Azeroth: Starting with Eagle Eye in the Necropolis

Page 14

“I understand, Lady Jaina. My Holy Light spells should be able to help.”

After discussing the matter together, Jaina cast an invisibility spell on Rhodes, and then took him back to the outskirts of Stratholme, where they gathered together some of the terrified people.

Among them were some Stratholme residents living elsewhere, and some merchants who had come from other places. No one knew exactly what had happened!

Everyone thought that after the prince arrived with his army, he would save them, but what awaited them was a massive blockade, with Arthas's army completely surrounding Stratholme.

At the gates of Stratholme.

“Your Highness, you’ve finally arrived. We’ve been feeling unwell, and there seems to be a problem with the grain that was shipped from Andorhal a few days ago,” an ordinary citizen said as he approached Arthas.

At this moment, Arthas's face was gloomy. There were many heavily armored warriors around him, all of whom had gloomy expressions and even covered their faces.

"Don't worry, I will save you. You are all citizens of Lordaeron, my citizens." Arthas patted Zheng Ming's shoulder gently.

He first calmed the other party down, and then, the moment the other party lowered their guard, he swung his warhammer and smashed the other party's head.

"My God! Your Highness, what are you doing?" The common people who witnessed all of this looked at Arthas in disbelief.

"I've come to save you. Don't worry, the Holy Light protects you." Arthas's voice was hoarse as he raised his warhammer.

The other human soldiers drew their swords, and a massacre ensued!

Screams! Curses! Blood! It stained the entire city red.

Chapter 26 The Game of the Dreadlord, The Slaughter Contest, Hell on Earth

Without mercy, without holding back, without the slightest hesitation, Arthas's soldiers slaughtered the entire Stratholme like a ruthless killing machine.

Countless citizens of Stratholme watched in disbelief as their beloved Prince Arthas turned against them.

The screams of innocent civilians, the wails of women before their massacre, and the cries of children stirred the compassion of countless Lordaeron soldiers.

Some soldiers even angrily threw off their helmets and questioned the prince, "Why are we raising our swords against our own people?"

Despite repeated explanations, Arthas was speechless. The little prince was on the verge of collapse, or rather, his moral defenses had crumbled.

The Dreadlord, who was watching all this, didn't want Arthas to fall into this state. "You have to start killing," he said, "you have to slaughter even faster."

"Hahaha! Young prince, your people are destined to be my army; they all want to join the Scourge." At this moment, a monster over 3 meters tall, with a pair of giant bat wings, a bald head, and demonic horns appeared before Arthas.

The newcomer was none other than Mal'Ganis, the dreadlord and the nominal ruler of the Scourge!

The actual vanguard of the Burning Legion.

"You damned demon, I swear, I will kill you!" Arthas roared, swinging his warhammer as he charged at the demon before him, only to find that the demon was merely an illusion.

"Don't be hasty, young prince. Our game has only just begun. If you don't want your people to fall into my hands, then kill them all. If you kill them faster than I do, they won't become my army." The illusory image of Mal'Ganis let out a strange laugh.

"I'd rather kill them all than hand them over to your demons. You'll never get them!" Arthas roared.

"Oh! You'd better speed things up! You can't go on like this." The Dreadlord's laughter echoed in the sky, and his phantom had vanished.

“We all saw the soldiers of Lordaeron. If we don’t kill them, they will become undead and be used by that demon!”

So don't hesitate any longer!

"I know you are in pain, but I am in a thousand times more pain than you. The only thing we can do now is to bring them back to the embrace of the Holy Light, instead of letting them be used by demons. We must destroy the dreadlord Mal'Ganis." Arthas raised his warhammer and addressed his soldiers.

At this moment, these demoralized soldiers were finally roused to fight by the spur of the Dreadlord!

That's right! What they're doing now is the right thing to do. If they didn't, these innocent citizens would all become monsters of the Dreadlord.

After morale stabilized, the slaughter became even more bloody and brutal. Innocent townspeople hid in their homes, and Arthas ordered his soldiers to set fire to them, either to come out and die or to be burned alive.

