User:Joshmaul/Saavedro of Stratholme/Invasion of Northrend/Arthas' Last Stand



The final blow was ready to fall, and once more Saavedro of Stratholme was prepared to deliver. He had endured Tirion Fordring's Argent Tournament. Now he was prepared to deliver the final deathblow to the Scourge by bringing the fight to the Lich King himself. But the paladin knew this would not be an easy task. Arthas had had plenty of time to prepare his defenses, and given that they were now fighting in the boundaries of Icecrown Citadel itself, those defenses would be formidable indeed...

The Forge of Souls: The Testing Ground


Saavedro was contacted by a Kirin Tor mage named Apprentice Nelphi, who met with the paladin in Dalaran. Nelphi reported that his patron - none other than Lady Jaina Proudmoore herself - had discovered a hole in Icecrown Citadel's defenses and was rallying soldiers of the Alliance to aid her in exploiting it. At the same time, Sylvanas Windrunner had also arrived in Icecrown and was seeking soldiers of the Horde to accompany her on that same task.

Saavedro journeyed across the frozen wastes and met with Jaina inside the Forge of Souls, a massive production area carved in the ice beneath the citadel. Jaina was awaiting the arrival of champions from the Coliseum to aid her in pushing forward, but required someone to secure the Forge so they could press on into the Pit of Saron. The Regent agreed to aid his old friend again, and - accompanied by Artimus Devaneaux - ventured into the Forge. It was here that the Lich King was developing a new weapon called a "Soul Grinder", and Saavedro resolved himself to stopping it before it could destroy them all. The first obstacle they encountered was a human warlock named Bronjahm, the so-called "Godfather of Souls", who unleashed a torrent of spirits against them and corrupted a portion of each man's soul.

With his defeat, they ventured across the winding, grated walkways of the Forge to reach an inner chamber wherein dwelt the Devourer of Souls, the product of the Forge's work. Unleashing trapped souls and mirroring the souls of the enemy so that damage to the construct would result in damage to them, Saavedro and Artimus endured the strength of the Devourer as it unleashed a great beam of energy in a last ditch effort to destroy its quarry...shortly before being destroyed itself. As the Devourer fell, Jaina and her army of champions ran in to join them. Jaina revealed that the next location would be the Pit of Saron, the saronite mining operation south of the Shadow Vault - the same operation that the paladin and the death knight, working with the Ebon Blade, had shut down months earlier.

The Pit of Saron: The Slave Rebellion


The Pit of Saron was a source of slave labor for the Scourge. Upon entering the Pit and approaching its foul master, Scourgelord Tyrannus, the Coliseum champions in Jaina's entourage were slaughtered and raised as undead. In order to continue forward, Jaina instructed Saavedro and his allies to free the slave laborers and to defeat Forgemaster Garfrost, the flesh giant who oversaw the great forge in the Pit. Saavedro, infuriated at the poor conditions that the slaves were kept in - literally worked to death - took to his task with holy fury. Once enough had been rallied, he marched to Garfrost's forge and dodged huge saronite boulders hurled in his direction, and using them for cover against the powerful spells of the Forgemaster. With his destruction, the slaves, led by a man named Martin Victus, took control of the forge and began working the medal to make weapons and armor to aid the champions in their march further into the Pit.

After Garfrost's destruction, they battled their way to where a plagued leper gnome named Krick oversaw the slave labor from atop a plague eruptor called, appropriately, "Ick". They dodged the powerful magic mines and poisons unleashed by the foul monstrosity until they destroyed it, making Krick suddenly defenseless. Breaking down, Krick revealed that the Lich King left Frostmourne unguarded in a place called the Halls of Reflection. Jaina took this information in with a degree of optimism...just as Krick was killed by Tyrannus, flying overhead. Rallying the slave army, Jaina and Victus lay in wait while Saavedro and his comrades fought their way up to a tunnel, leading to Tyrannus' platform. All through the tunnel, Tyrannus and his frostwyrm Rimefang were attacking the outside, trying to collapse it on the oncoming force. But they perservered, and arrived at the platform along with the liberated slaves.

Tyrannus was a difficult opponent, reminding Saavedro of Vazruden the Herald, the fel orc he had faced in Hellfire Ramparts in Outland years earlier. Like that long-dead foe, his mount attacked from above while he faced his enemies in melee, and branding them so that he could leech their energy. But he did not stand for long, and when he fell, his frostwyrm abandoned him. Victus stepped forward and applauded the efforts, and swore to stand by the liberators, when suddenly Saavedro felt himself pulled back to the tunnel. Sindragosa, queen of the frostwyrms, had flown up from below and unleashed her fury, killing Victus and destroying the majority of that slave army. Jaina, cursing Arthas for his crimes (though not nearly as vehemently as Saavedro), approached the doorway at the platform's edge...the door to the Lich King's most private sanctum.

