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The original was posted on /r/wow by /u/Efficient_Bicycle645 on 2025-07-04 19:00:24+00:00.
Premise/TL;DR: The Devourers introduced in Shadowlands are actually the "what's coming" that the cosmological forces are all afraid of, and the real 'Final Boss' of WoW. There will be various spoilers throughout, including some from 11.2 so please be careful if you're avoiding those.
To be honest I started connecting pieces while in the shower and had this epiphiny. Could be total BS but I thought it would be pretty cool as a lot of threads throughout WoW could be linked to this idea. If you love it, that's great!. If you hate it, that's fine too!
What are Devourers?
Devourers are creatures introduced in the Shadowlands expansion, as mindless consumers of Anima; the power generated by souls. It is later stated that they used to "have purpose" and "made for balance", but have mutated since their original creation and now pose a threat to the design of the First Ones. It is believed that these creatures reside in the In-Between, the space between realms, and create tears in order to enter the Shadowlands and consume Anima.
They are ravenous and while some appear to have some level of higher intelligence, like the humanoid Controllers that appear to maintain tears for others to enter through, they do not communicate and focus in stead on consuming everything. The only word ever spoken by a Devourer is from the Worldedge Gorger: "Huuuungerrr"
All creatures in WoW are shown to posses a soul, or essence in similar form, regardless of their place in the cosmos: Titans, Old Gods, Mortals, everything (outside of constructs to be clear). This makes the Devourers a potential threat to all six cosmic forces.
The Hunger and "What is to Come"
A reference to "a great hunger", "what is yet to come", etc. is a prevailing theme in modern World of Warcraft. in fact, nearly every cosmological force in the game has some example of outright stating it needs to unify the universe under itself.
The Light:
While not expressed directly, you can see through our interactions with Light entities and the way they speak about themselves that they want all beings to follow the light, in some cases literally "reforging" mortal beings in their power. Whether the subject wants it or not. There is no current lore in game about the Light being interested in the World Soul of Azeroth, but with the incoming Midnight expansion and the introduction and building up of the Arathi Empire, this may become something developed in the future.
The Void:
"I alone can save you from what is to come". - N'Zoth
"It grows hungrier...bolder. Alas, your eyes are closed." - N'Zoth
"Six Seats at the high table. Six mouths that hunger. One will consume all others." - N'Zoth
The current in game representatives of the Void not only continue the Void's mission to corrupt and turn all life to the Void, but the Old Gods themselves (based on 11.1.5 lore) appear to have 'broken free' in some form, the same way the Earthen broke away from the Titans after exposure to Azeroth's World Soul. In my theory, they believe their "Evolved" forms and the strength gained from the World Soul would make them powerful enough to withstand the Devourers once all has become part of their Black Empire. While no specific details are given about the "thing N'Zoth is building" outside this one line, I believe it to be a device allowing him to siphon the World Soul in full effect, advancing his power and expanding the Black Empire across the universe.
Tangentially related, if the "Evolved" fleshy forms of the Old Gods are due to their exposure to Azeroth's World Soul interacting with their chaotic nature, then that could be why all races of Azeroth are her "Children", even if they started as constructs like the Dwarves and Gnomes. The "Curse of Flesh" was actually the Old Gods elevating everything with their/her power:
"With many eyes they will see again. They will drink, and be uplifted"
"Her dreams sing beneath the surface. Our dreams. Our Song."
This could be alluding to how her song has elevated them and are now "Azerothian" void beings.
Order:
The Titans have been focused on finding and turning every World Soul it can find into a Titan. Instilling their singular order across the universe. Once they identified how powerful Azeroth's world soul is, they knew that they had to control it in order to survive, which is what most of the modern lore we are learning is about: their attempt to turn her. In the Dragonflight Time Rifts we are sent to a timeline where the Titans win and everything is machinery. If everything is a machine, there are no souls to consume. Thus their unending Azeroth-powered army of constructs could fight against the incoming threat.
Fel:
This one is more difficult to find obvious lines for, but the stated lore that initially Sargearas in fact was trying to purge all life in order to prevent the Void from corrupting it would still be valid. However, we were given new lore during Legion that Azeroth's World Soul "blinked" at him, and in some way impacted him deeply.
My belief is that he then adjusted his crusade: if all life in the Universe that remains is Fel-Corrupted, then their souls would be re-directed to Argus, where he could prevent the Devourers from consuming them. He would then have an undying army to fight against the Devourers. When we defeated Argus and he was being sealed by the Titans, he knew this plan could no longer work, so he stabbed Azeroth attempting to free her from the Titan's prison so she could hopefully grow powerful enough to defend herself from the coming threat.
"The Dark Titan comes! We gotta stop him! Argus...the Legion's home world. She says our destiny lies there".
What if we were supposed to go there to learn about Sargearas' plan, but we misunderstood? Azeroth speaks in images, feelings, not words and explanation. It's been shown even with the Haronir that the visions can be misinterpreted by those who see them. It's possible Magni got it twisted.
Death:
I know. Everyone is going to groan as soon as I start talking about Shadowlands lore (if you haven't already the second I mentioned the Devourers), and with good reason. The bulk of the story beats were rushed, unearned, janky, etc. But I believe they have actually also laid the groundwork for this entire theory.
As stated at the top, the Devourers are confirmed to be a First One creation. I believe that the First Ones made the devourers to be the balance to their creation experiments. Something to "eat the trash" so to speak. Almost like Stephen King's "Langoliers". However, after their creation mutated over time, and upon realizing they had lost control of this ravenous force of nature, they attempted to use the various Zerith installations to build the Six cosmological planes and "trap" the Devourers in the In-Between in order to stop them. There is little to no information about the First Ones themselves, so it's possible they trapped themselves in with their creations, were devoured, or some other fate. Honestly, the First Ones themselves don't matter beyond this, so they can stay in the Lore Shame Closet.
The "Flawed" design the Jailer spoke of was due to the First One's system being oppressive and unfairly controlling of souls. He would rewrite the Universe in order to unite and dominate it under himself in undeath, all souls under his control, preventing them from reaching the Devourers. However, as is common in WoW, he didn't realize his plan itself would cause the Devourers to lose access to the souls they were already able to access causing them to go into a frenzy from the Anima drought he created and increasing their incursions in the Shadowlands. An animal is at its most dangerous when starving. This is also why he states that a cosmos divided would not survive what's to come: once again a cosmological force believes it has to be the dominant and only one in order to survive. He saw that the Devourers were breaking through in his moment of clarity upon being defeated, and that he had failed.
Additionally, all the "This world is a prison" references, used as world play both to describe the systems of creation and later on to be taken literally that Azeroth is a prison for the World Soul as we now know, could ALSO be taken as the entirety of creation to be a prison for the Devourers.
Life:
This is definitely one of the harder ones, and to be honest I don't have much to go with here. Since life's whole thing is growth and well...life, it's possible that a Universe dominated by unending growth and life would be the actual balance to unending hunger and consumption. This would also make sense as it has been stated that the First Ones built the cycle of Life and Death to be central to the workings of creation. Looking at the relationship between Life-centric entities like the Loa, Wild Gods and Ardenweald you can see that this was the intended cycle: Souls go into the care or guardians and are reborn into physical form until they die again. However the Devourers disrupt this cycle and as such are the absolute enemies of creation in the WoW universe.
Six cosmological forces, all devoured by a seventh.
In 11.2, it is speculated that upon Dimensious's defeat a giant tear in reality will be opened via his explosion, allowing for the entrance of Void Forces in bulk. But such a tear in the planes of reality could also surely allow for the Devourers to leak through ...
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