Quick Overview
Hakkar the Houndmaster brought the Burning Legion's felhounds into the War of the Ancients. The Highborne gateway exposed the kaldorei heartland to hunters and monsters unlike their familiar enemies. This demon must not be confused with Hakkar the Soulflayer, the blood god later worshipped by trolls.
Full History
The first invasion of Azeroth brought more than faceless demonic armies through the Well of Eternity. Hakkar the Houndmaster entered the ancient war with the Burning Legion, bringing the terror of his felhounds into a conflict already tearing the kaldorei realm apart. He belonged to the Legion's invading host, not to the much later troll worship of the Blood God who shares his name.
The Highborne's gateway gave the demons access to the imperial heartland, where their arrival shattered any pretense that Azshara's guests meant to preserve her people. Hakkar's hounds were part of the Legion's method of war: hunting and overwhelming mortal defenders as the invasion pushed outward. The resistance had to confront enemies unlike the armies or political rivals familiar to the night elves.
Hakkar's appearance helps distinguish the ancient invasion from the later human and orc wars. The Legion had already found powerful collaborators on Azeroth and could dispatch specialists through a portal maintained by those collaborators. The ancient-war novels preserve the Houndmaster as one of those enemies; the destruction of the gateway and the Sundering brought the invasion to its catastrophic end.
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Through History
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