How far will the Light go?

Regarding my first post regarding the Sacred Flame and Hallowfall Arathi, i feel i need to further write regarding the possibility of a powerful and beyond devout force the Light could bring to the future of Azeroth.

Lets take a step back to the events in the Legion. Specifically Turalyon. Now once a fighter in service to Stormwind who chose to step into the unknown to fight a never ending war against the Legion. He pursued his goal and met with the Prime Naaru Xe’ra.

From that meeting up until his first meeting with the adventurer we know only what we have from others regarding his personality and his agenda. What we saw aboard the Vindicaar was a soldier of the Light un-wavering in his path to a goal.

Notice how unlike the Draenei, or any other being aboard that vessel; in the moment of Xe’ra revival, Turalyon was the only one who knelt before her. Not once have we ever seen Velen, Khadgar or any other being kneel in such a way.

Lady Liadrin did prostrate herself before A’dal but that was more of a sign of forgiveness and hope to be accepted despite all the blood elves have done.

We do not know how long Turalyon served Xe’ra with such a conviction or devotion, but his belief was there and it was evident he was beyond simply loyal to the Light, especially how he reacted upon her death. Velen did little, but remained focused on the mission.

Even years later can we truly think that Turalyon has recovered or returned to an otherwise normal self? For now he guards stormwind but what goes on in his head is another matter.

Now we return to the present. The Hallowfall Arathi have spent the past 15 years in service to the Sacred Flame of their home. The Light of Beledar has for most of their service been a beacon of hope and faith. But that faith was tested when Beledar first shifted to the Void and many died.

Even up to the events regarding the adventurers role, and Anduins pursuit of self forgiveness and worthiness, did we see their continued faith despite the challenges. When the sacred flame fell to the void on their hallowed veneration grounds did they give up instantly, for without the light all was lost.

The same kind of fear we saw in Turalyon upon Xe’ras death.

It was only thanks to Faerin’s faith, possibly bolstered and influenced by Anduin’s presence, that they still clung to hope and were renewed with the Sacred Flames restoration. They further bonded with the adventurers and rekindled their sense of duty. Its that same influence of Faerin that we found an ally ready to jump into the void with us to continue the fight.

Now the reason i bring this up is these people have been cut off from their Empire for a period but the basis of their faith was founded upon the Light. An empire that has no racial or other interactions beyond humans and elves, although intermingling may have made some half-elf/half-human.

There is that possible idea that they could be both racial bias but also extremely devout in their faith of the Light. Imagine a whole civilization with the same mindset of Turalyon or others fully devoted to the Light’s cause/mission. Even the Lightbound of the AU universe on Draenor from which the Mag’har orcs escaped from were fanatically devout, a belief based on the lies of the Light.

What is possibly an even darker course is that they may already be among us. What goals could they pursue in their un-wavering faith in the Light?

Let us add one step further. Could the Alternate Xe’ra and the Lightbound from the AU reached Azeroth and be a powerful influence on that Empire. Unlikely but still something to base their devout goals upon.

And the inevitable possibility that they could invade Stormwind and take over? Would Faerin betray her friend for her Emperor/Empire. Imagine a fleet of those air ships and a force to surround/capture stormwind off guard.

We must wait and see. For now, keep an eye on your friends. They may be in league with the Arathi Empire.

Another note, Im seeing alot of players wearing the Hallowfall Arathi plate and cloth sets, hope they aren’t being brainwashed into serving the Empire. There is your new fanatical crusade!!!

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I mean…no, we literally had him as a viewpoint character in Tides of Darkness.

Turalyon’s pretty much always been fanatical, the way he reconciled fighting Orcs in the second war with ‘the Light is in all creatures’ is deciding ‘Orcs aren’t of the Light’. There’s no real ‘recovery’ he needs, what we saw of him in Legion is just how he’s always been.

At the same time, even when he was wrestling with ‘how can the Orcs be the enemy when all things are of the Light’, he was still fighting them for Lordaeron. And when Xe’ra said ‘kill Alleria, she’s using the Void’ he refused. So his loyalty to his kingdom/wife definitely comes before said fanaticism.

Do we actually have any confirmation of this or is it just your opinion on it?

As for Faerin, there’s a ‘stay a while and listen’ where she reveals the Empire itself may not be as open to the Alliance/Horde races as the expedition has been, but that also makes it pretty clear she doesn’t share that view. Blizz is probably building the Expedition up as the eventual Nightfallen/Frostwolf Clan/Severed Threads to the Nightborne/Iron Horde/Azj-Kahet of the Arathi Empire.

