Interesting. I had noticed this in the game's skybox before, but I didn't know what to make of it, so I didn't comment on it. According to the webcomic, this is Celestial, the "abode of the gods".
Barbatos/Venti has been wearing the same outfit for 100 years.
Seems like the lake that Mondstadt is in is canonically supposed to be Great Lakes huge, since you can't see the shore on the other side.
Barbatos founded Mondstadt thousands of years ago. So I'm guessing that the setting is between 5,000-10,000 years old or so.
Mondstadt has a commercial district.
Apparently silver is rare, so Venti barters his performance for apples. I'm guessing that Mondstadt doesn't have any silver mines within its territory, and thus has to rely on foreign silver coins? BTW, what's the deal with currency in Teyvat? Apparently Mora is a universally accepted coin. Who mints Mora? Are there mints in all seven kingdoms? Have they all agreed to mint Mora with the same percentage of gold/silver/whatever? How do people from one kingdom trust the Mora of another kingdom? Do they weigh Mora for every transaction?
Venti seems to be a lazy hypocrite, singing songs criticizing the gods for abandoning their people... when he too waltzed off after founding Mondstadt thousands of years ago.
We get a look into one of the ancient traditions of a Mondstadt festival, and how over time it changed. At the beginning of the festival, a girl is supposed to throw a ball into a crowd, and the young man who catches it will receive good luck. Lemme guess; it has become a sign of bethrothal/engagement? And Venti is going to screw things up by catching the ball that the groom was supposed to catch?
Yup.
Oh... that wasn't wholesome like I was expecting it would be. The prince picks a girl to throw a ball... and then he takes her home and rapes her.
The statue in front of the cathedral is supposed to be Venessa. Since it was there before Venessa became renowned.
The nobles are cartoonishly evil.
Venessa was the Liontooth Knight? But those are two different Winds, though.
We are introduced to a new race/ethnicity/culture of people: the Muratan. They are a hardy, red haired people who live near volcanoes to the West. Are the the chosen people of the goddess of Pyro? Apparently an entire Muratan clan was taken captive as slaves (either captured by Mondstadt, or captured by another kingdom and sold to Mondstadt), so it looks like the Muratan were losing 100 years ago. Hm... typically a god of fire tends to be associated with war. So either the god of the Muratan isn't a god of war, or he is and the Muratan are trying to wage a war on multiple fronts and are losing?
Oh, nevermind. The Lady of Fire is also known as the Lady of War. So yeah, I'm guessing they antagonized/fought everyone and lost.
The Muratan eventually became nomadic plains nomads scavenging for food.
Great heroes are chosen by the gods, and then they are uplifted to live with the gods in Celestia, and the heroes become immortal. Hm... I wonder if those heroes become gods too?
Venessa seems to be a Kargath Bladefist situation where she is promised her people freedom if she kills enough guys in the gladiator pit. I'm guessing she's going to kill the last guy... and then find out it was all a lie.
The lords shove Venessa out Mondstadt's walls... and then the evil dragon army is literally right there about to eat there. Um... why didn't the evil dragon just wreck Mondstadt then? It's so huge that it could easily smash through the walls with its body weight, and there are dragons in the army that can fly over the walls anyway. Mondstadt should have been screwed.
Why are the commoners rioting over Venessa being shoved out the gate? What, was she popular among the commoners? Did she spend enough time socializing with them to become respected by them?
Is that a flying Chilihurl?
Goodness gracious, Venti's old outfit is um... it's a thing.
(Don't look! Ye be scarred for life! Ye have been warned!)
(It's hard to take the story seriously when you have Venti and Venessa dressed like that. Way to get the climax guys!).
So contrary to what the game says, Venessa wasn't actually a great hero who liberated Mondstadt. She was crying in the dirt while Venti strummed his lyre and hypnotized the evil dragon army into withdrawing. Some great venerated hero she is, certainly worth hailing as "one of the Four Winds of Mondstadt"! Maybe she became a great hero later in life. Also, why did she even stay in Mondstadt? Wouldn't she have such bad memories that she would want to leave with her clan and head back towards their homeland? If they did stay, then has Muratan blood mixed in with the people of Mondstadt? There doesn't seem to a separate sub culture or minority visible within Mondstadt in the present day, at least not in the game. I think Diluc is the only red haired person in all of Mondstadt.
Venti says she went to Celestia when she died, so maybe we will see her ingame when we eventually go there.
Venti starts quoting real world mythology. I'm not sure whether or not this is supposed to be canon. From my little familiarity with Chinese culture, it is very common to use metaphors or allusions to stories and fables and other works.
