War of the Spark/Event

The War of the Spark is the culmination of the fight between Nicol Bolas and the Gatewatch, that takes place on Ravnica. The event is depicted in the 2019 set with the same name, and fully described in the novel.

Description

Dozens of powerful planeswalkers, from many disparate realities, unite against the elder dragon, who has claimed dominion over Ravnica and is perilously close to completing the Elderspell that harvests sparks and will grant him "ultimate power" and godhood. The stakes are high: Spark harvesting is lethal, and the assembled planeswalkers soon find themselves trapped on Ravnica due to Bolas' use of the Immortal Sun. As the planeswalkers and native Ravnicans fight alongside the Gatewatch — led by Jace Beleren and Gideon Jura — against Bolas and his relentless army of Eternals, nothing less than the fate of the multiverse is at stake. Little do the Gatewatch suspect that Bolas has not only accounted for their interference, but he is practically relying on it.

Events

The following events occur during the War of the Spark.

Prelude

• Bolas conspires to overthrow the leaders of Ravnica's guilds and replace them with planeswalkers that he can influence: Ral Zarek takes over the Izzet League after Niv-Mizzet disappears, Kaya takes over the Orzhov Syndicate after killing the Obzedat, Vraska takes over the Golgari Swarm after assassinating Jarad, Domri Rade takes over the Gruul Clans after defeating Borborygmos in a duel, and Dovin Baan rises to a leadership position in the Azorius Senate.
• Over the next few weeks, Ral, Kaya, and Vraska conspire against Bolas, realizing the dragon's treacherous nature. With the help of Lavinia and the Rakdos emissary Hekara, they hope to unite the ten guilds against him. They plan on performing a ritual to make Niv-Mizzet the new Living Guildpact.
• Their plan goes awry after the guild summit, when Vraska kills Isperia in a fit of rage. The guild representatives immediately become suspicious of each other, and negotiations rapidly break down. Isperia's death allows Dovin to become the new Azorius guildmaster.
• Niv-Mizzet attempts to fight Bolas without the power of the Guildpact, and ends up getting killed. Hekara is murdered as well. Vraska flees to Ixalan to avoid being killed by Ral for her betrayal.

Act 1

• As a backup plan, Ral activates the Interplanar Beacon to lure planeswalkers from across the multiverse to Ravnica, in the hopes that they'll assist him in defending Ravnica against Bolas.
• The Gatewatch travels to Ravnica, intending to confront Bolas. Many other planeswalkers find themselves compelled to follow the Beacon's call, unaware of what awaits them.
• Bolas activates the Immortal Sun, which traps the assembled planeswalkers on Ravnica.
• Bolas and Tezzeret erect Bolas's Citadel and the God-Pharaoh's Statue on the Tenth District Plaza.
• Tezzeret opens the Planar Bridge to Amonkhet, allowing Liliana Vess to lead the Dreadhorde through. Additionally, Tezzeret destroys the Embassy of the Guildpact by opening the Bridge inside it, disrupting Ravnica's leylines and causing Jace to lose the power of the Living Guildpact.
• Bolas' Eternals invade Ravnica, indiscriminately slaughtering civilians to lure out planeswalkers.
• The Boros Legion and House Dimir declare their opposition to Bolas. Ral leads the Izzet into battle against the dragon and convinces the Simic Combine to join him as well. Kaya appeals to the Orzhov elites. Despite their disdain for her (due to her policy of forgiving debts and raising taxes), they reluctantly agree to help her.
• Under the command of Aurelia and Feather, the Boros Legion launches a counter-offensive against Bolas' forces, with the floating fortress Parhelion II leading the charge. With the help of Gideon, their assault is initially successful in driving back the invaders.
• Nissa animates the Selesnyan guildhall of Vitu-Ghazi, using the colossal tree to further push back the Dreadhorde. She uses the massive elemental to topple Bolas' statue, greatly boosting the morale of the Ravnican forces.
• In response, Bolas brings his God-Eternals through the portal. The undead gods quickly destroy Vitu-Ghazi, tearing it to pieces. The Boros troops are forced to retreat.
• Bolas casts the Elderspell, and his Eternals begin harvesting sparks for him. Domri, despite pledging his loyalty to Bolas, is the first planeswalker to be drained of his spark and killed.

