The Legends of Aetherdrift
The Ghirapur Grand Prix—a multiversal race with grandiose stakes and competitors to match—is the centerpiece of Aetherdrift. With ten racing teams each competing for the enigmatic Aetherspark, it's going to be a bumpy ride on the way to first place. The story, written by K. Arsenault Rivera, was released last month, and you can read it (or re-read it) on MTGStory.com. Once you've learned the story, you'll be ready for Prerelease events this weekend and the set's full release on February 14, 2025.
But if you're curious about the legends of this set, whether it's the iconic Planeswalker Chandra or the leader of your next Commander deck, we've got all the info you need right here. Start your engines, buckle your seatbelts, and prepare for the legends of Aetherdrift: your guide to the faces of this high-octane release.
Aetherdrift releases on February 14, 2025. You can preorder the set's products now at your local game store, online retailers like Amazon, and elsewhere Magic products are sold.
Basri Ket, Tomorrow's Champion
Once a Planeswalker and paladin of Oketra, Basri Ket is now the champion folk-hero of Amonkhet, having earned his plane's respect by fending off the Phyrexians alongside the living and the dead. In wake of the invasion, Basri worked to restore Amonkhet and unite its people, leading expeditions into the Broken Lands and parlaying with undead monarchs of the past in the Tombs Before Time. With the formation of the Ghirapur Grand Prix, Basri has taken the mantle of co-captain for the Champions of Amonkhet racing team. With his participation, Basri hopes to usher in a glorious future for his home.
Zahur, Glory's Past
A legendary charioteer whose name was scoured from history during Bolas's reign, Zahur's gloried tomb was discovered by Basri Ket during one of his expeditions into the Broken Lands. With the proper rites performed, Zahur rose from his grave and proudly stepped into the role of co-captain for the Champions of Amonkhet. He is the leader of the Maahestet, a once dominant race of leonin who have since been reduced to a cadre of declining undead. Determined to prevent their wasting, Zahur hopes to reap the rewards of the Ghirapur Grand Prix and bring a new dawn to both his people and his home.
Captain Howler, Sea Scourge
The scarred scourge of the sea, Captain Howler unwaveringly leads his crew, the Keelhaulers, toward fortune and glory. This hulking giant of a chordatan hails from a world submerged in water. His body is inked with a map of every port he's ever docked in, and he wields his signature aether culverin with deft brutality. While his boisterous crew bristles against the restrictive rules placed upon them by the Grand Prix, they stay in line … for the most part. But woe be to any who stand in their way when the cameras stop rolling!
Aatchik, Emerald Radian
Aatchik is a wizened Speedbrood highmind, a learned druid of velocity and precision. She has earned herself the title of emerald radian for this year's Speedbrood cohort and leads a crew of eager claimants ready to prove themselves. To the Speedbrood, velocity is beauty, and thus the goal of the race is not only victory itself but the act of becoming one with the very concept of speed. This is Aatchik's last race as a highmind before she returns home to fulfill her destiny. A win—or at least a good showing—would be an auspicious sign and ensure she'd enjoy the finest pupal baths to coax her form into its most pure shape.
Chandra, Spark Hunter
Chandra shocked Avishkar when she decided to lead Kylem's Cloudspire Racing Team. But for Chandra, the choice to race with the previous year's winners was an obvious one. The grand prize, the Aetherspark, is too fantastic a reward to risk losing, and she would do anything to traverse the Multiverse again with her lover, Nissa. She's dedicated herself to the sport and proven her competence as an excellent leader and driver, quickly earning a name amongst the Prix's best and brightest in addition to her status as a war hero.
As the day of the Prix fast approaches, Chandra finds herself pitted against her rival Spitfire and her mother, Pia Nalaar. Faced with fierce competition, bombarded by stardom, and confronting dangerous schemes brewing around her, Chandra is determined to race for Nissa's future.
