According to canon, the ritual Arthas used to turn Sylvanas changed her soul forever the source says the ritual “infinitely prolonged her existence as a creature filled with hate toward all life.” The Banshee version of Sylvanas is a literal undead walking talking ball of kick butt with an affinity for death; Arthas was a literal undead walking talking ball of kick butt with an affinity for death.
Is it possible they reconcile in Shadowlands? Sylvanas reconciling with the former Scourge considering she is a millisecond away from becoming a fist pumping death goddess. The thought is currently entertaining me.
The ritual(simply preformed with a wave of Frostmourne in her general direction) pretty much just made Sylvanas like the Banshees of Azsuna. She like most Ghosts saw Azeroth in Monochromatic which pretty much means she was in the Shadowlands and reality at the same time just like Uuna.
Becoming a Banshee makes you more likely to be ignored by Kyrian. Kyrian are only supposed to bring you to the Arbiter if your Soul is ready. Banshees’ Souls aren’t ready until they possess a body and that body dies.
The Arthas that killed Sylvanas and turned her into a Banshee is not the same one who Uther and the Kyrian punted into the Maw…
That Arthas was Matthias Lehner AKA the discarded Humanity/Soul of Arthas(the Arthas Novel outright describes Arthas’s Human Soul as his Humanity with him deliberately shoving it’s last sliver into Frostmourne when it tried to redeem him).
Matthias Lehner gained sentience sometime after Arthas grabbed Frostmourne(or you could say Arthas’s body gained sentience after grabbing Frostmourne) though before he encountered Tichondrius.
The Soul of the Arthas who killed Sylvanas and Uther should pretty much be a mass of Sin and Memory(since they are a form of Anima/Soul-stuff themselves) which I presume is usually ignored by the Kyrians considering Shaman don’t consider Echoes to be Souls.
Memory of Arthas is the monster who created Sylvanas so if she decided she wanted to thank him and bring him into the Jailer’s ranks she has to locate him and he would either be bound to the Blades of the Fallen Prince or be somewhere on the Broken Isles(since that was where we last saw Arthas the Lich King).
Anything is possible. And reconciliation can mean a great many things.
I do not mind if he is relegated to a goon in Sylvanas’s ascension, and his soul has long since been consumed to give anima to some plant in Ardenweald. Never to be considered again. But the story always seems to go the opposite of what I would like, so Arthas will probably end up being Warchief.
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I’m avoiding a lot of spoilers so I can’t to talk Uther and friends punting souls to the maw(WTHLMAO!!). Arthas is described as being evil even before wielding Frostmorne(I mean Cdev said those exact words). I hate to ask but is cdev going forward with Matthias is good Arthas in SL or is it still a possible that its all philosophical? Without going into too much detail, could you be wrong?
Matthias Lehner(appears in Icecrown and the Arthas Novel) isn’t so much as Good Arthas as a Evil yet not Sociopathic Arthas.
Arthas just before he grabbed Frostmourne had internal guilt inside him and yet had become a vengeance driven villain like Maiev(though with more guilt unlike her).
His evil while retaining a Soul still pales in comparison to what Kael’thas did:
Kael’thas didn’t simply purge a city of potential infected but actively tried to genocide the Draenei on Azuremyst Isles as well as razed Kirin’Var Village with a Mana Bomb, ravaged Outland with his Manaforges and aided the Legion in invading Azeroth while betraying Quel’Thalas’s people.
Arthas betrayed his mercenaries for the sake of the civilians of his Kingdom yet Kael’thas betrayed all of his Kingdom to the Legion and stole Mu’ru & Anveena to summon Kil’jaeden.
Kael’thas, the sentient Body of Arthas and Sylvanas are far worse than the Soul of Arthas AKA Matthias ever was!:
The Soul of Arthas at worst(backstabbing his armies and burning one city to stem a plague) wasn’t even as bad as Lady Vashj(who enslaved Broken, supported Azshara’s allegiance with the Legion, attempted to murder Tyrande out of envy and conquered the Zangermarsh) and she wound up in Maldraxxus and became Baroness Vashj!
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Why the heck should she? She is under no delusion that Arthas did her any favors by making her the monster she is now. She is not a fist pumping anything… if anything her driving away everyone from her presence, supporter or enemy shows very much the opposite personality.
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Her inner monologue in BtS suggest otherwise. All of my books are in boxes but I’ll provide you with those quotes once I unpack.
At the very least, if Sylvanas were to find Arthas’ soul I can imagine she’d stop to torture him a bit.
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The arthas/lich king (arthas as in mathias lehner) connection seems alot like the anakin/darth vader connection.
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Maybe? Isn’t she supposed to be all gung-ho about death now? Maybe she’d thank him…
Nope. At minimum she’s going to dunk on him.
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That’d be such an outlandish moment showing off how much they’d twisted Sylvanas’ character, so it’ll probably happen.
Wasn’t Sylvanas talking about herself here? As it related to Delaryn’s predicament matching Sylvanas’ when she was alive? In regards to the thread’s title.
What if they become a “pair”?
Ya know, since WoW has become this weird amalgamation of fan fiction now. Every big boss we’ve killed is coming back in someway. : /
I’m always extremely wary of people who try to tie Sylvanas’s current storyline to Arthas or envision a way to bookend him in. Half the time it’s just some creepy revenge fantasy where Sylvanas gets “what’s coming to her” from the dude who murdered and tortured her (with an arguable dash of sexual assault euphemism for good measure).
To be fair, not every theory I see is like that. I think I just don’t like the idea of the man responsible for destroying a woman’s life and afterlife being so closely tied to her identity and emotional state for the rest of time, even after he’s dead and his story’s been tied up.
Imagine if Spiderman was rushing to save Manhattan from a nuclear bomb or whatever and he swings up to the cockpit of the armed plane, only to discover–gasp!–the pilot is the guy who shot Uncle Ben. Just dumb.
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To be fair, Sylvanas is speculatively working with Kel’Thuzad to aid the Jailer, and Kel’Thuzad was as much responsible for what happened to Quel’Thalas.
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Also add on the fact that KT stopped Sylvanas from taking her revenge on Arthas before Arthas became the Lich King.
"For all the humans who fell with their city would be reborn to serve her. Would that be so terrible, really? They would be with their loved ones for all time. They would not suffer the daggers of passion or loss any longer. They would need no sleep. They could pursue their interest in death as well as in life. There would be unity.
If the humans only understood how terribly life and all its attendant suffering death with them, Sylvanas thought, they would leap at the chance." - BtS
We’re going into the afterlife, so I don’t see how it’s unexpected. It’s also Warcraft, which is somewhat well known for this type of thing.
As for wow becoming “fan fiction” i don’t really care as long as they keep some standard of writing (which they haven’t in bfa but somewhat have in Shadowlands in my opinion so far)