In the Pale Moonlight

The less said about Ironforge, the better.  Even if I wanted to discuss it, which I really don’t, now isn’t the time.

Deliana returned with me from the Eastern Kingdoms, and we met Ji briefly in Ratchet.  He had good news (relatively speaking, at least) from the errand I’d sent him on, even though it had ended up running him from Desolace to Feralas then all the way back up to Stonetalon.  After we all exchanged notes, I sent Ji back home to Orgrimmar.  He resisted at first; he wanted to come with us for this next step.  But he was already deeper in this mess than I’d wanted him to get, and besides, this was my fight, not his.

Liana and I arranged windrider passage from Ratchet down to Mudsprocket.  From there, it was a fairly short ride over to the Wyrmbog, and the cave that used to be the lair of Onyxia.

We entered the cave.  We didn’t venture far, just deep enough to find a corner where every point of entry was visible.  Onyxia’s been dead for years, of course, but that didn’t stop it from being unnerving to go in there.  I’m sure it would have been unsettling in any case, but considering the rumors Theldren had brought back about Nefarian’s old forces being restless again, I found myself still half-expecting a black dragon to come jumping out of the shadows at any moment.  After all, Nefarian and Onyxia had both come back from the dead once already.  Not that I’m one to talk; I’ve died a couple times myself.  Spirits willing, I’d like the last time to stay the last for a good long while.

Eventually, we heard footsteps, and saw the light of a torch approaching from the same direction we’d come.  The footsteps slowly drew nearer, until a single tauren stepped into view.  Between his dark fur and the shadows that shifted around him in the dim cave, he probably seemed a lot larger than he really was.

 

TAUREN:  You are Mokvar?

Mokvar nods.

MOKVAR:  Are you alone?

The tauren tilts his head and cocks an eyebrow.

You know what I mean.

TAUREN:  We honor the terms of the meeting, of course.

MOKVAR:  <faint grin>  So in other words, the rest of your friends are waiting right outside the cave.

DELIANA:  Do you want me to check outside and see—

TAUREN:  If we’d wished to harm you, little one, you would already know it.

MOKVAR:  There’s no need, Liana.  He has a point – if we’re screwed at this point, we’re screwed no matter what.

The tauren looks back and forth between Mokvar and Deliana, then back up the passageway through which he’d entered.  He lifts a horn to his mouth and sounds a low blare.  Deliana continues to watch him closely; the tauren returns her gaze bemusedly.

TAUREN:  You’re going to make me think you don’t trust us, little one.

DELIANA:  You might say you have something of a reputation.

TAUREN:  <nods toward Mokvar>  So do the orcs.  That doesn’t seem to have affected you.

DELIANA:  <shrugs>  I like green.

The tauren chuckles.  From the passageway, footsteps become audible again and grow progressively closer.  After a moment, Magatha Grimtotem enters the chamber and scans the scene.

MAGATHA:  Ah, Mokvar.  It’s been too long.

MOKVAR:  Magatha.  I’m surprised you remember me, to tell the truth.

MAGATHA:  I never forget a face.  <looks to Deliana>  This one is new, though.

MOKVAR:  Yes, she is.

Magatha smirks.

MAGATHA:  You’re not going to introduce us, Mokvar?  How rude of you.

MOKVAR:  On top of everything else, Magatha, do we really need to maintain the pretense that we’re friends now, too?

MAGATHA:  I’m merely trying to be cordial.  <to Deliana>  Is he always this prickly?

DELIANA:  No.  You must have that effect on people.  <looks to Mokvar, then back to Magatha>  But, if it makes you feel any better… Deliana Hawthorne.

MAGATHA:  The pleasure is mine.

DELIANA:  It would have to be.

MAGATHA:  I’m beginning to see why you two get along.

Magatha looks around the cavern.

This is an interesting choice of venues, Mokvar.  Something of a step down from your usual accommodations, isn’t it?

MOKVAR:  A change of scenery now and then can be a good thing.  For instance, last I heard, you were on the run even from your own tribe.

MAGATHA:  You’ll find the Grimtotem tend not to hold grudges long against their own kind.  And I can be very persuasive.

MOKVAR:  Just as well.  It made it a little easier for Ji to get my message to you.

MAGATHA:  I must say I was intrigued.  I’m not unaccustomed to being the object of some…pursuit…but usually only from your Warchief’s usual lot of knuckle-dragging lackeys.  Your furry friend, however…

MOKVAR:  Not your typical Orgrimmar grunt, I know.

MAGATHA:  Yes, he had a polysyllabic vocabulary.  And spent a not-inconsiderable time musing over whether we had anything extra to eat.

MOKVAR:  That’s Ji, yeah.

MAGATHA:  Regardless, I’m quite curious as to why you would seek me out, given the company you usually keep.  Then again… <looks to Deliana> …I doubt your current companion would be well received in Orgrimmar herself.

DELIANA:  Maybe he’s trying to make me look better by bringing in one of the only people who would be less welcome.

MAGATHA:  <chuckles>  As plausible a theory as any.  <looks back to Mokvar>  But not the right one, I suspect.

MOKVAR:  I have some business that’s going to require me to travel to the Firelands.  Trouble is, I’m still relatively inexperienced as a shaman, and my ability to influence the elements isn’t nearly strong enough to keep me safe there.  You, on the other hand…well, whatever else I might think of you, there’s no disputing you’re a powerful shaman.

MAGATHA:  You flatter me.

MOKVAR:  Take it with a grain of salt.  It’s one strength offsetting I don’t know how many despicable things about you.

DELIANA:  I bet she’d also go great with fries.

MAGATHA:  If we’re going to be racist, I’m sure you would be quite adept at climbing trees and picking bananas.  <sneers>  Especially green ones.

MOKVAR:  The point is, I think you might know a trick or two that could help keep me alive when I go.  That’s why I wanted to meet with you.

MAGATHA:  And why turn to me, Mokvar?  There’s certainly no shortage of shaman in Orgrimmar you could have turned to.

MOKVAR:  I’d prefer to keep this trip to the Firelands off the record.

MAGATHA:  The Cenarion druids at Mouth Hyjal?  Thrall and his Earthen Ring?

MOKVAR:  Very off the record.

MAGATHA:  It must be quite the scandal you’re sitting on if you’d rather turn to me than confide in your supposed friends.

MOKVAR:  I have my reasons.

MAGATHA:  And those reasons would be…?

MOKVAR:  Mine.

Magatha grins.

MAGATHA:  Cairne would have liked you.

MOKVAR:  Then it’s a shame he was murdered by a traitor before he got the chance to know me.

MAGATHA:  You shouldn’t talk about your Warchief like that.