Kolodin, Triumph Caster
Once leader and now co-captain of the Cloudspire Racing team, Kolodin brought victory to his home of Kylem in last year's Grand Prix and intends to repeat that performance. He is a deeply faithful member of the Great Victory, an order that worships challenge and perseverance. He and his order train in triumph-magic, a style of casting fueled by their burning drive for victory. It allows Kolodin to invoke his will and diffuse it amongst his team for precision-point racing and wordless coordination. He can also breathe this life into his vehicle so that it may fight alongside him.
Sita Varma, Masked Racer
Sita Varma hides her identity behind a mask, adopting the name "Spitfire" when she races. She carefully maintains her persona of a stoic antihero and enigma whose face remains unknown but whose exploits soar. On the track, she's known for her unique exosuit, designed by Pia Nalaar, which burns aether cartridges to shunt Sita into the Aetherdrift, a blended space somewhere between aether and reality. But behind the mask, Sita is the wealthy daughter of an old Consulate member, a secret she guards closely.
Winter, Cursed Rider
Once a survivor of the plane-spanning house of Duskmourn, Winter has been cursed to race forever as a revenant, bound to a life of never-ending road rage. He leads a doomed crew of possessed racers alongside a wicked entity known as the Speed Demon, who never leaves his side. The remnant of Winter's humanity is a threadbare façade that disguises his new form of a flaming blue wraith whose appearance is just as agonizing to bear as it is frightening to witness. Having captured Loot, he hopes to use the creature's Omenpath-related powers to finally win the race and escape his eternal torment.
The Speed Demon
The Speed Demon is a being of ravenous hunger. A lesser demon from Duskmourn, it was cursed and bound to Winter to forever act as his warden. As the co-leader and namesake of the Speed Demons, it demands sacrifice after sacrifice to satiate its endless need for speed.
Far Fortune, End Boss
Leader of the Endriders, Far Fortune is a scarred, road-bitten ride boss who led her gang from the wasteland grave-fields of Gastal to the wide and endless horizons of the Multiverse. Once driven by white-hot rage, her life in exile has calmed Far Fortune's bloodthirst. However, her desire for revenge has not faded. She still nurses an ember of that old anger and uses it to fuel her ultimate quest: return home and take Gastal for herself.
Redshift, Rocketeer Chief
Before he led the Goblin Rocketeers, Redshift was a brash and brilliant test pilot with an incredible (some might even say impossible) survival rate. An innovator in goblin aeronautics, Redshift was not the first goblin to strap a rocket to his back and strike the ignition, but he was the first to live to see the next day. By dint of fate or luck, Redshift has survived every test he's ever run and concluded his winning streak will never end. He's determined to lead his crew to new heights. As long as there's a sky above and a rocket behind, they'll follow him to death or glory.
Daretti, Rocketeer Engineer
Daretti is the unofficial co-lead of the Goblin Rocketeers, having bankrolled the team in the hopes of discovering a new means of interplanar travel after the loss of his spark. His efforts advanced their technology by literal leaps and bounds. Only afterward did he consider that perhaps arming a bunch of trigger-happy goblins with advanced ballistics and highly flammable chemical propellants was risky. Now, Daretti begrudgingly serves as the Rocketeer's lead engineer, responsible for keeping the team safe and their machines functional while secretly searching for an Omenpath home.
Caradora, Heart of Alacria
Caradora is the champion of Alacria, a plane connected to Avishkar via an Omenpath. She never intended to lead the Alacrian Quickbeasts as the exemplar of her district, but after the tragic death of the original team captain mere weeks before the race, the mantle fell upon her shoulders. Though she is the best and brightest of her district and a prodigious jockey, her appointment was both incontestable and bittersweet. Fresh-faced yet determined, she bears the immense challenge and honor of leading her team to victory, all while learning the ropes of her new duty on the fly.
Lagorin, Soul of Alacria
Lagorin is an ancient Quickbeast, the strongest of his district and a shoo-in pick to lead the Alacrian Quickbeasts in the Grand Prix. When his pledged rider died at the cusp of the race, Lagorin was duty-bound to stay the course and take a new rider, for the honor of his pledge and the glory of his people. Though reluctant at first, Lagorin has grown to respect Caradora as a worthy partner for his final race before retirement.