The metaphor Venti uses talks about the gods sacrifcing one of their own, and using his dead body as materials to create the mortal world. Hm...
Wait, Venessa reincarnated as a bird? What?
We now move to the present day, shortly before the events of the game.
A new organization is introduced: the
Fatuus. (it's a type: it's Fatui). They have underground gladiator fights to the death for... research. They're going to Mondstadt to kidnap more test subjects. The head scientist is Il Dotorre, and he's now being hyped up as the person who slew Ursa the Drake a few years ago.
Mondstadt seems to be abbreviated as Mond.
Apparently there is still an aristocracy in present day Mondstadt. Diluc hosts a party at his house. His mansion in the webocomic is MASSIVE! Like the main ball room is as tall as a cathedral. Nowhere near as small as the rather comparartively humble estate we see in game.
"Ordo Favonius"? (Ah, it's just latin for "Order of Favonius").
Kaeya is also a quartermaster of the Knights (in addition to being their Cavalry captain? How understaffed are the Knights?)
Ah, the Fatuu was a typo. They are the Fatui. I'm starting to think that the people who localized the comic are not the same people who localized the game.
"Every city on this continent has agreed to accept protection offered by the Fatui"... except Mondstadt, which is why they have a "diplomatic delegation" in Mondstadt in the game.
Mondstadt has "a small population", I'm guessing that the other nations are canonically larger?
The Fatui want to recruit (or draft) new members from the population of Mondstadt. Not sure how that'd be possible when Kaeya literally just said that there aren't enough able bodied people in the nation to fill the Knights. The children Fatui take never return. Why are they still tolerated by the nations, then?
Diluc's father was killed? And Diluc was a Knight of Favonius? I'm guessing Diluc found out his dad was actually apart of the Fatui or something?
I don't understand how the Fatui can act like they have clout. They are obviously evil and everybody who knows it. Why don't the nations just say "piss off you child kidnappers"? It's not like a threat of violence actually means anything. Snezhnaya is one nation, outnumbered 6 to 1. If Snezhnaya were to try to invade, everyone else could dogpile them. Ask Germany how well their invasions went when they antagonized literally every other nation in Europe (and America).
I'm reading the comments, and, yeah, the webcomic too is incoherent unless you've played the game. It feels bizzare that you need to have both played the game and read the webcomic to understand what's going on.
Diluc dons his batman outfit. He has a black cloak and a beaked mask, and he throws knives and wields a chain.
"That vision you're wearing" is he referring to the red jewel thing on Diluc's hand?
Ah, so that is what a vision is. It's a magical orb that bestows power to the wielder, gifted to mortals by the gods. Diluc's vision is unique in that it doesn't appear to have the fire goddess's sigil on it (while Amber's does). Maybe it was artificially created? I don't think Diluc was chosen by the fire goddess.
Awww Kaeya and Diluc are actually really close bros!
That's a really cool ability. A Fatui test subject set fire to a wagon. The wagon is on black fire, and the smoke from the black fire turns into a smokey snake, and as more of the wagon burns and more smoke is generated, the larger the snake summon becomes. Kaeya says that it's not a vision power, so I'm guessing that the Fatui scientist is trying to artificially created superpowers without the involvement of the gods?
Amber is seems to be the rookie new girl, desperate to help. Kaeya has nothing against Amber; he's just used to getting things with Diluc.
Diluc got the vision at 10 and became a Knight captain at 14. Then when he was 18, he killed his dad and quit the knights. And now he's acting like he's retired. (lol, this is reaching
Randy Orlando levels of silly, but, okay. Anime. Don't think too hard about it!). Also, HE KILLED HIS DAD? What? Why isn't this important backstory in the game?
We are introduced to a "seer" who seems to round up kids who have been "touched by the Deev", apparently that means the kids were rejected by the gods? How does that make them different from 99% of normal people who just don't get a vision?
Il Dotorre has greated a giant cyborg robot.
Wait, what, Jean is the Dandelion Knight? I thought that Diluc was the Dandelion Knight? Is it a title bestowed to the current captain of the Knights of Favonius?
"The Rulers of Mond" WHO ARE THE RULERS OF MONDSTADT? TELL ME!
Lisa's vision is reacting to a piece of paper.
While searching for the Fatui scientist Il Dotorre, Amber finds a device with a Fatui mark in a Hilichurl camp. Is it mindcontrolling the Hilichurls?
According to a Fatui report Jean found, Diluc father's possessed something called "the delusion".