They can’t be biased against working with the Alliance/Horde due to them having a ton of races and yet immediately happy to work with the Mag’har from another timeline. It’s kinda one or the other there.

…what?

Not so much these days. In fact, he’s been quite the opposite.

In the pre-shadowlands novel, Genn’s ready to start the Fifth War, but Turalyon is the voice of reason against sending armed forces into Zandalar to hunt down Sylvanas and her Dark Rangers.

He’s literally told Anduin that as men of the Light they should allow it to guide them, but not think for them.

When presented with an undead Alonsus Foal, Turalyon’s initial reaction was to frame the man before him in the only way he knows the undead: corpses animated by the soul of some malevolent creature. The moment Foal spoke, however, Turalyon instantly realized Faol wasn’t some evil monstrosity, but the man he had always known.

Let that last one sink in for a moment. For DECADES now the rest of the world has seen the Forsaken as monsters. Turalyon only needed 5 seconds talking to one to realize otherwise.

Fanatics aren’t this open-minded, tolerant, or moderate when it comes to discussing their religion.

There definitely seems to be different minds regarding Turalyon on the writing team, though. While the novels repeatedly demonstrate him to not be a zealot, someone who writes the quests for the game likes to push that narrative. Azurathel hadn’t been awake a full day, meets Turalyon for all of 5 seconds, and instantly decides he’s a zealot. Like, there was no time to form any sort of frame of reference to make that call. It definitely felt like someone on the quest team threw it out there because its what they want.

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I’d argue that fanatical here doesn’t necessarily mean evil, it just means he’s extremely devoted to the Light. As for the stuff with Faol that’s kinda the point I made with Alleria/Lordaeron/the Orcs?

Turalyon is shown to have a real need to frame what he does as right in regards to his worship of the Light. Even when Uther/the other original paladins and Faol himself didn’t have an issue with feeling they had to reconcile fighting the Orcs with the ideals of the Light, Turalyon did to the extent he eventually framed it to himself as ‘Orcs must not be of the Light’ instead of either ‘what he was doing may be against that specific doctrine’ or ‘that specific doctrine may be wrong’.

Basically I’m saying Turalyon is fanatic in the sense of he has a set view of how the Light is and the doctrines of it and he bends his other view of things to ensure that view is uncompromised.

But at the same time you’re right in that he’s really quick to still do what he thinks is reasonable based on other loyalties. Even when he’s trying to justify fighting the Orcs in the context of the Light, he’s still fighting them because he’s loyal to Lordaeron. Even when Xe’ra is telling him Alleria is bad because the Void, his loyalty to her won out and presumably he justified Xe’ra as not speaking for the Light/somehow there being a loophole there.

Or with Faol, yeah, he immediately recognised him as a friend and a mentor instead of getting stuck in the standard view people have of undead.

Tl;dr: I’m arguing Turalyon is a fanatic because he has this uncompromising view of the Light being correct to the extent he forces the rest of his worldview to accommodate to that…but at the same time he’s also no less fanatical about his other loyalties and seems to have the view of ‘if this doesn’t make sense to me/seems contradictory I’ve yet to discover the answer’ instead of forcing himself to outright choose between Light or other loyalty.

Except, he doesn’t. He literally told Anduin that while they should allow the light to guide them, it must never control them.

I think the word you’re looking for is, ‘Devoted.’ Turalyon is very devoted to his where his loyalties rest, whether that be people or dogma. He isn’t, however, fanatical.

https://www.dictionary.com/browse/fanatic

Under Synonym study:

Fanatic, zealot, militant, devotee refer to persons showing more than ordinary support for, adherence to, or interest in a cause, point of view, or activity. Fanatic and zealot both suggest excessive or overweening devotion to a cause or belief. Fanatic further implies unbalanced or obsessive behavior: a wild-eyed fanatic.

That last sentence in particular, does not describe Turalyon in the slightest.

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I’d agree he’s mellowed out/become more devoted than fanatical as part of the Army of the Light (ironically) then. Though I’d still argue the second war-era Turalyon is borderline fanatical given at least imo being so devoted to the Church/Light that he has to justify “Orcs aren’t of the Light” instead of admit that maybe a specific bit of dogma isn’t always correct ticks the “excess/unbalanced devotion” box.

Though either way, the point is he’s not the sort of Light fanatic the OP of the thread is trying to paint him as. Neither are the (majority) of the Hallowfall Arathi, especially Faerin.