Faster, faster!
Alleria, running through the Void, constantly pushed her potential, making herself faster, fast enough to catch up to the fleeing Imonar.
Imonar had long noticed the tail behind him, but he didn't think of directly intercepting Alleria. He was worried that if he was delayed, he might not be able to reach a sufficiently safe location.
After all, he was currently behind the Allied forces' front lines. They could retreat for support at any time, while the support he could get was limited.
Imonar's choice was simple: he dropped all the traps and devices he had stored along the way. These dangerous traps, imbued with demonic technology, were designed to buy him enough time.
And indeed, they did. Even though Alleria was moving through the Void, most traps couldn't directly slow her down. However, Imonar's traps were exaggeratedly diverse. Some traps, infused with dangerous fel energy magic, could cause damage or influence even if the target wasn't in that plane.
Watching the distance between herself and Imonar grow with the traps' obstruction, Alleria couldn't help but feel a surge of impatience. But she quickly suppressed this emotion; in this kind of battle, the more impatient side is more prone to making mistakes.
Imonar, still setting traps in the distance, suddenly sensed a sharp danger. He quickly threw out an unfinished fel energy explosive device. Just as the dangerous explosive left his hand, it detonated violently.
Imonar raised his hand to block the scattering shrapnel. Although these high-powered fragments even pierced his gauntlet and entered his skin, Imonar seemed to feel nothing, merely turning to look in Alleria's direction.
"This elf is truly persistent..."
A slight, abnormal fluctuation had emanated from the Void just now. Although tiny, it affected the stability of the explosive device's precise internal structure, leading to the explosion.
Alleria had discovered the best way to stop Imonar: constantly pluck the strings of the Void, allowing its vibrations to reach Imonar.
This energy fluctuation was quite weak, unable to harm any physical creature, but it was enough to disrupt the stability of precise instruments. And the trap devices in Imonar's hands were highly dependent on the stability of their internal precise structures; otherwise, Imonar would be carrying a pile of bombs that could explode at any time.
But now, these devices were being turned into potential bombs by Alleria. Imonar had no choice but to stop, dump all the devices he was carrying, and quickly move away.
Not long after he finished, these traps, originally intended to hinder Alleria, turned into a towering blaze, shaking the surrounding earth. Boulders and shattered rocks rolled down the ridge, falling into the surrounding fel energy lava pools and stirring up monstrous waves.
Imonar plunged his spear into the ground, barely steadying himself against the explosion-induced storm. But after the shockwave and dust cleared, he chose not to continue retreating.
Because Alleria had already arrived nearby.
Three feathered arrows flew out from an unknown direction, dark purple ripples swirling around their tips. Imonar dared not take them head-on, flashing behind a large rock that the recent explosion had propelled towards him.
"Heh heh, you truly are a monster, so skilled in wielding Void Power."
Imonar, cowering behind the boulder, dodged the trajectory of Alleria's arrows, all the while mocking Alleria's embrace of the Void. "Those who claim to be righteous wield the most dangerous power in this world."
Alleria couldn't be bothered to argue with Imonar. She simply aimed and shot calmly. The arrows pierced the rock where Imonar was hiding, and the energy that burst forth from within disintegrated the hard shale into a pile of rubble.
But behind the pile of stones, Imonar's figure was nowhere to be found.
Alleria's heart jolted. She quickly raised her bow to block, and the sturdy bowstring timely helped her fend off a deadly arc of light.
However, the power spreading from the bowstring sent Alleria flying uncontrollably. Fortunately, the Void Power instinctively wrapped around her body acted as a buffer, otherwise the tremors to her internal organs and brain might have caused Alleria to temporarily lose consciousness.
Generating a Void tremor out of thin air, Alleria, who had readjusted her posture in mid-air, fired three more arrows without hesitation. The three arrows aimed consecutively at Imonar's head, heart, and lungs.
The sharp arrows were like lightning, yet Imonar could still easily evade them. Clearly, in a one-on-one fight, Alleria alone was not his match.
However, their objectives were different from the start. Alleria was there to delay Imonar, while Imonar was there to escape in time. Now, Imonar only had one path: quickly deal with Alleria, otherwise he would be relentlessly entangled by this elf.
So this time, Imonar held nothing back. The demon's robust physique allowed him to unleash a speed far beyond Alleria's imagination with just his body. In the blink of an eye, Imonar's spear had already reached Alleria's chest, intending to run her through.
