The story of ASSASSIN'S CREED COVENANT revolves around Nashru, an ancestor of the Assassins that serves king Nebuchadnezzar II of the Neo-Babylonian Empire. Nashru will fight the Median members of the a new of branch of the Children of Cain known as the Order of the Ancients, whose leader sacks the temples of Babylon and Jerusalem in search for technology of the Precursors.
Ready to live a new historical scenario for the Assassin's Creed saga? Here we go!
MESOPOTAMIA. 689 b.C.
The army of Sennacherib, Emperor of Assyria, marches against the ancient city of Kadingir, also known as Babylon. The Assyrian soldiers, bearded, with a cold piercing look, behold the great walls that have resisted invasion for centuries but are now ready to fall.
The rams crush the solid, wooden doors, and the
Assyrians enter the city. It is a real massacre – the Assyrians are well known
for their viciousness and cruelty.
While his troops sack the temples, burn the
houses and palaces, and take every single young man and woman as slaves, king
Sennacherib enters the magnificent ziggurat of Esagila, the temple of the god Marduk
built on an ancient Precursor vault. There, the Assyrian king finds the Hand of Marduk, an
ancient Isu gauntlet of great power.
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| The ancient Babylon, city of the gods Anu, Enlil, Éa, Marduk, and Ishtar. |
Satisfied with his finding, the king adjusts
the gauntlet to his right arm. Then he instinctively caresses the red cross on
his armor - with the Hand of Marduk in his power, the secret society known as
the Children of Cain will be invincible. The Empire that they have forged by
terror and utter mind control will last millennia.
But king Sennacherib’s days are numbered. His dreams
of an everlasting empire will not survive the night he returns to Nineveh, the
Assyrian capital, a beautiful city of hanging gardens.
History will blame Sennacherib’s sons for the
assassination of their father, the king. The truth is very different: it is the Children
of Eve, the first Assassins on African an Asian territory, that infiltrated Sennacherib’s palace to stab the emperor and destroy the Hand of Marduk so that it did not fall into the wrong hands again. For Esagila is the secret home of the last Children of Eve in the
Middle East.
MESOPOTAMIA. 560 b.C.
Babylon has recovered. The invasion of the Assyrian
king has long been avenged: Nineveh was destroyed and left in ruins. Under the
reign of king Nebuchadnezzar II, Babylon becomes a new powerful empire that controls
the ancient cities of Mesopotamia, Phoenicia and Syria and reaches the borders
of Egypt, Arabia, and the northern tribes of the Cimmerians and Scythians. In addition, Nebuchadnezzar’s
marriage with princess Amuhia of the Medes is to enlarge the empire.
But there is a shadow rising in the east: the
Median Empire -soon to become the Persian Empire- is ruled by a powerful branch
of the Children of Cain known as the Order of the Ancients. While the Children
of Cain sought absolute power by means of terror and violence -just as the
Assyrians forged their Empire-, their close kin the Order of the Ancients
prefer a subtler, more refined type of control: it is suppression of free will
and passion, a peaceful submission of the peoples they govern.
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| King Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylon. |
Even though king Nebuchadnezzar was raised to
follow the teachings of the Children of Eve in the temple of the Esagila, his
marriage to Amuhia has changed his mind. Now Nebuchadnezzar has let powerful
members of the Ancients in: the Neo-Babylonian Empire is now secretly ruled by Median
noblemen and war chiefs while the king remains idle in his gardens. Led by the Ancients, the Babylonian troops sack
and extort most cities and villages all around the empire. It is an age of
terror and confusion.
This is the story of Nashru, one of the
Children of Eve, devout of the god Marduk of the Esagila and personal guard of
Nebuchadnezzar. As her proto-Assassins antecessors, Nashru possesses the Isu sixth
sense and can communicate with her eagle pet, Roc. She also bears the
hidden-blade that belonged to Eve herself, which was, in the beginning, a
simple tool of the factory-slaves of the Isu.
Nashru is Nebuchadnezzar’s first bodyguard. She
proved her value fighting alongside the king against the gigantic northern
barbarians, the Cimmerians. In this battle, Nashru saved the king’s life.
