Someone in one of my Discord servers is starting up the ARR Sahagin Beast Tribe quests, which got me to thinking how much I love WoL’s unexpected Fish Dad, Clutchfather Novv. And then it suddenly hit me about his horrible, villainous history which is a focal point for the Sahagin quests, and how Novv is seen and treated by the story, characters, and players, compared to other characters with unsavory or villainous pasts. Spoilers for various side and main story quests and characters.
We’re meant to like and sympathize with Novv, whose first action in game is to save a hyur child and return him to his mother after the clutch helps a foundering ship. We know Novv just wants a peaceful place to raise his clutch, and see that all his children are under the age of 15. We know he clashes with the current leader of the local Sahagin, who is a war leader coordinating raiding parties and causing trouble for the Maelstrom. Later, after Novv scares the scales off some of those younger enemy Sahagin, we get the full story: he was a feared reaver in his youth known as the Scarlet Sea Devil, leader of the Coral Tridents, a holy terror against Limsa and any other shorewalkers unfortunate enough to get near him.
“Pillage, slaughter, kidnapping─there was no foul deed I did not commit.”
Until the day the Limsans found his clutch and destroyed it, killing most of his children in retaliation for his actions. The children he cares for now are the few survivors and a handful of younger sons born since. The enemy war leader is a surviving elder son who can’t understand why Novv turned his back on his violent past, especially after what happened to their family.
Novv as we meet him in the present day is a good man wanting a peaceful and safe life for his family, to stop his son and show him a better path, and who genuinely comes to care about the WoL and claims them as a clutchmember, calling the WoL his child. The ARR Allied tribes even start with the villain injuring Novv and him begging WoL to “save your brother” in another sympathetic measure. We’re meant to care about what happens to Novv (also cheering when he does break out the badass fighting skills, like at the climax of the Allied quests)--regardless of the heinous actions of his past.
There’s a contrast here to characters like Captain Jifuya from the Stormblood patch MSQ. Jifuya is a respected captain of the Doman Liberation Front, though we don’t meet or see him until he’s relevant to the story (another error, I think, in how this story is presented). As we bring in the amnesiac Yotsuyu, Jifuya suddenly vanishes. Chasing him down, he reveals he rabbited out of panic and shame—he had been Yotsuyu’s pimp, the man Asahi sold her to once her husband died. Jifuya is an unknown to us as players; many are immediately revolted in learning he was one of the abusers responsible for shaping Yotsuyu into a monster, one of the abusers who treated her like property and not a person. He controlled her life and sold her body for others’ pleasure.
Yet Hien calls him “a man of courage.” A good soldier, respected, fighting to free his country. He reassigns the captain elsewhere. We have no basis for who this guy is except for Hien’s word. All we know is Jifuya did some terrible things in his past, things he apparently gave no consideration to now—until suddenly confronted by the reality of it, and it made him run rather than face it, but it’s OK because our friend says Jifuya’s a good guy now.
If we’re meant to sympathize with Jifuya, it’s handled poorly in my opinion. If he had been a character met in 4.0, a leader of the local troops we interacted with as we tried to free Doma, how would the reaction have gone? Would we agree with Hien that Jifuya is a changed man and deserves a chance to make things right, that we “can’t judge him” for those past wrongs? Would we then be allowed to point out that if the captain can change than so can Yotsuyu, given this new chance to be shown a kinder way of life?
The clumsiness of the courtesan story aside, it rubs me the wrong way that both Yotsuyu and the elezen scientist who created Black Rose are without memory of their actions, mentally incapable of comprehension anymore, yet still treated as reviled monsters deserving punishment. Meanwhile others like Jifuya, who took no responsibility for his sins until forced to, are given passes by the narrative. Many players, however, don’t give Jifuya that same pass, as we’re not given reason enough by the story to care about who he is now versus who he was then. We don’t interact with Jifuya as a villain (the way we do with Yotsuyu’s parents and brother), but he exists in a similar narrative space as Novv in regards to his history versus present, how it shaped him, and how it affects him now. But we don’t know Jifuya, so he doesn’t get the sympathy and care Novv developed before we learned of the hellion he had been and that the Sahagin storyline was itself a result of his own past, the way Yotsuyu is a result (in part) of Jifuya’s past actions.
