Holy Light Army

When Galen finally pinpointed Gandalf's teleportation, what greeted him was not a scene, but an apocalyptic aftermath. The detonation of Rakeesh's colossal Gundam's fel energy core had unleashed a cataclysmic force, a raw power that rivaled Mannoroth's own infernal might. The revered Seat of Naaru was utterly annihilated, its very foundations vaporized.

Volos, once a beacon of light, was reduced to a grotesque mosaic of shattered fragments, scattered across the scorched earth—a puzzle so irrevocably broken that even the Prime Naaru, Xe'ra, could never reassemble it. Yet, amidst this devastation, a miracle: Gandalf's elite guard and the Draenei troops, shielded by Velen's impenetrable Holy Light barrier, had miraculously survived, their forms preserved against the blast.

All but two. Two stark, horrifying figures lay at the epicenter, undeniable in their finality. Galen's gaze locked onto them: one, unmistakably Aragorn's, the other, a towering Eredar, his crimson skin appearing as if it had been flayed and then steeped in corrosive acid.

Velen, his ancient frame trembling, stumbled through the debris, his face a mask of profound, soul-wrenching grief—the agony of a father who had lost his sons. And indeed, he had. Galen, recalling the chilling Legion scenario battle, understood the grim tapestry of cause and effect. As if drawn by an unseen force, Velen's head snapped towards Galen.

"I am broken, Galen," his voice rasped, raw with self-reproach. "Because of my failure, Brother Aragorn was sacrificed!"

Since their emergence from the Altar of Kings, the four heroes had been untouched by true death, save for Gandalf's singular, faked demise in Karazhan, masked by an arcane puppet. The secret of their physical resurrection had remained an impenetrable mystery. "Do not mourn Aragorn,"

Galen stated, his voice a low, unfathomable current. "We possess a hidden method to reclaim him from the clutches of death, to pull him back into this world." His gaze sharpened, piercing Velen. "But you, old Velen… are you truly alright?"

A flicker of desperate hope ignited in Velen's eyes at the mention of Aragorn's potential return, a minuscule reprieve from the crushing weight of guilt that had settled upon him, a guilt born from his own actions affecting Aragorn's final stand.

"I knew this moment would come," Velen whispered, his voice thick with sorrow. He knelt beside Rakeesh's lifeless form, cradling his son's head. "I… I foresaw it… but until now, I never truly understood the horror of it." The ancient prophet began to unravel a tale steeped in tragedy: "In the distant past, on the very day my son was born, a chilling vision seized me. I saw myself holding a dying Eredar, weeping over a form ravaged by fel blisters and grotesque scars." His voice cracked. "But when Kil'jaeden tore my family from me, I buried that premonition, sealing it away in the darkest recesses of my memory for countless millennia. Now, as I hold him in my arms, the prophecy screams its truth, finally understood." He looked up, his eyes hollow.

"Galen, Gevos has fallen. There is no Naaru left here to decipher the Heart of Holy Light. Please… take it away from this place…"

The bitter irony was not lost on Velen: he had only just confronted the traitor Talgath, who had orchestrated the murder of his wife and children, and now, he cradled the body of his own son. A profound weariness settled over him, a despair he had never known, not even during the twenty thousand years of relentless interstellar flight, leading the Draenei through the cosmos, fleeing an endless shadow.

Galen, himself a father of three, felt a chilling empathy for Velen's profound agony. He understood the depths of the old prophet's despair. Talgath, once Velen's most trusted lieutenant, had been tasked with safeguarding his wife and son during the desperate flight from Argus. Yet, Velen's judgment had been fatally flawed; his command, tragically lax.

Tal'gath had long since pledged his soul to Kil'jaeden, a viper in Velen's inner circle, orchestrating a direct, brutal betrayal. The consequence: Velen's wife and children delivered directly into Kil'jaeden's demonic grasp.

