The whole becoming a dragon story concept

[HarleyCroft]

https://www.tombraiderforums.com/sho...6&postcount=11

Sidenote: I miss Wooxy He knows to move on when a franchise gets stale

Oh dang, actually he linked from a thread
https://www.tombraiderforums.com/sho...86#post1771286
Still taught me tho

[Quebsenuef]

Originally Posted by Sat42

[gif[/IMG]

You're serious?

I could just about imagine I may have heard this once before but let me tell you, I sure as hell thought it was Natla undergoing Evolution™ back when I first played the game!

It’s true! The link above this post shows how there is a small mutant with arms that latch over Natla’s shoulders, and a pair of little legs that wrap around her waist! It also has a functional weapon for Natla to use from her arm.

I always thought she went through a mutation or something when she presumably hit the lava when she dived to Lara, knocking them both off the platform with the Torso Boss. Apparently on Natla’s way down the mutant came in and caught her before she burned alive in the lava pit below.

She then must’ve known her beast might perish at the hands of Lara and waited for Lara at the exit to ambush her. Thankfully Croft won

[Sat42]

Thank you for the link HarleyCroft!

Alright I had a good hard look and read the comments and well, OK there are some real arguments being made based on the visuals but at the end of the day, I would side with the opinion that it's just graphical limitations that prevented the developers from integrating the 'biological augmentation' to the normal Natla model in a way that would look completely seamless.
There's something appealing about the unconventional mutant-saves-Natla-from-falling-to-her-death scenario, but I strongly believe that the intended narrative was to show that Natla herself would, of course, gladly join in the 'kick in the pants' evolution on steroids. Natla is also shown to have real agency like Lara, and when she has her back against the wall her reaction is to fight back, and when falling to your death... well, if you have injected any of that fast-track evolution cocktail into yourself, now's a good time for the intended effect to kick in, perhaps as a result of the sudden increase in stress and heartbeat rate that sends your blood rushing through your body, accelerating the spread of the genetic change...

[HarleyCroft]

Anytime Queb reminded me of it

^ooh, that's interesting. I always thought it was more like Natla shedding her human disguise but the concept of her taking the opportunity to force evolution is also pretty hardcore

[trfan16]

I always assumed that the Dagger of Xian would turn the user into an immortal deity of some sort. The one post in this topic about Xian actually meaning a transcedant human makes the most sense to me. I spent time over the years try to researchthe lore behind the Dagger of Xian and most of the information came from this forum.

On a different note, I always wondered how Bartoli was able to avoid the trap door protecting the dagger in Temple of Xian. Did Lara deactivate the trap when she fell through while trying to approach the altar? Based on the number of skeletons though in the other chambers of the temple, it seems that some other individuals have also tried to covet the dagger but fell victim to the same trap door so it doesn't seem like it could be tripped easily.

[Ashnod]

Originally Posted by Quebsenuef

It’s true! The link above this post shows how there is a small mutant with arms that latch over Natla’s shoulders, and a pair of little legs that wrap around her waist! It also has a functional weapon for Natla to use from her arm.

I always thought she went through a mutation or something when she presumably hit the lava when she dived to Lara, knocking them both off the platform with the Torso Boss. Apparently on Natla’s way down the mutant came in and caught her before she burned alive in the lava pit below.

She then must’ve known her beast might perish at the hands of Lara and waited for Lara at the exit to ambush her. Thankfully Croft won

I'm not 100% sold on this, though I know that's what it looks like.

You don't have to defeat the mutant AND Natla. Nor can you only somehow defeat one of them. They are a singularly entity and they both are eliminated together. It is very possible a fusion of the two has occurred.

If they were independent of the other, you could kill the mutant and leave Natla defenseless, or kill Natla and then have to tangle with the mutant.

Neither of these things are possible. So long as we're going pull hairs on this, I'm going to pull these.

[perryloo]

All this talk about Dragons.

What if the roles were reversed in the Dragons Lair

[Sat42]

Originally Posted by perryloo

All this talk about Dragons.

What if the roles were reversed in the Dragons Lair

LOL
Best mod ever

Besides that, you're all just overthinking the matter!
Become the dragon* seems cool and I never asked myself how logical that would be - also never asked myself how Bartoli was able to avoid the trap door protecting the dagger in Temple of Xian, this is the same game where you'll find perpetually swinging crates around a derelict opera.

* it's better in Battle Realms though!