Westfall Tanks
"Pew!"
A flare, perfectly timed for maximum drama, shot into the sky, and the forest northeast of Westfall instantly erupted into sheer, unadulterated chaos.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
A steel behemoth, gleaming menacingly, burst through the treeline, flattening ancient oaks like toothpicks. Then a second. Then a third—
Siege Tanks. Not just any Siege Tanks. These were the latest, most absurdly over-engineered war machines jointly developed by those perpetually squabbling geniuses, the gnomes and goblins. They'd ditched the clunky, perpetually leaky steam-powered cores of their predecessors in favor of roaring, high-output petroleum combustion engines. Around these mechanical titans, infantrymen with gleaming swords and shields, along with sharpshooting riflemen, formed a protective screen, looking remarkably calm for people standing next to explosions.
"Open fire! Fire at will! Someone call my mother, I'm famous!" "Finally, something to blow up that isn't our own training dummy!"
The tank crews were practically vibrating with ecstatic glee, their excited chatter flooding the arcane comms network, nearly drowning out the roar of their engines. And it was understandable, really—this was the grand debut of Stormwind's newly formed 6th Mechanized Legion, armed with cutting-edge, ridiculously expensive weaponry purchased at crippling cost from Stromgarde. The king himself, and practically everyone else with working eyeballs, was watching. This was their moment!
BOOM!
The lead tank, Tank One, fired first, a glorious, earth-shaking blast that utterly obliterated an infernal that had been lumbering sluggishly toward the fortress walls. It dissolved into a shower of green embers and frustrated screams.
"Direct hit! Nice shot, Tank One! Buy you a brew after this!"
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
The other tanks quickly joined the party, picking off targets with ruthless, almost gleeful efficiency. Green flames and shattered demon parts soared through the air.
"Tank Three here—got another one! All that grinding in the training grounds actually paid off!" "This is Six! Took another big ugly down—my compliments to the gunner!"
BOOM!
Another shell screamed through the air—but this time, the targeted infernal, clearly a veteran of many unpleasant projectile encounters, twisted its massive, rocky body. The projectile slammed into its hardened chest instead of its vulnerable, squishy joints.
"Whoa! That one just tanked the hit! We didn't penetrate! Get that thing a medal!" "Hah! Looks like Tank Two's crew needs to go back to boot camp in Arathi! Maybe they can learn how to hit a barn door!"
Amid the cheerful, slightly unhinged banter, the actual Legion fleet above finally took notice of the tiny, annoying metal bugs on the ground.
One of the dreadnaughts, a truly colossal behemoth of shadow and fel, slowly swiveled its main gun, its massive fel cannons charging with a sinister, power-hungry hum that vibrated through the very air.
WHOOSH!
A searing, green beam of pure, concentrated evil lanced toward the heart of the 6th Mechanized Legion.
"Damn it! Incoming! Scatter! SCATTER, YOU IDIOTS!"
BOOM!
The Legion's Not-So-Subtle Multi-Front Assault
Westfall, it turned out, wasn't the only battleground currently having a very bad day.
At nearly the exact same moment, reports flooded in from Hillsbrad Foothills, the Golden Plains, Tanaris, Azshara, and even the perpetually chilly Dun Morogh—all confirming that Legion dreadnaughts were descending from the skies like unholy, green-tinged rain.
Ironforge, Stormwind City, and even the notoriously self-interested Steamwheedle Cartel were, thankfully, holding their own. Otherwise, Stromgarde's territories would have faced even more incursions, and King Galen really didn't need that headache right now.
"Welp," mused Galen, watching the chaos unfold with an almost bored expression, "good thing I've got enough troops to go around. Kil'jaeden's 'all-in' push would've been a real headache otherwise. So impatient."
As he spoke, he casually raised a hand and, with no discernible effort, fired a beam of pure Holy Light skyward.
Directly above, a particularly menacing Legion dreadnaught's main cannon had just finished charging, glowing with malevolent fel energy, preparing to unleash a devastating blast at the Crusader's Fortress below.
The descending fel beam, a concentrated spear of green hatred, collided with Galen's righteous Holy Light in midair.
KABOOM!
