Lost Temple - Near the Broken Shore, Broken Isles

  “We move…on our Champion’s command!”

  Said Champion was atop their borrowed Argent Crusade Hippogryph, recollecting how they’d even gotten here. Lord Maxwell Tyrosus had brought them to the tomb of Uther the Lightbringer, one of Azeroth’s first paladins. Uther revealed that unlike High King Wrynn, Tirion Fordring was still alive, and the Ashbringer was in the hands of the Legion.

  This was not acceptable.

  The Argent Crusade had set out soon after, and now, a full company of Argent Crusaders was descending on a lost temple in the Broken Shore.

  In short order, the crusaders saw Tirion, bound by magical and mid torture from a Jailer of the Legion. The demon shouted something about mortals suffering for their incredible hubris, but the Champion didn’t bother listening. They were the last words of a being that would just reform, in time.

  The jailer fell easily to the Light, and Tyrosus started using his power to free Tirion from the strange light blue crystalline prison he was trapped in. “Go, Champion! Find the blade!”

  The hardened veteran of most of Azeroth's recent and concurrent global disasters didn’t need to be told twice. A golden armored Charger wreathed in light and heavy plate carried them deeper into the ruined temple, and disappeared just before the Ashbringer, which was just sitting in the open, embedded in a piece of rubble, sparking with golden lightning.

  “Well this is the most obvious trap I’ve ever seen…” They turned to shout at their surroundings, guessing rightly at what kind of demon lay in wait. “I thought Dreadlords were supposed to be clever! As traps go… this is pitiful.”

  Seeing he was called out, the master manipulator deigned to manifest from the shadows. “Ahhh… The Light’s greatest Champion, come to reclaim the holy Ashbringer, and lay waste to my Kin. They say only the pure can wield the Highblade. Come Champion. Claim your destiny.”

  Sighing, the paladin stepped forward, and placed their gauntleted hand on the Ashbringer’s sparking hilt. Shadow magic surrounded them, holding them in place. Then, the coward appeared. The paladin grimaced as they recognized this particular Felspawn. The paladin growled a single word, “Balnazzar…”

  Feeling secure enough to monologue, the demon responsible for corrupting the Scarlet Crusade into bigoted zealots started monologuing.

  “I’ve been waiting for you, Paladin. Know that I will rip the soul from your flesh and make your body my own. I will turn you into a weapon of the Legion. I will use your hollow shell to corrupt and destroy everything you have ever loved, piece by piece.”

  He held out a hand, frowning as his power wasn’t immediately overpowering the paladin. “Now kneel! Kneel before your new Master!”

  The Champion was struggling as well. Balnazzar was strong, for a coward. But the Ashbringer was resisting him. It felt as though the sword was waiting for them to do something, to call upon the power of the sleeping Naaru core set in the blade.

  The previous Ashbringer’s iconic words echoed through the paladin’s head. They and the other raiders had been dead atop Icecrown. That was the part the bards always left out. They had died, before Arthas. They had failed, fallen to the power of the Lich King.

  Until Tirion performed a miracle.

  The Champion knew the Light was not likely to give miracles on demand, but maybe here, in this pivotal moment, it would do it again. All they needed was a push. Through their helmet, Balnazzar heard the paladin speak, and the words sent a prescient chill up his demonic spine.

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  “Light…grant me the strength…to shatter these bonds!”

  Flame and Light exploded around them, as the next Ashbringer was born.

  Divine flame scorched the corrupted stone of the temple, leaving it glowing and dangerous to anything spawned from the Twisting Nether as it spread across the stone in cracks of heat and light.

  Balnazzar was undeterred. “You cannot fight my will… You are mine!”

  Silent, stoic, and stronger than they’d ever been, the Ashbringer charged Balnazzar, their Charger once again appearing to aid them, if only briefly.

  “Very well.” Balnazzar crowed, still pretending this was all part of the plan. “This shall be a fine test!”

  The demon turned to shadow and tried to slip past the Ashbringer, but the unmatched blade sliced into him anyway, and the demon snarled as he retreated backward from the paladin.

  They circled each other, the paladin one-handing their new weapon, Balnazzar enhancing his claws, for all the good it would do against Azeroth’s strongest blade.

