Magic Untapped takes a look at Kristina of the Woods, an "old-walker" from Magic: The Gathering past who was one of Urza's Nine Titans.
TRANSCRIPT:
Welcome back to Who Is on Magic Untapped as we explore the lore of characters from throughout the Magic: The Gathering multiverse. I am Barry White.
During the time of the Phyrexian Invasion of Dominaria, there were eight planeswalkers that Urza more-or-less trusted to be part of his Nine Titans as a counter-offensive to the Phyrexian attack. One such planeswalker was Kristina of the Woods.
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Kristina of the Woods was an ancient planeswalker born before the Brothers’ War on Corondor, an island nation of the plane of Dominaria. Despite her age, she always had the appearance of a young woman – the appearance she had when her spark ignited centuries ago.
Shortly before the Ice Age that overtook Dominaria after the detonation of the Golgothian Cylex that signaled the end of the Brothers’ War, she met and fell in love with Taysir, a planeswalker from the far-away plane of Rabiah.
Trapped in the Shard of the Twelve Worlds – a micro-multiverse that came to be as a repercussion of the Cylex blast – she and Taysir journeyed between the twelve planes of the Shards doing what they can to help the people they find. At least, they did until they were summoned to the Summit of the Null Moon on her native island of Corandor. There, she helped to forge an agreement known as the Treaty of the Shard before it was nearly immediately broken by planeswalkers Tevesh Szat, Leshrac, and Faralyn. The betrayal caused the planeswalkers present at the summit to attack one another, causing one of those in attendance, Ravidel, to be slain along with his close friend, Rhuell (who was really the Elder Dragon Chromium in disguise).
After the battle had ended and the agitators fled, Kristina used a resurrection spell onn Ravidel. Ravidel, however, returned to life quite mad – especially after learning of the demise of Rhuell.
That same year, Kristina was present when Freyalise, another planeswalker native to Dominaria, cast her World Spell. The spell not only ended the plane-covering Ice Age on Dominaria, but also allowed the Shard of the Twelve Worlds to finally rejoin the greater multiverse after nearly three centuries apart.
After the World Spell’s casting, Taysir approached Kristina and offered her a Reflecting Mirror as a proposal gift. Kristina refused, opting instead to explore the multiverse now that the rest of it had opened up to her. And, with that, she left Taysir.
During these travels, she met another planeswalker – one whose spark had much more recently ignited than her own. This planeswalker was Sandruu, a minotaur from Ulgrotha. She grew fond of him and traveled back to his home plane as his partner. This enraged Taysir, who found out about their supposed union through his underlings. He traveled to Ulgrotha as well and confronted the minotaur, banishing him to a far-away plane before he, too, met his demise at the hands of Feroz, another planeswalker and close friend of Sandruu whom had make Ulgrotha his home.
Years after, Kristina found herself back on Dominaria in the valley of Minorad for an assembly simply known as The Gathering. There, she, along with a number of other planeswalkers and powerful warriors of Dominaria were ambushed by an insane Ravidel who threatened the group with a second detonation of the Golgothian Cylex. Thankfully, the mad planeswalker’s threat would never come to fruition.
Years after that, she was back home on Corondor. There, she met and saved a shadow mage named Jared Carthalion. She taught him the ways of mana, falling in love with the man in the process. Together, they would eventually do battle with Ravidel. Kristina found herself wounded, but Jared saved her from a gristly demise as he ascended to becoming a planeswalker himself.
A year and a half later, she and Jared would have a child together: Justina.
And that’s pretty much the last anyone would hear about Kristina of the Woods for nearly 200 years when, as a countermeasure for the invasion of Dominaria by Yawgmoth and his Phyrexians, she was recruited to be one of planeswalker Urza’s Nine Titans. One of the other Titans, as it would turn out, was her old lover, Taysir, though the two of them had quite moved on by then and had become rather friendly towards one another.
Unfortunately, during their infiltration of the plane of Phyrexia, one of the other Titans, Tevesh Szat betrayed the group and killed Kristina.
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And that act of betrayal would mark the end of Kristina of the Woods.
By the way, here’s a little trivia for you about the character. Kristina of the Woods was the co-creation of Magic story authors Jeff Gomez and John Tynes. The pair named her after Tynes’ then-girlfriend.
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