Theory: Illidan is a sleeper agent

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Recently, a book has been found on the PTR called Enemy Infiltration -Preface. If you don’t know about it or don’t want spoilers, stop reading now.

The book talks about how an unseen hand, most likely a Dread Lord given hints in the book, are infiltrating all the various comics powers in the Warcraft universe. If you haven’t read it, I suggest you do now or most of this won’t make sense. All of this is just my speculation.

So, Illidan is an unknowing or sleeper agent for the Dread Lords. His goal is to disrupt or cripple the Titans so that the Jailer (or whomever the Dread Lords serve) doesn’t have to deal with them. Illidan is the only non-order entity in contact with the Titans right now (besides Mr. Stabby himself). The reasons Danny gave for staying with the Titans were thin at best, and hes a known over thinker.

His invasion of Nathreza would at first seem to sink this theory. However, if the Nathrezim really are from the Shadowlands, Nathreza might very well have just been some random plant they set up shop on. Illidan was shown to have Nathrezim as part of his forces, if you remember in BC the big one guarding the front of the black temple. They might very well have known about Illidan’s plans to invade their planet. Maybe they let the demon hunters win. That way, they would have a valid excuse for sending only a token force to the battle at Antorus.

Also, a lot of Illidan’s demonic mutations make him look more like a Nathrezim (horns, hoofs, wings) most of which he got after absorbing the skull of Gul’dan. A skull that Arthas, an unknowing agent of the Jailer, convinced him to steal. The same skull he took with him to Outland. A skull that was held previously by a Dread Lord (Tichondrius). There is also the possibility that when Arthas “killed” Illidan at the end of Warcraft 3, Frostmourn took a bit of his soul, giving the Jailer slight control over him.

In Legion, in the Nighthold mythic Gul’dan fight, The players had to fight Illidan’s “demon within”. (Tichondrius also happened to be in the Nighthold at the time). In the Illidan novel, you see the process of making a demon hunter involves infusing your soul with a demon soul. In the example’s case, a felhound. What if Illidan’s “demon within” Is a Dread Lord? What if that Dread Lord is waiting for just the right moment to take over Illidan’s body?

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Interesting theory, however it seems to be kind of moot now, that he’s eternally trapped™ in the Seat of the Pantheon. If Illidan was an unwitting pawn of the dreadlords, he would have been a rather minor one, given the ‘results’ that he got for them.

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He might not be, that red dot in the sky in game is still there. One dev said ominously that if it ever disappears we should be worried. Maybe at this very moment hes poisoning the pathenon against each other. Or maybe I just listened to the Illidan audio book too much.

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I mean, hey, if it let’s me put him down for good this time, I’ll buy it.

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Illidan’s demon within is implied to be Azzinoth, since he also summons Shards of Azzinoth (or whatever those adds were called) during the fight. Azzinoth was a terrorguard.

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But the Titans are already disrupted. The ploy being that Sargeras was shown the Void to cause his fear. This in turn lead to him killing the Titans. Now they have in turn imprisoned him. They’re all weakened or working against one another, so already effectively neutralized.

This is true of becoming more demonic in general, more or less. And we’ve seen it happen to Satyrs and other Demon Hunters.

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