The Lich
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The Death that Waits
Anduin rose from the ashes of the great battle, at first thinking he had survived. Something in him had changed. Perhaps it was a combination of mystical energies, perhaps something to do with binding the otherworldly gate combined with his refusal to perish and to continue fighting at all costs but his existence continued on after death.
Unable to return to his people, knowing they would not understand that his descent into undeath was not of his design, he withdrew. However, he still felt the need to protect the innocent.
For countless millennia, the elves of Qualinost had defended the north against all manner of threats. Anduin, subtly, provided them with aid. He kept an eye on the hordes of the north, informing those few he could trust through agents and illusions, of impending attacks or dark human wizards from the south that intended to pillage the Elven Kingdoms for their wealth of knowledge.
For untold generations he protected both humanity and elven kind, hoping they would learn to overcome their difference.
Then, when relations soured, the humans sent multiple envoys into the north and roused the hordes, providing them with weaponry, training them in tactics and goblin cannon fodder, overseen by orcish overseers assaulted the elven lands. waited for the hordes to rise and took advantage of the elves as they routinely routed and quelled the threat of the combined might of goblins, orcs, ogres and trolls.
Anduin's warnings went unheeded, his agents being unable to sabotage enough of either the horde's or the humans' armies to make a manageable difference. When the horde flooded down upon Qualinost he stepped forth, revealing himself and waged battle against the unending mass of green flesh.
Meanwhile, to the south, with most of the elven defenders to the north, the humans overran every defense and laid waste to the land. The elven kingdoms were no more.
With the humans destroying Qualinoth, defense of the north has fallen to Anduin. He keeps to his oath despite the fall of his homeland and is now the very last defender of the north. He hopes that, in time, humanity will rise and become the heralds of virtue that he saw growing within them long ago in their golden age.
Thus, deep inside the ruins of Qualinoth, what is now known as the Northern Badlands, north of the frontier town of Swansmeade, Anduin has his lair. Anduin works against the forces of the encroaching horde. He scries from his lair, ever keeping an watchful eye upon the green skins. He hires adventurers, both evil and good, to perform tasks north of the human lands, sending more evil groups to perish softening a particularly dangerous area before calling up those adventurers he would see excel and grow to succeed where others failed.