Mendicant Core, Guidelight
Mendicant Core and the Guidelight Voyagers have been an enigmatic, fan-favorite team after their appearance in the first multiplanar run of the Grand Prix. Rumors follow them, with the ignorant fretting they might be some new form of Phyrexian and the curious wishing to disassemble them in search of a maker's mark. The truth is far more mysterious and even more tragic: They are lost, with Mendicant the sole sapient being amongst the machines he attends. They race the Grand Prix searching for a way back home, each member of their racing team functioning as one of their limbs in a vast network intelligence, lost in and alien to the Multiverse.
Loot, the Pathfinder
Loot is a solitary being, a young beast of an unknown species and time that was discovered in stasis within a strange vault on Thunder Junction. As far as anyone knows, he is the only creature of his kind. Loot appears to have a unique and valuable power in this brave new Multiverse: the ability to divine the precise location of any Omenpath and its destination. This power does not seem to be the limit of his abilities. As he grows, he may prove not only able to uncover Omenpaths but to manifest them himself.
Curious, bright, and gregarious, Loot is eager to learn and quick to trust—perhaps too quick. After escaping the vault, Loot was brought by Jace to the horrifying plane of Duskmourn, where he was then captured by Winter. He is now forced to serve the Speed Demons, directing them through Omenpaths.
Vnwxt, Verbose Host
Kylem's favorite verbose host, the emcee of this year's Grand Prix is Vnwxt, or "Vin" for short. Back by popular demand, Vin was a shoo-in for the role after his extensive work commentating for the Spellslingers. Adored by his audience and gifted by gab, Vin is adept at spinning dull moments and random chaos into quick witticisms and heart-racing epics for the ages.
Samut, the Driving Force
Samut is Hazoret's champion on Amonkhet and the spokesperson for the living in Naktamun. She oversees the restoration of Naktamun's empty quarters, the compilation of histories learned from the restoration, and their implementation toward the betterment of Amonkhet. While she does not participate in the race, she approves of Basri and Zahur's mission.
Mu Yanling, Wind Rider
Mu Yanling has scoured every corner of Shenmeng and beyond in the hopes of finding her lost mentor, Li Shan. Her search has taken her across the Multiverse, even catching her within the machinations of an interplanar war, all without a hint as to her mentor's location. With little to show for her efforts, Mu Yanling has decided to shift tactics. If she can't find Li Shan, perhaps he can find her. This reasoning brought her to the Grand Prix to race in the lower division GP Aspire category. She races with no team, a solo participant who bends the elements of wind and water to carry her to victory and, she hopes, to her mentor at last.
Gonti, Night Minister
No longer a crime lord in post-revolutionary Avishkar, Gonti is now a legitimate politician. The title of night minister was offered as a reward for their help during two consecutive revolutions first against the Consulate and then during the Phyrexian invasion. In the wake of so much unrest, Gonti works to help the newly named Avishkar rediscover itself. While the ardent revolutionaries champion the day, Gonti takes the reins by night, channeling Ghirapur's free, raucous energy into productive cultural and entrepreneurial efforts.
Oviya, Automech Artisan
Oviya's lifecraft engineering was instrumental in the revolution and subsequent overthrowing of the Consulate and Phyrexians. Now, she dedicates her formidable skill to assisting the New Culture Collective, the organizing body for the Ghirapur Grand Prix. Her constructs—once a fearsome and incompleatable frontline against the Phyrexians—now help the Grand Prix marshals with everything from construction and maintenance to raw spectacle.
Ketramose, the New Dawn
Ketramose is a new god, manifested from the fierce determination of the living Amonkheti to survive and the undead Amonkheti's desire to protect. Born of the Luxa bank reeds in Naktamun, he rose from sparkling water in wake of the Phyrexian invasion, equipped with a bow like Oketra's and the head of a proud lion. He is the hope of tomorrow, the god of the breaking dawn, a being of solidarity and endurance, and a champion of the peasantry.
