Pilgrim’s Bounty

So here’s some funny timing for you — the pandas join the Horde and arrive in Orgrimmar, right?  And when do they turn up?  Just in time for Pilgrim’s Bounty to kick in.  I’m pretty sure I don’t have to tell you how much those pandas love to eat, and what’s more, the Pilgrim’s Bounty feasts consist pretty much entirely of foods the panda’s haven’t seen much of before…so as we speak, Ji Firepaw and his gang and running around hitting up every feast table they can find.  They seemed like they were a little wary of Thunder Bluff at first — apparently there’s some offshoot race of tauren down there in Pandaria, so they weren’t so sure what to make of our version, but they seem warming up fast enough.  Also, how many offshoot tauren races ARE there?  First the taunka and now this?  I’m starting to think it was a fucking miracle when Nazgrim had his whole deal in Vashj’ir that he didn’t run into a race of fucking sea cows.

Anyway…hope everyone is having a good Pilgrim’s Bounty.  Eat up, rest up, all that good stuff.  And watch out for pandas.  Seriously.  From what I’m hearing, they’re sweeping across the countryside clearing every table they can find.  I’m telling you, get your food and then do NOT look away from it.  Take your eyes off that second helping of cranberries at your own risk.  Don’t blame me if you look back and find a big furry black-and-white face picking its teeth and spouting off something like, “To ask what happened to your turkey is to ask where I came from.  I came from somewhere where they recently ran out of turkey.  Perhaps there is a better question.”

Back to Azeroth

Back home in Orgrimmar.  It was a long trip, but definitely worth it.  Other than the gateway herbage.  But the less said about that the better.

I’m mostly going to spend the day getting settled back in and resting some, plus starting to sift through my mail for this week – looks like there’s a fair amount for some reason.  Then I can start check on how big a mess Eitrigg and the others made while I was away that I get to clean up now.

One thing that I’ve been thinking about on the trip back though.  When Magatha wrote to me a week or so ago, she made a passing reference to Grebo having been helping her “for a price.”  That really kind of sticks in my craw, the idea that Grebo was actually working for Magatha back in the day, but it also kind of makes sense the more I think of it.  I even got a letter ages ago that was intended for Grebo – dead by that point – thanking him for his work in Stonetalon, and mentioning something about reimbursement, and it was just signed “MGT.”  At the time I just figured it was from the management of some business Grebo was working with on the side.  Never thought to make the connection MGT = Magatha GrimTotem…

Not to mention, I always wondered why that little pocket of Grimtotem up there in Stonetalon were able to remain such a nuisance, with all the personnel we’ve moved into the area.  Hell, I even commented once on how quickly Overlord Cliffwalker managed to crack down on the Grimtotem up there after he replaced Krom’gar.  I just thought maybe it was a tauren pride thing.  But no, when Cliffwalker took over for Krom’gar, that was the same time that Grebo died too.  And Grebo being Krom’gar’s XO, it makes sense he would have had plenty of chances to manipulate things to give Magatha’s people breathing room.

So that little snippet of news helps make sense of a few things.  Still, it gnaws at me that he was working for Magatha at all in the first place.  Granted Grebo was an asshole to begin with, so in a way it’s kind of a relief that he wasn’t totally on board with us, but still, it’s grating to think Magatha could have gotten one of our officers in her pocket like that.  Oh well.  Guess it’s just one more reason to turn the torture up to eleven when we finally catch her, right?

 

 

[Header image provided by Khizzara from Blog of the Treant, used here with permission and many thanks.]

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.

Monday Mailbag

Don’t forget to make your last-minute suggestions for Garrosh’s Poetry Challenge this week!  The last installment was the Sylvanas poem from Friday, so be sure to put your ideas in the comments there.  In the meantime, let’s have a look at this week’s mail…

 

Dear Warchief,

Since you’ve shown an interest in this week’s Noblegarden activities, I thought you might want to know about some rather…strange events going on around them.  Down here in Bloodhoof Village, many of us have been engaging in the traditional egg hunts.  As you probably already know, some of those eggs are magical, and when gathered they spawn several bunnies.  So fairly early on in the holiday season, the village ends up being filled with dozens of these little rabbits, hopping around all over the place and going about their business.

That much is fine, it’s part of the holiday and we don’t mind the rabbits at all.  The problem is that this year, we’re having an extra, unexpected guest whom we weren’t expecting.  A few days into Noblegarden, the forest nymph Mylune, whom I think you’ve met, showed up unannounced and…well…just started going nuts.  Not violent nuts or anything, she just saw all the bunnies and flipped.  She’s been scampering around the village hugging as many rabbits as she can herd together, talking baby talk to them, and squealing on and on every time she sees more of them.

She’s not bothering anyone, really, just minding her own bunny-hugging business, and I can’t say she’s doing any harm.  We tauren generally are on good terms with the dryads, so I don’t think we’re going to have any real trouble with her.  It’s just…really weird.  So I thought you might want to know what was happening.

–Maur Raincaller, Bloodhoof Village

Huh.  Well, Maur, as long as she’s not actually causing any real problems, this might be one that we just let sit.  Not to stick you guys with her charming company down there in Bloodhoof Village, but honestly?  After last time, I’m not going anywhere near that chick.  You should be fine, the holiday’s over now so she’ll probably go home soon enough, just make sure your newbie druids down there don’t try shifting into animal forms while she’s around.  And you might want to tell any hunters you’ve got to keep their distance if they have pets.  Oh and also, it might be a little inconvenient, I know, but you might want to give your windrider master a day or two off and just close down the flight path.  I know from experience the wyverns probably aren’t going to get a lot done while she’s around, and your flight master will probably appreciate being spared the headaches.  And possible bosom-clasp bruises.

 

Hey mon,

How come people always be makin’ a big deal about dese death knights?  I be pwnin’ dem down here in de Echo Isles ever since dey started seein’ dey trainers here.

–Bob, Echo Isles

Um, okay, first of all, idiot, there ARE no death knight trainers in the Echo Isles.  There aren’t any baby death knights running around the junior league training areas like Echo Isles or Razor Hill or whatever.  Because – NEWS FLASH, dimwit – all the death knights in the Horde are former Knights of the Ebon Blade, who were turned into death knights by Arthas back in the day, so the ONLY place they can train is in their own damn floaty city out in the Eastern Plaguelands.  Which you would KNOW if you didn’t have your head jammed so far up your ass that you don’t have any fucking idea what’s going on AROUND you.