DELIANA:  As much as I’m enjoying going back and forth with this…

MAGATHA:  Indeed, let’s cut to the chase.  You need my help, Mokvar, so now for the real question: Why should I give it to you?

MOKVAR:  We both know you don’t harbor any ill will for me, Magatha.  I may work for Garrosh, but your quarrel is with him, not me.  He’s the one you hate.

MAGATHA:  True enough.  But that’s merely why it wouldn’t be worth it to me to go out of my way to hurt you, Mokvar, not why it would be worth helping you.

MOKVAR:  You’re focusing on the wrong part.  Think about this, Magatha.  I work for Garrosh.  I’m there in Grommash Hold every day.  Do you not think that makes me someone who would be…useful to have indebted to you?

MAGATHA:  Surely you’re not naïve enough to assume I don’t already have my informants.

MOKVAR:  Are they in Garrosh’s inner circle?  Do they attend every meeting with him?  Keep a written record, literally, of nearly everything he says and does?

MAGATHA:  <smiles thoughtfully>  Interesting…

MOKVAR:  I thought you might think so.

MAGATHA:  I think I may have an item or two that might help augment your abilities sufficiently for what you have in mind.  Nothing worldshattering, mind you…

MOKVAR:  That’s fine.  I’ve already lived through too many shattered worlds as it is.

MAGATHA:  We can meet again here for the exchange.  Tomorrow at this time?

DELIANA:  How do we know you won’t just be setting a trap?

MAGATHA:  How did you know I wasn’t setting one tonight?  There are two of you – three if you count your bouncing bear friend.  I could bring dozens with a word.  But Mokvar was right about one thing – I have nothing to gain from harming him.  And whatever else you might think of me, I’m not in the habit of doing harm when there’s no benefit to myself or my tribe.

MOKVAR:  Tomorrow night, then.

MAGATHA:  Tomorrow night.

Magatha gestures to the other Grimtotem, and they make their way back up the passage.

DELIANA:  Are you sure about this?

MOKVAR:  Not even remotely.  I may spend the next year washing my hands.

Mokvar peers up the dark passageway for several moments.

I think we’re clear.

Mokvar and Deliana start to walk up toward the cave exit.  As the passage narrows, a low whooshing sound is heard.  Deliana hesitates a moment while glancing around.

DELIANA:  <whispering>  Did you hear that?

Mokvar nods.

<whispering>  There’s someone stealthed in here.

MOKVAR:  <whispering>  It’s Garona.  She came in not far behind us when we arrived.

DELIANA:  <whispering>  You knew she was following us?

MOKVAR:  <whispering>  I was counting on it.

 

 

We’re staying in Mudsprocket until we go back to Onyxia’s lair tomorrow night.  With any luck, things will go off without a hitch there, and Magatha will have something useful for me.  Then that much will be over and done with.

Then comes the hard part.

 

 

Mokvar

The fall of Theramore

Victory from the jaws of defeat.

Or, no, that’s not quite accurate.  Defeat was never really in the picture.  This was more victory from under the guide of defeat.

That much sweeter, in a way.  Let the humans think they’d won, right up to the moment that their doom became inescapable.  The moment they realized it was upon them, and had nothing left to do but stand there helplessly and watch it come.

Today was a good day.

 

After we left Northwatch Hold, we marched south and made short work of Fort Triumph.  I couldn’t help chuckling at the irony of the name while we annihilated what passed for its defenses.  I think our soldiers were so eager for battle after the long wait at Northwatch that they threw themselves with ever great ferocity into the fight once it finally came.

The long wait at Northwatch.  To them – what? – six days?

They’ll never know how long their Warchief had been waiting for this moment.

We continued on our way into Dustwallow Marsh and divided our forces at the fork in the road.  Half of our troops traveled north with me, while half went east with Malkorok.  We would meet at Theramore and strike both its gates at the same time.  As my half of the army made its way north, we added reinforcements from Brackenwall Village – Krog and Draz’Zilb among them – then continued on our way toward Theramore.

My contingent was the first to reach the city.  Jaina had recruited aid from the Kirin Tor to help strengthen the city’s defenses against our battering rams and siege engines.  It was a wise decision on her part.  Pity I’d been counting on it.  Me and…what’s his name, the blood elf guy.  I can never remember.  I should probably work on that, seeing as he really stepped up to the plate with more than one part of this plan.

See, Jaina had called in mages from the Kirin Tor to help hold the Theramore gates against our attack.  A powerful mage could reinforce a gate for a good long time against our siege.  As it happened, though, one of those crucial, city-saving mages was a guy by the name of Thalen Songweaver.

A blood elf.

See if you can guess who writes his checks.

Down came the gates, and in came the Horde.

Malkorok’s forces joined ours in the midst of it all, and Captain Drok and the rest of the Horde fleet hit the harbor.  Our troops flooded into Theramore, laying waste to its defenders.  Jaina and her wizard friends did a decent job of chipping away at our numbers from above, but on the ground, none of the Theramore soldiers could hold their own against our assault.

Everything was going perfectly until Jaina’s new blue dragon friend turned up and started dropping boulders and trees over the broken gate.  Kalecgos… I remember meeting him, once, just after Deathwing’s defeat.  Apparently mortality’s left him pretty damn bored these days, because now he had nothing better to do than meddle in battles that were none of his concern.  Problem was – as Baine and Vol’jin were only too quick to point out – at the rate the big lizard was going, he would shore up the opening right quick, and seal us all inside.  At that point, closed in without any further reinforcements from outside, it would just be a matter of time before the mages picked us off.

So, I ordered our forces to fall back.  We cleared out of the city and retreated to the north and west.  We all regrouped just west of the bridge over Dustwallow Bay, overlooking Theramore.  Baine was less than thrilled about how things had gone.  Can’t really blame him, though, considering he wasn’t seeing the big picture.  The foolish tauren thought the siege was all there was to this attack.  For all he could see, this was a loss.

But see, here’s the thing.  When you fight me, there’s never just one piece to the plan I throw at you.  Sure, it would have been nice if the siege had gone perfectly.  But that’s the beauty of it all.  It didn’t have to.

Welcome to fighting Garrosh Hellscream, Theramore.  Evern when I lose, I win.

Sure, you fought off the attack on your gates…  And kept yourselves busy while Drok slipped into the harbor and dropped off a small, elite strike team, who crippled your aerial defenses and recovered our agent Thalen Songweaver.

And sure, you managed to secure that north gate again…  And sealed yourselves in, within the city walls.  With some of the Alliance’s greatest generals, who’d come to aid in the defense.  Closed in together.  Nice and compact.  All in one place.

Boy, it sure would suck for you if I had, say, a giant bomb I could drop on you right now.

