Dredgen Yor

Dredgen Yor
Biographical information
Other name(s):	Rezyl Azzir
Species:	Human
Gender:	Male
Political and military information
Affiliation:	The Last City (formerly) Guardians (formerly)
Class:	Titan
Notable info:	One of the first Guardians Leader of the Risen Owner of the Thorn Most despised Guardian to have ever lived.

“

Nothing dies like hope. I cherish it.

”

Dredgen Yor (alias, original name Rezyl Azzir) was an infamous Guardian who fell to Darkness and became one of humanity's most hated villains. He was first armed with the Auto rifle Inferno and Hand Cannon Rose, which later became Thorn.

Biography

Rezyl Azzir was revived by his Ghost in a time when Guardians were known only as The Risen, when Titans were not yet called Titans, and when the Last City was still an unnamed urban sprawl growing beneath the Traveler and its walls had yet to be built. As one of The Risen, Rezyl helped protect the countless refugees who flocked to the Traveler as the Dark Age gave way to the City Age. When a schism arose between The Risen, with some eschewing serving as enforcers for the City's burgeoning, oppressive Factions and deciding to take a more noble path, Rezyl fought in the ensuing Faction Wars and gained a reputation as a great leader and champion. When the Fallen first began to encroach on the City, Rezyl helped unite The Risen into the Guardians to repel them, earning further fame. He would spend the years afterwards defending the City, watching its new walls rise and wondering if humanity would ever be safe with the Darkness still out there, lurking.

Other feats undertaken by Rezyl include fending off an ambush by the House of Devils, assassinating a Kell by intentionally dying to a crew of Fallen and being revived when the Kell arrived to gloat over his body, and saving a remote settlement from a Fallen attack.

Troubled by strange nightmares, Rezyl went to the Moon, presumably before the Last City launched its offensive, and encountered Xyor, the Betrothed, who prophesied he would one day fall. Undeterred Rezyl fought and killed her consort, an unnamed Hive Knight, whose chitin he took as a trophy to adorn Rose before he left with his Ghost to warn the City.

Eventually he was overtaken by Darkness completely, corrupted by his Rose; abandoning his name, Dredgen Yor began wielding the dark sorcery of the Hive, killing innocents wantonly and consuming their Light. He parted ways with his Ghost on Mars, whom he considered his last true friend, after a long debate where his Ghost attempted to get him to see the error of his ways.

Dredgen's motivations are still something of a mystery, but what is clear is that he had lost hope and faith in the Guardians' cause, and instead pursued his own twisted version of "peace". He also wanted the memory of his former life as a hero unspoiled, so that his victims would come to fear him even more when they realized who he was. He even hungered for the Light of others, though this may be more due to the influence of Thorn or the Hive and their parasitic nature.

Campaign of Destruction

Yor was responsible for the destruction of the settlement of Palamon and the death of its protector, the Guardian and owner of The Last Word, Jaren Ward. However, he spared Ward's Ghost and his son, Shin Malphur, as he anticipated that Shin would hunt him down in desire for revenge, hoping to corrupt him to Darkness. He is confirmed for murdering two other Guardians: the Hunter, Pahanin and fellow Titan Thalor, who reigned undefeated in the Crucible until one fateful match, where he wound up on the wrong end of Thorn.

Death

Yor would eventually fall to Shin Malphur, in a showdown at Dwindler's Ridge. Shin described Yor as "the darkest shadow he would ever know."

Years after Yor's demise, his dark legend has nevertheless earned a following among the Guardians in the form of the Shadows of Yor, a group of Crucible fighters who utilize cleansed replicas of Thorn, and seek to follow in Yor's footsteps, explaining away his evil deeds as misunderstood despair.

The legend of Dredgen Yor and Shin Malphur's legendary showdown is known to every Gunslinger Hunter.

Mysteries

The subject as to how Rezyl Azzir would become Dredgen Yor has become one of the most intriguing pieces of Destiny's lore to many fans. With Destiny's final DLC's and major updates before the release of Destiny 2, several new Dead Ghosts provided new insight into his life and some of the events that marked his fall. As it often is, finding such answers often leads to many new questions and theories.

