Warcraft 3: Reign of Chaos
Chapter 3: Delays
Disclaimer: Same as the restAuthor's Note: Once again I cannot stress it enough to read the other chapters or become hopelessly lost. Constructive Criticism is great! (Take a look at some of the reviews if you do not understand), but flames are meant to cook my food. I hope you enjoy this next installment, and for all who have pointed out critical errors (Birdie and others), thank you for that and please continue to point them out! Please do not forget to Review!
"Bah! The putrid smell of life! Has a gold mine been located yet, acolyte?" grumbles Lord Bershzul.
"No, sire, we have yet to locate a gold mine. According to our maps, there should be two human encampments just north of this last marsh. I believe the closest of the two is a days march ahead of us." the acolyte replies. Lord Bershzul shakes his head in disappointment. His dark eyes peer into the dark green waters of the marsh. He puts one of his claws into the water, and fills his palm with it. His hand moves up toward his face, and he drinks the salty water.
"One day, all the water on this planet will be like this, so salty that nothing could survive, then our conquest and purging of this world will be complete." Lord Bershzul thinks to himself. A group of 8 ghouls and a necromancer come through the marsh trees from the north, and trudge through the salt water to reach Lord Bershzul.
"Kel'Thuzad! What news do you bring? Hopefully your short expedition has found us an abandoned gold mine." Says Lord Bershzul in a cold voice. The small group pull themselves out of the marsh, and the necromancer brushes out various plant materials from his red and purple robe. The necromancer's skin is extremely gray, and a long white beard hangs from his chin. Slightly covering is glowing yellow eyes is the skull of a long dead bull. A gnarled stick with a bright glowing spark at the tip of it brightens the area as it rests in the necromancer's right hand.
"I am sorry to report Lord Bershzul that we did not locate any gold mine along the northern side of this marsh. I did, however, feel two immensely strong fields north of the marsh, both magical in nature," Kel'Thuzad stated and pointed toward a mountain to the far north of the marsh, "The stronger of the two emanated from that mountain's peak, the other seemed to be just north of the closest human settlement, but much farther east then the mountain." Lord Bershzul rubbed his chin, and then entered a nearby tent. A few minutes later he emerged with a map in his right hand. He stood at the edge of the marsh and examined the map. He looked constantly between the map and the mountain, looking more puzzled each time. He looks at a 5-digit number in the right hand corner of the map, and his eyes flare up.
"You fools! This map is over a millennia old, and you expect us to use this?! All these mines listed here have been exhausted from the two Human-Orcish Wars, and that mountain in the distance hadn't been discovered when this map was printed! The only thing this map has correct is the proportion of this one marsh in how far the two Human Settlements are! Where did you find this map?!" Lord Bershzul asks with fury in his voice.
The acolyte standing beside him examines the map, and notices the date in the right hand corner to be 1,200- the year the Human Empire of Arathor was established. He bows his head in submission to the infuriated Dread Lord, and answers in a low voice, "We found it in a sinking chest about 7 days from our current position, sire. Since we had only basic directions of when this swamp ended, we felt this map could assist us in finding the first two Human Settlements." Lord Bershzul crumbles the map into a ball, speaks words from a long lost language, and burns the map within his closed palm.
"Acolyte, you will have to make up for your failure if you ever hope to advance in my army! You will take these eight ghouls and identify what that mountain is, and if there is any gold mines on it! NOW MOVE OUT BEFORE I HAVE THE GHOULS DEVOUR YOUR FLESH!" the Dread Lord commands. The acolyte bows quickly, then trudges through the marsh with the eight ghouls as fast as he can.
"Kel'Thuzad, you will come with me. We will investigate this other magical presence within this Black Morass. Go gather the remaining ghouls, acolytes, and gargoyles. We will setup camp around this magical site after we find it." Orders the Dread Lord. Kel'Thuzad bows in command and rushes off to relay the command. Lord Bershzul walks into the dark waters of the marsh to cool himself off. He ducks underwater and takes in several gulps of the putrid salty water to refresh himself. After he emerges from the marsh, he follows Kel'Thuzad as the invasion force stumbles through the plant life and mud hidden under the murky waters. After several hours of marching northeast from the northern shore of the last marsh, the invasion force reaches what appears to be a large hole in the ground.
