The Shattering
Aesgar cursed loudly in gutterspeak as he crashed through the turbulent, unstable portal on to the ground below. A large, armor-plated arm was extended to him, as the warrior helped him up to his feet. "Well now, we're really here aren't we," Aesgar said, as if stating something quite plain and usual. His companions were noticeably worried, "How can you be so damn calm? We're years in the past, nearing the battlefield that almost saw the destruction of the entire world!" Rhaka blurted out to the warlock. Aesgar raised an eyebrow almost as if to challenge that, "Dear assassin, I am no stranger to traveling through to extra-dimensional planes of existence; a small thing like time-travel is no surprise to me." Ghaku peered around searchingly; they were at the summit of the mountain, a relatively small Night-Elf encampment lay just below them, flanking the largest monster of a tree that the warrior had ever seen. "The World Tree…" Rage exclaimed, reverently, falling to one knee. "Oh get up," Elusin said sarcastically, she would have rolled her eyes if they hadn't rotted and fallen out years ago. The five began their slow descent down the mountain, towards the great tree. A loud thumping echoed in the distance as they climbed, the sun shown high as it neared its zenith.
High Priestess Tyrande shouted orders to the few that remained of the armed forces that guarded the world tree, Nordrassil. The Night-Elf woman sighed; these were the last of her archers and ancients that could be sent to protect that which mattered most, and the Burning Legion was approaching ever-nearer. A sudden outburst from the outer edges of the camp brought her attention. "Scourge?! I'm a goddamn forsaken! Night elves… I swear…" screeched an unusual raspy woman's voice. Tyrande slung herself over her white nightsaber tiger and sped off towards the disturbance. A very strange group of people were trying to enter her camp, and the warden guards were preventing them access. "Alright listen there elfy, I'm big, strong, and impossible to reason with, it would be in your best interest to just let me through!" but the stoic warden would not give way to the massive orc warrior. "Who are these people?" the High Priestess demanded, "As if we don't have enough issues…" A tall, calm Tauren man saluted the woman, bowing slightly, "Priestess, we have come to bring the help of the Horde, but we cannot if you will not allow us to do so." Tyrande cocked an eyebrow quizzically, "If you're from the Horde, then why do you come alongside the undead? We've been fighting the Scourge bastards every step up the mountain, if you hadn't noticed!" Elusin coughed uncomfortably, "Undead is such a harsh phrase; we prefer the term 'Mortally-Challenged…" the ghoulish woman muttered. "Previously-Living," her zombified husband nodded in agreeance. Rhaka smiled weakly, "They're really very nice people, very non-evil…" The High Priestess sighed, "I don't have time for this. We need all the help we can get; you can accompany this next group of sentinels." Tyrande jabbed a finger towards a nearby group of warrior-women, bows slung across their shoulders. The pale-green skin of the Night-Elves almost blended them in with the grass as they journeyed down towards Nordrassil. "Whatever you're doing has to work, Malfurion…" Tyrande sighed as the group left.
The loud thumping that had escorted their descent had turned in to an echoing thunder by this point, something was coming, and for once in his life Ghaku was terrified. A gargantuan grey giant erupted from the edge of the warrior's vision; the being's massive form scarcely had room to move in the mountain pass. Rune-covered bronze armor embraced the colossal, making its appearance even fiercer still. Glowing fel-green eyes scanned the horizon, settling on the World-Tree. The demon smirked, his horrific macabre face grinning wickedly. The group had almost reached their destination, but even though there wasn't much farther to go it was evident to the warrior that the demon would reach the tree with his massive stride before they did. In the distance, there was only one figure standing between the demon and the last hope that Azeroth had against the Burning Legion. If the World Tree was destroyed, all mortals would soon follow. The colossal eyed the individual, wondering who would be foolish enough to impede his path. The sun burned brightly overhead, now reaching its apex, its glimmering beams of light gripped the figure, a tall blue-skinned woman that stood with determination against the world's coming twilight.
