A/N: this story will include material exclusive to FF, exclusive to my posts on the WoW EU forums, and material which appears on both. Warcraft, its world, and the game are all copyrighted to Blizzard; Ral'rush is my original character. I won't post material written by another player unless they give written consent, and they will be credited as such. Enjoy.

[Journal entry, autumn year 33]

I've been here in Uldum for over a week. It is really hot in the dessert. Things not be too boring…I met someone I never expected to see again. Very random place and time, but I guess that be how it is in real life instead of stories. I'm gonna go eat some desert.

[Another entry, autumn year 33]

I camped with two other people on guard duty for the last few nights. One of them be human, from Westfall. Family of farmers, just like mine, so we can talk without arguing about politics or anything else.

Loa, why do humans smell so bad? No matter how nice they be, I feel like I can't breathe when they get close. He be big for a human, not like Kul Tiran, but big enough that if he stands near me, his scalp be close to my nose. That, and also every time he lifts his arms, I feel nauseous. I be a troll who lives in a swamp; it takes a lot to make me nauseous.

Then I thought: maybe I smell bad to him too? Do humans think trolls smell bad? Maybe all races smell equally bad, but people just get used to the smell of their own race.

[Last journal entry of that section, autumn year 33]

I was on guard duty last Tuesday…I only get one day off a week, which is fine. I came here to help. I was on night shift, me and three of those local cat centaur things. Toll-fears, they call themselves. Good people. Our guard tower be across the delta from their big city. Isolated. Not near a trade road. No disturbances, which be disturbing in and of itself. I get jumpy when there be no action, but the locals seemed fine. We were usually fine.

Past midnight, me and one of the toll-fears got interrupted in our card game by gibberish from outside. I jumped up cause I was jumpy, so I got out there first to see if some traveler got dehydrated or another usual happening like that. On the flattened road, beneath a torch, this…thing was stumbling. Like a drunk, but I didn't smell alcohol. It looked like a human but not Wastewander. The thing danced up to me when my buddy finally got her behind out there and tried to touch me, but not with its arm.

All over its body, it had cuts without blood. It was opened all over, but not undead…bloodless wounds usually mean aged undead, but this thing looked like holes had opened up naturally. Then I saw what was reaching for me: comin out of a hole in its stomach was a purple tentacle. Everywhere, in most of the holes, these feelers like a starfish were fightin to get out and poke me. The human's face wasn't scary, but it was weird. The toll-fear hissed in, well, fear when she got close enough to see what was babbling. The thing smiled at me like it wanted me to touch it too, and I saw a third eyelid opening on its forehead.

Well, what was I supposed to do? I don't care how brave you think you are; you see crazy crap like that, at night, outside a city, and you gonna get scared. Rexxar himself woulda got scared. I had a stick in my hand since I'd forgotten my mace back in the tower, but the thing was - at one time - just a little Menethil human, so it died as soon as I hit it against its temple. Dropped like a rock and stopped babbling, and my buddy comes over with her torch meowing and hissing when it changes back to normal. All those tentacles, the mutated parts, they didn't even melt or pull back; they were just gone.

I looked at my card buddy and asked her if she saw it too. She said yeah but started havin a panic attack, saying we'd be punished for killin a traveler. I told her to go wake the others and tell them the human was on drugs; I planted a knife on him, and the others believed our story.

My card buddy hasn't been to work since then. Last I heard, she kept claiming to have back pain and other fake excuses. I don't blame her. Every time I hear a cricket, my shoulders tense up. I hope I'll get over it soon.