I have devised a way to loosely incorporate all of the existing Dragon Age tales with a narrative of the past I am really dying to take part in as a playable character, The First Blight. The way to tie all the stories together, even though they're set over a thousand of years apart, is with the use of Flemeth. Flemeth's character is the glue that binds the story to the past and present. She is perfect because she is believed to be very old and her past is shrouded in mystery. Before I get into the intricacies of tying the tales of the past to the present I would like to first discuss why I would like to play through the stories of the past.
First off, Dragon Age's lore seems to have a deep-seated and historically prevalent past. For me, the past of the Dragon Age's lore is some of the most interesting properties in the game. So, we must ask then is "what aspects would it be interesting to go back in time 1300 years for?" One aspect maybe the conclusion of the First Blight? Another, I would love to see the differences in the world as a cultural whole. Some examples, Elves not being slaves or peons in society but actually having enormously immaculate cities and being looked upon as the pinnacle of architectural and magical brilliance, a true super power among the other races. Also, to see a perspective of Dwarven Thaigs thriving and the Dwarven empires untouched by the taint of the Dark Spawn horde would be fascinating. Lastly, but not least, to witness the Tevinter Imperium worshiping the Old Gods and to see their feud with the Elves whom they later conquered and enslave come to fruition. This would be a great chain of events to see unfold. Then the corruption of the Tevinter and their quest to usurp the Old Gods in the Golden City and the few who attempted to go there and were cast out and tainted for their arrogance. In turn, is the event that created the first Dark Spawn.
In other words, Dragon Age's history is the backbone of the amazing universe they have created and who doesn't want to go back to the "Big Bang" and unravel its fantastical beginnings. Of what I call...
Dragon Age: Dawn of the Darkspawn
This is where the corruption of the Dark Spawn begins to take part and some of the greatest moments in Dragon Age lore take place. The Dwarfs are the first to feel their impact. Under the surface the Dwarves dwell close to where the Dark Spawn frantically digs to unearth their dark Gods. Under the effects of desperation the Dwarves then create the controversial means to put the souls of their warriors into stone and iron constructs to battle the Dark Spawn. The Tevinter Imperium is weakened by the Dark Spawn and the prophetess Andraste uses the opportunity to topple their debased society. Also, the Horde's first unearthing of the Archdemon, Dumat. Besides these already known historical events it would be a delight to see the inhabitance of this nation and their reaction to a Dark Spawn first hand for the first time in history. What are these things? Why are they attacking us? And most importantly, how do we stop them? No one knew back then. The world as they knew it would have been in upheaval and utter chaos. The civilizations would have been overwhelmed and most likely pushed into a corner due to the lack in knowledge of their newfound enemy.
This is where I would like to introduce plot changes to the story. First and foremost, Dumat should have a human form.
The Archdemon from Origins could have had one…we really don't know. The ability for the Archdemon to transform from a dragon into a human form would give it a much more intimate feeling for the audience to draw a connection with a living breathing "face" to put to their antagonist. This would also open the door for it to answer "WHY?!" Why is the blight doing what it is…why does Dumat hate them so? Especially since the Tevinter Imperium actually worshiped him. Then, why would he try to eradicate them in such a way? The ability of Dumat to actually be able to answer such questions and have a human entity would draw a great connection. His answer, because they were unworthy of him as a God and the Dark Spawn were the ones to free him from his eternal prison in the core of the planet. Only they shall reap the benefits of his glorious reign.
This is about the point where I want to start an introduction to the key protagonist characters of the adventure.
Flemeth would be one. She is a thriving young normal human mage woman, a prodigy, in the world of magic. She thrives in a world where Templars and Mages actually have a deep respect and almost love for one another. This would be a world where Templars see their duty to protect mages as a badge of honor as one of the utmost prestigious privileges obtainable. The Circle of Magi does not exist. Blood magic is in public practice and not ban and she is, like Morrigan, a respectable shape shifter mage, but a remarkable blood mage. During this time, not only is blood magic not ban from practice, but it is embraced. Elven and Human blood alike flow from Tevinter Imperium alters to fuel their power lust.
Andraste would be one of your companions. She is the Idol that the Chantry would later come to iconize and the leader of her "barbarian" people who overthrow the Tevinter Imperium. Andraste is an unparalleled cleric capable of healing and unmovable protection spells, but also the use of wrath against those who oppose her.
