Destiny 2 Lore - The potential origins of The Dread & The Witness' twisted vision of perfection.

The dread have instantly become my favourite faction just due to the subjugators alone, they carry a strange respect towards us [as shown by the bow at the start of the fight] which makes me excited to see any major dread characters.

Even when I stop playing, I’ve never stopped listening to Byf.

Husks to me seem more like the final step of Rhulk's Scorn/Worm experiments. Their hooded apparel is just too similar to the caretaker for me to ignore.

There is also the possibility that some of the Dread are chimeric in nature, being stitched together from the templates of different species.

Considering the Tormentor and Subjugator are based off of Nezarec and Rhulk, respectively, my gut tells me the Dread may be based on the other Disciples the Witness had in the past.

My theory is that the caretaker is a prototype for the husk. It’s not worm and hive. It’s worm and scorn.

If the dread are made off of the collected bodies of the hive and other species, it could mean that all of the frozen bodies in the pyramid ships are there waiting to be dreaded.

The scariest part of Nezarec possibly gaining use of the new enemies, is that Bungie heavily implied that Nezarec has connections to the Vex Network. That meaning he could possibly send the Dread through all time lines or take them from the list timelines

Nezarec has all the right ingredients to the next great, “big bad” for the next saga. He’s very hard to kill, he is fear itself, and he could possibly be a threat to even the Hive Gods and Worms. Contorting those he kills, into monstrous Taken/Dread hybrids potentially. To inspire more fear.

The Psion Conclave that joined Calus and the Witness must feel very regretful now, being changed into these mutant creatures. I bet the ones who remain unchanged will join with Caiatls Ascendancy, right? Well no. Caiatl has made it very clear that she has no mercy to give to traitors. Every time you do a Vox Obscura Exotic Mission to shut off the Psion Conclaves Broadcast, she reacts with glee at the sight of you killing them “Eliminate these Traitors! For the honor of the Vanguard and the Empire!” And in the Shadow Legion Lost Sector you can get this exchange: Caiatl: “Traitors and deserters, the lot of them. You do the Cabal Empire a great service, Guardian. Ghost: All of them? Caiatl: Any Cabal who have wound up here are no longer Cabal. There was ample opportunity to turn back.” Now you might think that “Well, the Shadow Legion are completely mindless and emotionless so who cares about wiping them out?” Well, that’s not actually true. Caiatl admits this in the Lightfall Campaign: Caiatl: The soldiers Calus sends. While some of these may be the mindless clones you saw on the Leviathan, many more are deserters and traitors... Those who have forgotten what it means to be Cabal. And lastly, not to mention back in Season of the Chosen, Caiatl broadcasts the Execution of a Psion Conclave Member ON AIR. Really, it seems like the idea that the Shadow Legion and Psion Conclave being just mindless clones is just Propaganda for Caiatl to dehumanize her enemies and motivate Guardians to wipe them out. So this means Amtec, Yirix, and the Psion Conclave is trapped. Either they accept the Dreads Transformations, or they get exterminated by Caiatls “honorable” Ascendancy. That’s kinda tragic.

My current theory is that these creatures, aside from the attendants, are all creations in the image of former Disciples, as a twisted way to honor their memory. The reason that Subjugators weren't deployed alongside Tormentors on Neomuna is because while Tormentors had been created after Nezarec's death in the Collapse, Subjugators were still being worked on, as the Witness only began creating them after Rhulk died. Them being a recent creation also explains why they use Strand like we do, even though the Witness previously had no idea Strand could be used that way. Strand powers were likely a last minute addition to account for our new abilities.

These guys really remind me of the corrupted Twili from Zelda: Twilight Princess. The flyers in particular. I hear that strange trumpet noise in my head when I see the grim

I am so excited to see the Final Shape’s Campaign!!! The gameplay looks so good and I hope there is no “training arc” and it’s just good story!!!

something interesting about the language used to describe these enemies. its been established that the precursors had words with multiple different meanings. as seen in the tesselation and collectors edition lore entries, these words have to be translated to show their multiple meanings, otherwise the full context is lost. compare this to the language the witness uses for the dread. each unit reduces the race its based on down to a single descriptor. the hive are husks thatre haunted and possesed. the psions are either attendants to the cabal or weavers of their own fate. rhulk was a subjugator, nezarec was a tormentor. theres a linguistic aspect to the final shape that involves reducing entire people and entire races down to their simplest, plainest form, a stark contrast to how the precursors used to view the world as one of many possibilities and meanings.

Seeing as every one of the Dread is based on an ally or disciple of the Witness I assume that the Gun Bats are based on a yet-seen Disciple. One that we may meet in the raid.

What if the dread species was what the drifter's crew encountered on that frozen planet?

I feel like some of the ground dreads were humans that were able to be brought away from the guardians reachs during that season where the witness told its troups to capture humans

Witness reshapes our enemy like we reshape our weapons

A dread guardian boss fight would be incredible.

Hot take: these enemies should have been the inhabitants of the pyramid ships under the witness the whole time. We should have fought them in the vow of the disciple raid, the root of nightmares raid, and they should have been here when the black fleet first arrived in our system all those years ago.