Chapter One
The Edge of the Abyss
Why had he come here, exactly? He could have altered his portal to take him twenty miles instead of twenty billion, and stepped out of it at any point in Lordaeron he wished.
Nex closed his eyes and pressed his face to the gritty stone in front of him. Normally he wasn't one to second-guess his decisions. The future was generally unpleasant enough without searching for more unpleasantness in a past abounding with it.
Of course after climbing almost three vertical miles, with only the limited levitation he could conjure from the combined powers of the passive effect of the Illidari stone and drawing shadows, he supposed a little second-guessing was only natural. The fact that he had at least that far still to climb only made it all the more pleasant to indulge in. Foolishness, even so. With a sigh he opened his eyes, trickled power into the spell matrix to make himself lighter, and searched for his next handhold.
It wasn't weariness that had prompted his brief pause, of course. Although his head was pounding with the imminent need to go into his exhaustion trance so he could continue to draw shadows, he still had a ways to go before it became absolutely necessary. No, what had prompted his pause was searching for any excuse to escape the sheer monotony of lifting one hand, one leg, to the next handhold or foothold. He had already been doing so for hours. He'd even had a chance to see the sun of this place, which had risen from below him and set above him. It had provided only a brief distraction from his boredom.
He continued to climb. Hindsight was all well and good, but in truth he couldn't really have altered his portal in that way. It was tied to his bond with Stormrage, providing a straight-line vector between him and the corrupted night elf. And, to make things more complicated, that vector had actually pointed down through Azeroth before coming out the other side and shooting off into the Twisting Nether in Stormrage's direction. He could make minor alterations to it, but the farther he tugged that vector away from Stormrage's location the more difficult it became to maintain the portal.
If he knew how large Azeroth was, and how far it was from the surface he'd been standing on to the surface the vector passed through, he supposed he could have shortened the portal and found himself on the other side of Azeroth from his woes. Attractive as such a thing sounded, he probably would have ended up smack in the middle of some ocean, levitating his way to land. Provided some leviathan or sea monster didn't kill him first. Other than that, the only thing he could have done was put the exit portal somewhere in the ground beneath his feet. A tidy solution if his desire was death, and it was.
But noooo, he had decided to portal to roughly Stormrage's location, even though he had absolutely no reason to be here and he wasn't even sure where here was, or where the hell Stormrage was.
Fuming provided a modest diversion from his boredom, and he indulged in it for the next hour or so as he continued to climb relentlessly towards the top. And as if an hour of lambasting and mocking his erstwhile master had drawn his attention, he felt a searing pain in his head as Stormrage communicated directly into his skull.
To his surprise, the communication wasn't directed specifically to him. It seemed more as if Stormrage had tapped every single link simultaneously and spoken this message for the ears of all of his minions.
"For the past day or so you may have felt an urge to come to me, for those of you to whom I did not issue direct orders to do so. This urge may have been so strong that you tried to answer it without even realizing what you were doing, and sought out my other servants to find the means to do so.
When I first issued my indirect summons it was with the intent of gathering my forces to the sanctuary I have chosen. There was no urgency to answering these summons. That has changed, now. Come to me with all haste, by any means you may."
And just that quickly the pressure was gone, and he was alone with his thoughts once more. On the bright side, Nex could look forward to several hours more of cursing Stormrage while he climbed, fueled by this new source of outrage. Whatever the bastard said, he sure as hell wasn't answering any summons.
At least, not until he got to the top of this false gods cursed cliff.
. . . . .
What he wouldn't have given for even a ravine cutting through the cliff that he could have run up, no matter how steep. Or for that matter a cliff that was actually vertical, rather than sloping backwards so that every handhold he reached for was over and behind his head, and when he looked down he could see that he clung directly over the chaotic core below. It hadn't all been like this, of course, but for the last mile or so he'd had the singular pleasure. It was enough to make him swear he'd never climb anything again if he could avoid it.
After a few more hours he finally found a resting point, a fairly wide ledge recessed into the cliff where he could not only stand but also not have to see what lay ever present below him like a threat. It turned out to be a good thing he had, because even as he was staring at the expanse above him a chunk of rock the size of Stormwind Keep slammed into the cliff and shattered, the bottom of it not twenty feet above his head. The entire rock face lurched at the impact, and the next thing he knew he was falling.
Desperately he cast a levitation spell, halting his fall some ten feet from the cliff. Then he was forced to cast a shield as massive rocks began falling all around him. Some he managed to dodge by clever manipulation of his levitation, others were small enough that the shield shunted them aside.
After a few frantic moments of danger the bulk of the swift moving rocks had passed. But not all of them had gone; as he watched a rock drift lazily passed him and realized he'd been wrong. The rocks around him weren't falling, they'd simply been flung in his direction when the bigger rock had shattered. In fact, those that had absorbed the brunt of the kinetic energy instead of rebounding were now drifting along the cliff face. Nex stared at the rocks floating around him, at the continent-sized cliff face he'd been climbing, and then down at the dizzying drop below, finally realizing just what it was he was seeing.
He'd been a fool to not see it before. Of course, the fact that it was technically impossible had made it less likely he'd notice it, but he should have all the same.
Those with a poor education in magic or lore often confused the Great Dark Beyond and the Twisting Nether as the same thing. Of course for many practical intents and purposes they were, in the sense that they shared the same boundaries and the two occupied the same space. But any student of magic soon learned that the Twisting Nether was a different plane entirely, a chaotic plane where nothing physical existed. Many arcanists insisted that the Twisting Nether was in fact the source of all arcane energy, and likely other forms of energy as well.
For practical reasons, to reach the Twisting Nether was as impossible as reaching the Great Dark Beyond itself, and would require leaving the world behind and reaching a place that was technically physical, but lacking any sort of physical substance such as air or gravity. From there, any sort of planar shift spell would allow a person to reach the Twisting Nether, although they would likely soon regret doing so.