Which brings me to my next point.  Dude, what the fuck is up with you?  Seriously.  Every few weeks I get some letter from you where you’re asking about some shit that absolutely anybody with a brain already knows, and half the time you’ve got something cringe-inducingly WRONG, so like, really, what’s your deal?  Did you just get dropped on your head like eight thousand times?  Did you, Dontrag, and Utvoch draw straws to see who got how much of the one brain you’ve got between you all, only you wound up with nothing because you lost focus and stuck your straws in your nose and started cracking yourself up making walrus noises?  Or did you put on a bear suit for who the fuck knows what reason, then made the bad decision to drop by Hyjal, and next thing you knew that aforementioned prancy head case Mylune ran up and started squeezing you till she literally made you shit your brain right out?  Because I’m really trying to figure you out, and I’m not coming up with much of anything other than something like that.

I tell you, I give Vol’jin a lot of crap, but spirits help him if this is the kind of wall-to-wall hired help he’s got to choose from down there.

 

Dear Garrosh,

I’m not quite sure how to begin, or even if you would want to hear from me.  I’m sorry that I haven’t tried to contact you until now.  I hope that in the end you’ll understand why.

When the red pox tore through our people in Nagrand, you and I were both afflicted, like most of the rest of the Mag’har.  It was probably so long ago that you barely even remember it, if you do at all.  I remember it well.  I remember how sick you became.  But I knew you would make it through.  Even then, you were strong.  You were always so strong.

Eventually the healers of Garadar began to cure our people of the red pox.  Bit by bit, our little forgotten village began to recover.  My symptoms, though, continued undiminished, no matter what our shamans did.  Worse yet, in a few cases, those who had been cured found themselves reinfected after being around me, only this time with symptoms that were far more severe, and resisted all attempts at treatment.  Almost without exception, they died.

I, on the other hand, lived on, suffering but alive, as if the pox and I were locked in a stalemate: me too strong to die, the disease too strong to fade.  The shamans decided that somehow I had become a carrier for a far more virulent strain of that hateful disease.

In time, Garadar recovered, and I was the only one left, with no end to the pox in sight.  More and more, those who came close to me found themselves infected.  And more and more quickly, those who fell infected would die.

In time I decided that I could not remain a burden to our people.  I exiled myself from the Mag’har, taking up shelter in a small hovel hidden away in the mountains near the Ancestral Grounds.  When time and illness finally took me, I thought, at least I would be close to our sacred place.  Perhaps the spirits would help guide me to the next life.

I disappeared quietly one night.  At my urging, Greatmother Geyah told the village that the pox had finally taken me.  In the eyes of Garadar, I had died.  Only a handful of the elders knew the truth.

Years passed.  The pox carried on unabated.  So did I.  All the while, I watched from afar as best I could.  I watched as the demons’ hold on our once-beautiful world waned.  I watched as the Mag’har slowly regathered themselves.  And I watched you, Garrosh.  I watched you grow up, strong as you always were, a man before your years, denied the luxury of a childhood.  And I watched you live in a self-made purgatory forged of your father’s sins.

It broke my heart.

Years more passed, and you left Draenor to pursue a new life.  A better life, I prayed.

Then, not long ago, a group of healers found me in my mountain refuge.  I did not know them, and their garments were of a make unfamiliar to me.  They were not of the Mag’har, some not even orcs.  I do not know how they knew to find me, but they claimed to have new medicines from the world the orcs had taken up as their new home.  While they could not offer a cure, they claimed they could contain the pox enough to prevent its spread.  Under their treatment, the disease would no longer be airborne, only contagious by contact.  A small comfort, but now at least, they said, the pain of the disease need not be compounded by the misery of solitude.

In time, I decided to risk revealing myself.  I returned to Garadar, to the welcoming embrace of Greatmother Geyah.

In the days since my return, she has updated me on much that has transpired in my absence.  The war, the internment, the demise of Mannoroth and the lifting of the blood haze.  But most of all she told me of you.  Strong and proud.  A hero of a faraway war, fought against the icy talons of death itself.  A leader of men, and now, Warchief of our people.

I do not wish anything from you, Garrosh.  I have decided to reach out to you now only that you might finally know the truth, and know that I am so very, very proud of you.  Do honor to our people and lead them well.  As I always have, in this life or the next, I will be watching over you.

Love always, my Garrosh,

–Lakkara, Nagrand

Um…

<blink>

<stare>

…Mom?

Filling in the gaps

Okay, I was planning on writing this a lot earlier, but I ended up sleeping WAY late that first night back in Orgrimmar, which had me up late last night, and blah blah, up-late-sleeping-in domino effect.  Any of you who’ve gotten into a late-nighter groove on Earth Online know the drill.  Anyway, I’m back in Grommash Hold finally and settled in, and HOLY SHIT it’s good to be able to crash in my own bed again.

So I’m figuring you’re all probably wondering what was going on on my end of things since the last time I posted.  Saurfang and Garona have been giving me the run-down about their side, but I’m still in the process of getting caught up on what Saurfang was posting here while I was out of it.  Anyway, let me try to fill in what I can and maybe fill some gaps for you guys.

Last time you heard from me I was flying down to Alcaz Island.  When I got to the island, Dontrag and Utvoch were still just chilling at one of those naga conjuring rune circles with Skarr, and so I figured I’d gotten there in time to get a jump on things.  Before I could get my bearings, though, a gang of tauren led by Magatha Grimtotem showed up and attacked.  At the time I assumed they were Grimtotem, but from the sound of things now, they must have been Twilights and just happened to be tauren.  Probably hand-picked, actually, so they could seem like they were Grimtotem.  Maybe.  Anyhow, they attacked, and somehow or other Skarr managed to get loose not long after.  Magatha was hanging back some and I could hear her chanting something, but I was a little too focused on the couple dozen dudes I had beating on me at the time, so I wasn’t really paying too much attention to it.

What happened next is still pretty fuzzy.  All of a sudden there was a blinding flash, and I remember being thrown back a long ways.  I think I hit my head on a tree or rock as I was falling back, but before I passed out I remember seeing a lot of the other tauren and maybe D&U getting thrown around by the blast.  I don’t remember seeing Skarr from that point – I think he was the explosion.  Looking back on it based on what Saurfang’s told me, I guess he must have been walking around with some kind of explosive enchantment, and Magatha detonated him when she arrived.  So he really was a time bomb, just a lot more literal than I was figuring.

And for that matter…turns out I was right, just not for the right reasons.  I thought Skarr was the phylactery, and we’d gotten baited into a trap bringing him out in the open.  Well, we got baited into a trap, all right.  But Skarr wasn’t the phylactery.  He never was.  He was the bait.

The next several…days, I guess? I’m not sure…were a blur.  All I can remember is bits and pieces.  Being picked up and dragged around, sounds of the ocean, grunting from ogres and ettin…that sulphury smell from the incense that the Twilights always seem to have burning all over the place.  Purplish walls.  I don’t know how long I was out before I finally came around for good.  Even then I felt pretty groggy, so I’m figuring the fuckers were using some kind of magical mojo on me to keep me subdued.

