Summarized Lore: What Happened in Innistrad: Midnight Hunt

The Year 2021 ended and as Wizards announces the news we'll see in Kamigawa, I wonder about Innistrad: can we all keep up with the stories of the plan? I didn't want the year 2022 to start before I knew what happened in Innistrad during these last two releases, so I decided to write this article to give you a brief version of everything that happened on the plane this year. The article will be divided into two parts, as the aim is to be a quick read, and it summarizes the events of Midnight Hunt (Part 1) and Crimson Vow (Part 2). To understand Innistrad's current situation, it is necessary to recap what happened previously in the Shadows over Innistrad and Eldritch Moon In 2016, when we last visited the plane, the story revolved around the centuries-old rivalry between Nahiri and Sorin, who had been allies in the past, but after some disagreements, Sorin made the bitter decision to lock Nahiri in a magical prison, where she remained for centuries. After breaking free, Nahiri, for revenge, lured the Eldrazi titan Emrakul to Innistrad, Sorin's home plane.

Emrakul's presence unleashed a wave of madness, the villagers had delusional visions and strange bodily mutations. The angels, who normally acted as guardians of humanity, went mad and attacked the population, led by the archangel Avacyn. Sorin, who had created Avacyn to protect the population, was forced to destroy his creation. A group of heroic planeswalkers known as the Gatewatch came to Innistrad's aid. The necromancer Liliana has summoned a huge zombie army to help fight the Eldrazi, and the others have joined forces to imprison Emrakul on Innistrad's Moon. This series of events became known as The Travails. The Midnight Hunt lore begins a few years after Emrakul's imprisonment on the moon. The Eldrazi still resides there, dozing silently, and this may be affecting the plane's cycle of days and nights. The nights are getting longer and that means more attacks from werewolves, vampires and other horrible creatures that have an interest in creating an eternal night. Arlinn Kord, concerned for the safety of the humans, decides to seek help from Katilda, a witch, leader of the Dawnhart cabal. Members of this cabal believe that reviving the ancient tradition of harvesting is essential to restoring the balance of day and night in Innistrad. To perform the Harvesttide Festival rituals, it is necessary to activate The Celestus, an astronomical mechanism, built centuries ago and capable of tracking the movements of the stars and moon. Unfortunately, to activate this mechanism the Sungold Lock inside Celestus needs to be reunited with the Moonsilver Key, which has been lost for generations.

Meanwhile, Tovolar commands an ever-stronger pack because of the longer nights, the Moon's effects have spawned a new werewolf race called the Dire-Strain, so strong it despises even blessed silver. Tovolar defends the freedom of werewolves to embrace their wild nature, and he is against any ritual that might bring the sun back.

Arlinn is invited to join Tovolar's army, but she refuses and sees her pack abandon her to follow their new leader. She bids farewell to her wolves, and departs for Ravnica to seek help from the Gatewatch. She finds them and explains Innistrad's situation to Teferi, Kaya and Chandra. The three planeswalkers agree to help her and head to Innistrad. On their way back to Innistrad, Arlinn and the sentries meet Adeline, Resplendent Cathar, who in addition to being an excellent strategist has an uncompromising strength on the battlefield, she leads a battalion of Cathars, who joins Arlinn to seek clues to the whereabouts of the Moonsilver Key.

Arlinn and her group depart for Thraben, where Kaya finds an ancient book showing that the key was given to an ancestor of the Betzold family by a sorcerer. Arlinn and Adeline knew a bishop named Worrin Betzold. When they leave in search of the bishop, Arlinn's group comes across the group of zombies left in Thraben by Liliana, it seems that she didn't bother to get them out of the city after Emrakul's imprisonment. Arlinn and her group find the bishop in the ruins of a church and discover he became a zombie during the Travails. Even dead, Worrin seems to recognize his old friend Arlinn, who interrogates him asking about the Key, but all he can manage to say is a name, Dennick. In an act of mercy, she kills her friend, so he can rest in peace. After that, the group heads to Gavony, birthplace of the Betzold family. There they get the information that the bishop's son, Dennick Betzold, is in the family mansion, but that the place is haunted.

Arriving at the mansion, Kaya enters alone and eliminates the ghosts that haunted the place so that her companions can enter the house. After talking to the spirit of the late Dennick, they discover that the Key was given by the boy's great-grandfather to a vampire, Sorin Markov, as a way to protect the Key. Now the group heads to the ruins of Markov Estate, where they find Sorin sitting on a broken throne, he's reading an ancient book, a hole in the ceiling throws a single sunbeam onto his gray skin. Though he doesn't look at the group, Arlinn can smell the resentment emanating from him at Avacyn's death. His voice is strong and arrogant. "State your reason for harassing me now, or I will drive you all out." Sorin is asked about the whereabouts of the Key. Arlinn explains that humans need protection as darkness grows once more over Innistrad, but Sorin isn't worried about that problem. Upon mentioning Avacyn, Sorin becomes enraged and attacks Arlinn, who in her werewolf form manages to stop the attack without taking too much damage. She is attacked again, but this time an angel appears and interrupts the attack. After the destruction of Avacyn, some inhabitants of Innistrad began to direct their prayers to the archangel Sigarda, Champion of Light, one of the few angels who never succumbed to Emrakul's influence, and fought nobly to defend humanity from the Eldrazi monstrosities. She took on the role of Avacyn as best she could. Sigarda was there in answer to a prayer offered by Arlinn before the group entered the Mansion. Sigarda tells Arlinn and her group to look for the Key in Sorin's quarters while she faces the vampire. In Sorin's quarters, they find the Key on a decapitated statue of Avacyn.

Arlinn takes the key. For the second time that day, she mutters a prayer. This time, she prays that Sigarda is safe and that they return in time for the Harvesttide Festival. Shortly after Arlinn and her party return to Celestus with the Key, Tovolar and his army attack the Harvestide Festival. Teferi casts a spell to delay the sunset, which also delays the transformation of werewolves into their wolf forms. Cathars, witches and planeswalkers fight werewolves to protect humans. When Teferi's spell can no longer delay the sunset, the werewolves complete their transformation, including Arlinn. Arlinn and Tovolar fight and both suffer serious injuries. During the fight, the alpha continued to entice the planeswalker to abandon the humans and join his pack. Arlinn feigns surrender, but overpowers Tovolar by sinking her claws deep into his chest. Crushed by this ultimate betrayal, Tovolar surrenders and retreats with the rest of the pack.

After the fight against Tovolar, Chandra and Adeline lead Arlinn to the center of Celestus. There, the witches were performing the ritual and asked Arlinn to complete it with them. Just as Katilda is about to complete the ritual, Olivia Voldaren appears and catches the witch in midair. Olivia threatens to kill Katilda if Arlinn doesn't hand over the Key.

The other witches say that only Katilda can complete the ritual. Without much choice, Arlinn throws the Key to Olivia, who drops Katilda's body towards the ground. To prevent Katilda from getting hurt, Arlinn throws herself in front of the witch, breaking her fall. Bones break when they hit the altar. By the time Arlinn is recovering from the fall, Olivia is gone, flew away, and the key is gone with her. And so, the Eternal Night began... The second part of the article, telling Crimson Vow's events, will be published soon!