"As the rest of the world burned around them, the Carribeans began to build a nation, and not only did they survive, but they actually thrived, as the archipelago began to take it's place as a great power. They also did something that they would deeply regret many years later. They helped out their neighbors."
...
"The USA was hit just as hard as China, Russia, or Japan, with widespread chaos and death threatening to destroy it. Unlike those nations, however, they had the good luck of being neighbors in the Caribbean, which meant that as the new empire rose to prominence, the nation had a trade partner just by, who was willing to trade them large, large amounts of food. Which allowed them to survive the complete and total starvation that wrecked lands like China or Russia. So, as they reached the stabilizing period, The USA had only lost 24% of it's total population, compared to half, which… Was pretty remarkable actually."
"Unfortunately for the Carribeans, as things began to stabilize around the world, their method of doing things ran into one massive problem, that only became even more pronounced as the world settled on the hero System."
"Let us guess." Venom suddenly piped in. "The rest of the world, that did not operate with this kind of system in mind, quickly found it couldn't compete."
Black Cat looked surprised, then nodded.
"Yeah, that's exactly what happened. As the entire rest of the world began to rebuild and get back on it's feet, they quickly realized that the Carribeans simply out-competed them in pretty much every area. Which was not surprising. They utilized their quirk users to their absolute fullest, taking full advantage of every single possible advantage they had. The rest of the world would have had one hell of a time trying to compete with that, even if it had been healthy. Try imagining them doing it when their entire industries and economies had gone belly up, and huge amounts of the population had up and died."
She flipped the page again, this time showcasing a very detailed series of sketches of figures Izuku instantly recognized. The very first hero team in history, the group of Vigilantes who had been responsible for making the concept of pro heroes a thing.
"And then… The first pro heroes emerged on the American east coast. Tell me Izuku… Do you know WHY the hero System became so popular?"
"It… Restored order, and made people feel safe?"
"That is absolutely correct~ In a world where the police forces of the world had grown incredibly hard and militaristic to cope with trying to uphold law and order, the vigilantes that styled themselves on superheroes from the comics of old proved to be a remarkably popular alternative. Not to mention, that just like the Caribbean system, many Quirk users proved FAR more effective at dealing with the challenges of quirk-related crimes than men with guns did."
"It also had one other, massive benefit. It drew a very clear, simple line between "Good" and "Bad" Quirk users. People who previously didn't have any way to utilize their quirks legally, suddenly found a real, legal avenue to do just that. The police were NOT a fan of the new system, but everyone else was. It worked, because it was simple, it didn't penalize you for just having a quirk.
So long as you worked within the system, you could use your quirks, and you would even be rewarded for it. For the USA, who had been struggling mightily to keep any resemblance of law and order, the system was a godsent. It was popular across the board, and the simple fact that people who signed up on it tended to be locals, who worked within their home, generally meant that they had a vested interest in trying to keep their homes safe."
"What it in practice meant, was that the government just had to find locals with decent quirks, train them, then give them the money to live, and they would generally do a good job at restoring order, they would do so all the way until retirement, and most crucial of all, they were adored by the people they protected, which, I can assure you, the police and military at that time were NOT."
That… Was a strange idea to Izuku. That the police would not be liked or respected. But… It was a different time and place he supposed.
"These 3 things, the simplicity of implementing it as an effective system, the way it drew a very clear, easy, and "fair" line in the sand of how quirks should be used, and more important than anything else, the fact that it proved a very, very popular alternative to hard crackdowns by militarized police, is the reason why the Pro Hero System ended up winning, over other alternatives, like the ones Japan's Destro or Germany's Charlemagne advocated for."
Izuku had never really considered an alternative to the pro hero System. For him, it was just… The way things were. The way the world had always been, and should always be.
And yet… He knew enough of history to know that once upon a time, Destro had been a massive force in Japan. The only real, credible challenger the hero system had ever had in the empire.
"Everywhere that is… Except for the Caribbeans. In Europe, the third French Empire embraced the Hero system with open arms and as a result of that, it's still around today as a constitutional monarchy, while the aforementioned Charlemagne's attempt at a German communist utopia fueled by quirks, failed due to lack of popular support. Same story around the world. Destro was crushed in Japan, while other nations that tried alternative systems eventually collapsed, or was pressured into adopting it by it's neighbors."
