Storm Peaks and the city of Ulduar - part planetary control facility, part Old God prison - were run by six Watchers - Titan constructs who, despite being essentially big (sentient) robots, were essentially on the level of minor gods in terms of power. While I don't remember if they explicitly state it, it's suggested that Mimiron is literally the inventor of the Gnomish race.
When we arrive in Storm Peaks, most of the Watchers have gone missing. Loken has been corrupted by Yogg-Saron into attempting to free the eldritch God of Death, and he tricks us (in a very complicated plot that has us switching loyalties two or three times) into helping him capture Thorim. As we all know, Loken dies in the Halls of Lighting, while Thorim, Hodir, Freya, and Mimiron basically all get some sense knocked into them in the Ulduar raid and then help us attack Yogg-Saron.
During the quests in Storm Peaks, though, we explore the temples of Winter (Hodir,) Life (Freya,) Invention (Mimiron,) and Order. It's this last one that's the puzzling one. While the other temples seem to have been only abandoned relatively recently (though how recent that is is anyone's guess,) the titanic scanning device that accompanies us notes that Watcher Tyr has been missing for a very long time indeed.
Tyr should be a familiar name to anyone who has quested through Eastern Plaguelands. There is a town that is controlled by the Scarlet Crusade called Tyr's Hand there (well, it's Balnazzar's "Risen" post-Cataclysm, but same dif.)
We've gotten tidbits about Tyr over the years from the developers. Legends in human society that have been passed on for ages tell of a heroic figure named Tyr who lost a hand fighting off a great and powerful evil, and then replaced the hand with a fist made out of silver. (This is, I believe, all taken from Norse mythology.) It is this Silver Hand that the Knights of the Silver Hand named their order after, so it makes sense that the Scarlet Crusade would have a strong presence in a place named after it.
It's likely that the humans passed this story down all the way from their vrykul ancestors, who directly worshipped the Titans. In the Dawn of the Aspects novella, we found that the great evil that Tyr had fought was actually Galakrond, a massive proto-drake who seemed to be mutating into a more familiar dragon, but was also doing weird things like eating smaller proto-drakes and vomiting them up as undead. (There's a whole bucket of unanswered questions right there.)
But since then, we don't really know what Tyr has been up to. The cleverer proto-drakes who bound together to fight Galakrond became the Dragon Aspects, but Tyr's exact history is unknown.
Ok, so let's move on to another Wrath lore moment. When Arthas came to Light's Hope Chapel (at the end of the Death Knight starting experience,) some immense Holy power prevented him from succeeding in his attack. The Corrupted Ashbringer, wielded by Darion Mograine, rebelled against the Scourge and was purified by the power there - the same power that broke the Lich King's control over the Knights of the Ebon Blade.
We've been told that the Chapel was Holy Ground due to the vast number of righteous paladins buried beneath it. That seems... possible, but kind of a stretch. After all, the Scourge had very little trouble raising Paladins from the dead - it's the primary way they created Death Knights. Sure, you could argue that a place so incredibly consecrated with all those people might add up to have some special power, but what if there's another explanation?
Consider the name Tirisfal. Tirisfal Glades is where the capital of Lordaeron once stood, and is clearly an important place for humanity (the Council of Tirisfal starting there, of course.) The Highborne Night Elves first landed there, but decided to search farther up the coast for their new settlement because of some dark power that Blizzard has explicitly said is not the Old Gods.
Tirisfal sounds a lot like "Tyr's Fall," doesn't it?
Could it be that the Watcher of Order, Tyr, the champion memorialized by humanity in the name of their most heroic knightly order, died in Lordaeron? Perhaps he accompanied those poor pygmy vrykul, fleeing the persecution of King Ymiron, and served as their protector in a strange land that would eventually become the home of humanity, and gave his life to defend their nascent civilization?
Such a figure would certainly bear remembering, and such a figure would also deserve an honorable burial. And such a burial site would become quite the holy ground - a place of reverence for pilgrims to visit.
We know that in Legion, the Paladin Order Hall - the headquarters for the Knights of the Silver Hand, will be in a vast, previously-undiscovered vault below Light's Hope Chapel.
Could this vault be Tyr's Tomb?
Having a Titan construct - a being that is practically a god - buried beneath Light's Hope would totally explain why it was ground so holy that it could repel the Lich King himself. It would explain the importance of the location (before Cataclysm, just a little chapel nestled in EPL's eastern hills) and why it was such an important stronghold in the fight against the Scourge.
And finally, what of his Silver Hand? Such a thing would clearly be a relic of immense importance, at the very core of the identity of the Paladin class. And perhaps that silver fist could be mounted on a handle... maybe forming a mace of intense holy power?
Yep, this is my theory - and I'm so happy with it that I'm tempted to upgrade it to a prediction - that Tyr's body is in the vault underneath Light's Hope, and that Protection or Holy Paladins (seems more Protection, but that might just be wishful thinking on my part) will get the literal Silver Hand as their artifact weapon.
No comments:
Post a Comment