[Theory] - LotV Will End With the Xel'naga's Return

[Drake Clawfang]

Spoilers for HotS and WoL, obviously.

The big thing with the zerg in HotS was Amon's corruption, the hive mind. Kerrigan's re-infestation cured her of that, and she is pure and strong now. I think it's hard to say now how the hive mind stands with regard to the rest of the Swarm, but we're told in no uncertain terms Kerrigan is clean. Also, numerous members of the Primal zerg that were never corrupted in the first place are part of the Swarm.

LotV tells us that Amon returns and somehow corrupts the Khala which shatters the unity of the protoss, and Artanis has to reunite the race.

Of course it's been repeatedly emphasized throughout the series the protoss and zerg are the two extremes of a greater whole. The Dark Templar Saga tells us the two races were supposed to come together and combine naturally, which would result in the rebirth of the xel'naga, but that hasn't happened. In fact, it can't happen, Blizzard has said the zerg cannot infest or assimilate the protoss, the Khala makes them immune. That's why Duran and Narud had to artifically splice their genes together to create the hybrids, and the DT Saga says the existence of the hybrids is a disruption of the xel'naga's rebirth cycle. We also know the Overmind created Kerrigan with the purpose of trying to circumvent Amon's corruption, which apparently has been done via her cleansing of his influence, and the Overmind's goal all along was to assimilate the protoss and become "perfect".

So, my theory - the reason the zerg can't infest protoss is because Amon's corrupting hive mind. The hive mind and the Khala do not get along and they reject each other. So, Amon sabotages the xel'naga's experiments on the zerg to ensure they cannot join with the protoss and the xel'naga will never return, then the zerg goes on a rampage through the sector, building into an army. Then when Amon returns his hybrids will take control of the zerg and use them to destroy the protoss, as we saw in the vision in WoL.

The Overmind created Kerrigan to be an agent powerful enough to take command of the Swarm in its place, and free herself from Amon's influence. With Amon's influence from her gone, there is now the potential for the zerg to successfully assimilate the protoss and recreate the xel'naga... except, oops! Amon has come back and corrupted the Khala now! While this is shattering the protoss and is of benefit to him that way, now the Khala is corrupted by Amon, the same way the zerg were corrupted via the hive mind. Amon knows what the joining of the two races would mean, and now that Kerrigan has disrupted his ability to influence the zerg, he's doing it to the protoss instead, to ensure the two races cannot join. As long as his influence taints one of the two races, they cannot recreate the xel'naga.

In summary - LotV will see the return of the xel'naga via the joining of the zerg and protoss, or maybe two specific characters join. Amon corrupted the Khala to try and ensure the two races cannot join, but either the protoss will purify the Khala of his influence to merge with the zerg, or a specific character unconnected to the Khala merges with Kerrigan now free of Amon's influence. A Kerrigan/Zeratul archon? That'd be dumb but hey, with some of the other story choices Blizzard has made, maybe it'll happen. Or perhaps there will be a dramatic sequence where Artanis severs his nerve cords to become a dark templar, cutting himself off from the Khala to save himself from Amon's influence so he can merge with Kerrigan and become a xel'naga. Like Tassadar, allying with an ancient forbidden "enemy" for the greater good of their people. Or maybe the Dark Templar merge with the Primal Zerg, and with no hive mind or khala, and no Amon influence over them as such, they become the new xel'naga. This would also leave the rest of the zerg and protoss around to continue the franchise if Blizzard desires.

Story foreshadowing aside, it just makes sense for the trilogy to end this way. Ever since the original game we have built up what a union of protoss and zerg could mean, it's been one of the central concepts of the franchise, and The Dark Templar Saga that led up the trilogy explained what that union means. It's only logical for that union to finally become a reality.

[Alex06]

Well, in a BlizzCon 2014 interview, they did confirm that we'd finally get to see the Xel'Naga, and that it was hard to design them, because they had to look both impressive, but also very majestic. So, I suppose it's a possibility. The whole Khala/Hivemind thing makes sense.

[Visions of Khas]

I've been saying for a while that I believe a Primal, purified Kerrigan, and a Khala/Void-infused Artanis will probably merge to form the first of a new generation of Xel'Naga, to successfully combat Amon. I'm guessing that the memories of the previous cycle of Xel'Naga are somehow genetically preserved, probably by the Zerg, and will emerge with the new generation. This is why Amon is so vehement the Protoss and Zerg don't combine naturally.

[Turalyon]

I haven't read the books but I kinda thought the idea of their "natural combining" to form Xel'Naga wouldn't be through Zerg assimilating the Protoss since a) the Zerg (Primals included) would be forcing this onto the Protoss/it's one-sided and b) the Protoss just don't want to be assimilated by the Zerg even if they could've been assimilated. I thought the Zerg and Protoss would've had to naturally evolve on their own for ages (without corruption or further jiggery-pokery by the Xel'Naga) until they became something far removed from what they are now before such a joining could be possible. As they are now, I can't see any joining of the two as being a natural, let alone a mutually consented, process.

Having said that, the Dark Templar and Primal Zerg probably has the most legs if they were to incorporate the Xel'Naga's return since they are the most free from "corruption". However, I'm not really sold on the idea of Kerrigan being the representative of the Zerg side of this new Xel'Naga equation though since she's (supposedly) more human now than anything else. It'd also be kinda lame to have the neo-Xel'Naga represented as being a "power-up" just to defeat Amon. The original Xel'Naga were killed by the fledgling Zerg on Zerus way back in the beginning and have remained dead so I can't imagine why Amon would be any different or require any special treatment since he has already died once. I guess it's maybe because Amon's spirit was somehow sucked into a Black Soulstone or something when he dies? If they do use the "neo-Xel'Naga as the solution to Amon" plot-device it would probably work out best if they treated it like how ascended beings in the Stargate universe "occupy each other" by battling for all eternity on some ascended plane.

[Nissa]

This is exactly why I despise HotS. I don't understand half of what you guys are saying, and the game is the dictionary definition of obfuscation.

But I do understand the other half. Drake, I read the Dark Templar Saga, and nothing in there mentioned that it was specifically the Khala that prevented the Protoss from being infested (you'd think the Zerg would have tried infesting a Dark Templar at some point, if that were the case).

[Drake Clawfang]

Drake, I read the Dark Templar Saga, and nothing in there mentioned that it was specifically the Khala that prevented the Protoss from being infested (you'd think the Zerg would have tried infesting a Dark Templar at some point, if that were the case).

This has been stated in other materials.

[ragnarok]

This is exactly why I despise HotS. I don't understand half of what you guys are saying, and the game is the dictionary definition of obfuscation.

But I do understand the other half. Drake, I read the Dark Templar Saga, and nothing in there mentioned that it was specifically the Khala that prevented the Protoss from being infested (you'd think the Zerg would have tried infesting a Dark Templar at some point, if that were the case).

In some ways I didn't get why the Dark Templar can't be infested. But then, the DT Saga did not really go into that many details about the void....

[Nissa]

This has been stated in other materials.

What materials?

Aish. This is exactly why I think only a game's content and manual should be canon. Additional texts only complicate things, particularly when they're written as badly as the SC novels.

[Turalyon]

Oh man! All this talk about the Khala being the reason for the Protoss immunity to Zerg assimilation is giving me shell-shocked induced flashbacks to my convo's with Shadow Archon about what the Khala is and is not. *rubs temples*

[ragnarok]

Oh man! All this talk about the Khala being the reason for the Protoss immunity to Zerg assimilation is giving me shell-shocked induced flashbacks to my convo's with Shadow Archon about what the Khala is and is not. *rubs temples*

And how did that discussion end?