Somehow, by some means, he had stepped through a portal from the physical world of Azeroth into the Twisting Nether itself. But it was also a physical world in its own right, though that should have been contradictory.
He had contacted beings within the Twisting Nether, of course, and read the few treatises that existed describing the place. But it had never occurred to him that he could be there because of the simple fact that physical objects such as the rocks all around him, including the one he was climbing up, shouldn't have existed in the Nether plane. Of course, the fact that they were floating weightlessly in opposition of all physical laws of nature should have been a clue, but in his defense he'd had a lot on his mind, what with being flung into this mad place and spending his first few moments in it staring down thousands of miles towards certain oblivion.
The question was, how was it possible that this place was simultaneously within the Physical plane and the Nether plane, with aspects of both?
He could only surmise, based on the existence of other worlds around him, including the ever-present gas giant behind him as he climbed, that this had also been a world, but some vast magical cataclysm had broken it apart. If so, whatever immense magic had torn this world to shreds had torn the veil of reality and flung it into the Twisting Nether as well, creating a sort of midpoint. A physical world within the Nether, accessible to denizens of both planes.
That was bad. There were some nasty creatures that existed in the Nether plane, and many of them were demonic in nature.
Of course if it was truly the Twisting Nether there would be no gravity and he could move simply by willing himself. Wouldn't that be nice. But unfortunately he still had his weight, drawing him down to the core of mashing rocks and magma below, and he still had a mile or so to go before reaching the top of this cliff and ending this damned interminable climb.
The prospect of returning to the cliff face and climbing through drifting boulders, any one of which could smash him to a pulp, was less than attractive, so he decided to give up on the climb entirely and use the reserves he'd been steadily building as he climbed to take him the rest of the way.
It was an extremely costly process, of course. Levitating to slow your fall required a fraction of the power levitating to remain in place did, and by the same token levitating in place required a fraction of the power it took to to actually rise against gravity. The most efficient way to do it was all at once, actually, an explosion of force that would launch him upwards with enough speed to reach all the way to the top. The danger was that if he miscalculated the direction of force he could end up launching himself right into the cliff face, crushing him as thoroughly as any of these drifting rocks could. If he miscalculated it the other way he could end up being far from the cliff face when the upward force finally depleted itself and he started to fall again, this time with too few reserves to levitate back where he needed to be. Best case scenario then was that he'd end up falling farther than he'd actually climbed before he could manage to get himself back to the cliff face, and he'd have to do it all over again.
So he moved to one of the drifting stones and sat atop it, carefully measuring distance and calculating force and vectors in his mind. It was a welcome break from the tedium of climbing, and the likelihood that he'd end up spectacularly killing himself made the prospect all the more enjoyable. He wondered if goblins derived this much pleasure from tinkering with their explosives.
Finally he had what he thought was the best vector, with a bit of margin for error in case he'd misjudged either the height of the cliff or its angle of inclination. All that was required now was to craft the spell, shunt all of his precious reserves into the spell matrix, and after a few deep breaths and an uneasy look downward release it.
The upward force compressed his spine to the point he thought it would snap, smashing his head down into his bowels and obliterating everything in between. Every single joint and tendon popped simultaneously in an explosion of pain, and he felt a nauseating sensation in his gut as all of his organs were smashed together somewhere around his pelvic bone. Other than that it was quite an exhilarating experience to be flying upwards at several dozen miles per hour, and watching the cliff face fly past in front of him. His upwards speed felt like a rude gesture pointed at the core below, taunting it with the vision of escaping prey.
His speed was slowing as he reached the top of the cliff, as if that stony maw below was sucking at him, and it was probably a good thing it was, because he'd slightly misjudged the cliff's angle of inclination, and right as he reached the top he clipped the very edge of it with his shoulder, knocking him tumbling through the air. Desperately he cast a new levitation spell with his remaining reserves, lacking the presence of mind to do anything but push himself away from the direction gravity was pulling at him. A moment later he slammed into the ground with bone-jarring force, bounced once, and found himself abruptly looking down another cliff face. Desperately he reached back for the surface he'd just struck, clutching, and managed to grab hold of a rocky outcrop. He hung for a moment, panting, then pulled himself up and looked around. Injured, exhausted, his reserves depleted, his fleeting moment of triumph quickly faded at the sight ahead.
He was on a two foot wide ledge that stretched out endlessly to his left and right, like the rim of a colossal bowl. Behind him was the cliff he'd just climbed, in front of him another cliff dropping away not for thousands of miles but for thousands of feet. Tiny by comparison, but daunting enough. Stretching out before him was a tortured landscape of jagged peaks, razor-thin ridges, and everywhere he looked sudden drops of thousands of feet.
Nex stared around him with the sort of numb dismay felt when barely defeating a powerful enemy, only to turn around and see one even more powerful approaching. "Gods damn!" he snarled.
. . . . .
The first thing Maiev had done, when bringing Illidan back to their makeship camp in the dubious shade of the low ridge the portal had brought them to, was to order him placed in the cage wagon she'd brought with them from Azeroth.
"Remember this cage, Betrayer?" she asked as the poisoned demonkind was shoved helpless through the bars. With the cage door shut, barred, and locked he looked like nothing less than a high-profile convict being paraded through Stormwind on his way to the Stockades. Puros could almost imagine jeering crowds of peasants throwing rotted fruit and fouler things through the widely-spaced bars as he passed, although the night elf Watchers and Sentinels had made a good show of it as well with their perfectly silent lines and eerie, intent stares as he was dragged through camp. Illidan immediately fell into an odd sitting position, legs forming a diamond in front of him with his feet together and his knees raised from the ground to either side. Without a word he placed his hands on his knees, leaning forward slightly, and the green glow behind his blindfold dimmed. He went perfectly still, making no response to Maiev's taunts.
