The Return of the Burning Legion (Warcraft 3: Reign of Chaos)

After preparing for many long months, Kel'Thuzad and his Cult of the Damned finally struck the first blow by releasing the plague of undeath upon Lordaeron. Uther and his fellow paladins investigated the infected regions in the hope of finding a way to stop the plague. Despite their efforts, the plague continued to spread and threatened to tear the Alliance apart.

As the ranks of the Undead swept across Lordaeron, Terenas' only son, Prince Arthas, took up the fight against the Scourge. Arthas succeeded in killing Kel'Thuzad, but even so, the Undead ranks swelled with every soldier that fell defending the land. Frustrated and stymied by the seemingly unstoppable enemy, Arthas took increasingly extreme steps to conquer them. Finally Arthas' comrades warned him that he was losing his hold on his humanity.

Arthas' fear and resolve proved to be his ultimate undoing. He tracked the plague's source to Northrend, intending to end its threat forever. Instead, Prince Arthas eventually fell prey to the Lich King's tremendous power. Believing that it would save his people, Arthas took up the cursed runeblade, Frostmourne. Though the sword did grant him unfathomable power, it also stole his soul and transformed him into the greatest of the Lich King's death knights. With his soul cast aside and his sanity shattered, Arthas led the Scourge against his own kingdom. Ultimately, Arthas murdered his own father, King Terenas, and crushed Lordaeron under the Lich King's iron heel.

Sunwell -- The Fall of Quel'Thalas

Though he had defeated all of the people he now saw as his enemies, Arthas was still haunted by the ghost of Kel'Thuzad. The ghost told Arthas that he needed to be revived for the next phase of the Lich King's plan. To revive him, Arthas needed to bring Kel'Thuzad's remains to the mystical Sunwell, hidden within the high Elves' eternal kingdom of Quel'Thalas.

Arthas and his Scourge invaded Quel'Thalas and laid siege to the Elves' crumbling defenses. Sylvanas Windrunner, the Ranger-General of Silvermoon, put up a valiant fight, but Arthas eventually eradicated the high elf army and won through to the Sunwell. In a cruel gesture of his dominance, he even raised Sylvanas' defeated body as a banshee, cursed to endless undeath in the service of Quel'Thalas' conqueror.

• Sargeras and the Betrayal
• Codex Azeroth
• The Birth of Azeroth
• The Birth of Azeroth 2
• The Sundering of the World
• the centuries passed
• Part II - The Doom of Draenor
• Rise of the Horde
• exiled Frostwolves charged
• Lothar and his warriors
• Part III - The Alliance of Lordaeron
• the wayward orcs
• new Orcish
• The Birth of the Lich King
• The Battle of Grim Batol
• The New Horde
• War of the Spider
• The Forming of the Scourge
• The Alliance Splinters
• Warcraft 3: Reign of Chaos
• Archimonde's Return and the Flight to Kalimdo
• The Battle of Mount Hyjal
• Part VI - The Betrayer Ascendant
• Civil War in the Plaguelands
• The Lich King Triumphant
• Old Hatreds -- The Colonization of Kalimdor