World of Warcraft: Legion is a cornucopia of lore, both old and new. One of those strings of known old lore is revealed only to the priest class during the Artifact Questline — before priests are sent to the Broken Isles. And it involves Tyr in a way, and answers what exactly were the old whispers that drove the high elves insane milennias ago when they landed upon the shores of Tirisfal Glades shortly after their exile.
Warcraft lore fans have always wondered and even conspiracy-theorized that an Old god is imprisoned beneath Tirisfal Glades. Blizzard Entertainment finally answers the question. It’s not an Old god, but it was indeed a servant. Continue reading at your own discretion.
SPOILER ALERT!!!
Watcher Tyr and the Old Whispers of Tirisfal
Under the protective spell of “Spoiler Alert”-ery, I dare to say some of these Old Warcraft lore bits introduced by Blizzard Entertainment upon Azeroth in World of Warcraft: Legion.
The first thing Priest players will stumble upon when they arrive to Dalaran after the Legion Cinematic Intro is a quest leading you to Tirisfal Glades, near the Scarlet Monastery.
You meet up with two important Warcraft lore personas who have never been in the MMO, per se. The first one is Calia Menethil — sister of Prince Arthas. She becomes one of the NPCs in the Priest Order Hall. The second figure and the most astonishing of the two is the revelation that Alonsus Faol is alive … or rather said undead. He is known as the Bishop of Secrets, and he gives you three choices of powerful weapon artifacts to pursue.
In Alpha testing, only the shadow artifact and spec was available for testing at the time of this posting.
Starting the search for your artifact weapon, you are sent by Alonsus Faol to the lake near that eerie faerie dragon ritual (in The Whispering Forest) that Blizzard added in World of Warcraft: Cataclysm.
There is now a Twilight’s Hammer camp with level 100 mobs, and you pick up books that give you a bit of backstory of what the Twilight’s Hammer are doing there.
It is revealed that beneath the lake is the Tomb of Tyr.
Watcher Tyr
Not much is revealed about Watcher Tyr, but in the “not revealing” one can see revelation, and disconcert. This artifact questline reveals that Tyr died thousands of years ago in this place fighting a servant of the Old gods. A Faceless One. Tyr’s followers buried him there.
So two questions come to mind immediately:
1. If Tyr died thousands of years ago in Tirisfal Glades, then what did we actually see in Coldarra? More precisely, in the Nexus? Jaina actually saw Tyr (what she perceived as a hooded figure that was there a moment, then not.
To those who don’t know what I am talking about — the first time Blizzard Entertainment ever published a story involving Watcher Tyr was in World of Warcraft: Dawn of the Aspects
That book revealed that Watcher Tyr was who helped and guided these proto-drakes against Galakrond, and the novel also reveals the origin of that fabled legend revered by the Order of the Silver Hand … that of Tyr’s Hand. Tyr lost his hand in the maws of Galakrond — yea that massive dragon skeleton you have seen in the Dragonblight (Northrend) is the one of this novel, except very much alive over 12,000 years ago.
Dawn of the Aspects is divided in two eras. We see the past through the eyes of Malygos. In the present (as of shortly after the Dragon Aspects and us defeated Deathwing), Kalecgos had found Tyr’s Hand beneath the skeleton of Galakrond. The artefact (the hand) triggered a series of visions of the past into Kalec’s mind that made him relive Malygos’ memories of the battle with Galakrond — where Kalec sees Tyr’s involvement with the proto-drakes who would later become the Dragon Aspects.
Toward the end of the novel, in Part 5, Tyr was retrieved by the Watchers of Ulduar to recover from the loss of his hand. The proto-drakes were transformed into Dragon Aspects by the Titans flowing their power through the hands of the Watchers of Ulduar. That novel revealed that the Titans weren’t physically on Azeroth when these 5 proto-drakes were transformed into Dragon Aspects. The Titans did transfer their power remotely through the Watchers of Ulduar.
