Haggstrom

**Haggstrom** is a town on Version 5.0, located on the continent of Apus. It is the largest and most populous settlement on the server.

## History

Haggstrom was founded on August 13, 2021 - the same day that WikiCraft 5.0 officially opened. A party consisting of Ned\_Edgewalker, MC\_Zoomer, Benthamic Tsar\_Gar, MokikiMorgan, RoselleFeng, and Squirto19, set out from the hostile conditions of spawn in search of a more prosperous land. Descending from the continent's snowy and inhospitable peaks, the group hazarded their way across thousands of blocks of dark forest and enemy-filled valleys before finally coming upon the promising land that is today home to Haggstrom. Upon the shores of a large lake, the group built their first rough shelters to survive the unforgiving night. As their meagre food supply dwindled, they were saved by the lake's bountiful supply of fish. When morning came, the first cornerstones of Haggstrom had been laid.

The group would eventually be joined shortly that same day by several others, including Cannonwalker, Mexican\_Sultan, Doopulus, Mallace, Vosche, and jackieisllama, all of whom too had to brave the harsh wilds of Apus to become part of the new settlement. Vowing to create a town that reflected all styles and personalities, the founding members began staking out various plots to build their new homes. Some harvested much-needed crops from the town's new communal farms, whilst others took to the dense forests or complex cave systems snaking beneath the surface to procure essential materials. At the end of the first day, a quaint collection of houses dotted the barren landscape.

By the end of the week, the town began to take shape. On August 18, five days after its founding, Haggstrom finally got its name. Several estates now made up the settlement's de facto centre, situated closely to the community farms and the still-standing survival shack of the first day. Paloma, Haggstrom's quaint cottage district, opened its first shops on the lakeshore. Further afield, the hellish shrines and towers of Babil appeared overnight, simultaneously terrifying and captivating the town's civilians. The stone battlements of the unassailable Castle Haggstrom, looming large from the crags overlooking the town centre, were lain. On the far shore of the lake, the first steps were taken in founding Cala del Cuervo, home of a fabled pirate king and his legendary ship, the *Black Warrior*. All of these areas and more would gradually coalesce into a town of an unmistakable character; that is, a town of many characters in one.

The first of Haggstrom's tests came on August 24: the night of the 1st Deluge. Though the town's founding had been peaceful and free from bloodshed, over the span of its first two weeks the civilians noticed increasingly abnormal occurrences around the fledgling settlement: strange and shadowy monuments springing from the earth, the sudden slaughtering of the town's sheep population, the appearance of hellish beasts and undead legionnaires, the arrival of a mysterious and belligerent religious cult, and even the unexplained temporary vanishing of one of the town's own civilians into thin air. Haggstrom's chief mage Benthamic took it upon himself to investigate the surreal occurrences, concluding that the town had been infected by a number of Netherean totems of the dead, which were the source of ghostly behaviour. When, on the night of the 24th, a group of Haggstromers banded together to dislodge the nefarious totems, the hellish deities retaliated, engrossing the small town in a plague of demonic beasts. From the deck of the *Black Warrior*, to the crypts of Castle Haggstrom, and finally in the Plains of Babil, the town residents battled their way through swarms of hellspawn. After fighting tooth and nail throughout the endless night, the group finally succeeded in destroying the unholy totems, and it looked, if only for a moment, as if Haggstrom may be saved. But the forces of the undead have been merely kept at bay, and each of the town's residents fear what may become of their eventual retaliation...

## Geography

Haggstrom is located in the southeastern portion of the continent of Apus. It is immediately situated on the banks of the eponymous Lake Hagge, one of Apus's largest inland bodies of water. An unnamed river drains into the lake's southwestern corner. Most of Haggstrom has developed on the northern shore of the lake, with the exception of Cala del Cuervo, located on the southern shore. The nearest seashore is roughly two days by foot from the town centre.

Lake Hagge is located in a river valley, and Haggstrom is virtually surrounded on all sides by mountain ranges and some of Apus's tallest peaks. The climate of the region is temperate, contrasting with the tundra-like conditions of the nearby mountains. Haggstrom enjoys an average level of rainfall, with some snowfall in the more elevated parts of the town. Despite the town's surface being mostly rugged, uneven, and rocky, flat plots of arable soil by the lake's shores provide ample conditions for crops such as wheat, potatoes, carrots, and sugar cane to grow in abundance. Though the region experiences a general dearth of wildlife (like the rest of Apus), Haggstrom's civilians have managed to procure certain specimens of local fauna and repopulate the area to fit their needs. By contrast to the land's meagre offerings, Lake Hagge is home to abundant supplies of fish (particularly salmon), once credited with saving the fledgling town from starvation.

