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// Interlude: Calm Before the Storm 
// Story: Sunset Shimmer: Path of the Damned 
// by Blackdrag-rose 
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With Icecrown totally in the hands of the Scourge once more, and the defenses were bolstered by her army, Sunset set her sights on the rest of Northrend, allowing her army to spread over all of the Storm Peaks once more and ravage the living who called it home, to give her control over the northern portion of the continent. After that she would carefully work her way down to the southern end of the continent, heading to Zul'Drak and Grizzly Hills in the east while wiping out anyone in Sholazar Basin and Wintergrasp, just in case anyone dared to flee to those regions. With that done Chromie and the rest of the Council were under orders to seize the Borean Tundra, the Howling Fjord, and the water south of Dragonblight, all to cut off all possible escape routes, while she would quickly enter a small central province, Crystalsong Forest, and bring down Dalaran. After that she was planning on invading Dragonblight personally, to raise the fallen and take the tower that the Aspects had been guarding in the other timeline, just to see how much more dragon energy she could steal from them in the process, to make her far stronger than anything else in this world.

Of course Sunset knew that she was basically repeating what she had done in the other timeline, which she was fine with since it gave her far more soldiers and boosted the ever increasing might of the Scourge, something that Azeroth's heroes had failed to stop when she revealed her hand to them. Such a thing made her think about all the materials that she had access to, all the metals, ores, gems, and whatnot that she could pull in from all of the conquered timelines, giving her the ability to mass produce necropolises and flying machines, and with engineers she could replicate the machines that both the Alliance and the Horde used to transport their troops. That caused her to glance in the direction that the Alliance ship had flown in, taking it's leader back to Stormwind so they could regroup with the leaders of the other races, likely to ready themselves for the impending doom that would be coming to kill them all. She purposely let that one ship depart with her minion hiding aboard it, just to see what sort of plans her enemies had in store for her and her army, though she already knew that it wouldn't do them any good, as her army would ravage the land until all of her enemies were dead, but Dalaran was able to escape destruction, as it wasn't in the air above the forest.

While her army ravaged Northrend, and cut off all possible escape routes that the living could use, she used her wings and flew through the air with ease, focusing on the tower and all the dragons who were waiting for her to kill them, though as she reached her destination Sunset was surprised to find that only one figure was on top of the tower, the Dragonqueen herself.

"Looks like someone told you that I would be coming and the rest of the dragons let to avoid crossing me." Sunset said, all while landing at the edge of the top of the large tower, though she knew that what the rest of the dragons decided to do didn't matter in the end, not when her forces would find them and raise them into undeath.

"Once you claimed Frostmourne we knew it was only a matter of time until a new Jailer of the Damned was born, and one of our allies confirmed it with their powers." Alexstrasza replied, her tone showing that she didn't seem to mind her being there, in fact it was possible that her time ally, whoever it happened to be, showed her that she had died several times in her attempts to bring Sunset down, in fact she walked up to Sunset for a moment, stopping when they were in the middle of the tower's peak, "It pains me to see so much death, caused by your hands, when you could do so much more with all of your great power... you could have been one of the greatest heroes this world has ever seen, in fact you could still walk down that path if you relinquished your hold over the undead and cleaned up the mess you've made."

"Come now, you realize it won't be that simple, even if I did such a thing and blamed it all on the Lich King." Sunset said, as she was humoring the Dragonqueen at this point, because it gave her something else to do while she waited for her army to fulfill her orders, though given Alexstrasza's power she had a feeling that if the red Aspect came to speak to her during her time in prison something interesting would have happened, "I'm afraid that it's far too late for me to change, not after what I've done to reach this point and everyone I've slain to gain the power to become the next master of the Scourge... at this point, well, it is nothing more than a distant fantasy for someone like me."

"Dear Sunset, of course there's still a chance for you to right your wrongs and become a hero," Alexstrasza stated, where she took a few steps forward, showing that she wasn't afraid of her after seeing what she was capable of, meaning Sunset had to applaud her bravery in the face of a monster that many would cause many to cower, though as she raised her left hand for a moment she pulled it back as Sunset gripped her weapon's handle, "Please, Sunset, don't walk down this path anymore... you can be so much more than a monster."

