there was a post on reddit about Caldarus talking about the Caldonians and the Aldarians. i posted my response but i wanted to post here too. here's what Caldarus says:
"The Caldosians and the Aldarians are known to share a common ancestral origin. The Caldosians... and the Aldarians. Descendants of those who lived and worshiped here during my time, I am sure of it. And yet, those who would become the Caldosians sailed east to form their empire while the Alda remained to found Aldaria. Why..?"
now, i don't remember much dialogue and i'm going to be relying on what the wiki.gg website had written (which doesn't have a lot of dialogue tbh). but this isn't the first time the Caldosians and Aldarians are mentioned (spoilers below!) (also i've editted this post to add more theorycrafting about the witches!)
here's what i know of the two nations:
both have their own archeology wings, but the Aldarians have TWO sets (Aldarian and Alda sets) while the Caldosians only have one (the Caldosian set)
the Alderians and Alda sets are only found in the west of the map (The Narrows and Sweetwater Farm respectively). the Mines is also located in The Narrows
the Caldosian set is coincidentally only found in the east of the map (The Eastern Road)
the Aldarian and Alda sets are listed separately. i assume Aldaria is the ancient civilization while Alda is more recent (Elsie says that the Alda Feather Pendant is still used in some places in Aldaria)
Caldarus' home/temple is found in the east as well, just north of The Eastern Road. There's also stuff about the Witch Queens (in the Western Ruins, you find the Ancient set). there's been datamined info about the Witch Queens (like furniture) so i assume the game will expand on them in the future
when digging stuff up, we can find swords from both sets, military gauntlets + war banners from the Aldarian set, and breastplates from the Caldosian. naturally, i assume that the two nations had a war, and ancient Mistria was one of the battlefields, possibly before Mistria was named Mistria
Dell comments on the Aldarian sword, asking if it was from the "War of the Lillies). you can also find Statuettes of Caldarus in the Eastern Road, which is a Caldosian artifact
we also see two dragon statues in Mistria: one in our farm, one in the mines. BOTH were broken and forgotten
the one in our farm was hidden behind a tree and the head has fallen off. we had to reattach his head. this is confirmed to be Caldarus' shrine
the one in the mines is broken and remains so. according to Eiland, the statue wasn't there prior to the earthquake. i assume it was hidden behind all the dirt, and the earthquake unearthed the statue. like how the teleport chalice was unearthed when we unlock the Stone Refinery. HOWEVER, we never got confirmation that this is also Caldarus' shrine!
Eiland states that Caldarus is the mythological guardian of Mistria, and that their ancient ancestors used to worship the statues. clearly, the statues haven't been tended to in years. Mistria doesn't know that Caldarus is real, and people in the past didn't either, as Caldarus was still in slumber. it appears Modern day Mistria doesn't worship Caldarus anymore either
from Caldarus' quote, the Caldosians and Aldarians came long after Caldarus' went to sleep. when Caldarus was still active, the two nations were most likely still one nation
my theory of Mistria's and Caldarus' timeline:
long ago, the Caldosians and the Aldarians lived together as one nation. they both worshipped Caldarus while he was still active
Caldarus goes into slumber at least before the "Dark Ages." the seals in the mines play a major part in this, but idk if he went to sleep because of the seals or not
at some point, the Aldarians start worshipping another dragon (we can find Unknown Dragon Statuettes around the map; they have no specific spawn locations). the Caldosians, of course, did not like that and were on Caldarus' side (Statuettes of Caldarus, and they're called the Caldosians lol). this may be how the one nation split into two
they went to war over their worshipped dragons. i assume this is the "War of the Lillies" Dell mentioned
the Caldosians lost, and had to sail east to form their empire, while the Aldarians went on to establish Aldaria
Caldarus remains a small "mythical" dragon that guards Mistria. at least in Alderia, anyway. the Unknown Dragon (or the Alderians' dragon) also gets lost to the ages
because Caldarus was already in slumber before the Caldosians + Alderians, he was not present during the war, but the Dragon Priestess(es?) was. she recorded the past and stored them in Caldarus' temple. how the temple remains untouched idk, but answer is probably magic
Aldaria may not worship any other dragons in present times, because Eiland doesn't recognize the Unknown Dragon Statuettes and neither do we (we are not native Mistrians, after all). i think we'd hear about other dragons if Aldaria still worshipped them (more on the Witch Queens later in the post)
the Deep Woods gets blocked with large, thorny vines at some point after the burial of March + Olric's parents and Hayden's grandma
earthquake happens, weakening the seals and waking up Caldarus from his slumber. weakening the seals also brings the magical essences back into Mistria. it also uncovers the statue in the mines + the seals underground
we move in! who knows why Caldarus chose us to help him.......
as for the Witch Queens + the mines...
the Witches/Witch Queens may have helped the really ancient Alderians in sealing Caldarus' powers. the Alderians may or may not have been involved, but the Witches definitely were because the tablets are written in Witchspeak
Witchspeak was how humans and dragons communicated to one another long, long ago, according to the legends
to unlock the Fire Seal, a Sealing Scroll was needed. upon unlocking the seal, the Sealing scroll ends up draining your character to 0 HP + Stamina, essentially trapping them in place (Dragon Priestess even calls out that it's a trap)
it appears that whoever made the seals did not want the unsealers to proceed to the final seal to restore Caldarus' powers/memories
the Dragon Priestess may be sealed within the depths of the mines as well
the Ancient artifact set is related to the Witch Queens. they are only found in the Western Ruins. there's also a Dragon Priestess statue in that area that we can't go to yet... was the Dragon Priestess a Witch/Witch Queen?
OR... is the Dragon Priestess also a human form of the Alderians' dragon/the Unknown Dragon? because she and Calderus share similar face + arm markings! it may make sense why she wants the seals broken too: she wants her power restored, but is indirectly helping Caldarus. whether she knows this or not, i'm not sure
someone on reddit added an interesting theory saying that the witches BETRAYED the Aldarians by sealing their dragon as well after sealing Caldarus, which i find very interesting and plausible! because of this, Aldarians' dragon/the Unknown Dragon ends up being lost to time. Caldarus at least was an already established guardian long before the Caldosians/Aldarians existed. the Unknown Dragon never got the chance to make its influence
for this, i imagine that the Witch Queens end up influencing Aldaria more than their dragon down the line, because we still have practicing witches in present-day that understands Witchspeak (like Juniper), but there's no mention of modern-day dragon worship as of now
i don't think anyone's gonna read this but! whatever i just really needed to throw this out there. i'm probably wrong but it's fun to theorycraft methinks
So I got to the late Winter Friday Inn events and...
Eiland is a precious chaotic bean. I saw him say this with the smile and flowers and HAD to make a reaction gif out of it. And, to share the fun, here it is for everyone to enjoy.
Background color is matched to Discord btw, and I uploaded it on Tenor as well, so if you give it a day or two, you can find it in the Discord gif search with the codewords "Eiland disaster" ;D
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