One very interesting fragment appears in a conversation Yor is having with a soon to be victim where he brags about "stealing the dark", but then immediately wonders out loud if it instead stole him. There is a subtle, but clear implication that the Darkness has consumed him</>--likely during his attempts to take what he thought he needed from the Darkness. Yet, it's what Yor says immediately after is most intriguing:

"Either way, here we are. And I'm hungry. Its hungry. You have no Light beyond the spark of your pathetic life. But a spark is something.

It wasn't until the release of The Taken King and the Books of Sorrow that we are finally given a whole new insight to this cryptic part of his monologue. In the Books of Sorrow, fragments of which are recovered on the Taken King's Dreadnaught, provides the history the Hive's encounter and pact with the Darkness. For the Hive to draw upon the powers of the Darkness and to gain immortality, they must consume a worm larva, which itself acts as a mediator between the Hive and the Darkness. Although this pact seemed fair in the beginning, in the later Books of Sorrow, we see the sinister twist that wasn't mentioned when the Worms first offered their immortality and powers to the Hive--that their desire for more was never quenched. As Hive warriors became stronger and more powerful from the Darkness, their worms living inside them became hungrier for more death, more Light to devour. The Hive's ruthlessness was driven by no factor more than the insatiable hunger of the worms that lived within them. If they ran out of Light to consume, if the warriors stopped killing ever greater numbers, the worm would begin to eat away at them and their soul.

Suddenly in light of this new information of the Hive, Yor's actions and his fall from the Light become much clearer. Although it has not been confirmed, a number of fans believe that Dredgen Yor may have encountered a worm or observed the Hive's practice with them and taken one for himself. However, the mention of "shadows' whispers" seems to indicate that the Darkness was tempting Yor to seek it out. This would explain Yor's increasingly wanton killing of people, which later shifted from marginally bad guys to outright innocent victims, and eventually, the destruction of an entire town, Palamon. His behavior matches perfectly with that of the Hive's early history. The Darkness hungers to consume the Light, and it is his last few sentences that really add weight to this theory. He was becoming increasingly desperate to feed his worm. It is basically as if he stated it may be just a spark of Light, but that's something to satiate its hunger; and I'm desperate to escape this hunger.

Dredgen Yor's fall to Darkness may have originally started with the adornment of his weapon, Rose, with a piece from the fallen Hive Knight--a war trophy that was driven ultimately by his pride. Unbeknownst to him at the time, the Knight's armor, which is stated as being "living armor that was one with the beast", was still alive with Hive sorcery--its connection to the Darkness. Although it was originally believed that Rose was re-forged with the Darkness to become Thorn, the last few Dead Ghosts added to Destiny seem instead to indicate that this adornment of Hive Knight armor corrupted Rose, which in turn, corrupted its wielder, Rezyl Azzir. Even during the exotic quest to build a replica Thorn, guardians are warned several times of the dangerous power the weapon contains. Later in the quest, the player must first "cleanse the Darkness" before the weapon is safe to handle or wield. If so much care must be taken during the construction of a replica, then what horrors must the original unleashed upon its victims and upon its own wielder. With the most recent Dead Ghosts and fragments, it is implied that Rezyl Azzir did not fall to the Darkness and become Dredgen Yor, and re-forge Rose. Instead, it appears that Rezyl Azzir added Hive armor to Rose, unbeknownst to him still alive with Hive "magic", which slowly corrupted Rose to become a much more sinister weapon. Rose's corruption began to corrupt Rezyl Azzir, twisting him into a more cruel and ruthless person. The whispers that would lead him into darkness, are implied to have started in the Knight armor he affixed to Rose.

Trivia

• The name Dredgen Yor comes from a language forgotten by most, perhaps that of the Hive. Those that still know it know that the name means "The Eternal Abyss".
• Curiously, Rezyl Azzir was never a part of the Iron Lords.

List of appearances

• Destiny (First mentioned)
  • Rise of Iron (Mentioned only)
  • Age of Triumph (Mentioned only)
• Destiny 2 (Mentioned only)