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5/16 night
Talaada woke again, so that she could go to the great green dragon and awaken it momentarily. She always seemed to rest just a bit easier after she was given the insignia. Talaada didn’t know this poor beast’s story, but Prophet Bismark had said she was corrupted by dark magic and needed help. Talaada did all she could to provide her comfort in these brief flashes of lucidity.
“Don’t worry. We are healing you. It’s going to be ok.”
It was only a minute, but she sensed that it meant a lot to the dragon. Talaada was on her way back to bed when the raid started. It was a confused and brutal attack, with almost fifty lost ones swarming in with cudgels. Leading them was Noboru, her own uncle, crying out accusations that they had been replaced by demons and dragons. It hurt to have to attack her uncle, but Talaada couldn’t allow him to harm her people freely.
She grabbed one of her hunting spears and lunged for one of the attackers. As a dragon, she was stronger, faster, and had better night vision than she ever had before. More than half of the Brotherhood had become dragons, and even those who hadn’t were at their absolute physical and mental peak. If they hadn’t been empowered so, it’s likely that most of her companions would have died. If she hadn’t learned how to heal, just today, at least one more draenei would be dead.
Talaada tried to keep as many people alive as she could, channeling the light of love to heal. She was joined by a priestess who had only yesterday successfully completed the second initiation and regained the power to channel the light as she took on the body of a dragon. Together, they were able to stabilize the majority of the combatants on both sides, and everyone within the retinue.
Talaada sent the corpses along to Abby; she didn’t have anything against necromancy. She had no experience with it other than Abby, and Abby was a friend and companion to Erich. Therefore, it could not possibly be an inherently evil form of magic. The rest were tied to posts, or placed in the Inventory. She would need to ask Erich what to do next to help these poor lost creatures. All 22 of them.
5/17 morning
When I woke up in the morning and drank my green mud, I checked over my body and found that my knees and left elbow were fully functional. The prickling sensation was down to my calves and approaching my wrists. I think, with something to stabilize my feet, I might be able to walk with assistance. I sent Dena to go to the clothes closet and get me all the boots she could find, thankful that everyone back in Stormwind expected her to be away for a few more months; it made things very easy for me to keep her around.
While I waited for her to bring me some fancy footwear, I checked my necklace. Today was a moderately big day for captures; Nozara, Varian, Prudence, Imriss, Nadira, and Kam Deepfury would all be in the retinue by the end of the day. Checking in with them would probably eat up some time, as would going to the palace for dragonspawn, and maybe swinging by the ogres too. Just to finish up dominating them.
I considered who to give my next minor mission to. Auffrey and Prudence didn’t have much to do except pass out a necklace, which I sent to them as the thought occurred to me, but Dremuus was planning on doing a mission in Dun Morough anyway. No need to waste it. That meant Tony, Doris, or Tessa. Of those three, only Doris was simultaneously cooling her heels and in close proximity to a time sensitive target. I selected Feralas and requested a new minor mission.
Petty but important
Steal Hahrana Ironhide’s entire store of silk thread.
Reward: instant capture of Hahrana Ironhide
Nice! I have a master rogue in the area, and the mission I’m issued is to steal something? Something relatively mundane, no less. It’s probably not under particularly heavy guard.
Hahrana is a Tauren, a cow person, so I had little to no interest in her aesthetically, but Tauren were huge, slightly bigger and stronger than ogres by the lore, and much smarter. Hell, if I remember correctly in the RTS the average Tauren warrior was actually stronger than an ogre lord. No clue if that holds up, probably not, but I’m at least curious about the possibilities. I gave Doris her marching orders, triggering a shift to Amelie until she finished, and let her go to town.
Dena came back to my room with a pair of embossed leather boots and a very skeptical expression. They were definitely too small for me, probably because they were one of the simpler sets of shoes Vanessa has worn in official artwork, but when I took them from her they started to grow.
They seemed to reshape themselves to fit my thick legs until they fit perfectly, and I tightened them around my damaged feet, immobilizing them a bit. I stood up, using the bed and then Dena for support. I definitely wasn’t steady, and it hurt like hell if I put my weight fully on the feet, but I could get around. Better than going to meet the leader of the Argent Dawn as a black dragon carried by a satyr, that’s for sure.
I moved around slowly, supporting myself with the stone wall and Dena, and summoned on my vestments, which I cleaned with the light. I fortified my body, which helped me stand a bit, but I definitely didn’t want to be walking around more than necessary. I sat down at the table and went into my inventory to pick out something for breakfast. That stopped me short. The whole inventory was packed to the gills with broken draenei. Almost a dozen of the bastards.
