“I kinda figured there’d be more here,” Sayaadi said, looking over the outside of the Exodar crash site.

          “They may have gone inside,” Man’ar said. “Jarigise may have called them in there because he found a serious thre— oh crap.”

          Before the last words had left his mouth, Man’ar was sprinting towards the closest entrance, Sayaadi and Ilthilior close behind. Come on, Velen, hang in there…

          Suddenly a sharp pain shot into his back. He turned around to see a troll some yards away, his bow in hand. He pulled out his own bow in retaliation, whipping out an arrow from the quiver on his pants and shooting it with impeccable speed. The arrow struck right in the attacker’s heart, dropping him like a fly.

          Hearing a crack behind him, he turned in time to see Sayaadi’s thunder bolt electrocuting an orc. Man’ar reached to his back and pulled out the arrow, wincing in pain as the wound opened deeper. Ilthilior turned to him and waved his hand in Man’ar’s direction. A soothing wind enveloped him, and the pain slowly started to fade. He nodded in thanks and turned to help Sayaadi.

          “Man’ar, where’s Maladath? We could use him right abow now,” Sayaadi yelled as two tauren ran towards her, massive weapons in tow.

          Man’ar nodded again, placed his fingers to his mouth, and let out a loud, shrill whistle. Immediately a bolt of lightning struck the larger one from the sky, followed by a burst of freezing wind. The warrior fell to the ground, breathing heavily, helpless as Man’ar drew his spear and impaled him. As he did, his beloved Maladath swooped down from the sky. The blue and purple chimaera stabbed the second one with the blades on the lower jaw of both its heads, then lashed at her with its two tails. Its jet black eyes affixed on the kill, it withdrew the blades from the tauren’s flesh, and its left head snapped shut on its neck. The victim let out a shriek of pain, which slowly wavered as she died.

          “Good work, Maladath,” he said, stroking its two heads, The chimaera let out a quiet sound of pleasure as it followed him to the Exodar.

          The ramp down to the Seat of the Naaru was empty, strangely enough. The reinforcements were either not here yet, or already slain. Neither possibility was any good. “Wait… where’s O’ros? Wouldn’t he have done some serious damage to these forces?” Man’ar said.

          Sayaadi looked down the huge circular ramp, and her expression turned rock-hard. “Not as much as we would hope.”

          Man’ar followed Sayaadi’s gaze, and his stomach turned. Below, where once there was a being of greatest light, there was nothing but crystalline fragments. How they had done it was incomprehensible, but they’d done it… they’d killed the naaru.

          Ilthilior looked down alongside them. “How did they manage that?” he said incredulously.

          Man’ar shook his head, peeling his gaze away from the horrific sight. “We can worry about O’ros later. Velen’s in danger, and we have to find him now.” With that, he turned and ran down the ramp.

          He started to run to the Vault of Lights, but before he had stepped too far into them, he heard shouts of battle in another area of the wrecked ship. Listening carefully, he ran to its source, Sayaadi, Maladath, and Ilthilior behind him.

          As he ran, he nearly tripped on a corpse. He looked down to see a huge tauren, an important looking one, dead on the ground. As he looked around he saw a very fancily-dressed blood elf body. Were these two Horde leaders?

A dull whistle sounded right by his ear as a bolt of shadow spell whizzed by his head, missing by mere inches. Looking at a ledge above, he saw a large group of Horde fighters alongside an important-looking orc – Thrall, he thought – an undead elf wielding a bow with amazing prowess, and another undead wearing purple robes and an odd, large-looking collar… Jarigise.

          Looking to the figure locked in combat with them, he saw a familiar figure… the Prophet. He was being forced back, but was also casting spells almost endlessly. Beams of light burst out of thin air and pierced his targets’ flesh. Man’ar, realizing there was no way Velen could win alone, let out a bellow of rage and held his hand to the sky. Suddenly, bolts of shadow energy rained on the Horde army, exploding on contact and forcing many of them back. The ones that didn’t die quickly focused their attention on Man’ar, Sayaadi, and Ilthilior, leaving only Jarigise, Thrall, Sylvanas, and a handful of troops on Velen. Man’ar rose his bow and fired a quick arrow at Jarigise, hitting him in the arm. The warlock yelled out in pain and turned in the offender’s direction. His eyeless sockets narrowed in anger when his magic-granted sight caught Man’ar.

Suddenly, Man’ar was tossed upward. A pillar of flame had risen from the ground and thrown him up, severely burning his arm. He shouted in agony, but was forced to turn to the many Horde soldiers advansing upon them. Rising his spear with his good arm, he stabbed one soldier through the heart, then withdrew and slashed another’s throat. With that, he turned and ran, knowing he couldn’t handle that many. Sayaadi held her hand out and threw one troop into a few others, and Ilthilior’s magic generated a small tornado, tossing a large portion of the troops back and forth. They, too, quickly turned and ran.

Man’ar made the mistake of turning back to see a horrific sight. Velen was standing still, a blank look on his face. A sword that seemed to be made of pure flame had pierced straight through him. As the great prophet fell to the ground, Jarigise grinned horribly and sheathed his magical blade. Not even having time to shout in sorrow, Man’ar kept running… knowing that the master of his whole race had fallen before his very eyes, and he hadn’t been able to stop it.

AUTHOR TALK:

So far, this has been my favorite scene to work on, I've worked out how I want the end to turn out (SPOILER: haha yeah right, are you fucking serious)

A lot of major lore figures will end up dead in here, and considering I killed off four in this chapter alone, you can expect more to come. It's sudden, yes, but I can't find a way at all to fit Cairne and Lor'themar in there. Plus, Velen had to die in order for the plan to work.

For the most part, I've worked out most of the issues I had before, mainly whether Sylvanas will feature prominently as a main character. And no, she will not, unfortunately. Sorry, Sylvanas fans, but it was getting too hard to work her in to a story about a deranged tyrant loner.

Chapter four should be up tomorrow, but no guarantees on that, because I'm back to school and all.