Here is a list of characters about the Windigos, the Frozen Hordes and other notable figures and allies related to the racial archenemies of the Three Tribes of Equestria.
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The Windigos and the Frozen Hordes
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The Windigos
The infamous racial archenemies of the Three Tribes of Equestria, thousands of years ago the Windigos were spawned from the growing hatreds between the Three Tribes, and the 'Windigo Scourge' which followed nearly wiped out the Three Tribes' civilizations on the Equestrian Subcontinent and forced them to flee southwards, to where modern day Equestria would be found. The original Windigo Scourge was eventually defeated with the Three Tribes putting aside their animosity for one another and discovering the 'Fires of Friendship'.Yet while the Windigos were forced back to the northern wastes they had turned the original Three Tribes' homelands into, their threat had not abated - not by a long shot. Far from being the mindless, animalistic forces of hatred, the Windigos as individuals and as a whole proved not only to be much more intelligent, but far more devious and dangerous than anyone had suspected even in the present day. Time and time again they would seek to finish what was started by the Three Tribes, whether directly by their own power or indirectly through those they corrupted into hateful horrors.
The malice, persistence and cunning of the Windigos seems to know no bounds, and with their sudden resurgence during the 'League of Domination' Crisis, the Ponies of Equestria are forced to once more confront their oldest and possibly greatest enemy once again, seemingly more insidious and powerful than ever. And while they were beaten back once more, they would continue to lurk in the Frozen North and other places tainted by their perfidious presence - hating, scheming, waiting, preparing for the day they can finally turn the entire Equestrian Subcontinent, and perhaps beyond, into a frozen wasteland of hate.
General
- Arch-Enemy: Widely considered this for the Equestrians on a historical and very, VERY personal level, with the only other being who remotely come close being Discord.
- Create Your Own Villain: The Windigos are magically-spawned from the hateful thoughts and feelings the Three Tribes had for each other, and acted to magnify it in order to increase the yield and corrupt the mortal Ponies who spawned them into avatars of hatred.
- Our Demons Are Different: In the FIM series proper, they are portrayed as simply evil spirits brought about and feeding upon the hatred of the Three Tribes. Here, due to their nature, they are outright classified as Demons and behave as such.
- Didn't See That Coming: It is implied that the Windigos, devious as they are, did not anticipate the Equestrians would open their Northern Reconquista/Frozen North Crusade to reclaim the original homelands of the Three Tribes by warding the Temper Trolls - then experiencing a population boom from the 'Second Equestrian Civil War' and the 'Terra Equus Continental War' - against the harsh environment of the north and drive them up north right into the tribes and warbands of the Frozen Hordes, where their emotivorous nature make them largely immune and even thriving from the violent, hateful dispositions of the Frozen Hordes and the Windigos. By the time the Temper Trolls hordes were put down, the Windigos' main group of corrupted and manipulated thralls had been weakened enough that when the actual Reconquista began, the Equestrians were able to make enormous gains, reclaiming and purifying hundreds of miles northward from the Windigos' grasp.
- The Dreaded: Every (sane) Pony in Equestria is afraid of them, given the historical enmity between them as one of the greatest existential threats to Equestrian Ponykind. Heck, even other enemies of Equestria is afraid of them, notably Lord Tirek, to the point of bringing portions of the League of Domination's forces against them in midst of the 'League of Domination Crisis' (though it's mostly because they are a threat to them too).
- Evil Versus Evil: They came into conflict with the 'League of Domination' when the Windigos suddenly arrived in midst of their crisis in pursuit of their own plans of freezing Equestria solid with ice and hatred. While Chrysalis is fine with them wreaking havoc in Equestria and is willing to let them destroy much of Equestria if she could rule over what remains, Lord Tirek doesn't want them to do that (so he could rule over Equestria himself) and led a significant portion of the League's forces against them during the battle against the 'Palace of the Four Winds'.
