World of Warcraft: Shadowlands is the upcoming expansion for the long-running MMO, and Blizzard is releasing an animated series, Shadowlands Afterlives, in the run up to launch. Afterlives: Bastion and Afterlives: Maldraxxus have already been released and give new perspectives on key moments in the World of Warcraft lore.
Now, Afterlives: Ardenweald gives fans insight into another realm of death, where mysterious creatures called the Night Fae appear to nurture the souls of dead nature spirits awaiting reincarnation. The short also shows the Night Fae’s leader, the Winter Queen, reforming her subjects into something called The Wild Hunt that is willing to sacrifice the souls they swore to protect in order to stop all of Ardenweald from dying. But who is the Winter Queen, what is the Wild Hunt, and what can fans expect in World of Warcraft: Shadowlands?
The Winter Queen
The Winter Queen is the leader of the Night Fae and Ardenweald, a realm of the Shadowlands like Bastion and Maldraxxus where the spirits of Wild Gods, loa, and Ancients among other nature spirits are kept in slumber until their rebirth. In the animated short, fans might recognize Ursoc, one of the Ancient Guardians, also known as the Bear God, who players help defeat in-game. After his death, his soul is kept in something resembling a spore pod in Ardenweald, awaiting reincarnation.
When the Winter Queen first appears she is silent, graceful, and mysterious, disappearing on the wind. However, her being is heavily connected to Ardenweald itself, and the region suffers more in Shadowlands from the drought of anima – soul essence – than other realms like Bastion. When she is next seen, her regal presence has taken on a more domineering and intimidating tone, and she is willing to allow the Night Fae to sacrifice the anima of souls like Ursoc's in order to prevent the destruction of all Ardenweald.
Like nature itself, fans can expect the Winter Queen to seem cruel at times, but it is clear from the Afterlives short than her first priority is the protection of Ardenweald so that it can continue to sustain the souls of nature spirits until they are able to serve the wilds once again. The fact that there are likely some very powerful souls in Ardenweald, including the green dragon aspect Ysera, could lead to some interesting confrontations if powerful anima are needed to sustain the realm.
The Wild Hunt
The Wild Hunt will be a faction in WoW: Shadowlands and is formed only when Ardenweald is in great peril. The members of the Wild Hunt seen in the animated short take the anima from the groves of Ardenweald in an attempt to off-set the effects of the anima drought. They are clearly willing to protect their realm by any means necessary, so it will be interesting to see whether or not their good-intentions corrupt them and the Winter Queen as the situation gets more and more dire.
It's unclear what relationship the Winter Queen and the Hunt have to other mortal souls who served nature in life, but it seems likely that druids could also find themselves in Ardenweald after death. What is interesting, however, is that unlike Bastion and Maldraxxus, souls sent to Ardenweald are sent there to slumber until rebirth, and are kept in the roots of trees in their anima form, not physical forms like Uther and Draka are shown to have. This raises questions about whether souls like Arthas in the Maw are are more abstracted like in Ardenweald, or have physical forms.
Ardenweald could be the site of some serious moral dilemmas in WoW for both the Night Queen, her Wild Hunt, and players alike as they ask what is worth sacrificing to save the realm and what lengths they are willing to go to save the souls they claim to protect in World of Warcraft: Shadowlands.
World of Warcraft is available on PC. World of Warcraft: Shadowlands will be available on October 26th/27th worldwide.