Let's say purely hypothetically that Xerath beats Azir and secures his new Empire over all of Shurima. What would it look like for the citizens, what would the culture be like. I know Xerath grew up in the ancient Shuriman Empire so would its culture be preserved or would he enforce an entirely new culture amongst his people. Also, how would he treat other neighbouring nations such as Noxus and piltover/zaun and maybe ixaocan if he knew about that?
ima go out on a limb here and just say SHURRRRIIIMAAAAAA
I keep a folder of images just for this. Trolling ArtStation for stuff that could potentially work in the League Universe is like a part-time job for me.
Nerizameth is a part of Ancient Shurima, it was the first capital of Shurima and was where they built the Sun Disc that would later hover over the new royal capital. Ironically, even though as a man Xerath was a slave campaigning for the rights of all other slaves, after he becomes Ascended I imagine he no longer holds on to these ideals of self- determination and free will
Driven insane with power, he now seeks to take what he believes is rightfully his and replace the upstart civilizations of the world with one fashioned in his image.
Xerath sought the heart of the desert to regain his strength and understand how the world had changed in the millennia since his imprisonment. His stolen power grew with every passing moment, and he beheld a world ripe for conquest, a world brimming with mortals ready to worship at the feet of a new and terrible god.
Much like the Ascended beings and Darkin before him, Ascension has came to make Xerath see all other mortals as little more than cattle so its hard to envision Nerizameth as anything other than an empire built on the back of slavery. I think it's a good way to sell his turn to villainy, watching him lose his one redeeming quality and truly lose himself to his thirst for power that he developed ONLY because he was a slave for so long. The oppressed make for the best oppressors.
https://i.ibb.co/PwDKxq0/Nerimazeth.jpg
Nerizameth should be more drab, because this is before Shurima ever got involved with Targon and before they had an Ascended army that let them conquer the world, flooding the imperial coffers with gold. Its a dark depressing place.
As a bonus that image is actually drawn by an Artist who draws for League all the time so it matches the style for the other stuff he drew like Targon his name is Gabriel Yegeyemon
https://www.artstation.com/gabe-11
https://i.ibb.co/rGsyPGm/pablo-dominguez-2017-kayframe1-slaveescape.jpg
Here we can see the extent of the slave labor.
https://i.ibb.co/WV8vPSf/pablo-dominguez-2017-kayframe2.jpg
And a sweeping shot over the whole empire so you can see the whole scale of it.
These are by the talented Pablo Dominguez he did a lot of concept art for Captain Marvel and even worked on Game of Thrones https://www.artstation.com/pablodominguez
Also was his intention to rule the Ancient Shuriman empire and not destroy it or did he want to destroy it
i don't think Xerath cares anything about having an empire, he is ascended - in other words immortal. uniquely as well his body was destroyed leaving him as a sentient mass of arcane energy which currently inhabits a coffin which not only acts as a container but also a limiter on his power.
i personally don't think that Xerath would want a empire for himself, he was willing to betray his master/friend, nation and fellow slaves and mages to achieve more power. so more than likely he simply doesn't care about anyone but himself. he cares only about power, if he finds someone with enough power (like Syndra) he would probably want to study and than obtain/absorb it.
not only that history tells us (and xerath) that subject/slaves can easily mean the downfall of an empire the size and magnitude of shurima, what's stopping that from happening to his own empire, where he to create one himself?
in short: he has reached the top, why would he want to share it with anyone but himself?
