Minipost: The Klaxxi Chronological Puzzle


I've been doing a lot of reading about the Klaxxi lately, for a little fiction project I've been working on. Lots of research about their culture, lots of re-reading of Death From Above, the short story about Kil'ruk the Wind Reaver, and careful perusal of their little bits of dialogue they say to one another in Klaxxi'vess.

Something I haven't been able to figure out for certain, though, is how old exactly all the Klaxxi Paragons are. We know quite a bit about some of them - even precisely how many years some of them were preserved for - but for others, we know almost nothing at all about when they originally "lived".

What's funny is that it all ends up like one of those brain-teasing logic puzzles you always saw in school. "If Paragon A is older than Paragon B, but Paragon C was active before the Serpent's Spine existed, how old is Paragon D?"

Frankly, there's just not enough information to make an accurate timeline / chronology of the various Paragons, and figure out their exact order of seniority. But here's what we DO know for certain:

Hard Facts:
- Korven the Prime was the first Paragon. He invented the process.
- Iyyokuk the Lucid was preserved 877 years ago.
- Ninil'ko the Bloodcaller is older than Kil'ruk the Wind Reaver.

Soft Facts:
- Ninil'ko was preserved for centuries. How many, however, is unknown.
- Kil'ruk was preserved for "thousands and thousands of years."
- Ka'roz the Locust was active during construction of the Serpent's Spine, before the Pandaren rebellion, which took place 12,000 years ago. Therefore Ka'roz is older than that.

The Serpent's Spine:
- Ninil'ko was active before the Serpent's Spine existed, as he does not recognize it in Death From Above.
- Ka'roz was active during Lei Shen's first reign, when the Serpent's Spine was being built.
- Kil'ruk hatched after the Serpent's Spine was built, when the Mogu were still in control of Pandaria.
- Malik the Unscathed was active after the Serpent's Spine was built, as he mentions how Kypari Vor was close to it.

Empresses:
- Hisek the Swarmkeeper overthrew an earlier Empress.
- Xaril the Poisoned Mind served Shek'zeer before being preserved.

Other Info:
- Kil'ruk says that the cycle was old when he was young.
- Xaril knew Amber-Shaper Un'sok when Un'sok was still a drone.
- Kaz'tik the Manipulator developed a process by which mantid could cooperate with kunchongs, rather than use force to control them. However, this indicates nothing about his relative age.
- Skeer the Bloodseeker has no timeline clues.
- Rik'kal the Dissector has no timeline clues.


Conclusions:
- Korven was first.
- We have no idea about Kaz'tik, Skeer, and Rik'kal. They could fit in literally anywhere in the timeline.
- Ka'roz and Ninil'ko were pre-Spine, so they are definitely older than Kil'ruk, Malik, Iyyokuk and Xaril, who we know are post-Spine.
- Ninil'ko is older than Ka'roz, since Ka'roz saw the Spine being built, while Ninil'ko had never seen it before.
- Kil'ruk is older than Iyyokuk and Xaril. (Preserved for thousands of years)
- Hisek is older than Xaril. (Served an earlier Empress)
- Xaril is likely the youngest Paragon, since he served Shek'zeer, the current Empress. If we knew how long Shek'zeer had been Empress (ie, more or less than 877 years), we could estimate which of Xaril and Iyyokuk was older.
- Similarly, if we knew how old Un'sok was, it would give us an idea of Xaril's approximate age.

Anyone else have any insight? I wish we knew more!

2 Responses Subscribe to comments

  1. gravatar
    Anonymous

    Interesting, indeed! I don't know much more about the Paragons other than what you've posted, but looking forward to future analysis!

    September 2, 2013 at 10:35 AM

  2. gravatar
    Anonymous

    As always you ask the right questions. Thank you for your work!

    September 3, 2013 at 1:14 AM