In November of 2008, Blizzard introduced the expansion, Wrath of the Lich King, for the World of Warcraft MMORPG and in it players fight against the undead evil that is the Lich King. Some players are even able to help out a renegade Death Knight by the name of Thassarian as he fights against the Lich King’s agents in Northrend. World of Warcraft: Death Knight tells the story of just how Thassarian came to be.
Highlights
This story, being a prequel, kicks off in the middle of a bloody massacre of the Kingdome of Lordaeron at the hands of an army led by Arthas. The story then jumps back three months to a quiet farm that Thassarian and his mother and sister. We find that Thassarian, though son of a great Alliance Hero has been overlooked for promotion in the military, even though he tries hard, he just doesn’t have the spark that those capable of leading have.
As word gets to Thassarian that his lord Prince Arthas is leading a company of troops to Northrend to battle the Scourge that have been plaguing the land and been killing many of the living. After arriving on the island and discovering that they are unable to leave, Arthas disappears while hunting down the enemy, and while Thassarian goes looking for him alone he gets turned into a Death Knight, servant of the Lich King.
With the Undead army growing each and everyday, the Lich King sends his Knights to where the Heroes of the Alliance lay to steal their bodies and turn them as well. There the Death Knights are broken free of their hold and declare then intention of killing the Lich King and every Scourge they come across. Feeling at a loss of what to do next, Thassarian and Koltira separate, with Thassarian joining the Alliance and Koltira joining with a Tauren outpost. While Thassarian is with the Alliance killing Scourge, he discovers that there are many within the Alliance itself who are willingly working for the Lich King in exchange for power.
Overall
Even though I’ve never been able to play the World of Warcraft games, I just loved this story. I enjoyed the manhwa (a form of comic book from South Korea) art style. While this is a World of Warcraft story, it is still a good fantasy story that anyone who enjoys sword fights would enjoy. If you are a World of Warcraft fan then you get the added bonus of seeing, in depth, just where the new playable character class “Death Knight” came from.
I really hope there is more to this story then just this book. There were several questions I had after reading that went unanswered: who was that man with the beard during the massacre at Lordaeron and just what was going on with Koltira.
ComicsOnline gives World of Warcraft: Death Knight 4.5 out of 5 Runic Swords.