Neither Talgath nor Kil'jaeden had ever revealed the truth of Velen's boundless love to Rakeesh. Instead, they meticulously twisted the narrative of Velen's agonizing flight from Argus, transforming it into a vile tale of a coward who lacked the courage to embrace the Legion's "blessing," a craven who abandoned his family and fled with a band of equally spineless devotees.

Their ultimate, sadistic goal: to orchestrate a day of reckoning, to force Velen to endure the unimaginable torment of killing his own son, or being slain by him. "We have all fallen," their silent taunt echoed, "why should you remain aloof? Are you the only one blessed, the only one untouched by damnation?" Kil'jaeden's malevolent machinations had indeed exacted a terrible price, his grand, evil design culminating in this moment.

The shattered remains of the fel mecha, scattered across the landscape, bore testament to its monstrous power. Now, the ancient, white-haired Velen, a being who had witnessed twenty millennia of cosmic history, was forced to bid farewell to his crimson-skinned, youthful son, and to carry Aragorn, who had walked with thunder, into the unknown.

"Galen," Velen rasped, his voice barely a whisper, "perhaps you should seek A'dal. He is one of the ancient Naaru, perhaps he possesses the knowledge to activate the Heart of Light."

He lowered his gaze to his son's face, a profound weariness in his eyes. "Go… The Holy Light here is dead. New Shattrath holds nothing more for you. I… I need to remain with him, just for a while."

Galen watched, a strange, knowing glint in his eyes, as Rakeesh's spirit flickered, attempting to tear free from Azeroth and plunge into the Twisting Nether.

"Velen," Galen's voice cut through the air, sharp and direct, "I told you I possess a secret to resurrect Aragorn. Why do you not ask if I can snatch your son's soul from Kil'jaeden's very grasp?"

Velen's head snapped up, his ancient eyes wide with a sudden, impossible disbelief.

"Galen… can you truly do this?" Velen's grief was not merely for Rakeesh's death, but for the horrifying knowledge that the Burning Legion wielded the power of resurrection. Aragorn's return was a possibility, for the Holy Light could recall the dead, or perhaps his soul had been preserved. But Rakeesh… his son's soul had been twisted into a monstrous, insane parody by Kil'jaeden.

The souls of fallen demons, once released, always returned to the Twisting Nether for their rebirth. No one, not even Azeroth's demigods of death, had ever intercepted them!

"Velen," Galen declared, a subtle power thrumming in his voice, "your Draenei Holy Light is but a fraction of my own!" With a silent, terrible command, Galen uttered a single word: "Receive!" Rakeesh's soul, poised on the precipice of escaping Azeroth's barrier, was violently wrenched back, a screaming torrent of energy forced into the Altar of Kings.

"Come," Galen commanded, his voice resonating with an almost divine authority, "and bear witness to a miracle!" Velen, clinging to this impossible hope, did not follow Galen immediately to Minas Tirith.

Instead, he remained in the shattered ruins of New Shattrath, a shepherd comforting his traumatized flock, and relentlessly purging the lingering resistance of Jaraxxus and his demonic legions. Two days later, with New Shattrath slowly clawing its way back from the brink, Velen and Maraad finally set forth for the White City.

In the fragmented echoes of time Galen knew, Velen had endured countless trials and unfathomable tragedies in his relentless war against the Burning Legion, his faith in the Holy Light an unyielding beacon. Until the shattering revelation: the architect of the Legion's terror was his own son.

This discovery had been a seismic shock, a blow that threatened to unravel his very soul. Yet, even amidst such soul-crushing anguish, Velen had remained steadfast, his commitment to his sacred mission unwavering, forcing him to make the ultimate, agonizing sacrifice: to eliminate his own flesh and blood for the salvation of Azeroth.

But it was this crucible of experience that subtly, irrevocably, reshaped his perception of the Holy Light. Had it not been for this, when Illidan's demonic eye-beams obliterated Xe'ra, Velen would not have stood silent, his sword sheathed, unlike Turalyon's righteous fury. Instead, he had merely, chillingly, ordered the coalition soldiers to cast Xe'ra's shattered remains into the furnace.