As Sunset opened her mouth, to tell Alexstrasza that such a thing was a waste of time, she felt something in her head and in that moment she shattered the illusion that the Dragonqueen tried to use against her while they were talking, just by exerting her will over the area, causing her foe to take a few steps back.

"Really? You tried to use an illusion on me... of what, becoming a broodmother?" Sunset said, showing Alexstrasza that she quickly understood what she had tried to do and had broken the spell before it could take hold of her mind, which had to be a benefit of the Helm of Domination, while her statement was due to her foe's position as the Life-Binder.

"Not just an illusion... I sought to change your reality, but your will is stronger than I thought." Alexstrasza replied, where Sunset found that, once more, she sounded sad about what was going on, like she had been hoping to overwhelm her defenses with a surge of her power and awaken something inside her, to create a being who would fix the timelines she had broken to reach this point, "You'll have to forgive my desperate actions to change you into something other than the new Jailer of the Damned... the death of my children always makes me sad, the deaths of my consorts always hurts more than anything, and just hearing about everyone you've killed makes me want to just give up and embrace death. Sunset, I don't want you to walk down this path, killing and raising everyone who dares to get in your way, hence why I sought to alter you in such a way, so you could reverse the damage you've done to the timelines. Yes, using my power to twist you into something else might have been a little extreme on my part, maybe even uncalled for... I will admit that right now... but embracing the good inside you would change everything. You don't have to be a force of darkness, Sunset, as you can be whatever you want: a hero, a leader, a teacher, an explorer, or whatever you set your mind to, just... please, choose anything other than a dark harbinger of death."

"While it is amusing that you would try something so drastic to try and change me, it won't change the fact that this is the path I have chosen to walk." Sunset stated, though as she said that she drew her runeblade out and readied herself for a fight, because while the other dragons had fled, to save themselves, the fact that ALexstrasza stayed behind to make such an attempt to bring her down told her that there had to be more coming, "This world will fall before the might of the Scourge and become a world of death, which means that every living creature must be slain and raised into undeath... and that, I'm afraid, includes you, Alexstrasza."

"I understand, even though I was hoping to help you become a beautiful red dragon." Alexstrasza said, where she took a few steps back as Sunset started to walk up to where she had been standing, as she could see that the figure wanted her dead and that, once that was done, she would raise her as a weapon of death and turn her against Azeroth, before finding that she had reached the edge of the tower's summit, "However, I'm afraid that our time together will have to be cut short..."

Sunset found that Alexstrasza fell backwards and a portal opened behind her as she started to fall towards the ground, a portal that closed a few seconds after she spotted it, though she already knew that there was no reason to trace the magic to where it had originated from, as the Dragonqueen would have fled the moment she landed on the ground.

"This world's version of Nozdormu warned her about my arrival... interesting." Sunset remarked, though she guessed that it was her fault for attacking multiple timelines to gather the power she wanted, before claiming Frostmourne and the Helm of Domination, before sheathing her blade as several dragons landed nearby and shrunk down to their preferred guises, just like what happened when she spoke with Chromie, "What do you have to report?"

"The Sanctums have been cleared, my Queen. The eggs, and their guardians, have gone missing." one of the dragons, a blue dragon who actually wore a female human guise, replied, while the others, being a male dwarf, two female night elves, and even a male gnome, nodded their heads.

"So the living are trying to prolong their suffering, by hiding from us... fine, I'll play their game." Sunset stated, because this would make things much more interesting for her in the long run, as the Alliance and the Horde were preparing their armies and the dragons were fleeing to keep themselves alive, before a red dragon she had raised earlier landed nearby and told her of another fallen red dragon, along with them conquering all of Northrend, "Prepare for the start of our assault on the northern reaches of the Eastern Kingdoms, while I raise the rest of the continent to fuel the might of our war machine."

