World of Warcraft: Burning Skies

by Blackdrag-rose

Suramar: A Growing Crisis

The first thing Rainbow did, after seeing the danger that the Arcan'dor posed to the rest of Shal'Aran, was make sure the attendants and the others that had joined them were safe and sound, since it would be an insult to Ly'leth if harm came to any of them, so soon after they were assigned to work for Thalyssra and the rebellion, or for her thanks to the time she spent with Ly'leth, though once that was done she walked over to where Farodin was standing and hoped he had an idea of what they needed to do to stop the Arcane storm that was building in the center of the ruins, even though she was sure that Spitfire was doing something to prevent things from getting out of hand.

"Farodin, you have some explaining to do." Rainbow stated, because he was the only one among them that knew anything about the Arcan'dor and had prompted them to 'plant' it when the Fal'dorei Queen broke the seal that had been placed on the metallic container that they had discovered inside the ruin Theryn had showed them, due to the fact that he must have been worried about it fading into nothingness, and she was hoping that the Night Elf had some information about what was going on right now, something Thalyssra seemed to agree with since she was standing near him as well, "What in the world is happening?"

"...the Arcan'dor is, despite our efforts, failing..." Farodin replied, where he stared at the tree for a time and thought about what he needed to tell them, even though Rainbow had the feeling that the tree failing meant it might detonate the vast amount of Arcane energy that had been fed to it since it had been planted, an explosion that would ruin Shal'Aran and the area that was around their base of operations, possibly even further since there was the hole in the ground that the Ley energy happened to be coming out of, meaning this could have disastrous effects for all of Suramar, before Farodin took a moment to glance at her, "This energy was once bound in its boughs and fueled its growth, the same growth you and the others have witnessed since it was planted, as there happened to be a delicate balance between the energies that went into creating the Arcan'dor, the energies of Life and Arcane... but now, thanks to all the Arcane power that has been fed to it, that balance is broken, and all of that energy is currently breaking free. When the heart can no longer hold it, this tree will kill every living thing in this hall... I know this because I have seen it happen once before, as in the past there were two seeds and one was used by the elves in the Temple of Fal'adora, something that lead me to seal the second away, and now I must find a way to stop such a terrible fate from happening again."

"Basically, you want to head back to the first tree, to the Temple of Fal'adora, and use its bones to guide you," Spitfire said, taking a moment to divert her attention away from what was currently going on in front of her, where Rainbow found that even with her friend taking her eyes off the stone and the tree none of the storm lashed out at everyone else that was in the ruins, but even then she had the feeling that Spitfire was thinking about what Farodin had said and was considering if it might be a clue as to how someone could go about obtaining the power of the six Cosmic Powers that existed in this part of the universe, "Don't worry about me, I'll keep the Arcan'dor in check and make sure it doesn't expand, or detonate and take everyone with it... if it comes to that, we'll flee and escape the explosion, but I'll buy you as much time as I can before that becomes a reality."

Rainbow, sensing the urgency that was in Spitfire's voice, nodded and made sure that the head attendant had her mask, as it needed to remain safe and she knew that taking it the Temple of Fal'adora might damage it, or the enchantment Ly'leth had placed on it, before heading over to the portal that would take them back to the chamber that the beacon Oculeth had activated for them was located in and used it to move herself back to the temple, leaving Elylia with all of the other heroes that were in Shal'Aran, though not a few seconds after she reappeared on the other side of the portal she drew both of her weapons as she glanced around the area, just in case some of the Fal'dorei were nearby.

"As you know, in the hall beyond rests the bones of the failed Arcan'dor, shattered into fragments that now line the rest of the chamber it is located in," Farodin spoke up, speaking as soon as he appeared behind Rainbow and readied his scythe for a moment, even though she had the feeling that he wasn't about to use his weapon against the remaining Fal'dorei that were scattered throughout this portion of the ruins, before he sighed for a moment as he considered something, even if Rainbow was half paying attention to him as she kept her eyes open for danger, "so here's my plan: I will explore the hall and collect any fragments of the crystallized tree that I can find, in an attempt to read them and discover the root cause of this destruction, because through understanding the past can we prevent the same from happening in the present, but while I do that I'm sure the guardians will try to stop us. What I want you to do is engage the guardians of the fallen tree as I do that and kill them, as the dryads who once walked this hall have been totally corrupted by the twisted energies of the failed Arcan'dor and cannot be saved, much to my sorry, so I must ask that you end their suffering while I collect as many fragments as I can."

