The sun was setting on Southshore, bathing the port city in a scarlet light as the shadows grew longer, and the last cusps of day were about to give way to night.

It was the time when everyone who were still outside, was now heading to whatever they called home, whether they be dockworkers, folks at the bar, or as in the case of a Gnome who was about to have a rather uncomfortable night, heading home from one of the port city's brothels.

"Hatchet Tombard" whistled as he walked, feeling the kind of relaxedness he only really felt after a night on the town.

Around him as he walked, in complete contrast, the humans were seemingly all worried their arses off.

Guards were a bit too on edge for regular patrol duty, the people walking around glanced way too hard at the darker corners and alleys of the city, and there was not a child to be found on the street other than homeless urchins.

The only ones who were the same as usual were the town drunks, and people staggering out from bars. Alcohol was the great equalizer as his friends back home in the snow had always used to say. Once you were drunk, you did not care that there were orcs in the hills, or that there was weird stuff going on up north in the kingdom.

The entire city was on edge, waiting for… something to happen.

It was probably a good attitude to have "Hatchet" supposed.

The Orcs, under that terrifying new warchief of theirs, had now finally liberated the last of the Alliance's Internment camps.

Which meant that all across the southern parts of Lordaeron, somewhere between 100 000-200 000 orcs(Depending on which country's reports you believed)were currently roaming around in the wilderness in bands.

Needless to say, everyone knew that Something was going to go down soon.

The only question was what?

What did the new, mysterious Warchief intend to do with this new terrifying army of his? Would he resurrect the horde of old? Would the third war between humans and orcs begin soon? Not just minor clashes between orcs and Humans, but real, bloody war as in the old days?

It was a terrifying prospect for most people.

And making it even worse, was that rather than rallying his forces to to fully crush this new, revitalized force while it was still building momentum, their beloved king was instead forced to have most of his army in the north east, where… Strange things were going on.

Things like the dead rising from their graves to attack the living. Or demons from hell. Or giant bat men with goat feet. It was honestly extremely confusing to try and sort out what the hell was going on up there.

Yes, it was a very tense situation all around.

For everyone else at least.

For "Hatchet" though, he had a way out. A rather expensive staff of teleportation, enchanted to send the user to its place of origin, a nice, out of the way city called Moonbrook in the kingdom of Azeroth, far, far to the south.

Far away from rampaging orcs, undead, demons and whatever other kind of nonsense the kingdom of Lordaeron was facing.

It wouldn't be perfect of course, he'd only be able to take with him what he could carry, so it would mean abandoning everything he'd set up here, but it wouldn't be the first time he'd had to abandon everything he'd set up.

He'd lost far worse than a simple gun shop. His real name for one.

If he had to, if the orcs and humans actually began fighting here, he'd run home, grab his gold, staff, and some other stuff, and he'd be out of there on the spot.

He didn't particularly want this city to be burned and sacked, but better to flee and live, than die a pointless death attempting a futile struggle.

If not… Well he'd continue his life in Southshore.

Quiet, safe, and anonymous.

"Hatchet" eventually reached his home, still whistling that cheerful tune.

It was a decently sized building, that doubled as both a home, and a gun smithy, where he made, modified and repaired guns.

It was a relatively profitable market, and he'd pretty much cornered it here in Southshore. Humans just did not have the mind or skills to fix their flintlocks.

As he closed the door behind him and locked it, he was about to head to his bathing tub, to take a nice bath to clean off in, something slammed into him.

A particularly large, strong foot came out of the shadows, and kicked him straight into the wall.

He cried out in pain, but that was short lived.

As he tried to get back up, a hand closed around his face, and muffled his mouth.

A grayish, green hand.

Oh light… Oh storming light…

The orc, with no particular difficulty, lifted his severely bruised body up with one hand, the other still firmly clamped over his mouth, silencing any sound other than the frantic breaths from his nose.

"You're Hatchet right? The owner of this… fine establishment?"

Three things immediately struck him.

The first was that the voice was female.

The third was that it spoke in a perfect human accent, not a trace of foreign accent.

And the third was that it was an old, OLD voice. It was a real grandma voice, a voice of an old woman stitching together clothes for her grandkids.

It was a sharp contrast with the power he felt in that monstrous grip.

He nodded, way too scared out of his mind to do anything else.

Idiot. He should have left the moment the orcs were getting uppity, while he had the chance. Now he was going to die here. This crazy old orc woman was about to kill him.

"All Right then…"

The grip around the back of his shirt tightened.

"Here is the deal Hatchet… I have some… Information I need from you. Information about your trade. So you have two options here… The first… Is that I bind you, you don't struggle, and you tell me what I want to know."

He felt the breath of his ear as the woman leaned in.

"You do that… And I'm gonna leave you gagged by the entrance, and I'll unlock the door when I leave. On the morrow, one of your clients is gonna come here, and find you gagged and bound, and help you out of your predicament. You'll live, and you and I will never see each other again… That's option one..."

One of her sharp, long nails dug into his cheek, drawing blood

"The other option… Is that I break your neck. Now… Do you want option one?"