“Talaada. What the hell happened?”
“Oh, Prophet Bismark, you’re awake! It was just awful. Those who are still Lost somehow convinced themselves that we were all being controlled and brainwashed by some nefarious force, so they attacked us in the middle of the night.”
I took a moment to process that. “Yep. That’s definitely a warped perspective of the situation. Probably the fel corruption. So you took prisoners? How many of them did you capture?”
“Twenty two.”
How the fuck am I going to process twenty two prisoners? It usually takes me weeks to capture ten. I’ve got too many necks and not enough necklaces. “I only have 14 in the inventory; where are the rest?”
“We tied up who we could. What do we do with them?”
“Don’t worry. I’ll figure something out.” I turned off the channel. Sighed. “Onyxia. Vanessa. I need somewhere to keep more than 20 prisoners until we can capture them.”
Vanessa sheepishly admitted that she didn’t have any space for more no questions asked prisoners. The deal with Ursula hasn’t progressed much at all yet.
Onyxia sounded like she was just waking up as she responded, “Use my lair. It won’t be comfortable for mortals, but it’s well guarded. I assume you want them kept alive?”
“Definitely.” This is a later Erich problem. Preferably an Erich that can walk. Onyxia was currently in her lair, so I transferred them to her location and told Talaada to do the same. Hopefully they aren’t harmed by extreme heat. The more sociopathic part of myself kinda wanted to know if heat stroke would make them more vulnerable to possession, though. They also would make for excellent target dummies for Soothe. That would have to wait until after lunch though. I wanted both ghosts if I was going to do that.
First, I had Quel’Lithien Lodge to get to.
••••••••••
*Finally!* Lividia thought as she sighted her prey, a purple murloc with milky white eyes. “Start sending them!” She cried, diving for him. It was a perfect dive, flawlessly executed. She severed the spine, killing him instantly. She smugly spun in the air to look down at her handiwork, even as the demons sent to escort her began to fall from the sky. They would serve no purpose but to witness her victory.
She checked her amulet as the demons started fighting, enjoying the view. To her indignation, the regional mission was still marked as uncompleted. She had killed him! He had the exact look! The dive had been perfect!
Beneath her, the demons were fighting against a swarm of murlocs, surrounded on all sides. The imps mostly served to screen Pryzhum’s flanks. “They got Slark! Kill em!” Was shouted by another purple murloc in Nerglish, a wail of despair at the random attack straight from the sky.
*Ah,* thought Lividia. *So that wasn’t Murk-eye. Damnit.* She didn’t really care to understand the Nerglish, but she supposed that the amulet granted her the ability for free and at least this time it had proven useful. She winced as she heard another cry, laced with anguish. Horribly loud, and in that gutteral fish language.
“My boy! They killed my boy!” It was a substantially larger murloc than the one she had already killed, and one who was barreling at the Satyr. Pryzhum glanced over and saw the angry father barreling towards her. In her surprise, she instinctively reached for magic and found it.
Pryzhum’s figure flickered, and there were suddenly three of the satyr girl instead of one. The one that took the murloc’s charge shimmered and vanished, while the other two stared at each other, then both lunged for the murloc together. Lividia couldn’t have that. There was a chance the satyr would win, and if that happened then Lividia wouldn’t get her well deserved empowerment.
Before the murloc and satyr clashed again, Lividia dropped onto his head and started tearing. The circle of imps was rapidly collapsing, so she couldn’t afford to dive the right way. Instead, she dug a furrow into his head and breathed hot magma into the crack while the demons kept the majority of the tribe occupied. After that she disengaged, leaving Pryzhum and the imps to all die their temporary deaths. This time, she had in fact killed Old Murk Eye. Hah. Erich will be pleased, and soon she’d get to reap the rewards.
••••••••••
Rewards:
Relationship Shift
Shift the nature of a relationship between two people by pointing this rod at someone and willing it. This will not change whether it is a positive or negative relationship or its intensity, but you may choose whether it is affected in one or both directions. For example, you could turn lovers into best friends or vice versa, or could convince one member of a couple that they were only ever friends. This would likely sour the relationship, as only one person will remember their original relationship. Similarly, a murderer and the lover of one of their victims who had sworn vengeance could have their relationship reframed into a bitter rivalry, the aftermath of a particularly nasty breakup, or even a particularly abusive marriage. Memories of everyone aware of the relationship will change to fit the narrative.
Disguise Ettiquette
Grants all retinue members using their amulet to make a disguise a limited variant of communication talent, limited to informing them about general etiquette and social customs that their false identity would be aware of, and warning them when they might be in breach. It does not extend to particular interactions within smaller social groups of less than 10 people.