Oh, wait.  I do.

Goblin sky galleon.  Blood elf mana bomb.  And the immeasurable power of a handy little relic called the Focusing Iris.

Goodbye, Theramore.

The troops cheered around me as I pointed to our victory and the sky glowed white and purple with the aftershocks of the mana explosion.  Louder and louder, raucous voices all around me.  Some stared in shock, confusion, maybe even…misguided disapproval.  No matter.  Give them time.  They’ll come around.  Eventually, victory wins everyone over.  And we won.

I turned and looked over the bay, holding Gorehowl over my head, taking in the sight of our triumph, of the mark we had left on this world, never to be forgotten.

Deep down, in some tiny, hollow corner, I knew it still wasn’t quite enough.

But it would do.  For a start.

Monday mailbag

So yeah, I know I’m just getting this mailbag in under the wire for it to count as Monday, but whatever, it’s hard to get a stable internet connection out here in the fucking swamp.  I’m writing from the field as we make our final march into Dustwallow Marsh.  I figured I haven’t answered any mail for a while, so it might be good to offer up a few messages from the my loyal Horde minions before we but a roflstomping on the humans.

Let’s see what we’ve got…

 

Written on a heavy parchment in multicolored inks, the first impression of this letter is one of chaos. Small sketches of Tauren, prairie wolves, swoops, and other sights of Mulgore clutter the margins, at times encroaching on the text itself. The sketches are obviously done quickly, but with moderate skill; the subjects are clearly recognizable even though the drawings are rough and unfinished. In contrast, the words meander across the page, crooked and shaky, with the occasional backwards letter. Many times a word will be started in one color of ink and finished in another, as if the writer got distracted halfway through the word.

Dear Mistr Warcheif Sir,

I have a question, and the nice ork Mistr U told me to write to you and ask. Hes visiting, and hes been reel nice to me. He talks a lot. Sumtimes I cant ask him anything because he talks too much. But he told me to ask you. He said you would kno. I wanted to ask if brown orks taste diffrent than green orks. Do green orks taste like mint? Are brown orks chocklate? Tauren taste like fur. Why are you brown when the other orks are green? Did you eat too much chocklate? Everyone tells me I cant eat too much chocklate, itll make me sick. Did you get sick from chocklate? Mistr U needs to go now, so I have to stop riting and give this to him.

The letter is signed with a large, inky pawprint, a small sketch of a Tauren druid in cat form, and the shaky name “Taktani,” with every letter in a different color ink.

Um…

Hmm…

Well…

<scratches head>

The FUCK is this?

Okay, so I get that the talkative orc this person is talking about is probably Utvoch… I mean, starts with “U” and talks too much, how many of those could there be?  And I guess this is good since it confirms D&U must still be alive in the restored timeline after…well…you know.  Um…I GUESS that’s a good thing.  Not sure what Utvoch is doing in Mulgore rather than Vindication Hold up in Stonetalon, but whatever.  I guess being killed in the line of duty earns you a little R&R time.

As for you, Taktani…um, no, brown orcs don’t taste like chocolate, and green orcs don’t taste like mint.  Although it IS kind of funny thinking of that, since it would mean, what, Thrall and Aggra are going to have mint chocolate chip babies?  Heh.  But no, we just taste like….orc.  I mean for real, I get enough attention from the ladies as it is, what with me being Warchief and dead sexy and all — last thing I need is for word to start getting around that I taste like chocolate too.  Dude, I won’t be able to walk down the fucking STREET.

Anyway, Taktani, thanks for writing just the same.  Hopefully you’ve outgrown Tauren Kindergarten-Land in Mulgore, and are off doing some bigger-kid stuff.  The Horde can always use more good soldiers, especially on my watch with me looking far and wide for ways to keep the troops busy.  Ashenvale’s looking pretty nice this time of year, if I can make a recommendation.  Just don’t get too much of the damn night elf glitter in your eyes.

 

Hey mon!

I’m writing’ to ya from one of our ships headin’ down to Theramore!  I’m on a boat, mon!

Make sure ya watch it to da end, mon!

–Bob, S.S. Echo Isles

I… he… what the hell IS this, the mailbag of WTF?!

I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that this Bob guy managed to dig up a new and creative way to be stupid.  Funny, though, I’m pretty sure that’s the song I’ve been hearing Vol’jin humming to himself for most of the trip down.  Maybe it’s some kind of a troll thing…

 

Hail, Warchief!

Time is short, in more ways than one. I’m writing this for those of us on the road to Theramore.

The hour of assault approaches. There may be some who doubt why we’re here. Why we’re doing this. Why we must. The reason can be given in one word: Taurajo. A hunters’ camp, not a military target, annihilated by marauding Alliance soldiers. Soldiers, I say? I misspoke: they weren’t soldiers, they were bandits. Bandits supplied, equipped, and brought to Kalimdor through one place and one place only.

That is why Theramore must burn.

That is also why I make what may sound like a peculiar request. When we make the final assault, those of us who aren’t compelled otherwise should wear Thunder Bluff’s colors. Not only will this show our solidarity with our Tauren brothers, it will also remind those cowards why we come. To remind them that Justice neither relents, nor sleeps.

For the Horde! And for Taurajo!

–A Concerned Citizen

Now THAT’S what I’m talking about!  Go to it, ACC, lay some truth on them motherfuckers!  I’ve got to say, one thing that’s fucking infuriated me on this trip has been seeing how many of our people HAVEN’T on board with me with the post-Taurajo hate.  Check this out — I even heard a rumor that Baine was telling people that Taurajo was a legitimate military target, and the human commander at least gave the civilians room to flee, and he wonders if we’ll conduct ourselves as honorably.  This is BAINE talking.  BAINE.  THE FUCK IS THAT SHIT?  In what backwards-ass universe am I more pissed off about Camp T than chieftain of the fucking tauren?!

Anyway, I’m definitely encouraging the troops to follow your suggestion, ACC.  And on that note, we’re about to spit up the force for the final march.  I’ll update again soon…can’t wait to see the looks on the humans’ faces.  I’ve got a little surprise planned for them…

Back to the drawing board

The attack on Theramore is on hold.

I’m still fuming over…hell, what am I NOT fuming over right now?  Yesterday when I finished my debriefing with Draz’Zilb over the Grimtotem messenger, I just stormed back in here to the war room and threw that model of Theramore the Gob Squad had made into the wall – bounced it right off the pin-covered strategic map we’d drawn up of Dustwallow – smashed it to a hundred pieces…

Any now I get to spend my time thinking about what I was about to do, if I hadn’t been stopped by absolutely NOTHING other than sheer dumb luck.