The entire Stratholme had become a living hell, with corpses piled up like mountains.

Arthas's hands were stained with the blood of his people, and his expression became even more tyrannical; he even began to doubt the Holy Light.

Why? Why didn't the Holy Light save its own people? Why couldn't the omnipotent Holy Light cure this plague?

Filled with doubts, Arthas went on a rampage, slaughtering his enemies until his armor was almost completely stained with blood.

The massacre lasted for three days and three nights, and hundreds of thousands of Stratholme's residents were slaughtered. Only a few scattered individuals managed to escape to the outskirts of the city and were protected by Jaina and Rhodes, thus surviving.

However, one-third of the residents of Stratholme who were under the protection of the two later became minions of the Scourge.

Rhodes used a flash of holy light to purify the residents who had become undead!

In the end, the entire Stratholme was burned to the ground and slaughtered, and the Dreadlords awaited the prince at the docks of Stratholme.

"Demon, it's time to settle this, right here." Arthas, his face covered in blood and his body trembling, approached the Dreadlord.

Beside him was a large group of human soldiers, and the surrounding area was littered with corpses.

"Heh! Commendable courage, but unfortunately, it's not over yet. Your journey has only just begun, young prince," Mal'Ganis said with a mocking expression.

"Don't even think about escaping, monster! I won't let you get away! My soldiers won't allow it, and neither will the souls of the dead here!" Arthas's voice was almost a roar!

“That’s not up to you. Gather your troops in Northrend in the far north and challenge me again. There, we will see the end of our feud, and you will learn your true mission.” After saying this, Maganis transformed into countless bats and disappeared.

The surrounding human soldiers were horrified, and even the dwarven musketeers fired at some of the bats in the sky, only to find that they were just illusory forms of energy.

"Even if you escape to the ends of the earth, I will catch you! Do you hear me? Dreadlord, I will kill you! I will kill you!" Arthas roared at the sky with despair, anger, and resentment.

The human soldiers around them were also cursing the Dreadlord madly. They had acted as executioners, but they had not brought the culprit to justice.

"Warriors! We are embarking on an expedition to Northrend. Set off immediately without delay!" Arthas roared.

He issued his decision to all human soldiers.

“Following His Highness, we will make that demon pay the price,” Farek said.

“Destroy that demon and make him pay for his crimes in blood,” Maven said.

Arthas nodded, and without pausing for a moment, immediately led tens of thousands of Lordaeron troops, along with a portion of the dwarven army, aboard ships from the port to the continent of Northrend.

No one can stop him from taking his revenge!

After the massacre ended, Uther, a paladin of the Knights of the Silver Hand, led a small contingent of paladins into the city of Stratholme.

Rhodes and Jaina also came to the city to meet Uther.

Looking at the hell created by his most beloved disciple, Uther almost lost his balance!

He simply couldn't imagine how monstrous Arthas must have been to do something like that.

Militiamen recruited from elsewhere were burning the mountains of corpses piled up in Stratholme, and the whole of Stratholme was weeping.

In a city of hundreds of thousands of people, fewer than a thousand survived.

“There are dead everywhere… I can’t believe Arthas did all this,” Jaina sighed.

Chapter 27 Uther's Inquiry, Rhodes, Who Has No Shortage of Gold

Rhodes, standing to the side, shook his head helplessly. In fact, Arthas had no choice. He and Jaina had saved a lot of people in the past two days.

As a result, many of these people eventually became undead, and their families and relatives were unwilling to give up on them before they were completely undead.

Some of them had even become undead. When Rhodes purified them with holy light, he was cursed by their families. In the eyes of these families, they needed someone to vent their anger on.

Even though most people can understand Rhodes, some extremists even believe that Rhodes killed their brothers, sisters, fathers, and mothers.

Arthas had witnessed the horrors of Andorhal and the tragedy of Hearthglen, so he knew what was going to happen, and Rhodes knew it too.