Another companion in the tale would be Aeducan, of the Dwarven Warrior Caste, who united the armies of the dwarves and led them to defend the city of Orzammar; by this time most Thaigs had fallen, and Aeducan chose to hold the line at Orzammar rather than attempting to save the remaining Thaigs. Aeducan joins your band on the quest to kill the leader of the Dark Spawn, Dumat. All of these "champions" are the best of the best of their race and discipline. They have been chosen to assist you on your quest to sack the Archdemon and overlord of the Dark Spawn, Dumat. As there seems to be no stop to the swarm of the Blight, the leaders of the different races have sent their best and brightest to vanquish this evil as a final resort.
This band of prodigies, profits, champions, and "warrior artists" succeed in their task. Keep in mind, this is the first Blight…no one knows how to permanently sack an Archdemon. After Dumat's physical form is laid to waste by the companions Dumat is shortly reborn thereafter…stronger than before. This is why the first Blight last the longest out of any other Blight to follow it. Not only because the population of the world really had no idea how to permanently destroy the Archdemon, but also because of this transformation during Dumat's "death". Dumat's being, his essence, went through a metamorphosis of-sorts. This transition changed his physical form and alters his comprehension of reality during his so-called death, Dumat accents to an even greater evolution of his former self.
The champions must find a means to vanquish him forever.
Now this is where the story brakes-up into one of two paths I have thought-up of.
Path #1: Morrigan the "good" path.
A way to tell the tale of the past and include the present story is through the use of the Eluvian which is a magical mirror featured in the Dalish Elf Origins story. Also, the mirror is used often in Merrill's companion quests in Dragon Age II. It is known to be a portal of some sort, and it can transmit the "taint" disease. It was crafted by the elves of Arlathan to be used as portals for telecommunication and perhaps even teleportation between their cities, using a type of magic different from that of the modern Circle of Magi or even the Tevinter Imperium. After the fall of Arlathan, the Tevinter magisters attempted to unlock the secrets the Eluvians, but all they could use them for was long-distance communications.
So, what if Morrigan actually unlocked the secrets of mirror? The secret is that the mirror could be used to send your physical form through time. What if, when Tamlen went into the mirror it didn't actually infect him with the taint, but he actually got sent back in time to a previous blight? Furthermore, that is how he really got tainted was from an encounter with real Dark Spawn and he got some blood on him during an aggression.
In this scenario Morrigan would actually be a very self-sacrificing character. It gets a little tricky here but try to hang in there with my ramblings. So, if Flemeth is actually 1300+ years old one must ask…why has she been "stealing" kids (or having them…you really don't know) for all these years? One of my plot ideas is that maybe it is because she met Morrigan 1300 years prior, during the first Blight. Morrigan told Flemeth about the future and then that would let Flemeth tell Morrigan her destiny in the Origins timeline. In turn, Flemeth knew that Morrigan would give birth to the first Grey Warden who was the baby that had already been tainted by an Archdemon from the future that Morrigan was pregnant with. Flemeth didn't know at what point-in-time she would have the "right Morrigan" so she just always named her children that and trained them for the duty that they may possibly need to go to the past to give birth to the first Grey Warden someday. This chain of events would actually still make sense with calling the first Dragon Age game "Origins" because technically…it was.
This is what the Dragon Age Wiki states for the Grey Warden founding. "A group of Anderfel Knights, recognizing the threat the Blight posed to all of Thedas, decided to renounce their service to their king and take on a new, more important duty: to defeat the Blight. They formed the Order of the Grey Wardens in 890 TE, at Weisshaupt Fortress in the Anderfels. The process of the Joining ritual was discovered by the knights, who somehow managed to consume both Lyrium and potent dark spawn blood together to grant them the ability to sense the enemy."
So, what if that is where Morrigan lived in the past: Anderfel? Wherein a case, she either was the one that told the knights directly and trained them about The Joining or (The part I like better) she trained her son, who would become the founder of the Grey Wardens. Whom is also who you create at the beginning of your adventure…your playable protagonist, is Morrigan's baby and the founder of the Grey Wardens who she trained in the ways of how to go about killing an Archdemon.
That is path 1. Now for the next path, this is the path that I am more partial of.
Path #2: Morrigan the "bad" path.
In this path Morrigan is actually absent for the game, I will explain in a bit why it involves her though.