Perhaps it was then, in that moment of profound disillusionment, that he began to question the very essence of the Light, and the Naaru's decree that had forced his desperate flight from Argus.

To Galen, Velen had always been a figure of profound respect: a gentle, noble, and fiercely responsible elder, his wisdom honed to a razor's edge. Crucially, he carried the weight of over twenty thousand five hundred years of interstellar odyssey—a depth of experience unmatched by any leader on Azeroth, not even the ancient Azshara.

This alone solidified Velen's standing as an indispensable ally in Galen's eyes, even as the Draenei's power had dwindled to its lowest ebb. As Velen finally reached the Minas Tirith's chapel, a startling sight seized his attention in the courtyard: two holy warriors engaged in a brutal, rhythmic sparring match.

One was Turalyon, his form a blur of golden light as he wielded the familiar Soulrender. But it was Turalyon's opponent who riveted Velen's gaze: a red-skinned Eredar, his powerful torso bare. From Velen's vantage, the Eredar's exposed back was a canvas of intricate, glowing golden patterns, extending across his shoulders, down his arms, and along his legs. A Lightforged.

For eons, Velen had believed only the Naaru possessed the divine spark to forge such champions. But witnessing similar Lightforged paladins within Galen's ranks had shattered that dogma; Galen was no mere mortal, or rather, the power he commanded transcended mortal comprehension. Velen had once sought answers from A'dal regarding the Lightforging ritual—a sacred, agonizing empowerment practiced by the Army of the Light.

It involved the infusion of colossal, raw Holy Light into a warrior's very being, etching luminous patterns onto their skin, much like the conduits of a demon hunter, enabling them to channel and condense the Light with unparalleled efficiency, while simultaneously augmenting their physical prowess and extending their lifespan. But the true, terrifying transformation lay deeper: Lightforging irrevocably bound the warrior's soul to the Light, twisting them into semi-holy, living weapons.

"Hah!" A guttural battle cry ripped through the air, jolting Velen from his trance. The Lightforged Eredar, a whirlwind of crimson fury, swung a massive warhammer, unleashing a relentless, brutal assault upon Turalyon. His wild, sweeping strikes, though leaving momentary vulnerabilities, were always followed by the Eredar's shield, which snapped into place with chilling precision, deflecting Turalyon's greatsword at the absolute last instant.

"Rakeesh…" Velen breathed the name, a complex tapestry of emotions flickering in his ancient eyes.

"Quite the spectacle, isn't it?" Galen's voice, a low, knowing rumble, emerged from behind him.

"His combat skills… Kil'jaeden trained him exceptionally well." Trained him to kill me, the unspoken thought echoed in Velen's mind, a dark secret he kept hidden. His tortured history with Kil'jaeden was a labyrinth of betrayal, too intricate to unravel in mere words.

"I apologize for subjecting Rakeesh directly to the Lightforging ritual," Galen stated, his gaze fixed on the brutal dance between Velen's son and Turalyon. "His body and soul were utterly consumed by fel. Only the Lightforging could scour that corruption clean."

"I understand, Galen. There is no need for regret." To Velen, this miraculous outcome was a divine blessing, a chance at redemption for his tormented soul.

"I thank you for this profound gift. This… this is the redemption I prayed for." Galen offered a faint, enigmatic smile, accepting the gratitude. The ancient prophet was an asset beyond measure. Galen had already irrevocably twisted the threads of this world's destiny, countless known events now fractured and altered. Velen's prophetic sight, especially with the Ata'mal Crystal, would be an invaluable weapon in the coming assault on Argus.

While D'ore and K'ure offered glimpses of the future, their fragmented visions paled before Velen's profound insight, amplified by one of the legendary Ata'mal Crystals—artifacts of power far surpassing any lesser Naaru.

"Perhaps I should grant you both some privacy," Galen murmured, his gaze noting the shift in the courtyard.