It's simply impractical to investigate every single person in Stratholme to see who didn't eat the contaminated rice and who did, or to wait until they mutate before killing them.

Because some people lie, and some people deceive.

Just like in modern movies where people are infected with a zombie virus in the apocalypse, they won't give up until they die; everyone has the desire to live.

Once they transform into undead, they will attack everyone indiscriminately, and those attacked by them will also be infected. This is a deadly situation.

Arthas was the one who chose this question, but Rhodes was not.

Even so, only a portion of the people he and Jaina saved expressed their gratitude, while those whose family members had become undead creatures and were purified by Rhodes' Holy Light harbored only resentment towards Rhodes.

"Rhodes, when Arthas came to us for the last time, did you think it was right for us to refuse him?" Jaina turned to Rhodes and asked.

“You rejected him, and I rejected him too. Neither of us wants to go to Northrend. It has nothing to do with right or wrong; it’s just a difference in our beliefs,” Rhodes said, shaking his head.

After the massacre in Stratholme, Arthas calmed down, knowing he might not be able to face the Dreadlord alone. Therefore, he sought out Jaina and Rhodes outside the city, wanting to invite them to rejoin his army and journey with him to the northern continent of Northrend to fight the Dreadlord.

But Rhodes refused the little prince's invitation without hesitation. He was joking, "I haven't lived enough to go to Northrend with you yet!"

After pondering for a moment, the female mage told Arthas that there might be a trap there and advised him not to go, but Arthas wouldn't listen to her advice and left angrily, ignoring the two of them.

“You’re right, Rhodes, this is over. Come back to Dalaran with me!” The female mage took a deep breath and looked at Rhodes.

Rhodes has already fulfilled his promise to help rescue some of the people of Stratholme, and now it is time to fulfill his promise to take him to Dalaran.

Just then, hurried footsteps approached, and a tall man wielding a warhammer walked over. It was Uther.

“Miss Jaina Proudmoore, and Mr. Rhodes, I have something I'd like to ask you.”

“You said it, Lord Uther!” Jaina nodded very politely.

“Princess Jaina, you were the last to contact Arthas. Can you tell me where the child is now?” Uther asked anxiously.

Although he was relieved of all his duties in the Silver Hand, Uther was still worried about his disciple and wanted to return to see Arthas. However, after returning to Stratholme, he did not see his disciple, nor did he see the army of Lordaeron.

The only person who knows Arthas's whereabouts now is probably his closest female mage.

“Lord Uther, Arthas has led his army to Northrend! He is going to hunt down the dreadlord Mal'Ganis,” Jaina said, bowing politely to Uther.

"What! That brat, how could he act so impulsively?" Uther sighed.

The terrifying undead scourge and the dreadlord are far beyond what a greenhorn like him can handle. He should first return to the Knights of the Silver Hand to apologize, and then I should lead a large army to deal with this matter.

Although he was disappointed in Arthas, no teacher can truly abandon their disciple, and he still prayed that Arthas would change his mind.

At this moment, Uther also realized something: Arthas had no choice in this massacre. Some soldiers who survived in Andorhal and Hearthglen reported to him the horrors of the Scourge.

"Lord Uther wanted to invite me to go with him before he left, but Rhodes and I refused. I told him it might be a trap set by the Scourge, but he wouldn't listen." Jaina told Uther about Arthas's last whereabouts.

"I understand, Jaina, Princess and Mr. Rhodes. Don't blame yourselves too much. We will report this to King Terenas."

Mr. Rhodes, you helped Arthas when you were in Andorhal and Hearthglen, on a contract basis.

"Lord'daelan has never been an untrustworthy man. On behalf of the King, I am paying you a reward. Here are 1500 gold coins as your payment." Uther beckoned, and several heavily armored knights carried a small chest of gold coins to Rhodes.

Arthas can break his contract, but Lordaeron can't. Since they've hired someone, they have to pay them. He can still make that decision.

"This is an agreement between me and the prince, Lord Uther. I have not completed this employment, so I will not accept the money."