- Greater-Scope Villain: For the Frozen Hordes which terrorised Equestria and other lands during the time of Classical Equestria and the early Principalities era, as they are often the ones driving their raids and conquests and provided boons and powers channelled through their warlords and shamanes/warlocks.
- It Can Think: One of the most terrifying discoveries about the Windigos which was only accepted by many in the present day was that far from the mindless, animalistic forces of hatred everyone assumed they were, these demons of hatred are deviously intelligent, capable of playing a Long Game and making plans and preparations centuries, if not millennia in the making which they would execute when everypony least expected it. They only appear animalistic and mindless due to them being The Unintelligible, as well as many Equestrians considering the mere possibility of their racial archenemies being a thinking foe too horrible to contemplate.
- Kryptonite Factor:
- As shown in the Hearth's Warming story, magic born from love and bonds is their kryptonite and can weaken or destroy them.
- It turns out that the Snow Ponies, who are descended from ponies who were midway through becoming Windigos when they were purified, have magic that directly neutralizes Windigo magic. Once Prince Snjór ascends, his PQ infused Snow Pony magic made him a straight up Man of Kryptonite to lesser Windigos.
- Made of Magic: They are 'Ethereal Entities' made from the Three Tribes' thoughts and feelings of hatred for one another imprinted into the background magical field of Equus which coagulated by chance during their natural background interactions into magical Boltzmann Minds.
- The Power of Hate: Like the Windigos in the FIM canon, Codexverse Windigos feeds on and are powered by hatred, and could magnify and corrupt through the hatred of those who fell under their influence.
- Superweapon Surprise: During their resurgence in the 'League of Domination' Crisis, they shocked everyone by bringing in one of the Lost Wonders of the Three Tribes - the 'Palace of the Four Winds' - which they had corrupted into a superweapon capable of allowing them to turn the entirety of Equestria into a frozen wasteland if allowed to fully activate, forcing the Equestrians and even the League of Domination to briefly suspend hostilities to, if not work together, concentrate on dealing with them first before there is nothing left of Equestria to save/rule.
- The Unintelligible: The Windigos can think, but that is not readily apparent because they communicate in ways which are incomprehensible to Ponies and other mortal races. Those who fell to their perfidious influence, such as members of the Frozen Hordes, can understand what they are saying, with the 'Shamanes'/'Warlocks' who have the ability to channel the Windigos' powers being the most able to hold communion with them.
- Walking Wasteland: Technically FLYING wastelands, but a massive outbreak of Windigos could like in canon turn whole regions into frozen wastelands, those not frozen solid or turned into Windigos themselves falling under their perfidious influence and becoming hateful, savage, bloodthirsty beings consumed by animosity for any others not like them.
- Was Once a Man: If someone gives into hatred in the presence of a Windigo, they become one themselves. Therefore, a number of Windigos were formally ponies and other creatures, though there are ways this can be reversed. The Snow Ponies were born from ponies half-way between pony and Windigo were purified.
- Villainous Legacy: The 'Windigo Scourge' left deep marks upon not just the history of Equestria but many other beings and places.
- First and most obviously, the Windigos were responsible for turning the original homelands of the Three Tribes into what became known as the Frozen North, causing the 'Great Exodus' which would reestablish the Three Tribes in the fertile lands south, force them to put aside their animosity and unifying them together into a single nation: a land called Equestria.
- The Fires of Friendship the Three Tribes discovered and used to banish the Windigos would become the foundation of Equestria's greatest magic and also its ideals. It would also purify some of those being corrupted halfway into new Windigos and turn them into the lost Tribe known as the Snow Ponies, who would flee even further north from the Frozen North where they would establish their own civilization, centered around the city-state of Jokull.