"I can feel the arcane energies flowing throughout this place, they seem to be a residue of some long destroyed artifact," the necromancer states. Lord Bershzul walks toward the edge of the large crater-like hole, and looks down. He can clearly see the hole is twenty-five feet deep. In the center are mangled black rocks. He motions with his hand to the ghouls, and they run and jump into the hole. Tumbling as they hit the bottom, they quickly recover and begin to construct a makeshift staircase with rocks near the edge of the hole. Thirty minutes later, the rest of the forces descend into the hole, and the 19 acolytes are sent to examine the black rocks in the center of the hole. After observing the acolytes doing their job correctly and sending the ghouls to patrol the area around the hole, the Dread Lord enters the tent where the Gargoyle statues were being stored.
"Arise, flying pets of the Lich King. I require your assistance." Lord Bershzul commands. The statue's eyes glow a yellowish-white color, and the folded wings begin to move. The muscles of the Gargoyles begin to expand and contract as the stiffness wears off. After several minutes of stretching, the Gargoyles listen patiently for the Dread Lord's next orders.
"I need you nine to go inform our expedition at the mountain of our new base," Lord Bershzul instructs and then points at the remaining Gargoyle," and I want you to scout the nearby human encampment of Stonard!" The Gargoyles screech in response and waddle outside the tent. Once outside they sniff the air and look at the setting sun to get their directional bearings, then the large group goes airborne toward the mountain in the northwest, while the remaining Gargoyle flies southwest to the Stonard. Lord Bershzul smiles as his pets mindlessly obey his every command, but his thoughts are interrupted when an acolyte comes to give him a report.
"Your Unholyness, we believe this is the site of the Dark Portal. The dimensional rift that brought the Orcs into Azeroth, this is what remains of the portal after the Humans destroyed it in the second war. We agree that we can reconstruct it if needed," the acolyte reports.
"Good, I want the new portal to be twice as large in proportions to the original, this site will be useful in bringing the Burning Legion in Azeroth one again. Get to work on it immediately!" the Dread Lord responds. The acolyte nods and returns to the pile of ruble.
The next morning, the patrolling ghouls report seeing two flying figures approaching their position. Lord Bershzul exits his tent and notices the figures coming from the northwest. "Hhhhmm, they appear to be some of my Gargoyles, but why only two? They always stay in their pack," the Dread Lord thinks to himself. A few minutes later the Gargoyles arrive with 2 ghouls and an acolyte, all seem badly injured.
"What has happened to all of you? Acolyte, what did you find on that mountain?!" Lord Bershzul demands.
In a low voice, the acolyte answers, "Sire, we found multiple crevices filled with gold mines scattered throughout the mountain. We believed that it would be the perfect spot for our main base camp. I choose the highest crevice we had found and setup the various bones around the mines in order to haunt them. After your Gargoyles informed me of your new base camp, I attempted the summoning, but the spirits rejected all of the 20 mines. I became very confused, and led the ghouls and Gargoyles into one of the mines near the entrance to the crevice. About halfway down the mind, we ran into what appeared to be a wall of dark red rock. The ghouls attempted to clear it, but their claws could not pierce the substance. After about five minutes of attempting to dig through the rocks, a giant yellow eye opened from the side of the rock wall. We realized then that this was no wall, but a dragon. We fled from the mine as fast as we could, but the dragon hunted us down until only the five of us were left, and then it returned to its underground lair. I am still confused, sire, I have known of only five dragon flights, and none of them were as dark of a red as this one." The acolyte then pulled a piece of wood with something carved on it from his torn robe. "I found this in the crevice where the dragon's lair was, I was hoping you could read what was written on it," The acolyte said in despair. Lord Bershzul took the piece of wood from the acolyte and examined it. After looking at it for several minutes, he was astonished by what it said.
"Black Rock Spire! That mountain is Black Rock Spire! The capitol of the Orcish Horde when it invaded Azeroth is that mountain! I cannot believe this, but why would there be dragons in the mountain now? Dark red dragons, there is only one dragon flight that is red and they are bright red like the Dragon Queen Alexstrasza. This is terrible news, I must inform Lord Archimonde of this delay in our plans," the Dread Lord thought to himself.
Why are there dragons on Black Rock Spire? Are these dark red dragons members of a new dragon flight? Will the Undead ever find a suitable gold mine, and have the Orcs reached Undermine safely? All of these questions and many more will be answered in the next chapter! Please do not forget to write a review!