"Yes," she purred, "I see you do. The cage wrought by Malfurion Stormrage and the remnant of the Highborne before they accepted exile as punishment for their sins. Hold that position, Betrayer, as you did for ten thousand years, to minimize contact with the enchanted bars. Not even you can break free of it, nor influence the world with your magic."
Within the cage Puros almost thought the Betrayer's lips quirked slightly. Then he went rigid as if in pain, and his breath hissed from his teeth in short, panting gasps.
Maiev leapt forward, smiles gone. "What are you doing?" she demanded, making a curt motion. As one three dozen bows raised, arrows nocked and drawn and waiting her signal. "Have you forgotten the terrible price invoked for trying to use magic within that containment?"
For a few moments more Illidan remained rigid with pain, a look of severe concentration on his face. Then he relaxed back into his previous position and raised his head, sickly green light flooding from beneath his blindfold once more. "I forget nothing of our time together, Shadowsong. It was a necessary pain, to alert my minions of my situation. Unlike you, I am leader enough to care for my people even when compromised."
Maiev scowled. "Preposterous. No magical communication can pierce your cage, or you would have called your foul satyr servants to you long ago."
His lips pulled back from those inhuman canines once more. "Also unlike you, I learn from my mistakes. Though most things are precluded, a soul link remains intact."
For a moment Puros thought she meant to let fury overwhelm her once more, but instead she abruptly turned away. "It matters not. All your minions remain behind on Azeroth. The gulf of the Great Dark Beyond which you thought would protect you from my pursuit has instead put you far away from any aid." Without another word she stalked towards the perimeter of their makeshift camp.
Puros hastened to follow her. "My Lady, a moment of your time." She didn't look pleased to give it, but finally she nodded curtly. "Now that you have your prey in hand, I wonder what you mean to do. I had hoped you purposed to bring him back to Azeroth, and me as well."
She turned and glared at him, so hard that Puros took an involuntary half-step back. "Perhaps I did, human. But it makes no difference now, since the one who brought us here is out of our hands and likely dead."
Puros went stiff. He had feared that was the case, of course, although it was such an unpleasant prospect that he hadn't allowed it to really sink into his mind. The thought of being trapped here filled him with dismay too great for words. "What of Illidan Stormrage? If he came to this world he must have a means of returning to Azeroth. Could we not compel him to take us home?"
"We might, but we will not."
"My Lady?"
She hissed through her teeth. "I'll be damned if I stoop to asking that traitorous filth for anything. He'll remain in his cage, helpless, until the worlds end for all I care!"
His dismay became palpable. "But what of your own people? Surely this army you've brought with you did not intend to remain here forever. This world is a purgatory, invested with demons and likely the territory of a demon lord. Do you really mean to stay here and risk having your prize taken away from you?"
Her face, partially hidden behind the deep shadows of her plumed helmet, went noticeably darker with rage. But before she could answer shouts went up from the far side of the camp, and a surprisingly deep and resonant warhorn rang out. They both turned in time to see half a dozen imps skittering through the tents in their peculiar, hopping bounds. Behind the imps a felhound was battling a huntress backing desperately away through the lines of tents, using her massive longbow to bat aside the whiplike mana-leeching tentacles felhounds were dreaded for.
"Silence that horn!" Maiev roared as she leapt forward, disappearing abruptly and reappearing twenty yards away to cut an imp in half with her razor chakram. The horn rang out once more. "Silence that horn, fool! Do you want to draw every demon in miles to us?"
Puros rushed forward as well, turning and instinctively whipping his poleaxe across in a cut that was half block and half attack. The imp that had tried to ambush him from between the tents gave a screech as the haft just below the axehead smashed into it, a noise that was abruptly silenced as Puros finished the swing by slamming the weapon's haft, imp and all, into the ground and crushing it like a bug.
Through the tents more imps were streaming, and another felhound actually tore through a tent in front of him and turned his way, whiplike tentacles waving in delighted bloodlust.
Puros sighed grimly, calling upon the Light, and got to work.
. . . . .
In retrospect the ridges and peaks and sudden terminal dropoffs might have been a pain in the ass, but spending almost a day negotiating them was all made worth it when at last he reached a final series of ridges that dropped off into a wide, blazing-hot plain that stretched endlessly in every direction he looked. With half a minute's inspection he was able to see, and feel, at least three portals. One was below him and to the right a bit, and from it he could see demons emerging in endless file.
He had no idea what the hell demons were doing on this desolate rock, but he supposed he shouldn't have been surprised; from what he knew of Lynda's studies with demon summoning, you could practically throw a rock in any direction in the Great Dark Beyond and hit a world infested with Burning Legion minions. For that matter, they inhabited the Twisting Nether itself in the form of void demons and shadowbests.
He stared down at the portal below, watching the demons emerging in two lines, one afoot and stretching as wide as the portal, and the other in the air, various flying demons fluttering over their landbound companions' heads. So, a scorching, barren, endless wasteland populated by demons as far as the eye could see, half stuck in the Twisting Nether with denizens from that plane regularly crossing over.
Nex had trouble controlling his happiness.
The question was what to do now. It was awfully tempting to try to find a way down from the ridge and begin slaughtering the demons. The problem was that the presence of so many portals suggested a higher purpose for this world of floating islands than simply overrunning it with demons and moving on to the next. It was possible there might even be a demon lord present. If that was the case then attacking the demons carelessly might alert their leaders, something he wasn't ready for. It would be far more prudent to follow the relative safety of the ridgeline until he found something worth investigating.
Whatever he did here, there was something he probably had to do first. With a sigh he drew out the Illidari stone and focused intently on his link, using it to draw a line between him and Stormrage. It tugged him westward as the sun of this world moved, along the ridgeline to his left, the way he'd been planning to go anyway since it was the opposite direction of a portal spewing demons.
