User:GoldenYak/Utgarde Catacombs

Utgarde Catacombs is a level 95 raid dungeon containing six bosses, along with one heroic mode only boss. Together with The Dreadforge and Karazhan: The Malevolence Rift, it forms the third raid tier of the Spider Kingdom Expansion.

Background
After the Titans had banished the Old Gods and secured their dominion over Azeroth, they constructed great machines known as Titan Forges, engines of creation that could create life itself. In Northrend they placed several - the Forge of Wills within Ulduar is one such engine, but another exists beneath the Howling Fjord. This engine, the Stoneforge, was the engine that brought forth the first earthen, vrykul, and stone giants the world had ever known.

However, even the great works of the Titans are immune to corruption. From within its prison, one of the Old Gods, one whom even the Titans could not completely shackle, stirred and reached out with his power. This Old God, known as He Who Shapes, afflicted many of the Titans creations with a dire malady - the Curse of Flesh. The Curse sank into every working and mechanism of the Stoneforge, and the living beings brought forth from the engine were corrupted beyond redemption - thus the troggs and other vile beasts were spawned into the world. Unable to completely purge the Stoneforge of the Curse of Flesh, the Titans instead buried the machine and infused into their next generation of servants a resistance to the corruption wrought by He Who Shapes.

The mightiest of the vrykul of the first generation, Utgarde, became ruler of his people and reigned over them for many years. He built his fortress of Utgarde Keep on the hills high above where the Stoneforge was buried. When his dreams grew trouble by visions of doom from deep below, he gathered his strongest warriors, their stone bodies slowly softening from the Curse of Flesh, and led them into the depths to watch over the hidden Stoneforge forever. In his stead he left his son to lead his people. So it has been for the vrykul ever since that day - the kings of ages gone by would venture into the depths of the catacombs beneath Utgarde Keep when they grew weary of life, or they would be interred there upon their death.

All this was long ago. In recent times, dire calamity has befallen the vrykul race. Their faith was torn apart by the rise of the Lich King, and many of the vrykul people foolishly followed their new god into undeath. Angerboda, wife of Ymiron and queen of the vrykul, has become undead and seized the crown of the Lich King, inheriting much of his power. Now, she seeks to control the Stoneforge hidden deep beneath the Howling Fjord, and use its corrupted powers of creation to attain dominion over life and death.

Dungeon Journal
Deep beneath the castle of Utgarde Keep lies the Stoneforge, the ancient Titan creation engine that first brought forth the vrykul people. Buried long ago, the vrykul guarded it for generations, even after the Curse of Flesh stole their stone forms from them, even after their gods had departed. Since ancient times, when vrykul heroes had fallen in battle, their bodies were interred in the great sprawling catacombs surrounding the Stoneforge, the departed maintaining their watch in death. When the vrykul entered their great stasis sleep during the Sundering, they slept within the catacombs alongside their honored dead, joining them in their vigil.

Angerboda, now the bearer of the Crown of Domination and inheritor of the mantle of the Lich King, has entered the catacombs with dual intent - to raise the slumbering dead as a new army, and to unearth and capture the Stoneforge. Under her corrupt control, the titan engine will churn forth endless living soldiers, who she will immediately transform into undead. With an inexhaustible source of troops at her disposal, Angerboda will sweep away all opposition and reign supreme over Northrend.

Vidar Ymironson
The son of Ymiron and Queen Angerboda. Vidar rejected the worship of the Lich King, defying his own family in an effort to spare his people from a living nightmare. For years he sought out others like himself and ultimately sought to ally himself with the Alliance and the Horde against the undead of Northrend. When his mother Angerboda was raised as an undead, he sought to bring her everlasting peace, but was himself slain and transformed into one of the living dead. Now, bound to Angerboda's rule, he stands guard over the Utgarde Catacombs entrance hall, his ravaged, rotting frame tethering the once noble soul of a true hero.

Gog the Necromonger
Gog has long been a vile blight on the vrykul people - a slayer of kin and clansmen, a practitioner of dark and forbidden magicks, a bringer of curses and suffering. Once exiled from his people for his wicked ways, he was been welcomed into the fold by Angerboda, and became one of the mightiest of the vrykul Necromancers.

The Chosen
Angerboda's most powerful servants, raised from the ranks of the vrykul honored dead. For millennia they have held unending vigil in the resting place of their people, but without a second thought Angerboda exhumed their corpses and ripped their souls from their slumber to reanimate them as her personal guard. Bregga Rimeblood, Skadi the Damned, Thorlief the Thunderer, Svetlana Sorrowgrave, Nodens One-Eye, and Fengris Wulfblood stand ready to slaughter the living in Angerboda's name.

Ymiron the Fallen
Though Ymiron was slain in his own throneroom in Utgarde Pinnacle, the newly raised Angerboda could not bear to be parted from her husband. She retrieved his corpse and sought to restore him to dark unlife. Her efforts were only partially successful - he has become a vargul. Ymiron has retained his ability to call upon the souls of his slain kinfolk however, and in the Utgarde Catacombs he is surrounded by the spirits of untold hundreds of warriors. With his mind destroyed and his powers unchecked, he is more dangerous than ever.

Raes'Velg, the Black Eagle
A dark and terrible demigod of Northrend, the counterpart to Aviana, the falcon goddess. When Aviana was thought slain during the War of the Ancients, Raes'Velg was overcome with grief, and fled deep into the frozen north. In his anger and sorrow, he inflicted terrible destruction upon the ancestors of the vrykul and tuskarr, who began to worship him in a desperate attempt to appease his wrath. His pain could not be assuaged, and eventually he fled deep beneath the surface of the world, burying his grief. He would not take kindly to being disturbed.

Raes'Velg's presence has transformed his cavernous dwelling into a massive dreadstone, thrumming with evil energy. The gemstone cave is so vast he can fly comfortably. Facing him in his own lair will be no easy task.

Death Queen Angerboda
Queen of the vrykul and the undead. Angerboda has seized the Helm of Domination from Bolvar Fordragon and schemes to usurp the mantle of the Lich King from him utterly. Within the depths of Utgarde Catacombs she plans to raise up the slumbering dead of countless generations, an unstoppable army backed by the lost power of the Titans. If she is not defeated, her legions will conquer Northrend and set their sights on other realms. And the crown must be returned to Bolvar, before the slumbering Scourge awaken...

King Utgarde
Heroic Mode Only - The first king of the vrykul, and ancient guardian of the Stoneforge. When the Curse of Flesh first afflicted the vrykul, Utgarde traveled deep into the catacombs beneath his fortress-home of Utgarde Keep to seek out the Stoneforge - the legendary birth place of his people. He never returned...