You’ve played Dota 2 for thousands of hours,
but you’ve always wanted something more.
A reason to fight, a deeper meaning to your
battles.
But to know the hidden history of Dota 2 you
must go on an adventure of a lifetime.
An adventure into the lore!
There have only been a few updates in dota
2’s history that have focused on the lore,
when they uploaded the old training program
where you received pages of the Archronicus
for completing them, and…well that was pretty
much it.
Until now, with the release of Siltbreaker.
Siltbreaker is the realization of a dream
of lore enthusiasts, opening up the dota 2
world from a simple unchanging map to a entire
universe to explore.
A living, breathing world with new people,
towns, places and terrors.
To be able to see this world that has once
only existed in theory and weapon flavor text
come to live is a dream come true, and one
that hopefully we will be able to see again.
But while Siltbreaker is exciting and breaking
down every little piece of lore is going to
be an exhilarating experience for me, we can't
get started on it yet.
Too much background information for us to
discuss and know before we can get into the
new revelations of the game mode.
In order to understand the new campaign, we
must understand the characters and the lore
behind them: The Slithereen.
So come with me now on a journey beneath the
waves, where the radiant and dire’s reach
are lessened, and the gods of the surface
hold no power.
Let’s dive headfirst into the world under
the sea.
The slithereen are humanoid creatures that
live underwater, but appear to be able to
travel freely between the surface and the
waves.
They don’t appear to be amphibian, who require
air to breathe, but can live in the deepest
depths of the ocean without ever needing to
surface.
The humanoid creatures that live under the
seas are called Meranths, which is a blanket
term for all of the creatures, much like the
term human.
But unlike humans, different races of meranth
seem to have huge biological differences and
physical appearances.
First we have mer, which we have never “officially”
seen before and who’s only ever been mentioned
in sven’s lore, whose mother was a mer.
Headcannon alert but this actually explains
Sven’s entire life as the rogue knight.
His father fell in love with a Mer, a humanoid
fish woman, who bore him a child.
His father’s order considered their relationship
a abomination and executed him, and the mother’s
people shunned her as well, forcing sven to
care for her alone in her dying days.
This prompted sven to infiltrate his father’s
order, and kill them all in righteous fury
after years of biding his time.
So what does this 
tell us about the Mer?
Well for one, they must be very human like
for..well...babies to be made between a human
and a mer.
So human-meranth hybrid like sven would be
able to live for years among humans without
ever being discovered as an “Abomination”.
Our first time actually seeing Mer may be
in the Siltbreaker comic, with Disciple Kai
and the conclave.
As you can see, Kai is very human like despite
being a Meranth, with 2 feet, 5 fingers, really
the only big give away of his fishy features
is his head.
Perhaps that is why sven dons the shattered
helm, and perhaps this also explains why he
has so many assorted helms…to mask his ancestry
in the period where he infiltrated the Vigil
Knights.
But with that headcannon over, there you go.
The mer, like Sven and Kai, are our first
race of Meranth.
Next up we have the leviathans.
On our sliding scale of human to fish, the
leviathans are one step more fish than the
Mer.
Still human-ish looking with their bipedal
2 legs and hands, but clearly fish like in
their heads and size, the Leviathans are creatures
that live in the shallow waters, rather than
the deep ocean.
Which, doesn't really make a lot of sense
when you think about it cause the general
rule for aquatic life is that the deeper you
go the bigger creatures get, but perhaps the
reason they live in the shallow waters is
not because it was preferred, but because
they were forced too.
But we will get to that later.
Suffice it to say, the leviathans live up
to their name of being huge, hungry creatures.
AS DISPLAYED BY THE ONLY LEVIATHAN WE KNOW
OF IN THE GAME, TIDEHUNTER
Now we move on to the slithereen, and this
is where things get complicated.
Alright so, the slithereen are the furthest
we get to the fishy side of our sliding scale
without going full fish.
They have prominent aquatic features for most
of their bodies like their long tails, prominent
gills and frills, and overall fishy features.
Yet they still have human arms and human like
facial features.
Yet, this is not necessarily needed, as you
can still have 2 feet and 2 arms and be a
slithereen, as slark’s dark pact lore states
that “sithereen can regrow appendages”
implying that slark himself is a slithereen.