Nex engaged his levitation with partial intensity, the way he'd been using it to move through this jagged landscape. It was enough to make him lighter but not entirely weightless, allowing him to bound from one high point and outcrop to the next. He'd grown expert at calculating his jumps and manipulating his levitation at the same time so he always went where he wanted, and though it drained most of the passive energy he gained from the Illidari stone and drawing shadows, he was able to move swiftly and with great agility. Moving along the ridge was less treacherous than maneuvering through peaks and cliffs, although he still ended up making massive leaps at times to avoid more difficult stretches of terrain.
He was so intent on his course that he failed to notice the large plateau ahead, from which numerous winged forms were leaving and arriving, until he was less than a mile from it. As soon as he realized what he was seeing he canceled the levitation spell completely and allowed himself to drop, rolling, behind a rocky outcropping. Then he carefully lifted his head, using both his sight and his second sight, to investigate the plateau.
There was a sort of rough encampment, there, with the impermanent look of a temporary outpost. It was filled with massive, greenish winged forms going about this and that task, as well as a much greater number of succubi, which compared to the other creatures were much, much smaller.
Fiends. He had heard of them, of course, but he'd never seen one. They were less common than the lesser demons or the felguards, and more highly placed, but not so highly placed as the nathrezim or pit lords, and certainly below the eredar. They generally performed the role of midlevel force commanders, especially where heavy discipline was needed. It was said they possessed an uncanny ability to strike terror even into the hearts of the most uncontrollable demon.
Certainly their appearance was impressive enough. More massive even than tauren, stocky and with thick muscles bulging beneath a green hide sprouting lank black hair. Short, powerful wings sprouted from their shoulders, and most wore nothing, or a light harness of skins, save for a few in the midst of the crude fortifications which wore heavier armor over their few vulnerable spots. The more lightly shod fiends came and went, obviously flying scout patrols, though most remained within the fortifications, overseeing the scouting and patrol efforts. Coming and going in greater numbers than the fiends were succubi, and there were even a few felguards riding terrible creatures like winged spiny insects covered in scales.
It was a demon watchpost, obviously. He didn't know what the hell the demons were scouting so vigorously, or why they were scouting at all so close to the portals unless their operation was a more recent one. Still, the wariness these demons displayed didn't seem to indicate that this world was wholly subjugated. Either that or two factions within the Legion were fighting; not unheard of with these vile creatures, although generally eredar solved their disputes without the waste of setting the creatures they commanded against their rivals.
As he watched a particular succubus alighted outside the watchpost and hurried between the mounds of sand and rocks, reporting to a pacing fiend at the center of the encampment. Whatever she had to report obviously didn't please him, for he bellowed and struck her, knocking her sprawling, then snarled a command. The succubus hissed at him and then took to the air where she stood, winging away on whatever errand she'd been set to.
Nex watched the scouts, sentries, and messengers coming and going with narrowed eyes. His reserves were nearly empty, but potentially could be far greater than they would have been drawing the less potent shadows of Azeroth. Even so it was a fairly well entrenched emplacement manned by creatures a step above the usual run of the mill demons. Killing demons was his specialty, but even so the watchpost would be a tough nut to crack. Then there was the fact that even if he succeeded it was certain some of the winged creatures would get away, and there would be no logic to a watchpost such as this without a larger force they were reporting to.
Again, as with his decision not to go down onto the vast plain and kill demons indiscriminately, he had to turn away. He was more than happy to kill demons en masse, but if it was a choice between slaying a score of fiends at once and dying in a blaze of glory, and slaying them a few at a time and living to fight another day, he would be the first to admit that discretion was the greater part of valor.
He had all the time in the world to kill demons if he was careful; until then, it was probably a good idea to find whatever force had those fiends patrolling so diligently, and go from there. With a sigh he ducked back behind his cover and slunk into a crack in the stone.
A pity; assaulting an encampment like that would have been a great way to die.
. . . . .
It wasn't trivial to find away around the patrol outpost, particularly with demons overhead searching for enemies. But with a bit of effort, and helped by the natural roughness of the terrain, he found a place where the ridge leaned out over a narrow gully, hiding him from searching eyes in the air.
He was getting closer to Stormrage's location, he could feel. And he was probably far enough past the demon outpost that he could start concentrating on making his way to the ridge overlooking the plain. He activated his partial levitation once more and bounded up the gully, catching a handhold and flipping himself up and around the leaning ridge to another handhold and climbing up atop it. From there he had to go over two more ridges before he found a good vantage point overlooking the plain.
From there, his link told him Stormrage was almost due north, somewhere out on that plain, hidden from his eyes, and likely far enough away he wouldn't have been able to see him anyway.
He had a choice, now. He could either go down into the plain, or he could scout by other methods. He was frankly sick of climbing and running around, and probably once he got down there he'd decide it was better to travel along the ridge anyway, so that meant scouting by other methods. There was one that seemed most ideal for the situation, although he despised it.
With a sigh he reached up, steeling himself, and yanked his right eye out of its socket. Before the pain could knock him unconscious he began weaving a complex spell matrix around his bloody eye, first of all creating a spirit link that would fool his body into thinking the eye was still attached, and allow himself to continue to see through it no matter how far away it traveled. Next he imbued it to respond to his will and then imbued it with levitation. Finally he shut his left eye and focused his vision solely around his right. When he let go of the thing it hovered in midair, and he willed it to go northwards, dropping down until it flew just a hundred feet or so above the ground.
The rather grisly and painful spell was known as Eye of Kilrogg, in honor of Kilrogg Deadeye, chieftain of the Bleeding Hollow clan. The orc had lost his right eye in battle, and when he learned it could not be reattached he had instead used his powerful warlock magics to preserve the eye and link it, making it an aerial scout he could directly control. While the idea was greatly lauded, few of the other orc warlocks cared to put out their own eyes for the dubious benefit of long-range scouting. Unlike the orcs, however, the ogre mages thought it was a terrific idea, especially the two-headed ones who thought they had an eye or two to spare anyway. During the Second War it became common practice for ogre mages to use the Eye of Kilrogg in combat.