Act 2

• The trapped planeswalkers get together with Ravnican leaders to strategize. Nissa rejoins the Gatewatch at this meeting.
• At Jace's recommendation, they decide to split up into teams to focus on specific tasks:
  • Gideon, Aurelia, Angrath and Huatli lead Ravnican military forces into battle against the God-Eternal Rhonas and his battalion of Eternals. Gideon kills Rhonas using the Blackblade, completely draining the god's essence.
  • Ajani, Jiang Yanggu, Mu Yanling and Khazi volunteer to help protect and rescue civilians. Huatli later joins them.
  • Ral and Izzet Chamberlain Maree are sent to disable the Interplanar Beacon to prevent even more planeswalkers from being lured to Ravnica. They succeed by draining the device's power supply.
  • Chandra, Saheeli, Lavinia, and Lazav are sent to shut off the Immortal Sun, which is guarded by Dovin. Lazav disguises himself as Chandra, which allows the real Chandra to disable the Immortal Sun. Lazav defeats Dovin and leaves him blinded, forcing him to planeswalk away.
  • Karn, Ob Nixilis, Dack and Samut are sent to travel through the Planar Bridge and shut down the portal from the other side. On Amonkhet, they defeat Tezzeret, causing the portal to close. Afterward, they meet with the god Hazoret, who gives them her spear to aid in the fight against Bolas. Ob Nixilis planeswalks away, but Sarkhan comes back to Ravnica with them.
  • Jace, Jaya, Teferi and Vivien attempt to assassinate Liliana. They almost succeed, but Bolas intervenes to save her.
  • Kaya, Teyo and Araithia are sent to persuade the neutral guilds (Selesnya, Gruul, Golgari, and Rakdos) to join the fight against Bolas. Ral later joins them. With some help from a returned Vraska and a resurrected Hekara, they succeed. After Dovin's defeat, Lavinia can bring the Azorius on board as well.
• Many planeswalkers escape to safety as soon as the Immortal Sun is disabled, but a few stay to help the Gatewatch.
• With all ten guilds united, Nissa and the assembled guild representatives perform a ritual that repairs the plane's damaged leylines and resurrects Niv-Mizzet as the new Living Guildpact.
• Niv-Mizzet uses his newfound power to destroy Kefnet, completely incinerating the God-Eternal, although the strain of killing a god leaves him unconscious.

Act 3

• As part of his plan to kill Bolas, Gideon has Chandra reactivate the Immortal Sun, trapping the elder dragon on Ravnica.
• The remaining planeswalkers, along with Ravnican military forces, launch one last attack on Bolas' Citadel. During the battle, Dack is killed by Eternals, who harvest his spark.
• Gideon rides a pegasus toward Bolas, but it gets shot down by the God-Eternal Oketra. Oketra is directly controlled by Liliana, who chooses to 'miss' by hitting the pegasus instead of Gideon himself.
• Rakdos catches Gideon and brings him within striking distance of Bolas. The demon tries to attack Bolas himself but is effortlessly knocked out by the godlike elder dragon, who's now almost completely invulnerable due to the hundreds of sparks he's consumed.
• Jumping off the demon's head, Gideon strikes Bolas in the face with the Blackblade, only for it to shatter. Bolas reveals he enchanted the Blackblade thousands of years ago, preventing it from being able to harm an elder dragon again.
• Liliana betrays Bolas. He cancels her demonic pact, causing her to start disintegrating. However, Gideon uses his hieromancy to transfer the contract to himself, killing him in her place.
• Liliana frees the God-Eternals Oketra and Bontu, who attack Bolas of their own volition.
• Bolas prepares to fight them but is unexpectedly stabbed in the back by Niv-Mizzet, who impales him with Hazoret's spear. Bolas still manages to knock out Niv and obliterate Oketra, but not before Bontu bites him, harvesting all the sparks he's consumed as well as Bolas' spark. Unable to contain the energy, she explodes.
• Ugin arrives to bring Bolas' body to the Meditation Realm to prevent him from coming back to life on Ravnica. To prevent anyone from following him, Ugin has Jace create an illusion of Bolas' corpse disintegrating instead.
• The Ravnicans hold a Planewide Celebration. Kaya joins the Gatewatch.
• Niv-Mizzet and the other guild leaders declare that Ral, Kaya, and Vraska must atone for helping Bolas. As penance, the three of them are assigned to bring Bolas' other planeswalkers to justice: Ral volunteers to find Tezzeret, Vraska is assigned to track down Dovin, and Kaya is sent to assassinate Liliana.

Epilogue

• Months later, Bolas is reborn in the Meditation Realm but finds himself completely powerless, unable to planeswalk or even use the simplest spells.
• Ugin explains that he worked with Niv-Mizzet and Sarkhan to orchestrate Bolas' defeat. Additionally, he has stripped away Bolas' names, preventing anyone from summoning the elder dragon.
• Ugin expands himself throughout the plane, revealing that he's merged his essence with the Meditation Realm. He's also sealed the plane off from the rest of the multiverse, preventing anyone from entering or leaving again. Both Ugin and Bolas are trapped there forever now; they can never leave. But just to be certain that Bolas will never plague the multiverse again, Ugin will keep watch over his brother until Bolas' natural death in thousands of years.

