Grand Alliance Invasion of Tanaan

## A World Unified

With the advance of Gul'dan, the members of the The Court of Uther, having already heard the call into Tanaan, rushed to hear the call. Many organisations ran to stand with the Grand Alliance and continue to do so with the advent of the Fel Horde facing them all.

## The Grand Alliance

In face of the threat of the Iron Horde and Gul'dan's fel abberations, |Sir Tenevus Stromheart rallied many members of the Alliance to stand against the orcish horde, that it may defend against another attack against Azeroth. The group met and divided a variety of responsibilities across Tanaan to ensure command of the region.

## Invasion: Stage One

While the Magus Senate, Dwarven Vanguard and Te Amun battered and weakened the vanguard, it offered an entranced for the Silver Hand to bash their way into the field, alongside their allies, before being forced to retreat to the Rangari Refuge where they squared off against a mighty Gronn.

Meanwhile, the Highguard, and the City State of Alterac approached by water.

## Allies on the Seas

The Highguard had already intended to take the fight to Gul'dan's last bastion, but what they didn't account for was the timeline that was so very quickly sped up. The Dwarven Vanguard had already deployed, and severely underestimated the Legion's foothold; they found themselves being beaten back. At the Court of Uther meeting in which Tanya Seltara was found unrecognised as a Knight by the Court, such a report was read, and production of the Grand Alliance Fleet was sped up in great haste to rescue the Dwarves.

Two days later, with the Highguard's shipyard and first transport completed - christened Sprite Darter's Praise, Port Danath found itself under an odd, seemingly spontaneous attack from a patrolling Iron Horde Carrier. The Lighthouse was destroyed by a series of cannon shots, burying Aeriyth under its rubble, while Binor had moved SDP (Sprite Darter's Praise) out from being docked so it wasn't such a sitting target. Derian and Aeson had rushed back to the Redoubt to get ARCADIA II repaired and back online from the Space-time rip of earlier, for ARCADIA was the only real defense that Port Danath had against an Iron Horde Carrier.

With its meager swivel guns, SDP provided some help against the league of Rylak Riders the Carrier had launched, but it was soon noticed that a skeleton crew had hold of the Iron Horde vessel. Vor'taria had wheeled down one of the Spellistae prototypes, and supercharged its power crystal to provide a volley of punishing spellcraft as the other two rushed back down to the Port. ARCADIA had been repaired enough to power on, but was stuck in a power-cycling loop and couldn't help them. Derian had activated his Silver Reaver, slinging round after round of armour-piercing ammunition at the Carrier as the Rylaks bombarded the docks with bombing runs and peppered the wood with their own mounted turrets.

As the Carrier began to take on water, its side-turret focused on SDP and spun up to unleash a salvo of bullets at the hardly-protected carrier. Binor had only a split second to throw up a golden barrier of light to protect the transport ship, as Aeson loaded a High-Explosive round into one of the Port's cannons, and fired. It slammed into the Carrier, igniting gunpowder and oil, sending it up in a magnificent plume of smoke and flame.

Oddly however, the Rylaks peeled off after one of them dropped something in the water, by the Port. With Aeriyth under rubble, an Iron Horde Infiltrator jabbed a paralytic-tipped dagger through Derian's throat and strapped a shaped charge to his body, before pulling him off to the side to be discovered. Vor'taria was next, but was jabbed in the side, and in trying to radio for help, found the beacon system disrupted with static. With Binor healing Aeson from his shrapnel wounds, and the other three present disabled, the Infiltrators worked quickly to load the shore cannon and jam them before lighting the fuse. They exploded, taking out bits of the dock and putting quite a dent in the Highguard's plans to deploy.

Thankfully, Binor and Aeson were able to find Vor'taria and expel most of the paralytic agent before the lot rushed to the collapsed Lighthouse. Raphah had been able to levitate most of the rubble off of Aeriyth, and Binor did the rest of the digging to free her, when Aeson had noted a faint ticking sound from the brush behind them. Upon investigating, Derian was found with the explosive device strapped to him, but thankfully it was disarmed at the three-second mark...Only for the Silver Reaver to roar overhead, pilotted by one of the Infiltrators, before it sped off towards Tanaan. Once they had what they came for, the interference over the beacon had sparked out, and an EMP device was dredged up off the side of the battered shipyard.

On the eve of the 23rd, the Highguard and aid from the Alteraci delegation set sail on Sprite Darter's Praise to Tanaan Jungle. Along the way, they battled Rylak aerial attacks, an orcish boarding party, and even an Iron Horde submarine. With torpedoes launched at the transport vessel, Binor had no choice but to weigh anchor at the last moment which caused the ship to be swung out of the way with momentum. With its salvo evaded, the submarine surfaced and crew emerged to set up a gunnery turret, and the Alliance quickly swung from ropes on SDP's mast to board the vessel. The away team quickly dispatched the orcs, but the submarine signaled an attempt to dive. Binor used the swivel guns to puncture holes in the sub's hull, having it take on water and both Derian and Velayna tossed grenades down the hatch. The away team crawled back on grapple lines in a hurry, but the explosions went off, detonating the munitions stores inside the submarine and causing it to combust internally. The lines were severed, dropping many into the water and peppering them with shrapnel, but they were reeled in safely.

