After the war ended, many of the armies that had been formed during the conflict were assigned to new duties.
The High Elves' volunteer force was disbanded. Originally assembled by Alleria to support the Alliance, this unit had been recruited in Quel'Thalas.
Now that the war was over, its members naturally returned to their homes.
Alaric's mounted archer unit, on the other hand, was formally incorporated as a permanent army.
While this force had limited use in the dense forests of Quel'Thalas, their outstanding wartime achievements led the kingdom to abandon any plans to dissolve them.
Another force that remained active was the Knights of the Silver Hand.
Though initially created for the war, the end of the conflict did not signal the end of their mission.
The paladins, in alliance with the Church of the Holy Light, continued to assist the Alliance, healing the sick and offering refuge to survivors devastated and helpless in the aftermath of battle.
During this process, the order inevitably split.
The High Elf paladins, led by Liadrin, fell under the command of the newly appointed Archbishop of the High Elves, her foster father, Vandellor.
With this emerging force, the influence of the Church of the Holy Light began to grow steadily among the High Elves.
More and more Elven warriors, intrigued by the path of the paladin, joined their ranks.
Of course, no one, not even Vandellor, realized that the Liadrin who had once been trained by the so-called Chaste Maiden was no longer a zealous devotee of the Light.
Having seen through its true nature, she now commanded the Light from an entirely different perspective.
Although the armies of various nations returned home to recuperate and many soldiers laid down their arms to return to civilian life, this did not mean that the Alliance races had let go of their hatred toward the orcs.
Haunted by the memory of their kinsfolk being slaughtered during the war, driven by a burning thirst for revenge, large numbers of humans, elves, dwarves, and gnomes embarked on hunting expeditions for the remaining orcs.
They roamed the remote wilderness and rugged mountains of the Eastern Kingdoms, seeking targets to vent their grief and sorrow.
During these expeditions, Alliance hunters captured many orcs, and quite a few were executed on the spot, justified as retribution for their slain friends and families.
In the original timeline, Alleria Windrunner would have been one of these avengers. The Horde, after allying with the forest trolls, launched an assault on Quel'Thalas.
During that attack, Alleria lost seventeen family members, including her brother and mother. That was the fate she would have faced.
But now, thanks to Alaric's efforts, the trolls had been eradicated early on, and the Horde had never made any significant breakthroughs.
The Windrunner sisters were unaware of it, but their tragic destinies had already been rewritten.
Alaric felt no regret over this outcome.
In his eyes, his relationship with the Windrunner sisters had long surpassed the stage of doing good deeds to earn favor.
As long as he could help them, he didn't care whether they expressed gratitude or not.
Unfortunately, those Alaric could help directly were few.
Even though his efforts had drastically changed the course of the war and reduced the Alliance's losses significantly, there were still countless people he couldn't protect.
And the differing perspectives on orcs were not limited to the common folk, even kings disagreed.
The Alliance members fell into clear divisions over how to deal with the prisoners of war.
Genn Greymane of Gilneas and Thoras Trollbane of Stromgarde proposed immediate execution of these criminals. But Terenas of Lordaeron opposed such action.
They believed that what set the Alliance apart from the Horde, what made them more civilized and noble, was precisely their sense of compassion.
Instead of executing the orcs, Terenas advocated for imprisoning them in POW camps funded by the Alliance.
The Six of Dalaran, the ruling council of Kirin Tor, also supported this approach.
After Aegwynn retired with Medivh, the Council of Tirisfal had faded from history.
Its former responsibilities were now handled by the Kirin Tor, including investigating demonic activity.
Dalaran's mages hoped to study the orcs and their strange magic, both to further their knowledge and to address strategic needs.
Publicly, the mages argued that only through understanding the orcs and learning from their strengths could the Alliance secure victory in future wars.
Eventually, after much lobbying and voting, the Alliance reached a consensus: all members would contribute to building prison camps for the orcs.
Once completed, these camps would be managed by the renowned warrior Danath Trollbane of Stromgarde.
If operations ran smoothly, the camps would remain; if not, the orcs would be exterminated.
Beyond dealing with the orcs, another thorny issue facing the Alliance was how to handle the traitorous kingdom of Alterac.
Even Gilneas, far to the south and distant from Alterac, became entangled in the matter.
The first to covet Alterac's lands was Stromgarde.
Alterac and Stromgarde were neighboring countries, and tensions had existed between them even before the war began.
King Thoras Trollbane of Stromgarde had committed all his forces to support the Lordaeron Alliance.
This was likely due to Stromgarde's proximity to Khaz Modan, cooperation with the Alliance was their only viable choice.
Still, no one could doubt the resilience of Trollbane's warriors.
Without them, the Alliance might have lost vast swaths of territory within the first week of war, drastically worsening the situation.
Now that peace had returned, Thoras Trollbane made his demands.
As compensation for their sacrifices, he claimed that Stromgarde should be awarded all the eastern territories of its treacherous neighbor, Alterac.
However, Terenas of Lordaeron had other ideas.
He was weighing two options, turning Alterac into a vassal state, or appointing a more obedient monarch to rule over it, one way or another, it had to be under Lordaeron's control.
While Stromgarde had been a loyal and steadfast ally during wartime, and mutual respect existed between the two, this situation inevitably strained their political relationship.
Originally, Gilneas had little to do with such complexities, it rarely engaged with the western nations.
Therefore, many believed that Genn Greymane's involvement was not just about boosting his own reputation, but also part of his broader ambition for territorial expansion.
A nephew of Perenolde had fled to Gilneas after the betrayal, and rumors spread that Greymane was backing him as a claimant to the throne.
If successful, this would allow Gilneas to funnel much-needed resources from Alterac to the southern kingdoms.
It would also give Greymane an excuse to send warships across the Great Sea, though this would inevitably threaten Kul Tiras, a nation fiercely protective of its naval dominance.
Thus, paradoxically, after the war's conclusion, tensions among the human nations of the Alliance only grew worse.
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