When I finally came around, I was in the Bastion of Twilight.  Magatha was running the show.  Which, considering the place was obviously overrun by Twilights and not Grimtotem, didn’t make a whole lot of sense to me.  But man, was she ever proud of herself for having me under wraps.  I had a few choice words for her…okay, you know me better than that, I had a few choice paragraphs for her…but after I got the initial outrage out of my system (which granted took a while), I managed to get her monologuing.  Thank goodness for villains who can’t fight the urge to run their mouths, that’s all I’m going to say.

So come to find out, Magatha cooked up the story about the phylactery and fed it to the other Grimtotem through Arnak Grimtotem and Isha Gloomaxe, had her people running around making trouble for the ogres under the pretense of finding it, knowing that sooner or later word would get back to the Twilights and they would be all “WTF there’s no phylactery, is this bitch crazy?”  Which okay, she is, but whatever.  Arnak and Isha were the only other Grimtotem who ever knew the real story, or part of it, anyway – there was no phylactery, it was just Magatha’s way to get the Twilight’s Hammer’s attention and bait them into coming for her.  Which they did, in Thousand Needles.  And when they raided the Grimtotem and captured Magatha to interrogate her, they were really doing exactly what she wanted.

Once she was the Twilights’ “prisoner,” that put Magatha in a position to make them an offer they couldn’t refuse.  Sure, there wasn’t any phylactery, but she HAD found a way they could revive Cho’gall, and she was ready to make them a deal.  All she needed was the Doomstone, which the Twilights already had, that collection of tauren relics, which the Grimtotem already had, and a new body for Cho’gall spirit to set up shop in.

On the drawing board, that was going to be Skarr – THAT was his special duty, the job Cho’gall had in mind for him.  Somehow or other Cho’gall knew it could be possible to bring him back in a new body if need be, and had Skarr in mind to be the one, which a handful of those Gordunni ogres were aware of even if Cho’gall didn’t spread word around among the cult in general.  Who knows, maybe one of Magatha’s tribesmen in Feralas got wind of this from the ogres somehow, and that’s what got the call rolling on this idea in the first place.  Anyway…

The only thing that was missing was Magatha’s end of the deal.  I’ll give her this much, she’s no idiot, and she knew better than to trust the Twilights to hold up their end of the bargain if she went ahead and gave them Cho’gall up front.  So that was her one ace in the hole: she was the only one they knew of who could do it, and they weren’t getting any resurrection until she’d gotten her payoff.  As far as the other Grimtotem were concerned, the payoff was help in regaining power, retaking the Grimtotem’s lost territory…but in reality, Magatha knew that was a lost cause.  For now anyway.  The Grimtotem were reduced to bands of renegades, they were banished from tauren society and cast out of the Horde, they couldn’t even get the Alliance to give them the time of day…there was too much lost and too many enemies stacked against them for them to hold on very long even IF the Twilights helped them regain a foothold.  Better to let the Twilights get Cho’gall back, and let the world burn.  At least her enemies would burn with it.

But what she wanted was to be sure one enemy in particular would be the first to go down.

Remember that letter I wrote to Magatha, when she asked me for help in her coup in Thunder Bluff, and I told her where she could stick it?

Yeah.  Guess who.

That’s when they started letting information about all of this start reaching us, to set off their plan to lure me out.  Eventually when we went after Skarr, they started putting the pieces in place for a backup plan that would let them kill two birds with one stone – let us get Skarr, feed us more information through him, then set me up to be captured…and then put me into the Skarr role as Cho’gall’s future place of residence.  A live Cho’gall and a dead Garrosh all in one fell swoop.  Cho’gall’s revived spirit would take over, my soul would be burned up by the restoration – “consumed by the fires of resurrection” as she put it – and my body would be corrupted into something more “suitable” for him.  Fun stuff.

Eventually they even had good luck on their side.  In my stupidity, I sent that fucker Johnny Awesome to Thousand Needles, where the Twilights were still holding Magatha in “protective custody,” which gave her an opening to round up all the magical doohickeys she needed and cover her tracks all at the same time.  I mean, think of it – at this point she was ALREADY basically screwing over her own tribe for the sake of helping the Twilights burn the world down.  So now rather than having to come up with another cover story to keep leading the other Grimtotem on, she just sent Johnny Awesome to round up the stuff she needed from them, then got him to KILL Arnak and Isha, the only Grimtotem who knew anything at all about what Magatha was really up to in the first place.  And then he comes back, “steals” the Doomstone for her, and sends her off on her way, so as far as anyone can tell, she’s just ESCAPED the Twilights rather than working with them.

Gotta admit, this is all so sly and sneaky I’d actually be kind of impressed, if it wasn’t all so totally revolting.

Anyway…you can probably see how everything played out from there, the trap-within-a-trap at Alcaz Island, and all the rest.  Which brings us back to me being held in the Bastion of Twilight.

Eventually a couple of ettin dragged me out of my cell and set me up in a scaffold in the middle of Cho’gall’s old throne room.  Still a little groggy from whatever spells they’d been casting on me, but I guess they needed me conscious for the big pay-off.  Either that or Magatha wanted me awake so I could feel every last bit of it.  Probably both.  The scaffolding actually didn’t feel THAT tight, and the wood seemed to have a little give to it, but I wasn’t sure how much time I was going to have to struggle with it at that point.

Anyway, Magatha stood up beside me with the Doomstone in hand, tauren relics set up all around us, and started doing some incantations that who the fuck knows what they meant.  Apparently the ritual called for some kind of ritual bloodletting (blood is life or some shit like that), and since Magatha wasn’t exactly one to turn up a chance to rub some salt in the would, she had the cultists bring her Gorehowl – she was going to spill my blood with my own axe.  And then, just to add insult to injury…wait, no, she was already adding insult to injury…to add extra insult to insult and injury, she decides she has to get her last jab in, and says something along the lines of, “Fitting, isn’t it, a little loosed blood sets you on your way to becoming a monster that will lay waste to your world…like father, like son, eh, Hellscream?”

And I’m not going to lie to you – THAT?  That pissed me.  The fuck.  OFF.

And seriously, when you’re trying to finish an old-school warrior, Magatha, what’s the one thing you never want to fucking do?  Yeah.  Feed him extra free rage.

Crack.

Snap.

Broken scaffold.

Pummeled tauren bitch crone, flying across the room.  Gorehowl back in the right hands, and a whole room full of Twilights running in to take a number at the deli counter OF MOTHERFUCKING PAIN.

