Inari Tower...

...and the Watchtowers of the Al-Karesh

Location

Inari Tower is an old, decrepit dwarven watchtower. It is situated in the River Inari, originating in the The Ancient Summit mountain range. This Tower is one of many that was built in The Age of Dread, when the dwarven Tribe of Al-Karesh first settled in the mountain range, seeking shelter.

History & Lore

The towers served both as a lookout and as an additional line of defense. Many of the watchtowers in the mountain range itself are still functional and used for this purpose. The towers were equipped with siege weaponry and energy shields from The Age of Discovery, some of which are still operational to this day. Moreover, each tower contains intricate traps on the inside, which can be activated in case of emergency, to make the towers unusable for anyone who does manage to invade the tower. Inari Tower was the tower furthest out from the Ancient Summit and the first - and only - tower to fall into enemy hands. Despite its difficult-to-access location in the middle of a river, the corpses of the The Dark One minions eventually piled up so high that they clogged the river, allowing access to the tower. After many weeks of being besieged, when supplies had long run dry, rather than succumbing to starvation, the guards lowered the shields in a last-ditch effort to take out as many enemies as possible, letting in the minions. Once the place was nearly overrun, they activated the traps, reactivated the energy shield, and destroyed the mechanism that controlled the shields and traps, effectively trapping the enemies inside the tower with them. The Al-Karesh tried to reclaim their tower in The Age of Solitude. They managed to temporarily disable the shields but many of the volunteers died to the Watchtower's traps and the creatures still stuck inside of it, causing the dwarves to abandon Inari Tower for good. To this day, when all is quiet in the night, blood-curdling screeches can occasionally ring out from the tower. I shudder to think what manner of creatures could still be alive in the tower after all these centuries when food has surely run out long ago.