The Ardenweald Dreamer - Ysera's Story in Shadowlands (Story Spoilers)

With how the Soul Cage is described as being able to compel Souls and how Ysera was in the last batch of Souls to arrive in Ardenweald before the Anima Drought and how Azsuna takes place before Val’Sharah which takes place before Stormheim…

Could it be possible that Helya swapped the Arbiter’s core for a fake Core(causing her to shut down with no known reason since there is a glowing Core right inside her) while shoving the real one into the Soul Cage?

Imagine the Jailer grabbing the Arbiter’s core and bragging about having won but just as he puts it into his chest he discovers he has a fake one and the real one was shattered in Stormheim by Genn Greymane! His whole plan derailed by Helya’s desire to enslave Eyrir!

1 Like

Ysera, like all of the now-former Aspects, had lost the bulk of that power when Deathwing was defeated at the end of Cataclysm.

This would be nice.

1 Like

I imagine Helya’s deal with Sylvanas was to obtain the Arbiter’s Orb for the Jailer(which is why he has a hole in his chest: he wants the Orb’s powers) and in exchange Sylvanas would subjugate Eyir first. Not only did Sylvanas fail yet Genn smashed the Arbiter’s Orb derailing both Sylvanas and Helya’s plans!

Incidentally there is apparently a Helya Scenario which I presume shows Sylvanas’s deal with Helya.

https://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/2500342-9-0-General-Discussion/page2712?p=52406417&viewfull=1#post52406417

https://i.gyazo.com/2312221797bd727f00cb03bad1022fe0.jpg

Sylvanas naturally blamed Mueh’zala for this failure as shown with Before the Storm as her being Warchief drew Genn and everyone else’s attention to Stormheim!

The Azerite ultimately showed her how to salvage this failure though(“This changes everything!”):

Once she realized the Souls were all going to her associate she immediately capitalized on this and started the 4th War to get as many Souls to the Jailer which was easy since they are going straight to him without the Arbiter’s Orb compelling them to the rest of the Shadowlands!

In otherwords all the Arbiter does is point Souls to the best destination and away from the Maw unless they are a threat. Genn smashing the Orb requires someone go to Stormheim to reclaim the remains to repair them and Eyir probably won’t allow that and become a Raid to be sacrificed.

Odyn would of course be interested in the Arbiter and the Purpose and if I know him he’d probably give the repaired Orb in exchange for moving the Halls of Valor over Oribos so that he may sort his Vrykul(and any untainted yet worthy Souls) into the Halls himself without that failure Eyir!

All Souls that don’t go to the Halls of Valor would be allowed to go to the Arbiter to be pointed to the best Afterlife for them.

(Query): Aren’t Nightborne Priests technically worshipers of Elune? If not, then what do they worship?

1 Like

Nightborne don’t seem to worship Elune as far as we can tell. At least not as a major religion. A lot of Nightborne roleplayers play their priests a bit like gnome priests. No specific deity. Just a general faith in themselves and their people.

You know, this reminds me a lot of Hakkar and that weird crystal in his chest. He’s supposed to be working with Mueh’zala and the Jailer. Might be a connection there.

That should vary by individual. It could be anything from the Light to the Cult of Forgotten Shadow. I would assume that the Blood Elves would be a heavy influence in that department. There’s no evidence that Elune worship continued in the Bubble City.

(Commentary): Well, we didn’t see any Priests of Elune, but there doesn’t seem to be any evidence that worship of Elune would’ve ended with the Nightborne for some reason. We were never shown or told they had some kind of crisis of faith that made them turn away from her, as the Blood Elves had with the Light.

Well we know they couldn’t see the moon (Thalyssra said they were without moonlight in Suramar’s intro cinematic), so while there’s nothing explicit I personally find it hard to believe they’d continue to worship a moon goddess in that situation.

10 Likes

Again… that’s not my point.

As to the Blood Elves there’s precedent from the RTS that they had Mage-Priests as combat units so they do have a history of Priests.