His former mistress, Lynda the Demonologist, had been fascinated by the spell, given her reluctance to leave her cavern home but her desire to know what was happening in the world. Rather than view losing the eye as a sacrifice, however, she further refined the spell to preserve the eye intact, and established a method of reattaching it after its purpose was done.
Nex had learned how to do so as well, although not willingly. After nearly losing her disembodied eye to a raven Lynda had forced him to begin scouting in her place, and he'd further refined the spell with protective magics that shielded the eye against most small attacks.
Not that there were any birds or other flying creatures in this desolate wasteland to threaten his eye as it flew, although if there had been they likely would have loved the tasty morsel. He guided the eye in the direction Stormrage must be, flying over a low ridge and on into a particularly flat part of the plain, and realized only after a few moments that he'd overshot Stormrage's position. He turned the eye back around and saw, tucked down in the meager shade of the ridge, the night elf army he'd made a portal for back in Azeroth. "There you are," he muttered. The almost infinitesimal changes he'd made to his portal had thrown him miles and miles from where they'd come out, and nearly to his death. They seemed none the worse for wear for his portal.
And in the center of that haphazard encampment he saw a cage on wheels, and within the hunched form of his erstwhile master. Elsewhere in the camp he saw Lightfinder wiping what looked like demon gore from his poleaxe, and Shadowsong was setting a group of half a dozen night elf bowwomen to some task.
With a low laugh Nex ordered his eye back to him, opening his left eye and sitting back. So, they'd managed to capture his master after all. It would explain why Stormrage was so eager to have all his minions come to him, although how they'd manage to reach this desolate slab of rock was another question entirely. They hadn't killed the corrupted night elf yet, and didn't seem inclined to do so anytime soon, more was the pity.
His eye reached him, and he began the irksome task of reattaching it. It was bound to be red and swollen for days, like it always was, but he'd be able to see with it as well as before. In truth he wasn't too concerned even about going blind: Stormrage had proven well enough that eyes were unnecessary if you had the second sight.
Well. There was no way in hell he was getting Stormrage out of the middle of an army of night elves, even if he'd wanted to. And he doubted any of them would be pleased to see him if he sauntered into camp waving cheerily. Until the situation changed in one way or another, there was really only one thing to do.
Nex sat down on the ground, pulled his pack around in front of him, and began taking out his toys.
Before he'd even got the first one out, however, a hoarse scream jerked his head around. It was coming from the south, in the direction of the island-continent's edge.
For a moment Nex considered ignoring what was obviously a shout for help, looking longingly at his toy. Then it came again, and with a sigh he stood and slung on his pack, then activated his levitation spell and leapt from the ridge to the next one along.
Unlike the place where he'd come over the cliff and onto the continent, here the distance between the ridge overlooking the plain below and the edge of the continent was only a few ridgelines, and before he knew it he was once more looking down that nauseating drop. Then another shout turned him to his right, and he saw a small hollow surrounded by cliffs to three sides, with the fourth side overlooking the endless drop to the core below.
In the middle of the hollow a crudely made hut of stones and a few sad twigs and branches abutted a corral full of strange spiky pigs which had been tainted and mutated by fel energy. The cry had been raised by the creature that obviously lived in the mean little shelter, who was up with his back against the cliff wall opposite the drop to the abyss below. Two succubi circled him, one hovering on slender wings and the other stalking lightly along the cliff, blocking off escape through a tiny ravine that seemed to provide the little hollow's only exit.
A third succubus leaned casually against a healthy tree incongruously growing in the center of the hollow, its sad nearly leafless branches giving the hut a modicum of shade. The creature was idly slapping the handle of her whip against her hindquarters as she watched her sisters at their play. Her pale, flawless skin was covered only slightly with silken cloth placed to preserve the extremes of modesty, although the cloth was thin and clingy enough to make even that a mockery. The body, and face, was that of a female ripe and lush in the perfection of new womanhood, with soft curves and flawless lines. Her face was slender and vaguely reminiscent of an elf's angular features, softened slightly and with full lips. Only when the creature smiled after witnessing a particularly devastating strike against the pathetic creature her sisters tormented could Nex see the long fangs those lips had hid, and when she turned her head slightly he could see the short, slender horns rising scant inches from her head. Wings were hidden behind her back, but he knew they were there.
He'd never seen anything like the succubi's victim. It looked like nothing so much as an hunchbacked frog standing on two legs, with greenish-brown skin, hunched, rounded shoulders, and spindly limbs, with an oddly flat face and a mouth filled with needle-like teeth which protruded at all angles in an unnatural way. It, too, bore the taint of demonic corruption, unlike anything he had felt before. The creature was fighting off the succubi with an oddly twisted wooden staff, batting at them ineffectually. But its efforts were feeble at best, laughable at worst, and Nex wasn't sure the creature even realized it. Its eyes had a glazed, vague look, with far more confusion and fear in them than than any sort of belligerence.
The two demons stalking him were flicking at him teasingly with their whips, in no hurry to put the creature out of its misery. In fact, the blows they were inflicting showed well the creative cruelty that was second nature to succubus inferni. They would never tire of tormenting their prey, though they may grow bored and kill him then go in search of a less broken victim. The froglike creature was limping, odd dark blood seeping out of a dozen wounds on its legs and arms. A whip slash had cut around its eyes with expert precision above, below, and to either side, leaving the orbs themselves unharmed but blinded by blood and swelling. It continued to make its pitiful, hoarse cries, though for the life of him Nex couldn't figure out whether the beast actually thought anything would be coming to its aid here at the edge of oblivion with nothing but jagged cliffs for miles in all directions.
Then again, by some twist of fate Nex was here, so it wasn't as if the cries had gone unheard. And though he delighted in killing all demons equally, he had a special place in his heart for succubi.
