FALL!

Whether facing a powerful lich whose magic could ignore protective enchantments, shatter defensive barriers, and annihilate souls with pure lightning, or confronting armored death knights whose very presence froze the blood of mortal warriors, Sylvanas never missed her target.

Or perhaps the target was a death knight whose martial prowess had been enhanced by undeath, skilled in using dark magic to constantly repair battle damage to his rotting corpse. Sylvanas's arrows, fired with the velocity of falling stars, invariably found the critical weak points in a death knight's armor as he charged forward at supernatural speed.

Then there were the pathetic demon spawn that had crawled out of whatever hellish caverns birthed them. Those wretched creatures that had once been spider demons, even when they burrowed underground seeking safety, would be obliterated by the massive power of her thunder-enhanced arrows unless they had dug themselves graves deep enough to reach the planet's core.

Sylvanas had become a living banner of hope, inspiring every elf who witnessed her lethal artistry.

Many elves had fallen behind during the initial chaos, and similarly, many others had found themselves trapped in various deadly situations throughout the forest and city. But when they saw Sylvanas cutting through the undead hordes with ruthless efficiency, they abandoned their hiding places and joined her crusade without a moment's hesitation.

To the north!

To the north!

Advance relentlessly northward!

Exterminate those putrid undead abominations and their demonic allies!

Keep slaughtering, keep butchering! Cut down everything in their path until they reached Silvermoon City, until they could see their families, their beloved king!

The magnificent platinum and gold gates of Silvermoon City had been completely obliterated!

Rubble and devastation stretched in every direction!

Blood painted every surface in crimson horror!

Death had claimed dominion over everything they could see!

However, none of this mattered—their unshakeable belief in defending their homeland sustained them through the nightmare.

They followed the ranger hero Sylvanas, who had returned from distant campaigns on the far southern continent, ready to die for their cause.

As the number of undead creatures swarming the battlefield increased exponentially, the strike team's progress slowed to a bloody crawl. Paradoxically, this deceleration allowed the scattered elves behind them to catch up and rejoin the fight. Combined with reinforcements arriving desperately from the eastern and western districts of the city, their army of loyalists grew larger and more formidable with each passing hour.

Quantitative change eventually triggered qualitative transformation. When their numbers exceeded ten thousand battle-hardened warriors, the undead army defending the approaches to Silvermoon City's gates finally began to crack under the relentless pressure.

"CHARGE!"

"For the Quel'dorei!"

"For Quel'Thalas!"

The battle cry was answered by a thunderous magical bombardment as Prince Kael'thas, who had been conducting patrol operations in the kingdom's eastern territories, arrived at the crucial moment. He unleashed an eighteen-shot Pyroblast barrage that carved a path of absolute destruction through the densest concentration of undead forces. As the prince absorbed the residual fire elements from his devastating spell, the passage to the royal palace lay completely open.

However, the scene that greeted them after this victory filled every elf in the army with growing dread.

After smashing through the undead army positioned near the city gates, they encountered neither survivors nor fresh corpses along their entire route.

This absence of life sent waves of ominous foreboding through every elven heart.

No one spoke a word as they followed Sylvanas and Kael'thas in their desperate rush toward the Court of the Sun.

Crimson columns rose majestically.

Golden spires gleamed in the unnatural light.

Snow-white marble floors reflected their approach.

The breathtakingly gorgeous palace appeared exactly as pristine, solemn, and beautiful as it had been the previous day.

Compared to the collapsed ruins and devastation that surrounded it, the contrast was as stark as the difference between paradise and the deepest pits of hell.

Initially, Kael'thas felt a surge of relief washing over him, but just as he was about to set foot on the palace stairs, Sylvanas's arm blocked his path.

"Where the fuck are the royal guards?!" Sylvanas's sharp observation sent ice through Kael'thas's veins.

Exactly right!

Absolutely fucking right!

Under normal circumstances, every single step leading to the royal court was guarded by pairs of royal spellbreakers, each wielding large, nearly oval-shaped crimson shields and wickedly sharp double-edged swords.

Now, not a single guard could be seen anywhere.

