《Grand Arcanist: A Warcraft(Fan)Fiction》 Chapter 1: New Life! Part 1 Xiao Yu opened his eyes, what greeted him was an unfamiliar ceiling before his eyes. ¡°Where am I?¡± Xiao Yu mutter weakly, the feeling of fatigue lingered within him while his state of mind were at best, hazy as the only thing he remembers was an incoming train rushing toward his direction. That¡¯s right! It was a train, Xiao Yu finally remembered, he remembers saving a little boy who accidentally fell onto the train tract as the training was coming into the station. None of the adults were brave enough to risk themselves, thus Xiao Yu steeled his resolve and try his best to save the kid, he succeeded, but at the cost of his life in the end. Xiao Yu did not regret saving that kid in exchange for his life, if he had to choose again, he would still choose to save him, at least the kid has a bright future ahead of him, unlike Xiao Yu who has nothing but to live day in and day out, with no family or relatives and no one to love. ¡°Aren¡¯t I supposed to be dead?¡± Xiao Yu became confused as he looked around at his surroundings, a marble white room decorated in red and gold with a window showing a beautiful golden sun and it light bathed the world in a tint of that gold. Before a mirror in the room caught his eyes, a floating mirror reflecting the appearance of a slender beautiful boy with peachy skin, glowing green eyes, pointy long ears and long silky golden hair slightly flowing with the warm breeze from outside. ¡°What kind of sick joke is this?¡± Xiao Yu was utterly speechless at the sight before his eyes, in the mirror was himself, from a twenty years something young man, to a Blood Elf child in luxurious red and gold clothing. It wasn¡¯t long before memories that were not his own began to surface, apparently this Blood Elf child was named Aethas, ten years old and of course without a surname- not to confuse him with the famous Aethas Sunreaver, his parents named him so he could use the elf as a role-model and possibly used that bit of motivation to ascent his family into a different social class. In a sense his family wasn¡¯t rich but they¡¯re not poor either, their income was enough to send little Aethas to school and learned about the world and not remain ignorant for all his long life, when you have a dad working as one of the Farstrider killing undead in the Dead Scar like a champion and a mother who owned a trade goods shop, your life is bound to cut above the common folks. To summarize Xiao Yu situation up, he seen to have encountered that fable ¡°I¡¯ve reincarnated into another world¡± type of thing from all those novels he loved so much, even without a broken cheat like a system, Xiao Yu was glad that he got a second chance of life with a loving family, albeit it¡¯s a bit abnormal to be an elf in a fantasy world where War is an everyday occurance, at least he wasn¡¯t reincarnated as a gnome. ¡°From this day onward¡­ I am, Aethas, I will take charge of my destiny!¡± Xiao Yu, now known as Aethas declared proudly in front of the golden sun. ¡°What are you yelling about, Aethas?¡± from behind the door, his mother word sounded which quickly brought him back from his chunni daydream to reality. ¡°Nothing mother! I was only practicing my spells!¡± Aethas responded, only to hear his mother gasping on the other side of the door in sheer terror.Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon. ¡°Aethas! How many times have I told you not to practice magic in your room! Do it outside- before that! Come down and get ready for supper!¡± his mother reprimanded him. The truth was, Aethas does not know any magic- less for the basic from the memories of the old Aethas before his soul took over this body. ¡°Welcome to Azeroth, home sweet home for who knows how long it¡¯s going to be.¡± Aethas sighed before heading out of his room to the kitchen below where his mother is waiting for him, along with the wondrous food this world, Azeroth has to offer. Once again, Aethas (Xiao Yu) was glad that he wasn¡¯t born as a Gnome, what fate worse than becoming spare ammunition for the Alliance siege engine? Part 2 When Aethas arrived down from the spire, he could see his mother was waiting for him in front of the dinner table, the sight of her was breathtaking to say the least, a beautiful creature that could not and will never be appear on Earth, his old world- in all fantasy fiction he had read, one thing always ringed true- all Elves are beautiful in their own right. Aethas had guess this is where his beauty had come from- instead of the man who sat at one end of the table drinking wine straight from the bottle, which was his father whom had a figure of a bear, all muscles and scarred, the true definition of a warrior, if Aethas( Xiao Yu) didn¡¯t know his situation beforehand and come without the imprinted memories, he would have thought that his dad was an orc with peachy skin and golden blond hair. Secretly, Aethas is glad that he did not inherit that ¡°ogre¡± or ¡°orc¡±-like gene from his dad''s side of the family, it wasn¡¯t a harmful thing if Aethas were to choose the profession of a paladin or a warrior- but the trade-off is just too much for him to handle. ¡°Aethas, my son! Come join your father for a drink!¡± his father beckoned him over to the dinner table as he uncorked another bottle of wine and poured Aethas a glass- but before he could handed the kid the glass filled with fine alcohol, a silver tray came crashing onto his head, creating a deep dent. ¡°What in the name of the holy are you intended on doing?! You are not suppose to give children alcohol! Did all these time spending in the Dead Scar rotted your brain you fool!¡± Mama Aethas reprimanded him. ¡°I¡¯m sorry honey, I was only joking! I¡¯m sure my little boy know better than to accept alcohol at his age! Did you forget that he inherit beauty from you while the good judgement comes from me?¡± his dad mutter weakly in front of a ferocious woman he calls his wife. Aethas only raised an eyebrow before finding a chair and sat down. ¡°Aethas, are you feeling any better now? You¡¯ve been sleeping all day today, if you didn¡¯t wake up for supper, your mother would have called for an alchemist to have a look at you, did you catch a cold?¡± his father asked while sliced off a chicken leg and passed it over to little Aethas. ¡°No father, I was just feeling tired and wished to take a good rest.¡± Aethas replied while taking small bites from the food on his plate, secretly complimenting the unique flavor it has to offer, food in a medieval fantasy world with sword and magic does taste different. His father just nodded ¡°take good care of your health, I don¡¯t know what magic school is like since I¡¯ve never taken one before, but I heard it sound very stressful from my colleague, just don¡¯t overdo it¡± he paused for a moment ¡° we Sin¡¯Dorei have all the time in the world to master our art and magic is our birthright gift, you will get the hang of it eventually.¡± his father advised him. Deep inside, Aethas has no clue of what the hell is going on, most of his memories from the previous life and this body has completely merged without much of a problem- however some were fragmented and disappeared into the void, leaving blank areas within his sea of conscious, it might not posed much problem in the long run, however for now it might be a problem as most of these memories involved the usage of magic. ¡°Yes father, I understand.¡± that was all Aethas could say, hoping for the best- what worried him now was the magic school that his parents had been talking about. ¡°Eat up, you need to go back to rest, less you want to not have any energy for classes the next morning.¡± his father told him as he passed over more vegetables while leaving all the meat for himself. ¡°...thank you, father.¡± Aethas stealthily sweeped the green to the side and went back to the meat dishes. His mother could only let out a long sigh. ¡°Like father like son.¡± she rubbed her eyebrows looking at the two of them, but couldn¡¯t help to let out a small laugh. Later that night when both of his parents had retired to their bed, Aethas was in his room on top of the spire, looking outside the window, staring at the bright moon overhead. Thinking of how his wished before death has been granted, receiving a warm, loving family in his next life- albeit into a very fuck up world that wanted you dead on every turn if you¡¯re a weakling, but nonetheless, he was happy for now, might as well live it to the fullest and not wasted it like his past life. Behind Aethas, there was an illusion of his past life Xiao Yu, standing watched over him with a kind smile, Aethas noticed this and responded back with a smile of his own, showing that he had long accepted this new life, the illusion soon faded away. ¡°Goodbye Xiao Yu, thank you for a good life.¡± Chapter 2: The School of Magic Part 1 ¡°Good morning children!¡± greeted the magic instructor to a group of young, beautiful children before his eyes. ¡°I am known as- hold on a moment, that might not really be necessary, from now on, you all can addressed me as Professor Sunreach.¡± Professor Sunreach began to introduced himself to the children- which in this case included Aethas who sat on a corner watching intensively. If there is one thing that¡¯s true to the appearance of all Blood Elves, but never stated in the known lore that Aethas has once read through on the internet, they are all narcissists, especially the male one, Aethas doesn¡¯t blame them since beauty is indeed a blessing and a curse at the same time, he too couldn¡¯t help but admire himself once or twice in the mirror since the day he reincarnated over. As one might have already guessed, today Aethas started his first day of school! Isn¡¯t that exciting, no matter where you¡¯ve been, past or present life. The first day of school is always exciting especially when your class is a magical one. As long as Professor Sunreach can conclude his little introduction that has gone on for far too long. ¡°That concluded my introduction for now, as you might have already known this, you children are too young to understand even the basic concept of the Arcane Art itself.¡± Professor Sunreach snapped a finger and a scroll instantly appeared in his hand. ¡°Thus, I shall teach you the basics of Enchanting and Disenchanting, since there should be plenty of resources for you children to practice with after class.¡± Professor Sunreach open up the scroll and looked around his small classroom and finally pointed at Aethas, who was sitting quietly in a corner. ¡°You there, student, would you kindly come up to the stage and be my assistant for this demonstration? Also, bring along your amulet.¡± Professor Sunreach told him. ¡°Alright students, I will now demonstrate to you the most basic method of casting and imbuing an enchantment onto an object of your desire.¡± Professor Sunreach then tore the scroll in half, the moment the scroll was shredded it quickly burst into flame and magical energy began to wrap around his finger, Professor Sunreach then quickly redirect that energy into the amulet in Aethas hand. ¡°That students, is the most basic method of using an enchantment scroll to enchant an object, there is no complication or what-so-ever, just tore up the scroll, redirect that power into the object of which you wished to enchant.¡± Professor Sunreach grab the amulet from Aethas hand and showed to the class, the former silver amulet now shimmering with a blue light under the sunlight. After showing the student his handy work, Professor Sunreach gave back the amulet to Aethas and sent him back to the mass of student down below to return to his seat. ¡°Does you children has any question regarding to enchanting?¡± he asked. Immediately Aethas raised his hand, attracting the attention of Professor Sunreach, along with all the other students in his class. ¡°Yes child, what is your question?¡± ¡°Professor Sunreach, can you tell me more about the enchantment you placed onto this amulet?¡± Aethas asked with curiosity, Aethas didn¡¯t bother asking about what enchantment or disenchantment is because most people probably have a good idea of what they are, so there¡¯s no point in rebriefing it again, what he is curious about was, what kind of enchantment did the professor placed on his birthday amulet his father had given him.Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road. ¡°It just a mana gathering enchantment from one of my old research, nothing too major.