So, slithereen, obviously not human and have
prominent fishy features such as tails instead
of legs, big or fishy eyes (slark), and even
octopus like tentacle as we saw in the siltbreaker
comic.
But it goes deeper.
Literally Litterally.
Slithereens can further be split into a faction
called the deep ones, who guard the sunken
cities and treasures the slithereen hold dear.
I like to think of the deep ones as the royal
guard of the slithereen, their top honor guards
that protect their most sacred things.
But unlike human honor guards that are more
tourist attractions and spend their time trying
not to smile at tourists, deep ones smack
shit down with conch maces and pissy attitudes.
But who guards the guards?
Well that would be, believe it or not, the
slithereen guard.
Naga siren lead a battalion of the slithereen
guard, who are the royal army of the slithereen
and were the main fighting force of the slithereen.
Unlike the deep ones, who actually guard the
treasures, the slithereen guard are the army
that fights battles so that no one can actually
get there.
Confusing that the guards are not actually
the guards?
Tell me about it.
So, now that the classification system of
the Meranths has thoroughly been explained,
we can get into the actual lore.
And it all revolves around one, tiny item.
The gem of true sight.
During the last lore update all those years
ago, we got our lore bible the Archronicus,
and in it we read a wonderful story about
the eye of truesight.
Let’s get into it, one line at a time.
Here we go
Beyond the reach of Southward's End,
Where summer's warmth dares not to roam
Songs tell of ancient treasures lost
Worth more than titles, lands and home
Alright so in the corners of the world in
a very cold region, there are old legends
of treasure.
Interestingly enough after defeating siltbreaker’s
final boss, we can see a winter setting.
Will be heading to Southwards end?
MAYBE!
Stay tuned.
At night skies streak in ribbon's glow
Chill ocean's maze of jagged frost
Wild winds betray the best of men
Where boldest captains fear to cross
Within 'tis said's a hidden coast
Unknown to neither map or man
Yep same stuff, in these hard to navigate
arctic seas below the aurora borealis there
is a hidden coast where no man has been.
Reading on..
Where once there died a seaborn fiend
Washed up along its sandy span
Inside this corpse, the legends claim
A gem lay hid away from sight
Ok so on this hidden beach there was a huge
creature that died there, and a gem was hidden
inside of his body.
Neat.
Let’s read a lot here.
u
And who dares hold this stone unique
Shall see all hidden forms of fright
From whence the single frigate sailed
No soul still lives to dare recall
Brave voyage launched into the cold
Afraid of neither gale nor squall
To southern ice and wind they forged
The dauntless crew did plot their trek
In times the fields of floe and berg
Gave glimpse of land to all on deck
Upon an arctic shore they spied
Frost touched remains of monster vast
So a ship of brave sailors found the monster
next
Old marks from briny wars they saw
And ice locked teeth to dwarf their mast
On darkened beach was set a host
To excavate this mortal coil
Their picks and tools they lifted high
Then dug into their grisly toil
For days and days they hacked and crawled
As stained was beach in ancient gore
Through rib and tissue, deep they delved
And wrought their path to monster's core
From humid depths came glowing dim
Strange spectral light of emerald hue
Great gem matched size with finder's fist
Worn crew rejoiced; old songs proved true
And they dug into the anchient monster’s
corpse until they found a glowing gem inside.
Interesting that they had to “lift their
tools high” to get to the top of the creature,
so they must have climbed on the top of it
and made their way down.
Must have been huge!
Returned to deck with treasure held
As one all crew did choke their breath
For ringed they were by wraiths of yore
Ghost ships long sunk, and those past death
For hidden from the common eye
Are ones who drift when lifeblood fails
Bright gem grants truth to sight they learned
Then set with fright to raising sails
Yet ghastly shades no harm intend
But warning men whose air's still drawn
To bring sight's stone on waters wide
Would raise the wrath of deep Maelrawn
So the crew finds the gem and goes back to
their ship and low and behold they can see
every ship that has died in that area, complete
with ghostly crews who are all ringing their
bells.
But not to scare them, to warn them that moving
the gem from the shallow water to the deep
ocean would awaken maelrawn, who we will explore
later.