Just so happens, as I was starting to fight my way back out, Saurfang and the rest were making their way in.  I think they might have run into a couple batches of cultists that Magatha sent back out to the exit to secure the way out while I was on the move.  Kinda wish I’d been there to see the looks on their faces when they came out of the portal, actually.  “Okay, guys, we’ll just lock this down and WHERE THE FUCK DID THIS OTHER ARMY COME FROM **CLEAVE**”

So…I think that covers everything.  I probably missed a few details here and there, but fuck, this was long enough already, no need to go piling on more.  Anyway I can try to answer any left over questions you guys might have.  Otherwise, it’s going to be good to get back to semi-normal life, answer my mail, all that good stuff.  I’ll write more soon, about some less apocalypsey stuff.

I’ll say this much, though.  Magatha’s day is coming.  I can take some comfort in knowing that now she’s probably an even greater outcast, even more alone, than she’s ever been, now that she’s not only an exile from the tauren, but she’s even betrayed the one remaining tribe that would have had her.  But this?  Just wait till I finally get my hands on her, and get a chance to crush her under my heel.  CRUSH her.  See if the elements protect her then.  Crush and burn and drown and suffocate.  ’Tis a little dream I have.

More soon.  And also, um…yeah.  Thanks for coming after me.

Many Questions, No Answers, One Theory

Citizens of the Horde,

The more I consider our current crisis, the more troubled I become.  Something is amiss, and I am at present at a loss for what precisely lies behind it.

Upon reflection, I have come to realize that our investigations have uncovered a number of loose ends which have proven most disturbing.  Indeed, some of these loose ends were present even before our most recent movements against the Twilight’s Hammer and Grimtotem, but amid the chaotic last days before Warchief Hellscream’s disappearance, it is not difficult to understand how some of them may have escaped our notice.

Let me begin with the most recent wrinkles.  Continued interrogation of both the Twilight’s Hammer and Grimtotem captives by Garona Halforcen and Krog, respectively, have confirmed their early testimony: that the search for the phylactery of Cho’gall appears to have been initiated by Magatha Grimtotem, not the Twilight’s Hammer themselves; that the Twilight’s Hammer then targeted Magatha for capture upon learning of the Grimtotem search, whereupon Magatha agreed to aid in the resurrection of Cho’gall; that, according to both sides, no alliance or agreement has been forged between our two groups of adversaries.

While disturbing in and of themselves, these facts give way upon closer examination to far more troubling questions.  How is it possible, for one, that Magatha Grimtotem could be aware of the phylactery when by all accounts the Twilight’s Hammer cult itself appears to have been unaware?  While it may be that the existence of the phylactery was known by a small, select number of high-ranking cultists, such that the cult en masse would be oblivious, it still strikes me as strange that, once word of Magatha’s undertaking became widespread amongst the cult, such high-ranking members would not have put forth some account within their ranks beyond, it would seem, “Well that’s news to us.”

Furthermore, there is the odd behavior of both the Twilight’s Hammer cult and of Magatha Grimtotem in Thousand Needles.  Consider: if Warchief Hellscream was correct in his shrewd deduction that the linguistically spastic ogre Skarr was in fact the living phylactery of Cho’gall, then this would mean that the Twilight cult always had within its grasp the means of reviving its leader.  As the Warchief rightly worried, this leaves open the question of why they would not make use of the phylactery, with the likely answer being that something else was yet needed before they could do so.  The Warchief’s continued line of thought led him to suspect that perhaps the Doomstone and a collection of tauren artifacts – all collected and delivered to Magatha Grimtotem by the contemptible blood elf Johnny Awesome – comprised the missing piece.  Yet, the Twilight’s Hammer already had the Doomstone in their possession before it was stolen by Johnny Awesome, which means that the cult possessed at the outset access to both the phylactery and to a power source which could be used to harness it.  Therefore, once again, why would they not have used them?

My only explanation here is that the key pieces to the puzzle may have been the collection of tauren relics which were in the hands of the Grimtotem, and which Johnny Awesome recovered at Magatha’s behest.  Another possibility may be that even given the availability of all these resources, perhaps – strange though it may seem – only Magatha possessed the obscure conjuring knowledge to actually make use of them, and so the key to the entire Twilight operation may have been capturing Magatha Grimtotem and gaining her cooperation.  While these suppositions are certainly possible, nevertheless, I am far from comfortable with our current understanding of this facet of these events.

Finally, there is the matter of the attacks launched on the fateful day of Warchief Hellscream’s disappearance.  We have, on the one hand, nearly simultaneous Twilight raids in Ahn’Qiraj and Bladefist Bay, one driving our people from C’thun’s chamber, the other sinking the Doomhammer and preventing its voyage to Alcaz Island; and on the other, we have the attack of Grimtotem raiders against the cacophonous warriors Dontrag and Utvoch in which Skarr was freed.  The problem I have come to realize is twofold: one, in the absence of any alliance between the Twilight’s Hammer and Grimtotem, how do we account for a Twilight’s Hammer attack at Bladefist Bay, whose only rational purpose could have been to facilitate the pending Grimtotem strike at Alcaz Island?  The only plausible explanation I can think of for this is that the Grimtotem attack at the island was not actually staged by Grimtotem, but by tauren agents of the Twilight cult under the guise of the Grimtotem – certainly possible in light of the known existence of tauren cultists, and further validated by the (ordinarily suspect) insistence of our Grimtotem prisoners that their clan never set out for the island.

Nevertheless, even supposing this explanation, we are left with a further, more troubling question: given, once again, that no cooperation exists between the Twilight’s Hammer and Grimtotem, how would the cult have become aware of our planned movements on Alcaz Island, if the only information ever in circulation on the matter was a decoy letter that was deliberately allowed to fall into the hands of the Grimtotem?  How would they know not only to launch an attack on the island, but to attack us at Bladefist Bay (indicating an awareness not only of the Alcaz operation but of the fact that it was in fact a trap)?

I fear there is something yet in play that runs deeper than we have supposed.  Indeed, the only speculation I can offer fails to account for the many loose ends, and should of course be consider cautiously.  Still, in the spirit of this forum, I will share the current state of my thoughts.

That Magatha Grimtotem is a traitor to her people – both the Bloodhoof tribe and the tauren race in general – should be news to no one.  But I begin to suspect that we have underestimated the depths of betrayal to which the insidious crone might sink.

I believe that Magatha Grimtotem may in fact have betrayed the Grimtotem tribe itself, at the hands of the Twilight’s Hammer.

This theory is purely speculation on my part, and by no means does it account for everything I have raised as a concern.  Yet far too many pieces fit in place for me to discount it as the ravings of advancing age.  Consider: it was Magatha who put set her Grimtotem tribesman on the search for the phylactery through her underlings Arnak Grimtotem and Isha Gloomaxe, leading them to believe by all accounts that the Twilight’s Hammer were also looking for it, and that the tribe might benefit from finding it first.  Yet the cult appears to have been engaged in no such search, and the Grimtotem effort appears to have accomplished nothing save drawing the attention of the Twilight’s Hammer.

