The Valley of Broken Suns
Few places in Warlderia better illustrate the terrible power unleashed during the earliest years of the Higher Wars than the Valley of Broken Suns. Long before the rise of Human kingdoms, when the Elves and Dwarves still contested dominion over the richest lands of the continent, this broad mountain valley was the site of one of the greatest magical catastrophes in recorded history. Even today, many years later, the land bears scars that neither nature nor magic has been able to heal. The valley was once renowned for the extraordinary mineral wealth hidden beneath its mountains. Vast seams of Adamantine, Mithril and precious metals attracted the attention of both the expanding Dwarven Holds and the neighbouring Elven realms. At first the dispute was settled through uneasy agreements and shifting borders, but as the Higher Wars spread across the continent both sides came to regard possession of the mountains as essential to their survival. The valley became the scene of repeated sieges, great battles and increasingly destructive acts of magic.
The final battle remains the subject of endless debate amongst scholars. Dwarven records claim that the Elves sought to end the war by calling down the very power of the sun, weaving a spell intended to consume every Dwarven forge beneath the mountains in cleansing fire. Elven chronicles tell a different story, insisting that the Dwarven Runemasters unleashed forbidden rune magic capable of shattering mountains themselves. Whatever the truth, both sides agree upon one point. Neither spell was ever completed.
As the two great enchantments met above the valley they collided with unimaginable force. Instead of destroying one another, they merged into something neither side had foreseen. Light, fire and rune magic tore through the landscape, twisting the very fabric of reality before erupting in a blinding radiance said to have been visible across half the continent. When the light finally faded, the armies of both races had vanished. The valley itself had ceased to obey the natural laws of the world. Today the ground is covered by mile upon mile of glass, formed when unimaginable heat fused the earth into vast sheets that still shimmer beneath the sky. Entire mountains appear to have softened and flowed like wax before hardening once more into impossible shapes. Ancient rivers remain suspended halfway down cliffs where the stone itself seems to have frozen whilst melting. Nothing grows within the valley, and even the hardiest mosses refuse to take root upon the lifeless ground.
The strangest phenomenon occurs at dawn and dusk. As the sun rises or sets, several pale reflections appear across the sky, creating the illusion that multiple suns hang above the valley. These ghostly orbs cast conflicting shadows that move independently of both the landscape and one another. Travellers report seeing their own shadows walking in different directions, lingering after they have moved on or disappearing altogether before reappearing hours later. Magic behaves unpredictably throughout the valley. Simple spells often fail without explanation, whilst powerful enchantments may produce wildly unexpected effects. Wizards who have attempted to study the phenomenon speak of currents of arcane energy flowing through the air like invisible rivers, remnants of the ancient collision that still refuse to dissipate despite the passing millennia.
Scattered across the shattered landscape lie silent reminders of the battle itself. Great Dwarven siege engines remain half-embedded within fused stone, whilst elegant Elven towers appear melted into the mountainsides as though fashioned from candle wax. Weapons, armour and fragments of impossible machinery occasionally emerge from beneath the glass after earthquakes, only to disappear once more beneath shifting crystal. No bodies have ever been recovered. Both the Elves and the Dwarves regard the Valley of Broken Suns with equal measures of sorrow and shame. Each race preserves its own version of the disaster and quietly blames the other for unleashing forces that neither fully understood. Neither willingly enters the valley, and even the greatest Runemasters and Archmages admit that they cannot explain precisely what happened on that fateful day.
Amongst scholars there is an old saying: "The Higher Wars were fought with swords... until the Valley of Broken Suns taught the world that some victories cost more than kingdoms."
To this day, the shattered valley remains one of the greatest magical scars upon the face of Warlderia, a silent monument to the moment when two of the world's oldest civilisations discovered that there are powers no race was ever meant to command.