Talfuric beamed for a moment, happy that they were going for such a simple solution. Then, slowly, his smile faded into a grin, then to a straight line, then to a frown.

"But… wouldn't that kill Charlie?" he laughed nervously.

The man gave him a sad smile, than said, "His sacrifice was admirable, but we can't go down there and try to rescue him."

"Why couldn't you? After all, the only reason you're collapsing the cave is so that they can't use him as a hostage," Talfuric said.

The man frowned. "Is that what I said?" he asked himself, "What I meant to say is, if we go charging down there, they could kill Charlie and then unleash the ex-leader of the Burning Legion to lay waste to all of Azeroth, ushering in an age of death and darkness. Don't you think preventing that is worth one man's sacrifice?"

"He risked his life to help us," Talfuric growled, "and we have a duty to help him!"

The man gave Talfuric that sad smile again. "My good man, we don't know if he hasn't already been poisoned! He could be dying right now from some incurable toxin, and then we'd lose many men and risk the world trying to save a lot cause. It's not worth it," he said.

Talfuric drew his sword.

"I will not let you harm him!" he said to the man.

The man sighed heavily, and then flicked his fingers at Talfuric. There was a flash of blue light, and he knew no more.

************

As two men dragged the unconscious Night Elf away, the lead spell caster raised his arms towards the cavern ceiling along with 198 others. Summoning countless kinds of different energies, they sought to bring down the cavern.

For a few moments nothing happened. And then, suddenly so that the cultist leader couldn't reverse the effects, the ceiling caved in.

Boulders of every size killed countless cultists, and obscured the rest from view. A thick layer of dust lined the air, but a druid sent it away in a gust of wind.

"Go get the General," the man in charge told one of the mages.

The mage disappeared in a flash of light, and the others descended to observe the damage.

There was rubble everywhere, and where the ground wasn't covered in rock, there was usually blood and gore from the unfortunate cultists.

He stepped in and around it until he reached the ruins of the sacrificial altar. He couldn't see any available route towards it, so he gathered his men to move the rocks.

Before they could act, he heard a muffled scream from inside. Happiness soared inside him as he realized that Charlie might have lived.

At his order, the rock was swept aside to reveal the lead cultist, his arm crushed under a boulder.

Screaming and gnashing his teeth, he tried to grab a dagger to cut off his limb.

The magi knocked it from his grip and cut it off for him. As they healed the wound, the leader of the group put him into a sitting position.

He had a grey beard and bushy eyebrows of a similar color. His nose had been broken and blood sprayed out over his face, so it was hard to see him clearly.

After he had been healed, the leader of the group threw his hand around his throat and decided it was time to get some answers from this piece of scum.

************

15 minutes after the collapse of the cavern, Talfuric awoke. He didn't hurt like he expected, so he stood up. His sword was gone, but the rest of his gear was still on him.

After a second, the head mage he had conversed with earlier came over.

Smiling to see him awake, he said, "Don't worry, you won't be punished for what just happened. You did what you thought was right. I wouldn't have done anything different."

Talfuric glared at him. No amount of kind words would ever excuse him from his kind deed in his eyes.

Giving him that cursed sad smile, the man grabbed him by the shoulder and led him over to where he had been interrogating the leader of the cultists.

He was tied up and gagged in a sitting position by a boulder. Talfuric looked at his face again, trying to recognize him, but the dried blood made it impossible.

Over the cultist stood a man in gleaming Stormwind Armor and a helmet that obscured his face. He didn't know who the man was based on his armor, but he did recognize the tabard. This man was a member of the Alliance Special Forces.

"Talfuric," the mage said, "let me introduce you to General Henry Bohun, leader of the Alliance Special Forces." Talfuric's eyes widened slightly at that revelation.

He bowed to the General. He did not return the favor.

"Right, now that greetings are over, let's get down to business," the General said in a deep voice.

Talfuric raised an eyebrow but said nothing.

"This man," he said pointing to the cultist, "is the leader of the Cult of the Demon Skull. Apparently, they were founded many years ago, with the purpose of resurrecting the Demon Lord Sargeras."

"Yes," Talfuric said, "I know. I wanted to ask you, mage, how this could be possible? Surely if you could resurrect someone with 50 deaths it would have been done before, but I have never heard anything like it."

The mage nodded. "As a matter of fact, you cannot resurrect someone with 50 men."

Talfuric nodded his understanding. "So then, this Cult was a nonsense group with no achievable purpose, correct?"

The mage shook his head. "Oh no. They have not only killed the people they've gathered from Goldshire. Apparently, they've killed over 20,000 people from all over Azeroth."

Talfuric paled. "How could this happen?" he asked the General.

"They captured only about 1 person per town they came upon. More from larger towns, and then when they did not get enough they started getting as many as they could from Goldshire. Such few people disappearing was hardly out of the ordinary," the General said.

Talfuric nodded. It made sense.

"Well, at least the threat is over," he said.

He paled even more when the General and mage shook their heads.

"According to him," the General said, pointing to the cultist, "this was only a small group. There are more all over Azeroth, trying to do the same thing,"

"How many?" Talfuric asked.

"Lets ask him!" said the General.

They were unable too, however, because at that moment a spinning blade, wreathed in flames, was thrown out of nowhere and impaled itself in the chest of the Cultist.

Talfuric recognized the blade.

It pulled itself out of the man and went over their shoulders, handle first, to return to the fist of it's thrower, a man dressed in black plate, riding a black dragon.