"I kill everything in the hall, while you gather the information we're after. I understand the plan," Rainbow replied, to which she quickly walked over to the tunnel that would bring them back to the chamber that looked like Shal'Aran, the area that the fallen tree rested in based on what she recalled, and braced herself as Farodin followed behind her, as it was time for him to put his knowledge of the Arcan'dor to use while she dealt with those that would be trying to bring them down, and once they had the information they were after she was sure that they would flee before Fal'dorei reinforcements came to get revenge for their fallen Queen.

As they walked down the tunnel, but before they reached the chamber that the fallen tree and their enemies were resting inside, and proceeded with their mission, Farodin gave her some bits of information, which would be given to the others once they returned to Shal'Aran, where he explained that many years ago he encountered the first of the Nightfallen that had been forced to flee Suramar City, the unfortunate ones that had been trapped outside when the barrier sprung up to protect everyone from the Legion's invasion at the time, cutting them off from the Nightwell in the process. Such a thing lead to him withdrawing one of the two seeds that had been created and granted them access to one of the ancient gifts he had been guarding, where he aided them in making the first Arcan'dor and found that it sustained them for a time, a fact that had lead him to grant the second one to Thalyssra and her rebellion, but, as Rainbow and the others knew, it was a short lived peace before the Arcan'dor tore itself apart and the energies inside it transformed those around it into a new type of being, the Fal'dorei. He realized that he had made a mistake by granting them access to the first seed, which lead to him sealing away the second to the best of his ability, something they knew was terrible since Spitfire broke the seals in record time, and take up watching over where it rested for all of the years that it had been safe, or at least it had been that way until they came to Suramar and found the seed, and he endeavored to make sure that he didn't make the mistake a second time, hence why they had come here, to uncover the secrets of why the first tree failed. Rainbow felt that it was, in some senses, a good plan and decided not to argue with it as she turned her attention towards the enemies who might be down in this area, allowing Farodin to focus on his task and nothing else for the foreseeable future, as once they reached the chamber in question she rushed out and swung her weapons at the corrupted dryads that were standing on one part of the walkway, giving her companion a chance to slip over to the shattered tree and either collect the fragments he was looking for or study them for a time before they were overrun, where she hoped that he was doing the former and not the latter, before dodging an attack and slashed at her target.

The blue skinned dryads, accompanied by some of the small crystalline spiders that accompanied the Fal'dorei, or at least that was due to the last time she had been near these creatures, lashed out at her with their spears and the volatile power which now rested inside their bodies, where she avoided their attacks, as they were slower than what she was expecting them to be, allowing her to slice through her foes and dropped them to the ground as every enemy nearby rushed over to where she was located, hence why she stood near the second tunnel and pulled them away from Farodin. That was one of the reasons behind why she was doing this, as another happened to be the fact that she had to worry about the Fal'dorei rushing up the second tunnel and joining the fight, which would give her foes a chance to overwhelm her, since she wasn't using her transformed state against these enemies right now, but she welcomed them to try and bring ruin upon her, as it would be a real chance to test her skills, even though it became clear she was better than them. Still, this gave Farodin the chance to gather as many fragments as he could possibly get his hands on, which would give him a chance to determine what had happened to the first tree and what they could do to prevent it from happening to their tree, before she turned her attention back to her fight and dodged another spear thrust as she took the head of the dryad that tried to hit her with the weapon, even though it had been a good attack in the grand scheme of things, and her luck held as their enemies just focused on her. Not a few moments later, after about a couple of minutes of fighting with the dryad, Farodin beckoned to Rainbow as he headed for the portal chamber, indicating that he had all of the fragments he needed for his studies on the first Arcan'dor, something that caused her to lash out with a bit of lightning and struck part of the crystalline branch that was above her at the moment, breaking part of it and dropped the limb on top of her enemies, either crushing them with the weight or just knocked them out for a time, but once that was done, and none of them had a chance to recover from her attack, Rainbow landed near the first tunnel and followed after Farodin, where they passed through the portal and returned to Shal'Aran without delay, leaving Oculeth to weave his magic and prevent their enemies from using it to travel to their base of operations.

