An excerpt from the upcoming lore anthology, Folk and Fairy Tales of Azeroth for Blizzard’s World of Warcraft has finally revealed that Chromie the NPC is transgender, and uses she/her pronouns. Slated for release later this month on May 25, the book titled World of Warcraft: Folk and Fairy Tales of Azeroth features short stories which expand on the lore within the world of the massively multiplayer online roleplaying game.
First appearing in-game in 2004, Chromie is a time-travelling bronze dragon who chooses the form of a female gnome during her Visage Day ceremony to interact with mortals in the game. As a bronze dragon, her name is Chronormu, which is considered a male name as it uses the “ormu” suffix, whereas female bronze dragon names usually end with an “ormi” suffix. A regular fixture in the game, Chromie appears throughout WoW’s numerous expansions providing quests for players and is also a playable character in Blizzard’s now abandoned MOBA, Heroes of The Storm.
As reported by PCGamesN, fans that have received early copies of Blizzard’s upcoming Folk and Fairy Tales of Azeroth lore book have found that Chromie’s preferred pronouns are officially revealed in the story titled “Visage Day”. In the story, Chromie chooses to take the form of a female gnome during her Visage Day ceremony, a coming-of-age ceremony where bronze dragons choose their mortal form. After choosing her mortal guise, Chromie is asked why she specifically chose to be a female, to which she answers “It suits me.”
Fans quickly took to Twitter to ask WoW’s narrative lead, and author of the story, Steve Danuser for further clarification to Chromie’s gender identity. As Chromie has a mortal and dragon form, fans were eager to find out whether she was considered gender fluid, male as a bronze dragon, and female in her mortal form. Luckily, Danuser cleared it up for fans, stating that pronoun use for Chromie’s story was very deliberate, and that “Prior to the Visage day ceremony, Chronormu is he/him. Afterwards, she/her in both mortal and dragon forms.” While the upcoming book finally confirms that Chromie is transgender, she is certainly not the first in the game, with Pelagos, a prominent NPC in the Shadowlands expansion revealed as being transgender when the expansion was released in 2020.
While the World of Warcraft community has speculated heavily in the past on Chromie’s gender identity, this was never confirmed by Blizzard until now, which must come as a welcome revelation as fans can finally put their theories and confusion to rest. Although it has taken Blizzard almost 17 years to confirm that Chromie is indeed transgender, her story is another welcomed step towards more diversity and LGBTQ+ representation in video games.
World of Warcraft: Folk and Fairy Tales of Azeroth is available for pre-purchase and releases on May 25.
Sources: PCGamesN, Steve Danuser/Twitter