Xal’atath

Folks who'd been hoping for a new World of Warcraft animation like the Harbingers and Warbringers series that predated Legion and Battle for Azeroth respectively finally got a little something today to whet their appetites: a Xal'atath-focused animation, subtitled "Supremecy." Seemingly set sometime between the end of the Manaforge Omega raid and the beginning of Midnight, this animation shows Xal'atath winning over "loyal, tractable" servant Nexus-King Salhadaar by wielding something very unusual for her: the truth.

Now that we are starting to get major details about the grand finale of The War Within, the time is ripe to begin speculating on who will serve as the main antagonists for the next expansion, Midnight, as well as the finale of the three-part Worldsoul Saga, The Last Titan.

WoW patch 11.2 arrives on August 5, sending us off to the ruined world of K'aresh — which we just got a fresh lore dump on in a new short story about Locus-Walker — and eventually into Manaforge Omega to confront Dimensius.

One of the most anticipated features of The War Within's upcoming patch 11.1.7 update is the addition of Lorewalking, which allows players to experience some of the most important and influential story arcs in the history of Azeroth in-game.

We are near the end of The War Within, the first chapter of the Worldsoul saga that has promised to bring the first three decades of Warcraft's story to an epic crescendo.

There have been various magical MacGuffins that we've pursued across Azeroth in the past two decades of World of Warcraft's story -- The Pillars of Creation, The Helm of Domination, The Scepter of the Shifting Sands -- and our current adventures in The War Within task us with traipsing across Khaz Algar in pursuit of Xal'atath and the powerful Dark Heart.

Naz'jatar.

I'm making some assumptions here, but I think it's a pretty safe assumption that Khadgar's day is not going to improve from this point on.

Prior to the imminent release of The War Within, the World of Warcraft team released a short cinematic to catch you up on the lore of the last few expansions which led us up to here.

As we round the corner on The War Within, Blizzard has been releasing more glimpses of what we can expect from the expansion, this time in an exposition-filled video.