Alleria narrowly dodged the spear's blade, but the sharp spearhead still severed the strap of Alleria's quiver on her chest, causing the quiver on her back to fall, scattering the arrows on the ground.
This sudden change made Alleria inwardly curse, but Imonar clearly wouldn't miss this opportunity. He pulled back on the spear and pressed down, intending to cut Alleria in half.
This chapter is not over, please click next page to continue reading!
The elven ranger's waist snapped downwards, dodging Imonar's attack, while simultaneously grabbing an arrow from the ground. She then quickly rolled aside, nocked an arrow, and with one fluid motion, fired this last arrow.
Imonar disdainfully shattered the arrow with his spear. However, the Void energy contained within the arrow suddenly erupted under this external stimulus, exploding into a dark purple cloud that obscured Imonar's vision.
Imonar didn't panic. He knew Alleria had temporarily lost her ability to counterattack, so he merely dragged his fel energy spear along the ground, creating friction. Then, with a sudden surge of power in his arm, he jolted the heavy spear upwards. fel energy fire instantly ignited on the spearhead, transforming into a powerful flame impact that dispersed the obscuring mist in front of him.
However, after dispelling the dark mist, what he saw was not Alleria's figure, but four cold knights clad in black heavy armor.
In that instant, Imonar's eyes suddenly widened, his pupils trembling uncontrollably.
"For the Lich King."
He recognized the sword in their hands, an incredibly dangerous evil weapon even within the Legion—Apocalypse!
Upon seeing this greatsword in the enemy's hands, Imonar instinctively wanted to flee, but the arriving Death Knights were already fully prepared. Four dark energy hands, like giant claws, tore through the Void, pinning him firmly in place.
Then, the aura of Apocalypse had already decayed his flesh, making his tough body incredibly weak, and his hard bones brittle. He couldn't even support his own weight anymore. This notorious bounty hunter, in the blink of an eye, turned into a puddle of bloody flesh, splattering onto the ground with a wet thud.
It wasn't until the corrupting power of necromantic energy had completely reduced Imonar to a puddle of sludge that Alleria finally breathed a sigh of relief; she really didn't want to experience another chase like that.
Even she couldn't help but feel exhausted, but unfortunately, only Death Knights were guarding her now, and no one could use healing magic to help Alleria recover.
"Sir Lothar, thank you. If it weren't for your help, I might not have been able to stop this demon."
She expressed her gratitude to Lothar, who at that moment had just pulled Apocalypse from Imonar's corpse—if that pile of foul demon sludge could even be considered a corpse.
"As long as you're alright."
After confirming that Alleria was fine apart from some exhaustion and minor scrapes, Lothar refocused his attention on Imonar.
Although the pile of rotting flesh was almost unrecognizable as a demon, it didn't mean that the pile of things had lost its value.
Lothar waved to the three Death Knights behind him, who immediately gathered around, drawing their longswords beside Imonar's remains and carving deep lines into the rocky ground.
Although Alleria didn't understand necromantic spells, she was still an orthodox High Elf from Quel'Thalas, and her familiarity with magic allowed her to recognize at a glance that this was the prototype of some ritual array.
Before Alleria could even ask, Lothar explained, "I noticed some unexpected changes in your troop movements, so I've been on guard for possible contingencies."
The Grand Duke pointed to the demon's remains on the ground, "He thought he could evade the eyes of all the undead, but in reality, the favor from His Majesty allowed us to discover his existence long ago. It's just that due to the pressure on the front lines, we couldn't send anyone to deal with him immediately."
As Lothar said, Imonar's illusion could deceive the senses of ordinary undead, but it absolutely couldn't escape the eyes of the high-ranking undead personally strengthened by Arthas. The traces and fluctuations he left in space were as conspicuous as fireflies in the night to an undead of Lothar's caliber.
But Lothar indeed couldn't send anyone to track this demon immediately, because the main battlefield tied up most of their attention. If they were to mobilize the forces capable of perfectly resolving Imonar, it would likely create a certain gap on the main battlefield.
Lothar understood that this was the enemy's expedient measure. The demon commanders were not incompetent; he was well aware that the actual disparity between the demon forces in Antorus and the Azeroth Allied Forces was not significant, otherwise the war would not have been stalemated for so long.
They sent out Imonar, hoping to force the Allied Forces' commanders to choose: either let Imonar cause chaos in the rear, or withdraw troops from the front line to deal with Imonar.
