Guardian of Tirisfal The Guardian of Tirisfal , also known as Guardian of the Tirisfalen ( and perhaps " Guardian of Azeroth " ) , was a single mortal champion magically empowered by the Council of Tirisfal to secretly fight the Burning Legion and other demon s wherever they may appeared on Azeroth . It was an order of immensely powerful beings who were empowered to protect the world from the Burning Legion over the millennia . The Guardians were imbued with powers from all members of the Order of Tirisfal , becoming extremely powerful mage s in their own right . Typically , Guardians took rooms in the Violet Citadel . At the time Aegwynn became Guardian , all Guardians were given the honorific title " Magna " , which comes from a dwarven word meaning " protector " . It is unclear if Medivh ever received this honorific . He is usually known as " Magus " . The Guardians of Tirisfal have served for ages to protect the world from demonic influence . A Guardian of Tirisfal can understand and speak Eredun . There can be only one Guardian of Tirisfal at a time . Each Guardian of Tirisfal is empowered through a long ritual by a council of seven archmages . The secrets of this ritual are closely guarded , if not all but forgotten in recent times . A new Guardian of Tirisfal cannot be empowered while the previous one exists . Only through his death , or through an equally long and secret disempowering ritual conducted by the surviving archmages who empowered him , can a Guardian of Tirisfal be stripped of his power . Each archmage participating in the empowering ritual loses part of their power . The loss of power lasts as long as the Guardian of Tirisfal that had been empowered lives . The power is regained if the Guardian of Tirisfal dies or is stripped of power by the surviving council of archmagi . A Guardian of Tirisfal cannot be stripped of power if all of the empowering archmagi are dead . Instead , they must be killed before there can be another Guardian of Tirisfal . Guardians live for centuries , and as a result , there have been few of them . Only the names of six are known : Foundation of the Order . Following the inadvertent summoning of several demon s of the Burning Legion into the streets of the newly founded city of Dalaran , and the summoning of elementals from the Elemental Plane by both elves and humans , the ruling mage s of that city sought out the help of the high elves . While the Convocation of Silvermoon was able to help neutralize the immediate problem , the underlying threat of the Legion remained . Formed by a secret pact between the human and elven mages , the Order of Tirisfal was created to oversee the secret war to protect Azeroth from demonic invasion . Taking its name from the council ' s meeting place in the Tirisfal Glades , the Order imbued a single mortal with incredible powers of both elven and human magic . Though there would only ever be one Guardian at a time , they held such vast power that they could single - handedly fight back the Legion ' s agents wherever they were found in the world . The Guardian ' s power was so great that only the Council of Tirisfal was allowed to choose potential successors to the mantle of Guardian . Whenever a Guardian grew too old , or wearied of the secret war against chaos , the Council chose a new champion and under controlled conditions channeled the Guardian power into its new agent . Aegwynn and Medivh . The Guardians of Tirisfal were finally corrupted by Sargeras when his avatar fought the Guardian Aegwynn in Northrend . Though the Guardian Aegwynn successfully defeated Sargeras , his dark spirit entered her , and later the child that she conceived by the court conjurer of Stormwind , Nielas Aran . Determining that she , not the Order , should determine the heir to the mantle of Guardian , she imbued her new son Medivh with the powers of a Guardian , though these powers would not be realized until he reached adulthood . Unbeknown to Aegwynn , the spirit of Sargeras had tainted Medivh ' s soul . Medivh would eventually be overcome by the will of Sargeras and conspire with Gul ' dan and his orcish Shadow Council to open the Dark Portal which would allow the orcs to invade Azeroth . Following Medivh ' s death during the First War , no new Guardian was chosen , and nothing more was ever heard of the Order of Tirisfal . It may have been that extraordinary power , however , which allowed Medivh to return and guide events during the Third War . The New Order . At the behest of former Guardian Aegwynn , Archmage Jaina Proudmoore and Meryl Felstorm , a member of the first Council , a new Council of Tirisfal was formed to combat the threat of Cho ' gall and his foul masters while the focus of the Alliance and the Horde was on the war with the Lich King in Northrend . The first Guardian of the new Council was Med ' an , the child of Medivh and Garona Halforcen , who took up the mantle at the behest of his father .