The battle was concluding, Velen's son now clearly dominating Turalyon. With a knowing nod, the ever-tactful Turalyon followed Galen, leaving the red-skinned Eredar and the blue-skinned prophet alone. Despite their starkly contrasting complexions, an undeniable, haunting resemblance etched itself across their faces.

"Rakeesh…" Velen began, his voice laced with a fragile hope.

"Hmph!" The Lightforged Rakeesh, his eyes burning with a cold, fierce light, spat the word. "Rakeesh is dead. You chose that, Prophet!"

He jabbed a finger at the grotesque network of scars marring his chest, so deep and numerous that even the luminous Lightforged patterns could not conceal them.

"For over ten thousand years, Talgath and Kil'jaeden molded me. Every agonizing day, they poured their venom into my mind, brainwashing me, all for one purpose: that when I finally stood before you, I would crush your skull with this hammer!" A heavy silence descended, thick with unspoken accusations. When Velen offered no immediate response, Rakeesh's verbal assault intensified, each word a poisoned dart.

"They painted you as a father who abandoned his wife and infant son in their darkest hour! A traitor who betrayed your closest friend, Kil'jaeden, and your 'loyal' subordinate, Talgath!" His voice dropped to a chilling whisper. "You should count yourself blessed that I have returned to the Light. Otherwise, the raw, burning hatred, the searing pain, the unbridled fury that still courses through my veins would compel me to tear you apart where you stand!"

Velen's mind reeled, plunging into the abyss of his memories.

"Rakeesh, listen to me," he pleaded, his voice cracking with desperation. "When we fled the inferno of Argus, I entrusted Talgath with your lives, with your mother Nuri's life, to bring you both to safety." His gaze was haunted. "But I could not have known… Talgath was a viper, already sworn to Kil'jaeden's darkness. I believed you and your mother had perished in the cosmic void. I never dared to dream I would ever see you again, Rakeesh."

Tears, hot and raw, streamed down the ancient prophet's face, stripping away the impenetrable facade of his millennia-old composure. In that agonizing moment, he was not the revered Prophet, but simply a father—a broken man consumed by grief, consumed by a desperate longing for his lost family.

"Tell me, my child… is Nuri… well?" he choked out.

"My poor mother… she died over ten thousand years ago," Rakeesh snarled, each word a shard of ice.

"In her final, agonizing moments, she cried out your name—alone! You failed her!"

The crushing revelation of his beloved Nuri's death, coupled with his son's venomous accusations, shattered Velen's spirit, leaving him reeling. Yet, with a monumental effort, he steadied his trembling form, and began to speak, pouring out the raw, unvarnished truth, desperate to tear down the edifice of lies, to prove he had never, never abandoned them.

High above, from the apex of Minas Tirith's tallest spire…

"What a truly moving family drama," Galen mused, a sardonic twist to his lips as he maintained his scrying spell.

"If we captured this on a memory crystal and staged it as a play, the Alliance nobles would devour it whole." Turalyon, his face contorted in discomfort, covered his eyes.

"Galen, is it not… profoundly improper to intrude upon the Prophet's personal agony like this?"

"You are free to depart," Galen retorted, a faint smirk playing on his features. "The portal is open, turn right—" Turalyon's feet, however, remained rooted, betraying his feigned discomfort. His mouth might protest, but his body remained enthralled. "Hah. Hypocrite."

After a prolonged, silent vigil, they witnessed a fragile, temporary truce descend between father and son. Rakeesh's soul, purged of its fel corruption and the insidious brainwashing, had been restored to a semblance of sanity. His rationality rekindled, he was finally willing to listen to Velen's desperate explanations.

Yet, a chilling resolve hardened Rakeesh's gaze: one day, he vowed, he would return to Argus, to confront Kil'jaeden himself, to tear the truth from the demon lord's grasp and verify Velen's every word. A dark question lingered: would Kil'jaeden ever truly align with Velen's narrative? But Velen, his spirit buoyed by this fragile connection, did not falter. He believed time, and the unwavering truth of the Light, would ultimately prove everything. Eventually, Rakeesh would truly accept him, truly forgive him.