Could it possibly mean that...

The terrible uneasiness that had been gnawing at their hearts spread like wildfire through every elf present.

Just as Kael'thas could no longer contain himself and was preparing to storm inside with his forces, the massive doors of the royal court swung open with deliberate ceremony.

No light emanated from within the enormous doorway.

Because the sky remained shrouded by the supernatural canopy of undead magic and the entire city was choked with pale, icy mist, even the rangers' supernaturally keen eyesight couldn't penetrate the darkness within the royal court. They could only make out a single figure in elaborate royal garments walking slowly out of the court, accompanied by a faint, otherworldly luminescence.

After thousands of years of shared history, that silhouette and those distinctive royal robes were unmistakable!

"Father!?" Kael'thas broke free from Sylvanas's restraining grip with desperate joy and rushed forward, bounding up seven steps in a single breath.

The next moment, the prince's body froze solid as if struck by a petrification curse.

The prince's identification had been correct!

Standing at the main entrance of the royal court was indeed the King of Quel'Thalas, the great Anasterian Sunstrider!

But—

This was the Sun King appearing before his royal army as one of the immortal undead.

Even as a high elf blessed with a lifespan measured in millennia, Anasterian had been visibly aged, his face marked by age spots and deep wrinkles that no magic could conceal, his arms and fingers rendered skeletal by time, his once-proud frame slightly hunched by the weight of centuries.

At this moment, apart from his hunched posture having straightened to regal bearing once again, what immediately commanded attention was his deathly pale skin and his eyes that now glowed with the spectral blue fire of undeath.

"No... this is fucking impossible! With my father's incredible power, how could he have been defeated so easily..." Kael'thas's voice trembled with the breaking of his world, and his outstretched left hand shook uncontrollably.

After the living are slaughtered by the Scourge, they inevitably transform into undead through the corruption of evil magic—this was common knowledge throughout the realm.

But Kael'thas simply could not accept that his father, who possessed the backing of the Sunwell's infinite mana veins, could have been killed so effortlessly and then reanimated as a goddamn lich!

Kael'thas wasn't the only one horrified by this revelation. Every single elf who witnessed this soul-crushing scene in the square before the royal court was shocked into a state of complete mental shutdown. At this moment, they had entirely lost their capacity for rational thought, and every elf stared at their king—who had crossed into the realm of the undead—with blank, lifeless eyes.

Three thousand years!

Anasterian had ruled the High Elf Kingdom for three thousand fucking years!

For humans in the world of Azeroth, whose average lifespan barely reached thirty years, this represented over a hundred complete lifetimes.

This span of time was so vast that the fundamental fact of 'Anasterian is our king' had been burned into the deepest core of every elf's soul.

This seemed to be the most immutable law of their world!

However, their king had not only died but had been transformed into an undead abomination!?

This wasn't merely catastrophic news—it was a complete collapse of both soul and faith!

Prince Kael'thas struggled for what felt like an eternity before finally managing to force out these words: "Father... why did this happen!? Did you actually lose the battle?"

"Lose!?" Anasterian's facial muscles, now maintained purely by the artificial animation of dark magic, contorted into an expression of absolute rage: "Lose!? I didn't lose to that rotting bastard Antonidas! I lost to myself! I lost to the passage of time! I lost to this decrepit, failing body! If I weren't so fucking ancient, I could have drawn unlimited power from the Sunwell and obliterated any invader who dared set foot in my kingdom! How could I have been subdued by a mere cursed blade like Frostmourne?"

Subdued!?

The moment the former Sun King finished his bitter confession, every knowledgeable elf in the square could visualize the scene in their minds—the Sun King had indeed resisted and fought with everything he possessed. If he had been a thousand years younger, if he had still been in his prime as a Sunwell Archmage, he certainly could have ignored all magical limitations and drawn upon the infinite power of the Sunwell to annihilate every single invading enemy.

Unfortunately, age had claimed its inevitable victory.

Both his total mana capacity and his ability to channel magical energy had declined catastrophically over the centuries.

So he had lost the battle!

But this was not the end of their story!