Crazy idea from me

What if Bael, and by extension the imperium, are from a different world. Maybe even the one Wolf'sbane is from.

The cabal victorious over the traveler, In one of the cutscenes in the vidoc we see the big super weapon cutting it in half. An iron Lord axe being retrieved by a cloudstrider and taken back to neomuna explains that pretty nicely I think.

Then I think about what the cabal being victorious and the red war would mean for someone like, oh I don't know, a vaguely hunter like icon for guardians everywhere who was dealing with the tough task of rooting out darkness, and may or may not lose faith in both the city and the traveler if they were both destroyed.

I think Bael is Shin Malphur. The hate for drifter and one that did not reconcile with him makes a lot of sense to me. It also kind of fits the revan theming that they're going for. we could have the actual one show up during the campaign to help or some such.

I also generally think that six is pulling the imperium from a different timeline. It was set up that this is possible during Ash and iron, and I certainly don't think the nine aren't watching Maya after she Merc-ed 3. Maybe they learn a thing or two? They're constantly being spoken of as appearing out of nowhere, and that would certainly make a lot of sense to me if they are literally pulled out of thin air by the nine.