Who a King Must Do Ch. 07

Westfall was a land of brown. Romantic farmers often claimed it was a land of gold, but really it was a land of brown. All overpowering brown from the crops that farmers forced out of the ground. The thing about Westfall was that it wasn't even the most fertile of Stormwind's provinces. That title went squarely to the Elwynn Forest. However, Westfall still produced the majority of Stormwind's grain.

This was thanks to the other things provided in Stormwind's provinces. Elwynn and Duskwood both produced lumber and rather than putting up fields in the resulting bare areas, there was a longstanding culture (particularly towards the east) of planting new trees. In Redridge they concentrated on fishing and driving back the dangers coming from the surrounding areas, especially the Burning Steps.

Westfall's soil wasn't good at growing trees, particular the kind strong enough to be used for building. The waters off and the coast itself was murloc infested. The only thing Westfall had was a lot of barren land that was mediocre for farming. So, the reason why it was the biggest soil producer of the kingdom was solely because it used its entire, fairly flat surface to that end.

This was all about to change now that Anduin was here though. He stood atop the tower at the heart of Sentinel Hill, the fortress in the area painfully erected by dragging stones from Stormwind's mines all the way to here. They would have used the Moonbrooks mines instead, but that was the Defias centre of operation with the infamous Deadmines at their very heart.

He was going to travel to the city, the only settlement in Westfall that had really deserved that title before being ruined, in the next few days. The Light would guide them in their search for anymore spies and deviants and then the Defias would finally fade into obscurity.

'Just destroying the birth of the people's rage will not quell it,' Anduin thought, looking further north until his eyes hit a pillar of light, trees, houses and chunks of soil tumbling through the air around it. The Raging Chasm, a scar left on the land from the Cataclysm. It had the shape of a giant sinkhole, for why there was a pillar of light attached to it, nobody knew and many investigations were made.

Anduin didn't know either, but he saw in that unworked sinkhole an opportunity to stroke many giants with one swipe. He turned around to look at the gathered night elves and Gilneans. Both were clothed and stood in military order. When called to duty, it was expected of soldiers to keep their discipline, which, due to the promises of IOYs (I own you) bonds was higher than ever and still rising. Stormwind must have had the most elite military in the world now, even outclassing Lordaeron in its prime.

It also helped that all of those soldiers already had sex today and balls, unlike stomachs, were a good thing to serve empty on. Sadly, Anduin could not think of a similarly common saying for the women in his army. A scratched itch makes a soldieress fit? No, he wouldn't try to popularize that one. Perhaps he should leave such a thing to Tyrande, her people's elite warrior class, the sentinels, were entirely women after all.

None of that was related to the plans at hand though. Valeera, invisible to everyone else around, raised an eyebrow at him. He still hadn't fucked her, the situation in the cart had never felt right, and once they arrived he had been in constant motion. "Listen and listen closely. The list of instructions I shall now give you will be the lifeblood of a rejuvenated Westfall. I want you to..."

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Moonbrook was a ghost city. Not that it was entirely devoid of life, it just had more houses from its peak than then people around needed. Not that the people around were particularly pleasant fellows, with few exceptions this was a hive of scum and villainy.

Now, it was also surrounded by a siege ring of heavily armed Stormwind knights and mages. They were there to make sure nobody got away. "Make sure to watch these points," Anduin commanded a specialized battalion of spies and scouts, handing them a map. It marked the endpoints of evacuation tunnels in the area. Produced by a combined effort by Valeera and the SI:7, Stormwind's intelligence service, that map allowed them to make this siege absolutely effective.

Anduin's goal wasn't to starve them out, however, he was anxiously waiting for a signal to storm into the city with his elite guard. The goal wasn't just to smash the Defias, they had reformed once and they would do it again, it was to decapitate the beast while also destroying its footing. Valeera was working on the former, the High King had put the groundworks for the latter.

A sudden explosion of dark smoke, that was the signal. "Follow me!" he declared, raising Shalamayne while putting his horse into motion. The signal flags his accompanying officer rose relayed to the rest of the army that they were to stay put and close the siege ring behind him.

