Darnassus would not be the last city to burn. The loss of life on both sides would tower over this atrocity. And it would all rest on his shoulders. Every moment would be a nightmare.
Sylvanas turned back toward the World Tree, watching it burn. Saurfang made himself watch the flames consume city and citizens alike. He would not dishonor himself further by turning away.
The screams continued. They reminded him of Shattrath. He had loved the sound, then. Smoke filled the air, reminding him of Stormwind, of racing through the streets as buildings burned all around him, finding cowering humans and butchering them as they begged for their lives. He had loved the slaughter, then.
And he had loved this war, too, hadn’t he?
Saurfang did not move for hours, not until the screams faded and the flames had burned themselves down to embers. Before him stood a smoking husk that had once been a great civilization. Inside him was a feeling of despair, a feeling of shame. There was no haze of corruption now to soften the horror.
Saurfang would remember this moment in his dreams forever. He would relive this shame, and all the new ones to come, over and over again.
You have led your Horde in the service of death , Malfurion had said.
How could Saurfang face the soldiers he had led into this war? How could he explain what they had done?
He couldn’t. He would never know how.
But the burden would be his, always, until his dying day.
As Saurfang turned away, he hoped that day would come soon.