After Viego, Riot Games announces three more champions to fit into the ‘Fallen King’ storyline – and the first of them could be his wife, Isolde. In any case, that’s what the publisher clearly suggests…
Viego is currently in testing on League of Legends’ PBE, and as usual, guesswork is pouring out trying to figure out who the next champion will be. And indeed, it seems that the story of the Fallen King as well as the latest teasing from Riot Games announce the arrival of Viego’s wife, Isolde.
The history and inspiration of Isolde
Do you know of Tristan and Isolde? It is one of the oldest accounts of the knightly period, the story of an impossible love between a knight and a princess, separated by a war and two families whose rivalry is ancestral. Well, in a way, the story of Viego, the last champion to join the Rift, sounds like this myth. Because, like Tristan or Romeo, his story is that of an impossible love. Heir to a Kingdom he does not want, Viego falls in love with a peasant woman, a young seamstress of whom he makes his queen, Isolde. One day, an assassin sent to kill Viego misses his target, and Isolde succumbs to his stead from a poisoned blade.
Mad with rage and despair, Viego sets out to resuscitate his lover. He slaughters the inhabitants of the blessed islands to steal their secret, holy water capable of curing any disease.
Except that obviously, it goes wrong. Viego plunges Isolde’s body into the holy water, but it reappears in the form of a specter. She snatches his enchanted sword from him and plunges it into his heart, making him the Fallen King, and in the process giving birth to the Dark Isles.
If I tell you this story briefly, it is because it is studded with elements which seem to announce the imminent arrival of Isolde in the Rift. In Ruination, the cutscene announcing the start of the 2021 season, we witness a clash between Senna and Lucian, the couple of the Purifiers, and Viego. The Ruined King manages to defeat them, and seizes what seems to be the soul of his late queen…
This is the first time that a League of Legends season has truly followed a story arc, and when one wonders what the next chapter will be, one can imagine that Isolde’s resurrection is among the possibilities. Especially since other elements put the chip in the ear. In a video recently posted to Riot Games’ YouTube channel, Ryan “Reav3” Mireles announces that Viego’s release marks just the first chapter of the Ruined King story arc, and that the next three champions to join the Rift will be connected to Viego.
And, in case this image is too subtle, Reav3 plays on words, and moreover it is voluntary, to announce the arrival of the next champion. I quote: “We’ve been wanting to add AP fighters for a long time, especially one that would be tailor-made for toplane.” And you know what that means? It means tailor, dressmaker, or seamstress.
But that’s not all. Several weeks before Viego’s arrival, an image of his seal had surfaced on the internet, and in the same video Reav3 reveals artwork apparently related to the next champion to be brought into the Rift. A quick glance and we notice that the two symbols are extremely similar. And then, it also confirms the trail of the seamstress…
It’s hard to know exactly if Isolde will actually be the next champion to join the Rift. After all, with Riot, you never know. That said, it is clear that the indices are extremely solid, and that Reav3 seems to have literally leaked the thing to us …
Viego is announced for Patch 11.2, so maybe we can dream of Isolde for Patch 11.3…
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