To the Defias hiding behind hastily made barricades made from tipped over carts, crates and whatever else they could find, several fear-inducing sights were given. First was that very siege ring. In this time of the year, Westfall was often subject to heatwaves and that was such a day. Seeing the steel-clad knights standing in the sweltering heat, making the air itself waver, in a perfect semi-circle with equal gaps between each showed the band of lowlifes what true discipline looked like.

Next was the equipment they had. Stormwind had always been one of the more well-equipped kingdoms, but with its ascended economy the amount of money Anduin had to spend on military was so absurd basically everyone had his armour heavily enchanted and tailored to their liking. While that broke up the perfectly uniform appearance of the army somewhat, with the differing runes and what-not, everyone with half a mind knew they were dealing with an army that would go down as legend.

Lastly was the High King himself. Anduin had exchanged the lion themed plate after getting fashion advice from all of his ladies. They had called it, especially the helmet, 'frankly ridiculous' and that was a consensual opinion amongst all three of them. The sentinel, the arch mage and the High Priestess had thus gone to the crafters themselves, knowing Anduin's measurements down to the girth of his biceps.

The result was a much less decorated but more stylish piece of tri-colour armour. The thick plates were of a sleek look and were dominated by gold. In keeping with his recent changes, the secondary colour was a deep purple, especially taking hold of his armguards and boots. Pieces of blue cloth shone with heavy enchantments, making the plate even sturdier and Anduin himself stronger and faster. All of it laid over a layer of brown griffon leather, in itself enough protection to ward off arrows from but the most skilled of hunters.

It didn't stop at his armour or the armoured horse he rode into battle, it also extended to the aura of holy fury around him. Ever since accepting the power of Light and Shadow, Anduin had become that more adapt in actual combat, his true potential was unlocked.

"THROW FIREBALLS, YOU FOOLS!" one of the commanding Defias finally managed to snap out of the paralysis of awe but none of the mages managed to react before Anduin's horse jumped. Jumped and on the paladin king's back sprouted wings of Light, his horse sailed over the barriers like they weren't even there, leaving a trail of gold behind it that his twenty elite guards trampled over like a solid bridge.

The Defias didn't set after the High King after that display. Instead, the immediately stopped chanting their spells. One of them pulled down the red headscarf they wore and mumbled. "Well, think they hand some of the ugliest night elven whores to prisoners with a good track record?" he joked with a strained voice before making his way from behind the card with raised hands.

He had said that jokingly, but the man wasn't aware that: A, there were indeed super-masochistic night elves degrading themselves to cum buckets that prisoners with a good track record were allowed to gang bang (Of course, they weren't granted a personal night each, there was only so much that a former criminal should be rewarded while still in prison for reformation) and B, that there were no ugly night elves.

Anduin continued to ride on, a divine shield encapsulating him and everyone riding after him like a slipstream that began in front of his horses head. Stray fireballs hit it uselessly, the unskilled mages of the Defias were only a threat to peasant and low-class adventurers. Their true power had always been how slippery they had been in a province that was unable to sustain large military operations for prolonged period.

This was why Anduin was hitting them while they were down with a lightning strike attack. A military operation his father could never have gone through with due to a lack of funding and other problems higher up the priority list. The new High King did only suffer from the second one, but those could be taken care off by women he no longer needed to oversee as they were not trying to enact their own headstrong ideals but would avoid doing anything that could displease their master. On the contrary, those women would do everything to see his ideals of peace and prosperity enacted to be the first in line to suck his cock in front of the envious court.

Truly, everything was going well for the Alliance.

Disheartened, the attackers soon stopped trying and instead fled into the evacuation tunnels, right into the arms of Anduin's special forces. Less important Defias with hearts more easily swayed surrendered right to the siege ring. Only a few fought back with hateful conviction and Anduin slew them where they stood with holy fire, soul-consuming curses and sword alike. A king had to kill those that would not surrender and endanger the people of his nation.