¡± the professor played it off like it was nothing, but it surprised Aethas, a mana gathering- or based on the name alone, a mana regeneration perk enchantment is hard to come by in the game and it is a mid level enchantment design for bracer, instead of jewelries. Classes gone by without much of a hitch afterward, Professor Sunreach taught them many things about the basic of magic, more on the side of enchantment, disenchantment and how to create minor ward that could block a hit or two from a kid, these may be irrelevant when Aethas thought of how he could fight deadly bosses, but it serves as a foundation of knowledge for powerful spells in the future, for now Aethas just soak in as much knowledge as possible, they might come in handy in the near future. Part 2 Later that day, after classes were over and Aethas returned to his home somewhere in Eversong Forest, there he quickly went into his room and began laying out trinkets and shiny bauble, smooth stones and such on the beautiful red carpet. ¡°Time for practical usage and application of knowledge.¡± these are the materials he prepared himself on his way back from school, he purchased these goods from a local store near his school for a few copper, which was dirt cheap in his opinion as Aethas basic allowance were roughly five silver weekly, and there¡¯s also his saving as well, which added up to around one hundred and twenty silver coins, as for why those hundred silver coins didn¡¯t ¡°magically¡± converted into gold coin like it was in the game, well folks, this is reality- not game defying logic. These amounts are by no means small, an average commoner family could live off of these amount for roughly a month, as for why any parents would be crazy enough to entrust such an amount to barely old enough to be a teenager, that is because this can be considered a pocket change to their paycheck, his mother ran a business that regularly traded in gold coins while his bear-like father''s job as a Farstrider captain who fight the undead in the Dead Scar, he¡¯s bound to strike off a decent amount just from picking up the loot from the dead, combine that with the pay of a small time officer in the armed services. Aethas used the tool from his backpack, mainly just a quill and a bottle of ink, because that¡¯s the only thing that available for him at this moment. There are a few runestone Aethas wished to create today, the first one is the common ward rune, next is the more useful one, a rune imbue with a bit of healing power, and finally a rune stone for a minor firespell- not to confuse with the mage fireball spell which were designed to kill, the most this rune going to make is a tiny spark, big enough to start a kitchen fire. ¡°It''s hard to believe they taught these to kids in school, if anyone had a brain they could turn these into a possibly dangerous weapon of mass destruction.¡± Aethas idea for enchanting a small rock with a firespell is, he wants to see if he could turn a common rock into a grenade. The things that goes in Aethas little would baffle any old sages or mages if they could take a peek at it from time to time, combining modern knowledge and concept in a world of magic where wars are constantly waged across the land, a true recipe for disaster. It took a few hours following all the instruction that was written on the scroll for Aethas to complete a bag full of useful ¡°rock¡± and other trinkets for future usages, a ward rune is useful in a case when the user was being assaulted, one is enough to last a couple of punches, as for healing rune, it¡¯s not as useful but it¡¯s still healing, enough to treat minor cuts and injuries that caused minor irritation to the user. ¡°But the most useful are these!¡± Aethas proudly held up a small shiny marble with a spark sealed within, the marble itself is warm to the touch- it was until Aethas randomly tossed the thing out the window without thinking. ¡°Oh crap! No watch out!¡± it finally hit him of the consequence of such an object could do to someone if it hit them right in the head from a roughly three stories building. Down below, father Aethas was just returning home from a long day of killing undead and was borderline dead tired, all he wished for now was some good food his wife had prepared for him and fine wine in the cellar. ¡°Oh crap! No watch out!¡± father Aethas could faintly hear the voice of his son. ¡°I must have missed the little rascal some much that I¡¯m starting to hear voices in my head-¡± before he could finish his thought, he saw a sparkling marble flying toward his way and out of instinct, the man pulled his sword and give it a swift slash, deflecting the marble away at a high speed toward a golden birch tree- *BANG! The moment the marble touched the bark of the tree, it exploded destroying the outer layer of the tree and charred a patch on it. Father Aethas turned toward his son, whom sticking his head out the window now sweating bullet as he looked at the bear-like figure down below. ¡°THAT¡¯S MY BOY! HAHAHA! SUCH A GENIUS!¡± father Aethas gave his beloved son a big thumb up for inventing a makeshift grenade. Chapter 3: Time fly by when youre having fun! Part 1 Later that night, when everyone were at the dinner table. ¡°Alright sonny, mind explaining what that was this afternoon- or just tell what this is.¡± his dad unwrapped a cloth containing fragments of his shiny marble grenade, or what was left of it anyway, after he dug it out of the tree. Aethas is currently sweating bullets as he looked at the fragments on the table, struggling to find his words on how to explain this mess. ¡°Erm¡­ it¡¯s just a little fun experiment, I just want to apply the knowledge professor Sunreach taught me at class today.¡± Aethas tried to show his cute and innocent side as he replied, the puppy eyes is also a bonus. Mother Aethas raised an eyebrow as she inspected little Aethas handywork. ¡°Professor Sunreach would taught these kind of offensive magic art at school? I didn¡¯t know that you can teach children anything other than the basic defensive art and basic understanding of the arcane art.¡± she pointed out- which was true, most children in Azeroth simply does not have the mana capacity to cast even the most basic spell. At most they will be learning the basic art of enchanting, disenchanting, wards and basic understanding and defense against magic theories, like what Aethas learning currently- all of these are a special case since he is of Elven descend, whom are widely known to be very talented in magic as it is their birthright, courtesy of his highborne ancestor. ¡°Tell me son, what else do you have hidden up in your room? You¡¯ve piqued my interest now.¡± inside father Aethas head, there was nothing but praised for his genius of a son, to create such magical items at a young age, one could imagine what kind of wonder he could create in the far distant future- plus, if he could ¡°borrow¡± some of these items, it would do wonders in his fight against the undead, one could load these explosive marble into a rifle and create a basic form of artillery- even though father Aethas dislike the gun technology, he admitted that they are very useful weapon. Weeks later, in the gloomy woods bordering the Ghostland. ¡°Take aim! And hold!¡± father Aethas is currently commanding the Farstrider valiantly on the frontline against the undead horde that shambling toward to invade and destroy what remaining of Eversong Forest, under the influence of the current Lich King Arthas- these monstrosities are relentless in their mission. ¡°Release the arrows!¡± he commanded, and upon so- a volley of arrows rained down upon the shambling undead horde consist of mostly of skeletals being, remnants of the first invasions, braves Kal¡¯Dorei who sacrificed themselves to hold off the Scourge. The moment the volley of arrows made contact with the undead Scourge they exploded, sending bone shards and bit of rotten flesh flying, seeing this many of the Farstrider were showing look of amazement. ¡°Captain! These arrowheads are amazing! Did you see how much damage they¡¯ve done to the vile Scourge?!¡± his second in command couldn¡¯t help but feel excited, at first he thought ¡®How could a toy of a child, who is barely 10, could contribute much to the effort of pushing back the undead and possibly cleansing Eversong Forest of Scourge presence?¡¯ You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author. ¡°With a bit of modification from our mages and craftsmen, these ¡°toys¡± can be very- heated in the hand of professional.¡± a Logistic specialist pointed out. ¡°The child who invented such a beautiful piece of art deserve much praised.¡± he added. Hearing such praised, father Aethas couldn¡¯t help but feel proud of his cute son, he had introduced his son little project to his unit 2 weeks prior, much to the dismay of their discontent toward their commanding officer eccentricity, however orders is order and thus, they leave it to the logistic specialist to incorporate the toys into their arsenal, when the first prototype came into light, which was an arrowhead completely made of a special alchemical glass, enchanted with a minor fireball spell, father Aethas immediately put them to the test and demonstrate the capability of the prototype on a captured undead. But after a few more improvements on the prototype, the result was satisfactory to say the least, if years of fighting the undead had taught them anything, brittle bones and large potential energy do not go together. ¡°I¡¯m sure when words get out to all the other units, and one that fought bravely in the Ghostland, they will do everything in their power to get a hold of a crate full of these little precious at any cost.¡± his second in command rubbed his hand greedily at the thought of selling these weapons of war. ¡°Leave that idea aside after we finish cleansing our lands of Scourge presence, other than that, when will the next batches of Reaver Flare be ready?¡± that was the name he had given to the arrowhead. ¡°Our Jewelscrafters and Enchanters are working overtime as we speak, sir- currently, we 20 quilvers, each containing a minimum of 15 arrows ready for service, unfortunately we are lacking trained professional for such task, the concepts are simple enough fortunately, all we need is manpower.¡± the Logistic specialist answered. Part 2 Our protagonist is oblivious to his father current ecstasy of course, as he is currently in a fantasy world of his own, busy counting gold coins from a small coffer his father traded him for the right to produce and incorporate his ¡°toy¡± and experiment into the military. Now Aethas has enough gold coins to fund all kinds of possible experiment in the near future and expenses for buying magical grimoire as well- these can be very expensive. ¡°Aethas! Your friends are waiting for you outside! Go out and play! Stop hiding in your rooms all the time! It¡¯s not healthy!¡± mother Aethas voice called out from the kitchen. ¡°Yes mother! I¡¯ll be down in just a moment!¡± it has been roughly a month or so since Aethas was reincarnated over, a lot had happened, such as making a lot of friends at class and creating a grand scheme to take over and rule the world and possibly the infinite Dark Beyond, screwing over the Burning Legions and such even before the ¡°Heroes¡± of Azeroth has the chance of doing so. ¡°Aethas!¡± by the time Aethas walked out of the house, his friends are all already assembled, waiting patiently for him as their leader, it was only right for them to do so due to the fact he has demonstrated his capability during classes which make him rank above many of them in terms of practical knowledge and theories. The group of kids include 4 boys and 2 girls, adding Aethas into the mix that would make a total of 7 children, their plan for the day was ¡°Let go to the Dead Scar!¡± exclaimed one of the boys with excitement! However all the other children quickly jump and cover the idiot mouth up, this was supposed to be a secret between them! If the adult were to know what these kids are up to, they would freak out beyond reasoning, who in their right mind would let children venture into an area infested with undead Scourge? Other than Aethas own parents? Although where they will venture is only the outskirts of the Dead Scar, which were only infested with a couple of brittle bones Scourge from time to time- but nevertheless, dangerous. However, of course Aethas being who he is, prepare for such a scenario of encountering the undead, he had made a backpack full of enchanted explosive marble for such occasion, if they encounter any Scourge along the way, they could yeet a couple of these babies through a sling shot- and there won¡¯t be a piece of the undead intact. Aethas goal for visiting the Dead Scar was to salvage any magical items if there¡¯s any left, courtesy of the fallen defenders and scourges during the first invasion- and possibly any knowledge on Necromancy, even though it¡¯s a forbidden art and a very dangerous one, if he were to be caught trying to learn such a taboo subject, his fate might be at the burning stake- however, that is only if he were to get caught. To him, there is no right or wrong in a school of magic, what determined what right or wrong is he himself! And as long as he didn¡¯t screw up, the path of great power is always there for him to walk, such is the fate of all ¡°Isekai persons¡±... well most. Chapter 4: Dead Scar? Part 1 It was around afternoon that Aethas and his group arrived at their destination, the children look excitedly at the wasteland before their eyes, filled to the brim with death and remains of Scourges and Heroes alike- well most of them anyways, the girls in the group only frowned at the sight of bones and long decomposed corpses that stuck out in the dirty black mud. ¡°You boys can go down and play in the mud, Valeera and I shall be the look out.