On the other hand, in the “present” time (after Deathwing’s defeat) at the end of World of Warcraft: Cataclysm, Kalec awakes in the Nexus to a worried Jaina Proudmoore who tried desperately to knock him out of his deep trance state. The Hand of Tyr had shown him a long forgotten era. However, this novel not only showed Tyr in that far past. Many a time throughout the novel, we are reminded of a cloaked or hooded figure over Kalec’s unconscious body. Jaina saw the hooded figure too when she forced her way through the Nexus’ wards to find out why Kalec wasn’t responding to her calls.
”There was no one there— or, rather, no one there now. Yet a peculiar thought ran through Jaina’s mind, the thought that she had seen someone. Not a dragon and not a human but something closer to the latter in shape. As she concentrated, the archmage imagined that it had been a cloaked and hooded figure a bit taller than even Kalec in his humanoid form. Jaina knew something of keepers, and while they were much taller— like giants, actually— she was certain that they had the power to make themselves be seen otherwise. Yet even if that was the case, if she had seen some keeper image, Jaina wondered why it had faded away so quickly. I didn’t imagine it. . . . It stood there. And it had not appeared until Jaina had begun to investigate the fact that there were two components to the artifact, not one.” — World of Warcraft: Dawn of the Aspects: Part V
This hooded figure Jaina saw or thought she saw was Tyr in the present. She’s unable to see him, because his magic allows him to cloak his presence. Some sort of stealth.
Even in the very last paragraph of the novel, Kalec did see something, but shrugged it off as something he imagined. It was Tyr. In the present.
”In the growing shadows of the great ribs (NOTE: referring to Galakrond’s skeleton), Kalec thought he had seen a figure, a figure small and cloaked but at the same time seeming as tall and as powerful as a dragon. And whether the image of Tyr had been real for that brief time or, most likely, conjured by his mind, Kalec silently thanked the keeper for Alexstrasza, Ysera, Nozdormu . . . and himself.”
Back to World of Warcraft: Legion — the revelation that this is Tyr’s Tomb, and that he died thousands of years ago in this place, rattles those who read the World of Warcraft: Dawn of the Aspects novel. Was that Tyr’s spirit all along? Or has Tyr resurrected somehow?
More questions yet… Why did Blizzard focus so much on Tyr in the past and the present in that novel? What plans does Blizzard have for Tyr in World of Warcraft: Legion by materializing his tomb in the MMO. One thing we can be certain of is that Blizzard pours lore in the novels, comics, manga, short stories and … not too far behind the plotline surfaces in the MMO sooner or later.
Just searching the keyword: “Tyr” in the novel tells you how relevant this character is.
In Part III, the keyword “Tyr” is used 41 times.
In Part IV, the keyword “Tyr” is used 100 times.
In Part V, the keyword “Tyr” is used 77 times.
I’m not pulling those numbers out of my — err, anyway — I have Kindle PC app with my collection of Warcraft novels to verify.
If you wish to read some of the lore of Tyr’s Tomb in World of Warcraft: Legion then check out our Class Artifact Questlines section with quest transcripts and videos.
2. The second question born from the revelation of the Tomb of Tyr in World of Warcraft: Legion is … who buried Tyr? This is what Shadowlord Slaghammer says:
Shadowlord Slaghammer: Can ye believe they found the Tomb of Tyr himself?! He died here LONG ago fighting some monstruous general of the Old gods. His
From Northrend’s lore, we know that the Vrykul were affected by the Curse of Flesh. Shortly after, the female began to give birth. The vrykul saw these weak children as monstruosities that had to be slain. Tyr led these weaklings to Tirisfal Glades to escape the slaughter, and it’s the descendants of those first vrykul weaklings who became the nation of Stromgarde. It would be interesting if Blizzard introduced some lore about that era either in-game or in printed media.
The Old Whispers
All these years of conspiracy theories about what lies beneath Tirisfal has finally being answered. The Tomb of Tyr harbors the carcass of a servant of the Old gods. A Faceless One who fell in battle against Tyr. Bishop Farthing of Stormwind is now revealed as the Twilight Deacon. He’s found an artifact weapon named Xal’atath, Blade of the Black Empire to rise Zakajz the Faceless One back to life.
This questline leads one to belief that the High Elves were driven mad by the dark whisperings of this faceless one who is buried beneath that area in Tirisfal Glades.