After the band of champions had "killed" Dumat and he had risen, stronger than before, they needed to devise a new way to permanently be rid of him. In this chain of events, history is correct…but must be taken ambiguously. It is common knowledge that all of the Grey Wardens that fought and killed the first Archdemon died in the final battle with it. Yes, all of the Grey Warden's don't survive their final encounter with Dumat. Here I have taken some liberties with this wording. Everyone believes that Dumat was killed by the same means in which Urthemiel (Origins' Archdemon) was supposedly destroyed. Wherein, it is believed that the Warden sacrificing oneself to contain and extinguish the Archdemon's soul can only be achieved while a Grey Warden (tainted vessel) is in the immediate proximity of the Archdemon directly after its death. Which then the Warden's tainted blood absorbs and destroys the Archdemon's soul while simultaneously forfeiting their own life. What if that is not the case for how they slew Dumat? What if Grey Wardens didn't even really exist yet? Sure, maybe the Order of the Grey Warden did exist, but not in the way that the modern Dragon Age universe thinks of them with their tainted Lyrium-dark spawn fused blood. Only through fables and parable have the true history gotten misconstrued in the past 1300 years.
What if through Flemeth's unequaled knowledge of magic she devised a way to rid the world of Dumat? But, at an enormous cost. A blood magic spell of epic proportions. Flemeth would ask her companions, and fellow members of the Order of the Grey Wardens, to sacrifice them to fuel the power of her spell to vanquish Dumat. In order for this special spell to work she would have to be pregnant and get the Archdemon weak enough to be on the verge of death, again. After those two circumstances are fulfilled the willing members of her party sacrifice themselves to her blood magic to entrap Dumat's soul inside Flemeth. Thus, Flemeth's combine knowledge of blood magic, shape shifting abilities, and the Archdemon's soul ritual is what gives Flemeth her ability to shape shift into a High Dragon. The combination of the Archdemon's dying body, sacrificing the companions, and the baby insider her all coalesce to give her the abilities of an unparalleled supreme elder mage, nearly a Demigod. This is also why Flemeth has lived for such a long period of time as a human and also why she is a little…crazy. Her soul is always at unrest from containing the Archdemon Dumat. Flemeth in her High Dragon form would come to be known as Asha'bellanar. And, this is how the first Blight is truely ended.
Now, the reason this makes Morrigan an antagonistic character is because with this chain of events that means that she was manipulating the Hero of Ferelden for the whole duration of the Origins story. That is why she wanted Flemeth's journal. The book contained many of Flemeth's spells and instructions for obtaining various grand powers. Morrigan wanted the book so she could try to do the same incantation to reach the level of power of Flemeth and to be able to command the abilities and form of a High Dragon so she stole Flemeth's tome. This is also why Morrigan has now "disappeared" from Ferelden. She lacks the blood magic knowhow to complete the final stages of the witchcraft. Her lack of blood magic knowledge is also the reason she couldn't finish the spell in one fel swoop when the Origins Archdemon was slain by also consuming the rest of her companions at the same time. As we all know...swooping is bad. That is why Flemeth needed the Champion of Kirkwall to transport her essence in the amulet in that manner. Most likely, Morrigan is heading in that direction to find a superior blood mage and she possibly put up a magical ward that was within the pages of the Flemeth's tome to fend off Flemeth from pursuit.
Those are a few examples of how the story could go about still tying together all previous game stories and tell the story of the first Blight.
As for the rest, I guess the holes would be filled with the already written lore of the Dragon Age universe.
Which is labeled like this.
The First Blight, Chapter 1 - The Second Sin
The First Blight, Chapter 2 – Dumat Rises
The First Blight, Chapter 3 – The Dwarves Fall
The First Blight, Chapter 4 – Griffons Take Flight
That is it…that is my broad vision for a Dragon Age tale I would really like to take part in. Remember that this is not a Thesis and does not get into surgical detail, it is only a broad vision. I am sure that there are some loopholes here and there between my story and the nuances in your personal game's story experience and how i cannot speculate on your conjecture of your personal perspective interpretations of events played. Please don't slam me with paragraphs of "this and thats" as there is no way i have played every possible play-through outcome for each game. If you ask small questions i will try to address them. Suggestions are welcome and or ideas for what directions you would like to see the story go in.
Thanks for reading.
Log in to comment