Once they were back in Shal'Aran, and were reminded of the situation when they witnessed a bit of purple lightning that branched out and was sucked into the stone of infinite capacity, as Rainbow felt like calling it at this point, which stopped it from dealing damage to either someone who was walking around the ruin or to the ruin itself, where Farodin walked over to an area that happened to contain a desk of some kind and got to work studying all of the fragments he had collected... though it didn't take him all that long to sigh as he seemed to figure something out, which brought Thalyssra and most of the group over to where he was standing, all while Spitfire seemed to be listening to what he had to say as she focused on containing the unbound Arcane energy.

"This Arcan'dor is one of an ancient species, as they were not bred, in the traditional sense, but rather they are created by ancient rituals and powers." Farodin commented, revealing the true nature of the ancient tree to them, even though it was possible to guess it based on what he had said the first time he talked about it, before he focused on the fragments that were in front of him for a moment as he considered everything that he could see right now, almost as if it wasn't good for all of them and it would require them to do something else to fix the mess they were in, "In both of them the Arcane and primitive druidic magics, or Life magic as they are sometimes called, have been merged into something far greater than what the parts are capable of on their own, creating something that would be a boon to whoever cultivated it... sadly, the Arcane side of this Arcan'dor will soon devour it whole, resulting in a massive detonation..."

That was as far as he got in his statement before Rainbow growled and punched him right in the face, knocking him to the floor in seconds, though Spitfire understood why her friend was upset over this situation, given that Shal'Aran was an area that all of the Leylines in Suramar were connected to, and that may or may not include the city itself, so having something like the Arcan'dor, a magical tree that looked like it was about to explode, linked to an end of the Leylines was a very bad thing, because if it exploded there was no telling how much destruction it would cause to Suramar, the Broken Isles, or the rest of Azeroth for that matter.

"Seriously? You could have told us the consequences of planting this thing!" Rainbow snapped, because while she and the others knew the positives of the Arcan'dor, to heal Thalyssra, Oculeth, Valtrois, and the rest of the Nightfallen of the curse that plagued all of them, their need to feed on the Nightwell's energies to survive, or at least that was the tale that Farodin had told them earlier, when they brought the seed of the Arcan'dor to Shal'Aran and planted it in the circle able the hole the Leyline energy came out of, this was a massive downside that none of them had seen coming, that it came with the risk of detonating with the power to wipe everyone in Shal'Aran out, at the very least, since they had no idea how dangerous the Arcan'dor truly was.

"I weighed my options when the Fal'dorei cracked the casing open, and I was convinced that we could stop this from being the end of this Arcan'dor," Farodin replied, though even as he said that, where he took a moment to rub the area that she had struck in her anger, he glanced at the magical tree for a few seconds and considered what he had seen when he took a few moments to stare at the fragments of the first Arcan'dor, something that caused him to glance at the group and the fact that Spitfire was doing her best to keep everything in check and not break this area, before he sighed and turned to face Rainbow once more, "however, we can restore balance between the two powers, but it will require a great deal of Life magic to do so, even though said power is currently trapped in another realm, the Emerald Dream to be exact, which is the only place where we might be able to find such a powerful essence of Life... if we had that, we could bring stability back to the Arcan'dor and it would be able to thrive once more, granting the Nightfallen a boon that might be able to turn the tide of the rebellion in our favor."

"I don't think we'll be able to find such a thing right now, given that the Dream has been taken over by the Nightmare and its foul ruler," one of the other heroes, a Night Elf who was one of the four Archdruids of the Cenarion Circle, the order of druids who stood against the Legion, and happened to be the one who fought in the feral aspect of what a druid could use, meaning she was constantly in the form of a black cat, a saber to be exact, while she fought her foes, while the rest of her fellow leaders happened to be back in their base of operations, an area called the Dreamgrove as Spitfire recalled, but that was when she took a few seconds to consider what she had just said as she glanced at the others, "meaning we would have to fight through Xavius and the Emerald Nightmare to get to the Dream, which should be the location where we can find such a powerful essence of Life... though that is easier said than done given everything the Nightmare Lord has at his disposal, since he's corrupted druids and other protectors of nature, bending them to his will... we would have to gather all of our strongest heroes and march on the Nightmare, like we were raiding it."