"Enough." It was not Nex who had spoken, but the succubus leaning against the tree. She had straightened and was now stalking forward. Normally when succubi spoke their voices were harsh and guttural, but there was a time when their voices flowed like silk over smooth skin. "This creature is male, though it barely qualifies as such. Let's show it true torment." Then with a soft croon the demon's stalking stride became a seductive, fluid glide, and as the crooning continued she began running her hands teasingly over flesh that would have made any man's mouth dry. It seemed even the froglike creature wasn't immune to her charms, for his fighting ceased as he stared at her, his toothy mouth going slack in a sort of glazed, lust-filled stupor. He had obviously never seen a succubus in the midst of seduction before, or he wouldn't have looked so eager.
Nex had seen it. More than he ever wanted to. And never intended to see it again if it could be helped. He dropped lightly down into the hollow in front of the helpless thing and straightened slowly. "This world must be pathetic indeed," he said in demonic, "if this is all you can find to amuse you."
If the succubi were surprised they showed no sign of it, although two of them moved to flank him on either side while the third switched the focus of its crooning song from the frog-thing to Nex, sliding dainty clawed hands along delightful flesh with even more seductive grace. Nex felt the waves of the seduction spell pulse over him. While there was a physical component to the spell as well, which might even be enough to sway lesser men desperate for sex, the main danger of it was her crooning, which filled the mind and dulled every thought, every emotion, but blank intense lust.
Nex went still under the force of it, the succubus smiling as she saw him apparently reacting to her siren's call. He'd found that if he wanted to take a prisoner, the best time was early in the battle while the enemy was still unaware of the danger.
The succubus slowed directly in front of him, running an idle hand along his cheek. "Soft," she purred. "Such perfect smooth skin. What sort of mortal are you, for you surely don't live on this world?" Nex made no reply, and she laughed lightly. "You can answer, mortal. We're going to have lots of fun together."
"The only fun I have with your kind is watching the life fade from your eyes," Nex said. Then he snapped to life, and in a sudden motion swung the torpedo he'd held hidden under his cloak up and across, slamming the succubus in the head hard enough to shatter bones. From what he knew of succubi, and there wasn't much he didn't know of the vile things, it would be just enough to knock her unconscious. With her mouth opened in a surprised shout that never left her perfect lips she dropped bonelessly to the ground.
One of her sisters cried out in dismay and lifted her whip to lash at him, but before she could Nex closed the distance between them and used his torpedo to knock the whip from her fingers. Then he thrust the heavy-bladed knife he'd drawn in his other hand into the demon's chest below her perfect left breast. The flimsy cloth the succubus wore slowed the knife's thrust as a mail tunic would have, but his aim was true. The succubus gave a cry like a woman in orgasm and sprawled backwards, clawed hands clutching at the wound desperately even as the knife's powerful demonslaying enchantment ate at her flesh, revealing the corruption beneath.
Nex looked away from her towards the third creature. The knife had struck what passed for a demon's heart; the creature would die quickly.
A noise from the dying creature turned him back just as the succubus raised one hand, as if in supplication. "We could have been good," she croaked, alluring voice harshening back to its normal form. "I've never had a mortal like you before."
Nex turned his head back to her for a moment and spat, the spittle splattered across the demon's perfect cheek. "And you never will, bitch. The Abyss take you."
The succubus smiled, or perhaps showed her teeth. Blood appeared at the corner of one lip and trickled down, but though her eyes were glazing she managed to extend a serpent's tongue and lick up the spittle. It gave a little shudder. "I'll see you there, soon." There was no longer anything even remotely feminine about the creature's voice. The succubus gave one last dying cry, and its eyes seemed to lose focus, gazing at something past Nex's shoulder.
Nex started to relax, kicking the demon in the ribs for good measure, when something warm and dry as a snake's scales wrapped around his throat and yanked him off his feet.
Of course. He had too much fun when he killed succubi, it always made him lower his guard. Warm and dry the whip may have been, but as it stayed in contact with his skin it began to burn, the flames licking at his chin and chest. His demon skin absorbed much of the heat, but not all, and it did nothing to prevent the lash from cutting off his breath.
Nex felt himself falling, and he twisted desperately to get a hand under him to cushion his landing. But even as his hand thrust out another lash caught his wrist and jerked his arm away. He landed hard on his ribs, the wind knocked from him. A dull pain flashed through him from his left hip, and he could only assume he'd hit a rock while landing. He looked up to see the last succubus standing over him, a whip in either hand pulled taut to keep the pressure on his neck and wrist. She'd picked up the whip of the one he'd knocked out while he wasn't looking.
Instead of trying to attack him, she began crooning, beginning the same seductive spell her sister had attempted, and failed. Succubi were nothing if not arrogant; she likely thought she was more alluring.
Nex reached with his free hand and grabbed the whip around his throat, yanking on it powerfully. Succubi were stronger than they looked, and she didn't appear too concerned with his efforts until she found herself flying towards him; Nex was stronger than he looked too.
With the pressure off his bound wrist Nex reached out and caught the demon by the throat. "Seduction hasn't worked on me in seven years," he said into her wide eyes. Then his skin began to burn as he cast the costly but highly satisfying immolation spell, and as the flames licked out they caught the succubus and began to burn away that perfect skin. The creature screamed, like her sister also making a cry like a woman at the height of pleasure. Then Nex's fist closed completely around her throat, crushing it, and she went silent with grim finality.
. . . . .
Nex finished tying up the captured succubus using her sister's whips, then looped the last whip around his waist in an arrangement that would stay tied unless he grasped the handle at his hip and tugged. Within moments it would be loose in his hand, ready for use. It was an arrangement that had taken him a long time to work out, and near enough the only way to carry a whip for quick access. The process was complicated, but this was not the first time he'd carried a whip other than the semi-sentient one he'd taken from Rachondimus, and he had it bound at his waist, looking like nothing more than a belt, in moments.