- The Windigos' corrupting influence would turn those survivors who remained in the Frozen North without freezing to death or being turned into Windigos into bloodthirsty, hateful savages who would form into barbaric tribes and warbands who would raid the southern civilized lands of Equestria and other places when not warring endlessly with each other. On occasions, these groups would unite under a strong leader or the insidious whispers of the Windigos and drive southward in massive armies intend on rapine, slaughter, corruption and domination: the infamous Frozen Hordes who would terrorize the classical Equestrian Empire throughout its history and its successor states for much of their early existence.
- [WIP]
Notable Windigos
The Three Winters
The three oldest Windigos in existence, the Three Winters are among the strongest, most hateful and most dangerous of Windigokind, their mere presence capable of blanketing entire lands in endless winter and maintaining hateful holds over entire Frozen Hordes. They are among the greatest obstacles faced by Equestria and their allies in their goal of reclaiming their lost homelands in the Frozen North. General
- Demon Lords and Archdevils: They are this among Windigokind, although their power dwarves even the bog-standard Winter Lord. They are more accurately classified as 'Demon Kings/Queens' among their kind.
- The Older Immortal: They are the three oldest Windigos in existence, and are phenomenally powerful and dangerous as a result.
Auril, the Cruel Wind
Winter Lords
General
- Demon Lords and Archdevils: Winter Lords are particularly powerful members of Windigokind.
Lord Aquilo, the Harshest Blizzard
Lord Caurus
Lord Corus
The Frozen Hordes
Not everyone fled or perished when the 'Windigo Scourge' swept over the original homelands of the Three Tribes of Equestria - some of them were either left behind or stayed behind for one reason or another, and were unable to escape when the Windigos plunged the north into an Endless Winter. Those who didn't perish from the cold and starvation, frozen solid to feed the Windigos with their hatred, or even turned into Windigos themselves, they and their descendants would fall under the perfidious corruption of the Windigos, which erodes their sanity with Irrational Hatred and reduce them to bloodthirsty, savage, hateful and violent barbarians who endlessly war among themselves or with those who live beyond the Frozen North. These tribes and warbands would form the basis for the Windigo-aligned 'Frozen Hordes
'. For much of the Equestrian Empire's history and in the early centuries of its successor's existence, they were a persistent threat to many civilized lands with their raids and incursions, especially when a powerful leader or the Windigos' whispers causes many tribes and warbands to form into a proper 'Frozen Horde' and invade southwards to Equestria and other places in a rampaging campaign of plunder and slaughter. Although the last major incursion was defeated in the time of Pillars of Equestria's day, with the Windigos' resurgence in the present, it would be revealed just like the Windigos themselves, the Frozen Horde is neither truly gone nor diminished...
General
- Alas, Poor Villain: While incorrigibly hostile, and probably had it coming either by giving into their hatreds which spawned the Windigos in the first place or didn't run when they had the chance and was left behind as the 'Windigo Scourge' swept over them, at the end of the day they are as much victims of the Windigos' demonic corruption as they were perpetrators of hatreds which spawned them. Many of those who were descended from the survivors who stayed behind meanwhile never had a choice about being corrupted into hateful bloodthirsty savages to begin with.
- Ax-Crazy: Generations of living under the perfidious influence of the Windigos had eroded the sanity of the survivors who remained when the 'Windigo Scourge' came and their descendants, tainting them body and soul with their demonic corruption, turning them all into violent, savage, cruel and bloodthirsty individuals consumed by hatred for anyone and anything not themselves, often united only by greater hatreds, animalistic cunning/crude pragmatism, through fear-plus-force of their unifying leaders and the insidious whispers of the Windigos.
- Always Chaotic Evil: They are incorrigibly hostile, hating and envying everyone and everything else not them and would not hesitate to fight and kill each other as well as pillaging and razing lands south of the Frozen North out of envy and malice.