As the dragons took off Sunset stood at the edge of the tower and raised Frostmourne to the sky, channeling the dark power of Death into the air before sending it all over Northrend, where she found that the dead started to rise from their resting places, both fresh graves and old graves, and grinned as she prepared herself for the next stage of her dark plans.





While Sunset was doing that, and was covering Northrend in darkness, Khadgar and the other Council members gathered in Stormwind's main keep, though in addition to the six of them they found that the leaders of the Alliance were gathering, not to mention the unprecedented arrival of Thrall and the other leaders of the Horde, an emergency war council to address the incredible danger their world was in.

"I'm afraid Nozdormu's vision has come to pass, the Helm has found a new master... one darker and eviler than Arthas was during his tenure." Khadgar commented, though as he said that he found that Jaina, who had loved Arthas before he turned into the monster that eventually became the previous Lich King, didn't know how to react to this news, though he and many of the leaders sighed as they understood what was coming their way, "Even the remaining Aspects have fled, to save their flights from the darkness that has claimed all of Northrend... what are we going to do?"

"The only thing we can do: most of us must prepare ourselves for the battle to come, while we must send a number of our people to a safe location, to weather this storm." a voice replied, where they found that it came from Sylvannas, instead of one of the Alliance leaders, though she was clearly thinking about what she had said, especially since, due to what their allies had revealed to them previously, Sunset had wiped out an entire world already, "The problem is finding a location, or multiple locations, to hide our people until this is all over."

"We need a landmass of some kind that Sunset doesn't know about, and even then we have to be careful since there's no telling what her allies will tell her," Velen stated, an old draenei who had seen far more than most of the people in front of him, especially since he had fled from his home planet when his old friends betrayed him and joined Sargeras and the rest of the Burning Legion, so he was smarter than most people, "Going off world isn't an option, the Exodar is incapable of flight, even if it would solve the housing situation, and Outland doesn't have the resources to sustain all of our people for a significant amount of time... we might have to use Netherlight Temple..."

"I might... have... a suggestion." a voice spoke up, where the leaders turned and found that a newcomer had arrived, but it was something they weren't expecting, as it was a panda creature who had a black jacket and pants on, with a bamboo staff on his back, a pandaren, a race that many thought to be a fantasy, "Forgive my interruption... I was in the market just a few moments ago, buying a few herbs and spices, when I felt the disturbance in the air and came running to figure out what is going on. I have two suggestions for places to move to: the first being the Wandering Isle, a place that only a select few know about, while the other is Pandaria itself, a landmass located to the south of the Maelstrom, which is hidden thanks to a veil of mist."

"She might know of Pandaria, but the Wandering Isle sounds much better... less chance of her finding us." Tyrande said, all while a couple of the other leaders nodded their heads, even though most of them knew that a good portion of their races would die in the near future, since Sunset had to be readying herself for an invasion of the other continents.

The pandaren, Chen Stormstout they discovered, informed them that the Wandering Isle was smaller than Pandaria and, as a consequence, they wouldn't be able to house everyone until this storm was over, so each leader had to be smart as they considered who to send with him. Varian, on the other hand, already had one of his chosen in mind, he was planning on sending his own son, Anduin, with those who would be chosen to continue living, as with the downfall of Tirion his faith in the Light was second to Velen's own faith, especially with the loss of the paladin heroes who served the factions in the war against the Lich King. At the same time he was learning how to be a leader, as he had been grooming him to take over at some point in the far future, so this would allow his son to bring together the races of Azeroth, and maybe even some of the pandaren, into a force that could topple this new threat, especially if Nozdormu and the Aspects were able to meet up with with them. Of course the other leaders had to make such a hard decision in the next few hours, since they had no idea when Sunset was going to start her conquest of the known continents, hence why everyone broke and got moving to set things in motion, before their foe came knocking at their door.

He suspected that things were going to go from bad to worse before they got better, given what he had learned about the new ruler of the Scourge, and hoped that his son was prepared for the challenges that would be coming his way, all while hoping that this was unnecessary and that someone would end Sunset soon... but knew that only time could tell as he and the others got ready for the darkness that would be upon them in the very near future.