Back to the poem
A day and twelve on ocean waves
Passed laden, anxious crew's retreat
When came long shadows in their wake
Lord Maelrawn's servant, come to eat
Uh oh, maelrawn sent a monster to reclaim
the gem after 12 days
By haste and lucky breeze they sped
Four dawns the scourge kept far at bay
Until a wisp of earth drew far
When fickle fortune's winds betrayed
As beast drew under ship to strike
Rowboats were filled with man and loot
Then loosed were heavy chain and weight
To crashed ship's anchor on sea's brute
The monster caught up with the ship and went
under it, but the crew abandoned ship and
dropped a anchor on it.
Then deck leaned port as seabeast scaled
Wild tendril fury came aboard
In frenzied panic three boats fled
With ship entangled, kraken roared
Through tree thick feelers twist and squeeze
Wood hull made vent to frozen surge
As half-ship sank, death's master called
The gem still moved, and neared shore's verge
In rushed pursuit the kraken swam
To overtake the first boat of three
When drowned men froze and wreckage sank
Did hunter learn its charge stayed free
The beast sees 3 boats escaping and kills
the first boat
As second crew in horror rowed
Slick grasping fingers closed around
Yet once again gem was not there
And third boat's band set foot aground
So terrified of Maelrawn's rage
Did thrashing scourge set out anew
Then breached itself upon the surf
As kraken flailed, its foe withdrew
The beast kills the second crew and chases
for the third, but they make it to shore.
The creature chases them to the shore but
was much slower and couldn’t catch up to
the sailors/
Of fated crew's last port and call
No grey account still deigns to say
Some firm believe they made toward home
Though others tell of hangman's sway
Of gem and tidal deepgod's hunt
Vain quest goes on without reward
Its servants blindly come to shore
To kill and raze, be put to sword
For no thrall creature of the depths
Nor spirit bound in drowning's keep
Nor Maelrawn the Tentacular
Shall rest till seas, gem comes to sleep
So the men made it to shore, but no one knows
of their fate at the end.
All that is known is that maelrawn will never
rest until the gem is returned to the ocean.
Alright, so much lore to go through, so many
revelations.
Let’s get the headcannon going!
So, whos who in this story?
Surprisingly, this is the inciting incident
between tidehunter and kunnka, and explains
why they hate each other.
Don’t believe me?
Let’s take another look.
Tidehunter is a Leviathan, a rouge leviathan
who worships Maelrwan the tentactular.
The same malewran who sent his quote “hunter”
to go eat the sailors.
Now if calling the beast that he sent “the
hunter “and commenting about his desire
to eat things isn’t a big enough hint, there
are more.
The creature is referred to as a kracken,
so we here on earth assume that it was a giant
squidoctopus, as the story also talks about
its tentacles ravaging the ship.
But in the dota 2 world of Roo, krackens are
something else.
After all, tidehunter’s back is called the
kracken shell, and its description reads that
claddish navymen (kunna’s people) tell tales
of a beast that could not be pierced as it
attacked them.
Let’s not forget Tide’s ult, which summons
tentacles to ravage people in the waters.
Its pretty clear that tidehunter is a leviathan,
but humans refer to him as the kracken, the
beast hunter of the sea and the sword of maelreawn.
But how do we know it was Kunnka?
Well, the crew lost their ship but dropped
their anchor on top of the creature, and tidehunter
carries the anchor of kunnka’s flag ship.
Furthermore, kunnka has the ability to summon
a ghost ship, the same type of ghost ships
that he witnessed after claiming the gem of
true sight, that even rings its bells and
has ghostly wails just like in the poem.
Perhaps exposure for the gem for so long gave
kunnka power over it’s effects, and became
a part of him.
But in the end, there are too many coincidences
for it not to be true, this is the incident
that made tidehunter hate kunnka, chase him
to the ends of the earth, and finally catch
up to him in the battle between the claddish
navy and the demon fleet of the cataract,
where kunnka supposedly died to tidehunter,
who summoned malwrean to destroy and his ravage
of his entire fleet.
So there you go, one of the biggest mysteries
of dota 2 finally solved.
The theft of the gem of truesight by kunkka
is why tidehunter hates him so, for tidehunter
cannot return home and please his god until
the gem is returned to the deep.
But, that’s the start of the gem’s story.
No, it goes back even further, with more players
coming on the stage.
