It was they who would shepherd the earthly and spiritual forces of a young world’s afterbirth. And yet, at the pinnacle of their dominion, they would be consumed by an inferno of chaos and tragic excess, from which they would be forced to retreat back into the shadowy recluse of their home on Mount Hyjal, a cautionary visage of a race fading from memory to myth.

This is the story of how the World of Warcraft came to be —- a story above all else of fallen grace. It is a story, however, that could just as easily be an allegory of the rise and fall of the Night Elf race in Korea.

When Warcraft III was released in 2002, most Koreans-- and by default most pro-gamers-- were drawn to the reclusive, enigmatic Sentinel, and with good reason. The Night Elf featured a living forest of structures, shape shifting druids, phantasmal creatures, and an iconic, angst-ridden anti-hero, the Demon Hunter -- with his assassin’s blindfold and cleft, raptor-like blades -- as its rebellious poster boy.

Led by the spellbinding play of Jang Jae Ho, better known as Spirit_Moon, the Night Elf would dominate Korea’s professional Warcraft TV leagues, namely the MBC and OGN, as well as the Kalimdor gateway that was a second home to most Korean WC3 gamers. Moon would account for two MBC titles (Seasons II and V) and finish second in another (Season III). His rival for best Korean Night Elf (and by extension best Night Elf in the world), Hyung Ju Lee aka Check [FrienZ], would win back-to-back OGN titles in 2004 to go with one runner-up placement in the MBC (Season I). Other Night Elf standouts who would make their mark were SK.Evenstar, winner of MBC Season IV and runner-up at the MWL All-Star Carnival; Showtime.WeRRa, winner of a 2003 OGN title; and FreeDoM.WeRRa, champion of the 2005 OGN: TFT Invitational.

At the height of the Korean pro leagues’ existence, nearly all major WC3 pro clans boasted multiple Night Elf players over the other three races. Teams such as Hanbit Stars were home to Gerrard.WeRRa, Shoo [SAINT] and ShowTime; Schroet Kommando’s Asian division housed SK.May, SeleCt, WinNers and Evenstar; Samsung [Khan], Annypi.WeRRa and FreeDoM.

Because the Korean TV leagues held the copyright to all televised pro matches, and because most pro gamers preferred to practice against their peers in the privacy of custom games, there was a noticeable dearth of replays circulating online. This only served to create an air of awe and mystery about the hyperbolic talents of the Korean Night Elves. Replays of Moon, Check and the rest of their NE kin were treated with a wide-eyed, almost comic book obsessiveness by WC3 fanboys, the kind of faint-inducing fanaticism reserved for lost recording sessions of the Beatles.

Online, the Undead may have had an equal number of high-level players, but from top to bottom, the Night Elf was unquestionably the most balanced, with the likes of BB_DVD, Cherry-EVE, Lof.Way, Lof.Punky Go)Ohjie, NaN_Say, ReX.Rookie, WCB_Nangchun, WCB_Arena, etc. pollinating the Kalimdor Top 100 rankings. Some went so far as to say that Korea’s second-tier NEs were better than Europe’s top-tier (apm70, 4K.Kaj, 4K.Zeus[19] and aT.IntoX among others).

Korea would flex its NE might in the first, titanic Korea versus Europe Invitational in which Korea, given a chance to field an extra player of the same race, would choose two NEs, FreeDoM and Check, to fill out their roster alongside Showbu [FrienZ], SK.Zacard and SK.Sweet.

Today, five years after Reign of Chaos was published and three years after The Frozen Throne expansion, Korea’s once-most-prolific and dominant race has seemingly faded once more into the primordial dawn, with only a few left to remind us of their once proud kind.

Most have attributed the deforestation of the Night Elf army to the overall decline in popularity -- at least in Korea —- of Warcraft III, which sadly has failed to surpass its predecessor, Starcraft, in the hearts and hard drives of its gamers. With sponsorship and player salaries for WC3 dwindling, Korea would lose many of its first generation NE stars to retirement -- players like Gerrard.WeRRa and ReX.Jojo, who would see their financial aspirations disappear in an oasis of disillusionment.