- Barbarian Tribe: The Frozen Hordes are organized into various tribes and warbands who live in crude settlements build among and from the rubble and ruins of their ancestors' fallen civilizations. When not scavenging and foraging to survive, they either endlessly fight each other for resources, territory, or simply sheer hatred for anyone not themselves, or launch raids into the civilized and non-corrupted lands south of the Frozen North such as Equestria to plunder and slaughter, bringing back loot and enslaved survivors back north. A true 'Frozen Horde' is formed when a strong/sane-enough leader or the influence of the Windigos causes several tribes or warbands to unite into a single army and invade southwards, aiming to conquer and corrupt for themselves and/or the Windigos.
- Big Bad: They were one of the most persistent enemies of the Equestrian Empire and its contemporaries throughout its history, as well as foes of its successor states in the early centuries of their existence. The Windigos who often drove them to rampage in the civilized lands down south serve as a greater threat backing them up.
- Blood Knight: Given members of the Frozen Hordes are pretty much hateful, bloodthirsty psychopaths, they are also likely this trope.
- Captain Ersatz: The Frozen Hordes are based on the Chaos-corrupted/worshipping Norscan Tribes from Warhammer Fantasy, the cannibalistic Reavers from Firefly and several other inspirations.
- The Corrupter: Some of those which made up the Frozen Hordes, such as the 'Shamanes'/'Warlocks' and the Erqigdlets, are filled with such hatred or become conduits of the Windigos' corruption they radiate an area of corruption around themselves, which freezes the land and drives them within it into Irrational Hatred.
- The Corruption: The Frozen Horde are the result of the Windigos' demonic influence on those survivors of the 'Windigo Scourge' who were left behind and either didn't die from cold and starvation, frozen solid as an endless food-source, or turned into Windigos themselves. The Windigos' corruption erode their sanity with hatred and turn them and their descendants into bloodthirsty, savage, cruel and hateful barbaric shells of their former selves. Those places whom they conquer and hold - however briefly - also falls to their corruption and are turned into frozen wastelands of hatred.
- Divided We Fall: Their inability to get along with each other without powerful leaders, demonic influence and greater hatreds due to being utterly consumed by animosity for everyone and everything else not them meant that they are as set against each other as they are against all other non-Frozen Horde enemies. Like many other factions and groups of villainy and evil, the moment those unifying forces are removed, they waste no time fighting and killing each other as they normally do back in the Frozen North, allowing heroic forces and factions to take them out.
- Enemy Mine: One of the reasons Equestria was never able to truly reclaim their original homelands in the Frozen North was because every time they tried to, the tribes and warbands there would form entire Frozen Hordes to stop them. They also unite whenever a powerful warlord, Windigo influence or greater hatred gives them reasons to unite despite their constant animosity for everyone and everything not them to create 'true' Frozen Hordes which would go on campaigns of pillaging, slaughter and conquest. The Equestrians were aware of this in preparation for the Northern Reconquista, and thus their first move was the heavily weaken the Frozen Horde by mass warding the overpopulation of Temper Trolls against the winter and letting them invade the North to make fighting them more managable.
- Equal-Opportunity Evil: Despite being borne from inter-tribal hatreds, ironically the ranks of the 'Frozen Horde' could be made up of a wide diversity of races and groups. The Erqigdlets - degenerated, cannibalistic, savage descendants of Diamond Dogs who were left behind and became corrupted - could be found in the Frozen Hordes', for example. However, the catch is that this is only possible due to Windigo influence, powerful leaders and greater unifying hatreds, as everyone is pretty much consumed by hatred for all not themselves, and the moment those unifying forces disappear they waste no time to go slaughter each other. Even then, much of this unity is implied to be Teeth-Clenched Teamwork.
- Evil Will Fail: One of their biggest, most obvious and inevitable weakness is the fact that at the end of the day they are consumed by animosity for everyone and everything not their own and are barely held together into social and mental coherence by the Windigos' whispers, strong leaders from among their ranks and greater hatreds for other things. The moment they go, the savages would tear each other apart at a heartbeat.