Which then brings us to characters like Gaius, a character who was an active enemy in 1.0 and 2.0, whose actions are seen and felt by Ala Mhigans throughout ARR and Stormblood especially who dealt with the abuse of his soldiers. Who took Ala Mhigan children like Fordola and shaped them into soldiers for the Empire, raising them up on propaganda. Who took in Werlyt children orphaned by plague and war and raised them into Good Imperial Soldiers, too. Whatever the heck was going on with Livia. How he treated Nero and Cid. And on and on.
We’re meant to hate 1.0/ARR Gaius as a villain for all these reasons (and a few more I’ve not even gotten to). As an antagonist, he’s an objectively terrible person promoting a fascist colonist agenda he firmly believes is for the best to bring order and prosperity to the world.
Then the Praetorium happens. He realizes he’s been suckered. He crawls out, meets non-imperials and starts seeing how other people live. Learns the truth (somehow) about his beloved Emperor Solus and the origins of the empire he fought and gave so much for, believed in so strongly.
The Gaius the WoL meets in the Burn is not the same man fought in the Praetorium. Confronted with how thoroughly he had been duped by a lifetime of lies and propaganda himself, he works to make amends. He knows he committed a lot of sins, knows he spilled a lot of blood, and is committed to cleaning up his messes. He sometimes feels like the only person in the Werlyt story who remembers his own sins, with the occasional bone thrown by folks like M’naago and Valens, but Gaius also isn’t looking for forgiveness so much as just…changing who he was, and what he does going forward with his new understanding of the world.
Not unlike Novv.
Yet there are those who refuse to see Gaius as anything other than an enemy, because we’ve actively dealt with him as an enemy. We’ve seen the results of his rule over Ala Mhigo and those wounds are fresher, not in the past, not told to us through a narrative that immediately set him up to be sympathetic, as Novv’s did. If we had only met Gaius in Werlyt, had only been told of his past and only seen a man looking to correct the errors of his history and prevent repetition of those horrors and mistakes—would we feel differently about him? More like Fish Dad?
(And this is setting aside colorism issues where many of Gaius’ fans from his fascist villain days went silent when he was reintroduced, or those players now who perform all sorts of contortion to justify accepting and enjoying other active villains, like the Galvus family or many of the Ascians, while continuing to condemn Gaius for his past actions)
Anyway. How the narrative presents these characters, and many others in between who have been villains/antagonists in their past or during the game and perhaps have changed or been introduced in a specific way really affects player perception and reaction, and is something to be mindful of when talking about characters we love and why and how, and who is “deserving” of redemption or not, and their roles in the story and what they can teach not only our characters but us as players.
I wanted to draw older Novv, I was really happy with how I got her back and legs to look, the colour and design is a pretty good mix of fawn/deer and tree. It's not perfect but I'm happy. Xx what do you think? I'm planning on doing sept and decc next x
Do you know the beastnoch triples from @kanrix blog? I know it may be a weird request but can you please draw them in the au where beast has a town and enoch is the lutous gardener? You don't have to draw it If you don't want to x I really like your work btw x
I do know them!
Ask and you shall receive!
So, the Lotus Gardner AU doesn’t really change designs all that much, its about changing dynamics and there aren’t a ton of design changes. The person who changes the most is Enoch, so it would be the triplet’s aspects in relation to Enoch that would see the most change.
First, everyone would constantly be in bloom, Enoch is a lot more obvious about his Harvest Lord capabilities and all three triplets would constantly be blooming lotuses. Enoch also doesn’t really have the maypole skin on the same level, but I didn’t want to take away Novv’s ribbons because I couldn’t think of replacements for her to use as arms.