"Thank you, Galen," Velen's voice was thick with emotion, "You have granted me the impossible: a chance to reunite with my son. He is as precious to me as my very people." Velen and Rakeesh, a stark tableau of reconciliation, approached Galen together.

"I believed I would never again have the opportunity to mend what was broken," Rakeesh stated, his voice devoid of its former venom.

"Thank you… and thank the Light." Galen offered a rare, genuine smile. "Congratulations, Prophet. And to you, Rakeesh—may this reunion finally bring you the peace you deserve." His expression then hardened, a predatory glint entering his eyes. "Now… let us proceed with our true plans."

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

Back to present...

Deep within the hallowed halls of Minas Tirith's palace, Galen and Velen stood embroiled in a clandestine discussion. Galen produced the very artifact that had drawn the Legion's wrath upon New Shattrath. His fingers, almost caressing, traced the contours of the blade-shaped crystal, the Heart of the Holy Light.

Hum! A blinding, pure radiance of Holy Light erupted from the crystal, instantly engulfing the entire hall in its ethereal glow. A towering, humanoid silhouette of pure light coalesced in the air, its form shimmering, and Galen could almost feel the presence of vast, folded wings behind it.

"Azeroth…" a voice, ancient and desperate, resonated from the projection, "May this final, agonizing plea of the Army of the Light reach you safely! We can endure no longer. A thousand years of relentless holy war have bled us dry, leaving us utterly exhausted. We stand on the precipice of annihilation! Help us, Prophet. Help us, warriors of Azeroth. If you succeed, the Light will endure! If you fail… then all worlds shall perish!"

Whoosh! The spectral projection flickered, then vanished, violently retracting back into the heart of the crystal, leaving an oppressive silence in its wake.

"That was merely the surface-level plea," Galen stated, his hand withdrawing the crystal with a swift, possessive motion before Velen could even reach for it.

"This artifact was ripped from the very core of Xe'ra, the Prime Naaru herself—the genesis of her kind, forged from the primordial essence of Light during the cosmic ordering of Light and Shadow."

Yes, a Naaru of an age far beyond A'dal's.

"Using one of the legendary Pillars of Creation—the Tears of Elune—I tore open the encrypted layers within this crystal, revealing its true, chilling depths." A faint, cynical smirk touched Galen's lips.

"To believe a mere 'Chosen One' could alter a future of utter destruction… Xe'ra gravely underestimated Sargeras." Velen, his expression unreadable, offered little reaction to Galen's blunt skepticism toward the Prime Naaru. The recent cataclysm, the decimation of his people, had already irrevocably fractured his once-unwavering devotion to the Naaru.

Then, Galen began to unveil secrets, truths even Velen, the ancient prophet, had never glimpsed: "Perhaps you were unaware, but in the devastating aftermath of Argus's fall, Xe'ra, in her desperate gambit, marshaled the finest, most unyielding warriors among the Eredar to forge the Army of the Light." His voice dropped, laden with the weight of cosmic history.

"This nascent Army of the Light, aboard the colossal starship Xenedar, launched a suicidal assault on Argus itself—the very heart of the Burning Legion's power—igniting a brutal, thousand-year war." Galen knew the treacherous flow of time between the Twisting Nether and Azeroth made precise dating impossible, but in this altered timeline, without the formidable leadership of Turalyon and Alleria, the Army of the Light had been a rudderless blade, their achievements likely far less glorious than the legends he remembered.

Yet, their sacrifice was undeniable: they had, to some critical extent, diverted Kil'jaeden's infernal gaze, forcing the Burning Legion to delay its inevitable, cataclysmic invasion of Azeroth.