But Lothar had no intention of letting the demons have their way. After quickly making various arrangements and deployments, he personally led his guard to intercept the fleeing Imonar.
However, their speed was still a step too slow. If it hadn't been for Alleria's interception, Imonar, who had sensed something was wrong, might have escaped the encirclement.
"It seems we've beaten the demons again... As long as we keep this up, we will surely win."
Alleria shook her head. Although this engagement still ended in their victory, Imonar had indeed disrupted the Allied Forces' deployment, and also caused some casualties in the camp, not to mention the supplies and equipment that couldn't be protected immediately in the explosion.
After speaking, Alleria intended to return to Turalyon to report, as her mission was complete.
However, Lothar stopped Alleria at this moment, "Don't be in such a hurry to leave, Windrunner."
"Is there anything else, Grand Duke Lothar?" Alleria stopped, her hand still clutching the quiver she had just picked up from the ground.
"Wait a moment. This demon still has value; we need to get some information we want from his mouth."
Lothar's words made Alleria's eyes widen abruptly, and her mouth involuntarily opened. She looked at the disgusting... solid-liquid mixture on the ground, and asked uncertainly, "You're not kidding, are you? I don't think that demon just now still had a 'mouth' organ."
In fact, Alleria's surprise wasn't just because of this. She learned from Illidan that in Argus, even after a demon dies, there's no chance of resurrection. For any demon, death on Argus is as real as a mortal's death.
This demon was instantly struck down by the power of Apocalypse, perishing in putrefaction and decay. Logically, his soul should have dissipated as well.
"Generally speaking, that's true. Even demons don't get a second life on Argus—but Apocalypse is more than just a weapon."
Lothar watched the ritual array gradually take shape, then pulled out the devoured soul from Apocalypse and threw it back into Imonar's decaying flesh.
When Imonar's body was killed just now, Apocalypse greedily devoured Imonar's soul, but this coincidentally saved Imonar's life, preventing his soul from immediately dissipating.
However, whether such a fate was good or bad for Imonar was hard to say.
Under the guidance of the three Death Knights, the ritual successfully imprisoned Imonar's soul within his already corrupted flesh, meaning this demon would constantly experience the pain of his entire body's flesh and nerves being infected and rotted by poison.
The agonizing wails sent a chill down Alleria's spine, but Lothar wasn't simply torturing Imonar. Imonar's soul was far more resilient than that of a typical demon, and special methods were needed to break him.
And it proved that this ritual was very useful. Prying open a demon's mouth was a very difficult task; the only virtue of these inherently brutal creatures might be their loyalty to the Legion—or rather, their fear of Sargeras.
Imonar, almost devoid of consciousness, quickly spilled everything he knew like beans from a bamboo tube. However, to Lothar's disappointment, most of this information was quite fragmented. It seemed that perishing on Argus had caused irreversible damage to this demon's soul.
The only useful piece of information they obtained was that the current Commander Council was only under the jurisdiction of one demon commander, Eredar General Erodus, who now controlled all the demon soldiers on the lower levels of Antorus.
"So, if we just kill Erodus, we can make the Legion completely collapse?"
Alleria's eyes lit up. While this method of acquiring intelligence was indeed somewhat cruel, it was also truly efficient.
Lothar nodded, "Logically, yes... But why is the Commander Council now controlled by only one person? Where are the other demon commanders? Admiral Sphrackse should still be alive, and where have those cunning Nathrezim gone?"
However, these questions could not be answered by Imonar's remnant soul; his surviving memories yielded almost no more useful information.
Fortunately, they were not entirely without gain. From Imonar, they at least learned that eliminating Erodus could bring the war to a faster end.
The true core of Antorus, the interior of this demon arsenal, was the real appearance of the so-called "Burning Throne."
The grim, oppressive metal architecture, adorned with various terrifying metal spikes and savage decorations, and littered with bones and vengeful spirits, was no longer visible. Instead, symmetrical, dark red metal structures formed orderly halls.
Crimson cosmic alloy was forged here into the foundation of the halls, adding a touch of sacred solemnity, rationality, and divinity to this temple, which was otherwise filled with a cold and murderous atmosphere.
This was not the architectural style of any demon race, but a magnificent megastructure beloved by Sargeras, the Titan, still retaining most of the characteristics and style of Titan architecture.
