As the use of Smokeships continued to rise, the arwhals continued to flee to parts of the world where they were not actively being hunted. Despite the best efforts of the Kahawai to create reservations of safety for the endangered arwhals, the killing was constant.

Several arwhals were sighted trying to ascend into the mesophere, but the Realm of Fire proved inhospitable and they were incinerated upon breaching the plane between the spheres. With no options left, a pod of remaining arwhals turned down instead of up and plunged into the depths of the Quiangan Sea. This excited the hunters that had been tracking the pod to no end, since they merely had to wait for the arwhals to drown and then collect the bodies for processing into arwhal oil. But the bodies never appeared.

Theories

Theories about the non-appearance of the arwhal pod have varied from the mundane to the fantastic. Skeptics claim that the bodies either got stuck under a submerged land mass, or that they were simply eaten by a pack of Underwater Denivors. However, these simple theories cannot explain why the hunters saw no aether blood or bodyparts in the water, or saw no waves that would be expected by a land mass large enough to bury an entire arwhal pod moving under the water.

The Kahawai, upon consulting their Jubilee of Archaic Druids believe that the arwhal actually decended into the World's Center, and continue to thrive there to this day. While the Aetherists find this theory revolting, it could indeed explain the existence of an arwhal in the Basilica of Ysithmir upon it's reappearance at the end of the Aberration.

—Frobbnotz Mippleplunk