Let me be clear about something (you know, before I get another talking to from ACC): I don’t suddenly have qualms about attacking the humans, or hitting Theramore if it makes sense strategically.  But the last several days I got myself so wound up in a fury I was about to go rushing into a thrown-together attack, and more importantly, it wasn’t just the attack itself.  It was how I was going about it.  Specifically, Draz’Zilb’s corruption idea.  That wasn’t just a military strike – assuming the spell worked the way it’s supposed to, that would be wiping out EVERY LIVING THING from the point of deployment spreading and spreading until it had physically run out of things to kill.

I’ve got no problem with fighting a war.  But now that I’m seeing straight, I’ll be damned if I’m going to become a war criminal.  I’m not going to fight the humans by becoming them.

And in this case…after that baiting by Magatha…

That’s twice now she almost turned me into a monster.

So Theramore is going on the shelf.  For now.  At least until we’ve had a chance to work out an actual military plan that doesn’t involve necromantic weapons of genocide, and I’m not letting my temper make my decisions for me.  The Dustwallow map is staying where it is until then, as a reminder…

In the meantime, though, I still have a few things I need to do – starting with informing Draz’Zilb his little pet project is canceled – and some pieces I still need to pick up.

More soon.

News from two fronts

Everything is going on schedule – maybe better – with the ogres and their move from Brackenwall Village to Alcaz Island.  General Nazgrim has gone to Dustwallow Marsh to personally oversee everything, and set up base in Brackenwall with everyone who’ll be going with him on the initial strike on Theramore.  The remaining ogres have been moving to Alcaz in small groups, with infantry escorts scouting the terrain around their travel path to make sure they’re not being observed.

One interesting development in the midst of all this: one of the relocation groups have reported that while just making their way out of Brackenwall Village, they had a run-in with a Grimtotem warrior.  “Run-in” in the sense that the tauren was making a bee line to Brackenwall, and just happened to run up on the travel party on the way.  Either way, she didn’t much care about being intercepted, and only seemed concerned about finding Horde personnel, essentially to turn herself in.  When they took her into custody, she insisted she needed to be brought to Orgrimmar.  Nazgrim is going to question her in the village and then see about sending her along this way, depending on whether he sees something fishy in the works.  We ARE talking about a Grimtotem, after all, but then again, Magatha’s been largely on the outs with her own tribe ever seince he last little scheme, so who knows.

Meanwhile, we’ve got news from the investigations in Stonetalon, and the bottom line could be good or not depending on how you want to look at it.  Dontrag and Utvoch didn’t have much luck finding a whole lot of anything, other than tripping into one of those huge sludge pools at the Sludgewerks and finding themselves a giant sludge monster that hit them with some kind of sludge breath and sludge sludge sludge if I have to hear either one of them say “sludge” one more time I might have to behead them.  Which I’m right on the edge of doing half the time anyway.

Krog, on the other hand, managed to have better luck.  He was stealthing around near Farwatcher’s Glen, on the outskirts of their graveyard – where he found our old friend Grebo.  Or what was left of him.  According to Krog, the body was in pretty bad shape, had obviously been hacked up pretty badly by someone, or probably multiple someones.  So safe to say Grebo didn’t meet a good end.  Shiny.  I only wish I could have been there to have been a part of it.  Still, we don’t know WHO did us the favor of offing him, or why they decided to chuck the body off into the bushes to rot.

Still…as much as I’d like to let him KEEP rotting, at this point I’m not leaving anything else to chance.  I’m having the body transported to Malaka’jin, where it’ll be burned on a funeral pyre.  Normally I would send something like this to Cliffwalker Post, but that’s only going to dredge up painful memories for Overlord Cliffwalker.  Odds are he and I would draw even in the Who Hates Grebo More competition, so I figure I’ll spare him having to deal with this one.

Burn well, Grebo.  I’m sure, wherever you are now, you already are.

I am become death

If you’ve been paying attention lately, you might have noticed I’ve been having a lot of contact with some of our people down in Brackenwall Village – Krog about the goings-on in Stonetalon, Draz’Zilb about his potential uber-corruption spell.  It hasn’t been a coincidence.

No surprise to anyone that I’ve been on a pretty steady boil ever since I realized that Varian and Jaina were in the guild and must have heard me talking about where I was going with my mother last week.  I don’t know why I should be shocked by anything these humans do at this point.  Thing is, though, Varian I can at least see.  I mean, make no mistake, I hate that motherfucker, but at least it makes sense for him to have it in for me as well, and he’s not one to make any pretenses about it.  We’ve had bad blood going back to the Violet Citadel, probably further, not to mention he’s a hateful dimwitted warmongering orc-hating bigot, so of course he would grab any opportunity to strike at me.  And if an innocent has to die in the process, all the better.  It’s Varian.  I get it.

But Jaina?  THAT sticks in my craw.  Let’s even set aside all the joking around and clowning I do on her and all the cracks about her being a slut which granted they’re totally true but not really germane to the conversation right now.  But this is the woman who tried to play herself off as Little Miss Peacemaker.  Always playing the diplomat, coming off like she’s the level-headed human willing to yank Varian back when he’s being an asshole (which, admittedly, probably kept her pretty busy).  Always hiding behind her incomprehensible friendship with Thrall, like that made her better and nobler than the rest of her kind.  Like she just wants to be our friend too.

And she was a part of this.  Even if she wasn’t taking action herself, she knew.  She was there.  And all the while she probably kept on wearing her “Oh dear me, why can’t we all work together?” fake smile.

So guess what our first target is going to be.

I’ve been meeting with General Nazgrim to work out the logistics for our first strike on Theramore.  We’re planning two waves.  The first will be a ground strike launched out of Brackenwall, hitting the main gate of the city with several infantry detachments with artillery support.  That initial wave will serve two purposes: one, to break down the city’s outer defenses and allow our troops to make their way inside, and two, to keep Theramore’s defenses focused on the main gate, while the second wave comes in by sea and hits the harbor.

The second wave will be the key one, and deceptively small.  We’ll be bringing quite a few ships, but very few troops aside from the actual crews necessary to navigate the vessels.  The real purpose of the naval strike will be to hit the harbor, land, and get a single squadron to deliver the real centerpiece of the attack: Draz’Zilb, bearer of the new experimental chain corruption spell.

Remember how I mentioned Draz’Zilb’s spell sounded promising, but needed to be tested until controlled conditions?  Well Theramore is going to be our field test.  Our troops are going to get Draz’Zilb into the city long enough for him to find a decent-size cluster of humans, cast the spell, and then get back to the harbor while the chain reaction begins.  Once the spell is deployed, our incursion group will fire off a signal to let all our troops know it’s underway.  At that point, EVERYONE will head to the ships – the ground troops near the front gate can be making their way around the outer walls toward the shore – and then get out of there by sea.  Hence bringing so many ships when we didn’t have that many troops in the naval group.

