Something that hit me as I’m watching a series of survival games and horror games is that, in almost every modern game within those franchises, it is the loss of technology and the support it provided that decimated the settings the game occur in. Not the loss of government, that can be replaced in time, not the plagues or the monsters, those we learn to counter, to appease, to avoid. But it is the very pillar that raised those societies that, when it was lost, caused them to fall to earth hard, and never quite fully recover from.
What would WoW be like if, in an effort to cut off the Primal Powers and stop Light, Life, Death, Void, Arcane and Fel from hurting her, the World Soul emitted a terrible pulse of her energy, wrapping Azeroth itself in a bubble of Anti-Magic. All of a sudden, all magic, regardless of source, regardless of function, simply ceases.
Its not behind a barrier, its not muted or dismissed, the Anti-Magic simply occurs on such a broad wave-length it cancels out all other forms of magic.
And how much of Azeroth’s bio-sphere is dependant upon one form of magic or another, be it Arcane, Spirit or even the Light? How many of her races are, in some form or fashion, only able to survive or boast their unique traits because of an adaptation to, and a dependence upon, a certain type of magic?
How much of our industries, our faiths, our traditions, are built upon magic being a real, interactable force?
And one day, there’s a terrible moment, when the air turns as thick as molasses, our ears ring, our bones ache, our blood burns in our veins and then … nothing. Nothing seems to have happened but a dreadful sense of stillness despite the breeze in the air, the tinkle of the nearby stream, the bird-calls and insects’ song.
And then you hear the screams. The Mage, staggering out of the tavern, clutching their head and wailing in horror, eyes darting as if searching for something. The next is an Adventurer falling from the sky, landing with an awful, wet crunching noise as they crater into the cobblestone street, still clutching an empty saddle whose enchanted, jewel-crusted seat looks strangely pristine despite the fall, and the blood. One of the Light-Forged Draenei staggers down the street, eyes no longer glowing, clutching at their throat and gasping for breath as if the life has suddenly been snatched out of their lungs, before falling to their knees, then toppling over, whimpering in pain.
In the lands of the Horde, panic sets in as the great magical cities of the Elves of the Sin’dorei and Shal’dorei Tribes begin to crumble almost instantly, the sorcery that bound together stone and tree and gem suddenly absent, and many Elves scream in pain and confusion as they feel the vital force they have known since their birth inexplicably leave them. Those who survived the Withering, and the Wretched, feel a deep, primal sense of terror grip their hearts and spines as they recognize the feeling, but somehow, it is more. Somehow, it is worse.
Trolls across the land stagger as their blood, thick enough to hold in one’s hand, burns as the spiritual component of their regeneration simply vanishes, and the full burden of such a biological miracle rests on their entirely mortal shoulders. Goblins clutch their heads as the lingering traits of Kajamite in their system start to burn away, leaving them confused but horribly aware of their own imminent mental decline. Forsaken simply topple over, their undead forms collapsing like puppets with their strings cut, a gentle sigh of air leaving the body the final requiem for the Undead as their riven souls are finally unbound from their corporeal forms.
Across the land, engines that rely upon magic as much as science simply fail. Zepplins fall out of the sky, airships plummet into the ocean, steam-tanks shudder and come to a juddering halt or explode in a fury of steam and flame and screaming crews as the magical components within their engines and their systems catastrophically fail without reason. Ecosystems that relied upon access to Life, or Death, or the Light, or the Arcane, shudder as one, already dead but still desperately trying to carry on through sheer momentum, the wildlife growing frantic and aggressive as they instinctively realise something has gone horribly wrong. Plant-life would begin to die immediately, or worse, become parasitic trying to sustain itself, and insects would range far afield, seeking new feeding grounds in a desperate, mindless attempt to continue their existence.
Desperate mobs of civilians roaming the land, seeking answers, falling prey to superstitions and paranoia as the sources of their faith simply vanish, after thousands of years of being a real, tangible force in their lives, blaming each other, anyone, everyone for this new chaos in their lives. Without magic, the ability to disseminate news and give orders in the chaos would become nearly impossible, with each village and town becoming an island unto themselves in the mess.
How badly are we reliant upon teleportation magic to ferry perishable goods, preservation or elemental magic to keep food and water from rotting? How many of our industries turned to rely upon enchanted tools and magical devices to help speed up and keep up with demand with the crushing need for soldiers during the succession of conflicts we’ve had, both between the Horde and the Alliance, and against the Legion, the Old Gods, and all the lingering horrors in-between?
Imagine seeing the town mayor topple over, their skin rippling, revealing a Dreadlord whose eyes widen with horror, its taloned hands reaching for you not for violence, but because in that brief instant, the Dreadlord understands there is no coming back from this, and it seeks some sort of help, any kind of help, as its immortal existence unravels before its own eyes.
How long before supplies run short? Before the larger cities become death-traps full of fighting gangs who refuse to give up their homes and squabble over dwindling supplies of fresh water and preserved food? How long before the sewers clog with filth and plagues of a very mundane variety scour the land because we’re so used to magically dealing with them that nobody bothered with the mundane methods for treating them? When the Light no longer answers, Nature remains silent, the Wild Gods are gone or dead and the Spirits banished, who do we pray to in these dark times?
And whose order will prevail in the silence of magic?
I doubt it would ever happen, but I’d love us to dabble in it, a Timeline where the Bronze flight can only witness, not interfere, because there’s no magic, meaning to intrude is to become trapped, as as intrinsically magical beings, there’s no guarantee the Dragon could even survive, let alone not immediately perish as the very core of their being is snuffed out. Being trapped in such a world would be a death sentence for many Champions because we’re so obsessed with power, and magical items, that only a handful of them would even be functional in any way, shape or form without magic of some kind.
And to escape this timeline would be to return magic … and it could have been years, decades even, since the World Soul cut itself off from all sources of magic, and that World Soul is the desire of so many hyper-magical beings that, if we reversed the ‘Pulse’ and returned magic to the world, all those competing powers banging on that bubble of Anti-Magic would come surging in at full force … and possibly destroy the world between them in their eagerness to re-stamp their control on the World Soul deep within.