Chapter 1627: 1627

Druids also got adjusted; One area tweaked was their appearance . Cat druids had larger eyes and bird druids had fatter bodies . On the other hand, bear druids were more ferocious . The tree druids were like cute little tree people, and their healing had also been increased .

The Hunters didn’t change much . The main thing was an increase of their pets’ intelligence . Some pets could even say simple words .

Warlocks had an extra control skill, consolidating their position as the king of control .

Apart from this, there were some hidden changes . It was mainly related to the difficulty of Instance Dungeons, and it waited for the players to find out for themselves . Everyone realized that the Instance Dungeons that were originally extremely difficult had their difficulty reduced . A lot of people had also surged into the battlefield of Alterac Valley, wanting to fight with some foreigners .

However, Lu Li was more interested in the new Instance Dungeon . The instructions he had given to Ruling Sword earlier were very simple . It was to make sure they secured the First Clear of the Instance Dungeon . This new Instance Dungeon was about insects . There wasn’t much official info on the insects, but they also didn’t intentionally keep any information about them secret .

Assembling info about the insects and the quest became the main mission that Ruling Sword assigned . As long as the info was relevant it could be sent to the tactics group to collect . Any info about the insects, including info about what skills they used, were taken in to be analysed .

Lu Li himself went into Stormwind City’s Great Royal Library . Lu Li researched the early trolls of the past because insects and trolls once fought against each other . To understand someone, you can begin by looking at their enemy .

There was no concrete information about the origins of insects . Like many lifeforms on the Azeroth continent, they had appeared very suddenly, but still in an understandable way . We are also like this in reality, like the Cambrian explosion or the appearance of humans . It all feels very sudden to us .

It couldn’t be described in too much detail . How the ancestors of the insects were born in the sea, from how they went from being single-celled organisms to multicellular organisms . How they left the sea and crawled up onto land or how they evolved one step further to be intelligent insects .

Although the origin can’t be explained, but when they began to flourish can be discussed . It was when the Titans defeated the ancient gods of Azeroth, the first rulers, that a space was given for the insects to develop .

From the book The Origins of Trolls, Lu Li found some info about trolls .

16 000 years before Dawn, the insects already had their own civilization – the Azj’Aqir civilization .

They had established the third great empire of Kalimdor at the time – the Aqir Empire ruled over the west of Kalimdor . Completing the triumvirate was the empire set up by the trolls, controlling the jungles of the east and south – the Gurubashi Empire and the forest’s Amani Empire .

Aside from this, there was also Northrend in the far north, a small nation of trolls .

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These intelligent insect-like lifeforms greatly desired expansion and were also extremely evil . The Aqir insects were devoted to eradicating all lifeforms on Kalimdor that weren’t insects . On this point, they were in agreement with the Wings of Death, but the Wings of Death wanted to rid Kalimdor of all life that weren’t Black Dragons . This was the standard display of evil . If Lu Li was like this, then he would definitely be called a war maniac or the Destroyer .

Two tigers can’t live on one mountain . It was impossible for these two bloodthirsty groups, the insects and the trolls, to coexist without war . The two had fought for over 1000 years . Although the trolls had never had an overwhelming advantage over the Aqir insects, in the end, the insects still lost multiple times in the war . It was really difficult to tell from the current state of Azeroth but at that time, the power of the trolls was really great .

The Aqir Empire split into two . Their subjects escaped to the far north of the continent, assembling there as they lived out a feeble existence .

Two Aqir city-states were established . In the barren land of the north there was Arj Nirab, and Ahn’Qiraj in the south desert . The trolls doubted that there were still hideouts of insects on Kalimdor, and indeed, their existence has never been confirmed .

First, let’s talk about Arj Nirab .

From the books The Annals of the Origins of the Undead – Ner’zhul, The Legendary Northrend and Those Years I was in Northrend, Lu Li compiled the information of the branching empire .

When Saar liberated his own brother Lordaeron, Ner’zhul continued to consolidate his base in Northrend . In the space above Icecrown, he established a giant castle to control his huge undead armies .

