Above the jagged teeth of the distant mountains, the sky boiled dark gray, as if the heavens themselves were choking on the smoke of war. The clouds sagged low, bloated and bruised, ready to burst like a rotten bladder. Beneath this smothering ceiling, a swarm of green-skinned nightmares surged over the peaks with murderous glee. The entire canyon below had become a grotesque butcher's yard, littered with human limbs, broken weapons, and shattered armor that gleamed dully under the lightless sky.
What began as a defensive stand had devolved into a carnival of carnage. A massacre, plain and simple.
The only tools left that could hurt the orcs were a handful of heavy crossbows and a squad of frantic, overworked mages who were already coughing blood from mana burn. The rest? They might as well have been swatting dragons with spoons.
The orcs made sport of the bunkers, smashing them open like children whacking toy drums. Soldiers were dragged out screaming, only to be silenced forever in fountains of blood. Their laughter echoed like thundercracks of insanity.
Atop the command post, Lothar stood pale as marble, the blood long drained from his face. He turned to the grizzled leader of the Griffin Legion, his voice low and grim. "General Tom Seamus, bring your men. Stormwind will need someone to remember us."
He said it like a man ordering a cup of tea, but it hit like a funeral bell. Lothar straightened, his tall frame suddenly looming like a titan among children.
The nobles around him looked everywhere but at him. Shame burned behind their eyes. It was their cowardice, their political games, that had dragged the kingdom into this glorious disaster. Now they would watch a legend walk to his grave so they could live to lick their wounds.
The command room was stifling. Not from heat, but from the heavy silence of cowardice. It was the kind of silence that clung to your skin and stank in your soul.
General Seamus, a man with a jaw chiseled from a slab of granite, merely smiled. He adjusted the red tassel on his helmet with care—he wanted the orcs to know exactly who killed them. "With you, Lord Lothar, I will not walk into death. I will ride."
And somewhere in that moment, every man in the room remembered what a real soldier sounded like.
"Tell Llane," Lothar said to Bolvar Fordragon, "that his knight bled for the kingdom to the last drop."
Bolvar flinched, stepped forward. His sword was halfway out.
"I'll stand with you," he whispered.
But Lothar's hand clamped down on his wrist like a steel vice.
"One dead knight is enough. The retreat needs a spine. That spine is you, Duke Fordragon."
His voice was thunderous. Not the voice of a man ready to die, but of one who would make the Reaper himself second-guess his visit.
Bolvar hesitated. Then he turned away, every twitch of his face betraying the torment inside.
He growled to the remaining troops: "I will lead the retreat. Anyone who tries to run early will answer to me, and my sword doesn't take bribes."
Lothar had seen it clearly: only Bolvar had the pedigree and steel to keep the nobles in line. Without Llane, Lothar was just another name in a war ledger. But Bolvar? He was a dragon cloaked in human skin.
The nobles trickled out, stripped of their bravado. Orders barked through the rear echoed over the ridge. Except for the doomed frontliners, the mountain began to empty, piece by orderly piece.
Lothar watched the green tide swelling below. His eyes flickered with a dozen feelings, too tangled to name. Was it despair? Was it peace? Was it pride?
Tom Seamus returned. "The Griffin Legion awaits your word. Five thousand ready to buy time with blood."
Lothar didn't need to stay. He could've ridden off, blamed the failure on cowardly lords. Llane would've believed him. History would've forgiven him.
But Lothar didn't believe in history written by survivors.
He donned his helmet, the polished steel gleaming like a second sun under the storm.
"Sound the horns," he growled. "Let those green-skinned animals know the last meal isn't free."
The great horn blasted its baleful cry. Down below, the orcs paused mid-murder, heads swiveling like dogs sniffing fresh meat.
The bunkers on the upper ridges opened with the grinding screech of steel. Two great rivers of silver surged out—the Griffin Legion. Formations like clockwork, armor catching flashes of cold light. They weren't just soldiers. They were a wall of vengeance made flesh.
Slowly, methodically, they began their descent. A single silver avalanche, carved from resolve and steel.
On the slope, an orc chieftain barked a laugh. "Finally, humans worth the meat!"
The Griffin Legion advanced in perfect sync. Front rows of kite shields, interlocked like the scales of a dragon. Behind them, spears—dozens, hundreds—angled and layered, a bristling death hedge. Spear tips glinted like the teeth of gods.
It looked like a solid wave of liquid metal was sliding down to greet the orcs. Each step was a declaration: Here stands the last line. Come die on it.
A normal army would falter.
The orcs? They howled in joy. Enraged and delighted, they barreled forward. Huge axes swung. Spears cracked. Limbs flew.
The battlefield roared.
But for every spear snapped, another stabbed. For every man felled, another took his place. The Griffin Legion fought like they had already died and found hell boring.
They didn't expect to win. They expected to bleed so hard that the kingdom would remember them.
And in that moment, Anduin Lothar smiled beneath his helm. Not because he hoped to survive, but because he knew that the story of this stand would echo through the ages.
But they would die standing.