Characters

Planeswalkers known to be involved

There are 36 carded planeswalkers in War of the Spark. These have a stained glass picture in the list above. In addition, Tezzeret shows up as the Buy-a-Box promo card of the expansion.

Curiously, Dack Fayden and Mu Yanling show up in the story, but aren't featured on any planeswalker cards, while Ashiok and Kasmina have cards despite not appearing in the novel at all. However, Kasmina was later given a brief cameo in one of the War of the Spark side stories on DailyMTG.com. The book also introduces a newly named planeswalker, Khazi, although she is killed in her first appearance.

Other planeswalkers

Aside from the named planeswalkers above, hundreds of other planeswalkers were lured to Ravnica. A few of these nameless planeswalkers were seen in the novel, including an old man with turquoise eyes and a carefully trimmed white beard, an aven who considered surrendering to Bolas, and a woman with jet black hair and glowing green eyes who suggested hiding from the Dreadhorde.

These unknown planeswalkers account for the vast majority of the harvested planeswalker sparks shown flying through the air (e.g. The Elderspell, Spark Reaper). The book reveals that hundreds of planeswalkers were killed by Eternals and had their sparks harvested. Among the casualties were a lime-green viashino, at least two different vedalken, a tall elven woman, a four-armed ogre, a short male human with green hair, an old woman, and a young teenager. A female human planeswalker with a shaved head and metal-casting powers was killed by the God-Eternal Rhonas, and a tall elven planeswalker in a long white hooded cloak was killed by the God-Eternal Kefnet.

On the other hand, some known living planeswalkers don't show up on Ravnica: Garruk, Daretti, and Koth. The absence of Garruk is explained to be because his hunter personality didn't fit story-wise and because R&D had other plans for him. In-universe, it was specified that Bolas didn't want Garruk killing the trapped planeswalkers before he could harvest their sparks, and took steps to prevent him from being lured to Ravnica. Koth didn't appear because he's currently trapped on New Phyrexia, where he's being forced to fight in the Phyrexian Arena. No explanation has been given for Daretti's absence, although he may have been present on Ravnica "off-camera."

Other planeswalkers who don't show up include Estrid, Aminatou, Will Kenrith, and Rowan Kenrith. However, these characters have yet to be introduced in the Magic: The Gathering storyline and it's unclear if they're even active when War of the Spark takes place. Since they were never tied to any particular point in the Magic: The Gathering timeline, it's possible that they died a long time ago, or that they haven't ignited yet. (This theory was confirmed in The Wildered Quest, which confirms that Will and Rowan Kenrith's sparks don't ignite until the events of Throne of Eldraine, set after War of the Spark.)

The story did not include any planeswalkers from the lore who don't have cards, even those (such as Baltrice and Ramaz) who are known to be currently active and have ties to Bolas. However, it has been speculated that with his luck, the Unluckiest Planeswalker certainly would have ended up in the conflict.

Main participants (non-planeswalkers)

Others

The novel features many other characters who serve in secondary roles. Selesnya acting guildmaster Emmara Tandris, Simic guildmaster Vannifar, and Gruul guildmaster Borborygmos all played a brief but significant role, as they took part in the ritual to resurrect Niv-Mizzet as the Living Guildpact. Other notable established characters who appear in the novel include Orzhov chief enforcer Bilagru, Selesnya guildmaster Trostani, Izzet chamberlain Maree, Simic biomancer Vorel, Rakdos bloodwitch Exava, Golgari warrior Varolz, Devkarin leader Izoni, Erstwhile leader Storrev, and resurrected Dreadhorde champion Neheb (who is killed once and for all by Samut). The novel also introduces several new characters, such as Selesnya warrior Boruvo, Izzet chief chemister Varryvort, Kraul leader Azdomas, Golgari shaman Cevraya (who had only been mentioned on flavor text before), and Gruul warriors Gan and Ari Shokta. Additionally, one of the side stories on DailyMTG.com introduces the current Orzhov Triumvirate, comprised of Armand Morov, Slavomir Zoltan, and Maladola.

Many of the characters who received legendary creature cards in the block were not present in the novel: Orzhov matriarch Teysa Karlov and Simic speaker Zegana are mentioned in the novel, but do not appear in the story, while Ilharg, Nikya, Feather, Tajic, Judith, Etrata, the Haunt of Hightower, Roalesk, Tolsimir, Massacre Girl, Krenko, and Fblthp were not even mentioned. Ilharg's absence is particularly conspicuous; he was part of the set's cycle of gods, and the first two sets in the block had built up the prophecy of his return and the apocalyptic "end-raze" that would follow. However, as with Kasmina, Feather was later given a brief appearance in one of the side stories on DailyMTG.com.

In-game references

References