It works out perfectly, really.  Theramore makes the ideal test target: a solitary human colony, densely populated but easy enough to isolate.  As much as Dustwallow Marsh is swarming with life, it’s mostly spiders, crocolisks…nothing that isn’t expendable.  Black dragonkin, the last leftovers of Onyxia’s brood?  Good riddance.  Yeah, a couple Grimtotem settlements, but do you think I’m going to shed any tears over them?  The whole marsh is separated from the rest of Kalimdor by mountains and sea, perfectly enclosed.  No spreading of the chain corruption beyond that one zone, however it plays out.

I love when things work out neatly like that.

Nazgrim and I are getting the last details sorted out.  I even got a couple of the goblins from the Gob Squad to come in and put together a scale model of Theramore and its environs for us here in the war room, to help plan out troop and ship placement.

The only small wrinkle is the ogres in Brackenwall, seeing as we don’t want to end up wiping them all out with the corruption.  Would be kind of rude, what with it being Draz’Zilb’s spell and all.  So I’m having most of the ogre population – the ones who won’t be going on the actual attack – relocated temporarily to Alcaz Island.  They’ll be safely isolated there until everything blows over, plus we can even use the island as a staging ground for the naval strike.

Preparations are already underway.  I’ve had the ogres moving in small numbers for the last couple of days, so we can do it gradually enough not to draw attention.  A couple more days and they should be safely situated on the island, and then we’ll be ready to start.  And if things go according to plan, pretty soon Sylvanas’ plague will have some competition over on the other continent.

 

 

[Header image provided by Rioriel from Postcards From Azeroth, reproduced here with permission and many thanks.  Click here to see the souped-up Postcard version!]

Monday mailbag

We’ve got a bunch of letters today, and there’s a definite Earth Online theme going on this week.  So let’s get right to them…

 

Hail, Warchief!

This “Decision 2012″ world event in EO is starting to look pretty interesting. And it looks like it’s pretty easy to participate, despite what some of the guides tell you.

It looks like the basic layout goes like this: right about now, you have local zone-wide events to pick “delegates” to a “convention”, to select a faction leader to contend for the office of “President”, which is the EO version of Warchief. Actually contending for faction leader sounds like an immense pain in the rear, but participation at the zone level isn’t all that hard. There’s a kind of back door in that the devs may not know about yet.

Now, the strategy guides will tell you that if you want to participate, you need to max out your “Politics” secondary skill, and grind rep with one of the factions. If you don’t have time for that, what you can do is look for a sub-zone with a ridiculously unbalanced faction population. Like, for instance, the “Texas” sub-zone, although I’ve heard that parts of “California” or “New York” will do just as well. Anyway, on your sub-zone’s scheduled day for the local event, you just show up at 7PM server time for the “Precinct Caucus” raid. Queue for the low-pop faction. And … you might be the only one to show up. Which means, you’ll be rocking a “Precinct Chairman” title for the rest of the world event. And, you’re guaranteed a slot at the “Senate District Convention” raid, which happens about a month later.

Beyond that, I’m not sure how it works. I’ve never been to a “State Convention” raid, or the “National Convention” either. Maybe I’ll make it that far this time around. It’ll be a few months before I know, though. I’d planned on making the “Precinct Convention” raid next week, but my sub-zone is having trouble applying the most recent “Redistricting” patch, which has thrown a wrench into things.

Still, it should be fun.

– A Concerned Citizen

It IS kind of cool how they’ve set this up, ACC, with the contenders for faction leader all squaring off with the server-wide push to gather resources to eliminate some of them before the big final match-up.  Right now on my server it looks like there are a LOT of people running around crafting the Negative Ads needed to wear down the contending mini-bosses, although I kind of have to wonder if that ends up weakening whoever comes out in the end if it’s not a runaway victory.  Then again I guess there are the Fundraising dailies, where some of the Negative Ad debuff can be offset by pouring money into somebody’s campaign fund.  (And I thought the Shattered Sun Offensive were bad about asking for handouts – at least THEY gave you their “of the Shattered Sun” name tag for your troubles.)

Here’s the part I’m not too clear on, though – between these “primaries” and then the bigger “general election,” is every individual server going to have a different outcome as far as who the Warchief is going to be?  Because it would be kind of weird story-wise if they don’t have one consistent leader across the whole game…but if it’s going to be standardized and preset, it kind of defeats the purpose of all these world events where it makes it seem like you get to have an effect on who ends up in charge.

Anyway, at least they’re having a world event like this to account for a possible change in leadership.  It would kind of suck if you just logged on one day and the old leader was gone and the new leader was in place and the whole damn world had just gone topsy-turvy overnight.

 

Riiiiiiight…  You totally disappeared because you were kidnapped and used in a bloodletting ceremony to have the spirit of Cho’gall take over your body.  And also you’re Garrosh, warchief of the Horde.  You seriously expect me to believe this shit?

First of all, as far as your “blog” being “proof” of your claims, do you not realize this is the internet?  Anyone could start up a blog and pretend they were anybody.  Oh look, I’m going to start up a blog as Elune, because I’m totally a beautiful night elf goddess!  In the moooooooon!

Secondly, there’s no way Garrosh is smart enough to be able to string four words together, never mind learn touch typing and a complicated rotation in a video game.  He’s an orc!  Have you ever talked to one?  “Me tired.”  “Okie dokie.”  “Something need doing?”  And have you seen the size of Garrosh’s head?  His brain must be half the size of a normal orc’s.

Thirdly, if you were Garrosh, which you are not, that ALONE would justify me booting your ass from the guild!  Why would I ally myself with the most barbaric, disgusting, hated enemy of the Alliance?  Actually, I fucking hope you ARE Garrosh so that every time I see you I can camp your corpse for ten hours to remind you who the fuck owns Azeroth.  (Hint: It’s not the invading orc scum.)

And finally, I’m not even going to click your link.  Do you think I’m an idiot?  I don’t want any viruses or creepy porn pop-ups.

Don’t contact me again or I’ll report you for harassment.

–Manageurdeath, Guild Leader, <West Coast Avengers>

Oh this guy really really really wants this to end badly, doesn’t he?

I was in a bad enough mood about this asshat kicking me from his lame-ass guild before he turned out to be some fucking Alliance out in Theramore.  And before he decided to go all personal.  And racist, did I mention racist?  Goddamn fucking human.

