The Season 13 reveal is in a few days and we’ll finally get an idea as to where Bungie are taking this story regarding the seasons. I wanted to present ideas and potential theories as to what we could potentially see. All of this will be based solely on what we know: [b]Season Name:[/b] About a month back, notorious dataminer GinsorKR datamined the name for Season 13. It will apparently be called “Season of the Chosen”. Based on Ginsor’s track record with datamined content and providing very accurate information, I’m going to take this piece of information as true until proven otherwise. So what does this name mean? Well there are two potentials and those will be determined by the non-English translations showing us if “Chosen” is singular or plural. But because we don’t know this yet, I’ll cover both. Now. Everyone should know “chosen” is about being selected. Now we can gather a few guesses based on this. First we’ll look at Singular: Mithrax the Forsaken, being chosen and becoming the rightful holder of the title “kell of Light” or perhaps even “Kell of Kells”. I think in regards to Mithrax, it’s the former rather than the latter. A season doesn’t feel right for this type of title to be applied. Variks calls Mithrax “Kell of house Light” during the Beyond Light campaign, but also states he will need to prove himself in due time. This could be what we see and Mithrax proving himself worthy to be the House’s chosen Kell. Crow being chosen as Hunter Vanguard. Now for Crow to be Chosen, would mean we participate through some process that isn’t Cayde’s dare. Based on past lore we know the Vanguard are somewhat disregarding the date and leaving it up to the Hunters to decide, so this could be that time. Now we’ll look at plural: The City choosing it’s true alliance, which I will discuss somewhat more in the next season. Lots of people are talking about a particular cutscene which many think will be relevant in the next season (whilst I personally have my doubts, I won’t ignore its potential). We could see this next season being about helping certain factions (e.g. House Light, Red Remnant/Caiatl’s empire, The Awoken, Rasputin etc) build up and begin forming an alliance. [b]The Season Icon:[/b] I’m sure by now many people have seen the season Icon and heard a few theories about what it’s about: Potential sigil for House Light Potential sigil for a Light Aligned Cabal Faction Hint towards the reformation for the Tower A symbol that looks Egyptian (Osiris centric) Looks like the Torobatl arena Titan Helmet found in the Tangled Shore loot pool (and world loot pool) Looks like the helmet of a Psion Flayer So these seem to be the main 4 theories I’ve personally seen (I implore people to leave their own interpretations in the comments on this post). The symbol has an orb over it which is the main basis people are using to suggest it’s House Light or Cabal faction sigils. If you turn the symbol upside down it does somewhat resemble the Tower from D1, although this is a stretch. The Egyptian symbol hinting at Osiris has actually got a bit more basis from the art banner seen in the Seasonal challenges screen. The Symbol resembles that of the Titan helmet released back in Forsaken. This could potentially mean some kind of link to Caiatl, the Cabal’s current grand leader who as far as we know, is situated on Torobatl. The Psion Flayer link is somewhat lose (but one pointed out on Twitter) and could link to Amtec who’s fate is unconfirmed. So we could see her pop up as a potential main enemy. [b]Information from the vidoc and season pass promotion screen:[/b] The Season Pass promotion screen back from the trailers promoting the Deluxe edition of Beyond Light, revealed a set of coloured icons for the four seasons. Season 12 being a blue very similar to that seen in Beyond Light, Season 13 was purple, Season 14 was Red and Season 15 was Yellow. The Purple could be a nod to either Crow, House Dusk, The Awoken, or a multitude of things, but the colouring most resembled House Dusk’s colouration. The Beyond Light Vidoc spoke about the Seasons and there was two pieces of informations about this year that are important: 1) that we will slowly be watching Savathun placing down the dominoes of her plan ready to knock them down with Witch Queen. 2) that each season we will look at the different factions and seeing how they’re coping with the arrival of the Pyramids and disappearance of the celestial bodies. So far we’ve seen both of these happen. Savathun has attempted to interrupt our communication with the Traveler. And we’ve looked at how The Spider’s Crew and Xivu Arath in Season of the Hunt and The House of Salvation with Beyond Light are dealing with it. We know we’ll be looking at the Cabal and Vex at some point based on the cutscene and inevitable return of the Vault of Glass raid. So we know we will be looking at one particular faction and that Savathun has a very high chance of making an appearance. [b]Reprised Strikes:[/b] Much like how Beyond Light saw the return of the Cosmodrome and The Will of Crota Strike, now called The Disgraced, We know Season 13 will see the return of both the Devil’s Lair strike and the S.A.B.E.R. strike as well as the respective areas they take place in. This means we could expect the Cosmodrome to be a key location during this season. The Disgraced strike served story purpose as we helped Shaw Han track down Navota and kill her. So we could expect the reprised versions of the other two strikes to follow a similar format. [b]Returning Characters:[/b] A recent TWAB which announced the return of Umbral Engrams revealed that Crow will be elsewhere next season. So this should suggest that he will serve some purpose as a vendor. Whether that’s for Umbral Engrams or something else isn’t clear. A few months before the release of Beyond Light, Lance Riddick tweeted that he was recording lines for Destiny. Many people I’m sure know Lance is the voice of Commander Zavala. He also tweeted not too long before its launch that he was recording more lines. This could suggest he’s going to crop up again. If the Cutscene is to play this next season, it’s very possible we could hear more from Osiris who was recently made Zavala’s assistant/advisor at the request of Ikora Rey (who I’d be very surprised to hear from in the next season). Unrelated to the seasonal content, but due to the Trials refresh, we could hear more from Saint-14, even if it’s minimal (he did have idle chatter lines for Beyond Light after all). [b]The Cutscene:[/b] Now. Everyone knows about the cutscene. Zavala, Osiris and from what we can see, two Bloodguards. Now for those who don’t know or didn’t play the Red War campaign, Bloodguards are elite Cabal generals who swore their lives to protecting Dominus Ghaul. We saw two with him when we were kicked off the Immortal at the start of D2 and again when we killed Thumos in the EDZ. Now. From what we can tell this cutscene looks like it’s taking place on a Cabal Structure. Where is unknown. Possibly in the EDZ or even on a Carrier ship. But we can roughly make out much Cabal architecture. (Now I wanna preface. I saw a recent Reddit post indicating that this is taking place in the tower based on the cube maps. The cube map they based this off is from the pre-alpha build of the tower and I’d argue is very unlikely to be seen if the tower returns, which given the tower’s recent adjustments with the new kiosks, I doubt we’ll return anytime soon) Now. Who was there? Well we already discussed the Bloodguards. This could likely indicate a Cabal of higher importance ring present. Some left over Red Remnant Val or Valus or even Bracus. But I think there are more characters. We know Mara Sov is returning at some point. Likely in Season 15 in time for Witch Queen. Potentially Mithrax and/or Variks. Maybe even Exo Rasputin. We really can’t tell to the full extent. But I can imagine there are more people there. [b]Conclusion and closing thoughts:[/b] Personally. I think we will be looking at multiple factions based on the pluralised theory. I don’t think we’ll return to the old Tower. And if that cutscene is going to happen, I imagine it will be in the latter half of the season. But who knows. I’d like to hear your own theories below.