Know Your Lore: The Blue Dragonflight
The World of Warcraft is an expansive universe. You're playing the game, you're fighting the bosses, you know the how, but do you know the why? Each week Matthew Rossi and Anne Stickney make sure you Know Your Lore by covering the history of the story behind World of Warcraft.
The past few KYL's have been focusing on dragonflights, and this one's no different. This week, we cover the Blue Dragonflight, Azeroth's masters of magic. Before we do, though, we should go back and link my Red Dragonflight post and Anne's Black Dragonflight one, because a lot of the same ground is about to be covered.
In some ways, the blue dragons are the ones players may be most familiar with. From Azuregos wandering about Azshara to Sapphiron in Naxxramas and Sindragosa in Icecrown Citadel, with appearances by Kalecgos in the Sunwell, Arygos in Ahn'Qiraj, and of course two 5 man instances and a raid in Coldarra, players have plenty of opportunity to run into a member of the Blue Dragonflight.
The Blue Dragonflight has been involved in many of the important events of Azeroth's history despite suffering unimaginably from those events. From the War of the Ancients and the Sundering to the Third War and to the present with the Nexus War, blue dragons have attempted to hold to their ancient charge to shepherd the world's magics no matter what it costs them. And it has cost them very, very dearly. For thousands of years, the blue dragons were almost extinct, nearly wiped out by Deathwing and the Dragon Soul. Their leader and father, Malygos the Aspect of Magic, was driven mad by the loss of so many of his children and the betrayal of his best friend and most trusted confidant, Neltharion.
It's hard to imagine what the Blue Dragonflight was like before the War of Ancients. Malygos and his consort Sindragosa ruled over a dragonflight as expansive as any, in a world with few if any threats to them. It's clear that Malygos and his flight didn't feel particularly threatened by the wars between the troll and aqir empires, nor were they particularly concerned with the rise of night elf society on the shores of the Well of Eternity. At least, they weren't concerned enough to actually do anything about it. There are no reports of the blue dragons approaching the night elves' highborne and trying to convince them to stop meddling with the arcane power of the well.
However, when the dragons were finally roused to oppose the coming of the Burning Legion via the Well of Eternity (due to Sargeras' influence over the minds of Xavius and later Queen Azshara herself) Malygos made the mistake of being too trusting of his long time friend and fellow Aspect, and it was Malygos who helped convince the other dragons to lend their power to the forging of what was then known as the Dragon Soul. "It is a weapon like no other. It must be like no other." When Neltharion turned the Dragon Soul against the other dragonflights, the blues were the first to pay the ultimate price, as Neltharion froze all of the dragons in place using the power they themselves had donated to his great and terrible artifact. Horrified and enraged, Malygos led the charge against his brother aspect as soon as he was freed, and it was as they moved to attack the insane earthwarder that the blue dragonflight was almost entirely slaughtered. Sindragosa, prime consort to the Aspect, was hurled miles away to the north of the continent of Kalimdor (this was before it was shattered into the three continents of modern day Azeroth) and crashed to the ground in what we today call Icecrown, too weak to even make her way to the Dragonblight where dragons go to die.
Only Malygos and a few others survived, and them only barely behind the Aspects powerful protective magics. The loss of his mate and most of his children and the fact that it was in great measure due to his own work to help convince the other aspects to cooperate with Neltharion broke Malygos' mind, and he and the surviving blues quit the battle. After the Sundering, when the remaining red, green and bronze dragons created Nordrassil to help disguise the new Well of Eternity created by Illidan Stormrage, Malygos appears to have created Mazthoril and set the few remaining blues and blue dragonkin there to guard over the magical power slumbering below the World Tree. (It's possible also that Mazthoril was created far later.)
Afterwards, Malygos retreated to his lair in Coldarra, going so far as to rip the place away from the land to help ensure its isolation. Having lost so much and now finding their Aspect descending into brooding insanity, the few remaining blues were unable to stand up to Deathwing and his black dragon forces, and many more were slaughtered in combat against the blacks. The war of dragon against dragon that followed pitted red, blue, bronze and green against black and led to the near extinction of both the black and blue dragonflights and the great reduction of the others. From this point on, dragons could no longer muster the forces needed to truly fulfill their ancient charges, and the age of dragons came crashing to a close.
Yet, despite Malygos' ruin and their incredible losses, the blues did not wholly vanish. Some of them even attempted to pursue their mandate to watch over the world's magic. During the War of the Shifting Sands, for instance, the blue dragon Arygos, son of Malygos and presumably either Sindragosa or her replacement Saragosa (we have no idea when Malygos took a second consort, he may even have had two the same as Alexstrasza did for a time) ended up trapped within the Temple of Ahn'Qiraj alongside equally prominent red and green dragons. Arygos sacrificed himself to ensure that the barrier that trapped C'thun for a thousand years was created, and remained within the structure as a prisoner until mortal adventurers slew C'thun's physical manifestation.
