aggressiveness of their neighbors in Faerghus, but that also makes sense. The real question is what the relationship between the Nabatean Pantheon and those who were chilling at Zanado was.

Also, I was under the impression that Sothis only went to sleep AFTER wiping out the Agarthans, and that the current humans of Fodlan are also survivors that were sheltered by Sothis and the Nabateans, who then repopulated the continent as Sothis restored it. That, or people could have come from other lands to repopulate a deserted Fodlan, like Sreng, Duscur, Morphis, Albinea, or even Almyra.

[Lily Emilio]

The real question is what the relationship between the Nabatean Pantheon and those who were chilling at Zanado was.

Also, I was under the impression that Sothis only went to sleep AFTER wiping out the Agarthans, and that the current humans of Fodlan are also survivors that were sheltered by Sothis and the Nabateans, who then repopulated the continent as Sothis restored it. That, or people could have come from other lands to repopulate a deserted Fodlan, like Sreng, Duscur, Morphis, Albinea, or even Almyra.

Took me some time but I finally got my hands on the original JP text. I've also read some of the discussions of JP fans as well and I've seen some interesting speculations. One of such speculations being that the Nabateans at Zanado are a mix of survivors of the war vs Agarthans (probably some humans were also included) and new dragons created by Sothis to repopulate the race, with Rhea being the final one she created before going into eternal slumber. Basically the idea is, the Agarthans been killing dragons to obtain power (as the interview mentioned), and the amount of dragons drastically reduced. So, similar to the dragons in prev titles who were losing to humans during the Scouring and had to ask the Divine Dragons for help (but the Divine Dragon refused so they later kidnapped Idunn), the surviving Nabateans at that point awakened Sothis from her sleep to help them. Great Flood happened and all were wiped out.

And yes it is indeed said in both the original JP and the Eng translation that "the False God is awakening in the land of the Old God(s), Thinis". Basically Sothis was indeed sleeping for some unknown reason prior to this apocalyptic event. Then she awakened from her slumber and joined the war with her children. THEN after this war she exhausted all power and went to sleep again. So perhaps her first sleep was either due to some similar reason, or she just decided to sleep cuz that's the meme. Also the book has this mention of a "gigantic monstrosity" (異形の巨躯) which I believe refers to Sothis's dragon form. One theory I've read said that perhaps the Old God (or God(s), it's unclear) was Sothis (in human form) and the False God was also Sothis, but dragon form (maybe even a First Dragon looking like Anankos so they freaked out?) just like how The Immaculate One is assumed to be something separate from Seiros/Rhea. Sothis probably changed into to her dragon form and wiped out the world during that war, and whoever wrote the book just reported what they saw.

[SirGauoftheSquareTable]

Man, Sothis is truly unfathomably old. Also, a Scouring type situation does make a certain amount of sense, though I don't think it absolves the Agarthans of all that much blame. Also, thanks for all this clarification.

Anywho, I honestly theorize Sothis is either a First Dragon or an Astral Dragon because she's able to attack with what seems to be the concept of Sirius. In addition, I've always interpreted Sothis as coming from another Realm and not necessarily from outer space.

[Lily Emilio]

The First Dragon theory I've read is based on the term they used btw. Sothis is the Progenitor God, or Divine Ancestor (神祖) for the Nabateans, while First Dragon is 神祖竜 - Divine Ancestor Dragon, literally just add the kanji "dragon" at the end.

[SirGauoftheSquareTable]

Oh wow. Even more proof. Also, her soul astralized, which is something that the other First Dragons sans Anankos were also able to do.

[LegalLoliLover]

Given that Dimitri's and El's mother is strongly implied to be an Agarthan, she should have been the Shambhala boss in CF.

[SirGauoftheSquareTable]

I don't think Anselma/Patricia was a real Agarthan, just a noblewoman duped into thinking Lambert was keeping her child away from her and whose brother was killed and replaced right under her nose. I always headcanoned that they killed her not long after Duscur because she's way more useful dead than alive.

Additionally, with the way Arundel's enemy screen looks, I now have a body-swapping Touko Aozaki-like Thales headcanon, in that he is basically a floating consciousness with a few backup bodies, and he decided to inhabit the corpse of Arundel in order to act as him. There are definite holes in this theory, but still...

[Aozaki-desu]

Patricia definitely wasnt replaced, it would be pointless as she had no power
she was probably killed during the tragedy, it was just arranged that she was a traitor to fuck with dimitri

[SirGauoftheSquareTable]

I think she was quietly killed soon after the Tragedy, but all evidence present points to her surviving the massacre proper.

[LegalLoliLover]

I don't think Anselma/Patricia was a real Agarthan, just a noblewoman duped into thinking Lambert was keeping her child away from her and whose brother was killed and replaced right under her nose. I always headcanoned that they killed her not long after Duscur because she's way more useful dead than alive.

Additionally, with the way Arundel's enemy screen looks, I now have a body-swapping Touko Aozaki-like Thales headcanon, in that he is basically a floating consciousness with a few backup bodies, and he decided to inhabit the corpse of Arundel in order to act as him. There are definite holes in this theory, but still...

If you're going with that logic, then have Thales possess Sitri's corpse, like Surtr possessing Sinmara's corpse in Venus Blood Frontier. Conveniently, Sitri's corpse is shown to be preserved in the Cindered Shadows side story but is not a plot device in the main story.