The cult then attacks the Grimtotem and captures Magatha.  And it is here that I suspect the crone played her hand: through some means, perhaps she had learned of Skarr and of the possibility of Cho’gall return, and presented herself to the cult as the sole person living who would be able to carry out the deed.  Note closely the events that would follow: an unwitting Horde adventurer, Johnny Awesome, comes upon Magatha, still ostensibly being held by the Twilight’s Hammer; he is sent by Magatha to collect the tauren relics held by the Grimtotem in Thousand Needles; in the process he is also tasked with killing Arnak Grimtotem and Isha Gloomaxe, very possibly the only other Grimtotem who might have had further knowledge of Magatha’s initial scheme.

I suspect Magatha only ever set her people upon the ogres to catch the cult’s attention, and afford her the chance to go to them under guise of being captured.  I believe she offered her help to the Twilight’s Hammer in exchange for something.  I do not know what it is, but it was a price great enough to compel her to turn against her own people, steal from them, kill her kin and indeed her very family in order to cover her nefarious tracks.  I realize that this theory is far from complete, and still leaves yet unaccounted for no shortage of loose ends.  Yet I cannot escape the belief that there lies amid these ramblings some kernel of truth to the crisis before us.

I apologize for the excessive length of this post.  I did not have time to craft a shorter one.  Strange events are upon us, and the selective culling of ideas is a luxury, sadly, which I cannot afford while wrestling with the many questions and theories that plague my thoughts.

We forge on against the darkness, friends.  Honor go with us all.

 

-Saurfang

Magatha

Garona’s on her way from Twilight Highlands to be briefed on the new whole situation with the ogres and the Grimtotem and the Twilight’s Hammer and the WTF.  From what I’m told all she really needed to hear was “Cho’gall” and she was already packing.  Gotta say, if we do nip this Cho’gall thing in the bud, I really hope she doesn’t go all Maiev-post-mortem-Illidan on us.  She’s high-maintenance enough as it is, let me tell you.  Anyway, she should be here soon, so we can get to work on the Cho’gall problem, assuming we keep enough mood-balancing potions on hand.  (Seriously, you have no idea.)

Thing is, though, I’ve been thinking about what the Grimtotem told us in Brackenwall.  And I just realized – he said that the Dustwallow Grimtotem were put on the ogres by Isha Gloomaxe, and the Feralas Grimtotem were being directed by Arnak Grimtotem…and we know they’re two of the highest-ranking members of the whole Grimtotem tribe.  Which means, if there’s some scheme in the works, and the two of them are out coordinating, smart money says there’s only one place the overall plan could have come from.

Magatha.

And yeah, don’t get me started.

You know what?  Never mind.  I’m already started.

Look, I know people say I can be pretty cranky at times.  And I’m not going to deny I’ve got a temper.  There are lots of things that irritate me and a lot of people that piss me off.  I’ve got no use for gnomes, and I think we’ve established how I feel about humans.  Doubly so for a lot of specific humans – I’m looking right at you, Varian (also: fuck you), and I’m not too crazy about Tirion or Rhonin, either.  Even closer to home, Vol’jin annoys the living shit out of me, and I still say Sylvanas desperately needs someone to take her down a peg or two to knock her off her snooty pedestal.  But for all of my ranting, the list of people I really, truly, profoundly HATE is actually a pretty short one.

I hate Magatha Grimtotem.

It’s not just that she played me for a fool and basically turned me into a weapon to use against Cairne.  It’s not even just her betrayal of her own people, plotting against her chieftain and throwing the entire tauren civilization into turmoil.  It’s partly those things, but even those are small potatoes.

It’s that she robbed us.  Cheated us.  All of us – of so many things, on so many levels.  She robbed us in ways that are so complicated, and overlap so much, I’m not even sure I can untangle them all.  But here we go…Eitrigg told me forever ago that this blog might be helpful for hashing things like this, so it’s time to see if he was right.

She robbed the tauren of one of their greatest leaders.  Hell, she robbed the HORDE of one of its greatest leaders.  She robbed Baine of a father.  She cheated all of us out of whatever time we would otherwise have had with him by our side.

Not to mention that she robbed me of my honor.  My Mak’gora duel with Cairne was meant to be honorable combat, two evenly matched warriors, armed with a single weapon and nothing else.  By poisoning my blade, she put a shadow over me and forced me to spend the rest of my days hearing questions whispered behind my back about treachery and deceit and dishonor.  Cairne’s death will haunt me for as long as I live.  I wrote this to Magatha herself once when she called on me for aid: I deserved to fight Cairne honorably, to win or lose on my own merits.  If I died, so be it.  An honorable death is far better than a tainted victory.  But this?  What glory is there in defeating an opponent through trickery?  In standing over a weakened, dying body that should still be battling strongly?

Because here’s the part that will never stop eating at me.  You guys are all friends, so I guess I may as well come out and say it, because it’s not like it isn’t something you already know if you were there for the duel.

Before the poison took effect, Cairne was beating me.  And I mean badly.  I’m not going to try to dance around it at all – that old tauren was absolutely handing me my ass.  I was just barely keeping it together when I landed the glancing blow that poisoned him.  And then the venom kicked in.  And that was it.  There’s no two ways about it: if something hadn’t weakened him, there’s absolutely no way I was going to pull a comeback.

I should be dead.  And Cairne should be Warchief.

And right there is the worst of the ways that she robbed us.  She didn’t just deprive the Horde of one of its wisest voices.  She robbed us of our rightful leader.  The point of the Mak’gora is “victory to the strongest”…and she managed to turn that on its head.  (Hell, it’s like if someone rigged one of those Earth Online competitions for faction leader so that one guy won the contest, but the other guy got to be leader on a technicality or something.)  And so now, every crisis we come to, we’re forced to face it without the leadership that Cairne would have provided.  It’s one reason why, to be totally honest with you, many times when I’ve been faced with a decision, I try to think of what Cairne would have done in my place.  (Not often enough, if I’m really honest.)  Because on a really basic level, I feel like I’m serving as Warchief in his stead – serving out HIS term.

And all of this because of Magatha.  And now she’s finding new and better ways to betray us all.

She duped me into killing one of the greatest among us, a man I admired and didn’t even want to fight in the first place.  She stood right there and watched me do it, then had the gall to think I should be grateful to her for it.  And if I ever find her, she’s going to have a front-row seat for what happens when I get my hands on someone I utterly, violently DESPISE.

And on the off chance you’re reading this, Magatha, this is the part where you run.  Keep running.  Don’t ever stop.

