The first Magic: The Gathering set to hit Standard in 2025 will be Aetherdrift, a racing themed release in which a bunch of characters are competing to win a mysterious artifact. But a fan has pointed out that artwork released by Wizards of the Coast appears to already show who takes first place. Beware, spoilers below!
The Aetherspark is the prize for winning the set’s death race, which runs across three MTG planes. But artwork for the Aetherspark, revealed when this Magic: The Gathering set was teased last week, shows a familiar clawed, bandaged hand clutching the prize.
As user Charcharmunro pointed out on Magic’s lore discussion ‘Vorthos’ subreddit, that’s Vraska’s hand. Compare it to the art on the Thunder Junction Alchemy card Cathartic Operation, and it becomes immediately clear.
Now, perhaps Vraska steals the Aetherspark from the victor, and that’s why she’s holding it. Or perhaps she’s just the host for the award ceremony, for some reason. But there’s fireworks going off in the background, suggesting a celebration, so Occum’s Razor would suggest she wins the Aetherdrift race.
Whoops. Unless there’s going to be some last second twist in the final act, that’s a bit of a major plot point to reveal from the outset. We don’t even know all three worlds featured in the set yet!
While we don’t know exactly what the Aetherspark does, we do know it’s represented in card form as an equipment planeswalker, which is a pretty enormous clue. Presumably, it either allows its wielder to planeswalk, or turns them into an MTG planeswalker.
That must be why Chandra is going after it, since it’s been heavily implied she’s racing on behalf of her partner Nissa, one of many planeswalkers who lost their spark after March of the Machine. As we saw on the Thunder Junction card Vraska, the Silencer, the Golgari gorgon is another desparked planeswalker, so she also has an obvious motive to try and win the thing.
To find out more about Aetherdrift, and all the other MTG sets coming out in 2025, check out the MTG release schedule.
Source: Wargamer
