User:GoldenYak/Chronicle/Sargeron

Sargeron, also known as the Realm of the Fel and the Demon Realm.

Overview
Sargeron, called the Demon Realm and the World of the Fel, is the seventh Titan World. Born of the blazing hatred of the demon Titan Sargeras, Sargeron is formed from the destroyer's broken corpse, left all but lifeless after his battle with Azeroth. Only the barest flicker of the demon Titan's spirit remained in his shattered body, just enough to sense what his enemy had wrought with the creation of the other Titan Worlds. With his last ounce of concious strength, Sargeras wrought a transformation upon himself, his body collapsing in and folding around itself, while the lingering fel energy within him was stoked to blazing. Sargeras the Titan ceased to be, and from his ruined form was born Sargeron, the Titan World, the world of the fel.

Sargeras' spirit sleeps within the core of Sargeron, nurturing his anger and hatred, slowly rebuilding his strength. One day, he will awaken, reborn and stronger than ever, to exact his revenge upon Azeroth and the universe she sought to protect.

Geography
Sargeron is a blistered, burning nightmare landscape, a world of scorched black rock and blazing, fel-green flames. Its oceans are liquid felfire, Sargeras' own fel-tainted blood. Volcanic mountains spew green molten death and choking smoke, smothering the land in ash and tainting the filthy sky. It's surface is black stone plains, cracked and broken by canyons blazing with green lava, deserts of ash that stretch for leagues, swamps of bubbling black tar, and blighted forests of great curling thorns.

Locations

 * The Dread Sea - Largest of the burning seas of Sargeron. The sea itself is molten lava brimming with destructive fel energies - the very substance that was Sargeras' blood.
 * Titan's Crown
 * Visage of Doom
 * The Bitterglass Plains
 * Demongash Canyon
 * The Well Infernal
 * The Sea of Blood
 * Mount Ghargutzh
 * The Vampire Marsh
 * The Sea of Ruin
 * The Killing Wound

Realm of the Fel
The burning power of the fel, the energy of disorder and chaos, burns within Sargeron. Fel energy breaks down all natural laws, caving in the walls of reality and allowing the unfathomable dimensions of the Twisting Nether to pour into the material realm. Netherstorms frequently wrack the surface of Sargeron, enveloping the blasted landscape in shimmering clouds of wild, chaotic magic. These storms briefly connect Sargeron to the Twisting Nether's alien currents, allowing demonic entities to leave the Nether and manifest on the world's surface. Though Azeroth broke the Burning Legion, the demons of the Nether still survive in great numbers, forever yearning to enter the material realm and wreak havoc. They see Sargeron as a staging ground for further assaults upon the worlds of mortals, and the Titans Worlds are ripe targets. Many demons recognize the blazing spirit of their dread former master within the depths of Sargeron, and some even hope to one day see their master rise and renew his Burning Crusade.

While demons inhabit Sargeron in greater numbers than on any other of the Titan Worlds, there are many more mortal inhabitants of the Fel Realm than demons. From scattered tribes to mighty empires, mortal kingdoms without number lie spread across the dark world, their inhabitants rancid with corruption and devoted to evil and destruction.

Dwarves of Sargeron - The Felforged
Dwarves of Sargeron are malign, corrupted, and merciless creatures, twisted by fel corruption and irredeemably evil. They see themselves as true children of Sargeras, mirroring in some twisted sense the beliefs of how the earthen view themselves as children of the Titan Pantheon. They call Sargeras the Master Titan, and believe that their worship of him will earn them a favored place in his armies when he rises again. Felforged dwarves are obsessed with building an empire worthy of Sargeras, constructing vast fortress-lodges in mountains and volcanoes, linking cliffs and canyons with blackstone bridges, and tunneling deep below the surface to extract minerals infused with Sargeras' demonic power. Ever outwards their fortresses sprawl, devouring more of the landscape with every passing day. Their forges blaze, churning out weapons and armor to equip their growing legions. Slaves toil day and night to further their vision.

