4Game

The Mountains seem to have a lot of interesting lore built in, even though the runestones I've found don't relate to it at all, and I think the devs might be dropping some hints about the upcoming biomes in it. Namely I'm talking about the Cult and the Ancient Cave Markings in the Frost Caves. I feel like the story we're being told is very incomplete, and suspect that they plan on bringing more in later.

One of the puzzle pieces I don't have is how the Cultists, Ulv, and Fenring fit together. They all have the same shaggy fur that separates them from wolves. They all have glowing eyes. Cultists are unsurprisingly immune to fire, and weak to poison. Ulv are very resistant to fire, and weak to poison.

Fenring are weak to fire and resistant to poison. Visually, it feels like there should be a progression from the quadruped Ulv, to the feral but bipedal Fenring, to the relatively civil Cultists. Instead, we have some kind of objective difference that separates the Fenring from the other two, resulting in reversed weaknesses. I considered the idea that Ulv are the odd ones out, that they're actually just some kind of domesticated wolves. Because domestication tends to isolate and inbreed a limited subset of genetics, it tends to bring out certain traits like different coat colorations, floppy ears and curly tails (which actually happened in attempts to domesticate foxes). But this idea gets thrown out when you consider the Ulv's long, humanoid hands, and the shared vulnerability to Spirit damage with Cultists and Fenring. Whatever they are is unnatural.

Some of the Ancient Cave Markings depict a human in the sunlight, turning into a wolf-like creature, then turning into a werewolf like creature under the moon. Presumably, the middle stage is actually an Ulv. I don't think that's a controversial interpretation. But is the last stage a Cultist, or a Fenring? Does it depict how Ulv eventually ascend into becoming Cultists, or does the moonlight change them into feral Fenring? Is that why Cultists and Ulv are only found inside the caves? I don't know, but I'd like to hear what others think.

The reason I think we'll get more elaboration on this later is something else depicted in the caves: a massive wolf with some kind of aura around its head that reminds me of a halo. One Ancient Cave Marking depicts people kneeling around this giant wolf. I think this will be the boss of a later biome. Since we know we have Ashlands and Deep North coming… it's hard to say which one. Obviously Wolves fit the Deep North, but the Cult is deeply entwined with Fire, so Ashlands feels like a reasonable interpretation too. Fenrir is the obvious choice for who the wolf is, because of the Cult collecting Fenris hair and claws (and the very name Fenring), although it could be Hati who hunts the sun, or the devs might write in their own Forsaken Wolf because they don't want us killing off actual major players in Norse lore.

I'm curious what anyone else thinks. Is there any lore I've missed that could revise or add onto my hypotheses? Any alternate theories out there? The Cult seems really interesting, and I'm really hoping they develop them, their history, and motives more.