The entire Burning Throne was located deep within Argus's mantle, reaching the true core of the planet—a mysterious realm that even the flourishing Eredar of tens of thousands of years ago could not reach. It was also the fundamental reason why many Eredar were fiercely loyal to Sargeras.
Sargeras showed them cosmic truths that they might never have been able to explore on their own. This alone made countless Eredar, obsessed with the mysteries of the universe, devoted to the Burning Legion.
But a few rational individuals still knew that all of this was not without cost. The gifts of fate had been priced from the very beginning. When the Eredar truly accepted everything Sargeras offered, they were also destined to lose everything.
And the first thing they lost was their home, Argus.
Although this planet, this world, still seemed to hang in the universe as if nothing had happened, Argus's life force had long been drained by the Legion's scorched-earth tactics. This once-beautiful planet had no hope of recovery. Everything had been used by the Burning Legion as fuel for war, thrown into the Legion's never-ending war engine.
The Eredar themselves were precisely what drove all of this.
Therefore, when Sphrackse once again stood in the halls of the Burning Throne, surrounded by cold and angular Titan architecture, a chill inevitably rose in her heart.
The Burning Throne was a "holy place" for demons, but few demons were willing to personally experience everything here. Even the weakest demons would want to gouge out their own eyes in fear just by looking at it.
There was no warmth to be found in the seemingly magnificent halls; only cold and ruthless Titan constructs. They were Sargeras's most loyal servants, but unlike ordinary Titan constructs, the scarlet light emanating from their eyes would make even demons tremble.
The reason Sargeras chose these mechanical beings to guard his temple was simple: ordinary demons could not withstand the terrifying atmosphere here. Regular demon soldiers would quickly be driven mad by the wails and screams echoing through the temple.
Yes, wails and screams.
Those were not the pained cries of ordinary life, but the wails of Sargeras's former brethren, the supreme Titan Pantheon.
Sargeras cruelly murdered his kin, not even sparing their souls. The Dark Titan traversed the cosmos, capturing and imprisoning the Titan World-Souls sent away by Norgannon, confining them within this hall to suffer the most dreadful punishments and torments in the universe. This was to break their will, thereby making the entire Pantheon obey Sargeras himself.
The wails of gods were not something ordinary beings could endure. Even a powerful demon like Sphrackse, when in the Burning Throne, would lose herself amidst the almost tangible pain and sorrow. To prevent her sanity from being crushed by the drifting agony, she had to constantly use magic to guard her soul and block out the cacophony of sounds.
Yet, even so, she could still feel an oppressive sense of despair, like the end of the world. Each of these Titan star-gods was as great as an entire world, and their suffering was equivalent to the suffering of an entire world.
That was an oppressive force that mortals, or even ordinary demons and demigods, could not withstand. Sphrackse only wanted to quickly report everything that had happened outside.
But this high-ranking Admiral had not yet spoken. She had only just stood before the grand entrance of the Burning Throne when a voice from within stopped her from advancing.
The voice was as quiet as night, yet hollow and ethereal. Every sentence, every word carried a magic that could plunge one into eternal slumber at any moment. "Stop, Sphrackse, this is not where you should be."
As the voice sounded, the Titan guards standing on either side of the gate lowered their halberds, blocking Sphrackse's path.
Sphrackse stood stunned, but dared not make any excessive movements. "Respected Mother of Night, Lady Ossara, I am willing to listen to your teachings, but the current war situation is too urgent. We need our Master's wisdom to help us overcome this difficulty."
Her voice entered the hall, but was met only with silence.
After a while, when even Sphrackse's heart was filled with unbearable anxiety, another voice, wild and like a blazing fire, answered her.
"Incompetent, useless, worthless idiot! The only thing you'll get from here is a lesson!"
As the voice faded, Sphrackse's heart felt as if it had been forcefully squeezed. She quickly flapped her wings and retreated, and just as she moved away from the door, scorching flames shot out from the crack in the door, climbing madly outwards like a pressure-releasing furnace.
The metal skin of the two Titan guards at the entrance glowed red and hot from the intense heat, but they remained standing there, unresponsive, like emotionless statues.
Sphrackse's mind struggled to comprehend what was happening before her. She didn't understand why, given the current situation, the Burning Throne was refusing her audience?
At this moment, she finally couldn't hold back. Sphrackse pressed her palm directly onto the halberd that had just been scorched by the flames, not caring even as she heard a "sizzling" sound like roasting meat.
The Admiral cursed, "By what right do you prevent me from seeing our Master?! The war on Argus is in chaos, the warp nexus has been destroyed by those mortals, we have a large army but cannot mobilize it, and those damned Nathrezim have also betrayed the Legion! Don't you want our Master to know all of this? Or are you also traitors, like those bats?!"
She angrily vented her dissatisfaction. As a member of the Commander Council, Sphrackse had probably not experienced such intense emotional fluctuations in tens of thousands of years. Her duty required her to coldly and ruthlessly execute her art of war like a machine, bringing death and destruction to all enemies of the Legion.
But it was only when destruction possibly loomed over her own head that Sphrackse realized she was not truly a machine; she too felt an unavoidable fear of failure and death.
However, no matter how much she expressed her anger, the flames erupting from the great door seemed to be the final response.
Sphrackse looked at the motionless metal door, and an absurd thought couldn't help but rise in her heart: was it the Coven who didn't want her to enter, or was it the supreme Lord of the Legion... who didn't want her to enter?
"Impossible, my inventions are flawless! How could you lowly mortals—"
"You talk too much!"
Grommash's war axe was Jingaloss's answer, its blade arcing gracefully through the air, precisely severing the connection between Jingaloss's mechanical arm and his flesh.
Oil mixed with blood splattered everywhere, and Jingaloss howled, clutching his severed arm in agony. Although he had dulled his nerves with fel energy technology to allow him to graft on these inhuman technological products, a Death Knight's blade was no ordinary physical attack. The excruciating pain brought by dark magic struck directly at the soul, impossible to evade by normal means.
The pain blurred Jingaloss's consciousness, making him even more overwhelmed by the ensuing attacks. Grommash and the others, however, showed no mercy, their slashes and spells raining down on Jingaloss like a tempest.
The massive body of the Legion engineer shook like a sieve from the exploding dark energy. No matter how robust and resilient a demon's flesh, it could not survive such an assault. When the last flicker of life was extinguished by Grommash's dark strike, Jingaloss's corpse slumped completely into the core of the workshop.
His body, which had undergone countless horrific modifications and was almost unrecognizable from his original race, gushed oil and blood. Without support, the cables that had held him in the center of the workshop could no longer bear the weight of Jingaloss's corpse.
Gravity snapped the cables one by one, and as more cables broke, Jingaloss's corpse plummeted into the void beneath the control platform.
Grommash held Jingaloss's massive mechanical arm, his five gripping fingers digging into the metal, even crushing the circuits within with his immense strength.
The Death Knight injected a vast amount of dark energy into the severed arm. The still-operating fel energy conduits within the mechanical arm immediately reacted violently with Grommash's power. Just before it exploded, Grommash deftly tossed it into the pit where Jingaloss had fallen.
With a loud bang, a blast of scorching air shot up from the shaft-like pit, the heat making Grommash's tattered cloak snap behind him.
"Tch, you and your metal toys are equally uninteresting."
Behind Grommash lay the fel energy mechs they had defeated, sprawled in disarray. These war machines, now without power sources, lay on the ground like scrap metal, being dismantled by the Scourge soldiers who took any useful materials.
After Jingaloss, the chief engineer of this factory, died and the mechanical support was lost, the demons guarding the area knew there was no point in staying and began to retreat to other parts of Antorus.
The Scourge seized the opportunity to occupy the area. Scourge technicians quickly began to transport the machinery and materials from the destroyed Floating Cities, or simply moved them from other Floating Cities, aiming to transform this place into an Undead armory as quickly as possible.
Even seemingly useless mechanical scrap could be repurposed into Scourge war constructs. Although these temporary constructs, built without regard for quality, generally had little lifespan, if they could knock out even one demon's tooth on the battlefield, then these resources were considered useful, especially since they were all plundered from the demons.
Not even the demons, long accustomed to burning, killing, looting, and taking everything, had expected that one day they would be 'fleeced' by their opponents.
In fact, these fel energy tools, heavily contaminated, came at a great cost for ordinary mortals to use. But the Undead didn't care about such things; as long as something was useful or still usable, they would try to exploit it.
"Are you done on your side too?"
Ogrim's voice entered Grommash's mind. Grommash replied, "The Legion's factory workshop is under our control. The only remaining area is their barracks."
The only remaining peripheral facility they hadn't cleared yet was the tall tower that served as both barracks and the Legion's command center.