¡± one of the girl declared and volunteer for the non-handin role of their little expedition after she carefully weighed the pros and cons of either, dig in the disgusting ground that is the Dead Scar to look for treasures, or just stand on the side line and be a look out, where it¡¯s safe and she will still get a share of the loot in the end. Of course, Aethas being the only adult in the group, technically since his soul was indeed, much older than these children, could understand why the girls would choose such task. ¡°Alright, just stay there and warn us if you see anything.¡± girls being girls, they tend to dislike doing the rewarding dirty work, Aethas doesn¡¯t have much complaining as either way, they¡¯re only children in the end. ¡°Alright bois, grab a shovel from your backpack and follow me.¡± Aethas came prepared, he previously asked his teacher, Professor Sunreach to see if there were any treasure hunting magical items for sale, and indeed being a magic researcher and a renowned mage that he was, Aethas managed to buy it off for a fair price of 10 gold coins. Well worth the investment for finding riches. The item was an enchanted compass, make a whole lot of sense in a way as the moment Aethas step into the black soil of the Dead Scar, the needle began to spinned in haywire before stopping and locking onto a certain direction. ¡°Look like the reading is that way! Follow me my minion! Treasure await for us!¡± Aethas excited ran toward the direction where the needle indicates the location of a magical reading, the rest of the boys followed Aethas excitedly, shovel in hand while the girls just followed along on the side-lane, not daring to set foot in the black soil filled with long withered away essence of undeath. It wasn¡¯t long before they arrived at their destination, which was a large fallen tree that has long wither and rotted away. ¡°It should be here, let start digging- of course being cautions about it, we don¡¯t know what in the light is under this log, it could be anything so just prepare.¡± Aethas pointed at the middle section of the rotting Golden Birch tree that was uprooted aged ago during the invasion of Quel¡¯Thalas by the fallen Prince, Arthas Menethil. The boys nodded and began to carefully dig around the area- it wasn¡¯t before long before one of the boy, his name was Faramis, his shovel managed to unearthed a skeletal hand buried under the log, covered in ragged clothes of course, doesn¡¯t seem to belong to any Elven style of craftsman, Aethas guess is that it must be from an undead Scourge. ¡°Look like we found a jackpot guys, the reading is strong for this one.¡± Aethas said excitedly, seeing the needle spinning non stop as he moved near the skeletal remains. After digging a bit more, the children managed to pull the entire remains of the undead Scourge up, it what look like to be a skeletal mage, covering in ragged robe, hand endorsed with rings and a book covered in chain stuck to it waist. It was the book that caught Aethas eyes, the book seemed to be made of a black leather material and an eerie facial feature of what look like the face of a humanoid creature was plastered on the front cover, bound by chains.This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there. ¡°What an evil looking book, just how I like it!¡± Aethas grinned as he grabbed the book from the dead Scourge mage and began dusting it a bit, Aethas carefully unwrapped the chain and read the content on the first page of the book, which was nicely enough to have a title. [Book of the Dead] with the author being Kel¡¯Thuzad, the infamous Lich Lord of Naxxramas, one that caused misery to the countless souls and formerly a powerful mage of the Kirin Tor whom studied the forbidden art of Necromancy. ¡°Oh, this is juicy.¡± Aethas couldn¡¯t help but exclaim, this is indeed a good finding- if anyone were to see such an object, their first thought would be burn it and spread it ashes in the Eastern Sea so no innocent could set eyes on it ever again, however Aethas was different, such priceless artifact shouldn¡¯t be destroyed, it should be study under strict supervision(himself), Aethas quickly closed the book and hid it in his backpack, much to the curiosity of the children as they were about to ask Aethas what that was. However before they could voice it out, the children facial feature immediately turned ghastly pale as they pointed behind Aethas back. ¡°Boss¡­ b-b-behind you!¡± Faramis yelped. Part 2 ¡°DIE!!! MORTAL!!!¡± the skeletal mage yelled in a ghastly voice as the creature began rising up, the chilling soulfire lit it eyes as the monstrosity of unliving set it gaze upon the group of innocent children, Aethas included as he held the sacred object belonging to the dead and dead only! ¡°What the hell?¡± Aethas jumped away from the creature as it began casting a frost spell, judging by the chilling aura emitted from it skeletal hands. ¡°Like hell I¡¯m going to let you take your sweet ass time casting a spell!¡± Aethas loaded an explosive marble onto his slingshot and launched the deadly projectile at the rotten head with a bang! Seeing their boss took the initiative attacking such a terrifying creature, the kids followed suit by launching explosive of their own. ¡°AHHH!!! NOO!!! STOP IT!!!¡± being a mage has it pros and cons, the pros being having the ability to throw out an insane amount of damage while the downside is being screw once being focused by attack on all sides. The skeletal mage wailed miserably as hail of explosive marble smashed against it body, chipping off bones and sending limbs flying, the killing shot was coming from Aethas, blowing up the skull with a marble right in the forehead. In the end, what remained was only pieces of jewelry and old rusted trinkets mixed in pile of broken bones, seeing this the children quickly went in and began looting the dead corpse, after that they quickly make a run for it and return back home, and divided the loot before the undead showed up, since they made quite a ruckus with raining down hell upon the poor skeletal mage, of course they took their chance digging up more stuff on the way back, by the time they reached home, it was already sunset. To sum up their entire trip today at the Dead Scar in a more efficient manner, they dig, they break, and loot, and dig some more, filling up their kids treasury that would shock any grown-up if they were discovered. [List of Items Obtained] 1 Enchanted Ring 1 Enchanted Necklace 2 Trinkets 11 Rusted Weapons A few copper coins. Added into group Treasury, signed by Aethas. Or so what Aethas filed in their account log, which was set up by himself in order to keep track of his future minions along with their spending and assets. Of course not being an idiot, he did not register the [Book of the Dead] which he discovered, and pocketed, perks of being the ¡°Guild Leader¡± he can get away with these kinds of stuff, corrupted- yes, he isn¡¯t denying it, but who cares? As long as he still feeding carrots to the minions and keeping them happy, none of this would matter anyway! What better way to take over the world? Other than to create an organization that solely loyal to him and would carry out his will without questioning? Progress is slow as they¡¯re still kids, but if he were to dedicate his time training them- sure? It will get there eventually. This thought somewhat terrified Aethas as he wasn¡¯t like this before his untimely reincarnation to this side of the Universe, but it doesn¡¯t matter now, maybe it¡¯s because he finally had a family and he wished to keep them safe at any cost. Anything that could possibly put them in harm ways must be eliminated or promptly, secured from happening, if it means taking over the world of Azeroth, then so be it. ¡°Putting modern knowledge and magical knowledge to good use is the first step- but for now, let''s find out what this precious has to offer.¡± Aethas smiled gleefully after locking the door and setting the [Book of the Dead] on the table and began to read it content, which bound to content a great deal of knowledge, seeing the author was an infamous Lich. *Omake Aethas reach out his hand and grabbed the old leather bound grimoire from the skeleton of the undead mage- the moment his hand touched the book. [A new hand touched the Grimoire!] a cold yet obnoxiously loud voice sounded in his head, first it confuse the living daylight out of him and secondly. ¡°What the fuck?! Wrong game!¡± Aethas cried out. Chapter 5: Book of the Dead and Continuation Part 1 Aethas heartbeat raced as he began reading the dreaded grimoire, written by a crazed mage who serve the dreaded Lich King. The first chapter of the [Book of the Dead] give details and a rundown of the forbidden dark arts of Necromancy, based on Kel''Thuzad point of view. For some reason, after reading the lengthy details of the first chapter alone, Arthas couldn''t help but feel that Kel''Thuzad might be a bit overly infatuated with his undead self for writing this chapter, it only mostly detailed his "great" and "supremely" practicality of being one of the undead. Chapter 1 of Volume 1, article 001 - The Soul of the Living and Dead basic instruction on Necromancy and path to Lichdom. As Aethas continued to read, he could somewhat hallucinate and picture Kel¡¯Thuzad speaking these words and written it down onto the codex of the unliving in his graspy cold voice. ¡°The soul of the living, it¡¯s a wonderful mystery of the world, how were they created and born? Does it come naturally? Why does it held so much, raw untapped power?-¡± Kel¡¯Thuzad commented. As the bullshit continued with Kel¡¯Thuzad own craze mindset putting into words, a few keys knowledge does revealed itself from time to time, for example- the instruction on how to harvest the lingering essence of death and convert it to mana to supply the user, the next part is how the user can weave those converted mana into disease and corruption spells, along with the basic creation of undead minions, Aethas doesn¡¯t want to touch that area yet as he feared he would lose control of the undead and caused trouble to himself. Based on the lore of the Warcraft Universe, all undead that hasn¡¯t been fully controlled by a powerful Necromancer tremendous will power or freed by the Banshee Queen, has a chance of being feral and heed to the call of the Lich King himself and bound to his will. Aethas doesn¡¯t want to mess with the Lich King just yet, he need a minimum amount of power to protect himself first- then he can fuck around with Arthas, or this case, Ner¡¯Zhul since he doesn¡¯t know which one is in control. Aethas stay up all night, carefully studying and taking down notes about the chapter, by morning, a large stack of parchment was sitting on his table, the candle was long burned out and leaving melted wax on the table where Aethas currently taking a rest from his all nighter. Outside of his window was a beautiful day awaited, the sun was shining brightly, giving off warm radiants in the land partially infested with undead, bird chirping and mana wyrm loitering around in the grass, suddenly a bird flew in from the window and landed near Aethas, chirping obnoxiously trying to annoy him, much to Aethas annoyance he just used a pillow and cover his entire head. A disturbing scene happened next, a black smoke radiating energy of death and decay circling around the boy, it doesn¡¯t seem to harm him, just loitering around Aethas- it suddenly shot toward the obnoxious bird and draining the life out of the critter, it only took a second before the previously lively bird lost it life and drop dead. When Aethas woke up, the first thing he saw was the corpse of the critter, laying there before his eyes, Aethas was shocked- ¡°what in the world just happened?¡± he was about to reach out and poke the dead critter, but he immediately pulled his hand back as he saw a bluish energy slowly rising from the dead bird floating toward and dancing around his hand.Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings. ¡°Oh this is¡­¡± Aethas couldn¡¯t believe his eyes, but the sensation is there. ¡°Fucking awesome!¡± finding such words coming out of a 10 years is wrong is so many different ways, but Aethas is the exception since he is a reincarnator from another world, the blueish power that currently dancing on Aethas palm, is none other than soul power, more specifically- the soul of the obnoxious little bird that annoyed him. This brought up a huge question though, how did this little critter- who were previously jumping up and down lively, suddenly ended up dead and it soul flew toward him? Something must have caused it to die! But what? Aethas carefully examine that corpse, looking for any possible cause of death. ¡°Nothing?¡± the only striking feature about this corpse was it eyes rolled to the back of it head and foam coming from it mouth, it looks as if the poor bird got squeeze the air out of it, poor bird, no matter if you¡¯re an obnoxious little piece of shit when you¡¯re alive, it¡¯s still a shame. Aethas threw the incident onto the back corner of his mind and stored the corpse in a small box and buried it outside in the yard and proceed to move on with life, moving on to the soul power that was in his hand, Aethas followed the note instruction and carefully convert the soul into raw power and absorb it into his body, upon doing so Aethas could feel that his mind is getting visibly clearer but not by much, if there¡¯s a comparison it¡¯s like getting a jolt from a cup of morning coffee, it only lasted for a few seconds though. ¡°Oh this is so corrupted, eating the soul of another living being.¡± Aethas chuckled, he could imagine the face of his parents if they knew what had just happened, evil as it might be- but the feeling of getting a power boost is quite addicting, more so than the so called mana addiction that the Sin¡¯Dorei is facing, this suddenly gave Aethas a great idea as he looks at the ¡°wanted¡± notice for cleaning up pest in the garden of the good citizen of Quel¡¯Thalas. Part 2 Near an Arcane sanctum in the Eversong Wood, a mana wyrmling is currently happily gorging itself on the mana generated by the structure that harvested raw mana from the leyline itself to support the nearby Blood Elves settlement. These majestic creatures were once helper of mages and sorcerer alike in Quel¡¯Thalas, kept as a pet for the rich and nobility- however alas, after the explosion of the Sunwell, these creatures broke loose from the Elves control and wrought havoc upon the citizens of the kingdom with their ability of eating precious mana- that¡¯s already became scared after the Sunwell destruction. From out of nowhere, a red marble came flying in and exploded the mana wyrmling, killing it instantly by blowing it head into pieces, the creature shrunk and reverted into a round orb and dropped on the ground. ¡°That¡¯s number 15, time to collect my reward.¡± Aethas walked over and quickly siphon any bit of mana that was left on the creature, along with pulling it soul onto his hand and convert it to his own power, after that he pocketed the mana Wyrm core. Since the day Aethas discover the ability of assimilation soul into power, he has been doing pest extermination ¡°daily¡± quest around villages for the people, gaining more and more power with each kill, the different might be small, but it does add up over time- it has been going on for 3 years already, to the point where he had built up a small reputation for himself among villages, his service was on the cheap side too. ¡°Valeera, mind take these back and cashed it out at the guild? I¡¯m going to make a few more trips before sundown today- don¡¯t forget to deposit 50% into our guild coffer, you can keep the rest for your use and make sure to register it into the log.¡± Aethas handed the beautiful Blood Elf girl companion the bag containing Mana Wyrm core before heading off. She was none other than Valeera, not to be confused with the famous assassin Valeera, she was one of Aethas original companions since they were still 10 in Professor Sunreach class, she had proved herself to be quite a capable minion during the years, thus Aethas decided to give her more responsibility in the guild, as ¡°His¡± Secretary of the Treasury. ¡°Wha-? *sigh nevermind, just make sure to be back on time, or else your mother will give our guild another visit again.¡±Valeera was flabbergasted by Aethas action, however she quickly swallowed her word and rubbed the area between her eyes, she had known Aethas long enough, it¡¯s part of the job description of being a Maid-secretary to the guild leader- however she still doesn¡¯t understand this boy eccentricity. She still don¡¯t remember why she choose to follow him around one day after class, might be because of his display of knowledge and understanding in the subject? Or perhaps it was just the fact that she found him to be cute from time to time. Valeera remember Aethas radiant smile when he helped her during study time. ¡°Ahh what the hell am I thinking!¡± she blushed and slapped her cheek before quickly headed back to the guild and quickly cashed out the payment. ¡°Oh! Aethas! Make sure to study for your graduation exam!!!¡± she quickly turned around to remind Aethas that there is going to be an exam that¡¯s coming up for Professor Sunreach class. ¡°Got it~!¡± was all that the wind managed to carry back to Valeera ears. Chapter 6: Power Testing! revisiting the Dead Scar and plans for the future! Standing at the edge of the Dead Scar outskirt, Aethas eyed on the shambling brittle horror walking on the black, dead soil filled with the anguish of millions of lives that were forced to turn into undead and marched through. Aethas eyes flashed an ominous glint as he focused on the walking skeleton wandering in the dead zone absentmindedly, after years of absorbing soul to strengthen himself, Aethas now had some confidence in trying to control some of the weaker undead roaming in the outskirts, breaking their bond with the Lich King and bringing the minion under his absolute control. ¡°You! Will! Obey!¡± Aethas doesn¡¯t waste much of his time of the day either, whatever there was free time, he will go back and study the notes from the [Book of the Dead], 3 years is plenty of time for anyone to master the basics of magic- let alone a Blood Elves, whom magic is their birthright to wield as they desired. The skeletal minion that Aethas is targeting began to struggle and combusted into blue flames, after the flame died down, the creature stood motionless and watched Aethas with it blue soul flame for eyes. ¡°Success!¡± it was a success, he managed to wrought control of the undead minion from the hive-mind of the undead Scourge and brought it under his control! Even though this undead was just a weakling among the general population of the Scourge, it still progress, seeing that his power has reached a substantial point, Aethas snapped his fingers and the minion immediate collapse and it soul flow toward him, fueling and expanding his mana reserve even further. Years of ¡°eating¡± soul of countless critters and from time to time, bigger animals, had expanded Aethas mana reserve beyond that of what could be considered normal even among elves, it should be more than enough for him to pass and enrolled in the magical academy within the Sunstrider Isle by the end of the year, Aethas wish he could say that to all his minion, but it turned out that not all are ¡°talented¡± enough to be mages. Of the 4 boys that followed Aethas, 2 of them choose to be a Paladin, 1 decided to follow the path of a Warrior, while the last has a talent to be a Rogue, maybe because of his family circumstances, while Valeera chosen to be a Ranger and the last girl, Litheria became a priest. Aethas seem to be the only one in the class that has any chance of becoming a certified mage, much to his own surprises, Elves does have talent in magic- sure, but with the scarcity of mana and the willpower of the user to manage their thirst, many had given up the chance of becoming a mage, as for the knowledge they learn from professor Sunreach class, it¡¯s just knowledge about life skills to help them whenever they needed. Good thing they won¡¯t be separated because of their choices, Sunstrider Isle teached all kind of classes, from the lowly Rogue Assassination class, to the noble priests. Of course to get into the academy, they first need to pass professor Sunreach minimum standard on practical knowledge test, then they can earn a small scholarship and recommendation for the Academy on the Sunstrider Isle. The things about the scholarship is it will only sponsor them for a maximum of 2 years, after that, they are on their on and will have to find a way to make a living, of course the student can choose to stay on the isle and look for work, most did anyway- but Aethas has a better plan and a much greater ambition, his plan was to enroll into Dalaran- however that might posed a bit of a problem, Dalaran disappeared from once it original location in Hillsbrad Foothill. Many do not know where the city vanished to and left only a magical energized crater behind, but Aethas know- based on his knowledge, the city itself should be in Crystalsong Forest, Northrend- the front door of the Lich King domain, all Aethas need to do now is either find a route there, or somehow create a portal and travel to the city itself.Love what you''re reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on. Aethas might have to take his chance and ask Professor Sunreach, as after boosting his own power to a certain point, Aethas could somewhat gauge the magical power of his teacher- and one thing is certain, he is not weak despite how he showed himself, the old elf is a powerful mage! Even though there was no record of his name etched in the wiki page, Aethas already threw most of what ¡°canon¡± lore out the window since his reincarnation. Part 2 After Aethas returned home to his family, washing himself up, eating dinner- chatting with his mother and father, listening to his father bragging about his current ¡°Valiant deed¡± for the day, nothing much is going on- yes of course! They encourage him to study harder and quickly become a mage and then a magistrate in the Court serving their Prince Kael¡¯Thas. Unbeknown to them that Kael¡¯Thas Sunstrider has long betrayed their people for Kil''Jaeden the Deceiver and the burning Legion, judging by history told by professor Sunreach that their Prince has returned from Outland and currently resided in the Palace on Quel¡¯Danas Isle a short distance from their Capital city of Silvermoon city. So if his guess is right, Kael¡¯Thas must have been defeated in Outland and was forced to retreat back to Azeroth, where he planned to bring his new master, Kil¡¯Jaeden the Deceiver to Azeroth, using the remnant of the Sunwell as a portal, this is good news and bad news at the same time for Aethas, the good news is there¡¯s a good chance of him going to Dalaran sooner or later, possibly within the next couple of years. The bad news is, currently he is not strong enough to personally secure his life from all kinds of threats that exist out there, if he were to face the Demon Lord Kil¡¯Jaeden in his weakened form right now, just a little sneeze would be enough to obliterate him let alone the might of the full might of the Lich King. Aethas need to immediately get stronger, the sooner the better, he needed to speed up his plan for this world, it¡¯s either get eaten or be eaten in this savage world, to survive all the contastrophy and chaos that will soon ensue. Soon enough, the day of the exam arrived marked by the warm morning sun- yet as always, the moment he woke up, his room was either filled by a corpse of some kind, either a random squirrel, bird, or insects, this has been going on for years already, to the point where he was used to it, thus he quickly cleaned up the mess- harvest the critter soul and collect any usable reagent from the creature before burn it with a firespell. Since the day that it first start, up to present day, Aethas still hasn¡¯t figured out as to why it happened- however since it doesn¡¯t seem to harm anyone close to him, he just let it be, maybe the answer will naturally come to him in the near distant future, for now let it serve as an extra measure against anyone who wished to harm him, plus it¡¯s an easy way to gain soul essence, it just served to him on a silver platter. That aside, when Aethas arrived at the classroom of professor Sunreach, it was a surprise to see that he was the only one who came on time, all the other kids seem to take their sweet time today it seems, when he got there, Aethas saw professor Sunreach sitting on his couch reading his book without a care in the world. ¡°You¡¯ve finally arrive I see.¡± the old elf closed his book and fixate his gaze on the young soon to be mage that arrived ¡°right on time¡±, seeing that Aethas was confused, some clarification must be done it seems. ¡°Don¡¯t bother looking around, I lied about the time you¡¯re supposed to show up for today''s final examination.¡± he smiled, much to Aethas confusion, why would he lied about such things? What the point of that- unless! ¡°Your guess is correct, I have something that might interest you.