The night elf's laughter echoed throughout the forest, maniacal and hysteric. The dreadlords eyed him warily. They had prepared themselves for grim defiance or violent rage or even reluctant surrender, but Illidan's crazed laugh set them on edge. Their eyes shifted back and forth from him to each other.
In his mind's eye, Illidan saw the pair illuminated like beacons of red light. They seemed uneasy, unsure of what action to take. He was laughing at their challenge, and the fact that the laughter disturbed them made him laugh harder. It was all so entertaining for him.
Suppressing his laughter to a quiet chuckle, the elf tightened his hands into fists and launched himself towards one of the demons.
Archimonde was also chuckling as he approached the massive roots of the World Tree. The humans' castle lay broken, the orcs' fortress crushed, the night elves' grove charred and dead. There was no one left to die for this Tree. It was time for the Tree itself to die.
Still chuckling to himself, the great Eredar lifted an arm and began to climb.
Azgalor grunted to himself, staring as the red Orb grew steadily larger and steadily brighter, and the gate began to vibrate and glow with the energies of the Nether. He smiled uneasily. He did not understand the power of the Orb fully, he only knew that it was power. He was mostly sure that possessing it would be helpful. Some spark of intuition told him perhaps he should not have trusted the Death Knight's gift, be he shivered and the hunch passed. He was just being skittish. In a few minutes, the gate would finish opening, and the Orb and its powers would be all his.
Anetheron bit his lip, lurching backwards to dodge the elf's punch. Mephistroth grabbed for Illidan's shoulder, bit the elf had moved out of the way already; his leg struck the blue demon's calf, sending the creature to the ground. Anetheron wrapped his arms around Illidan's neck, but again the elf slithered out of the way, landing a blow to the side of the yellow dreadlord's head. Grunting, he too fell to earth.
The dreadlords' eyes, having half closed, reopened fully as they pushed themselves back up. They shook their wings, angered at being unbalanced by a paltry elf. Their opponent sneered
Illidan's laughter began to change into a roar, slowly rising to drown out the cries of his prey.
Arthas whistled to himself as he lay in the grass of the small clearing, his eyes watching the skies. A few feet away, Morte stretched and yawned.
"Time yet?" the lesser Death Knight asked.
"Not quite," Arthas replied. Morte sighed impatiently.
After a moment or so, Arthas went back to his whistling.
Higher, higher, higher Archimonde climbed, until he did not remember why he was climbing. He wanted to destroy this tree, he thought distantly, but for some reason he had to reach the top. He had to reach the top…
Behind him, on a shallow ridge that rose a few meters off of the summit to face the Tree, four figures were gathered. They had been awaiting a fifth, but he, it seemed, would not join them. One raised his prize; he would wait no longer.
Azgalor shook now, visibly confused, yet smiling ridiculously, as if everything he did not understand didn't matter anymore. The Orb had swollen to an amazing side, glowing a rich, bright red like a plump fruit waiting to be plucked.
There was a stump nearby, he saw; it looked to be just tall enough to…
He clambered up upon it. Yes. He was high enough to reach out and touch the Orb; it hovered in front of him, impossibly huge, waiting for his embrace. Slowly, tentatively, he extended his fat arm towards it…
"Is it time yet?" Morte asked again. Arthas did not answer, he simply continued to whistle.
Somewhere, Nowhere, Kil'jaeden the Deceiver leaned forward on his throne, peering with confusion and interest into his mirror. Something was going on, some low, quiet hum of activity he had not noticed before, though it was now quickly rising in volume. Something was not right, something was not right… he probed the mirror violently, scanning the forest again and again… what was going on?
Closer and closer Azgalor stretched his arm; the Orb was suddenly farther away then he had thought. He reached and reached… he was on the edge of the stump… he was leaning farther and farther forward…
The figure raised his prize high above his head as his companions watched. He placed his lips to the horn's tiny opening and blew.
The world shivered.
Sound exploded through the forest, snapping Azgalor's concentration. He stumbled and slipped, careening headfirst forward off of the stump, his arms flailing out of control…
As he fell past the Orb, his finger brushed its side.
Archimonde blinked as the intoxicating feeling of his urge to keep climbing evaporated like a thin mist before the clear, piercing sound of the horn. He looked down at the base of the Tree, already far below him, and spotted the tiny figures huddled at the top of the bluff. A roar of anger escaped his lips as he glared down at them, the beginnings of a spell forming in his mind…
In the depths of the Nether, Kil'jaeden raged.
A ripple formed on the surface of the Orb where Azgalor's finger had touched it, as though the thing was water and not hard stone. The ripple spread instantly around the curvature of the sphere, covering every side. The earth shook, and for the first time, the soft glow of the gate flickered.
Then the universe exploded.
The gate disintegrated, detonating into dozens of pieces which flew apart at every angle. Sections of burning stone fell upon the demon, singing and scarring his hide. Ashes got in his eyes, stabs of lightening attacking his nerves.
Then, as he struggled to watch, the bright, crimson shape of the Orb moved. It accelerated away from the dying gate, through the line of the trees, into the now burning jungle.
Azgalor cried out in pain and despair as a force that he could not control propelled him to his feet and into the trees after the treasure.
Archimonde closed his eyes and opened his lips to speak, but was interrupted by a tiny shock in his side. He opened his eyes and glanced to his right, amused to see the meager form of a wisp hovering beside his arm like a jellyfish stalking a swimming creature. Laughing in spite of himself, Archimonde swatted the spirit away, then turned back to look at his target.
He blinked in surprise. Hovering beside his left ankle was another wisp. This one also shocked him. The demon was now becoming very irritated. He rolled his eyes in mile annoyance, but stopped, as his upward gaze revealed more of the spirits.
Many more.
The wisps swarmed like bees around the side of the Tree, a dozen, then a hundred, then a thousand. He tried to speak his spell, but they shocked his skin and pricked his veins. He was bleeding blue fire, and lightning was exploding out of the places he bled. Lines of white light spread slowly over his body, covering him, flaring in his mind like open wounds.
He threw back his head and screamed. It was the sound that a ferocious beast makes when it knows it is about to die; it was a scream of anger and despair. Then the blue lightning exploded from his chest, and Archimonde was no more.
The flames from the explosion ripped over the Tree, burning away the bark like diseased skin. The branches, leaves and moss crumbled away, the roots shriveling and melting away like hot glass.
Then, slowly, like a rising sun after a long and violent night, a beacon of light emerged from somewhere near the base of the Tree, illuminating for a second the desolation of the burning mountainside before the flaring light blinded anyone who might have been watching, engulfing the Tree and the mountain in its blinding, burning sunrise.
The minions of the Legion despaired as they watched the Tree's destruction encompass the mountainside, the death of their master and general symbolic of their own imminent demises. The sky shifted from night's blackness to brilliant red, and for the second time in the course of the War, the sky rained fire.
Arthas' whistling abruptly stopped. "It is time," he said. Morte sneered. Then the two Death Knights rose and began a calm yet urgently brisk walk into the forest.