I think she was quietly killed soon after the Tragedy, but all evidence present points to her surviving the massacre proper.

So either red herring or a Stephen King-style broken plot branch?

[SirGauoftheSquareTable]

If you're going with that logic, then have Thales possess Sitri's corpse, like Surtr possessing Sinmara's corpse in Venus Blood Frontier. Conveniently, Sitri's corpse is shown to be preserved in the Cindered Shadows side story but is not a plot device in the main story.

So either red herring or a Stephen King-style broken plot branch?

Thales possessing Sitri's corpse makes no sense both in the context of his overarching goal at the time of subverting the Adrestian Empire and the Holy Kingdom of Faerghus, which Arundel post-1174 was pivotal in achieving, and because I don't think he was even aware of her existence until it either no longer mattered or he never found out. I mean, the Agarthans were seemingly not aware that Seiros was alive and well, and I don't think they ever figured out the truth of Byleth independently. Rhea definitely still had a few secrets on them.

Also, I'm going with broken plot branch because Patricia alive leads to too many potential complications in their plans for Edelgard and Dimitri.

[asterism42]

I've seen theories that Patricia is the veiled woman in the Abyss

[SirGauoftheSquareTable]

Said veiled woman has a notable accent though, as if she were from Brigid, and the woman mentions her mother, not a daughter.

- - - Updated - - -

Unless of course, the accent is different in Japanese and doesn't mean anything.

[SirGauoftheSquareTable]

Yaknow, I just had this thought, but draconic degeneration as it is portrayed/used in most games in the series borrows a few elements from Classical Manicheism. I mean, draconic degeneration appears to be primarily a flaw of the body, thus making the body a source of animal corruption, while the soul is usually intact, maintains the intellect, and is freed upon the death of the body. For example, take Mila and Duma, both of whom degenerated physically, thus warping their sanities, but upon the deaths of their physical bodies, their souls spoke to Alm and Celica, repentant for what their embodied selves had done, and their souls even ascended to "rest". The First Dragons get even more Manichean, since their solution to degeneration was to literally astralize and have their souls ascend, which resemble the goals of Manicheans/Gnostics as shown in the writings of Irenaeus of Lyon. Anankos, who couldn't do this, actually split himself into his body and soul, with the latter retaining his goodness while the former descended further into insanity and animal corruption. I don't think this neatly applies to the Nabateans, but even in the case of Sothis, her soul and body are almost discrete entities.

Heck, if we're getting into dualism in FE, let's talk about Ashera and Yune. Both of them are the closest we get to an actual God of Good vs God of Evil struggle, though the dividing line is Order vs Chaos instead, and the script is flipped so that the traditional "Dark God" is in fact the God of Good, so to speak.

[LegalLoliLover]

Dark God being the Good God always makes things interesting, like how the God of Chaos in the Elder Scrolls series created the God of Ambition, who initially made humans to do his bidding. In other words, the God of Chaos is the creator (of the creator) of humanity. Going back to FE, I'll assume that it's just a coincidence that Manichean sounds like Manakete. As for Sothis, how much of that is "with body vs. no body" as opposed to "with memories vs. no memories"?

[SirGauoftheSquareTable]

It is most probably a coincidence that Manichean sounds like manakete. As for Sothis, I find the body vs no body to be linked to the question of memories vs no memories because the Sothis that was brought back by Rhea was incomplete in body and spirit, though I'm not sure. Besides, Rhea even states in Cindered Shadows that even though the Goddess' body died, Her soul remains eternally, and in Heroes, Sothis states that this whole experience feels like a dream, meaning little girl Sothis is essentially a projection of her slumbering soul akin to a bunrei. Sothis is honestly really screwy.

[LegalLoliLover]

So a bunrei is essentially the opposite of a sensory (using Dies Irae vocabulary https://shinzabansho.fandom.com/wiki/Sensory)? Heh, convenient coincidence that I learned these 2 complementary terms nearly back to back.

[LegalLoliLover]

The primary weakness to all non-CF routes appears to be the developers wanting to minimize variable cutscenes. That's why we have El's death scene in VW, which makes a lot more sense in SS. Similarly, we have El and Byleth meeting at Garreg Mach in SS, yet El not sending the entire Imperial army there to clear the place of rebels (Randolph's 1 unlucky patrol group doesn't count for this). Of course, this does fit her character in that she is often kind to a fault, such as actually meeting with Dimitri in good faith at the end of AM (compare her actions with those of Cao Cao to Yuan Shao or Loki Muspelheim to Freya).

[SirGauoftheSquareTable]

But then CF has next to no cutscenes at all. Stan all you want, but this is the truth. That being said, I do admit that El's death cutscene in VW/SS fits the latter more.

[LegalLoliLover]

See, when you play enough VNs and RPGs with a lot of VN cutscenes, such as Venusblood Frontier, you become a lot less sensitive to this. Event CGs are more than enough. Similarly, CF has the most choices where you can essentially spare everyone, save for the 2 people who think that they can talk to dead people. Of course, AM was supposed to have an event where Felix and Annette join the Empire, due to Dimitri being too crazy, but that didn't end up in the final game either: