The Scourge has retreated.
This is good news for the high elves.
They paid a great price to resist this enemy. At the time, nearly 80,000 high elves were guarding the city walls, most of whom were high elf civilians who had just taken up arms, not even worthy of being called militia.
More than half of these 80,000 people were killed or wounded. Adding those high elves who didn't evacuate in time and the war losses of the army, the high elves' population decreased by 100,000...
Although it wasn't enough to damage their foundation and greatly weaken their vitality, it still made Kael'thas feel the pain.
In the past ten years, their population hasn't recovered to what it was before the orc invasion. This invasion of the Scourge can be said to have doubled their population loss.
Population has always been the weakness of the high elf kingdom. Unlike the night elf clan, which inherited the huge population of the Kaldorei Empire after the War of the Ancients, their population base was in the tens of millions ten thousand years ago. Even if the Burning Legion's invasion halved it, they still had more than five million.
With the blessing of the guardian dragons, the night elves possessed healthy bodies and endless lives. Even if the birth rate was low, ten thousand years would have been enough to restore their population to its peak.
And this is just the normal population of the night elves, not counting Galen's hidden four million troops...
The high elves were just evolved from that group of surviving highborne. Their numbers were already small, and they were far away from Kalimdor, unable to be immortal like the night elves, but they inherited their disadvantage of a low birth rate...
Population is something that, when it reaches a certain base number, it will grow like a snowball. Unfortunately, the high elves' population has never been able to break through the one million mark.
In addition to population loss, they also lost most of their high-end combat power.
Almost all of the remaining members of the Silvermoon Council were wiped out.
The few who didn't die also suffered from depleted mental strength due to excessive use of magic, their strength permanently declining, only barely able to maintain the rank of high-level mage, unable to improve for the rest of their lives.
However, these councilors were worth it. Their families successfully drew a clear line between themselves and the families of those betrayers, and would not be blamed by their clansmen.
It can be said that during the Scourge invasion, almost all of the old powerhouses that the high elves had accumulated for thousands of years were written off.
Now, the most capable fighters are probably Prince Kael'thas, the new Archmage Rommath, Ranger-General Sylvanas, and her sisters.
In order to replenish combat power, Kael'thas urgently recalled all the high elves who were staying in Dalaran.
But little did he know that this inadvertent order saved them.
Of course, none of this is the most important thing.
The most important thing is that the Sun King sacrificed himself.
The Sun King has been on the throne for more than three thousand years. Most of the citizens in the high elf kingdom have known Anasterian sitting on the throne since they were born. This has become a habit for them.
Now, the old king sacrificed himself to protect his people and defend Silvermoon City.
But life must go on. Whether it is the citizens of Silvermoon City or Kael'thas, they must face the upcoming important task: rebuilding their homeland.
Kael'thas rejected the people's request for him to ascend the throne. He hoped to be able to avenge his father and the dead people before ascending the throne of king.
However, although Kael'thas did not ascend the throne, in the eyes of the people, he was already the king, and he also shouldered the heavy responsibility of revitalizing Quel'Thalas.
First of all, the first order he issued was to send envoys to Stromgarde, hoping to hold an Alliance conference to discuss the matter of rejoining the Alliance.
The second thing was to integrate the mage corps, merging the Firewing, Flamehawk, Flameblade, and Garrison regiments into the Sunfury and Sunstrider Legions, becoming two legions of ten thousand people.
The Dawnblade Knights and the Ranger Corps will maintain their existing organization.
Next is to clear the undead in the country!
After the Scourge left, the trauma they left to Quel'Thalas was still there. A scar of death from the Gates of Sallas to the south gate of Silvermoon City remained on the land of the high elves like an ugly scar.
This scar of death contains powerful death energy. From time to time, corpses are reanimated by the invasion of death energy. Just dealing with these resurrected dead requires a lot of effort.
Fortunately, the entire high elf group is holding back a surge of energy. Different emotions have increased their combat effectiveness by 30%.
Galen didn't continue to stay in Silvermoon City, leaving Thranduil and the Scarlet Flame Legion to guard against the resurgence of the Amani trolls. If possible, Galen hoped that Thranduil could bring Zul'jin under his command.
After promising to support Kael'thas with a batch of holy water every month to purify the scar of death, Galen headed south and secretly began a secret operation with his troops.
The main force of the Scourge Legion withdrew quite quickly. The Lich King had to complete the task of opening the door given to him by Kil'jaeden. Before Archimonde's arrival, the dreadlords were a sword hanging over his head.
Now, several core members of the Scourge, Arthas, Kel'Thuzad, and Dar'Khan, all know that their Scourge will inevitably break away from the Burning Legion and choose to rebel.
However, rebelling also requires skills. Now that the lord is too strong and they are not strong enough, they have to lie low for a while longer.
Galen also gave full indulgence, watching the Scourge grow bigger and stronger, and create brilliance again, but the bottom line is that no one can continue to die. As for the graves on the land of Lordaeron and Quel'Thalas, do as you please.
Anyway, they are not my ancestors.
So, under this circumstance, the number of the Scourge Legion was replenished once again. The largest source of troops was still the royal city of Lordaeron. In addition to the city's sewers, there were massive cemeteries underground.
Arthas went south all the way and returned to Tirisfal Glades. After replenishing a large number of troops in the royal city of Lordaeron, he came to the broken city wall in the south of the city. Not far outside the city wall was Lake Lordamere.
Not long ago, half of the people of Lordaeron escaped from here.
Arthas came to the shore of the lake and directly threw Frostmourne into the lake. The runeblade tumbled and flew forward, and finally the blade pointed down and stuck in the shallows.
The runeblade exuded a cold chill, and the surrounding lake water froze into ice. The ice surface quickly extended outward, forming a flat road for the undead and war machines to pass through.
In the original timeline, Dalaran underwent several reconstructions during the war. The first time was after the orcs were defeated, when Ner'zhul prepared to invade Azeroth for the second time. The death knight Teron Gorefiend led a team to seize the important magic items Eye of Dalaran, Book of Medivh, and Scepter of Sargeras.
Then the Dalaran Red Dragons were burned, so a new city area was built on the south bank of Lake Lordamere, which is the location of the Dalaran crater in later generations.
And this timeline, because Galen intervened in Draenor, directly strangled the reorganization of the orcish Horde.
Therefore, Dalaran is still on the original site of the Arathor Empire era.
Arthas and Kel'Thuzad led the undead army towards Caer Darrow in the lake.