Archimonde sneered cruelly; his bellowing voice reverberated throughout the mountain peak, "Had I known how pitiful and weak this world had become, I would have launched this invasion ages ago!" The monstrous lieutenant of the legion raised a deadly hand towards the remaining night-elves, "Let the echoes of doom resound across this wretched world, that all who live may hear them and despair!" Speeding his walk to a charge, Archimonde rushed towards his objective, his conquest lay just before him. The shaman kneeled down before the approaching evil, her lips giving fervent whisperings to the earth. The woman clenched her staff tightly as her simple dress began to shimmer and change, fire engulfed her as her skin became as molten armor, her weapon reformed in to her blazing spear. Tiji rose, knowing that the elements were hers to influence and direct in the coming battle.
Ghaku ran as fast as his encumbering armor would allow him, his companions not far behind. "Do you really think this is a battle we can win?" his sister called out to him, breathing heavily as they dashed. The warrior closed his eyes and head his hung for a moment, "I don't know. I do not know if this is a battle we can win, or even if we will live through it. I don't think we will. What I do know is that this is a battle we must win, and my own coming mortality is not enough to deter me from fighting it." She nodded to him, knowing that he was right. "I refuse to hide in the corners of the world, waiting for the inevitable end to come! I am the Bloody Prince, and my legacy will be glorious death!"
"You are the insignificant defenders of a doomed world! The Legion has come and there is nothing that can stand in its path of carnage!" Bearing down upon the shaman came the demonic monstrosity that was Archimonde. A gargantuan mailed fist swiped down towards her with frightening speed, but Tiji had erected an earthen shield to block the demons attack. Crumbing, the rock barrier fell back to the ground, but Tiji was already somewhere else. A glint shone in the troll's eye as a bolt of lightning erupted from her hands, striking the demon in the chest. Archimonde grinned wickedly, raising his ash-like arms to the sky. "This world will burn!" he cried out, striking the ground, his hands gleaming with fire. Doom crept out from the depths of the earth as flames erupted towards the shaman, searing the ground in a twisting snake-like path. Tiji reached towards her sides, retrieving many totemic staves from seemingly nowhere. Casting them at the coming fire, the totems instead took the form of numerous blazing elementals. The newly-spawned inferno creatures struck mercilessly at their demonic attacker, searing Archimonde's already blackened-like limbs.
The giant howled, "There are yet more of you?! Your souls will languish for an eternity!" Behind the battling duo came the remaining forces of the sentinels, and Tiji's own kin. The troll's eyes widened, "Children?! You should na have come!" "Yeah, and you shouldn't have been kidnapped by an enigmatic dragonflight bent on destroying time itself, so in the future lets do things differently!" Aesgar called back sarcastically. Archimonde flailed his sundering fists towards the fire-spawns, crushing them one by one. Tiji snapped her attention back towards the ostensibly unstoppable evil, lowering her head to the ground. Earth! Rise up against this defiler! She called out to the elements. The land around the demon began to shift and change, creating a crevice where evil stood. Archimonde let out a fearsome shout as his legs sunk in to the cold, hostile soil. Even still, the earth altered itself in an affront to the giant. Rocks likened their form to the ancient trees that fought alongside the night-elves, becoming as giants ready to assault the lieutenant of the Burning Legion. Crushing their stone limbs in to him, Archimonde yelled fiercely at the earthen constructs. Seizing one of the stone giants, the gargantuan demon hurled it towards the sentinels. Though many of them attempted to leap out of the way of the crushing boulders, many still were overwhelmed and destroyed by the earth that they so reverently adored. The Eredar pointed a malicious finger towards one of the remaining archers, a bolt of shadowy energy enveloping her. The elf's form crumbled, and forth from it came a silvery cloud of shifting essences, speeding through the air towards the Defiler.