 

 

[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!]

They couldn’t have just been bored and jerkish…

Okay, so now I’m getting worried.

I’ve spent the day in Brackenwall Village with Krog, Dontrag and Utvoch, and the ogre seer Draz’zilb, all working on getting some information from the Grimtotem prisoner.  Things really weren’t going anywhere for the longest time…I’ll give this Grimtotem credit, he had a really strong will, and even after I was giving him a pretty sound beating, he wouldn’t make so much as a peep.  Or a moo, I guess.

This was another one of those cases where I don’t want to lose any details, so I had Mokvar come with me to Brackenwall so he can keep a transcript of the interrogation.  Glad I had him go train up inscription, gotta say.  So, here’s the record of the session, at least after the first couple hours of me smacking the fucker around without much gain…

 

GARROSH:  Okay, so you know, as much as I’m enjoying beating on this guy, I don’t think it’s really getting us anywhere.

KROG:  Maybe we just need more knives?  I’m pretty fond of knives myself.

GARROSH:  Better than a good sound barefisted thrashing?

KROG:  Oh yeah, a good clean stab can be way satisfying.  Knives and daggers, either way.

GARROSH:  Well yeah, but you’re a rogue.  That doesn’t help us with this.

KROG:  What do you mean?

GARROSH:  You’ll just end up stun-locking him.  It doesn’t do us any good at all if we’re just keeping him silenced.

DONTRAG:  Rest assured, great Warchief, we shall find ways to make him talk!

UTVOCH:  Or a great inconceivable agony will await him!

DONTRAG:  Far greater than his worst imaginings!

GARROSH:  THESE two, on the other hand…

UTVOCH:  What about us, Warchief?

GARROSH:  Never mind.

KROG:  <chortle>

DONTRAG:  No, really.

UTVOCH:  Maybe just let it go, Dontrag?

DONTRAG:  I just want to understand what the Warchief is talking about.

GARROSH:  Yeah, good luck there.

KROG:  <snort>

DONTRAG:  As you say, sir…

KROG:  Seriously, where did you find these two?

GARROSH:  Stuck in a mine in Stonetalon.

UTVOCH:  Where we carried out our duty for the Horde most proudly!

DONTRAG:  For the glory of the Horde!  For the glory of Hellscream!

KROG:  Yeah, I’m sure.

GARROSH:  Well they were helpful at the time.  Kind of.

KROG:  Yeah, thanks for getting them involved with this.

GARROSH:  Would you rather be working on this with just a bunch of ogres helping you?

DRAZ’ZILB:  Um…

GARROSH:  No offense, Draz’zilb.

KROG:  Actually, I’m not sure I’m seeing the improvement.

GARROSH:  Oh come on.  OGRES?

DRAZ’ZILB:  Um, I’m standing RIGHT HERE.

GARROSH:  Did you miss the “no offense” part?

DONTRAG:  I did not, Warchief!

UTVOCH:  Indeed and verily, nor did I, oh great—

GARROSH:  Not YOU, for FUCK’S sake.

KROG:  See what I mean?

GARROSH:  Yeah, fine, whatever.

DRAZ’ZILB:  Chief Hellscream, not to interrupt, but I believe I may have a method that may facilitate the extrication of vital intelligence from our captive.

GARROSH:  Look, he’s being uncooperative enough, there’s no point in making him stupid too so he can’t even understand what I’m asking him.

DRAZ’ZILB:  Um…no.  What I mean, great Chief, is I may have a spell I can use to force the information from him, willingly or not.

GARROSH:  Well why didn’t you say so?  Hell, for that matter, why didn’t you guys do this before I had to fly all the way down here?

DRAZ’ZILB:  The incantation required a number of reagents, Chief.  Some helpful adventurers only just delivered them a short while ago.

GARROSH:  Good, so— wait, you actually needed that shit?  Like the “go get seven of these and nine of those” that we always send those noobs around to collect?  You mean you actually sent the volunteer errand boys out to do something that was really important?

DRAZ’ZILB:  Why…would I occupy others’ valuable time on tasks that were not of some genuine vital interest to us, great Chief?

GARROSH:  <blink>  …Shit, you ogres have a lot to learn.

UTVOCH:  I know a good place they could go for extension courses, if they—

GARROSH:  SHUT UP, YOU.

UTVOCH:  Yes sir.

DONTRAG:  Stop interrupting the Warchief, for goodness’ sake!

GARROSH:  The same goes for you!

DONTRAG:  Yes sir.

UTVOCH:  Apologies, sir.

DONTRAG:  Yes, sir, much ap—

GARROSH:  Okay, SERIOUSLY, BOTH of you, the next word of our either of your mouths had better be NOTHING, because otherwise, the SECOND word out of your mouths is going to be “OUCH, MY HEAD!”  You understand?!

DONTRAG:  …

UTVOCH:  …

KROG:  <chortle>  This is awesome.

GARROSH:  <pummel>

KROG:  OUCH, MY HEAD!!

DRAZ’ZILB:  Begging your pardon, Chief Hellscream, but is this…a typical day for you and your lieutenants?

GARROSH:  <looks down> <long pause>  Yes.

DRAZ’ZILB:  I…see.

GARROSH:  …Yeah.

DRAZ’ZILB:  Shall I resume my elaboration, Chief, or does the moment dictate a further prolonging of the awkward lull?

GARROSH:  Okay, I’m fairly sure I recognized SOME of the words in there.

UTVOCH:  The extension course DOES include a very excellent vocabulary building unit, if it please the Warchief, begging your pardon, sir, and hoping I might be spared a harsh inconceivable pummeling of—

DONTRAG:  <shakes head>

GARROSH:  <pummel>

UTVOCH:  OWW!!  Yes sir, re-shutting up…

KROG:  <chortle>

GARROSH:  <glare>

KROG:  <hand clamps on mouth>

GARROSH:  Draz’zilb, would you please finish what you were saying before I have to fucking kill everyone in the room?

DRAZ’ZILB:  Of course, Chief.  As I was saying, I know of a very potent incantation, the reagents for which have just presently come into my possession.  With it, I suspect we might loosen the reluctant lips of our Grimtotem prisoner.

GARROSH:  Is it some kind of truth serum or something?

DRAZ’ZILB:  Not at all, nothing quite so invasive.  At least not in such a manner.  No, good Chief, the spell I speak of executes a separation of the subject’s spirit from his body, leaving him highly susceptible to…coercion.

GARROSH:  Well, that sounds okay, but he’s been pretty resistant to “coercion” so far, and it’s not like I’m a rookie when it comes to beating an answer out of someone.