¡± the old elf pulled out an envelope sealed in wax, depicting an upside down eye- it¡¯s the crest of the Kirin¡¯Tor! The ruling organization and the council of magi¡¯s resided in the magical city of Dalaran! ¡°As my most promising disciple, I reserved the right to give you the best treatment and paved the path for your promising future- this is the recommendation and residential right for you to enter Dalaran, hench the reason for your early summon, but first prove to me that you have what it takes and earn that right.¡± professor Sunreach summoned an orb. ¡°Show me your power my young disciple.¡± the moment Aethas let his hand touched the orb, it glowed with a brilliant light- acting as a bright beacon for villages miles around. Hours later, the children finally arrived, when they got there they managed to spot the top of their class, standing quietly in the corner next to their professor, holding a letter and token in hand, quietly looking at them. ¡°Class, before the final examination start- I wish for you all to give a round of applause for your fellow classmate, Aethas- he has graduate early and will ¡°soon¡± be departing in the most prestigious college this world has to offer, joining the Sunreaver Sanctuary in the magical city of Dalaran!¡± dead quiet, these kids know too well what kind of place is Dalaran from their teacher, the magical city where many of the most powerful magus reside. Chapter 7: The Exam! family business! Part 1 After hearing the news that Aethas has been accepted into the magical city of Dalaran, the student went into an uproar after a moment of silence, much to the displeasure of Professor Sunreach, he had previously expect the classroom to be loud- but not this loud! ¡°Alright quiet down!¡± he snapped his fingers, amplified with magic to make it even louder. ¡°Getting accepted to Dalaran is one thing, but it¡¯s not like he will be leaving immediately, transportation will be quite costly, thus he will be staying for a year until the portal is stabilized.¡± professor Sunreach words caused the excitement to die down quite considerately. Hearing his words, the six children that followed Aethas, which include Valeera, Litheria, Faramis, Falrauldon, Andorath and Ronmath let out a sigh of relief, look like their leader won¡¯t be going anywhere soon, they all thought- the one who felt the most relief was none other than Valeera, for some reason, she doesn¡¯t want Aethas to leave at all! ¡°Alright, take a seat and prepare for your exam, I do hope all of you actually done some studying- Aethas you will help me oversee this exam since you are more than qualified for this.¡± he ordered, Aethas has no qualm for such task- however he wished the old professor would inform him of this days before the exam- not an hour before the exam! An hour before the exam, after Aethas touched the orb summoned by professor Sunreach and caused a burst of light that illuminated the surrounding and possibly drawn in way too much information. ¡°This amount of mana¡­ how is this even possible! This is beyond that of a 13 years old child!¡± professor Sunreach exclaimed with excitement as he watched the magic reaction on display, the orb name is [Orb of Magic Sense], a little invention that he himself came up with- the orb''s main purpose is to test for the amount of magic of a being that came into contact with it, the brighter it shine- the larger the quantity and purer the mana reserve that being has. Judging by how bright it is, professor Sunreach came to conclusion that Aethas was very talented in the Arcane art- no, talent might be an understatement as well as an insult for him! Sunreach was glad that he trusted his six sense after being around Aethas for the past 3 years, the boy mana quantity just exploded! ¡°That¡¯s it! You don¡¯t need to take this pitiful exam, from today onward, you shall be my apprentice!¡± professor Sunreach proclaimed, there¡¯s no way he would let ANYONE! That includes the old fogey in Dalaran taking this diamond in the rough first before him! That¡¯s the story of how Aethas just became the apprentice of a professor Sunreach, instead of a normal student at school- Aethas has the right to learn true magic now. ¡°But professor¡­ what about Dalaran¡­?¡± Aethas was speechless by professor Sunreach reaction after he touched the orb. ¡°Screw Dalaran! You can¡¯t go there anyway! At least not yet, the portal between two continents is currently being stabilized, and I¡¯m afraid it won¡¯t be available within the next year or so.¡± the old elf stroked his goatee, seemingly proud of himself. ¡°Then what is the point of giving that letter of recommendation early?!¡± Aethas wished he could scream those words out at the old elf, however he quickly swallowed those words. ¡°I was going to send you to Sunstrider Isle to meet one of my disciples in Quel¡¯Danas, where he can teach you personally before you headed off to Dalaran if your talent isn¡¯t as ridiculous as shown a moment ago.¡± he pointed at the [Orb of Magic Sense].You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author. ¡°Alright, master¡­¡± Aethas couldn¡¯t bother to argue with this old elf and just accepted his fate before accepting the letter of recommendation and a token of the Kirin¡¯Tor, starting from this day onward, he shall be known as the apprentice of the Mage Sunreach. ¡°Right, since you are cutting above the rest of the somewhat mediocre talents among your peers, I shall let you be my assistant and proctor the exam, I¡¯m sure you have some integrity to not overly abuse your authority.¡± he smirked, of course there¡¯s a deeper meaning to that ¡°not overly abuse¡± his authority as the proctor, could this perhaps be the legendary benefit of ¡°being above the laws?!¡± Aethas thought deeply onto the topic before reluctantly agreed. The reason for his reluctance was the fact he too doesn¡¯t know about the topic of today''s exam either, and it doesn¡¯t seem like professor Sunreach would be willing to share the answer key for a matter of fact, maybe he had confident in Aethas competency. Part 2 Aethas quietly patrolling around the classroom, watching the kids struggling on their final exam- of course he tried to abuse his power by giving them small hints, since all of them are somewhat close to him as friends, but seeing how they still does not get the correct answers Aethas could only let out a long sigh. ¡®Aren¡¯t Blood Elves supposed to be talented in Enchanting and Disenchanting?¡¯ he thought. Watching all these kids messed up such an easy task of just bubbled in answers for multiple choice questions and a short essay, it¡¯s baffling- Aethas could imagine how they would definitely screwed up on the practical examination part of the test- which required them to enchant a bracer with the [Minor Health] enchantment, he feared for what might hold in the future, with this batch of ¡°talented¡± individual defending against what might as well be event that could end the world many times over. However there¡¯s a silver lining in every cloud, as his group of minions managed to do quite well for themselves, Litheria to be exact, she already moving onto the practical part of the examination- Aethas could tell that she¡¯s going to make a name for herself in the near future with such beautiful handiwork. As for the rest of the crews, they still manage to enchant a passable piece of work, not bad in anyway whatsoever. Enchanting is an intricate art, Aethas found that fact after months on end studying the arts, one has to have sufficient control over the arcane power and basic knowledge of arcane magic at least, to make even the most basic piece of enchantment- that said all Sin¡¯Dorei indeed has to master such arts, it¡¯s a mandatory requirement less they want to turn into one of those wretches lurking in the woods and the ruins of Silvermoon. Aethas shudder unconsciously thinking that there¡¯s a possibility of him turning into one of those ¡°things¡±, at least he won¡¯t need to worry about it for a long while as he had plenty of mana to keep himself from going insane, plus there¡¯s also that necklace that was enchanted by professor Sunreach years ago- unless Aethas decided to go full mayhem and launch destructions like birthday confetti? That¡¯s problem for the future. By noon, the examination was officially declared over- luckily no one fails the exam, they just barely got a passing mark of either failing or passing the exam by 1 or 2 questions, however it was enough for these children to get a recommendation for further studying at the Sunstrider Isle, although the recommendation would only allow them to attend normal basic classes it would be enough to change their future by quite a large margin, getting a good paying job such as an assistance for tradesmen, joining the workforce and better the lives of their own family and themselves. The good part is, all of his minions managed to be the top of the class with their score and earned extra years of training into advanced classes, Aethas couldn¡¯t help but feel proud of himself, spending all those extra time helping them study didn¡¯t go to waste after all, a capable leader need capable underlings as they always said? Who say that? Aethas did just now. ¡°Alright, you children can go home after you receive your letter of recommendations, just be sure to read the instructions carefully!¡± he instructed them, peering out the window he could see a crowd of parents waiting with hopeful expressions on their face. Later that day, after class with professor Sunreach were dismissed, for good this time and not to just ¡°oh come back right after summer break!¡± type of crap. ¡°Boss! I made it!¡± Faramis has excitement on his face, he look toward Aethas in hope of receiving praises. ¡°Yes yes, you did great- just try harder in the future.¡± being most likely the most loyal of henchmen under Aethas, of course he would not deny him of any praise, more so Aethas would encourage the kid to try even harder to improve himself. ¡°Aethas! There you are! I finally found you! Quickly follow me back home.¡± from among the group of parents, the towering Orc-like figure of Aethas father called out for him, fully donned in shining armor and a greatsword on his back, the man beckoned for Aethas to come over to his side, seemingly in quite an urgent, from the look of it, something must have happened and he did not know about it. ¡°Can you at least tell me what the hell is going on, old man-¡± his father quickly pulled out a parchment that was crumbled up into a ball and tossed it to Aethas, the moment he unscramble up the notice his face immediately darkens. Chapter 8: Warchief Command- Let move into a Cementary! The notice state [ Warchief Command: Ghostlands!] just reading the name alone gave Aethas a horrible feeling inside his stomach, he steeled his nerve and continued reading. [Warchief Command: Ghostlands!] All bodied members of the Horde are hereby ordered to report to Arcanist Vandril at Tranquillien in the Ghostlands. Your help is needed to turn back the numberless Scourge invaders and secure the help of the Forsaken in fighting our common enemy. To reach Tranquillien, follow the road south from Fairbreeze Square and into the Ghostlands Destiny Calls! The notice was written boldly in red, Aethas could see why his father seem to be in a hurry now, he¡¯s going on a deployment and he¡¯s going to take us along with him! Plus the fact that there¡¯s a big reward posted below and bonus included. ¡°So, you¡¯re telling me that you want me and mom- out of all people, to move into the Ghostlands and settle there! A complete Dead zone filled with undead?! Are you out of your mind old man?!¡± Aethas couldn¡¯t take it anymore with his father eccentricity, it¡¯s one thing if it¡¯s just him coming with this Orc of an elf, but asking him to brother his mother along? ¡°Don¡¯t worry too much about it! Safety is guaranteed at the Tranquillien, it¡¯s the most fortified place in the entire region!¡± his father pointed out, that was somewhat true- based on the game, Tranquillien was formerly an Elven Village, but after the Scourge invaded and turned the zone into a deserted wasteland full of Amani trolls and Scourge, it was abandoned- that was until the Forsaken came over and take up resident and allied themselves with the Blood Elves against their common enemy. ¡°But why do you want us to come with you to that place though¡­¡± Aethas frowned. ¡°What else my son?! You be training with your daddy here to inherit the family business!¡± the brute of an elf proclaimed loudly. So that was your goal! Bullshit!- although, once Aethas thought about it, it could be a great way to gain more fighting experience and power level himself up a little with the numberless Scourge, along with a side dish that was formerly the ¡°Great Amani Empire¡±, since all the pest in Eversong Woods is barely enough to fill the gap in his teeth anymore with the amount of mana they had, thinking about the possible pros and cons, Aethas nodded. ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll bite the bait- my guess is you want me to convince mom to move into the Ghostlands, right?¡± knowing his own mother, there is absolutely no way in hell she would agree to his dad crazy idea of moving with him- thus it all came down to him. ¡°No, surprisingly your mother actually agree without a second thought when I propose the plans to her¡­ she was saying something about possibly expanding her company to other areas instead of staying local, along with the fact that the real estates in Ghostlands should be dirt cheap since no one is stupid enough to buy it.¡± father Aethas repeat the words of Aethas mother without missing a single detail. Damn! She¡¯s right! Who in their right mind would buy pieces of land that is currently infested with undead?! So it should be dirt cheap and with their current capital income, it will be enough to carve a huge chunk of Ghostlands for themselves! All they need to do is clean up the undead infestation a little bit overtime if not completely destroy Deatholme and end the Scourge presence in the Quel¡¯Thalas once and for all! ¡°Alright! What do you want me to do?¡± Aethas asked his father with excitement clearly shown on his face, there¡¯s money to be made after all- even the possibility of people a noble too, there¡¯s a saying ¡°with wealth comes great power!¡±.Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original. ¡° I want you to give up on going to the Sunstrider Isle-¡± before his father could finish the sentence ¡°deal! When can we move?¡± Aethas had already agreed. Hold it! Wasn¡¯t that a bit too rash?! I thought you would throw a tantrum when I told you to give up on going to a good college to become a mage! How can you agree so quickly! Although father Aethas had already made some backup plans, such as letting the Mage advisor in his unit tutoring his son instead. ¡°Of course! I¡¯m not going to the Sunstrider Isle, professor Sunreach cancel that plan and took me as his apprentice instead and tutoring me into I¡¯m qualified enough to be sent to Dalaran.¡± Aethas dropped a bombshell on his father which such news, dear god! Dalaran?! Isn¡¯t my son too talented?! The city of magic! The place where the Bloodline of the Sunstrider Dynasty once study?! Wait hold on, professor Sunreach? That old bastard actually took in my son as his apprentice?! Hahaha! This is great! Part 2 Convincing professor Sunreach was surprisingly, an easy task- the moment Aethas brought up the idea, the old elf was already packing up ready to leave at a moment''s notice, it was even before he could brought up the offer that his father told him to give to this mage here. Without much else to do, the family of 3 along with an old mage set off on the road that same day, their destination? It¡¯s Tranquillien of course! Where else would they headed to? Definitely not the Eastern Plagueland, that¡¯s just suicide, getting to Tranquillien itself is already a harsh ordeal that must be overcome- luckily, they had a group of escorts, mainly his father Farstrider unit, consist of roughly a dozen of Farstriders. The phrase ¡°Farstrider¡± might be a bit much, as his father informed him about the hierarchy of the group, starting from the bottom up- which consist of a regular ranger or hunter who enlisted into the group, followed by ¡°Farstrider¡± or member who had proven themselves, followed by Lieutenant, who co-op command the unit with the captain, which was the rank of his father, above that they have the Ranger captain who sole purpose is to command the leadership below him or her. Above that are the Ranger Lord, who are mainly distinguished and revered members of the organization, the future Regent Lord, Lor¡¯themar Theron was at this rank before he took the mantle of leader for the Blood Elves people- and finally, the most exalted member, the Ranger General, this rank held control of the Farstriders organization, as well as the military power of the nation. The moment Aethas laid his eyes on his father subordinate, he was shocked to find that there is a sorcerer in the group! It was shocking for the fact that the Farstrider only mainly consist of the ranger class, or the rogue assassin class! Where the hell did this sorcerer come from?! Of course his father noticed the shocked expression that is all over his son face. ¡°Oh so you noticed? I guess you really do pay attention to my story huh?¡± father Aethas rolled his eyes seeing the boy shocked expression. ¡°He is an exception, this is our group advisor, I was suppose to let him tutor you if you decide to not go to the Sunstrider Isle.¡± he then focus his gaze toward the easy going old elf that was professor Sunreach. ¡°But since we have this old bastard here, I guess we put off-set some stress our sorcerer had to deal with on a daily basis.¡± father Aethas leered at professor Sunreach, whom is currently messing with the surrounding wildlife with his magic. Judging by his father tone, there must be something fishy going on between the both of them, to cause his father of all people, to look at the old man as if he were his arch-nemesis. With that said and done, all the necessary personnel had been gathered and ready for departure- they quickly went on their way toward the Ghostlands region and straight to Tranquillien, they need to get there as soon as possible, less they want to be ambush by the Wretches, Scourge, or in any case the common untamed wildlife in the woodland. The thing that Aethas notice not long after he arrived on this ¡°new¡± Azeroth, is that the world is huge, beyond the normal comparison, unlike that game which make traveling look like a joke due to the distances between locations, from Eversong Wood directly crossing over into the Ghostlands would take them at least a minimum of 2 days constantly traveling, stopping and rest at night would drag it out even further, it would take at least 3 days before they arrive at Tranquillien, a special note, their village was already near the border to begin with- and during those times, they will constantly be on their guard against their surroundings. Luckily, Aethas and his mother, along with professor Sunreach doesn¡¯t have to worry about standing up for nightwatch, as they were technically civilians, thus they leave the duty to the more capable rangers and farstriders of his father unit. When they arrived at the border that separates Eversong Woods and the Ghostlands, his father stopped the convoy and look back at the carriage pulled by the Hawkstrider and smirked. ¡°Girl, why don¡¯t you just get out of that box, I¡¯m sure it must be really uncomfortable squeezing yourself in there, and the last thing I want is to have such a young lady put herself in that situation for our bonehead of a son.¡± he chuckled as patted Aethas head, much to Aethas confusion of course, like what is he talking about? Who¡¯s hiding? ¡°Ah!¡± oh an all too familiar voice, Aethas doesn¡¯t really need any explanation now, he knew that voice all too well. ¡°Valeera...why?¡± he facepalmed himself. One of his minions, the capable secretary one, had managed to sneak herself into the convoy by hiding in an emptied out dry ration box. Chapter 9: Oh boy... Part 1 Later that night, when everyone is sitting around a large campfire, in the piece of land that border Eversong Woods and the deserted Ghostlands, they all sitting in silence, staring at one specific person- Valeera. She too sat there silently, keeping her head down in embarrassment as eyes were focusing onto her. ¡°Valeera¡­ mind telling me why are you hiding in the crate?¡± Valeera blushed hard, she could only try to stamper out some weirds under such detail scrutiny that is coming from Aethas. In truth, Valeera ran away from home the moment she got wind of the news that Aethas family are going to move away, into the dangerous wildland that is the Ghostlands. ¡°Young lady, my guess is that you ran away from home, didn¡¯t you?¡± father Aethas smirked, he was confident that his guess was straight on point just by watching the reaction of the young teenager. ¡°Did your parents know that you ran away from home?¡± Aethas mother asked, worrying about what kind of hell would ensue them if Valeera parent filed in a ¡°Missing Child¡± report to the local militia. It wasn¡¯t in any doubt that Chaos would not going to stirred up in their former little village, and at some point, there will be someone who say, ¡°hey! I saw your little girl snuck into the Aethas family convoy¡± It¡¯s difficult to explain to any distressed parents on the reason of ¡°Why did your beautiful daughter just ran off with my family precious son?¡± depended on the outcome, there could be a feud and set in some bad blood, that or a more positive outcome of both parties came up with a mutual beneficial deals. ¡°Erm¡­ I don¡¯t think you need to worry about that¡­ madam, I told them that I was on a job for the guild.¡± Valeera replied, she had lied to her parents, saying that she accepted a quest from the guild and would be leaving for a week, at first her parents were worried- however, due to their family situation of living in a poor village, they reluctantly agreed, any source of income would help them a lot in the long run, plus they know their daughter can look after herself. ¡°Dear lord¡­¡± Aethas facepalmed himself, thinking how courageous this little girl must have been to have pulled off such a stunt, he doubts that her parents would ever allow her to set foot out of the house again, even if it means losing a part of their family earnings- money means absolutely nothing if you lose your children, more so true for the Blood Elves as their population were greatly diminished to less than 10%. ¡°Dear, should we send her back to the village? Her parents would worry themselves sick once they caught on to the lie.¡± Mother Aethas suggested to her husband, as he himself is in command of leading this convoy- father Aethas too was contemplating on whatever to send the little girl back or not, however it would posed major problems for the group. Such as they have to split up their manpower to safely deliver this girl back, and they have already set foot into the dangerous territory- so he couldn¡¯t do it as the little group would be easy picking for any Wretches bandit party or worse, Scourge- thus there¡¯s the choice of letting the girl follow them into the Ghostlands, from there they could arrange further transport back to Eversong Woods- out of all those option, the last one seems to be the most feasible. Even Aethas had to agree with the idea, splitting up now is just pure stupidity, and they couldn¡¯t just turn the entire convoy back just for 1 person either, Aethas look at his father, the elf seem to notice his gaze and simply nodded his head. ¡°Mother, I think it¡¯s better if Valeera tag along with our convoy until we arrive at Tranquillien, I¡¯m sure we can arrange some form of transportation service to get her back to the village, instead of endangering ourselves by splitting our forces.¡± father Aethas couldn¡¯t have worded it any better, he couldn¡¯t help but feel proud of his son, such a young age and have already mastered the basics of military tactics. The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident. If Aethas could truly read his father''s mind, he would definitely unload a few rounds of explosive marble onto the man''s forehead before cracking it open and see if his skull is filled with tofu are what- ¡°Mastered the basics of military tactics¡± my ass! Even a kid would be smart enough to come up with such a logical choice, wait- he¡¯s a kid¡­ much to Aethas own displeasure. ¡°When will I grow up?¡± he questioned himself in the back of his mind, thinking how much pain it is not being able to ¡°Grow up¡± fast enough. Part 2 ¡°Aethas! Look! Isn¡¯t it beautiful!¡± Valeera pointed at the beautiful wildlife and vegetation of the once population southern front of Quel¡¯Thalas, now known as the Ghostlands- it was decided that Valeera would follow the convoy until they reached Tranquillien, from there they will decide the next course of action. For now, Aethas parents believe that it¡¯s best for the girl to stay with them, first it would provide the little one with protection against danger that lurked within the land, second- it would provide their son with some sort of companions who¡¯s around his age( much to Aethas own displeasure.) Valeera seem to be too hyper on this trip than usual, the same could be said for professor Sunreach, the old elf doesn¡¯t act like a well respected professor anymore after their class graduation, gone with the scholarly personality that would accompany a ¡°sage¡±-like sorcerer, it was replaced by eccentricity of a youngster. For some odd reason, his father has been staring daggers at the old elf since the day he joined the convoy, one part being happy that a competent sorcerer had joined the party- the second, the hostile reaction was unknown- the man been trying to stand in between his wife and the old elf at every possible moment, there must be some ¡°deep¡± history that he doesn¡¯t know about here, his father wouldn¡¯t act like an idiot for no reason¡­ well he acted like an idiot most of the time that anyone would hardly noticed the difference. As Aethas was contemplating about his current situation, suddenly from out in the dark woods, an arrow shot toward their caravan and pinned itself onto the wooden side of the carriage, this brought the convoy to a sudden halt and his father yelling out. ¡°Enemy attack! Farstriders find the enemy!¡± however, it doesn¡¯t look like ¡°finding the enemy¡± would be a problem, as from the same direction the arrow came from, a band of Wretches emerged with eyes full of greed and lust and armed, ready to fight. ¡°Well, nevermind then- it looks like the enemy lack more patient then I would give them credit for¡­ damn Wretches¡­ all of them.¡± father Aethas glared at the band of marauder with hostility, Scourge is one thing- at least with Scourge it¡¯s easier to prepare against and let not forget, much easier to deal with than a bunch of rats that hidden within their society and constantly attacking their weak point due to their thirst for magic. ¡°What are you waiting for? Kill them! We need to get moving quickly before our presence attracted more than what we asked for!¡± father Aethas ordered, and immediately the clash initiate between the two groups, arrows flying alongside frostbolt and fireball, let not forget the old fashioned sword and shield bashing, sound crude for Elves, but it gets the job done and that is all father Aethas asked for. As for Aethas, his mother and Valeera, they made sure to stay on the sideline, far away from the fighting stages between the Farstriders and the marauding band of Wretches, Aethas mother being considerate and try to cover both of the children''s eyes, preventing them from watching the bloody brawl( one-sided massacre) while saying ¡°you children are not old enough to witness such a scene yet!¡±, much to Aethas annoyances, but he could see that his mother cared, she hope that Aethas wasn¡¯t traumatized by such gores. Aethas could only stood on side and quietly attracting the dead Wretches soul toward himself- thankfully the soul energy is mostly invisible to mortal eyes- unless they are sorcerer trained to pick up on such energy, fortunately the sorcerers in the group are too busy to notice such minor movement caused by Aethas, else he could attract a whole lot of trouble toward himself, as Necromancy were outlawed in Quel¡¯Thalas since their people couldn¡¯t forget about the horror of such horrendous school of magic. The feeling of ecstasy washed all over him as the soul of humanoid beings are much more potent than that of beasts, he could feel a major boost in his own mana reserve as his soul were boiling and churning to devour all the souls of the Wretches nearby- that was until he suddenly felt a tug from behind- ¡°what the-!¡± before he noticed it, it was already too late! A deformed face of what formerly a Blood Elves stared at him. A rogue Wretch had managed to sneak around the massive brawl and got behind the enemy line- where the civilians are kept, and Aethas seem to be an unlucky victim as the Wretch took off into the woods, dragging the little boy with him. ¡°NOOO!!!! AETHAS!!!¡± his mother screamed, which brought the attention to his father, who finally noticed that there was something wrong! His precious baby boy had been kidnapped! At that moment something finally snaps inside the Orc-like elf mind. ¡°I¡¯ll FUCKING KILL YOU ALL!!!¡± with a swing of his mighty sword, he cleaved the last remaining survivor of the band of Wretches Marauder before taking off after Aethas kidnapper with hatred filled his eyes. Chapter 10: Im a kidnapped victim? what game is this? Aethas had lost track of time since the moment of his kidnapping by a certain Wretch. ¡°Really? You know they are coming after you right?¡± Aethas grew bore out of the amount of time this Wretch had been running and dodging, he tried to take his mind off this kidnapping by just talk about something, even if it¡¯s to his captor- as there isn¡¯t any point in being quiet and uncooperative, either way Aethas was captured there is no escape yet- still looking for his chance to make a run for it, though, might possibly on the moment the Wretch drop him. The Wretch hissed at him from time to time, thus Aethas came to the conclusion that this one addiction seem to get deep into the brain, to the point where it lost all sense and method of communication, this remind Aethas of another type of addiction effect that elves suffered call Withering from the Nightborne- a much further distant cousin of the Highborn, Night Elves and Blood Elves themselves. This brought up another problem for Aethas though, he¡¯s practically dealing with a humanoid beasts here, imagine a beast with humanoid intelligent is going to be quite a pain to deal with, especially when you¡¯re a victim of mana thirsted one, who are known to cannibalised their victim or worse, violate them and before draining every drop of mana from their victim''s body. Thinking of the possible consequences, being eaten alive is the least of his worries, being violated is! Hearing stories from his village and through the lore from the wiki page, it gave him the shudder just by thinking about it, Aethas doesn¡¯t mind if it was a beautiful woman- but when it came to a mindless monster whom is a degenerated version of his own species? Screw that! I¡¯m definitely going to make a run for it! Or better yet! ¡°DAD!!!! HELP ME!!!¡± Aethas screamed with all of his might. As for why Aethas doesn¡¯t try to use any offensive magic to try and escape- one reason, there isn¡¯t much that could instantly cripple this Wretch or kill it outright, if he couldn¡¯t do any of that in one cost effective spell, it would just pissed this thing off even further and it might decide to chow down on him right there and then, instead of bringing him back to it lair. Plus, the only useful thing he got from the [Book of the Dead] was the ability to convert souls into mana and expanding his reserve beyond that of normal mortal, as for offensive? What¡¯s that? There isn''t any! It¡¯s just theoretical knowledge that applied to previously mastered spell! The rest is just Kel¡¯Thuzad damn autobiography and his propaganda for the Lich King, also known as Arthas Menethil. To sum it up, Aethas only magical knowledge are enchanting, disenchanting, soul conversions and the ability to wrought control of the undead from the Scourge, only the weaker one of course, and some basic magic to create a small spark to light a fire! Which isn¡¯t enough to kill! If he were to have his bag of explosive marble (which roughly had around 20-30 left.) he could detonate the damn thing on this sucker and make a run for it. But no, it¡¯s too good to be true, he left the bag on the carriage thinking that his dad could keep them all safe instead of carrying it on him at all times, and now he paid the price, however a ray of hope finally came to Aethas, in the form of his father calling his name from behind. ¡°DAD!!! I¡¯M AT THIS DIRECTION!!!¡± he shouted out with all his might once again and struggling to get loose from his captor. ¡°I¡¯M COMING TO YOU MY BOY! JUST HANG IN THERE!!!¡± he screamed, it seem like his dad managed to pick up on his voice and chased after them. The Wretch notice that Aethas was being quite loud and much of a nuisance, thus- a surprise in the form of a punch in the gut, which was strong enough to knock the air out of him and caused him to pass out from the pain, that is all Aethas remember, a sharp pain in the gut and everything went black, Aethas could only pray that nothing ¡°too¡± bad would happen to him afterward and the voice of his father getting fainter and fainter as time goes by.Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation. Yep, it seems like this isn¡¯t going to end well for Aethas, hopefully nothing like waking up totally naked or not waking up at all, ever- that is probably the worse case scenario. Part 2 By the time Aethas woken up, he did not know how much time had passed in the outside world, since all he could see and feel right now is the cold and wet ground inside of a cave, in the middle of nowhere, and being bounded up with rope, alongside a group of victim who gotten themselves into the same situation as himself, possibly becoming feed for the Wretches. The next thing he looked for was any ¡°violation¡± that had happened when he passed out, only to let out a sigh of relief the moment he found his clothes were still intact, look like nothing had happened yet- but he wished the same could be said for the victim around him, ranging from beaten up and drained of mana Blood Elves female and male, their will seems to have completely been broken by these savages, only breathing husk of themselves remained, they could only describe as soul-less meatbag if there¡¯s a better word for it. As for the location itself, the place is littered with bones and rotten corpses of victims, needless to say, it stinks to high heaven, imagine the smell of dead fish baking in the hot sun for a few days, the odor is much worse here since they are in an enclosed space. ¡°Hey you! The little boy! Finally woken up I see?¡± a raspy voice of a woman called out for him from the corner of the cave, where all the dead victim are kept by the Wretches, noticing the voice Aethas turn his attention there. ¡°You were trying to cross the border huh? You walk right into those Wretches ambush, same as us- and that spy over there!¡± for some reason, Aethas could feel a major deja vu coming from this scene. Fate indeed has a sense of twisted humor. ¡°Damn you Forsaken scum, if it weren¡¯t for you, I could have sneaked into Eversong Wood and complete my mission as planned, but you couldn¡¯t help but chased and lead me right into their ambush huh?¡± the spy seems to be a Night Elf, he must have snuck in through from the Eastern Plagueland or so Aethas concluded- but hold it! What the hell?! Author! I think you got the wrong game mixed up! Aethas cried out bitterly inside. ¡°What is going to happen to us?¡± the spy cried out after noticing the grim environment around him. ¡°What else? Possibly return to your Elune and me? Eternal suffering?¡± the Forsaken woman concluded- it was not wrong, that will be their fate since Aethas know the habit of the Wretches better than these two, he know of their dirty personality. ¡°I can guarantee that as well, you two might not know this- but the Wretches had a bad habit of breaking their victim open and drain every sip of mana from their body, before possibly cannibalised them.¡± Aethas added fuel to the fire, just because it was amusing to watch the Night Elf spy wailed in despair. ¡°There¡¯s no crying about it now, we¡¯re all brothers and sisters in chain now¡­¡± the Forsaken woman told the both of them as she glanced at the horror caused by these creatures- which were second to that of the Scourge. ¡°Well this isn¡¯t funny anymore, here they come.¡± from Aethas corner of the cave, he could see a group of Wretches just enter the cave with drool all over their mouth, heading for their direction, it seems like one of them is going to die today, by now the other two also notice the incoming hostile already, the one who attracted the most attention seem to be the Night Elf spy as he trying to undo his binding- and surprisingly, he succeeded! ¡°Haha! I¡¯m not going to die here today!¡± As he said that, he charged at the Wretch after picking up a sharp piece of femur bone on the ground and shanked one of them in the gut- sure it killed one of the Wretches, however he miscalculated, who said there was only one Wretches? Before long a group of them already jumped the stupid Night Elf and shredded him to pieces, before squeezing all the mana in his body and then moving on to the body of their former allies. ¡°Well that was stupid, who let him be a spy?¡± Aethas mouth twitched seeing how dumb that Night Elf was, whoever trained this idiot needed to be fire- or better yet, just kept training more of these dumbass so they wouldn¡¯t have to issue about having spy in their kingdom ever again. ¡°Don¡¯t worry, it baffled me too.¡± the Forsaken woman nodded in agreement. *BOOM! The sound of an explosion shook the area, spooking the Wretches and causing them to immediately rushed outside to check on the situation. ¡°Well, I guess it¡¯s time for us to leave, we couldn¡¯t let this situation gone to waste now that there¡¯s someone helping us outside.¡± the Forsaken woman too, had broke from her binding, it seem like she managed to sneak a dagger inside of her dead body. ¡°Wow¡­ never knew being an undead could be so convenient.