World of Warcraft’s latest good-vs-evil clash inspired a spicy ship

The war withinthe last World of Warcraft expansion, is off to a strong start. The early story is interesting, the environments are beautiful and detailed, and the characterization is a big improvement over the high point of Battle for Azeroth And Shadowlands. There is one element that is a little harder to quantify; it’s a special sauce that adds a nice flavor to everything else. It’s the dynamic between Alleria Windrunner, rumored to be the expansion’s main character, and the villainous Xal’atath. So far, it’s been tense, dramatic, and gay as hell.

Alleria Windrunner is a long-running character from the original Warcraft real-time strategy games. She is an elven ranger, devoted to her family and protecting the innocent. Her long backstory is marked by repeated sacrifices—she left her home and infant son to pursue the Orcs into the Dark Portal. Thought lost, she eventually found herself caught up in a thousand-year war in an extraplanar realm alongside her light-loving husband, Turalyon. The demands of that war eventually led her to embrace the dark powers of the Void.

In World of WarcraftThe Void is presented as a corrupting force, constantly whispering and coercing. This cosmology is a big part of the current lore; there are six cosmic forces, of which the Void is one, and it is opposed to the Light. This contrast is so strong that Alleria cannot even touch her husband without great pain for both of them. So what is a girl to do when she is having marital problems and struggling to master her newfound Shadow powers?

Meet Xal’atath, the current big bad of World of Warcraft. She is the Harbinger of the Black Empire, a sort of ancient and powerful force of the Void. She is an eldritch entity that haunts the corpse of a Void Elf. We don’t know much about where she comes from or what her ultimate goal is, and part of that is because she is so focused on seducing Alleria to her side. Metaphorically, of course.

There are multiple cutscenes throughout The war within where Xal’atath hovers menacingly around Alleria, cooing in her ear, and getting right in her face. I wasn’t really sold on this conflict at first. Xal’atath talks well about Alleria needing to “embrace her true self” and “be who she’s meant to be”, but she doesn’t have a lot of bargaining chips. The player isn’t given much reason to believe that Alleria would deliberately fall prey to evil, so the whole thing rings a bit hollow.

Unless you extrapolate to the relationship between Alleria and Xal’atath – which fans love to do. The ship is still in its early stages, but it has a lot of potential. Plus, there are two more expansions in the Worldsoul Saga after The war withinso we know that this dynamic still needs a lot of time to simmer slowly.

Will this ship ever become canon? Probably not, considering Xal’atath just destroyed the beloved city of Dalaran. While Blizzard has been making big narrative moves lately, I can’t imagine them resolving this particular conflict with kisses. But the interest from fans and the fact that fans are enjoying the dynamic between our hero and villain is a good sign for The war within. I want to be able to speculate about the inner lives of these characters, their motivations, their wants and needs. That results in old-fashioned shipping, and who am I to argue with that particular kind of enthusiasm?