Spazzle Speaks: Darkspear Edition

Big news just came in from Pandaria, and there’s really no good way to say it, so here goes.

Vol’jin is dead.

He was on a mission investigating a cave with Rak’gor Bloodrazor, Grizzle Gearslip, and a detachment of Kor’kron, when they were ambushed by saurok marauders.  Before the group could fend off the saurok, Vol’jin had been killed.  Word is that Rak’gor Bloodrazor died in the fight as well.

The news broke in Orgrimmar earlier today, and as you can probably imagine, people are freaking out over it.  Especially in the Valley of Spirits.  Eitrigg has ordered flags flown at half mast over the next week.

I’m not sure who’s going to take over at the Echo Isles.  I was never too clear about Darkspear rules of succession, to be honest.  In the meantime, while everyone sorts out what happens next, the Kor’kron are sending a unit led by Gul’tar down to the Echo Isles to maintain order and guard against any moves by the Alliance to take advantage of the instability.

At least that’s how they’re explaining it.  Who knows what’s actually going on.  All I know at this point is I’ve got a bad feeling about this.

There goes the neighborhood

The Dragonmaw work crews have finished construction on Domination Point, and can I just say again what an awesome job they did getting the place built in no time flat?  Seriously, just a few days, and they have a whole fortress up and done.  I don’t even want to THINK about how long this would have taken if I’d let the goblins who did (or should I say ARE STILL DOING AND YES IT’S BEEN TWO FUCKING YEARS) Orgrimmar were working on it.

So that’s the good news.  The bad news is, no sooner did we finish construction on the place than guess who comes strolling on in with the newest wave of troops – Vol’jin.  After I SPECIFICALLY TOLD EVERYBODY not to tell him when we were leaving for Pandaria, to boot.  I guess I should count my blessings, what with him showing up by himself.  With my luck, it’s a miracle he didn’t bring Baine along with him.  And of course, now that I’ve said that, watch Baine show up here too.  Just what I need.

Anyway, Vol’jin turned up, and hold on to your ass, you’re never going to believe this, but guess what he started doing right off the bat?  If you guessed “COMPLAINING,” congratulations, you’ve been paying attention the last few months.  He went on and on, dontragging about us spreading our war to a new land, and utvoching about us driving the pandas away from the Horde with what we’re doing, and blah blah, boo hoo.

Want to know how much I care about Vol’jin’s objections at this point?  Here, I’ll give it to you in Earth Online tooltip terms:

Yeah.  That’s how much I care.

Of course, that didn’t stop Captain Camel Toe from griping up a storm for a while more, so I finally decided I was going to have to do something with him if I was ever going to get any peace.  We’d gotten reports from our scouts about a saurok cave far to the east – the saurok being these crazy aggressive lizard people who used to be shock troops in the pre-panda empire here – so I told Vol’jin I wanted him to go with the unit I was sending to check it out.  He still gave me some lip, but agreed to go.  He’s heading out that way now with Rak’gor Bloodrazor and a team of Kor’kron, along with a few volunteers from among the adventurers here at the base.  With any luck, Rak’gor will manage to get the troll out of my hair for a while.

Since they left, I’ve been going over documents here in the office I’ve set up in the main keep.  We have no shortage of notes here on Pandaria and its peoples, not to mention scouting reports on Alliance activity to the east.  Thing is, though, as much as I have information overload on all those fronts, and as important as it is for me to be getting our plans in order, the main document I’ve found myself focusing on for the last hour or so doesn’t have much of anything to do with Pandaria.  It doesn’t really have much in the way of pertinent information at all.  And yet I have it here on the desk, staring up at me, pulling my attention away from everything else.  A worn, bloodied scrap of paper, written in the slanted hand of an apothecary who never existed.

They’re going to turn against you.  Don’t let them.

Maybe this is what he was trying to warn me about.  Maybe not.  I may never know for sure.  All I know for sure is this: Dranosh died so that the Horde would have a chance to prevail.  And I’ll be damned before I let it be for nothing.

I’ll be damned.

And I can live with it.

 

“Seriously, mon, ya tink I didn’t notice ya talkin’ ta dat guy all quiet?  Oh, no, mon, dere’s nuttin’ fishy goin’ on here at all.”