"Then that is what we will do." Spitfire stated, speaking the moment Kyrianna, the Night Elf druid, was done speaking her mind and had countered what Farodin had just said, where Rainbow and the others could tell that the storm had died a tiny bit and assumed that it had to do with her and the stone she had used to contain all of the potent unbound Arcane energy that had been coming from the magical tree, before they spotted that she had pulled herself away from the area she had been standing in when this mess first started earlier, before she gestured back towards the tree and they found that the stone was resting in the air, doing everything in its power to stall the storm that was no doubt building inside the Arcan'dor, one that would determine the fate of the Nightfallen rebellion, "We shall venture into the Emerald Nightmare, tear down anything and anyone that this Nightmare Lord can throw at us, including Xavius for that matter, and figure out where the Life Essence is located so we can balance the Arcan'dor, before it detonates and wipes everything out... but, to be sure the rebellion doesn't fail, we should evacuate everyone to somewhere safer, just in case we fail to make it in time with the essence."

"I don't think that will be necessary, but temporarily moving everyone sounds like a solid plan," Thalyssra said, to which she and the other Nightfallen started to make sure the residents of Suramar City, and the rest of their forces that would fight against the Duskwatch when the time came, carefully moved out of Shal'Aran, heading to another ruin by the name of Tel'anor, which was apparently an ancient graveyard built in the style that the rest of the Nightborne structures had, and they had a teleporter linked to that area thanks to the other heroes who made sure the rest of Suramar was safe for the rebellion, so not only did they have a means of transportation they also had a safe area that Elisande wouldn't think to look for them in, granting them some peace while the heroes worked to save the Arcan'dor.

While they did that Vytheril, Kyrianna, Scarlet, and the rest of the leaders of the Order Halls returned to Dalaran for a time, where Spitfire informed Khadgar and the Council of what was going on, not to mention that the main heroes of Azeroth would be venturing into the Emerald Nightmare to confront and destroy the Nightmare Lord, so they could obtain a Life Essence to balance the now unstable Arcan'dor, something that caused Khadgar and Jaina to inform her that they would head down to Suramar to help Thalyssra make sure her forces and citizens were safe, meaning they would be an extra bit of security in case their foe actually found them. With that done the pair took a few more minutes to make sure that Kayn, Altrius, Kor'vas, and the rest of the Illidari were fine and had a few places to visit so they could crush the Legion's forces, as in around the Broken Isles anyway, before discovering that they were now much closer to finding where Lord Illidan's soul was resting, meaning soon they would be able to recover him from wherever his soul had been left, which excited both of them since it meant all of them would be reunited with their master sooner than they originally believed they would, even though they still had to get his body back from Gul'dan. Both of them would be happy to have Lord Illidan back, as both his skills and knowledge would be useful in bringing down even more of the Legion's plans, especially since Spitfire was sure that there were a few more plans that he hadn't told anyone about, but for right now their focus was on making sure their allies had an idea of what was going on and several rushed to aid the Nightfallen, to make up for the heroes that were now departing for Val'sharah, to face one of the dangers that happened to be threatening Azeroth, even though Spitfire was a little worried that Xavius hadn't done anything since he appeared in Val'sharah, meaning he was waiting for something to happen. Once she made sure the rest of their allies were informed of what was going on, with the Arcan'dor and the fact that the heroes were planning on tackling the Emberald Nightmare, she and Rainbow came to a stop in front of the steps that would lead to where the Council met and discussed things, where Khadgar and Jaina stood so they could prepare a portal for them to use once everyone was ready to go, as the heroes were making their final preparations for what they were going to do in the near future.

What interested Spitfire was the fact that the heroes weren't the only ones to come over to their location, as Malfurion, Tyrande, Lady Liadrin, and a few others joined her and the others, something that caused her to raise an eyebrow for a few seconds as she spotted them walking towards them, though given that some of them were Night Elves and some were were Blood Elves, the Kaldorei and the Sin'dorei respectively, meaning they had to be interested in helping the Shal'dorei in freeing themselves from the tyrant that was in control of Suramar City.

"Lady Spitfire, word has reached me that you and the other heroes are getting ready for an incursion into the depths of the Emerald Nightmare," Malfurion stated, where it was easy for them to see that he had gotten over his initial dislike for every demon hunter that had followed his brother in the past, no doubt due to seeing Spitfire's determination to protect Azeroth from those who threatened her, especially after seeing what Sylvanas had planned for their world, including the destruction of Teldrassil and a near genocide of the Night Elves, "allow me to aid you in your endeavour, to free the Dream from the corruption of the Nightmare and its foul master, Xavius, as you will need someone well versed in druidic magics to bypass some of his defenses, especially since you'll be facing my Shan'do, the demigod Cenarius, and Ursoc, one of the Wild Gods that is supposed to protect Azeroth, not to mention any other corrupt individuals who might be lurking in the depths of the Nightmare."