So ANYWAY, Manageurdeath – or should I say Brant Jasperbloom, herbalism trainer who I’m guessing fell back into that line of work after months of bringing Jaina flowers didn’t get him anywhere even though she’s JAINA, because I guess he’s just that much of a loser?  YEAH YOU GOT THAT RIGHT.  Boy it’s good thing I’m not really Garrosh, otherwise I would have a tech guy who can trace IP addresses AND an investigator based right there in Dustwallow Marsh to follow up on leads and make sure I’ve got the right guy, and he might even be a rogue to boot so he could sneak right on into town and peek in on you in person, and by the way you REALLY ought to clear out your browser history because you and I both know you sure as fuck don’t need ME to send you any creepy smut links, RIGHT?

And yeah, you go right ahead and report me for harassment – when I fucking BURN THERAMORE TO THE GROUND.  Just you watch, Jasper, it’s coming sooner than you think.

Fucking hell I hate guild leaders.

 

Hahahahaha!  You actually named your toon “Omgipwnedurface”?  I thought that was a joke!  XD

–Garona Halforcen.

PS: You should really move those two points from Overtime into Tenure.  And your best secondary stat is Funding because then you won’t have to worry about going oom (out of money) and will be able to use upgraded versions of your lessons more often.  So drop some Charisma and stack Funding — your throughput will go through the roof!  Don’t you ever read the Self-Righteous Pricks forum?

Yeah, yeah, that’s my toon.  One of them, anyway.  I’ve also been playing around with a veterinarian alt a little.

And since when did YOU turn into the be-all expert on every other class?  Come to think of it, Garona, what do YOU even play in the first place?  Anyway, this shows how much you know – you’ve got your specs mixed up.  The Funding secondary only does you any good if you’re speccing deep into the Sciences tree and get a Reseach Grant set bonus.  Otherwise it’s just wasted points, because frankly if you’re going with more of a “Liberal Arts” setup for your Pedagogy aura, you’re going to be going OOM all the time no matter what.  The 5% buff to your money doesn’t do much good when it’s a 5% buff on next to nothing in the first place.  Why do you think we have to spend so much time farming tuna fish in the supermarket zones?

 

Decided i needed to go on a trip , somewhere im not going to be seen. Youve got a big list of alliance you want to see dead so i thought it was a bad idea to muddy up your head with the reason why and just let you know that it isnt important. Its important that ive had alot of time to myself to think though. Its why ive had time to catch up with some questions that have been swimming arround in my own head, problem was they were probably questions you get every week, how come your so great, How do you manage to keep inspiring the level of awe you are now and your thoughts on how to deal with a person using teeny-tiny harmless little words that might  have been misunderstood to mean that they wanted someone else to be warchief, that sort of thing.

But then I read this weeks mailbag and thought that since Sylvanas had hacked your admin id see if i could ask her something before your goblin locked her out.

So here’s the question,which im going to try to word very carefully, if youve got those winged scourge things flying arround making more forsaken why arent any of their vrykul or vargul fighting for the horde too? I thought we could have been allys if they didnt like eating our hearts or painting their faces with our blood so much but since you look like everything these guys look up to and even have their judges arround to..judge them.

–Notzenke, Who is not hiding in the vault of archevon.

Okay, first of all, somebody needs to get Notzenke here a proofreader, like, yesterday.

Second of all, though, this is kind of a good point.  With the Lich King dead, that should free up a whole lot of Scourge up in Northrend – how did Sylvanas put it that time?  “Found themselves unemployed”?  And say what you want about Sylvanas, but she’s definitely got enough charisma to get those stray Scourge onto our side.  Obviously it worked out with the val’kyr, so I don’t know why she couldn’t do the same thing with the vargul or for that matter even all the zombies and geists and abominations.  The funny thing is, it’s not even like all those Scourge have been running around loose since the Lich King’s been dead.  I don’t know if they just don’t know what to do with themselves now, or if there’s something else going on, but you would think they’d be primed for somebody like Sylvanas to come along and snap them up.

Third, proofreader.  Seriously.  There were parts of that letter where I was like “Is this a paragraph or did he just shake his dictionary over his keyboard really hard and these are the words that fell out?”

More importantly, though, Sylvanas is not still poking around the blog.  I had Spazzle crack down on blog security so everything is under lock again.  Problem solved.

 

Lady Sylvanas,

Are you reading the Warchief’s mail too? Because, uh, that one about you and me and him in the gnomish bubble bath was, um, meant to be taken in an artistic context. As a writer to a poet.

And those “special” wands are only available to a very select clientele…

Yours,

Quelama Lightblade

Yup, these are my readers…

I’m not even going to touch the bubble bath thing, seeing as those e-mails go right into the same spam folder as the links from random succubus web sites and fake letters from tolvir princes offering to pay me a fortune to help them sneak money into an account in Kalimdor and oh by the way all it will take is a small deposit up front on my part.  But really, you guys have got to calm down.  Sylvanas is not still screwing around with the blog, she’s not in my e-mail, you can all stop being so frigging paranoid.  Like I said, Spazzle has already handled that shit, so we shouldn’t be having any more trouble.  Everybody just needs to chill the fuck out and stop being a bunch of Chicken Littles.  The sky is not fucking falling, okay?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Or so our dear Warchief would think.  Spazzle, shmazzle.  Never underestimate the power of a woman on the internet.  ~_^

Monday mailbag

Okay, so finally I can get to normal business like answering my reader mail!  As a matter of fact, there’s a TON of it that’s piled up while I was away, so it’s probably going to take some doing to get through it all.  So here we go…

 

Hail, Acting Warchief!

I look forward to Garrosh’s speedy return. This is a continuation of an earlier question our esteemed Warchief answered for me, that I have discovered new information about.

To recap: I was confused about the use of flags to mark supply drops in Ashenvale, and the capture thereof to interfere with enemy resupply. Originally, my question was how this behavior had spread to the Dragonmaw as well. Recently, I had the opportunity to put the question to a Dragonmaw quartermaster … and the answer is head-slappingly obvious in hindsight.

Twilight Highlands is nowhere near as congested as Ashenvale. But, it is ABSOLUTELY ankle-breaker country. You’re not getting anything in by land. At least, not without losing a lot if it to ambush.

So, yeah. Stealing the enemy’s flags makes excellent sense here, too.

And best wishes for our Warchief’s return to duty. If there is anything this Blood Knight can do to assist, I can be found at the Wayfarer’s Rest in Silvermoon, when I’m not on-call with the Horde Medical Corps.

–A Concerned Citizen

Huh.  Okay, I guess this one was a leftover letter for Saurfang from when he was minding the shop.

