Buckle up, buckos, and get ready for maybe the biggest lore bombshell... in at least a long, long time.
The Dreadlords (aka Nathrezim - I'm going to use both interchangeably) have always felt like very important people amongst demonkind. Despite the fact that the Man'ari Eredar were elevated above the Nathrezim in terms of leadership of the Burning Legion, the Dreadlords have always had some major role to play.
It was, after all, the Nathrezim whose daliances with the void first drove Sargeras to despair - chasing the demons, he came to Telogrus, where the Nathrezim had made alliances with the Old Gods of that world to channel their shadow magic.
In our own experience of the story, the Nathrezim were first introduced in Warcraft III, with Mal'ganis leading the Scourge forces in Lordaeron and later Northrend. We wouldn't actually learn of the Lich King until later in that story, but we also met Tichondrius, Varimathras, Detheroc, Balnazzar, and Mephistroph. Tichondrius was one of the main commanders leading the combined Legion/Scourge forces in the attack on Felwood, but the others were largely tasked with trying to wrestle control of the Scourge back under the Legion's control following the Lich King's rebellion.
We even met Lothraxion in Legion, a Dread Lord who had been changed by the Holy Light and served the Army of the Light. It seems that the Dread Lords are very adaptable, aren't they?
People have observed some similarities between the Dreadlords and the inhabitants of Revendreth. Revendreth, the purgatorial realm of the Shadowlands whose purpose is the rehabilitation of souls through a grueling kind of "break them down before we can build them back up" approach, is inhabited by the Venthyr, vampire-like tall Nosferatu-looking people who were once sent there for their own crimes and then ascended into the realm's caretakers (this is standard practice for most Shadowlands realms, though in Revendreth, you might also get sent back to the Arbiter for reassignment, or if you never make any progress, you get dumped in the Maw.) The Dreadlords, while they seem to be demons and might even have a homeworld of Nathreza, nevertheless bear some striking similarities to the Venthyr, and particularly their Eternal, who rules Revendreth, Sire Denathrius (even his name shares the "nath" syllable.)
There is a book someone found in the Shadowlands beta that suggests something rather massive. not only might that connection be confirmed, but it might also suggest that the machinations of Sire Denathrius and the Jailer have been going on for a profoundly long time.
The book is called Enemy Infiltration - Preface. And it seems to be a report made out to a "most wondrous and resplendent Master" - Master being a common term used in Revendreth to refer to Denathrius. Not only that, but in a later paragraph, the writer says "this is, after all, the solemn duty for which you sired us," which I think makes any doubts that this is addressed to Sire Denathrius pretty much go away.
The writer then explains how they have been going about their mission to topple other powerful forces of the cosmos. They list the Titans, the Void Lords, the Light and the Naaru, the forces of Disorder (Fel, Demons) and Life.
While that would be enough at least to suggest a conspiratorial attempt by forces out of the Shadowlands trying to strike at the other forces of the cosmos, we get a few other details that should really be ringing some alarm bells:
First, speaking of toppling the Titans, they suggest that if they present a threat to the Titans' order, it will be very simple to make them consumed in a drive to eradicate it. Not only were the Nathrezim who were some of the original demons Sargeras hunted, but it was also them that led him to discover the Void, and Sargeras sure as hell was "consumed by a drive to eradicate" the Void, right?
Likewise, they say, the Light is so concerned with a singular path leading forward that what they want more than anything is to be proven right (remember, Draenei paladins are called Vindicators) and thus, one of "our" number being converted to the Light is something none of them would question...
Holy crap, folks. Lothraxion might be a... triple agent?!?!
The letter also makes mention of a female agent having infiltrated the forces of Life, having gained the trust of her target. (It also notes the connection between Ardenweald and "their plane," which I assume to be the Emerald Dream.
So:
This is beta, and I would not put it past Blizzard to throw a ton of fuel on the conspiracy-theory fires. But if this is legitimately a part of the lore of Warcraft, this is MASSIVE.
It implies, for instance, that Sire Denathrius, presumably in league with the Jailer, might have orchestrated the formation of the Burning Legion. It implies that the Nathrezim have been serving a different master all this time, and that, hell, they might not even have originally been demons! (If we assume that demons in the Warcraft cosmos are by definition creatures of the Fel, which to be fair I think might not be true, as Illidan had arcane-powered demons in his employ... though holy crap, we see something like the Reliquary of Souls, which was his source of arcane power, in the Maw, so...)
It also, heartbreakingly, suggests that Lothraxion, the super-awesome holy ex-demon you actually get as a Paladin follower in Legion might actually just be there as an agent - not of the Legion, but of the Jailer.
I think we're unlikely to get the truly massive lore reveals until a little farther into Shadowlands - one of the funny things about Betas is that for all the build-up, you're really only getting the first two or three chapters of a larger story - but this really throws a ton of Warcraft lore up into the air.
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