"And now," Galen continued, his voice grim, "the Army of the Light faces a dire, existential crisis—teetering on the very precipice of annihilation! They have no choice but to scream for our aid!"

The Army of the Light had bought Azeroth precious time, holding the Legion's monstrous attention. In a cruel twist of fate, the Legion's crushing defeats on Azeroth had, in turn, offered the Army of the Light a fleeting breath of recovery.

"According to Grand Matron Mother Shahraz, who defected to Illidan's command,"

Galen revealed, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial tone, "after Archimonde's demise, the Burning Legion descended into a maelstrom of chaos. Sargeras remains unseen, leaving the entire, sprawling, infernal bureaucracy to Kil'jaeden's sole, strained authority."

The crushing failure in the Mardum sector had ripped open deep fissures of discord within the Legion's ranks. Kil'jaeden, Galen surmised, was likely consumed with brutally suppressing rebellious demon lords, desperate to reassert control. The Burning Legion, a vast, monstrous military machine spanning half the known universe, was far from a unified entity.

Fel energy itself was pure chaos, and the demons who wielded it were no different. Before Sargeras's iron will bent them into a cohesive force, these disparate races had waged eternal, internecine wars for their own twisted desires. Kil'jaeden and Archimonde were merely the two most formidable warlords, latecomers who had clawed their way to the apex of this infernal hierarchy.

When this critical intelligence reached Galen, his mind immediately conjured the brutal dynamics of ancient Rome's great families in Total War: the Julii carving out empires in the north, the Brutii subjugating Greece, the Scipii battling across North Africa. Regardless of their individual conquests, once these factions swelled beyond the Senate's control, civil war became an inescapable, bloody certainty.

The Burning Legion, Galen realized, had reached precisely this volatile stage. Kil'jaeden, trapped at the Legion's infernal headquarters on Argus, was struggling, desperately, to rein in the myriad, ambitious demon lords scattered across the cosmos. In the original timeline, even after Kil'jaeden's downfall and Sargeras's imprisonment, the Burning Legion had not been utterly annihilated; it had merely shattered into countless, warring factions, a cosmic hydra with too many heads. After all, this was a force that spanned half the known universe, and the Army of the Light could only ever hope to reclaim a sliver of its vast dominion.

Though Galen now commanded a population nearing a billion, supported by a formidable military force of three to four million, even he understood the necessity of adhering to Illidan's ruthless, original strategy: a lightning-fast, surprise assault on Argus, a surgical decapitation strike aimed directly at Kil'jaeden. Kil'jaeden and Archimonde, along with their Eredar lieutenants, had been the architects of order, imposing a semblance of structure upon the inherently chaotic demonic hordes.

This, combined with Sargeras's unmatched, terrifying power, was what had transformed the Burning Legion into the existential terror of civilizations across the cosmos. If they could strike at the Legion's very heart before reinforcements could converge, eliminate Kil'jaeden, and imprison Sargeras, the Legion would inevitably shatter without its unifying, tyrannical leaders, rendering it a far less formidable, though still dangerous, threat.

"Heh." Velen let out a soft, almost imperceptible chuckle, a rare sound. His mood, lately, had been unusually, unsettlingly bright. "Kil'jaeden is… exceptionally capable. Knowing him as I do, I suspect he will resolve this internal strife before long."

It was clear: Velen, despite everything, still held Kil'jaeden in a chillingly high regard. Among the Eredar triumvirate, Velen had been the spiritual beacon, spreading the Light's tenets. Archimonde, the brute force, had commanded armies, crushing foes with raw might. But Kil'jaeden… he had been the true, insidious ruler of Argus in spirit.

A genius among geniuses, even among the gifted Eredar, his brilliance had been unmatched for millennia.

"Which is precisely why," Galen interjected, a predatory grin spreading across his face, as if struck by a sudden, wicked inspiration, "we must give him more to deal with—we must shatter his plans!"

"Oh?" Velen responded, a flicker of dark amusement in his eyes.

"I would be… most glad to assist."