- Grim Up North: They dwell in the Frozen North, the icy wastelands beyond the Crystal Empire and Yakyakistan where the original homelands of the Three Tribes of Equestria once are. Freezing conditions, scarce resources and Windigo corruption all worked to turn the survivors of the Windigo Scourge who were left behind or stayed behind into hateful violent barbaric savages.
- He's Back!: After centuries of dormancy following the defeat of the Frozen Horde led by 'The Gorequeen', the Frozen Horde made their terrifying return together with the resurgence of the Windigos during the 'League of Domination' Crisis, and continued to raid and invade with a frequency unseen in over a thousand years.
- The Horde: The Frozen Hordes fits this trope to a tee: savage, cruel and barbaric forces of Windigo-corrupted Ponies and other beings. Organized into tribes and warbands which fought each other over territory, resources or simply the fact the other guys existed when not uniting under a strong leader or the Windigos' influence and launching incursions to civilized lands such as Equestria down south for loot and slaughter.
- Laser-Guided Karma: The opening move of the Northern Reconquista/Frozen North Crusade, an Equestrian effort to retake the Frozen North from them and the Windigos, involve warding the continent's Temper Trolls (which had recently undergone such a massive population boom they had to be culled somehow) and letting the barbaric nature and bloodlust of the Frozen Horde cause the Trolls to launch a massive invasion into their territories, after centuries of the Horde doing the same to Equestria many times throughout history. It's implied to have caught even the dangerous warlords and their devious Windigos backers by surprise, and by the time the Frozen Hordes came out on top, they were weakened enough such that the Reconquista/Crusade forces were able to reclaim and purify hundreds of miles of territory.
- Logical Weakness:
- The fact that they are corrupted into hateful savagery meant because of their animosity for everyone and everything not themselves, they are more or less only held together by force/fear of their leaders, Windigos' whispers, greater hatreds, crude pragmatism and few other things. This makes invading Frozen Hordes easy to break into squabbling, internecinal messes once their leader is taken out or they are cut off from the Windigos' influence.
- Their hateful savagery also makes them have a 'natural enemy' in the form of Temper Trolls. As Temper Trolls feed and gain a powerful Healing Factor from hatred and bloodlust, it makes them very difficult for a member of the Frozen Hordes to kill them. This was exploited when Starswirl realized they could solve their Temper Troll problem by warding them against the cold and directing them at the Frozen Hordes letting them duke it out. While the Frozen Hordes did ultimately win, it came with such heavy losses and them being pushed far enough back that Equestria, for the first times since the Windigo Scourge began, managed to retake a substantial amount of land from them.
- Made a Slave: Being killed by the savages of the Frozen Hordes may be a preferable fate to being enslaved, as some survivors were turned into, as it entails being dragged back to the Frozen North, where they will likely perish from the hateful cruelty of the warbands and tribes, freezing to death in the frozen wastelands, or becoming corrupted by the Windigos' influence and joining up the Frozen Hordes themselves.
- Might Makes Right: The tribes and warbands are led by chieftains and warlords who are mighty enough in body and mind to have the strength, skills and senses to dominate and become unifying figures of their groups in spite of their constant hatred for each other and the world. The warlords are usually the ones who end up leading the Frozen Hordes in their rampaging incursions down south.
- Older Than They Look: Some of the Frozen Horde members may actually be the original survivors or their earlier offsprings rather than their distant descendants, preserved past their natural lives for thousands of years thanks to the Windigos' demonic taint, owing to the fact some had been found still dressed in similar attires and act similarly to the original members of the Three Tribes pre-Exodus. It is difficult to tell, however, as many of the descendants actually inherited and preserved some of the knowledge, traditions and cultures of their ancestors in spite of their corruption, making it just as likely they are imitators.
- Rape, Pillage, and Burn: The bloodthirsty tribes and warbands which made up the Frozen Hordes hate/envy those beyond the Frozen North and are also strapped for resources in the icy wastes they live in, resulting in them launching raids and full-blown incursions down south to Equestria and other civilized lands for plunder and slaughter. Those who aren't butchered when they razed their settlements and looted its charred remains are enslaved and taken back up north, where they either die from mistreatment or harsh conditions, or fall under the corruption of the Windigos and become one of the savage barbarians themselves.
