Chapter Text
Rarely do conversations about worldwide trade agreements, agricultural advancements towards bettering the world stage, or bleeding-edge tech ever surface without a member at the table of discussion being from one of any major kingdom on remnant today. Mistral’s citybound startups are renowned for their high populace support and user friendliness, while the Likes of the Atlesian Commonwealth are pointed to for the most advanced medical and robotic tech the planet over, as well as its Principality in Arcadia.
And while Arcadia’s, far to the south of most lands, is a perfect testing environment for weapons systems, being rich in Grimm whom are seabound and skyward both, as well as a tax haven of sorts for the wealthy the world over, the land taken and privatized by Nero and Nicholas Schnee before the Great War was not necessarily their own to take.
In truth, these belonged to the rather quiet land of Rhodes, and their so called peaceful people: Rhodes, ruled Diarchically since time in memoriam, is an older state with a rich and fascinating history. The taking of territory before the war, and its outbreak at the hands of Lilo Rufus of Argus’ infamous revolt, was one of many such strikes that ultimately bound themselves against us in Atlas, yet, much of the motivation existed far before that.
Rhodes, in itself, was reported to feel motivation against the forces of Atlas due to its own historical revolt. And the fact that they came to the aid of Argus was no small political message: especially when joined by their historical enemy, the United tribedom of Vacuo. The Second Era pact formed in the late stages of the buildup to the Great War, placed between Vale, Rhodes and Vacuo, was the culmination of decades of social reform at the hands of Auster Rose and Auburn Branwen, The twin rulers at the time of Rhodes.
But, how did we get here? Rhodes is a country that is over a thousand years old, or at least the tribes subscribed to its modern foundational structure. The indigenous people have lived in the area for over eleven hundred years, estimates even merging on two to four millennia before the modern day, most of the current structure having only existed since roughly the beginning of the second era.
Along with that, much of Rhodesian history is complicated by the way that stories were handled and passed down, before recordkeeping became ascetically key. As such, combined with the cataclysmic Civil War that formed the modern-day kingdom, it’s no wonder that some of the intricacies are lost on distant viewers from kingdoms like our own. So, over a five-year period, a team of researchers alongside myself worked together with the Patchwork Huntsman’s Academy in Rhodes, and the rest of the Valkyrian Research Institute to get something closer resembling the truth, as well as a method of proposing discussions going forward regarding the infamous isolationists among us.
This book, as a historical recollection and analysis of the history of Rhodes, is far from perfect; much inspiration for our work were previous members of the Schnee Family’s Exploratory Writings, as well as the writings of Argusian Faunus Ebon Belladonna, the first congressional monarch of the now minor kingdom of Menagerie. Specifically, His second most acclaimed work, after “The Modern Faunus”(Published Year 1499 SRE2) was his studies published in the middle of the Great War as “Rhodes: Corvids and Combatants”(Published Year 1493 SRE2.) His recollections, as good as they were, are in something of a bad light considering the interkingdom travel bans and warring navies, and is what unfortunately lead to much of the modern day mysticism surrounding Rhodes we seek to illuminate.
“This land is as beautiful as it is dangerous, and its people as superstitious and paranoid as they are prepared, and socially bizarre compared to all other people groups I have studied thus far.” These words are of grave importance to the first image most people pose when looking at Rhodes and its history through the lens of Menageries first Monarch, writings since dissuaded and apologized for interkingdomly by now ruler Chief Ghira Belladonna.
And, it is was our research team’s best intentions to push the disproving, while also levying our own fair notes on the country. With a quote from Head of the Cultural Diplomacy Agency, and Chairwoman of the Noble Houses Summer Rain Rose, to open us, we can begin talking about their rich history.
“Rhodes is no different than any other Kingdom in the fact it possesses a storied history barely understood by its own peoples, much less those who view it from across the world. I, my wife, my two husbands, and my daughters are just the next step in a chain of links around nine-hundred years old. If this really is for the better understanding of my people, and our ways, then I’ll answer whatever questions you’d like of me.”