Doesn't seem like the Knights know what was really up with Diluc's father. Jean sends Lisa to go to Diluc's mansion for answers.
Diluc's father died three years ago, so that'd make Diluc 21.
We flash back to three years ago. Diluc and his dad are in a wagon, having apparently just unloaded wine to sell at Mondstadt, and are presumably heading back home. A Fatui agent tails them.
Huh, it seems that the Fatui device can unfold into a bird? Sounds like more a surveilance automaton.
Diluc's father has a box that contains the vision that lacks a sigil that Diluc would later use. Who did he order it from?
On the topic of visions and gods... do the 7 gods bestow visions on people? I would think not, because it seems that each god founded their own nation, and looks after their people. It doesn't seem to make sense for Tsarita, the cryo god of Snezhnaya - which is trying to aggressively expand through the Fatui - to bestow a Cryo vision upon Kaeya, a guy in Mondstadt who is opposed to the Fatui (and therefore Tsarita). Shouldn't Tsarita be passing out Cryo visions to his/her expanding Fatui army? And yet, we haven't really seen any Fatui with Cryo visions. So far they seem to be using that black/purple flame stuff, which I guess is artifical. It sounds like the other gods in Celestia who are giving the visions to people.
The wagon is attacked by Ursa the Drake. Diluc's dad equips the vision and uses it to conjure purple chains that lock down the dragon. The Fatui automaton activates and casts a spell on Ursa, causing the dragon to go berserk and break its chains. It charges at Diluc... but his dad body blocks it and dies. So I guess all that talk of how Diluc killed his dad was hyperbole.
Welp. Diluc is going through his "I was hurt because I was weak! I must never be weak again!" phase. Let the power of friendship flow through you, Diluc!
Amber's grandfather was a knight too.
Amber seems to have been a little girl when Diluc's father died, so I'm guessing she was 10-13 back then, so she'd be 13-16 in the present day.
The Knights want to bury the fact that Diluc's father fought off the Drake. The Knights feel really insecure and are under the misconception that if a non-knight gets credit for heroism, the people will suddenly stop trusting the knights? What?
Seems like the Knight officer Diluc is talking is very power hungry and can't accept the idea of there being other national heroes the people look up to besides the Knights. He also has a somewhat standout character design, and has a hydro vision ring on his finger, so he might turn out to be an important character later on.
Diluc gets pissed off at the Knight officers being gloryhounds and quits. We don't see or hear about Jean, so I'm guessing either she wasn't in the order yet, or she wasn't a leader yet. I wonder what happened to that officer. Was he promoted further up the chain? Or did he quit?
Lisa knows someone in Sumeru who can decipher language (unless it's a bluff). Maybe we will meet that person when we go there.
The seer is working for the Fatui.
Aww, the circus is pretty cute. A dancing boar and anemos slimes bouncing around within bubbles.
Now that I've got a better look, the Fatui symbol is four eyes. Hm... two pairs of eyes, indicating two gods working together, perhaps?
WTH "Kaeya" is trying to murder the little kid, Collei, who was experimented upon by Fatui. No way it's the real Kaeya. Has to be someone using illusion magic or something.
Ah, no, he realized that the kid is being possessed and he's trying to kill that. Another voice speaks inside the kid's mind. The black snake power is from "Barnabas", and it calls itself a god. Is it actually a god? From Celestia? Or a lower tier being possessing Collei, hyping itself up as a god?
Lisa's friend form Sumeru Academia arrives. Really? Hasn't it only been like a day or two since Lisa sent a letter to him asking for help? A courier inm the medieval period could travel 30-50 miles per day if they changed horses. So either Sumeru is 50 miles away or less, or teleportation magic is at play here. Anyway, he has a unique character design, so there is a good chance he will show up in the game eventually. He says that Collei is infused with "Archon Residue".
It seems like there is another evil faction at play (the Abyss Mages?). The Fatui don't know much about them (they're trying to gather info on the other faction), but they don't really care that much. They're using the havoc the other faction is causing to sweep in and resolve the problem to gain good PR with the locals. Apparently it's their modus operandi; solve problems (or create problems to be solved by them) to gain PR with the locals.
The Sumeruian scholar draws a magic circle with eight points on the ground to purify the kid of the archon residue. Hm... I wonder if there are 8 gods? Again, at the end of prologue act II, the Abyss Mage said that they were going to return the MC's fallen kingdom to the mortal world. That would be an eight nation, so could there be an eighth god that people have forgotten about?
Eyes seem to be a recurring visual motif in Genshin Impact.
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