But when the Lich King expanded his borders, a single secret kingdom began to rebel against him . This ancient underground kingdom called Arj Nirab was established by a cruel race of human spiders . They sent out some elite troops to attack Icecrown . Ner’zhul realized that the spiders were completely immune to his mind control, and their strength was comparable to the undead troops .

The Spider Web Monsters, King of the Spiders, controlled a huge army, and also had influence over half of the tunnel network under the territory of Northrend . Their guerrilla warfare tactics made the Lich King wandered around aimlessly .

In the end, Ner’zhul won a difficult victory against the Spider Web Monsters . Under attack from the berserk Dreadlord and countless undead warriors, the Spider Kingdom of Arj Nirab became a land of ruins .

Although the Spider Web Monsters were mentally immune to Ner’zhul, Ner’zhul’s great Spirit power was able to control the corpses of the spider warriors . After Northrend had been unified, the Lich King began to carry out his true quest . The Lich King extended his sights onto human territory, and even summoned all the dark spirits that would listen to his voice .

The Spider Web Monsters, having been crushed in defeat, lifted their heads to the Lich . Some imagined that if the spider monsters had defeated Ner’zhul, then there wouldn’t be all this trouble afterwards . There wouldn’t be this new Horde, the Alliance and the Horde wouldn’t exist, and you couldn’t keep playing this game .

Let’s talk about Ahn’Qiraj .

Actually, the info in this area was easier to find . After all, the War of the Shifting Sands occurred not that long ago . A lot of people who participated in that war were still alive . And the effects of that war can still be felt today . What was important to remember was, insects and insect people were completely different things . Insects weren’t very smart . At the moment, there were a lot of places on the Azeroth continent, but insect people were intelligent lifeforms . Within insects, they occupied the position of commanders . At the moment, on the mainland, insect people barely existed .

The glorious Ahn’Qiraj Stronghold was originally was where the guards jailed C’Thun . The pitiful insects didn’t know this at all . They entered this stronghold and inside, they spread out and recovered their power . They tried, once again, to come out on the mainland and conquer the land . There was a surprising similarity with the trolls – they both wanted to recover their former glory .

At the same time the insect people of Aqir were looking to increase their power, they had already been corroded by the sealed C’Thun .

This branch of the Aqir insects began to be called the Ahn’Qiraj insects .

Although Azshara and her Night Elf empire once knew of the existence of this stronghold, it was forgotten over the long course of time . Also, this stronghold towered over the vast desolate Silithus Desert, where few intelligent lifeforms set foot .

It was only when the land of Silithus was revived under the leadership of Archdruid Fandral Staghelm that the Ahn’Qiraj again entered the sights of the elves .

In the biography The Son of the Archdruid, the author described in detail the situation of that time . The archdruid sent his own brave son, Valstann, as well as a group of druids he trusted, to go out together to do a quest .

They trudged back and forth in the sweltering desert, looking everywhere for an underground supply of water that could change this land into a jungle . Finally, Valstann led his comrades to go into the land where the Ahn’Qiraj were . Although numerous druids told him to avoid this area, Fandral’s son still went on ahead without turning back .

In the cold, lonely hall many Qiraj insect people were sleeping but they were woken up by Valstann’s rash entrance . And C’Thun had also realized the revival of the Qiraj insect people in the depths of Ahn’Qiraj, immediately sending numerous insect people to be driven into a great rage .

The high-level Qiraj insect people then organized the lower level insects, and with their numbers, they were a powerful group . They were like a type of scorpion – these evil insects had all sorts of different appearances, but everyone followed the will of the Qiraj overlord .

The existence of these Qiraj insect people absolutely shocked Valstann and the druids following him . They immediately got out of Ahn’Qiraj and established a little outpost in Silithus to monitor the movements of these insects .

The insects who forcibly occupied the stronghold became stronger and stronger every day . After a while, a general rushed out of the flooded tunnels of Ahn’Qiraj without warning, commanding a swarm of Qiraj insect people . They commanded many different types of scorpion underlings, completely swallowing up the surrounding wilderness . After this, they spread even further to other lands .

