Prologue
Screams pierced the air. Screams of women and children, of terrified men desperately trying to protect them- to no avail.
It had been a peaceful day, like any other, in Silvermoon City, the capital of the Blood Elves. The people of Silvermoon would never have suspected how this day would change so abruptly.
They had believed in their hearts that they were safe in their capitol city, that the enemies of the world would not yet have executed a massive offensive attack. But, now this massive demon army known on Azeroth as the Burning Legion had come knocking on their door, and had arrived in numbers far greater than any of the best strategies of defense could hold against.
And so the noises of agony and death spread throughout the city, and floated into the blood-red sunset. And as dusk fell, and the darkness of night took the earth, so the days of the blood elves had darkened. In a matter of hours their capitol city would fall to the Burning Legion-!
They arrived swiftly and from everywhere, the ultimate inside job. Portals appeared simultaneously in almost every building of the city, each letting through several horrific beasts that leapt roaring from the portal, maiming the closest victim before the elf even had time to react. These beasts were ugly, evil, howling and laughing in bloodlust, knowing their victims were unprepared and defenseless.
Terrified mobs of citizens from every street in the city fled with the demons biting at their heels to the Court of the Sun, their only hope for survival, and the only place where the demons had not yet breached. These survivors numbered only in the hundreds; they and the defenders and priests waiting in the Court of the Sun were the only blood elves left. This morning, the beautiful Silvermoon City had held and protected nearly ten thousand. Tonight, it had become a graveyard.
The relentless demon army would break through this last defense in only hours, and though the last of the blood elven mages and soldiers fought valiantly against them, the defenders were drained, exhausted, and terrified. There seemed to be no hope for this desperate defense, no way to make it out of Silvermoon alive.
No way but one.
Years ago champions of the Horde and the Alliance battled their way through the great titan temple known as Ulduar, where they uncovered a great wealth of knowledge of the universe, including many star charts with the locations of other life-sustaining planets.
The decision to send the survivors through the portals was hasty and reckless, but it was the only possible way the last of the blood elves could escape. They had to evacuate- quickly- if they wanted their people and culture to survive.
The demons had forced the defenders back into the inner magical sanctum of the court, where blood elven magisters furiously worked to draw open the portals and cram through as many citizens as they could. But the guards did not hold long enough; though there were still scores of blood elf citizens waiting to go through, the magisters were forced to try and shut the portal. The demons broke through the defensive line and quickly dispatched the powerless citizens and exhausted magisters, and just as the portal was closing they charged into it, hoping to finish off the last of the blood elves of Silvermoon.
The survivors turned and stood their ground, knowing that this would be their last stand. They had nowhere to run, and they were on an unfamiliar planet in the darkness of night. Those who still had strength formed a small, poor defensive rank around the elderly and children, and watched as five demons came through the portal before it closed, leaving behind their beloved Silvermoon City.
The demon's eyes and gruesome forms glowed an evil, ugly green against the blackness of the night, and they looked upon the pathetic score of elves panting from magical exhaustion and fear. Then they began methodically slashing their way through, enjoying their simple, unchallenged killing. Some of the elves knelt down gracefully to accept their fate with what honor they could salvage, while others beside them fought desperately out of a primal fear, a need to cling to life. One, two, three of the demons fell, but with each one of them fell at least nine elves.
Only three remained; two of them teenage elves, and the other, the male child's mother. She was bleeding profusely from a gash in her side, and could no longer defend the children. The demons grinned at the havoc they had caused, and ripped the mother away from the children and crushed her in their great, terrible hands.
The children were shocked at the abrupt violence that had surrounded them for the past few hours of their lives, and when they saw a body crushed completely in the hands of a giant demon, they couldn't hold their stomachs. One of them, the girl, was swatted aside while the boy just stared at the ground, oblivious to his friend's demise. This was it. This was the end. The last two demons laughed and the one who had crushed the boy's mother raised its sword- only to be caught by a small knife in the eye;a throwing knife.
The startled demon reached into its eye and plucked out the offending object with an angry grunt and threw it blindly in front of him toward the boy. The boy ducked his head and the knife whizzed by and nicked his left ear and landed with a sickening noise behind him. The elf turned around and saw the knife handle-deep in the mid-section of the young elven girl.
Several masked warriors moved with blinding speed to take down one demon, and then the other. The demons flailed in an attempt to shed as much blood as possible before they left the realm of the living. A few of the masked warriors were horribly maimed in the attempt, a few of them losing limbs and others suffering crushing wounds.
When the teen elf realized he was still alive, he looked up and gazed wide-eyed at the carnage around him, and he was filled with crushing sorrow and rage. His knees buckled and he fell to the ground. The demon that had crushed his mother's body lay in front of him, the face lifeless and still burning, glowing in evil green flame. And the spell blade of a fallen magister lay next to him. He picked it up and with a howl of anguish the child drove the sword into the face of his mother's killer. He saw the blood of his mother on his hands, and some of her tattered robes stuck to the blood on his scales. Another small, strangled sound came from his throat, echoing the feeling inside him, a mixture of disgust and anguish and helplessness. And suddenly this feeling transformed into unrelenting anger, and he stabbed the dead face of the demon again, and again, and again. He couldn't sate this blinding anger that held him, this undying rage, this endless sorrow. He howled again, the cry raged into the black sky, and he drove the sword in, one last time.
A massive, blazing light sprung out from the sword and the child felt his energy being drained away, but he didn't care, he had avenged his mother and best friend and now he would let himself slip into darkness. He collapsed on the ground, his hand still gripping the hilt of the sword… but, not anymore, for when he opened his eyes he saw not a sword, but a glowing green orb. His eyes widened for an instant- and then the child's world faded black.