Sab-Sunen, Luxa Embodied
Born of the living Amonkheti who yearn for water and the dead who pray for their descendants' prosperity, Sab-Sunen is the newly manifested goddess of plenty. She reins over agriculture, irrigation, inspiration, and fertility. It is now by her will that the seasons change and the waters run clear. Her first act was to flood the Luxa at the end of the Phyrexian invasion, cleansing Naktamun of blood, oil, and machine corpses. Following her floods, more rain came, then frogs, then sun and greenery. The people rejoiced, and their celebration summoned her to their banks.
Hazoret, Godseeker
Though terribly wounded in the Phyrexian invasion, Hazoret still fought alongside the Scarab and Locust gods and the allied forces of Amonkhet to defeat the Phyrexians. She is the last of the old pantheon, revered by the Amonkheti for her resilience and steadfast presence throughout their darkest hours. After the war, Hazoret alone led survivors through the desert to find Ketramose and Sab-Sunen and helped to manifest them. She has since set out to search for more of her kin, working to counter the machinations of the Chitin Court.
Mimeoplasm, Revered One
The Mimeoplasm is unique among the oozes of Muraganda, fiercely intelligent and partially divine, and carries within it the congealed ancestral memory of past leaders of the Saurid Autocracy. The saurids revere it, feeding it their great leaders upon their deaths and charting its migrations as a passing of eras. It travels the plane with such reliable consistency that the saurids have built massive, arching temples across its path to celebrate and worship the ooze as it transits the plane.
Sundial, Dawn Tyrant
Sundial is an inscrutable walking construct that has traveled the ever-changing landscapes of Muraganda since time immemorial, revered by its followers, the Dawnchaser Pilgrims. It carries a large sundial on its back around which a miniature sun orbits and is said to lead the daybreak. It is unknown whether Sundial marches toward any particular location or simply wanders; many a Dawnchaser has followed it endlessly in search of this answer, though many more believe its beauty lies in its mystery.
Caelorna, Coral Tyrant
Caelorna is a colossal octopus that has lurked for centuries in the bowels of Muraganda's coral columns, safe from the plane's destructive moonfalls. She fed off the raw leylines, incorporating the font of magic into her form. Though once content to gorge itself in a ravenous pseudo-hibernation, the rumblings of aether and machinery have drawn her attention toward the surface. Now, she emerges from the benthic depths engraved with the maddening spirals and nigh-impenetrable coral armor of the home she once feasted upon.
Kalakscion, Hunger Tyrant
Kalakscion is the apex predator of Galadak's Scar, a gaping wound of flooded moonfall craters carved across the Muragandan landscape. The heralded offspring of the tyrant crocodile before her, Kalakscion is the terror of the scar, an insatiable and unstoppable beast even amongst an ecosystem known for its size and savagery. She engages in a never-ending hunt that is a constant, territorial clash that feeds both her belly and her bloodthirst.
Tyrox, Saurid Tyrant
Tyrox is a notorious immortal of the Saurid Autocracy, known for both his brutal strength and clever tactics. When the Grand Prix came to Muraganda, Tyrox saw an opportunity to seize power. Once Avishkar's diplomats left Muraganda believing they had brokered peace with the plane, Tyrox commanded his legions of raiders to set up ambushes in chokepoints along the track. The Autocracy will be slow to respond to Tyrox's rogue actions, and the immortal believes that by capturing and hijacking the race's technology, he can claw tremendous power from the opulent, lazy dynasts back in the Autocracy's capital.
Terrian, World Tyrant
The Fang Druids of Muraganda refer to this mighty terrarium-ooze as the World Tyrant, for it holds a time capsule, an ancient world within its core body, having consumed entire ecosystems as it wandered Muraganda's proteogenic jungles. Some believe that Terrian is larger on the inside than it is on the outside and that if one were to pierce its gelatinous membrane and journey within, they might never escape. To travel toward its core would be to experience the history of the plane in reverse.
Aetherdrift releases on February 14, 2025, and is available for preorder now at your local game store, online retailers like Amazon, and elsewhere Magic products are sold. Discover exciting first-place foils, innovative Commander decks, and more. Remember: it's only a death race if you die.