Like all life on Sareron, felforged dwarves are polluted by fel corruption. Their skin is a fiery red, and in elder dwarves their skin turns black and cracks like stone, while blazing with green light within. Curling spines jut from their flesh and their teeth become fangs. Their beards are jet black, with streaks of crimson developing in elders.

Avatars of Darkness
A small number of felforged champions unlock the powers of Avatarization, an ancient power that is the heritage of all dwarves, inherited from their earliest titanforged ancestors, the earthen. With this power, the felforged increases in size and strength, while their flesh hardens and turns to black stone. Blazing fel energy wells up inside the avatar, spilling out of mouth and eyes in the form of green flame. In this state, the felforged taps into the tiniest fraction of the dormant Sargeras' spirit, taking a sliver of the demon Titan's terrible fury into themselves. Should they lose control of this tremendous force, a felforged avatar becomes an unstoppable berserker, destroying every enemy in sight before erupting in a detonation of fel energy, blasting themselves and everything around them apart. None may hold the power of Sargeras for long and survive.

Phlegrethar
The dread kingdom of Phlegrethar is the mightiest demon kingdom in all the Titan Worlds. All the disparate demon nations of Sargeron owe fealty to Phlegrethar, for while the black kingdoms of the Fel Realm constantly wage war upon one-another, they know they are only permitted to do so because it serves the cause of Phlegrethar's dark master, he who is the avatar of Sargeras himself. Seated upon the ruinous throne of Phlegrethar is Ahrmus, the Molten Emperor, whose stone skin was hewn from the black rock of Sargeron, whose molten blood is the fel green fury of the Demon Titan. Ahrmus knows the mind of the slumbering Sargeras, and he commands the legions of Sargeron to carry out the Demon Titan's will. When war cannot be brought to the mortals of the Titan Worlds, the demon nations must war against one-another to hone their edge, for when Sargeras rises, the Burning Crusade will begin once again.

The Orc Clans of Sargeron - The Fel-Blood Horde
The orcs of Sargeron are vicious and brutal, many having become fel orcs by consuming the burning fel blood that bubbles up from the world's molten depths. Many orcs are the slave-warriors of demon kingdoms, but some clans of orcs have become powerful empires in their own right, dwelling in the broken landscapes and wild places of Sargeron. A number of the most powerful clans aspire to shed mortality entirely and become a true demon race, ascending to a place of glory in the armies of Sargeras as the eredar race once did, even ousting the eredar as Sargeras' chosen people.


 * Bloodthirster - The Bloodthirster clan are named for their practice of drinking the blood of their enemies. To become a full warrior of the clan, an orc must hunt and kill a demon and drink its blood, transforming them into a fel orc.
 * Hellscream - The vicious war cries and battle howling of the Hellscream clan can strike fear into even the bravest soul. Through demonic enchantment, their war-screamers can strike the foe dead with the power of their bellow.
 * Shattered Sky - The warlocks of the Shattered Sky clan control powerful magics that enable them to rend the skies themselves asunder, raining down burning destruction and deadly sorceries upon their enemies.
 * Soulgrinder - The depraved fel-machinists of the Soulgrinder clan use demonic machinery to wage war. They have learned how to render down the spirits of their slain victims into raw power, which they use to fuel their demon engines.
 * Felhammer - Felhammer warriors are especially brutal, fighting with hammers enchanted by demon magic. These weapons can split apart the toughest armor and shatter the bones of giants, every strike causing an eruption of fel fire.
 * Skulltaker - The orcs of the Skulltaker clan see the act of decapitation as veneration for their demon masters, especially Sargeras himself. They flense flesh from the skulls of their victims and pile them in huge mounds as homage to their lords.
 * Deathgaze - The terrifying orcs of the Death Gaze clan are possessed by some dire and nameless evil that haunts their very souls. This dread power spills forth from their eyes in battle, draining the life from their enemies.

