The "After-Story" of Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind — "Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind Episode 3"
AdminNausicaä's Descent into Darkness
Behind Nausicaä's sudden realization of everything in the world and her destruction of the Crypt lay the following "dots and lines" hidden beneath the manga's dialogue:
• The Truth of the Toxic Jungle: The Sea of Decay and the Ohmu were not natural phenomena, but an "artificial system" created by the old humanity to purify the world.
• The Truth of the Human Body: Modern humans (Nausicaä and her people) were also genetically modified so that they could not survive without poison (pollutants). They were "disposable cleaning tools" who would suffer immune failure and cough up blood to die once the world became completely clean.
• The Crypt's Plan: After the world became clean, the "eggs of pure new humanity" sleeping in the Crypt would be awakened to start a new world. Nausicaä found it despairingly unforgivable that their lives had been programmed by the ghosts of the past. Declaring, "We are fine with the darkness," she destroyed the Crypt. However, she vanished from everyone's sight, bearing the cruel lie entirely alone that "at this rate, humanity will eventually perish in a cleaned world."
A Future 200 Years Later
Worshipped by all as a "god (savior)" and burdened with a lonely lie she could tell no one, Nausicaä transforms into a ruthless dictator (the bad guy), identical to the "Master of the Crypt" she once hated most. Just as the First Emperor of Doruk once sought a good world yet became a dictator, Nausicaä, too, is trapped in the "loop of darkness."
■ The Black Helmet and the "Hoo-Hoo" Breathing Sound
Two hundred years later, the world has been rapidly purified by the Sea of Decay, and the air has become far too clean. Possessing a physical constitution that can only survive in a polluted world, Nausicaä would cough up blood and die if she breathed clean air. Therefore, she wraps herself in a black helmet and black cloak that intentionally circulate "poison (miasma)" inside. Making an eerie artificial breathing sound of "hoo-hoo," she rules the world through fear and lies—she has truly become the bio-borg Emperor Nausicaä, the Emperor of Evil.
■ The "Rebel Army" Inheriting Kushana's Will
Kushana once crossed paths with Nausicaä, yet chose the "responsibility of living grittily in reality." She never became queen in her lifetime, living and perishing for the people. Two hundred years later, young members of a rebel army inheriting Kushana's spirit stand up against the Black Emperor, Nausicaä.
The Fateful Showdown and "Nausicaä's Mistake"
The core of the rebel army consists of the descendants of two bloodlines:
• The "Protagonist of the Sky," carrying the blood of Asbel and the girl who rode the Valley of the Wind's Mehve.
• The "Descendant of the Crypt Survivors," who inherited the secrets of the old world's genetic engineering.
Their generation does not know that the Black Emperor right before their eyes is the "legendary Maiden in Blue, Nausicaä," whom they long for as a symbol of freedom. Following a desperate strategy, the youths strike and cut the life support hose on Emperor Nausicaä's helmet.
"Completely pure, beautiful, clean wind" rushes inside the helmet, and the Emperor collapses while coughing up blood violently. When the mask shatters and Nausicaä's true face is revealed, she attempts to deliver a curse of despair: "You, too, will soon die from this clean air..." Breathing in the purified air—which is, conversely, a harmful toxin to Nausicaä—her face strains with bulging blood vessels, looking pained. Yet the evolved new generation, breathing in that clean air to their hearts' content without even wearing masks, smiles cheerfully.
■ Nausicaä's Error
Nausicaä's greatest miscalculation was underestimating life as a "programmed, fixed thing." Human "life" proved tough. Amidst an environment that gradually grew clean, individuals possessing genes capable of "adapting to clean air" survived through natural selection, just as Darwin's theory of evolution dictates, updating themselves across generational shifts. That was also the true salvation (schedule) planted deep within the old humanity's genes. People could understand one another. Yet, why did only Nausicaä at that time fail to fully believe in human potential and make the wrong choice?
The End of Myth, The Beginning of Human History
Rather than engaging in ideological dialogue with this immortal monster (Nausicaä) that tried to rule and desecrate humanity's future, the youths unleash their anger—"How dare you have an immortal ability that desecrates humanity!"—and pummel Nausicaä's face with raw, primitive violence. Amidst severe pain from being beaten black and blue, Nausicaä realizes: "Even without me managing them, humans have properly adapted to the new world, naturally continuing a peaceful era without the wars we feared, and without bickering." Her 200 years of rule and her lies were all wasted effort born purely of assumption. Yet, humanity will not go extinct. While keenly feeling her own ego in "not being able to fully trust humanity," Nausicaä recalls Kushana's smile with the thought that "humans were so strong and kind," and breathes her last with a feeling of fulfillment beyond measure.
Without "any way of knowing" about the old humanity or the filth of the past world, the remaining humankind casts the broken black helmet into the river as junk from a bygone era. Set within a pristine future completely severed from the shackles of the past, the new generation gazes only at the blue sky and green earth right before them, stepping forward on their own two feet. — 『Nausicaä of the Valley of the WindEpisode 3』
The End / Afterword
The original work's mystery of "why the Crypt was destroyed" was a rejection born of Nausicaä understanding the other's "darkness" far too well. However, by introducing the realistic perspective of "life's adaptive capacity (theory of evolution)" beyond that, we arrive at the ultimate grand finale: the saint Nausicaä temporarily becomes the worst Demon Lord, only to be saved in the end by being beaten up grittily by humans. When you reread the original manga, how will Nausicaä's "lies" appear to you?
