Azeroth's inhabitants endure a lifetime of
struggle and conflict. They're subject to violence from neighboring
enemies and rampaging beasts at an early age, and must learn to take up
arms to defend themselves against predators. Regularly forced to cope
with the deaths of friends, family, and members of their tribes, clans,
cities, and guilds, these scarred survivors become stronger by
reinforcing their walls, banding together with new allies, and raising
sharp, careful, resilient children. They adapt. They change.
Few places on Azeroth exemplify this ever-changing
dynamic more than the Twilight Highlands of the Eastern Kingdoms.
The
highlands have undergone constant upheaval throughout their history,
with races and factions thriving, collapsing, and changing seemingly
without pause. The fortress-city of Grim Batol has played host to no
fewer than three potent factions: the Wildhammer dwarves, who abandoned
their home after a Dark Iron curse left it uninhabitable; the red
dragonflight, which was forced to fight for the Horde in the captivity
of the Dragonmaw orcs during the Second War; and, of course, the
Dragonmaw themselves, who were driven from Grim Batol when the red
dragonflight was finally freed from their grasp.
The Dragonmaw
now cling to the edges of the highlands. They're no less wild and
difficult to deal with than when they ruled Grim Batol, but their
knowledge of dragons and warfare is of unquestionable importance,
especially amidst the chaos of the Cataclysm. The Wildhammer dwarves
dwell in forested outposts among the highlands' mountains; though long
friendly with the Alliance, they have only now begun to consider casting
their lot in with Stormwind and Ironforge thanks to the entreaties of
their cousins, the Bronzebeard clan. Even the mighty red dragonflight
has suffered greatly in recent months: its members have been decimated
by a frenzied, newly aggressive black dragonflight attacking
relentlessly from the petrified Obsidian Forest.
Amidst this upheaval, a new power has come to possess
the highlands.
Though the environment has been given many names
throughout its history, it's only been dubbed "Twilight" thanks to the
dominance of its current masters. The fanatical Twilight's Hammer
cultists appreciate the name, but there are more functional features to
the swath of land they've chosen as their headquarters. It's rimmed by
massive mountain peaks that scrape at the sky like fingernails, making
invasion by land nearly impossible, and the highlands' black-glass
beaches ensure that marine assaults are fraught with terror; ships
docking on the peninsula risk running aground.
More important to
the cult, however, is the promise of worldly extinction and change that
permeates the land. In the dimness of the highlands, shadows are deeper.
The sun and the rest of Azeroth seem distant. The elements themselves
are more pronounced: fires burn hotter; rain forces its way into the
ground; and the heaves and shudders of the land call to mind some
colossal being stirring beneath the earth. This doesn't frighten the
members of the Twilight's Hammer; it lulls them to sleep.
Their
dark work is done here in a manner that could never have been realized
in Silithus. The devoted of the Twilight's Hammer train in the halls of
mighty fortresses, not tiny compounds and outposts. They summon
dangerous, mercurial elementals who loathe each other to the point of
outright war but still pause their feuds momentarily to work towards the
destruction of the other races. Outside the highlands, the cult is
fractious and divided. Here, it is guided on its mission of destruction
by some of the cruelest and bloodiest names in history, yet the names
associated with this cabal belie the true extent of its leadership.
These
dark whisperers chose the highlands as their base of operations for a
reason. They can feel the presence of the Old Gods in the air and see
their victory in the darkness. The shifting landscape, battling
factions, and wicked elements embody the cult's vision of what its world
will become as it is finally purged of life and order. The rest of
Azeroth will follow the Twilight Highlands into oblivion, one way or
another.
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