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Reign of Chaos
The Return of the Burning Legion (Warcraft 3: Reign
of Chaos)
After preparing for many long months, Kel'Thuzad and
his Cult of the Damned finally struck the first blow
by releasing the plague of undeath upon Lordaeron.
Uther and his fellow paladins investigated the
infected regions in the hope of finding a way to
stop the plague. Despite their efforts, the plague
continued to spread and threatened to tear the
Alliance apart.
As the ranks of the Undead swept across Lordaeron,
Terenas' only son, Prince Arthas, took up the fight
against the Scourge. Arthas succeeded in killing
Kel'Thuzad, but even so, the Undead ranks swelled
with every soldier that fell defending the land.
Frustrated and stymied by the seemingly unstoppable
enemy, Arthas took increasingly extreme steps to
conquer them. Finally Arthas' comrades warned him
that he was losing his hold on his humanity.
Arthas' fear and resolve proved to be his ultimate
undoing. He tracked the plague's source to
Northrend, intending to end its threat forever.
Instead, Prince Arthas eventually fell prey to the
Lich King's tremendous power. Believing that it
would save his people, Arthas took up the cursed
runeblade, Frostmourne. Though the sword did grant
him unfathomable power, it also stole his soul and
transformed him into the greatest of the Lich King's
death knights. With his soul cast aside and his
sanity shattered, Arthas led the Scourge against his
own kingdom. Ultimately, Arthas murdered his own
father, King Terenas, and crushed Lordaeron under
the Lich King's iron heel.
Sunwell -- The Fall of Quel'Thalas
Though he had defeated all of the people he now saw
as his enemies, Arthas was still haunted by the
ghost of Kel'Thuzad. The ghost told Arthas that he
needed to be revived for the next phase of the Lich
King's plan. To revive him, Arthas needed to bring
Kel'Thuzad's remains to the mystical Sunwell, hidden
within the high Elves' eternal kingdom of
Quel'Thalas.
Arthas and his Scourge invaded Quel'Thalas and laid
siege to the Elves' crumbling defenses. Sylvanas
Windrunner, the Ranger-General of Silvermoon, put up
a valiant fight, but Arthas eventually eradicated
the high elf army and won through to the Sunwell. In
a cruel gesture of his dominance, he even raised
Sylvanas' defeated body as a banshee, cursed to
endless undeath in the service of Quel'Thalas'
conqueror... . . .
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