Demonic Invasions
The demons inhabiting Sargeron are creatures of Disorder, a cosmic principle that balances creation and order with destruction and chaos. Their very essence is fel, their nature corrosive to reality, their primary impulse to exercise their powers for the purpose of destruction. Whether the brutish rampages of demons like the Annihilan, the militaristic campaigns of the Mo'arg, or the slow and precisely calculated schemes of the Nathrezim, all demons wish to bring about ruin as the epitome of personal and cultural expression. While demons war amongst themselves within their native realm, the ever-shifting cosmic inferno that is the Twisting Nether, their home dimension is a realm that is already the very essence of Disorder. Demons far prefer to turn their powers upon the other realms of the cosmos, particularly the tempting mortal realms of the material dimension, the plane of the cosmos that most fully represents Order, the antithesis of destruction.

The majority of the demons of Sargeron see their world first and foremost as a staging ground to launch assaults upon the Titan Worlds. Only some of the more intelligent demon races are cognizant of the worldsouls of nascent Titans slumbering within the other worlds in Sargeron's solar system, and even many of those who know care little. Most demons only see six targets, six worlds full of mortals to corrupt, souls to devour, power to acquire, and life to destroy. While some demons rely on mortal spell-casters in other worlds to summon them, what demons truly desire is to stride unfettered across the Titan Worlds, unleashing their powers as they deem fit, rather than chafing under the rule of some upstart mortal flea with a scrap of mystical knowledge. What demons desire is to invade.

Sargeron itself provides its demonic inhabitants with the most reliable method of arriving en masse to the Titan Worlds. Sargeron's orbit in the solar system is erratic and unstable, moving in unpredictable paths that intersect with the orbits of the other six Titan Worlds. Sargeron never actually collides with any of the other worlds, but sometimes will drift into close proximity to them. At these times, Sargeron is wracked with tectonic activity, which tears loose great mountainous chunks of black rock from the world's surface and sends them blasting into the air on columns of fel fire. These great fragments of the demon world drift free of Sargeron's gravity, streaking through the void to fall upon the nearest Titan World like meteorites. Clinging to the surface of these fragments are countless demons, riding the pieces of their world like great vessels. When the fragments make world-fall, the demons swarm freely across its surface, unleashing their powers upon everything they see. The fragments that survive impact are carved into massive demonic bastions and portals to Sargeron and the Twisting Nether, so that further demon reinforcements can be called.

While these invasions are mercifully rare, they have been menacing the Titan Worlds for many centuries, and such invasions cannot be predicted with any kind of accuracy by the mortal astronomers of the Titan Worlds due to Sargeron's erratic orbit. Only when Sargeron blazes like a green star in the night sky do a world's inhabitants have any warning before the heavens rain fire, and the demons come to bring destruction and death.

Demon Invasions and Worldgates
Long ago, Titanforged artifacts known as Worldgates connected the six Titan Worlds with one-another, allowing the passage of mortals easily between worlds. However, such instruments drew upon powerful sorceries, and these magicks were like a beacon to many demons. The magic of several Worldgates were corrupted, with demon sorcerers transforming them into portals to Sargeron or the Twisting Nether, turning what was once meant to unite the Titan Worlds into a grave threat to them. Corrupted Worldgates were destroyed or dismantled, but some may yet survive in remote corners of the Titan Worlds, in-activate but still functional, waiting to be re-awoken.

Demons and Netherstorms
Some demonic races were once mortals who became completely corrupted by the power of fel energy, shedding their mortality and ascending to demonhood. Other demons were born within the chaotic expanses of the Twisting Nether, having never existed as mortals. Demons in their 'natural' state within the Twisting Nether discard physical form and exist as immaterial entities, creatures of pure spirit and power. All demons hunger for physical sensation however - they long to return to the material realm and unleash their powers, reveling in destruction and chaos inflicted upon others. Thus, demons within the Nether manifest solid bodies for themselves in order to return to the material realm to carry out their dark desires.