Finally, he reached the smokescreen. Thickly, it remained in the air. He stopped his horse and raised his hand in a quick following of three gestures, one of multiple sign languages developed by a military officer. A woman who had been quite bad at fighting but a genius of communications and tactics. She was soon promoted to general and given an entire three IOY. Male night elves were less in demand of being permanent slaves than female ones so Anduin could award them more generously.

The signs he had made meant 'Scatter' 'Ward' and 'Wait'. A combination that told them to protect the surrounding area from anyone who may intrude and not follow the king no matter what. If they had any objections to leaving Anduin to his own devices in the middle of a raid on an enemy force, they kept it behind their well-trained lips. Even as the High King entered the thick smoke still hanging around.

He could barely see a metre forwards, but that was enough. The non-toxic cloud was only there to mark Anduin's target in addition to making it hard for people to interrupt what was going to happen inside. Soon, he found the house at the centre of the smokescreen and a bit thereafter a door that led inside.

A bit of smoke travelled into the room with him, but generally the air inside the house was clear. Damp and smelling somewhat of rotting wood, but clear. "Valeera?" he shouted out as he failed to see the blood elf anywhere in the room of worn-down furniture and unclean floors.

"Down here, Anduin!" her voice attracted his attention to a hole underneath a nearby staircase he had overlooked until then. He went into the cellar, down a terribly constructed flight of stairs, pulling down his head to not bump it against the ceiling. The south of Westfall was, after all, poor and couldn't exactly afford good architects.

Ironically, the cellar was much better looking than the house above. The walls were covered under a creamy coloured plaster and duskwood shelves lined up, holding books on poisons, intrigue and other shady topics as well as an assortment of bottles full of concoctions and tools to instil those into even a suspecting enemy. A couple of doors clearly connected this cellar to an underground tunnel system, but all of the doors were locked and the person who wanted to use them bound to the table.

Vanessa VanCleef, daughter of the infamous founder of the Defias brotherhood Edwin VanCleef, master of poisons, member of the Uncrowned and traitor against Stormwind lay before him. She was a woman in her twenties, quite beautiful with lightly tanned skin. Her hair was a raven black, short but extremely curly towards the tips. Eyes of an ice blue rested in her attractive face, busy glaring daggers at Anduin.

Her red and black outfit consisted mostly of a tabard depicting a skull on a throne of flames. Between that and her belt-secured stockings was a clear gap for her thighs that actually left even most of her ass uncovered.

Clearly a deliberate decision as the Vanessa would have wanted not only the freedom of moving when skulking around invisibly as rogues liked to do, but also used her shapely ass and decent sized breasts to make her arguments more convincing in discussion.

The diabolical looking pauldrons she normally wore as well had been removed by Valeera as she feared they had some other magical usages than just looking scary. The red headscarf had also been removed and repurposed to muffle the traitorous rogue's complaints.

"I hope you didn't have any problems," Anduin said to Valeera, looking around. There were minor signs of a fight, a toppled over chair there, a pair of scattered jagged, red daggers here, but nothing that seemed liked it was truly worrying. Most of all, the only wounds covering anyone were covering Vanessa, a light bleeding on her throat and her upper arms, where her gloves didn't cover them. Anduin did the Defias leader a favour and healed them with a quick usage of the Light.

He didn't use just any spell, but one particularly of the Discipline school of priesthood called Penance. It would heal the target, but the swirling balls of light would also remind them of their sins they regretted in the process. The fact that Vanessa barely squirmed as her wounds sealed saddened Anduin. Where others would be sad, he just saw that he couldn't convince Vanessa like he had done with the others until now.

"No problems whatsoever," Valeera said, sitting on the edge of the table next to Vanessa, making sure the leather binding still held tight to the legs of the polished wooden construction. "In the first place, Vanessa here is good at mixing poisons, but only second hand at stealth... compared to me, that is."

There wasn't even a muffled complaint by Vanessa, it seemed she agreed there. Hard to say otherwise anyway, since Valeera had so handily beat her. "I see then, there wouldn't happen to be some water around?" Anduin asked, for what was to come, he would very much prefer the traitor to be clean. There was indeed a bucket with clear water in a corner, but no cloth to use it. 'Well, there is one,' the High King thought, pulling the muffler out after placing the bucket on the corner.