Their biggest change would probably be in behavior, that being, they’d be a lot... I don’t know if meaner is the word, but more malicious. Enoch is decidedly a very mellow character, and in the Lotus Gardener AU he’s much less of one, meaning, the kids would probably bully the Beast. A lot.
“Your presssence is as welcome as ever, daughter,” Novv said fondly while looking over glimmering shells Seww had brought up from the depths. “We have been approached by Maelssstrom officers about engaging with our fellow sahagin to bring peace. I am proud of the work you and yours have done to make this possssible.” He looked up, watching over his various young sons playing and working on their small rocky shore.
Aeryn nodded, smiling as she also watched the younger clutchbrothers.
“Here are the supplies you asssked about before,” Novv continued, gesturing to a few sacks. “Hopefully your allies will find them of use.” He shook his head in remaining disbelief. “Sahagin on another world, so sssimilar and yet different.”
“Thank you, clutchfather,” Aeryn said. “I hope this helps too; I don’t know when the waters will return for them. I’m afraid we did them great harm in our effort to find our enemy.”
“Better to adapt than to stop exisssting entire,” Novv said. “You will do right by these dissstant cousins.” His frills flexed in a way similar to a smile, needing to say no more.
Aeryn blushed and took the supplies. Novv was soon distracted by Houu and a matter of training the younger brothers, leaving Aeryn to pause and look out over the sea as it stretched past the barrier reefs and beaches of Halfstone.
The waves hushing against the shore were easy to tune out, unless one listened to them; then it was all she could hear, the rest of the clutch fading into the background. She thought of the gleaming shells brought back from the deep and not for the first time wondered.
Wondered if she could take an elbst or manta ray and dive further and further from Vylbrand’s coast, into the darker depths where the sun’s beams did not pierce the water. Where light came from the flora and fauna, some of it deceptive in its strangeness and size, dangerous to mere surface dwellers.
Wondered if, in a place somewhat similar to the Ondo’s home, she would find remnants of ancient buildings. Impossible spires, grand arches, unbroken glass. The silt and detritus might have buried most of them, but something, something had to remain…
Another version of Anamnesis Anyder? One with records that did not falter?
Were there answers, malms below the Indigo Deep?
Or, as in the Tempest in the First, were there only more questions?
She thought again of asking Novv about swimming farther and deeper; he had so far declined, concerned about other sahagin nearer the Indigo City, realm of the Queen, and how they would react to a hyur who now breathed water like a fish. He was disturbed by the distances she spoke of, the questions she had. While he claimed to have seen nothing resembling the buildings she described and drew, she found him harder to read than most, and so often debated with herself if that was true. Or were those possible remnants further down, more deeply buried?
She realized there would not be an island of air created by a fae whale, nor a shadowy city filled with ghostly memories and the nearly perceptible memory of music and voices. A mirage that made her ache in an almost homesick way, for a place she had never known, a person she had never been—yet knew, somehow. She irrationally hoped that if a sliver of that individual remained somewhere in the Lifestream, they watched and were at least somewhat proud of her.
As the sun slipped lower, the glow on the water reminded her of that strange space between where Minfilia had waited to rejoin with Ryne, though soon enough the light would fade to shadows. The waves lapped at her boots as the tide rolled in, the steady sound of their motion like breathing, or a heartbeat. Aeryn thought, not for the first time, that she could almost—
“Aeryn!” One of the youngest boys ran up to her, webbed feet slapping the wet turf loudly, followed by two of his clutchmates. “Pahh sssaid we can play with the new elbssst hatchlings! You should come too! Pleassse?!”
The moment had passed, and she shook it off with a laugh, letting the young sahagin pull her along to join in their games.
The mysteries of the ancient past would wait another day. The reality of the here and now had far more pressing demands—like playing big sister to a group of excited little boys getting to pick their own elbsts.
She was at least certain the ghost of her former self wouldn’t mind that.