Anyway, though, ACC, good to hear from you again.  And yeah, I guess it makes sense that the Dragonmaw would be adopting the same flag-marking methods that we were originally using in Warsong Gulch.  I’m actually kind of relieved that there’s some sense behind what they’re doing, considering how lately the Dragonmaw have been…um…kind of shaky in terms of how on top of things they seem to be.

Don’t get me wrong, I like Zaela and all.  She’s a good warrior.  But you know, there’s a difference between being a good warrior and being a good person to have in charge of things, you know?  And like, with Zaela, sheesh.  Not the brightest bulb.  If there’s a big fight coming, sure thing, I want her fighting on my side.  But if there’s something going on that requires you to have your wits about you, or able to wrap your brain around something bigger than “me see, me smash”?  Yeah, not so much.

 

Greetings again, Your Warchieferousness!

Thank you for your reply re: the housing issue in Orgrimmar. It’s unfortunate that you can’t solve this issue with the same speed with which former acting Warchief Hellscream created it, by unilateral fiat – but then I suppose if he had bothered to investigate before spewing his frankly racist edict we wouldn’t have this problem, would we? I shall, as suggested, look into Razor Hill in the interim.

With regards to to baking, I’m afraid my skills in that area of cooking extend little past spice bread and tasty cupcakes – like many self-employed aggressive problem solvers, my culinary skills revolve around making use of things I slaughter horribly on my travels. Also, as a Knight of the Ebon Blade I bear the “blessing” of the Lich King in the form of an unfortunate addiction to causing pain and suffering … there are ways and means to alleviate it, but you may wish to avoid my cooking.

Regarding the issue of pseudonyms, I think I’ll pass – every second Death Knight Arthas raised during the Battle for Light’s Hope decided that being Joe Smith, formerly of Goldshire, was not sufficiently “grimdark” enough for a soldier in the Lich King’s service, and changed his name to “Darkreaper of the Nightfall” or something similarly pretentious and absurd. Some of them, seeking to emphasize their existence as agents of the Lich King’s will, changed their names to “Arthas”! Not that they can spell it, mind. I suspect the Lich King left them too long before he raised them.

(Koltira “Deathweaver”? Used to be Koltira Twillweaver, of Goldenmist Village. Though he was a pretentious ass then, too.)

Yours,

Twilight Vanquisher Aimee

Knight of the Ebon Blade (still not the cake vendor)

Still the Goblin Frickin’ Slums

The FUCK is this?!  Okay so this is another one for Saurfang I guess, I get that, fine, makes sense he’d have some follow-up mail from the last few weeks…but DUDE!  How much hate mail was he GETTING about me?!  Frankly racist edict by unilateral fiat WHAT THE FUCK DOES THAT EVEN MEAN!!

But ANYWAY, as far as YOU go, Aimee (OH NO, look out, AIMEE is pissed at me – watch out or she might write an angsty mid-tempo acoustic guitar ballad about me and take me down a few pegs with her bitter understated irony!), you go right on ahead and find yourself a nice comfy place down in Razor Hill.  Keep an eye on the kids down there while you’re at it, that should be a job you can stay on top of no problem.  In the meantime we orcs and tauren will take care of the real job of defending Orgrimmar, Corpsey McBoneyknees.

Anyway, there’s got to be some mail in here somewhere that’s actually for ME…

 

Hi Omgipwnedurface,

Just thought you should know you’ve been kicked from the guild.  You should have been trying to make a good impression if you wanted to pass your trial, but you haven’t given us any reason to keep you.  You didn’t show up for two raids you signed up for and you haven’t logged on for, like, weeks.  It’s really inconsiderate to just disappear without warning and leave us hanging like that.  Would have been nice for you to at least drop us a note before you vanished.

Good luck finding a new guild,

Manageurdeath

Guild Leader

[West Coast Avengers]

…

…

THE FUCK IS THIS SHIT?!?!

Okay, okay, so for anyone who’s not connecting the dots yet – this guy is my guild leader (or, well, he WAS my guild leader) from the Earth Online guild I just joined.  Well, the guild I just joined as of like a month ago, right before the whole Alcaz Island deal.  I haven’t logged on since I’ve been back, what with me being a little busy PUTTING MY LIFE BACK IN ORDER, but APPARENTLY I’ve just been kicked out of the guild!

Because yeah, you know what, you’re right, Manageurdeath, that was really inconsiderate for me not to give you guys a heads up that I was going to be away a few weeks DUE TO BEING FUCKING KIDNAPPED!  Oh wait, did I mention the part where I was dragged to a Twilight’s Hammer stronghold where I was going to be used in a fucking BLOODLETTING CEREMONY to have the FUCKING SPIRIT OF CHO’GALL BURN OUT MY SOUL AND TAKE UP RESIDENCE IN MY FUCKING BODY?  Did I mention that part??

You’re right, dude, I TOTALLY should have cleared this with you to make sure it would be adequate justification for me missing out on the fucking Board of Directors raid we had scheduled!

HOLY FUCKING FUCK’S SAKE.

Actually, you know what, hold on.  I need to find Spazzle for a second.  You guys hold tight for a minute.  Here, funny video to kill some time while I’m doing this:

OKAY, so I just tracked down Spazzle and had him trace that e-mail from the guild guy to find out where this fucker is from.  I was expecting him to be from someplace way out in the middle of nowhere, where he’s got nothing to do but play this game and think he’s all hot shit for being the guild leader, because for fuck’s sake guild leaders always seem so fucking full of themselves, but anyway, check THIS out – turns out this guy is logging on from Theramore.

FUCKING THERAMORE.

The guild I was in was being run by some goddamn fucking ALLIANCE, and not even an Alliance from someplace fucking IMPORTANT, no, run by an Alliance stuck out in the run-down town out in the middle of the fucking swamp where there’s nothing for those assholes to do but bang Jaina all day, only THIS fucker doesn’t even seem to be able to pull THAT off seeing as he’s fucking logged onto the game 37 hours a day!

So you know what, I’ll tell you this, Manageurdeath, I don’t know who you are exactly, but I’m going to fucking find out, and WHOEVER you are, mark my words, you have fucked with the WRONG ORC.  Enjoy your little podunk swamp town while you can, because I’m telling you right now, somehow, someday, I am going to open up such a can of fucking DISASTER on that place, you and all your little Jainabanging friends aren’t going to know what even fucking HIT you.  YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

UGH.  Okay, so there’s still a pretty big pile of mail, but I’m in NO mood to deal with any more of this shit today, so I promise I’ll answer as much of it as I can next Monday.  In the meantime, keep it coming.  I’ll talk to you all later when I’m not dreaming dreams of ruins in the fucking swamp.

UGH!!!