There is however NO, NADA, Not one sign of Elune in Suramar not a single man, woman, or child makes a reference to her. There’s not even a moon glyph in site. Suramar was and is a city of Highborne culture. Elune worship may have been well ridiculed as a “lowborne faith”. The orignal Kal’dorei empire was extremely caste driven…to the point that the upper classes had their own languages. Remember also that “lowborne” is the gravest insult that a Nightborne will use on someone else.

You might find some Elune context in the ruins, but again, that’s outside “Bubble City”.

3 Likes

(Commentary): I may be wrong, but even in Azshara’s day wasn’t the Temple of the Moon and the Sisterhood a major facet of the Highborne Empire? I mean, we know the Night Warrior Ritual was used to fight the Trolls, and that past Night Warriors served the Empire.

3 Likes

The Temple was placed in the part of Suramar destroyed by the Burning Legion. We don’t really have much of a context of past Night Warriors and how they fitted within the total scheme of things. What we do know however is that over time, emphasis shifted from worship of Elune to concentration of arcane might tapped from the Well of Eternity. This included a caste system which was based on arcane ability, this would imply that Elune worship faded away from the Highborne castes to become more of a peasant faith.

Most likely by Azshara’s time the Night Warrior had become a nearly forgotten mythical figure. We really don’t have a history of the Night Elf empire before Azshara’s ascension, not even for the bulk of her reign.

So I judge Suramar by it’s PRESENT, not by a past we haven’t been given access to, most likely because Blizzard hasn’t had a need to create it, nor likely ever will.

So if you want to make a case for a present-day Church of Elune in Suramar… all you have to do is SHOW the evidence.

1 Like

(Commentary): That’s a perfectly reasonable position to take. Also, I have no evidence of any present-day Church of Elune or Elune worship in Suramar. At most there is one line, I think, from Thalyssra, about Elune’s Wisdom leading Tyrande to spurn the Nightborne, but that doesn’t imply faith.

I think that was supposed to be Thalyssra throwing Tyrande’s own words back at her rather than showing Thalyssra’s own belief in Elune. But Nightborne priests’ faith is entirely conjecture one way or another, so eh?

5 Likes

When Azshara rose to power and became queen, SHE started becoming the object of worship by the “high-born”

Azshara was their goddess. Azshara sold her people out for her own personal power gain. THIS is what Tyrande was referring to.

2 Likes

The Sisterhood of Elune held sway in the later days of the Kaldorei empire, but their political clout had decayed greatly during Azshara’s reign. That is why they had left their traditional seat of power in what became known as Zin-Azshari to set up shop in Suramar.

Then the Legion used the temple as a base for operation in the WotA and Elune seemingly did nothing about it… the Highborne mages sealed the Legion portal then abandoned the temple and set up their infamous 10,000 year barrier. The surviving core of Suramar we see now was the Highborne area, the lowborne sectors of the city were left to be washed away by the sundering.

The Highborne had abandoned worship of Elune for worship of Azshara for some time before the Sundering. With their faith in Azshara broken and Elune not doing much to help them I imagine modern Nightborne likely don’t worship any specific deity. There is actually a LOT more suggestion of ancestor worship practices, particularly of their most accomplished ancestors.

2 Likes

Looks like Tyrande’s part will only be in the Night fae campaign where she abandons her people just to die in the maw…

quite disappointing for me.

you know like the class campaigns, there is going to be updates to the night fae campaign right as the xpac goes on, so as long as tyrande doesnt die in 9.0 she will have more story in 9.0.5 + same goes for voljin

Well, they said her story moment will be in 9.0 so I guess that’s where she dies. She abandons her people and runs into the maw and well… we both know that Tyrande won’t survive in there, especially not if she had to face Sylvanas or Nathanos or someone…

I wish Tyrande would’ve died as a last boss in a raid instead of just dying to Sylvanas or Nathanos, but I guess she has to die in shame. As a bad leader that abandoned her people, went crazy and got destroyed by < insert Nathanos or Sylvanas > right after.

It’s more of a personal dig at Tyrande since she is the chief interpreter of “Elune’s Wisdom”

3 Likes