Scarred »

If you've read the Personality and Family sections already, you might notice that there seems to be some kind of disparity. If the rumors are true (and I think they are, of course) shouldn't Naga be more...not Naga? Except for her aversion to the sight of blood, there's nothing in the way Naga acts which would ever betray such a tragic history behind her, nothing to cause anyone to suspect the horrors she must have lived through in those moments after she'd found her mother murdered.

The mere idea of living through something so gruesome is frightening, but Naga not only lived through it but survived without much dent into her emotional armor...or did she? That's really the question which must be asked, because it's almost impossible to figure out what's going on in Naga's mind. We know what we think she's thinking about, but it's not as if she runs around talking about her feelings any deeper than her desire for food and treasure. And with all the emoting she does about herself how often does Naga talk about her past? Virtually never, if recollection serves me. She's no mirror, despite her seemingly obvious vapid nature. But is that nature the truth of what lies beneath or is it a clever cover for her scarred spirit? What exactly are the depths of Naga the white Serpent?

Theories
There are a few theories which could explain the enigma -- if one exists -- behind Naga's personality and its relationship to her past. One of the most popular, especially in fanfiction, is of the Multiple Personality or Amnesia variety, meaning that one contends that horror of her mother's murder either caused Naga's personality to split into two (or more) distinct and separate personalities or caused her to bury her memories in order to protect her sanity. Really, both say the same thing: Naga's personality as seen when she travels with Lina isn't the "true" Naga who was the Princess of Saillune.

For conversation's sake, we'll call this true, pre-tragedy personality Gracia while Naga will refer to the one which traveled with Lina.

So, what do we know about Gracia? She was a princess who studied white magic, wore non-bondage-type clothes and her name -- ironic or otherwise -- seems to be rooted in the word for grace.

If one follows the most straight-forward of the aforementioned theories -- Amnesia -- it follows that Naga has suppressed the memories of her mother's death and cannot remember that it happened and is therefore not subject to any distress from it. The Amnesia can be understood to varying degrees: she could simply have forgotten her mother's death or she could have forgotten that she was ever a princess. According to this theory the personalities of Naga and Gracia would the same, only differing by the lost memories, while mannerisms would remain constant.

The multiple personality deal goes a step farther by saying that the reason she does not remember is because Naga and Gracia have become completely separate entities, and that Naga came into existence to protect Gracia. If this is the truth, then Naga would have no idea about her own past and Gracia would probably be nothing like Naga is; in fact, if this were the case, then Gracia would probably resemble Shadow Naga more than Naga.

Of course, the simplest theory is just that Naga is fully aware of her past but chooses not to dwell on it or even deal with it fully. Not that she can't, but she won't. In this scenario, Naga was Naga even when she was Gracia, as bizarre as that may sound. Of course, knowing Amelia and Phil, it's likely that Naga could have been as wacky as she is and still be the princess of Saillune. When she left, she could have done so for many reasons, including a need to get away from the scene of the crime.

In any case, it's obvious that her mother's murder changed Naga dramatically; no matter if she suffers from some mental problem because of it does not change or lessen the fact that the event caused Naga to cast off her title, station and money for a chance to run around and blow up bandits. It also made her exchange her priestess robes for that leather outfit, which had been her mother's supposedly....in honor of her mother? or was it more of a taking over of her place in something?

The truth is, we'll never know. Naga is nothing but vague about her past, whether by design or need is unknown. We can only guess about what goes on in that head of hers and wonder if her dreams are not sometime haunted by images of blood, violence and death. Or not.

And that, my friends, is about as serious as I can be in discussing Naga the Serpent.

« back