Then he turned to where the frog-creature still huddled against the cliff wall. It appeared to consider Nex as great a threat as the defeated succubi, and was holding its twisted stick defensively in shaking hands. Nex moved forward slowly, hands held outward to convey harmlessness. "I will not hurt you," he said in demonic, on the off chance that the creature's demonic corruption indicated some association with demons and it would know the language. But the flat toothy face remained blank, though perhaps more fearful at hearing that foul language used. Nex sighed. "Can you understand me?" he said in Common. Of course there was almost no chance that an otherworldly creature would speak any Azerothian language.
Then the dull, confused eyes cleared for but a moment, and the creature croaked "mercy," in Orcish.
Nex blinked in surprise. Of course he knew Orcish, nearly as well as he knew Common. Lynda's cave had been deep within orc territory when he was young, until the orcs had been defeated, and even then rogue orcs had infested the area for years, and still did in some places. For that matter orc warlocks were some of the most powerful and dangerous to be found, and certainly the most experienced. Any self-respecting demonologist would speak the language, and Lynda had possessed a great many treatises on demonic magic penned in Orcish.
The question was why this creature, crouching in a hut on the edge of a continent floating a stone's throw from the Twisting Nether, halfway within the chaotic plane of the Twisting Nether itself, should be speaking Orcish. It could have been a fluke, the creature making a noise that sounded like communication. Nex stepped forward, ignoring the way the creature shied back. "You know of orcs?" he asked in Orcish.
The creature shied away, still looking confused and frightened. "Know no plans. Sit in hut, try think. Please, know nothing."
Perhaps some of its poor communication could be blamed on a poor grasp of Orcish, but Nex had a feeling the demonic energy which had corrupted the poor creature was influencing its mind. Most of the time demonic corruption scoured away higher thought, leaving in its place a sort of mindless bloodlust. To see loss of mental powers without the concurrent bloodlust was strange, but not impossible.
Such thoughts were immaterial, however. His master was here, and he'd assumed his master would go to Draenor. But despite the fact that this creature was speaking Orcish this most certainly wasn't a world, and all accounts he'd heard of Draenor which the expeditionary force the Sons of Lothar, led by High General Turalyon, had sent back through the Dark Portal indicated that Draenor had been a world like Azeroth.
Of course, there had been rumors about the raid Ner'zhul and Teron Gorefiend had led into Azeroth to steal powerful magical artifacts. Reports from the Dark Portal before it had been destroyed from the other side suggested that Ner'zhul had used the artifacts to open several portals that were destroying the land around them.
Could it be that Ner'zhul's portals had entirely ripped Draenor apart, creating this bizarre jumble of islands that was half in and half out of the Twisting Nether?
Perhaps. It was possible the creature would know. Nex crouched down, making himself smaller than the hunchbacked thing, and drew some bandages from his pack. The creature flinched. "Easy," he said. "These are for healing." Without waiting for the creature to respond one way or another Nex began carefully bandaging the worst of its wounds. They had been made to cause pain, but loss of blood would eventually kill the little creature, and Nex needed him alive. "Where are we?"
Dull eyes stared at him. "By cliff."
Nex fought a spark of irritation. "No. What world?"
"Is no world. Is rock. Sometimes things grow." The creature gave a slight cry of pain as Nex, in his frustration, bound a bandage too tightly. He quickly loosed the bandage and tied it on correctly.
"Do you know of Draenor?" he asked instead.
The creature's eyes widened. "Know Draenor," it said.
"Are we on Draenor?"
The dull eyes dimmed further, and Nex almost thought the creature looked sad. "Draenor dead."
He suppressed another flash of irritation. "Was this Draenor before it died?" Only dull incomprehension. With a growl Nex pushed back to his feet. Perhaps the creature knew something useful, but the thought of trying to find it in spite of the creature's poor grasp of Orcish and his dull, unfocused mind made him weary. "Stay here," he ordered tersely, walking away from the creature and pushing his way into the little hut. The first thing he saw, one of the only objects in the tiny space aside from a pallet of filthy cloth and a small pitcher of water, was an object so bizarre it took him a moment to recognize it as a warhammer.
And not just any warhammer, but one so superiorly crafted that he had scarcely seen its like, even on Azeroth.
The head was oval-shaped, formed of some odd crystal, purple and semi-translucent. It looked fragile, but from the minute scratches and dings on it (assuming the warhammer had been used for its intended purpose) it had to be nearly has hard as diamond. Unless he missed his guess, the grip was composed of adamantite, a mineral so rare on Azeroth that finding the materials for the four-foot length of the haft would be impossible. Not only was it made of rare materials and looked well-made, but it was also decorated with intricate patterns he didn't recognize.
One thing he did recognize, however, was that it had been spellforged and enchanted with the Light, and with such sophistication that most paladins would envy it. Nex moved forward, tempted by the thought of such a weapon, but as he touched it pain seared up his arm, the holy weapon rejecting him. He stepped back with a hiss, glaring. Likely he could disenchant it for potent materials, but the thought of destroying such a beautiful weapon struck him as not so much wasteful as criminal.
After a moment he took a filthy blanket from the creature's bed-pallet and used it to pick up the weapon, taking it outside. As soon as the frog-thing saw the hammer its eyes widened. "Put back," it croaked frantically, starting to come to its feet, then falling to its knees in distress. "Put back."
Nex shoved the weapon into the creature's arms, but it dropped it to the ground with a wail. Like Nex, it appeared the weapon pained it to hold as well. "How did you come by this?" he demanded. "Who did you steal it from?"
The hammer had apparently galvanized the little creature to more coherent thought. "Mine," it gibbered. "Before, it mine." The frog creature actually appeared to be weeping as it took the cloth and reverently wrapped the hammer in it, then lifted it up into its arms, cradling it as gently as a child.
Was it possible that before being corrupted this creature had been a servant of the Light? Perhaps had even wielded the hammer against the Burning Legion? A tragic waste, to have the hammer in such worthless hands. Nex knelt down in front of the creature once more. "What sort of creature are you, who possesses such a fine hammer that he can't even touch?"