DRAZ’ZILB:  True, he’s proven to be remarkably strong-willed.  But this is a different matter altogether.  One can steel oneself against the pains of the body, great Chief; the body is fleeting and corporeal, and a strong mind can divest itself of the fear for its well-being.  But the spirit…touch upon it directly, play upon the proper strings, and no mind can resist indefinitely.  Eventually…one reaches a point of necessity.  There is, for each of us, a breaking point, a fear so fundamental to our souls that if faced with it, we MUST escape it, regardless the cost.  It is no longer a matter of strength or courage or power of will; it is a matter of need.

GARROSH:  That’s…just evil.

KROG:  I’m liking this guy.

DRAZ’ZILB:  Shall I proceed, great Chief?

GARROSH:  So we’re going to be seeing this guy’s deepest fear, is that it?

DRAZ’ZILB:  Nothing quite so crude, Chief Hellscream, not quite as dramatic.  It is a process of the mind, and as such, it will be perceived solely by his mind.  All we will witness is the shadow of his spirit as it is…extracted.

GARROSH:  Well get extracting, then.

DRAZ’ZILB:  As you wish, Chief.

Draz’zilb begins the incantation, and the Grimtotem raider’s body goes stiff and freezes in place.  A shadowy outline of the tauren floats up from his body and hovers in the air nearby.

KROG:  Kinda like one of those shadow priest body double thingies.

DONTRAG:  Should we stun him before he has a chance to hit dispers— OUCH!!

GARROSH:  SHUT. UP.

DRAZ’ZILB:  Now then, here we are… As you can see, my Grimtotem friend, your situation grows a bit more, shall we say, tenuous.

The Grimtotem shade floats higher in the air and appears to look around apprehensively, limbs reaching in different directions as if trying to control its movement.

DRAZ’ZILB:  Please, do try all you wish to remove yourself from your current position.  It merely expends mental energy while I secure my hold on you.  If anything, I thank you for your aid.

GARROSH:  Is it working?

DRAZ’ZILB:  Quite.  Now then, something simple to start.  What is your name, Grimtotem?

The shade glares at Draz’zilb silently.

GARROSH:  You’re sure about that, dude?

DRAZ’ZILB:  <chuckles>  Oh good.  Even after hearing us discussing matters, he still needs to be…persuaded.  I was hoping he would.

Draz’zilb waves his staff, and shadowy tendrils of magic force swirl around the Grimtotem spirit.  The shade lurches back and forth, looking about frantically, limbs flailing with greater urgency.

DRAZ’ZILB:  There…that seems to be helping.  But….just to be sure…

Draz’zilb reaches for additional reagents and tosses them about his staff.  He gestures toward the Grimtotem again, whose movements become more jerky and exaggerated, then grow slower as the shade’s form shrinks back.

DRAZ’ZILB:  Now then…your name.

The shade’s mouth opens.  After a long pause, it speaks in an echoing, timid voice.

GRIMTOTEM:  Karthag…My name is Karthag Stonehoof.

DRAZ’ZILB:  Much better.  And you are one of the Grimtotem operating out of Blackhoof Village, is that correct?

GRIMTOTEM:  Y…yes.

DRAZ’ZILB:  You see, Chief, he can be reasonable.  <chuckle>

GARROSH:  Dude, you’re enjoying this way too much.

KROG:  Think maybe we could bring him in for some of our Alliance prisoners?

GARROSH:  Later.

KROG:  Just sayin’.

GARROSH:  Okay, let’s get back to the point.  Let’s find out what he knows about the attacks.

DRAZ’ZILB:  Indeed.  What was the purpose of your raid on our village, Karthag?

The shade shudders in place, then cowers with a pained moan.

DRAZ’ZILB:  Oh, this IS a strong one.  Here, then…

Draz’zilb sprinkles some dust around the Grimtotem’s body, then waves his staff again.  The shadow cries out in terror, then cowers silently, trembling.

DRAZ’ZILB:  Shall we try that again?  The objective of your attack?

GRIMTOTEM:  We…we are looking for an ogre relic…

DONTRAG:  Ogre relic?

UTVOCH:  Zounds!

KROG:  What?

GARROSH:  PEANUT GALLERY, SHUT IT.

DRAZ’ZILB:  An ogre relic?  Strange that I wouldn’t know of any such thing, being as I am an ogre myself.  What is this relic you’re seeking?  What do you want with it?

GRIMTOTEM:  It isn’t us that want something with it.  It’s…it’s the Twilight’s Hammer.

GARROSH:  The FUCK he says?

DRAZ’ZILB:  Yes, the fuck you sa— erm, that is, what do you mean?  Why would the Twilight’s Hammer have an interest in an ogre artifact?

GRIMTOTEM:  We…our leaders learned that the Twilight’s Hammer are seeking the relic, and we think it’s most likely in the hands of one of the ogre clans.

DRAZ’ZILB:  According to whom?  Where is this coming from?

GRIMTOTEM:  Isha Gloomaxe arrived in Blackhoof Village with the news.  She said we needed to hunt down as many of the ogres as we can, until we find the relic or confirm it’s not in Dustwallow.

DRAZ’ZILB:  Is this what’s happening in Feralas as well?  The reason behind the attacks there on the Gordunni?

GRIMTOTEM:  Y…yes… Arnak Grimtotem himself was dispatched to oversee the search there, at least that’s what Isha told us…

GARROSH:  I’m not liking the sound of this.

DRAZ’ZILB:  But why?  What is it for?  What IS this relic?

GRIMTOTEM:  It’s…a magic vessel… Some…some months ago, Cho’gall held a gathering of ogres in Dire Maul.  The Twilight’s Hammer believe he had the relic forged while he was there.

GARROSH:  Yeah, I’m liking this even less.

GRIMTOTEM:  The relic is a phylactery…the phylactery of Cho’gall.  They believe…he bound a portion of his spirit to it.  They want to use it to resurrect Cho’gall.

KROG:  Oh fuck.

GARROSH:  Hang on, what the fuck.  That’s all well and shitty by itself, but what the hell do the fucking GRIMTOTEM want with it?

DRAZ’ZILB:  A fine question, good Chief.  A fine answer to follow, I’m sure.  Well, Karthag?  What interest DO the Grimtotem have in such a thing?

DONTRAG:  Maybe they’re trying to stop the Twilight’s Hammer?

UTVOCH:  Maybe they think they can use it to preserve their own leaders?

KROG:  Maybe you guys should shut the fuck up?

DRAZ’ZILB:  Maybe we should let the spirit answer the question before I run out of reagents here?

GRIMTOTEM:  We…don’t have a use for it.  Bringing back Cho’gall doesn’t matter to us.  But…we know that the Twilight Hammer wants it…and so if we can find it first…

GARROSH:  You can cut a deal with them.

DRAZ’ZILB:  Surely you don’t think they can be trusted.  They want to destroy the world!