"You could at least heat it with your holy warmth, your majesty," Vanessa commented with sarcasm as she beheld her former headscarf scrubbing away the blood.

"For you, the Light has no warmth, Vanessa. You are a traitor to the kingdom of Stormwind," Anduin retorted in a preaching tone. "Your actions have ended hundreds of lives, you have pulled the poor into rebellion when my father tried his most desperate to feed them during the Cataclysm, you have done nothing but harm to our people."

"You and your people killed my father after doing a great injustice to him!" Vanessa responded, continuing to watch him. She didn't try to struggle against her bindings, she was too calculative for that.

"The refusal to pay the stonemasons was, indeed, a great injustice," Anduin agreed. "One that the black dragon Onyxia has been killed for, in the name of justice, and one I am willing to rectify."

"Your father wasn't, he only ever wanted to murder us out of spite," Vanessa sharply stated.

"Spite?" Anduin's hand stayed and he looked at the traitor with hard eyes. "His motivation to end the Defias wasn't any different from your motivation to topple Stormwind - you killed his wife."

At that, Vanessa had no retort. "What are you going to do then, High King?" she instead asked mockingly. "Going to enslave me like another slut? I won't give in like all those whores you are used to."

"Yes, I will and yes, you will," Anduin stated, putting his hand on her head. Dark magic started seeping from his palm into her, her eyes went wide as she was shown visions. A man laying dead in an alley and his son weeping. A mother finding her daughter raped by a band of gnolls. A vengeful vigilante cutting off his own leg to escape a Defias trap.

"What are these?" Vanessa asked, tears slowly dwelling in her eyes against her will.

"I have listened to countless farmers' tales on my way here, what the Defias have done - done in the years since you took over," Anduin explained as more images flooded his head, imaginations of those very same stories. Stories of extraction, robberies and murder, rape, slavery and family members never seen again.

"Stop...STOP!" Vanessa pleaded, her cool was gone as she came face to face with the consequences of her bitter actions. She had known, of course she had known, and sometimes she had witnessed them as well. In the name of her revenge, she had made pacts and done deeds she wasn't proud off. However, as long as she got her revenge, all of that would be justified. That was how everyone would have acted in that situation, right?

That was the worst part of all of these memories. The part where Anduin asked them what they were willing to do to get justice and if they had gotten it. Overwhelmingly the answer of the people was the same: They had reported it to the authorities and in time they had gotten their justice. Only a few had admitted they had taken matters in their own hands and all of them had stopped once they had achieved vengeance. None of them had been willing to tear down kingdoms over their resentment.

The last vision she was shown was that of a young Anduin standing in front of the grave of a mother he didn't get to know. There was no resentment in him. Only sadness for his loss and for the people who were so lost they had caused this tragedy.

And then the penance hit Vanessa again and this time it was as if molten gold was poured through her veins as she came to understand the true extent of her sins. "I am sorry, I regret, I repent, I will do whatever you want, master." Suddenly she screamed out as the pain got even worse, the Light did not toil with liars.

"Speak truth, Vanessa, in the Light, all your lies are unveiled," Anduin spoke increasing both his visions and his penance spells strength. "The only shadow you will see are the ones you cast."

Despite writhing from the pain, the words that left Vanessa's mouth weren't an apology. "You made me regret, great for you," she spat out instead, "but I have come too far to give up now. On this mountain of sacrifices I would pile even more bodies if it meant coming closer to destroying you and the scumbag nobles that serve you."

Anduin listened to those words with the ears of a priest and the Light told him they were true. "So, you regret but you will not repent?"

"I will never repent," Vanessa assured him, "I will destroy myself before I leave my vengeance unfinished."

The High King closed his eyes, "You will not have to do it yourself." Those words accompanied a spell that reached deep into her consciousness and forced upon her mind a sudden want for him, rather suddenly superseding the hatred in her mind. It was still there, just no longer atop her feelings.