The Halls of Reflection: Secrets of the Lich King


Having seen many horrifying and fascinating places in his time, Saavedro admitted to a sense of bone-chilling terror when he entered the Halls of Reflection. Before him on an altar in a cavernous hall floated Frostmourne, the blade that had claimed the once-noble Arthas, destroyed Lordaeron and Quel'Thalas, and stole the souls of kings, paladins and champions of all races and nations.

Jaina stepped forward, warning her companions not to touch the blade for fear of losing their souls, and began to commune with the spirits within the blade. To his horror, Saavedro heard the voice and saw the face of Uther the Lightbringer, first and greatest of the paladins of Lordaeron, his soul torn away from him at the hands of his once-beloved pupil. Uther warned that the Lich King was on his way, able to see the intruders through the blade. Jaina hoped to find a way to redeem him, but Uther warned that the Lich King must be destroyed, and it must be done at the Frozen Throne, the very place where he had been created. Adding to that dire proclamation was another warning: If the Lich King were destroyed, another must take his place, a sacrifice of a noble soul to contain the ultimate evil.

At that moment, Uther's soul screamed in anguish, and the Lich King entered the room to confront the intruders. He summoned his finest captains, Falric and Marwyn - who had turned to the Scourge along with Arthas, and had accompanied him when he slew his father, King Terenas - and left them to kill Saavedro and his comrades. As Arthas returned to his inner chambers, Jaina gave chase - leaving the fight to her comrades. Falric summoned the souls of Lordaeron's soldiers, and the battle began. Resisting the urge to give in to despair, Saavedro and his comrades destroyed the corrupted Lordaeron captain, the death knight's dying cry being a call to his friend Marwyn to finish them off. Marwyn, too, had ghosts at his command, but eventually, like Falric, would enter the fight against the intruders, his ability to corrupt flesh no match for the powers of the Light.

As they passed through the long hallway to the Lich King's throne room, they found Archmage Koreln, Jaina's companion, dead on the ground, and the sounds of battle ahead. Destroying the frostsworn general and the dark reflections of himself and his comrades, Saavedro entered the Shadow Throne to find the Lich King and Jaina in combat, the archmage realizing that the Dark Lord was too powerful. Joining with her escort, Jaina fled through a passage out of the throne room, but Arthas had his share of surprises for them - raising walls of ice that Jaina had to break through while Saavedro and his comrades fought off the undead minions raised by the master of the Scourge to impede their progress. Breaking through four such walls, they reached a platform outside - only to find that they were trapped, and the Lich King hot on their tails. Suddenly, Saavedro heard the sound of rotors coming from below and knew it could belong to only one vessel: The gunship Skybreaker. Stepping aboard as the vessel opened fire on the tunnel, collapsing it before the Lich King could reach them, Saavedro and his comrades made good their escape...

The Citadel: Beyond the Realm of Sanity


Having escaped the Lich King by the skin of his teeth, Saavedro knew, as Uther had warned, that they would have to enter Icecrown itself to do battle with the Dark Lord...and, steeling himself for the horrors within, that is precisely what he did.

Saavedro arrived to find a relatively abandoned siege camp and a large battering ram before the shattered main gates of Icecrown, and entered along with his comrades to the chamber called "Light's Hammer", the farthest point claimed by the new "Ashen Verdict", a coalition of the Ebon Blade and the Argent Crusade formed for this sacred task. The paladin met with his old friend Tirion Fordring as well as Ebon Highlord Darion Mograine, and the artisans and warriors assembled to join them. As they made their move forward, the Lich King appeared before them, remarking to Fordring that he could have been a great Scourge champion were it not for his rigid adherence to the Light, but he had a new champion in the works. To his horror, Saavedro recognized the voice of Bolvar Fordragon, believed dead at the Battle of Angrathar the Wrathgate. Muradin Bronzebeard, whom Saavedro had met in Storm Peaks prior to his leaving to hunt down Arthas, believed that there could be a chance to restore peace between Alliance and Horde if they were able to rescue Fordragon.

Accompanied by his student, Vulnavia Hildreth, Saavedro and his comrades fought their way through the ranks of the damned to reach the central chamber of Icecrown Citadel, the great Spire atop which rested the Frozen Throne of the Scourge. Guarding the way forward like an ageless guardian was a hideous bone wraith, constructed from thousands of different parts. It was called Lord Marrowgar, and it was the first challenge facing the would-be champions who sought to bring down Arthas. Only Saavedro's iron will and the quick action of his comrades to free him kept him from dying to the bone spikes that were the creature's most fearsome weapon, and the quickness of his feet (combined with a little engineering prowess) kept him from being consumed by the "icy fire" he conjured. After a grueling battle that cost several of Saavedro's comrades their lives, Marrowgar was destroyed - opening the way to the remainder of the lower Spire...

During the battle against Lady Deathwhisper, the only known female lich and Kel'Thuzad's apparent successor at the head of the Cult of the Damned, Saavedro was so badly wounded, he was considered a near-cripple, and he was taken to Dalaran to recuperate. This permanently brought him out of the battle for the Citadel, and instead the glory and the ongoing struggle has been left in the hands of Master Taeril'hane Ketiron...