Haggstrom does not want for natural resources and raw materials. The river valley is densely forested; Haggstrom itself is located in only a small clearing from the seemingly endless woods, and is flanked east and west by oak, spruce, and birch forests. Though most edifices in the districts of Paloma, Cala del Cuervo, and the town centre (including the town's cornerstone building, the aptly named survival shack) relied on these logging reserves for construction, other projects, such as Castle Dreiton and the Peace Hill Mausoleum, have exploited the town's quarries and caverns for stone, granite, and diorite. Curiously, the district of Babil differs greatly in this regard; both Babil's terrain and architecture resemble something quite other-worldly, leaving one to ponder whether the district isn't a sort of fleeting gateway between our dimension and another.

Intricate and often hostile cave systems snake their way just beneath the town's surface, from whence raw materials such as iron, coal, and copper can be extracted by civilian miners who dare to enter. Far deeper beneath the earth's crust, just above deepslate-level, the townsfolk have also carved out their own labyrinthine mines in the hopes of obtaining more valuable minerals such as gold, emeralds, and diamonds. These raw earth materials from both strata have brought a modest degree of wealth and defensive capabilities to the town in its earliest and most vulnerable stage.

### Districts

Currently, the city of Haggstrom is divided into five unique districts, with plans of further expansion in the near future.

* **Centre**: In the heart of Haggstrom is the town centre home to the settlement's earliest buildings, as well as the largest number of civilian houses. Featuring an eclectic style of architectural choices ranging from mediaeval to minimalist, the centre is the sight of the aptly-named survival shack - constructed by the first Haggstromer pioneers - as well as the community farms. This district is home to Ned\_Edgewalker, RoselleFeng, Mallace, Squirto19, jackieisllama, and MokikiMorgan.
* **Babil**: Eerie and mystical Babil represents the smudged boundary between our world and the underworld, as is evident from its hellish, haunting landscape and dark, imposing structures. It is separated from the centre by the undeveloped and blood-soaked Plains of Babil. A shadowy temple dedicated to an avian deity, and Benthamic's looming mage tower are the centrepieces of this district.
* **Paloma**: Haggstrom's waterfront district, Paloma is a quaint, rustic locale employing a rural cottage-style of architecture. Charming dirt paths snake their way between humble shops in this picturesque corner of Haggstrom. Paramount to the town's burgeoning economy, Paloma is home to a bakery, weapons shop, and fishmonger. It is also where the residences of MC\_Zoomer and Mexican\_Sultan can be found.
* **Castle-Peace Hill**: The tentatively named Castle-Peace Hill district consists primarily of two key locations: Castle Haggstrom and the Peace Hill Cemetery & Mausoleum, home to Tsar\_Gar and Doopulus respectively. The stone colossus of Castle Haggstrom is the town's chief defensive point; Peace Hill, meanwhile, overseen by the mysterious gravelord, is the final resting place for many of Haggstrom's civilians. Between these two structures is a yet-to-be-developed plain.
* **Cala del Cuevo**: Set to be Haggstrom's rough and lawless Caribbean quarter, this largely undeveloped nautical district sits on the south shore of Lake Hagge, opposite Paloma (its more civil counterpart). To date, the only structures in Cala del Cuervo are a wooden wharf and the legendary *Black Warrior*: an impressive pirate ship that doubles as the home of Cannonwalker.

## Residents

* Benthamic
* Cannonwalker
* Doopulus
* jackieisllama
* Mallace
* MC\_Zoomer
* Mexican\_Sultan
* MokikiMorgan
* Ned\_Edgewalker
* RoselleFeng
* Squirto19
* Tsar\_Gar
* Vosche

## Trivia

* Haggstrom takes its name from the track 'Haggstrom' by German artist C418, appearing as a song in Minecraft and on the *Minecraft - Volume Alpha* soundtrack.
	+ This is the second Wikian town to be named after a Minecraft soundtrack title, after Dreiton in Version 3.0.
	+ In Swedish, Haggstrom or *häggström* roughly translates to 'bird cherry tree on the river/stream'. In Sweden, the bird cherry tree (alternatively known as the hagberry tree) is said to represent the arrival of spring and new beginnings, thus reflecting this town's status as a 'new beginning'.
* Population-wise, Haggstrom is the largest Wikian town to date.
* The flag of Haggstrom was designed by town civilian Cannonwalker.
	+ According to Cannonwalker, each of the three colours in the flag represent a different emotional aspect of Haggstrom's world: green for the natural beauty of Apus, red for the mystery and bloodshed associated with the town's struggles, and blue for the cold and harsh conditions its citizens have struggled through.
* The district of Babil shares its name with the Babil Governorate in central Iraq, most famous for being the location of the ancient city of Babylon. This perhaps alludes to the ancient mystique surrounding Haggstrom's Babil.
* The district of Paloma shares its name with a town in California, a 1975 Mexican telenovela, and a tequila-based cocktail. It is also a female given name derived from the Latin word for 'dove', thus contributing to the avian symbology surrounding Haggstrom and Apus.
* In Spanish, *Cala del Cuervo* means 'Raven's Cove'. This is a reference to a location in the MMORPG *Pirates of the Caribbean Online* (2007-2013), and its unofficial reboot *The Legend of Pirates Online* (2015-). This is yet another avian reference in a district name.