At the top of that fel iron tower was the Commander Council, which the Burning Legion called the "Eye of the Legion," the command post from which the Legion's supreme commanders issued orders.
This tower was built by Legion engineers within the mantle of Argus, with half of its structure embedded in a sheer cliff face. Besides the bridge leading to the tower, there was almost no other way to reach it.
Although the Scourge's Floating Cities could transport troops after approaching the tower, those approaching Floating Cities were bound to be targeted by the Burning Legion's artillery. No matter how powerful the magic shields, they couldn't withstand such dense bombardment for long. Therefore, their only option was to defeat the demon Legion guarding the main road, then push into the tower, and completely destroy the Legion's command system.
Ogrim was in charge of this assault, but clearly, his progress was not as swift as Grommash's.
By inversely invading through the exhaust vents into the workshop, Grommash's forces bypassed most of the Legion's defenses, easily slaying Jingaloss, who was continuously manufacturing war weapons in the workshop, thus paralyzing a large number of the Legion's mechanical devices.
However, after Grommash successfully captured the Legion's war workshop, Ogrim's side finally made progress. Without artillery and mech cover, the Legion could no longer prevent the Scourge's Floating Cities from getting close.
Soon, the first naxxanar fearlessly slammed into the metal tower, its magic shield furiously eroding the rock and cliff face during the violent impact. Controlled by Scourge Necromancers and Liches, the magic shield acted like a battering ram, welding the naxxanar to the side of the tower, stabilizing it into an aerial platform.
A few skeletal soldiers shakily climbed out of the breach opened by the naxxanar. They were the first Undead creatures to truly invade the Burning Legion's command center.
The loose jaw of the foremost skeletal soldier constantly trembled up and down, as if it were laughing. Even though it wore no armor and its blade was a rusty piece of scrap iron found from who knows where, it stood arrogantly in the command center, brandishing its weapon.
The skeletons behind it were infected by this fellow's mood, and a group of eerie skeletons began to dance wildly.
But their joy didn't last long. A giant hand tore through the darkness, grabbed a skeleton's skull, and lifted it like a chick. The skeletal soldier, held in mid-air, swung its iron shard repeatedly, but couldn't even leave a scratch on the grey-green giant.
Then, Erodus squeezed hard, crushing the skeletal soldier's skull into a pile of fragments, extinguishing the soul fire in its eyes along with it.
"Kill these decaying Undead!"
"Charge! Charge!"
Ogrim stood at the very front of the battle line, his runic warhammer like a declaration of death, relentlessly harvesting the lives of the demon soldiers before him.
At the vanguard of the Burning Legion's command post, he finally felt a long-absent pressure.
A portion of the Burning Legion's power, which had rampaged across countless worlds, was fully displayed here. For the first time, they faced a difficult, hard-fought battle against an opponent that was fully prepared.
To break through the Legion's Eye command post's defenses, Ogrim chose to strike directly after Grommash opened a breach in their firepower. However, this also meant they would bear the greatest pressure in this battle.
With the command post under attack, Erodus, the Legion's current supreme commander, immediately ordered demons from all directions to guard the tower. For the demons, this tower was their eyes and brain; if even this was destroyed, they would no longer receive timely and clear orders.
Conversely, if they held the tower, the Legion would gain a moment to breathe. The Burning Legion's forces scattered throughout the cosmos far exceeded their current strength on Argus. As long as they could hold out for reinforcements, the Azeroth Allied Forces would be unable to resist the Legion's true might.
Thus, Ogrim's forces faced two major challenges on the bridge leading to the command tower and in its surroundings: they had to find a way to breach the tower's defenses and rush in to completely dismantle the Legion's command system, while also fending off attacks from demon forces coming from behind.
Meanwhile, the forces on other fronts were all under their own pressures. With troop deployment already saturated, it was difficult for them to receive further reinforcements.
This would be an extremely brutal war of attrition—fortunately, the Scourge was never afraid of such attrition.
When a soldier on the line fell, the Necromancer would use the demon's remains as sacrificial offerings for rituals, summoning more troops to resist the demon's offensive. After siege equipment was destroyed by the Legion's firepower, new constructs were immediately deployed from the naxxanar overhead, continuing to demolish the Burning Legion's defensive fortifications.
If the situation continued like this, Ogrim believed they could fully endure until final victory. After all, although his unit was fighting on two fronts, the Burning Legion faced pressure on even more fronts.
