Neltharion has been a World of Warcraft villain since the very beginning, and he may continue to play a role in the MMO based on an interesting detail about the Aberrus raid and its bosses. Neltharion is also known as Deathwing in World of Warcraft due to his massive dragon form that played a key role in the Cataclysm expansion, but players aren't done with the powerful foe yet based on the Dragonflight raid and references inside it.
Blizzard introduced Aberrus, the Shadowed Crucible with patch 10.1.0, and since then, geared players have been working to complete the second raid of World of Warcraft: Dragonflight. While Dragonflight was released in November 2022, Blizzard continues to add new content and fix existing issues through regular updates. Because of all the environmental storytelling and lore that World of Warcraft players can find in raids, some are delving into Aberrus, the Shadowed Crucible for the fine details, and one fan noticed a key similarity between three of the bosses.
Reddit user Grubuloid recently shared an image compiling three Aberrus, the Shadowed Crucible bosses, Neldris, Thadrion, and Rionthus, with the World of Warcraft player noting some overlap between them. Taking the first few letters of each name, Grubuloid stated that the "Nel," "Tha," and "Rion" of the names can be combined to reference the classic World of Warcraft foe Neltharion.
Beyond references to Deathwing in Aberrus, the Shadowed Crucible, Neltharion also joins World of Warcraft players during and between some of the fights, potentially setting the stage for a future update. Because players beat Neltharion as Deathwing during World of Warcraft's Dragon Soul raid, the boss was weakened before returning to the Dragon Isles to regain strength and prepare the army that players fend off in Aberrus, the Shadowed Crucible. Like other World of Warcraft raids, Aberrus concludes with a cliffhanger cinematic that shows Sarkareth speaking some final words before collapsing in the final room of the fortress.
Given that World of Warcraft: Dragonflight is an expansion about dragons, many players have speculated that Deathwing would make an appearance. As Neltharion has played a minimal role in World of Warcraft: Dragonflight before Aberrus, the Shadowed Crucible, it's possible that his appearance in the raid is setting up future content revolving around the significant dragon character.
World of Warcraft is available now for PC.