Draz’Zilb’s Discovery

Citizens of the Horde,

Some days ago I alluded to a conjuration proposed by the morally tenebrous ogre Draz’Zilb which, performed upon those entities who were in close proximity of the then-hostage Skarr, might cast some light on any magics unleashed on Alcaz Island.  With the unexpected departure of Warchief Hellscream’s personal wyvern – still at large despite our continued efforts to find it – one of our prime subjects was taken from us, but since that time we have had occasion to revisit the conjuration with respect to our other remaining subjects: the omnisyllabically discursive soldiers Dontrag and Utvoch.

After having the procedure explained to them – a process which took no small measure of time, given the pair’s peculiar reluctance to allow Draz’Zilb to complete a sentence unimpeded until I intervened –

[Saurfang doesn’t have to get a word in edgewise.  When he talks, everybody else’s words stop what they were doing and turn into “Yes sir.” –Mkvr., ed.]

the duo were initially uneasy about the ritual, as they indicated some prior experience witnessing the effects of Draz’Zilb’s spellcasting.  After some reassurance, however, we were able to carry on with the process.  The results were revealing, though perplexing.

Draz’Zilb’s original notion was that the proximity of Dontrag and Utvoch (and the wyvern) to Skarr at such time as Cho’gall’s spirit was summoned from within him would leave residual magic traces – aftershocks, in essence – on them that we would then be able to detect.  Draz’Zilb’s divination did indeed detect powerful magical signatures lingering on the pair; based on his examination, however, these magics were not consistent with the unlocking of a living phylactery.  Instead, he believes that the magical effect to which our subjects were exposed was purely explosive in nature – powerfully explosive at that.

While our information is, of course, incomplete at best, Draz’Zilb has suggested that his findings correspond to a sort of magical explosion that can be detonated by feeding off of the life energy of a living being.  Such a measure would not be out of character for the Twilight’s Hammer, as we have had first-hand experience with their willingness to use suicide bombers in their attack on the Doomhammer.  Nevertheless, it leaves us with many questions about what actually occurred to the ogre Skarr: not least among them, of course, being where he was when the detonation occurred, and indeed whether he himself was the instrument of the explosion – and, if so, what are we left to conclude about his role in the revival of Cho’gall?

Dontrag and Utvoch are, sadly, of little aid in filling in the gaps of our knowledge, as it is likely that the explosion incapacitated them prior to their removal to the island’s underground tunnels, and one can hardly expect them to retain clear memories of the final instants immediately prior to the detonation.  I will likely dispatch Krog to the island once more to search for additional evidence, though I am not optimistic about there being anything left after our original exhaustive searches.

I have additional measures to tend to personally for the investigation.  For the moment, however, having just spent much of the day with Dontrag and Utvoch, I believe I will grant myself a brief respite at the Orgrimmar tavern.

[Saurfang doesn’t always drink lager, but when he does, he prefers Captain Rumsey’s. –Mkvr., ed.]

I will update again soon, friends.  Honor go with us all.

 

-Saurfang

Flown the Coop, as the Saying Goes

Citizens of the Horde,

Interrogation of our various captives carries on, and begins to yield fruit, albeit gradually.  Just this morning, the perspicacious rogue Krog reported to me personally to provide updates on his ongoing questioning of those Grimtotem who were apprehended during out recent operations out of Brackenwall Village.  A good man, that Krog, and thorough.

His questioning confirms what we already knew of the Grimtotem situation – that they had, under the direction of Magatha Grimtotem through her lieutenants Arnak Grimtotem and Isha Gloomaxe, begun to search for the now-infamous phylactery of Cho’gall, so as to strike a bargain with the Twilight’s Hammer cult – while further indicating that thus far, no agreements or alliances had been forged between the two groups.  Indeed, shortly after the nefarious tauren clan began their hunt, the Twilight’s Hammer stepped up their activities in Thousand Needles, resulting in the Twilight capture of several Grimtotem, most notably Magatha…who, as you are already well aware, was subsequently freed through unwitting (nay, witless) Horde assistance.

Nevertheless, I find the timing of these events to be hardly coincidental, and I suspect that the Twilight cult undertook a pointed effort to capture Magatha upon discovering that she and her kin were endeavoring to complicate the cult’s efforts to resurrect the odious ogre Cho’gall.

That relations between the Grimtotem and the Twilight’s Hammer are, to say the least, unfriendly is confirmed by early reports from Garona Halforcen in Silithus.  While Garona finds herself still early in her interrogation of our Twilight prisoners (a process which, I hope, will not be slowed too greatly by the temptation to relish the process), she has been able to confirm a reciprocal disdain for the Grimtotem on behalf of the Twilight’s Hammer cultists.

Meanwhile, I have recruited the aid of the resourceful ogre seer Draz’Zilb of Brackenwall Village, who has already been of assistance in these events to both Krog and to Warchief Hellscream, in the hopes that we might glean some additional information through more mystical means.  Draz’Zilb has theorized that, given the powerful magics involved in the phylactery containment of Cho’gall’s spirit, as well as in its possible release, it may be possible to conduct a divination of sorts through any living beings who were in close proximity to the ogre Skarr when, or if, these necromantic powers were tapped.  This afternoon Draz’Zilb joined me in Orgrimmar to attempt such a divination, to see if any traces of recent spellcasting or magical aftershocks might be discerned through the three entities we know to have been present with Skarr on Alcaz Island (excepting, of course, Warchief Hellscream): the externally monologuing soldiers Dontrag and Utvoch, and the Warchief’s personal wyvern.

Draz’Zilb began his divination with the wyvern, which has finally recovered from its injuries on the island.  (I will hasten to note for those D.E.H.T.A.-friendly among you, incidentally, that I was assured that no harm would come to the wyvern as a result of these magics; I am moreover informed that the Warchief had developed quite a fondness for the animal, and having enjoyed the compansionship of numerous pet worgs in my youth, I am not unsympathetic.)  Draz’Zilb detected signs from the wyvern’s residual magic aura that it had indeed been exposed to a magic outburst of some sort; however, the wyvern appeared uneasy throughout the divination process, and while it was still in its early stages, the process was interrupted by the arrival of Dontrag and Utvoch, which served only to further agitate the animal.  Before our handlers could calm the increasingly emotional beast, it managed to slip from its restraints and fly off.

I have sent a scouting detail to patrol Durotar and its surrounding areas to locate the wyvern, but its whereabouts are currently unknown.  I must admit, given our current situation I cannot say that the recovery of the animal can afford to rank as a high priority, though it would indeed pain me upon the Warchief’s return to have to report that we had lost it in his absence.

I shall continue to keep you updated as events continue to unfold, friends.  Honor go with us all.

 

-Saurfang