Kindred's Splash - Wolf's Methods / Who's the Dead Man?
Kindred's splash art, animated in a login screen, shows Wolf's jaws drifting above the dead man's face; when the Wolf comes particularly close, the dead man's face is illuminated in an eerie blue, whereupon we are able to see the skull. We know that Wolf has left this man untouched, as Lamb's arrow is clearly sticking out of his chest (and choosing one means the other cannot intervene), but one question that burns in the back of many minds is - Who is the man in the splash art?
Discussion Point 1 I've seen some discussions, and while they do hold their points, there are a few important things to note:
- The person appears rather young, and possesses a crown
- He accepted death.
A young man of royal appearance who has accepted death would probably do so only after great loss from early on. Who else lost much so early on?
A particular "Handsome Gambler" who was whisked away to a palace of chance, and fell in love with, and married, a princess. The same gambler who lost everything was still royalty by association - after all, the princess was his bride. As such, he inherited the kingdom. Not wanting to repeat his mistakes, he ruled the land kindly, but he must have held many regrets over his past decisions (most notably, trusting Tahm Kench to lead him away from his problems). Perhaps a few years into his reign, he was injured by something in the wild (red stains on his armor), and so the Kindred marked him for death; with so much not having gone his way from past gambles, the former gambler thus must have learned to accept his fate - when Kindred came for him, he did not run away like he did years ago.
This time, he accepted death.
Discussion Point 2 Wolf's presence over the dead man's body displays an eerie X-ray sort of effect when his open maw drifts near the deceased's face; this is evident in the login screen's animation. I believe this subtle effect gives us a clue as to how Wolf actually kills his target, should they choose to not accept death.
The Kindred do not work out their agenda of death on the physical plane. As agents of death, they appear on the spiritual level to those they have selected with their mark. However, Lamb's arrow is shown to not leave any injury on the physical body; a similar effect must apply to Wolf's fangs as well.
It is well known by now that should one run from death, they meet their end in the jaws of Wolf. However, since his actions do not apply to the physical plane, there is but one place they do:
One's soul.
Wolf is quoted in his voicebank that he will "Rip them to bits," but he says this because that is his method. To the one who ran, it may appear that Wolf is tearing away at their physical body, but he is not, because he does not affect the physical plane.
Wolf is instead ripping away at the tethers that keep the soul bound to the body, but he is causing so much pain in the process that, to his unfortunate victim, it feels like he's ripping their body apart in their final moments. He has to do this because the person has run away from death; he must ferry them along to the afterlife by force, and in order for this to happen, he has to force the unwilling soul out of the body.
In Conclusion Phew. I know I made that a bit wordy, but this post was the result of a League discussion I had with some friends about lore for about a good two hours. This post is essentially two different topics about Kindred - a possible identity of the deceased man in the splash art, as well as Wolf's possible methods of ending people. Kindred is truly fascinating from a lore perspective, they truly are. TL;DR: Just read the whole post; it's not gonna kill you. Though if Kindred finds you, I'll personally vouch for you....maybe.
Thanks for reading! If you have any comments/any related lore stuffs relevant to topic, please share^^