He nodded.

"Good..."

"So, this is the new standard then?"

"Hatchet" had assumed that the crazy old orc woman would ask him about guns. About how you made them, how to use them, how to mass produce them for war.

Instead, the only thing she wanted to know was information about ammunition.

"Sharp bullets? Um… Yes? I mean, it's WAY more effective than round ammo."

"Who cares about the shape? It's the mechanism of the bullet that matters here."

The old woman, far less spindly than even a human woman in her absolute prime, fingered one of said bullets as she let it dance between her fingers.

She was tall, about 2 meters or so by "Hatchet's" estimation, with a completely white mane, one broken fang, and a face filled with wrinkles.

Just looking at her, it was extremely obvious she was a rouge, though he could have figured that out by how she managed to sneak into this city undetected.

She wore a full set of leather dyed a black that had just a hint of blue in it, and in her belt, she had both a hollister for a gun, and a particularly large knife, big enough that he'd had to use both hands to wield it.

"This mechanism… Once the back of the bullet is hit, its mechanism does pretty much everything itself. It's quite a step up from simple round pieces of lead."

"You're… Thinking of early guns and bullets right? Where you had to pour gunpowder down the barrel, then shove the bullet down after it?"

"Yes. Most human forces used that kind during the wars."

He snorted.

"Light, those humans… That's decades out of date by now. I can't believe they still used that stuff."

"Tell me… Do goblins use these kinds of bullets? Can they make them?"

"Goblins? Um...Yes? Why wouldn't they be?"

The old woman smiled. A real grin, full of sharp pointy teeth.

"Good… That's all I really needed to know…"

"Really? So…. We're done then?"

The yellow eyes looked down on him, where he was bound to his chair.

"No. But that was the BIG question… But I still have more. Tell me… Even with the… Limitations of your guns…"

She waved dismissively over at the wall, where his finest weapons just hung there, just a few meters away from where he was bound.

They might as well have been a mile away for all the good they did him.

"Why have they not become the only real weapons of note? A soldier with a gun should always beat one with a sword should he not?"

He squirmed uncomfortably in his bondage.

"Well… Yeah, if they're both unarmored, sure… thing that's exactly what would happen… But a bullet, even one with an edge, isn't gonna bite through a well made breastplate… At least if it's made of the good stuff…"

"Which is…?"

"Oh… Um there's the three big higher metals… there's Mithril, Truesilver and Thorium… And those are the "common", higher metals. There's also the mythical stuff. Like Adamantine."

The old woman pondered on that.

"I see… I'll keep that in mind."

The orc glanced over at his forge.

"Alright. I have one, final question then."

She turned back and looked him straight in the eyes, yellow against blue.

"What are the population numbers of each of the kingdoms of the alliance?"

"Hatchet" suddenly felt his mouth run dry.

"Oh, um… Well I haven't been keeping up to date about censuses and…"

"You know, I might be inclined to believe that… If I hadn't rummaged through your papers while you were out whoring. You've kept up quite well with news and tidings around Azeroth and Lordaeron. Ridiculously so. I would prefer to just go through the papers for the answers myself… But I don't have that kind of time."

"Well… You see..."

The orc nonchalantly pulled out her gun, and the cold metal of a flintlock steel barrel dug into his forehead.

He soiled himself.

"Azeroth has about 1 300 000! Ironforge has 700 000 souls! Gnomeregan…" He hesitated for just a moment… "It has 600 000! Stromgarde has 800 000 and Lordaeron has 3 000 000!"

He was practically out of breath when he was done, so fast had he talked.

The orc lowered, then reholstered her gun.

"And Gilneas and Quel'Thalas don't do censuses. I know. Well, that was everything I needed to know."

She nodded to herself.

"Also… You gnomes only have 600 000 people?" She shook her head.

"Man, you're in for a bad time."

He… He did not like neither the implications of that, nor the way she said it.

"And now…" She grabbed a piece of cloth from a table. "I'm going to borrow your forge for a bit."

"What? You said you'd leave after I'd told you what you wanted to know!"

"I said nothing of the sort. I said I would leave you so you would be freed on the morrow. And I will keep that promise. But first… I'm going to make something before I leave."

She gagged him, then carried him, and the chair over in a side room.

"It's why I chose this place. It has all I need… And an industrious gunsmith, known for continuing his work into the night."

As she began shutting the door, She grinned down at him one last time.

"I'm going to make history tonight little gnome… And the world will shake as the Horde begins to run."

Then, the click of a closing door, and darkness.

The orc kept her word.

She left him alive, and to be easily found the next day by one of his clients.

The first thing he did was go and clean himself, and find a new set of pants.

The second thing was to go to the mayor's house and get it declared that he was selling absolutely everything he owned for cheap, cheap prices.

Once that was settled, he took all the coin he'd made on the sale, and then began his teleport to Moonbrook.

He had no intention of still being here when the Horde "Began to Run". He'd find his peace on the other side of the world, in the most peaceful province of the most peaceful kingdom there was.