Tears fell freely from the creature's eyes. "Draenei," it said in a broken voice. "Was. Orcs came, warhorns call, choking clouds of poison. Never leave your weapon. never...he...I..." Confusion once more, and it looked away, huddled around its weapon. "Can't leave. Hurts to touch, can't leave. Why has the Light forsaken me?" This last was spoken with such vehemence that Nex fell backwards in surprise, nearly losing his balance. That had been far more coherent, and full of deep, abiding bitterness and rage.
Nex smiled grimly. "The Light will not stay in a broken vessel," he said.
The creature looked up blankly. "Yes. Broken. They call us that, whole Draenei. Should be happy they untainted, but hate them. Drive us away, throw stones, make us live in little camps starving. Tell us we repent or Light won't come, but Light stay away."
Nex fought between contempt and disgust, looking at the Broken Draenei. Better to die than to be reduced to such a state. It was no wonder the untainted members of its kind despised it. "Listen to me, and try to understand," he said calmly. "The Burning Legion has scouts flying all along here. These succubi who attacked you may be the first, but they will not be the last. You have to flee west, towards the setting sun."
Still protectively clutching the hammer, the creature stared at him blankly. "West," it said, and something in its voice changed. "Sha'tar'ath?"
Nex flinched at the word, although he didn't know why. "I don't know. But the main demon force seems to be to the east, so you have to flee away from them."
"West," the creature said again. "Naaru wander. Things grow. They see me now?" It was obviously a question for him, but Nex could only shrug. He didn't give a damn either way; he'd heard of the naaru, of course. The godlike energy beings that stood as the strongest foes of the Burning Legion. Strongest, and most useless; Nex didn't think much of the way they sat by and took no direct hand against the demons. At best they offered succor to the innocents the demons slew, and aided them in rebuilding if they survived.
Still mumbling about the beings of Light the creature turned away, stooping to pick up its twisted stick in its free hand. At the pen it knocked aside one of the fence supports, causing a section to collapse, and with a few hoarse cries herded the small huddle of fel-corrupted pigs towards a narrow crack on the far side of the plateau.
. . . . .
Nex watched it go until it was out of sight, then turned back to the captive succubus. She was awake, now, staring at him through slitted eyes. "You have me helpless," she said in a low, sultry voice. "It's a perfect time to have your way with me."
Nex strode over to her, pulling out his last remaining torpedo and pressing the wicked thorium point to her delicate throat. "I have some questions for you, demon."
The creature laughed. "Work before pleasure, mortal?" She began to croon softly, beginning her seduction, and Nex casually backhanded her with the torpedo rod. The blow would have shattered the bones of a normal person, but it barely bruised the succubus's jaw. Delicate as they looked, they were tough creatures.
"That didn't work the first time, what makes you think it'll work this time?" he asked calmly.
"Do you think pain will sway me? Me?" the succubus laughed throatily, as well she should. They often served as torturers in the Burning Legion, and only the nathrezim delighted more in causing torment. "Do you think there is anything of pain I do not know, mortal?"
"Pain is a terrible way to get information. I prefer more direct methods." Without hesitation Nex lifted the torpedo and slammed one of the wicked points into her forehead. Not hard enough to kill her, of course, but enough to pierce her skull and penetrate deep enough that the metal touched against her brain.
The succubus gave a cry of almost ecstasy and writhed in her bonds. "Yes, keep it coming, mortal." Nex smiled slightly, then gathered his mental concentration and power and slammed into her mind with a psionic assault. Demons were notoriously resistant to mental attacks, which is why he'd pierced her skull and channeled the spell through the metal of the torpedo, providing him a conduit straight to her mind. Even so she resisted strongly, but now her smiles were gone, and her struggling within her bonds not teasing but sincere. "What is this foolishness?" she gasped. "Do you think you can truly probe my mind without finding madness, mortal? The demonic nature of my mind will eat through your consciousness like a plague, eroding your sanity."
"There are some who would say I'm already mad. As to the other, we're not so different as you think." Nex increased the force of his mental assault, and his cry of pain echoed hers as he finally broke the last of her mental defenses and pushed into her mind. He didn't spend long in there. No matter what he'd said, there was so much darkness, corruption, bloodlust, and vile hatred within her thoughts that he couldn't stand it for long. But he was there long enough to get what he needed.
He broke the contact, and they both fell silent. "Is it time for fun now, creature?" she asked in her sultry, seductive voice."
"No. It's time to die." Nex tightened his grip on the torpedo and in one smooth motion finished driving it into her head, through the back of her skull, and into the ground beneath. It killed her instantly, before she could even raise a death cry.
Then he stood and turned grimly towards the north. He had been right, this world was not wholly subdued. And the aerial scouts he'd seen were part of a larger force, led by a pit lord called Magtheridon who styled himself Lord of Outland.
But mostly he had been right about this world. Or what remained of it. It had indeed been Draenor, until Ner'zhul's portals had ripped it apart. Those six portals had all led to demon-controlled worlds, perhaps worlds that Ner'zhul had learned of in his communion with the demon lords he served. After the portals had ripped Draenor apart Magtheridon had come through, seen a purpose for this world that had six portals to other worlds and a link to Azeroth through the rift where the Dark Portal had stood, as well as being halfway inside the Twisting Nether. Using his power he had begun dragging the island-continents together, and named this place Outland.
So many ways by which demonic reinforcements could be funneled to this world, and the Rift, made it a perfect staging area for a Burning Legion assault on Azeroth. And unlike previous attempts, which had relied on temporary portals that only allowed a comparative handful of demons through, rebuilding the Dark Portal would allow for an invasion far greater than anything the orcs could have managed.
By the same token, Nex had access to several Burning Legion worlds, and could even attack demons from the Twisting Nether. The thought made him so happy he could hardly contain it.
He dragged his pack into the abandoned Draenei hut, sat down on the filthy pallet, and began taking out his toys.