Nashru is married to her beloved Bashaa. Both
devout their lives to studying the teachings of the Children of Eve and protecting
peace in the Empire. They know nothing of Amuhia’s connection with the Order of
the Ancients, so when Nashru warns the king about the unusual violence that is taking
place at the cities, she is asked to abandon the
audience room immediately. Amuhia, who listened to the conversation hiding behind the curtains, finds a perfect opportunity to get rid of the Children
of Eve in Babylon. She gets the king’s young brother, Nabopolasar, executed,
and sends her Median mercenaries against Nashru.
Nashru survives the attack, but her wife Bashaa
is killed and her home is burned to ashes. In addition, Amuhia blames Nashru for
the assassination of prince Nabopolasar, and so Nashru must flee from Babylon. Then
the few Children of Eve in the Esagila are brutally murdered, and the Order of
the Ancients gets absolute control over Babylon. Now, Nashru is the last Child
of Eve. She feels devastated.
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| The Babylonian king's guard. |
Nashru is now a fugitive. She cannot fight the
Babylonians alone… and the eyes of the Ancients are everywhere.
One night at the middle of the desert, when Nashru thinks she is safe, a regiment of Elamite mercenaries catch her and are about
to execute her. But then a mysterious group of guerrilleros get rid of the
Elamites and take Nashru with them. They are the exiled Hebrews, one of the
many families that were forced to abandon Jerusalem after Nebuchadnezzar’s destruction
and sack of the city and great temple.
Nashru is taken to a refugee camp amongst palm
trees, where she is healed and dressed in the Jewish tallit.
The Hebrews treat Nashru as one of their own.
Actually, while she believes in no god (nothing is true; everything is
permitted) the leader of the exiled Hebrews, the Biblical Daniel, firmly believes
that Nashru has been sent by God to punish Nebuchadnezzar’s sins.
From the camp of the exiled, Nashru will help the Hebrew
fight the forces of the Order of the Ancients. Susanna, a young woman that
Daniel once saved, accompanies her.
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| Solomon's Temple in Jerusalem, sacked and destroyed by the Babylonians. |
From now on, Nashru and Susanna will visit each
corner of the Empire to identify and eliminate the members of the Order of the
Ancients: The Phoenician Biblos and Tyre; the Hittite Carchemish; the ruins of
Nineveh, Ashur and Uruk in Sumer; Susa of the Elamites; Elath in the red sea
full of Egyptian troops and camps; the nomad tents of the ancient Arabs; the
barbarian camps of the Cimmerians; and the cities of Jerusalem and Samaria.
Nashru will explore ancient Sumerian, Hittite,
and even Isu tombs and learn the history of the Children of Eve:
- How the Isu created humankind and treated us as slaves.
- How Eve iniciated a revolt against the Precursors.
- How Eve’s descendants, Shem, Ham, and Japheth, spread across the globe to found the first Assassin bases of operations in Masyaf and Alamut, the Nubian Medjay kingdoms, the harbor-city of Siraf (home of the most famous Prince of Persia), the ancient Mycenae in Greece, Tartessos in Spain, and the Zhou kingdom in China, among other places.
Nashru learns that she is not alone: as long as
there are Children of Cain (Templars) in the world, there will be the Children
of Eve (Assassins) to fight them back.
The members of the Order fall one by one. Now,
the Median influence on the Empire has been weakened. However, while Nashru
traveled across the Empire, the slaves of the Order worked day and night digging the old temple of Solomon in Jerusalem.
Now Amuhia has control over the Ark of the
Covenant and the powerful Apple of Eden it contains. She does not need Nebuchadnezzar anymore, so she tries to murder him. But the king survives and flees from Babylon.
He will meet Nashru again, apologize to her, and send her in a last mission: infiltrate the hanging
gardens of Babylon, kill Amuhia, and send the Ark back to the Hebrews.
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| Leap of faith from the fortress of Masyaf... or maybe from the ziggurat of Esagila. |
After the final confrontation, the Order of the
Ancients is finally driven out of Mesopotamia. Nashru has avenged her wife’s death
and become a Master Assassin. She meets Daniel the prophet again. With a smile on his face,
he mantains that it was God’s will that she hunted down the members of the
Order. Nashru must insist: "Who knows? Only one thing is clear: nothing is true,
everything is permitted".
Thank you for reading! If you liked this story, please, leave a comment in the comment section or just share the Assassin's Creed Covenant idea in your social networks. But please, remember to credit my writing: I am Guillermo Lance, a Spanish teacher and writer, and a great Assassin's Creed fan.
See you in the Animus!
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