I

Fremde made her escape from Southshore easy enough, despite the heavy weight she carried. The city's defenders were not particularly good at their job, as she'd proven when she made her way inside the city without detection. All the competent people were up north dealing with the new outbreak of scourge.

It was the classic gambit. Do you spread yourself thin defending the whole nation, or do you focus your might on one specific enemy at a time, essentially sacrificing the other part for the good of the whole?

As it happened, this was the smart choice. The scourge was a much, much bigger threat, and the new Horde was gonna leave without doing any particular real damage.

At least not to its infrastructure. Lordaeron's fleet though… That was a different story.

Not that this decision would help Lordaeron in the long run. Not as long as Arthas was there.

She'd considered maybe trying to assassinate him before his fall… But she had decided against it.

She had no bloody clue where he was, it would be a suicide mission if she did go after him, and if she did not act now, she would miss her chance to get in good with the leadership of the Horde before it went from Lordaeron.

And it was absolutely vital that she did so. If this horde was going to do better, it needed someone there to show thrall how you actually planned the building of a nation, as opposed to just winging it.

Now all she had to do was find the Warchief. Which should not be too hard. Hillsbrad was swarming with smaller bands of Orcs. An entire people on the march, all ready and waiting on the word from their overlord that it was time to reunite into one, massive group once more.

When she found one of them, they would help her find the Warchief.

Especially when they learned of the game changer she brought with them.

In her belt, she carried two things. Two crude, but perfectly functional first attempts at creating a weapon that would change the nature of the Horde's war machine.

Revolvers. A gun with 6 shots.

Alongside those two weapons, on her back she carried a sack of every single bullet she was able to carry with her.

It was a heavy burden, one her old body groaned at, but it was fully necessary.

With the power of the humble revolver at their back, the Horde's conquest of Kalimdor would change from a slow, steady push, to a Tidal wave that would crush anything that stood in their path.

Quillboars, centaurs, harpies and the giant insects would stand no chance.

None at all.

It would of course in the long run, be replaced by the real firepower that the Goblins would bring to the table, as they really began to buildings weapons of death, but in the short term, it would help her people rise to become the dominant power of Kalimdor, much much quicker than they had in the original timeline.

She was rather grateful for the Goblins and the Gnomes innovations.

This would never have been possible without them. She certainly would not have been able to create these kinds of more modern bullets.

The two smaller races had created this kind of sophisticated bullets to make reloading faster, and fix all the issues that came with musket loading.

And by doing so, they had skipped a lot of steps that the guns of earth had gone through. Like rifling. Or a gun that could shoot more than one bullet before being reloaded.

Simple, easy things that she knew how to add to what already existed, as proven by the revolver at her sides.

She was no genius, no great mind that could conjure up fantastical devices. But there were things she did know. Basic, reliable gunmaking was the most obvious, but she also had a few other things up her sleeve.

A map of Kalimdor for one(Created by herself) which she would pull out when being told where their ruler wanted to go. Heck she even had a plausible backstory for it planned, that she got it from the one Tauren who lived in these lands, which would check out later down the line when the existence of the tauren "Proved" her story of ox men real.

She also knew enough about Kalimdor to know that the land just needed a bit of terraforming to turn it into a fertile and productive region. She doubted she would get to use her knowledge of how to raise and reclaim lands from the seas(this world was not exactly brimming with shallow coasts) dutch style, but as the Cataclysm proved, there were plenty of ways of terraforming this continent in other ways.

And speaking of the coming cataclysm… There was another advantage she had.

Knowledge.

Knowledge about how certain events would go, and how she could influence those from behind the scenes.

Like making sure that the two warmongers that were Varian Wrynn and Garrosh Hellscream both died a painful, premature death by way of a bullet in the dark before they managed to take and retake their respective thrones.

Wrynn would find himself a slave at a certain point beneath a certain Shaman by the name of Reghar Earthfury. At that time, provided she was in the city, and had any degree of power, it would be easy to make sure that he never left Orgrimmar alive, and no one would know who the hell he was.

He would die alone, forgotten, and his counterpart in Stormwind would be a coward and weak ruler, never to be a real threat against the Horde.

And Garrosh? The man would be a complete and total wreck of a man by the time he met the new Horde. Provided she could meet him during that time before Thrall managed to bring him out of his clinical depression, all it would take was a knife in the dark… And Orc Hitler would trouble no one, and burn no cities.

There were other moments as well, other people she would have to try and remove. Quietly if possible.

Of course, all of that was predicated on the idea that she would be able to impress Thrall enough to get a position in his government to build a powerbase from.

She could never become a real leader, able to change the world directly by her own will and decrees.

She was an old woman, with no allies and friends, who's only real claim was having been one of Orgrim Doomhammer's spies from the second war. No one would care what she had to say based on that.

If she wanted to change the world, she would need to do so through others. And the only way forward to do so was to impress Thrall, son of Durotan.

She did not know what sort of higher power had put her here after she died, in the body of this old woman, a nameless nobody in a video game universe, but she would not balk at her lot.

This was a much more exciting afterlife than the nonexistence she had always thought awaited her after death.

She did not know how long she had in this world of warcraft, but she would relish her time here.