Not known to people in the world of the game including your character. Of course, it's known outside the game. What would the fun be otherwise? Unless you know the story of the game and how it unfolds, you can't really jump to any conclusions.
But this idea still sounds to me like the first Star Wars movies. All the Jedi were destroyed. Obi-Wan Kenobi is in hiding, known only as Old Ben, a strange hermit in the hills, to some people on Tatooine. Yoda was in hiding completely.