Quick Overview
Sargeras began as the Pantheon's champion against demons and ended as the master of the Burning Legion. His estrangement from the other titans transformed a long struggle against chaos into an organized campaign of conquest. That betrayal set the course for the Legion's later attempts to enter Azeroth through the Well of Eternity and other gateways.
Full History
For ages beyond mortal reckoning Sargeras fought in the service of the Pantheon. The titans had set their champion against the demonic powers that threatened the worlds they sought to order, and he met those enemies across the Great Dark and the Twisting Nether. The accumulated conflict changed the course of his existence. In the original histories, his encounter with the depravity and malice of demons became the turning point that broke his faith in the Pantheon's mission.
When he abandoned his former calling, the consequences were immeasurably larger than the fall of a single warrior. Sargeras gathered demonic races into the Burning Legion, turning scattered destructive beings into an army capable of striking worlds far removed from one another. The precise account of his earliest dealings with different demon races must be read in its period form; later revisions of those origins are not interchangeable with the story familiar to the original Warcraft histories. What is secure for this account is his betrayal of the Pantheon and his leadership of the Legion that followed.
The rise of the Legion gave the ancient kaldorei's misuse of the Well of Eternity its terrible significance. The magic wielded by Azshara's court attracted Sargeras, and his servants moved to prepare a gateway powerful enough to bring him into Azeroth. The invasion devastated the night-elven empire, and the destruction of the Well prevented his intended entrance. The campaign ended in catastrophe for the defenders as well as for the invaders, leaving the Sundering to divide Kalimdor.
Sargeras's reach did not end with that failed invasion. His struggle with Aegwynn and the later corruption of her son Medivh connected the ancient titan rebellion to the opening of the Dark Portal and the orcish wars. By the time the Burning Legion returned in the Third War, Azeroth's peoples faced an enemy whose origins lay far beyond their recorded kingdoms. The betrayal of Sargeras is therefore a turning point in the history of the cosmos and a recurring cause of Azeroth's wars.
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Through History
Explore documented turning points and follow their connections. The complete account remains in Full History above.
Further Reading
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