- Sanity Has Advantages: Some of the Frozen Horde warlords who arise to dominate their warbands/tribes or unify many of them into a proper 'Frozen Horde' also happens to be among the few strong enough in will to hold onto some of their senses in spite of the Windigos' corruption as they are in body.
- We ARE Struggling Together: Due to their animosity for everyone and everything not themselves, they are hateful towards each other and many could barely cooperate without other factors (such as powerful leaders, crude pragmatism, greater hatreds and Windigos' influence) to prevent them from killing each other.
Notable Frozen Hordes members
The Gorequeen
Mysterious yet dreaded, the Gorequeen was one of the most powerful Frozen Horde warlords to ever rise to power, and was the leader of the last major Frozen Horde incursion into Equestria and other civilized lands which neverthless was widely ranked as one of the greatest ever. Her and her massive horde's rampage threatened to annihilate civilization in Northern Equestria and elsewhere, making her one of the greatest foes ever faced by the old Pillars of Equestria. Her demise seemingly broke the Frozen Hordes for good, with lesser incursions and raids becoming less frequent until they were merely thought as fables, at least until the Windigos' shocking resurgence and the Frozen Hordes' return in the present day.
- Amazonian Beauty: Described as 'powerful' as she is beautiful, which is more-or-less mandatory for a Frozen Horde leader.
- Apocalypse How: Class 0 - She nearly wiped out civilization in the northern Equestrian Subcontinent and many other northern regions of the world.
- The Dreaded: Her title of 'The Gorequeen' is likely not a hyperbole or self-aggrandization, as her Frozen Horde was widely considered one of the greatest ever gathered to go on rapine and slaughter, resulting in a terrible and difficult conflict which only finally ended with her (apparent) death in the Final Battle against the Pillars of Equestria.
- Magnetic Hero: Villain, technically, but like many other powerful Frozen Horde warlords, she had to be this by default in order to bring all the hateful tribes and warbands of the Frozen Hordes together into a large, at least semi-coherent army for her wars and conquests. And given the fact her Frozen Horde was widely considered one of the greatest ever, that speaks of some serious metaphorical attractive quality. The moment she (apparently) perished, her horde was broken, and it apparently hit them so hard Equestria never faced another major incursion by the Frozen Hordes afterwards, at least until the present day.
- Might Makes Right: Widely considered one of the mightiest warlords of the Frozen Hordes, who was powerful enough to gather one of the strongest Frozen Hordes ever arisen and give Equestria, the Crystal Empire and other realms in the North a run for their money.
- Names To Run Away From Very Fast: She was known as 'The Gorequeen' - which should be enough by itself to tell you exactly what sort of person she is and why you REALLY should be running as fast and as far away as possible.
- Only Known by Their Nickname: Known only as 'The Gorequeen'.
- Posthumous Character: She is dead long before the present day, having lived in the time of the Pillars of Equestria and serving as one of their greatest foes, although apparently she disappeared in the Final Battle and is only presumed dead as her horde was shattered afterwards.
- Red Baron: Known only as 'The Gorequeen'.
- The Strategist: On top of being powerful, she was also known to be dangerously cunning, implied to have been able to outwit as she does outfight her rivals and enemies.
- Uncertain Doom: She disappeared in the Final Battle with the Pillars of Equestria, and was presumed dead. Certainly, her horde thought so as it broke so hard without their leader no major incursion or raid by the Frozen Hordes happened again until the present day.
- Villainous Legacy: A surprisingly positive one - the Gorequeen's death apparently hit the Frozen Hordes so hard, they were thoroughly routed and would not return to raid or attack Equestria and elsewhere again on the scale as the previous Hordes for over a thousand years.