"Your help is appreciated, Malfurion," Spitfire replied, as while this was a welcome surprise, since she wasn't expecting one of the strongest druids in the world to come to their aid to face the Nightmare, given that they were in the middle of a war with one of Azeroth's greatest enemies, the Legion, but she wasn't about to dismiss someone of his caliber, because many revered him and his power was no doubt on par with Xavius' own, meaning he had to be a god in his own right, or maybe a demigod, which was when she turned from him to the others that had joined them, "Tyrande, Lady Liadrin, are you and those behind you thinking of doing the same thing?"

"No, we're planning on heading to Suramar to help the Nightborne... sorry, Nightfallen... out with their rebellion, and keep an eye on Elisande's movements," Tyrande replied, knowing that Spitfire had no idea what might happen while they were away, since the Grand Magistrix was allied with the Legion and such a thing made her unpredictable in most cases, but her statement allowed Spitfire and Rainbow to understand that some of their allies were going to assist Thalyssra in making sure everything was fine, while at the same time preparing for the eventual invasion of the city, the end game that should lead them to bringing down their targets, "given that she's allied with Gul'dan, and his Legion masters, we're facing what seems like a repeat of Queen Azshara siding with Sargeras all those years ago... we can't underestimate her, least we walk into a trap they might have set or lower our guard at the wrong moment."

"Fair enough, given what they're currently going through," Rainbow said, as none of them had expected the Arcan'dor to suddenly become unstable and start churning out an Arcane storm that could break everything in Shal'Aran, despite the fact that Spitfire had used that stone she found to siphon some of the power, which allowed her to weaken the storm and give them the time they needed to figure out how to save the magical tree they had planted, something that apparently involved fighting both the forces of the Emerald Nightmare and the Nightmare Lord, Xavius as the druids called him, and that seemed like it was going to be one hard fight, though she had no idea who Tyrande was speaking of and suspected it might be something Spitfire would ask about later.

Spitfire had to agree that having the two groups of elves, even if they were small in number since most of their races were in the middle of dealing with anything or anyone that the Legion threw at them, would benefit the Nightfallen and protect them from whatever dangers might happen while they're in the Emerald Nightmare, and before she could say anything else the rest of Azeroth's greatest heroes, those who carried every powerful artifact that would bring ruin to their enemies, emerged from the buildings that they had been preparing in. What they had been doing was creating potions, making sure all of their armor and weapons were ready for the battles that were ahead of them, given that they had no idea what was waiting for them in the Nightmare, and whatever other items might be useful for the task that was ahead of them, while each of them made sure to exchange those items to the rest of their allies, to make sure everyone was ready for their trek into Xavius' domain. Once all thirty-five of Azeroth's greatest heroes were done with their preparations, and everyone was positive that their gear was as ready as it could be, each of them gathered around Spitfire and Rainbow and waited for the others to join them, allowing the pair to find that there was one member from each race in the two factions surrounding them, not to mention a near equal number between them, given that Scarlet seemed to break the balance a little, but once everyone was ready to move Khadgar raised his hands and started to channel his power for a moment. It only took him a few moments to achieve what he was trying to do, where he opened a decent sized portal in front of them, which Spitfire and the others suspected would allow them to teleport down to Val'sharah, and nodded to the heroes once his task had been completed, allowing them to enter the portal and reappear in front of what had to be a Void-tainted tree, or rather in a section that rested between the bottom of the tree and the ground, as there happened to be a ruined village resting near their location, across a lake anyway.

They quickly discovered that the tree in question was massive, blackened, and twisted by Xavius' power, meaning he was capable of corrupting the 'World Trees' of Azeroth, though she also had the feeling that Malfurion would reveal things to them, about the tree and everything, Spitfire and Rainbow started to walk towards the portal in front of them, as it was time to enter the Emerald Nightmare and face the Nightmare Lord, to wipe out one of the threats to the safety of Azeroth and acquire the Life Essence they needed for the unstable Arcan'dor.

Comments

[PrismStrike]

well the peace & co-operation Spitfire has been working towards this entire time between the factions seems to actually be paying off as I don't remember a force being sent back to the nightelf resistance in the last version (though I could very much be wrong on that) I also wanna say the teamwork displayed between Spitfire and rainbow dash outdoes how well Lyra and trixie were able to work together, I bet its because of how much Rainbow looked up to spits in canon, which if so, nice way to play on canon personality traits and relationship between the two

[zachary12]

nice work