With all aboard and being tended to medically, the crew of the Praise navigated her through the minefield that identified their approach to the shore safely. Upon landing, everyone armoured up, mounted up, and aerial recon was deployed by Ara'lith and Valetender to find the other Alliance party. They had been located at the Alliance Front, and so the landfall team raced to Lion's Watch through cannonfire and bullets along the Path of Glory. Once safely inside Lion's Watch, Aeriyth gave another briefing on meeting up with Team 2, and Lynnesta established a medical encampment at Lion's Watch for the badly injured.

As the briefing went on, blue signal flares errupted skyward from the area near Rangari's Refuge, sent by Velyanaa Swiftwind. Team 2 saddled up, all but the medical division, and rode out to meet the distress beacon. Upon arriving, Swiftwind was found with the Silver Hand Chapter, Te Amun and Lion Ascending, gored to a very impending death. She was lifted up by Aeriyth and set in Valetender's gyrocopter to be airlifted back to Lion's Watch for medical attention.

The culprit was a gronn that Team 2 had felled just outside the Refuge, and with the area secured by the 812th, the Alliance force moved inside to set up camp and for a speech by Stromheart that the author zoned out during. Following that, the Commanders met in the top-most building to discuss battleplans, and the Highguard set up camp on the lowest level, to the right.
One of the many potent areas of battle was the Temple of Sha'naar, once host to holy worshipers of the Light, now to the wicked Sargerei forces, warped by the Legion's promise for power. Highseer Kavaaru stepped up with the first assault plotted out.

## Battlefield: Temple of Sha'naar

One of the many potent areas of battle was the Temple of Sha'naar, once host to holy worshipers of the Light, now to the wicked Sargerei forces, warped by the Legion's promise for power.

One such attempt on the Temple, lead by Kavaaru and the Te Amun, lead many of the Grand Alliances forces upon the night of the 29th of July at 2100 hrs.

The objective, lead from a small Draenei outpost at the base of the Temple, was to strike fast and hard. The unified forces, though not not fully representative of the Grand Alliance, smashed through the unsuspecting guardians of the gate and made a cutting path up the pathway before they were met with a powerful, currently unnamed warlock whom, using its dark magic, crushed a large force of the crusaders with falling rocks that flanked either side of the pass, using that time, time where many of the crusaders used to free themselves and heal allies, to summon down a barricade around the temple, holding the siege to a standstill, despite a taskforce's efforts in sneaking past the barricade in order to disable it.

Xinatha Sunstorm managed to break the barrier, taking an extreme amount of fel in order to keep the other elves safe. All of the fel badges broke, but otherwise, the Highguard remained safe thanks to Sunstorm's sacrifice.

## Battlefield: The Fel Forge

Throughout the month of August, the Highguard was not only preoccupied with the Tournament of Ages, but also fighting in Tanaan after their brief vacation away. They encountered the Dominion of the Sun in a small compound of the Fel Forge attempting to take the weaponry for use on the Alliance. Unfortunately there was an ambush, many of the Highguard and friends injured, but a recovery was made! Thankfully, the Alliance was victorious and routed the sin'dorei menace, destroying the Iron Horde armaments and escaping.

Afterwards, an agent of the Dominion that also was a member of the Dawnblade family, approached Aeriyth and Binor at Rangari Refuge, asking after Elias and offering information. In light of the agent's contracted killings of high elves and Argents, Aeriyth was forced to execute her, but not after agreeing to a last request.

This last request would be to find a Silver Covenant Ranger battalion west of the Dark Portal, lead by a man of mysterious relation to the Dawnblades. This rescue operation would turn into an ambush at the hands of Cassandra Ellison - terrorist and Dawnblade Reformed extremist - who had agents disguised as the battalion. All but one, the mysterious man the Highguard was sent to find, revealed themselves as sin'dorei cultists and a gruesome skirmish resulted in the Ranger Lady being badly hurt. Thankfully, Ranger Dahlia took command of the operation and cleared out the cultists, saved the mystery elf, and evacuated the rest of the Highguard to Rangari Refuge.

## A New Friend

It would not be long, however, until the Highguard was in action again, and this time Ranger Windsong was in the middle of a real problem. For a time, the 173rd Farstriders, known as the 'Wind Dancers', was under the co-command of both Dahlia Windsong and her aunt, Commander Epona Windsong, a Sin'dorei at this point. During a routine scouting run, Epona was captured.

Forgoing the usual subtlety, it was decided to crash into the warcamp at the base of the Citadel. The initial engagement had several members of the 173rd taking up sniper support and additioanl intelligence on the situation. With a rather resounding result, the mixed Alliance force broke through the first guards, utterly annihilated a warlock before he could attack, and engaged a large contingent of Fel Iron Horde. There were some heavy injuries, but with a rather resounding conclusion and rescue of the Commander, the mixed Alliance force made off for the Rangari Refuge to heal up for the trials to come.