  “Foolish Mortal…” Balnazzar continued, “You are nothing but a pawn, in a scheme you cannot comprehend. Every quest you’ve undertaken, every challenge you’ve surpassed has happened only because I willed it. Even coming here, and retrieving that sword…is all part of my plans!”

  The Ashbringer struck, leaving a wake of burning ashes in the air. Balnazzar snarled as the holy flames scorched him with critical effectiveness. With a roar of anger, he disappeared in a flash of shadow, and summoned a swarm of imps.

  The Ashbringer cut through them like mindless Scourge, leaving only ash to mark their brief sojourn from the Twisting Nether. “Is this the best the mighty Balnazzar can do!? Imps? PATHETIC!”

  “Impressive.” Balmazzar rumbled as his minions were easily dispatched. “I did not expect you to attune to the Ashbringer so quickly. No matter. I will finish you off personally…”

  Once more, they clashed. Balnazzar tried, but the Ashbringer was a master with greatswords, and this sword was irritatingly powerful in their hands.

  “ENOUGH!” Balnazzar shouted, bleeding, burned, and furious, “Never again will that damned blade slay my brethren! YOU…WILL…DIE!”

  “Not likely.” The Ashbringer intoned, raising the highblade as a swirling storm of hammer-based Light fury smashed into the Dreadlord. “The Light is my ally. Even Death cannot claim me. What chance have you?”

  Balnazzar struck again, but once more claws and bravado could not overcome the Ashbringer. They felt it, as they fought. As if the highblade had long noticed their skill with greatswords, and their devotion to the Light. As if this union…was always meant to be. They briefly saw a vision, an alternate time now lost, of Tirion, aged and armored, handing them the highblade.

  This union was pre-ordained. Only the method of transfer had ended up changing, thanks to Kairozdormu and Garrosh Hellscream’s meddling with the timelines.

  Eventually, before the Ashbringer could strike the final blow, Balnazzar turned into a swarm of bats. “You think this is over, Paladin? Our journey together has just begun…”

  The paladin let him flee. Understanding filled them. The Light’s will was evident, and, they noted, aligned with Archmage Khadgar’s plans. To gather their world’s most powerful weapons, and in the hands of Heroes from all classes, drive back the Legion’s invasion.

  Tyrosus shouted for the Paladin to come quickly, breaking them from their reverie. The brief peace of communing with the Light faded as they focused back on the war.

  They came upon a heartbreaking scene, the former Ashbringer, the man who’d broken Frostmourne, lay dying in the arms of his friend. Lord Tyrosus looked up at the current Ashbringer as their mount faded into light, and vanished, leaving them standing before Tirion.

  The other Argent Crusaders gathered by Tirion, as their Champion arrived. The old hero whispered hoarsely, yet the ancient abandoned temple was silent enough to hear him.

  “Champion…come closer…you must…wield the blade…you Must…stop the Legion! You…must become…the Ashbringer…”

  Tirion Fordring’s last Light faded, and with a circular pulse of Light that washed over the gathered Paladins, a small golden orb, Tirion’s soul, ascended upwards into the hellish clouds covering the sky. Tyrosus ordered them to head for Light’s Hope Chapel, so Tirion could be buried with the other heroes there.

  As the paladins remounted their hippogryphs, Maxwell Tyrosus rode up beside the Ashbringer. “We gave everything for the Ashbringer. Tirion would be proud to see you wielding that blade.”

  The Champion just nodded. Still not quite believing what weapon was now humming warmly against their back. Even through their plate, they felt the blade’s Light. Dormant, for now, but waiting. Ready. It was as if it knew where it was supposed to be, and was now content to be there.

  Within the sacred underground halls of Light’s Hope Chapel, the newest Ashbringer inscribed their name into the Libram of Ancient Kings as they attended Tirion’s funeral. Maxwell Tyrosus proclaimed to the gathered paladins across all orders that the Silver Hand had reformed, and the Ashbringer was now its Highlord. The Blood Knights and the Draenei Vindicators pledged to fight the Legion together, and unified under the Highlord, the paladin orders of Azeroth felt hope for the first time since the catastrophic first battle of the Broken Shore.