Before the wars and time itself, there was Light and Void.
As Light expanded it grew weaker in some places forming small pockets of Void. Void is a dark force that tries to suck the life force out of everything it touches. The Light being opposite of it caused explosions as they fought for supremacy over the cosmos. With the explosions, life was born and the physical world came into existence. For many years, the life force expanded and is now what we call in-game “The Great Dark Beyond”.
These life forces are the stars, planets, and dust that we see in the sky. The most unstable of these forces is called The Twisting Nether, which exists just barely outside the physical realm. These forces are so powerful that sometimes they can tear their way through the veil and make themselves manifest to the physical worlds.
The explosion didn’t create only stars and planets though. The explosion gave birth to the Elementals: creatures of Fire, Water, Earth, and Air. They aren’t the only creatures to come out of the explosions either. Clouds of fractured light came together to form the beings that we know today as “The Naaru”. Creatures who vowed to aid the growth of light, wherever they may find it.
The most important beings who were created were the Titans. They were born out of the core of planets. For ages, they slumbered beneath the surface of the planets, before emerging one day. They are beautiful creatures that are said to “have eyes that shine like stars”.
Unlike the Naaru they went on a different journey…To seek out others of their kind and bring balance to the cosmos.
The Pantheon
This sets into motion every single story in Azeroth so if you want to know more, then this is the most vital part for you. Now, you may be asking “Gosmidin, who was the first titan to wake up?” That is a good point, my dear reader! The first titan was Aman’Thul. No one knows why he woke up…but he did. He was all alone at first but he journeyed through The Great Dark Beyond because he knew in his heart that he was not alone. Eventually, he did find others of his kind and helped them to wake up. The ones who woke up then helped Aman’Thul to find even more of their kind. This group became what we call The Pantheon and everyone had their name and ranking.
Aman’Thul: The Highfather of the pantheon
Sargeras: The Defender, Noblest of All
Aggramar: The Avenger and Lieutenant of the great Sargeras
Khaz’Goroth: The Shaper and Forger of Worlds
Eonar: The Lifebinder, Gentle Caretaker of All Living Things
Gol-Ganneth: The Thunderer, Lord of the Skies, and Roaring Oceans.
Norgannon: The Dreamweaver, Keeper of Celestial Magics, and Lore.
The Pantheon knew they were too powerful so they had a plan to find world souls. They would eradicate all elemental life and then seed the planet to find a world soul. If it resulted in no world soul they would still watch over and protect the planet. They weren’t completely heartless creatures and still vowed to protect everything in the cosmos. They would leave machines on the planets to purge life if something were to happen to these planets. Aman’Thul put a race called the Constellar in charge of watching these machines. They could activate them if they felt the planet needed to be purged.
Azeroth’s Constellar is found within the Halls of Ulduar in The Celestial Planetarium. He goes by the Name Algalon the Observer and he sought to reset our planet, but he was beaten to his senses by some brave explorers. More on this another time, but I thought you would like to know that Azeroth has a Constellar.
The Pantheon has found many world souls and has placed many Constellars to watch over these planets. But with things going right for the pantheon, something had to go wrong for them as well. Evil creatures from the void called the void lords sought to wreak chaos and destroy life as we know it. They knew that they stood no chance against the Titans, that didn’t stop them from trying to corrupt them, and looked to corrupt one of the slumbering world souls. Similar to the Pantheon they didn’t know which planets had world souls, so they just flung old gods across the cosmos hoping that they could latch on and corrupt a slumbering titan.
The Rise of Demons and the Burning Legion
Now, The Pantheon knew of the Void but they didn’t know their intentions. They were more focused on fighting a more corrupt power in their eyes…Fel: Born from The Twisting Nether, this vile essence was enough to make any creature go insane. From this essence, demons were born and they hungered for the destruction of all living things. The demons of the Burning Legion included:
Annihilans (Pit Lords)
Nathrezim (Dreadlords)
Void terrors (Void hounds)
Infernals
Abyssals
They broke their way through the barrier between The Twisting Nether and the physical world. They killed life on world after world. The titans noticed these creatures and were quick to act as this went against their mission of preserving life and protecting worlds.
The Pantheon sent out Sargeras to deal with the creatures and swiftly. He pledged that he wouldn’t stop until all demonic essence was destroyed. He killed millions upon millions, but soon he realized they could use Fel and Void energy. He started to notice that he had killed the same demon multiple times before, but they just kept coming back. This is what brought the Void Lords to Sargeras’ attention, and that deeply troubled him. He knew he couldn’t fight these demons forever and came up with a plan
With the Help of Aggramar, Sargeras built a prison to contain all the demons for all eternity. This prison was called Mardum: Plane of Banishment and nothing could go in… or out. Sargeras and Aggramar continued to fight against the Burning Legion and soon became close friends. Sargeras trusted Aggramar with many commands and even let him lead separate battles on different planets, but if either needed help then they would come in a flash.
While fighting Sargeras discovered the Old Gods on some planets, some with no life on them, and a few with Titan souls. He could hear the dreams of the sleeping soul, but not the dreams they normally hear. They were dark dreams of death and the Void.
Sargeras’ Campaign
Some Nathrezim were there with the Old Gods and were using the Old Gods to gain more power. Sargeras captured and tortured these creatures to find out what was going on with this planet. The Nathrezim told Sargeras of the plan of the Void Lords.
With a heavy heart, Sargeras realized that this titan can never be allowed to wake up as it will be a creature of pure evil. He drew his sword and split the world in two. He killed all the old gods and the slumbering Titan soul. He returned to the Pantheon with Aggramar, whom he had summoned, and told them what he saw and had done. The Pantheon was all shocked and couldn’t believe that Sargeras would go to such extremes. He tried in vain to explain what he did but it was too late… an argument broke out over the Pantheon and Sargeras shared his ideals.
He believed that a universe filled with no life at all was better than life with the void. He felt they should burn everything down and start over again. Life had succeeded once and it will do it again. He would rather everything be burned than live with the Void Lords for a second. This disgusted The Pantheon, especially Eonar: The Lifebinder and this was the last time they viewed Sargeras as one of their own. Sargeras realized that they won’t see reason and he would have to attend to this all by himself.
Thank you for reading Part 1 of the Lore! I’m so excited to bring you more and take you on this journey through Azeroth. We will be discussing the Old Gods and focus more on Azeroth and the Pantheon’s search for more Titan souls. This has been Lore Keeper Gosmidin and I will see you soon for the next part of the lore.
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