A demon's soul is forever anchored to the Nether however, and if their physical form is slain, their soul simply returns to the Nether to gather their strength and forge new flesh for themselves. Only if a demon is slain within the Twisting Nether itself, or a place in the universe were the Nether's energies flow freely and their soul is exposed, can the demon truly be destroyed and prevented from returning to life.

Sargeron is a world that burns with the dark power of fel energy that demons crave and draw strength from, but it remains firmly in the material realm. Demons slain on Sargeron will simply return to the Nether and continue to menace the universe. However, the Netherstorms that periodically wrack Sargeron's surface and allow demons to manifest themselves can also be used against them - since Netherstorms act as conduits to the Twisting Nether, a demon slain within a Netherstorm will be truly destroyed.

The Lady of Ashes
Far beyond the Bitterglass Plains, past the Cinderscream Mountains, across the torturous expanse of the Slough of Dis, there lies a region known as the Sea of Ashes. It is a vast empty wasteland, where Sargeron's fel energy is so polluted, so corrosive, that even demonic entities cannot draw strength from it and are gradually dissolved and annihilated, crumbling into smouldering mounds of lifeless coal, their souls dissolved instead of fleeing back to the safety of the Twisting Nether. In the Sea of Ashes, the winds howl like the screams of tortured gods, blowing the ashes that comprise the wastes in great storms that can sear the unprotected down to the bone in moments. Many demons believe that some secret, some great power lies at the heart of the wastes, but none have ever been able to claim it, and countless have tried and failed, devoured by the ashes. Only demons bearing the most potent of protective armor and magical wards can survive in the Sea of Ashes, and even then they can only endure for a short time on the very outskirts before their protection corrodes and disintegrates, forcing them to retreat or be destroyed.

But a few demons who have tried to brave the wastes and escaped with their lives bring tales of what they glimpsed, of something that lives in the Sea of Ashes. A towering figure that wanders the wastes, barely glimpsed, dwelling deeper than any demon has ever managed to reach. The being is tall, a giant, broad and powerful, seemingly female, though broken and ruined. She is limbless, her arms cracked and broken, and she drags a twisted leg behind her as she limps through the ashes. Her heart glows with burning fel energies, which torment her without consuming her. Her howls mingle with the screaming air, adding a note of deeper sorrow, anger, and madness. No demon knows the true origins of this being, though there are a thousand rumors. Some demons who brave the wastes once and catch a single glimpse of her feel compelled to try again and again, though no demon has ever seen her twice. Those who succumb to their obsession inevitably also succumb to the destructive power of the Sea of Ashes, meeting their doom while desperately hoping to again catch sight of the ruined being that has become known as the Lady of Ashes, none of them ever quite understanding why.

No demon knows her origins... but Sargeras does. The truth is that the Lady of Ashes was formed from a broken fragment of Azeroth herself, torn from the Final Titan's massive body during her fateful duel with Sargeras. The fragment became lodged in Sargeras' form, and when he became the world of Sargeron to recover, the fragment was expelled onto his surface. The fragment glimmered with the barest trace of Azeroth's cosmic power, and it drew the attention of Sargeras' slumbering consciousness, like a tiny sliver in the flesh of some great hibernating beast. Soaking the fragment in his fel tainted blood, Sargeras' dark will worked upon it, twisting it into its current form, that of a Titanforged giant wrought in Azeroth's very image. But Sargeras' turned all of his cruelty and sadism towards inflicting misery upon the image of his hated foe, and he crafted her a dreadful fate. The Titanforged was made to believe that she was in fact Azeroth herself, and that she had lost her final battle with Sargeras. Defeated, broken, poisoned by fel fire, the Titanforged believes she walks the empty wastes of a butchered universe in ultimate defeat, suffering alone in insanity and torment, endlessly screaming out her loss and rage. Sargeras keeps her unwittingly bound to the Sea of Ashes, drawing cruel pleasure from her torment, regarding her as a microcosmic model of what he intends to inflict upon the true Azeroth when he rises and confronts her again.