At this point, Valstann went to his father for help . Fandral continued to organise a group of druids, sentinels, female priests and jungle guards . They responded to the threat of the Qiraj insect people with their own army .

At that time, the Archdruid Fandral Staghelm was an old, established and renowned Night Elf . In his youth, he was already an outspoken member of the Cenarion Circle . Staghelm, with his big frame and furious temper, made him a strong and scary druid in the eyes of everyone else . Because of this, he often went against his mentors . However, he was handpicked by Malfurion as one of his disciples with the most talent, out of all the students .

That battle changed fate for a lot of people .

The Night Elves repeatedly tried to drive every last one of the Qiraj insect people back to the sandy hill of Silithus . However, the insects were not so easily defeated and launched a counterattack . However, the Elves snatched the advantage from their hands again . The war had been going on back and forth for a few months, and the battlefield was full of corpses from both Elves and insects .

This was how the War of the Shifting Sands began .

Fandral and his comrades kept up the war on one hand, but at the same time, they established a lot of outposts in the south of Kalimdor . They relied on these outposts to continue this tragic war with the insect species .

In the end, the Qiraj insect people, were pushed back to their homeland of Silithus by the tenacity of the druids and their allies . However, just when victory was achieved, an unexpected reversal occured . Under the carefully planned fake attack of the Qiraj insect people, Valstann fell to the insect people’s hands .

Valstann’s death ruined the will of the Archdruid and many other Night Elves . The Qiraj insect people didn’t let this amazing opportunity pass . Again, they swarmed out of Silithus, attacking cities and breaking up camps the whole way, pushing their way into Tanaris Desert into the east . The insect people fought their way into the holy place of the Bronze Dragon – The Caverns of Time .

This hasty attack angered the Bronze Dragons, leading them to take action . Under the leadership of Anachronos, they assembled the help of the Red Dragons, Green Dragons and Blue Dragons, three large dragon armies . So, with the dragons added to the Night Elves’ battle array, they worked together to drive the Qiraj forces back inside the walls of Ahn’Qiraj .

However, even though they had the help of these giant dragons, the vast forces of the Qiraj insect people were difficult to completely eradicate . Fandral was worried and afraid that this war would never come to an end – thousands upon thousands of Elves had already lost their lives under the insects’ sharp claws . He really didn’t want to sacrifice any more of his own people . So, he and the dragons wanted to find a way to end this war immediately . They precisely wanted to lock up the insects in Ahn’Qiraj until the end of time . For this reason, the Night Elves and giant dragons assembled in front of Ahn’Qiraj to end the war . Fandral ordered his druids to combine their power, the Night Elves and Anachronos summoned broad barriers to completely seal off Ahn’Qiraj .

The dry land outside this cursed city was completely dried up . The wall made up of rocks and roots, would emerge at the right time . From underground a strong barrier of beetles would tower over the city, forever trapping the Qiraj insect people .

In the end, Anachronos created two magic weapons: the Beetle’s Gong, and the Shifting Sands Sceptre .

Right afterwards, the dragons gave the scepter to Fandral to keep . If there was a time in the future when they needed to step into Ahn’Qiraj again, he could use this magic weapon to open up the beetle wall .

Thus, the threat from the insect people ended . However, Fandral still didn’t feel safe . The death of Valstann still lingered in his inner heart . He then broke apart the Shifting Sands Sceptre and scattered away the many pieces of the sceptre .

When the War of the Shifting Sands broke out, the three giant dragons, Arygos, Merithra of the Dream and Caelestrasz sacrificed their own lives to create the beetle wall .

Although the beetle wall was successful in sealing up the Qiraj insect people, the insect empire was still biding its time for conquest .

Now, the prospect of equipment, gemstones, Reputation and Skill Points, as well as countless treasure had attracted everyone to bravely advance without fear .

This fight to the death didn’t end!