The resulting explosion was blinding, a miniature sun of gold and emerald fire that roared and expanded, incinerating a few unlucky demon warriors and felguards who happened to be caught in the spectacular crossfire. Not even a tiny bit of them was left.
"Grand Marshal," Aegwynn said, stepping up beside Galen after ensuring the mages maintained the fortress's shimmering arcane barriers, "shall we deploy the 6th Legion now? Or would you prefer to just stand here and make things explode?"
"Ah, no rush, Lady Aegwynn," Galen replied, his eyes locked on the sky, a faint smile playing on his lips.
Twenty-two dreadnaughts. Just in this one sector.
If the other five invasion zones had the same numbers, Kil'jaeden had committed over a hundred ships to this initial, 'minor' assault.
But Galen, with his cosmic insights, knew the ugly truth—this was all just a spectacular, very expensive distraction.
The real prize, the grand target, was the slumbering Titan's corpse buried deep within the Tomb of Sargeras.
"The big fish hasn't taken the bait yet," Galen mused, almost to himself. "No need to reel in the net early. We need to let them think they're winning first."
Aegwynn nodded, a knowing smirk playing on her lips. The Golden Plains were ridiculously well-defended—between the Crusader's Fortress, those grumpy kobolds, the perpetually grumpy quillboar, their surprisingly eager centaur auxiliaries, and their own resident demigods, they could probably handle twice as many demons and still have time for tea.
"If we're fishing… why not add more bait?" she suggested, her eyes twinkling mischievously.
"Gandalf hasn't seen action in a while. That old man's bones must be positively gathering dust by now."
Galen blinked. A thought briefly crossed his mind. Had Gandalf pissed off his wife recently? Is that why she always suggests him for the most dangerous missions?
Well, better him than me, Galen decided with a shrug.
"You're the Governor of the Golden Plains, Lady Aegwynn. Your call—I'll just watch the show."
Aegwynn's smirk widened into a full-blown grin, and she strode off, already mentally picturing the havoc.
Soon, the massive Crusader's Fortress gates rumbled open, its magical barriers parting with an ethereal shimmer to allow a thousand-strong heavy cavalry charge—led, to the surprise of precisely no one, by a magnificent white-bearded old mage on a blindingly white stallion, his staff held high like a beacon of frosty doom.
It was Gandalf. And he looked annoyed.
"Ride out! For the Alliance! For glory! And for not being bored out of our skulls!"
The ancient wizard gripped the reins with one hand, his legendary Ebonyfrost Staff flashing with pure, raw power in the other.
Every pulse of his surging magic froze an infernal solid, leaving a magnificent trail of shattered, icy carnage in the cavalry's furious wake. It was beautiful. And utterly brutal.
The Legion fleet, naturally, noticed immediately. A demigod was a prize worth claiming, a soul worth corrupting, or at the very least, a nuisance worth vaporizing.
"Zakun! Deploy more troops! Their champion has shown himself—bring me his soul! I want it gift-wrapped!"
Two six-meter-tall fel lords, hulking masses of muscle and malice, stepped forward, each wielding a massive, wickedly sharp polearm axe. They looked ready to chew through mountains.
Without hesitation, they leapt from the dreadnaught, plummeting toward the battlefield like living meteors, their descent leaving streaks of green fire in the sky.
BOOM! BOOM!
They landed with enough force to shatter the earth, sending towering plumes of dust skyward and creating craters that would take decades to fill.
In moments, Gandalf and his valiant knights were completely surrounded, caught between two very angry, very large demons.
The old mage, ever the scholar, calmly studied the fel lords—evolved, deadlier versions of standard felguards, their brutality honed by millennia of slaughter across countless worlds. Fascinating.
"We are not alone, you overgrown brutes!" Gandalf roared, his voice ringing with power.
With a surge, brilliant blue mana erupted from Gandalf's body, swirling around him like a miniature blizzard, and his staff flared with incandescent power.
Hundreds of water elementals materialized around him—taller, fiercer than any seen before, their liquid forms armored in glacial ice, their limbs ending in razor-sharp frozen claws.
Ancient Glacial Elementals. The strongest of their kind, second only to the Elemental Lords themselves. And they looked hungry.