When the first human empire in the world of Azeroth—the great Empire of Arathor—finally collapsed and split apart after centuries of expansion and mounting internal conflict, it became seven independent nations: the Kingdom of Stromgarde (Stromgarde Keep), the Kingdom of Stormwind, the magical kingdom of Dalaran, the Kingdom of Gilneas, the mountain realm of Alterac, the maritime power of Kul Tiras, and the Kingdom of Lordaeron. The vast human empire founded by Emperor Thoradin had finally become a thing of the past, surviving only in the fond memories of Azeroth's humans.
Among the seven human kingdoms that arose from the Empire of Arathor, after a thousand years of development, the strongest were the Kingdom of Stormwind in the far south of the Eastern Kingdoms and the Kingdom of Lordaeron in the far north!
That, however, had been true a long time ago.
During the First War, after the Dark Portal opened, the Kingdom of Stormwind, at the southernmost edge of human territory on the continent, was unquestionably the first human kingdom to bear the brunt of the savage and cruel Orcish invasion...
In that brutal war, Stormwind City, the capital of the Kingdom of Stormwind, fell. Even King Llane was killed in a treacherous attack. In the end, a large portion of the army and people had no choice but to flee north across the sea and seek refuge in Lordaeron as refugees, while fewer than one in ten of those left behind in Stormwind survived the Orcs' slaughter.
Though Sir Lothar later led the Alliance forces to defeat the Orcs and recapture Stormwind City, allowing the people of the Kingdom of Stormwind to return south and rebuild their kingdom, no one could deny that the Kingdom of Stormwind today, in every respect, was far weaker than the Kingdom of