But just as the front line was steadily advancing, a very ominous premonition arose in Ogrim's heart. An intense, palpable sense of oppression weighed down on him, causing the Death Knight to involuntarily look up at the sky.
A meteor burning with fel energy tore through the sky above them, making Ogrim instinctively widen his eyes. "Evacuate immediately!"
Soul communication almost violently crashed into the Scourge's communication channel. The priests and liches in charge of controlling the naxxanar, disregarding the discomfort caused by their souls shaking, maneuvered the naxxanar to evade.
The trajectory of the fel energy almost grazed a corner of the naxxanar as it fell. Ogrim was sure he saw bricks breaking off and falling from the friction between the meteor and the naxxanar, only to be incinerated into ash by the meteor's high temperature in mid-air.
Even the river of plague flowing from a corner of the naxxanar was evaporated for a moment, and the spreading toxic mist began to permeate the battlefield. Ogrim cleverly utilized this mist, directing it onto the demons to weaken their power.
But that was all. This low-concentration plague, its components already damaged by the fel energy flames, could hardly inflict greater harm on these demons, who were naturally accustomed to various extreme environments.
And the meteor irresistibly crashed into the mountain wall, countless rocks tumbling down in a cataclysmic landslide, as if the entire mountain before them would be torn apart by it.
A group of undead and demons were buried by these rocks, but Ogrim didn't care about this negligible loss. His attention was almost entirely focused on the meteor that had slammed into the mountain.
Ogrim's senses told him that it was not a simple meteor, but some kind of "living" creature—though "living" might not be entirely accurate, Ogrim already felt the creature's substantial anger and pain, burning fiercely like flames.
Just like the unquenchable fel energy flames that coiled around him.
"Roar—"
Amidst the dust and smoke, a massive, four-legged fel energy beast, as huge as a dragon, revealed its true form. Its entire body was ablaze with fel energy flames, its flesh and skin charred and solidified like lava, adhering firmly to him, causing him to suffer the torment of being burned by flames at every moment.
Even more terrifying was his completely abnormal head. The cervical vertebrae connecting his head and body were shattered, and eerie fel energy magic sustained his life, subjecting him to eternal torment and humiliation in the gap between life and death.
This was the Legion's punishment for shameful failures, and now, this monster was about to unleash all the suffering and resentment he endured upon the enemies before him.
"What's the deal with this guy?"
Kilrogg, noticing something was amiss, had already approached Ogrim. He examined the monster before them, saying with a sigh, "I understand now why these demons are so loyal. It seems the Legion is not only ruthless to its enemies but even more ruthless to its own."
Even the Blood Ring Clan, notorious for its bloody savagery in the eyes of outsiders, rarely employed such extreme punitive measures. After all, no matter how cruel orcs were, they would at most deprive the punished of their lives, but the Burning Legion deliberately kept these failures alive, making them taste eternal torment while also using pain and hatred to drive them to continue serving the Legion.
Dear reader, there's more to this chapter; please click next page to continue reading, it gets even more exciting!
"It looks like the remains of an Pit Lord…"
Ogrim observed the monster's characteristics, guessing that this twisted beast might have once been an Pit Lord.
"What it originally was isn't important. The main thing is that this thing is blocking our way now."
Kilrogg pointed to where the monster stood guard. A massive collapse of rocks and the creature's enormous size almost completely blocked the path. It seemed the Scourge would have to deal with this roadblock before they could penetrate the command post.
The Blood Ring Chieftain licked his dry lips. Although he no longer had saliva, the demon's blood had helped moisten his lips. "Grommash always boasted about killing an Pit Lord. This monster in front of us should also count as an Pit Lord, right?"
Ogrim glanced at Kilrogg. "What are you going to do? Go up and duel a giant of this size? If you get flattened into a pancake by one slap, don't say I didn't warn you."
Kilrogg chuckled, "Duel? I might have done that when I was alive, but now I command the dead!"
The Orc raised the scepter in his hand and slammed it violently against the ground. The necromantic power, like a summons from the abyss, spread out like a tide.
Waves of dark energy rapidly diffused within the Scourge. The withered bodies of the undead were almost instantly filled with dark energy, and the influx of this energy made them even more frenzied, even causing unforeseen deformities in their forms.
At Kilrogg's command, this reinforced undead army charged towards the giant beast summoned by the Burning Legion.