This zone is built like Ardenweald-is it an island floating in golden dust? Peak of a mountain? Elemental plane? Anyway, can fly quite a bit off grid; not much out there, just weird golden clouds and silhouettes of roots.
Did notice two things, though: west of the Blinding Bloom there’s a mushroom, way down, simply the most titanic mushroom you can think of, called “Nihil,” unless that’s what all the gold dusty stuff is called. If you walk too far out on it, ya get knocked off your mount.
East of Har’kuai, on the flat space past the mountain range, there’s a haranir hut-a painter’s hut, paintings everywhere, including of surface zones; a couple target dummies (non-interactable), and two chairs on the edge of the glowy goldness that can be sat on.
Oh, and if you try to fly into the Cradle that’s a special achievement…which once more raises my question as to what, exactly, the World Soul is, and how it fits into the planet. And it was “taken” somehow, somewhen. Is there a three-dimensional map of Azeroth that shows how all this fits together?
Yeah as I was mining in Harandar, flying around, I approached the edges and was curious. Though I went back to questing and mining - I have been distracted from leveling by real life already, much less exploring curiosities.
I noticed it was similar to Ardenweald in that it seems like a floating island… but isn’t it in the middle of the planet? And don’t roots connect to it from trees above ground?
I didn’t explore it but it did raise questions in my mind.
I’m glad there are other people more intrepid than I am.
Reminds me of the Timeless Isle chairs that skip the WoD intro and takes you to Gorgrond.
I wonder who figured that out- it must have been fun when they first found it out.
The two big “snatch” events I think of are the old god being snatched out, and Eonar’s tree being snatched out.
Though, it could be some other snatching we aren’t aware of.
I think Nihil is the space around Harandar, as I’m pretty sure that’s what the it’s called when you fly off until you hit the invisible walls in any horizontal direction.
Very first thing I did when I Wormholed down to Harandar.
Harandar seems to be a pocket dimension of sorts:
All of the roots of the World Trees all converge here, all twisted up in this area, this pocket area which isn’t really directly connected to anything.
It’s possible that Nihil is the bridge between harandar and the twisting nether, or that Nihil is the name the Haranir give to the twisting nether.
The reasoning for this comes from the Arch druids believing that the rift of aln bleeds into the twisting nether, in the novel stormrage, which is all about the nightmare, rift, dream, and druid-y stuff.
If that holds true then Nihil might be the “prison realm,” designed by the titans, maybe. They built the elemental plane as a prison for the elementals and it’s constructed in the nether. They also created the prison of “Mardum, plane of banishment.”
Currently, I have a theory that Aln’hara (the haranir goddess) might have been the Element of Spirit and this lines up very nicely with my theory that the element of spirit is the Earth Mother that the Tauren refer to. The cries from the rift of aln that spawn the memories of shadows, and the heavenly voice of the cradle, are the same voice. The tauren believe that the Earth Mother is both spirit and decay, and that they are just different aspects of her. We can see this reflected in the Fungarians and Raati as well. Because you know what other planet has fungus and raati in perpetual war? Draenor with the proto-sporegar and everbloom. And that exists because the planet is overabundant with the element of spirit.
I could explain further what reinforces these theories but the comment would be too long. Like how the Tauren accounts of the Earth mother say that Elune had influence over water and wind, while an’she influenced fire and earth. That only leaves 2 elements. And while we could attribute Lo’sho (winter queen) to spirit and decay, it’s possible that she is something novel.
I’m not necessarily convinced Aln’hara was the world soul. I’m not convinced the world soul sings the radiant song. There seems to be a lot of indication that neither are the world soul. They may be connected to it or derived from it but I don’t believe at all that the world soul is the source of the Radiant Song or the “goddess” that once slept in the cradle.
It’s fine if it turns out that way but as of right now I’m not convinced. There’s too much evidence pushing for ambiguity or even contrarily, that it isn’t. Anduin and others say the radiant song comes from Beledar. Circes and her people heard a similar song resonate from the Siren Isles crystal. Orweyna travels to beledar to recieve her visions, rather than to the world core.
And what we’ve learned about Harandar is that the native life reflects that of the Sporegar and Everbloom on draenor, which canonically exist because of an overabundance of spirit. Something Azeroth lacks because the world soul supposedly consumed most of it. Ironically, Pandaria is the only place with a significant amount of the element of spirit, probably because the monks/pandaren have spent their lives cultivating it for millennia. The elements there are cheerful, playful, even childish. And in game files the Sha are referred to as “Spirits of Hatred,” perhaps the corruption of the lands spirit by the blood of yshaarj, manifesting when people’s chi (spirit) is out of balance or in disonance relative to the world soul’s song. This is ironic because the Aln’sharan, Herald of Aln’hara is a cloud serpent like Yu’lon. He is the unfinished dream of another August Celestial, leading credence to the idea, maybe, that the August Celestials may have been the last fully formed dreams of Aln’hara and why there aren’t many of them.
Curiously, also, the August Celestials are not druidic in nature. Their access to nature magic is through the element of spirit or elements themselves, rather than life. Perhaps wild gods are a perversion or corruption by life unto August Celestials and Loa.