"Which brings us back again, to the Caribbeans empire. The one place that managed to break the trend. Tell me Izuku, can you guess WHY the Caribbeans succeeded, while every other attempt at creating a true, quirk fueled society failed?"
Izuku thought about it for a moment, but it was Venom who answered.
"It worked because it was the first. The thing is, that such a society could easily work, but anyone who tried to follow in their footsteps would quickly be stifled by the fact that a society like the Carribeans, would act as a sponge for people with useful quirks. Why stick around in a country that despises you, when you could emigrate to a place where your powers are appreciated, and your work is rewarded? This, in turn, would lead to future attempts to create such societies to be lacking in the most useful kind of power sets, which the Carribeans would have in spades."
Black Cat and Mina(Who had mostly been laying back, looking really bored.) looked at Venom, with really, really surprised looks.
-We've seen that happen 64 times across the cosmos. It's a very predictable pattern. Such a society only works, if the emerging power goes on to conquer the entire world, so there are no potential rivals.-
"You're quite a bit smarter than I thought you were… Venom."
"But, yes that was indeed one of the biggest reasons. During the collapse period, and before the rise of Heroes, tons, and tons, and tons of quirk users emigrated to the Caribbeans. Especially teleporters. To this day, the Caribbeans is the biggest concentration of teleporters in the world."
Black Cat sighed.
"What it all meant, was that suddenly, as America lost it's position as the big top dog of the world, the Caribbean, the only country left that didn't accept the hero system, was doing very, very well, and even if it wasn't gonna become the next superpower, it was sharply on it's way to becoming THE power in the Americas. Needless to say, as the USA began to really recover in full, this caused a lot of tensions between the two."
"Then you also get the fact that the Caribbeans had taken land from the USA when it annexed Puerto Rico, at a time when America did not possess the ability to keep order within it's own borders, much less protect it's overseas land. The same went for France and England. Imagine if Taiwan had annexed Kyushu during the same period, and you get the idea of how awkward the situation suddenly became after order began to return to the world."
That… did indeed put it all into perspective.
"Anyway… Tension just rose over the years, and the question of what to do regarding the Caribbean Question was a pretty massive one in American politics. And we haven't even gotten into the mentality of the people at the time. During the period, most Americans had still grown up on stories of how the USA was once THE global superpower of the world. The societal collapse destroyed that, just as it did all the great powers of the age. China, Russia, India, the E.U-" "Wait, the E.U? What was that?"
"The European Union. It was an attempt to unify Europe in the 20th century. By the time the collapse came, it was an unsalvageable mess. Regardless, it was completely destroyed in the collapse, with new, smaller entities, like the Scandinavian Confederation, or the Third French empire taking it's place."
"Anyway, back to the Americas. As the years went by, and the hero System became entrenched across the world, the tension between The USA and the Caribbean Empire rose. There were a lot of reasons for that, and lots of idiots on both sides. On the Caribbean side, the refusal to change their method of doing things made it REALLY unpopular with the rest of the world. On the American side, there were plenty of people who dreamed of returning to the old days, when the USA was a superpower, instead of just a regional power in North America. Or at very least, they didn't want to be the secondary power of the Americas."
"Either way, things were gonna have to change one way or another."
She stopped talking for a moment, then gave a long sigh before she continued.
"I'm not gonna bore you with all the details leading up to it, but what you need to know, is that in 2109, the USA and the Carribeans went to war. It was brutal and bloody, with LOTS of dead soldiers and atrocities against civilians on both sides. But in the end, after a year of fighting the USA won."
Then her look changed to truly angry.
"Then they did something stupid, that is up there, with the dumbest moves in the history of the world. They decided that rather than treating the Caribbean empire like another sovereign state, they instead tried to carve it up into a bunch of smaller, weaker states. Essentially destroying it so it could never rise to challenge the USA ever again."
"That… Sounds pretty bad."
"It was. If it had been the 2050's, maybe it would have worked. But it wasn't. It was 2110, and the empire had LONG since formed an overarching cultural identity. Oh, there were lots of people who wanted more freedom in the empire, most people wanted a republic. But ripping the whole thing apart? There weren't many left by that point who wanted that."
...
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