Howling Abyss

The Howling Abyss is a massive frozen bridge spanning a bottomless chasm in the heart of the Freljord, and the site of one of Runeterra's oldest prisons. Buried in an immense tomb of True Ice deep beneath the crevasse are the Watchers, Void entities sealed away in ages past. The wind tearing across the span carries an unearthly, banshee-like wail. The Abyss took its purpose during the War of the Three Sisters, which tore the frozen continent apart as each side wielded the primordial power of True Ice. In the midst of that battle the Watchers emerged into the material realm through a rift torn in reality, monstrous beings who meant to return all of existence to the silence of the Void. Realizing the true cost of her bargain, Lissandra turned on her patrons and channeled every drop of True Ice she possessed, along with the life force of her sisters Avarosa and Serylda, to freeze the Watchers and seal the rift. Both sisters died, and the Watchers were entombed beneath what would become the Howling Abyss. The prison is imperfect. The Watchers dream beneath the ice, and their dreams leak upward as the madness and corruption that seeps into the Freljord's deepest places. Lissandra has maintained the seal for over eight thousand years, rewriting history to erase the Watchers from memory and building the Frostguard into an order devoted to one secret purpose: keeping the ice frozen. She is less the region's villain than its terrified jailer. Above the chasm stands the Frostguard Citadel, whose great gates open onto the bridge beyond. That uppermost span, the Bridge of Sorrows, is only one of dozens that once crossed the crevasse, though the lower bridges have long been abandoned and sealed by avalanche. Each year on the vernal equinox, three chosen Iceborn of the Keepers Lodge descend into the depths under the Eye of Lissandra, feeling the patient, ravenous gazes of the trapped Watchers follow them as they climb.