Archimonde grasped the essence in his demonic palm, whispering malignant thoughts to the world, "Do you know the power of a soul? I've long forgotten… ever since I gave mine for supremacy. THIS is power!" Grasping his fingers around the soul that was attempting to escape his grip, Archimonde tore it asunder, obliterating the soul quite explosively. The shockwave that immediately followed was enough to send every mortal to the ground, knocking them down. The giant gazed upon those still living with a ponderous eye. Settling upon Aesgar, he bellowed a voice that was heard across the land, "A warlock is it? A damned soul? Tell me little warlock, you like demons, don't you?" Raising his hands to form arcane runes in the air, the Eredar cackled malevolently. A frantic burrowing could be heard in all directions, as the earth around them erupted. Sickly blood-red hounds rose from the depths, black tendrils rose from their body accompanied by ivory-white horns. Fel hounds. Aesgar Reth sighed, before he was promptly set upon by dozens and dozens of devouring demons. A waning purple light shot forth from the pile that assault the warlock, spidery demonic chanting was heard even beneath the ravaging hounds.
A strange humming could be heard in the distance, as thousands of gleaming lights encircled the World Tree. Wisps. Recovering from the blast wave that had knocked the troll to the ground, Tiji grasped her yet-unused weapon, the blazing lance. Taking a moment to give an unspoken request to the spirit of Air, Tiji hurled the javelin towards the enormous Eredar, the wind guiding her spear to strike true. Piercing his gargantuan body, Archimonde cried out in rage as the burning spear shot pain throughout his massive body. To add torture to discomfort, the Defiler could hear the cackling of the undead warlock, shouting out to him. "Oh Archimonde", Aesgar called out mockingly, "You like demons, don't you?" Through his fel magics, Aesgar Reth had ensorcelled the ravaging felhounds with his own demonic power, turning them against their former master. Though he held himself raggedly and bled from every limb, Aesgar grinned with malicious satisfaction as he watched the demons tear in to the Eredar with the pain that had recently been visited upon him. Archimonde snarled, "Your resistance is insignificant!" as he tore out the fiery spike from his torso, fel-green blood pouring from his wound. Using his own energy, Archimonde commanded the weapon to grow to suit his own size, and with a blazing sweep he pushed back and destroyed the assaulting demons.
The blazing sun painted the scene in an eerily bloody glow. The Eredar's eyes were as fire as he stared down the mortals that had dared to face him. Heaving the radiant lance to the sky, it burned with renewed vigor and intensity as he raised it to strike at the group. "This world WILL BURN!" he shouted out once again, the mountain trembled at his ruthless voice. Hurling the spike with the strength of millennia of warfare and conquest, the air screamed as the missile flew towards the shaman. Blinded by the brilliance of the red sun, she did not see the coming doom, the spear pierced armor, flesh and bone.
Tiji's sun shattered.
What was once a faint humming in the distance was now an agonizing buzzing from the gathering wisps upon Nordrassil. Certain, now, that his conquest was within his grasp, Archimonde bounded towards the world tree, ignoring those that still stood. Running up to her mother's now motionless body, Rhaka's eyes were as flowing as the great rivers of Azeroth as she knelt over the troll's body. The rogue let out a sudden cry as a silvery red cloud of shifting essences emerged from her mother's remains, drifting towards the Eredar. Tiji's soul. Extending a massive blackened arm greedily, Archimonde reached for the essence as his other arm wrapped around the massive world tree. In his desire, the demon did not see the many thousand wisps creeping towards the limb that desecrated Nordrassil, and soon the crashing wave of shimmering beings were sweeping over his entire body. Turning back his head in surprise of this new trick, Archimonde's fel-green eyes lit up with fury as his form was enveloped with the many wisps, one for every mortal that had fallen that day, one soul for every life ended with invasion of the Burning Legion.
The many wisps engulfed his form until there was nothing left but the blinding light. Howling, Archimonde still refused to release his grasp upon the World Tree, intent on his destruction of all mortality. Ghaku covered his eyes from the sight that seared itself in to his memory, the screaming Eredar commander was a vision that he would never forget. With a vast all-encompassing flare, a powerful explosion rocked the world as Archimonde the Defiler, was purged from existence.
The now-blackened bronze armor was all that remained of the once-fearsome lieutenant of the Burning Legion, the left-hand of Sargeras the Destroyer. Those souls that had emerged unscathed through the terrible ordeal rose high in to the air, free from their burden. Among them was the soul of the troll shaman, her spirit flew high in to the Twisting Nether above, her soul refused to be weakened by the wearing sands of time.