GRIMTOTEM:  Our world…is already destroyed.  We’ve become outcasts of the Horde…our attempts to forge a truce with the Alliance have crumbled… We have precious few allies to turn to anymore.  And the hope is, if we can give the Twilight’s Hammer Cho’gall, they may help us regain some of what we’ve lost.

GARROSH:  You’re insane.  I seriously don’t know which of you is more crazy, the Grimtotem or the Twilights.

DRAZ’ZILB:  What’s the next move for you?  Where are your people striking next?

GRIMTOTEM:  I don’t know…very few of us ever knew more than our next mission… I just know what we’re looking for, but beyond that…

KROG:  Is he lying?  To cover for them?

DRAZ’ZILB:  Unlikely.  His spirit is broken enough at this point…I don’t think he has anything else for us.

GARROSH:  It was enough.

DRAZ’ZILB:  Indeed.

Draz’zilb chuckles and waves his staff again.  The shade shudders violently, then dissipates into the air in a burst of shadow magic.  Karthag’s body seizes up, then collapses limply to the ground, lifeless.

GARROSH:  The FUCK, dude?!

DRAZ’ZILB:  Oh, I’m sorry, did I not tell you about that part?  My apologies.  The procedure does come, eventually, at the expense of the subject’s life.  Spirits are so terribly hard to reintegrate into bodies once they’ve been extracted, after all…

KROG:  Seriously, Alliance prisoners.  Really, really look into it.

 

I can’t even tell you how pissed off I am about this.  How is this going on, and the GRIMTOTEM are able to put it together before WE do?  What am I paying my undercover agents for, anyway?!  Isn’t this EXACTLY the kind of shit that they’re supposed to be digging up for me?

Obviously this is bad news in a major way.  I like to bust Thrall’s balls, but he actually has been breaking his ass trying to come up with a way to get the Deathwing situation under control, and the LAST thing we need is a wild card like Cho’gall to get thrown back into the mix this late in the game.  I’ve got to get this shit under control. And fast.

Stay tuned for updates.  Meanwhile, I’m dispatching messengers to Twilight Highlands tonight.  Sorry if it upsets you, Wega – I’m calling in Garona.

“Could you keep it down, please? I’m trying to be unsettlingly evil in here.”

Desolace postscript

Not too many letters this week, so I’m going to hold off on doing a mailbag.  (Get with the program and get writing, people!  Your Warchief commands it! garrosh1337@gmail.com)

Also, a quick note on my recent trip to Desolace.  I think I mentioned at one point that I had a couple stops to make there, but I only ever really blogged about Shadowprey Village (annoying as that was).  Before coming back to Orgrimmar, I also made a stop at Ghost Walker Post.  I didn’t write anything about that at the time, partly because I was trying to save time for the trip back home, and partly because it was generally pretty uneventful.  It was also a little depressing, so I really just didn’t want to dwell on it much, but it’s probably just as well for me to give it a quick write-up now.  Better than dwelling on this Grimtotem business.

I’ve been out to Ghost Walker Post once before, and I have to admit, I always find the place pretty depressing in general.  Not so much for the outpost itself, which is fine as far as outposts go, but because of the area right below it – the kodo graveyard.  Go ahead and laugh if you want, but ever since I moved to Azeroth I’ve had kind of a soft spot for kodos (maybe they just remind me of my pet clefthoof from when I was a kid).  So seeing the place where kodos go to die, with all the skeletons and corpses all around, that’s just a little more than I want to take most days.

At least the surrounding area is a little less depressing-looking these days.  I know the cataclysm brought water into the area to help feed the regrowth of vegetation, but even still, it’s pretty incredible to see the change.  The whole area around the outpost has turned lush and green, and there’s even the beginnings of a forest starting up really quickly.  The Cenarion people – hippie druids, yeah, but still less annoying than those DEHTA fuckers – have set up a base there at Karnum’s Glade, although I didn’t actually go over there, because, you know, druids.  Still, I had to look around the new wildlands there, just because it really is a pretty amazing sight.  Even when you figure in the new sources of water, it’s incredible that the place started recovering so quickly.  It’s enough to make you wonder whether there’s something more going on there, beyond just the influx of water.

Which…yeah.  Really have to wonder.  I probably shouldn’t even mention this, because people are probably going to think I’m crazy, and it really honestly could be my imagination playing tricks on me.  But at one point when I was looking around the wildlands, off in the distance, I could have sworn I could see the figure of a tauren – not fully solid, but partly transparent, even a little shimmery.  Maybe it was just the light and the glare of the sun, I don’t know.  But it’s not just that.  If it were just a tauren it could have been anybody, and with all the druids around, not to mention Ghost Walker Post, there’s no shortage of tauren in the area.  But I recognized him.  I would know him anywhere.  The stature, the totem always in hand…the steady gaze that always seemed to be sizing me up and coming away just disappointed enough.

It was Cairne.  I swear on the spirits I thought I saw Cairne.

He looked at me, and he looked away, and just scanned around the wildlands like he was assessing his work.  And then he was gone.

At least gone from view.  I haven’t been able to get him out of my mind since.

Alliance are funny when their plans go to crap

Sorry I’ve been missing in action lately.  The last few days have been pretty busy and I haven’t had much time to tend to the blog.  That also means I kind of missed the last day of Hallow’s End for the in-character mailbag, but based on the responses I got, I might have overestimated how many of my readers are gamers.  Seriously, though, you guys would like Earth.  Give yourselves a break from Azeroth once in a while and try going there.

I ended up having a few delays leaving the Barrens, but mostly the big hold-up was in Mulgore.  While I was in Thunder Bluff meeting with Baine, this big gang of Alliance wannabes came storming in to raid the place.  Apparently somebody had the hot idea that they could roll on in and kill Baine and weaken the tauren.  (Trust me, people, those cows don’t fold that easy.)  So right in the middle of our meeting, these guys come charging in on us.

It was actually kind of funny – they obviously had this big fancy plan, all coordinated with some of them keeping the guards busy while the rest moved in, getting themselves in position to take on Baine…and then they come running in and see I’m there too.  Seriously, you should have seen the “OH SHIT” looks on their faces.  Priceless.

So Baine and I spent a good long while wiping the floor with the scrubs.  We really should have made pretty quick work of them, but you know how stubborn and pig-headed those humans are – no matter how many times we slapped them back, they just kept coming and coming and coming, and it took for fucking EVER before they finally figured out they weren’t even putting a dent in us and gave up.

Gotta say, though, the one thing funnier than all of that is the thought that they also tried hitting up Orgrimmar first, fought their way through waves of Kor’kron guards, took all these massive casualties just getting into Grommash Hold…only to find I wasn’t even there in the first place.

Stupid humans.