¡± Aethas couldn¡¯t help but comment after seeing the woman digging out a dagger from inside of her back and cutting the rope. ¡°I know, I was surprised about it too after I regained my freedom.¡± Chapter 11: Escape and Reunion- New Allies Part 1 Outside in the Wretches camp, chaos ensued as rain of fire fell from heaven, striking down any Wretches bandits that were fortunate enough to be in the path of destruction, the spell [Rain of Fire] is an area of effect spell exclusive to the warlock class in the Warcraft Universe, surprisingly, the caster is none other than the good old professor Sunreach, whom everyone thought was a mage. ¡°Go find the boy, I¡¯m sure he¡¯s somewhere in there.¡± the old elf pointed at the burning infernal ahead of them to Aethas father, whom without any thought dove head on and cleaving down any Wretches that get in his way. Back to Aethas and the Forsaken Assassin who managed to escape from the dungeon that kept them in captivity for who knows how long already, when they finally got outside, what greeted them was a sea of flame caused by the fallen rain of fire from above. ¡°Was it your people?¡± Aethas asked, noticing that rain of spell was a spell mostly belong to the ¡°Warlock¡±, and he couldn¡¯t help but to associate the Forsaken with all the dark and evil stuff on the back of his mind, only to earn the displeasure from the dead woman. ¡°Hey! That¡¯s rude! Sure we may have warlock in our ranks but I don¡¯t think there¡¯s anyone that powerful in our unit here in the Ghostlands expedition!¡± she retorted. ¡°Look over there, isn¡¯t that your people fighting?¡± she then pointed to a clash up ahead, where an all too familiar figure is going berserk and cleaving down anything that get in his way, that means it¡¯s a group of unfortunate Wretches bandits, and it seemed like he noticed them too. ¡°AETHAS!!! JUST HANG IN THERE! DADDY WILL BE OVER IN JUST A MOMENT!¡± *SMACK! The Great-Sword bisected the skinny Wretch, armor included and sprayed blood and guts all over his body. ¡°Family of your? Why don¡¯t I see the resemblances?¡± she joked. ¡°Don¡¯t worry, you¡¯re not the only one who noticed that.¡± Aethas retorted, it is true- all of their neighbors back in the village thought that they don¡¯t resemble anything like father and son- like who in the hell would believe an Orc-like Elf to father a son who looks like an angel? Absolutely no one- but in the end, Aethas was glad to have such a father though, even in the end if he is just a bone head, all brawn and no brain for most things all considered. Before long, his father had finally finished the last of the Wretches and litter the ground with their blood and guts, creating a hellish scene on Earth along with the fire and arson in the background- which were caused by professor Sunreach, his father immediately rushed over and dropped his blade and hugged him tightly as tears flowing from his eyes- the man is crying, who would have thought that the warrior that put fear into his enemy with his brutality would cry when he grabbed hold of his son- ¡°I am so sorry! You must have been scared, I swear in the name of the Sin¡¯Dorei, that this will never happen again!¡± he continued to sob. Many did not know this, but Aethas father loved his family more than his own life- after what happened to his own sister during the destruction of the Sunwell, where his sister who followed their prince into outland and went missing in action, as reported after their expedition force retreated back to Azeroth- losing his own blood sister is hard enough, but losing his son on top of that? If that were the case, he would make sure every single Wretch in the kingdom of Quel¡¯Thalas died with his son, none of them will ever allow to live! ¡°Stop crying dad, I¡¯m not hurt and you came and rescued me, so what is there to be sad about?¡± he hugged the elf back, after another round of sobbing, the elf finally calmed down and his stoic work face returned, his gaze finally landed on the Forsaken woman next to his son, he was taken back to see an undead of course, but after reading on the description of their new ally- the Forsaken, he knew that they would not caused them harm, yet¡­ Aethas father still hadn¡¯t trusted their new ally fully yet, as they were former agent of the Scourge, their hated enemy, but now seeing that this undead helped his son escape.This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author''s work. ¡°Captain Theramar of the 14th Farstrider unit, at your service.¡± he took the initiative and grabbed the undead cold bony hand. ¡°Thank you for looking after my son, we will do whatever it takes to help your people effort against the Scourge in the Ghostlands.¡± he told her. ¡°On behalf of the Dark Lady herself, I thanked you Captain.¡± she replied back in courtesy, of course Aethas already know who this Dark Lady was, the Banshee Queen Sylvanas Windrunner, former Ranger General of the kingdom of Quel¡¯Thalas. Part 2 Aethas, and the convoy along with their new friends, the Forsaken Assassin- went their merry way straight for Tranquillien, the heart of the Ghostlands territory, the trip was quite uneventful as there were no incidents or attacks- other than some random beasts like giant bats swooping down from time to time, but they were easily taken care of by the snipers. Of course, Aethas took his chance to ask professor Sunreach in secret, about his actual profession- which definitely isn¡¯t a mage as he claimed to be, because during the raid on the Wretches camp, he noticed that the professor cast the following spells [Rain of Fire] [Incinerate][Immolate] and many other spell that were exclusive to the warlock class, he could see why the elf would disguised himself as a fire mage. Surprisingly, the old elf did not denied his association with the demonic magic, but of course as his new teacher, the elf asked Aethas to keep this little secret between them, sure Blood Elves society doesn¡¯t view practitioner of demonic magic to be as extreme like the Necromancer who served the Lich King, however it doesn¡¯t mean that they don¡¯t receive any prejudice once they were discovered. Knowing this, Aethas complied with the old elf requested, but of course- Aethas wouldn¡¯t let such a great opportunity gone to waste, the old elf was a bona fide, certified Warlock with experiences, Aethas would definitely asked him for tips on the art of summoning as there are many things he wanted to try. After hearing his disciple requested him to teach him the Demonic Arts, professor Sunreach eye twitched a little, isn¡¯t this kid a bit too greedy? Teaching him common magic is one thing, but for him to lead his disciple ¡°astrayed¡± into the hands of the demons? But seeing Aethas giving him the puppy eyes, professor Sunreach couldn¡¯t bear to say no- but of course, he would teach the boy only under strict supervision. ¡°This is great! You¡¯re the best! Teacher!¡± Aethas flatter the old elf with flowery words, and with that, during their trip to Tranquillien, it wasn¡¯t that uneventful anymore as there would be something for Aethas to do, of course it was in complete secret- he finally can put his massive reserve of mana into good use and by the time they reached Tranquillien, Aethas had already mastered the basic spell of the Warlock class and could probably officially called himself a [Level 1 Warlock] based on the game standard. For he had learned the spell [Incinerate]] and [Summon Imp], but of course professor Sunreach prohibited Aethas from using the [Summon Imp] spell, as it would cause problem for himself because he was known as Aethas magical instructor, and secondly Aethas father would definitely murder him for the reason of ¡°You¡¯re a bad influencer! You¡¯ve led my son astray!!!¡± and thus a great sword cleaved the old poor professor Sunreach in half without a shred of mercy. But back to present about Tranquillien, their new home? If Aethas had any opinion, it would be that their new home is quite¡­ lively, ironically- the town population is Forsaken majority for population, only a small percentage of them are Blood Elves, the town itself was in no doubt, quite prosperous despite it odd location, seeing how the street is filled with the local populace( Forsaken) bartering and selling exotic goods that caused the group of new resident (Aethas convoy) to find quite strange and disturbing, things such as random eyeballs, humanoid limbs and that of animals- just to name a few. In the end, they just put it in as ¡°different cultures have their own uniqueness.¡± which is the same for their own race, the Blood Elves, which like to thrive in the Eternal Spring and Sunshine of the kingdom of Quel¡¯Thalas, unlike their former kin, the Kal¡¯Dorei- also known as the former Highborne and now, their faction enemy the Night Elves, who live in Eternal Twilight under the light of the Moon. ¡°This place is great!(with much sarcasm) So- where¡¯s our house?¡± Aethas asked his father and mother, whom just look at one another and smiled wryly, seeing this Aethas had a bad feeling- no it¡¯s a horrible feeling, and his gut feeling was right- by the time they arrived at their resident- no it¡¯s anything but a resident, if he had words to describe it, it would be a god damn haunted house, Aethas swear he could see spectral ghost floating out of the building! Not to be offended, he doesn¡¯t really mind it at all- but being a former human on Earth and knowing about the bad reputation of any haunted house? Aethas now glad that he had some knowledge about Necromancy and having a Warlock for a teacher accompanied his family for this trip. Chapter 12: Beginning of an Empire! More lost knowledge! Part 1 It didn''t take long for Aethas and his family to settle down in Tranquillien, it has been a week since the day they arrive- life goes on and continued as they say. "Aethas! Let''s go out and play!" Valeera nagged him as she break into his private domain- which also known as his room, as for why Valeera still hanging around him for over a week already, the reason was she somehow convinced both of his parents, to allow her to stay- and to his surprise, they agreed! It¡¯s outrageous! This is kidnapping! To make matters worse, his dad sent a letter back to her parents and informed them of what is ¡°actually¡± going on. Such as telling the poor girl parents that their daughter had been accepted into a noble organization (militia, mercenaries) that is the Farstrider and became his personal page, one can imagine how excited they must have been- thus it is without any problem that they accepted the fact that their daughter Valeera, will be staying in the Ghostlands for quite some time. ¡°Don¡¯t you have any training to do, Valeera? You can¡¯t just drag me out to play all day.¡± Aethas replied to the energetic girl in annoyance, it was true- for the past week, she¡¯d been dragging him out into the town either sightseeing, or worse- directly into the wilderness to hunt games, which include and not limited to bats, lynx, and sometime mana wyrm( if there¡¯s even any left.) rather than doing all of these activities, Aethas prefered to just stay home in his tower and study arcane knowledge with his teacher, professor Sunreach- whom is a retired Warlock. ¡°And no please, I just want to do some spell practice today, maybe next time Valeera.¡± Aethas continued, that is all he wanted to do- throughout the years, Aethas seem to developed a bad habit that all mages tend to have- the addiction to studying and hoarding knowledge. Valeera grinned upon seeing Aethas reaction to her usual antic, she too knew that he would refuse to go out and play with her, thus she prepared a secret weapon. ¡°Your mother order you to go outside, it would be a disappointment if I were to inform her that you refused to comply.¡± this immediately brought Aethas to a halt- this little girl, since when did he trained her to be this evil and cunning?! Oh wait, he himself isn¡¯t that of a good person either¡­ either way, look he doesn¡¯t have much of a choice either, the last person that he wanted to piss off in this world was none other than his mother, she can be scary when she¡¯s angry. ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll bite the bait, where and what are we killing today?¡± Aethas could only let out a long sigh, seemingly accepting his fate for what to come. ¡°Who said we are killing anything today? Do I look like that type of girl to you?¡± she pouted. ¡°Then what are we doing today?¡± his questions were only met with silence and being dragged and leaping out through the window and landed on a Red Hawkstrider down below, the weight of the two children caused the creature to squawk and jumped in surprise before it was being guided by Valeera and took off on the road. Of course Aethas- like any normal mortal in the world, scream for his life at the breakneck speed that they were traveling on! ¡°Are you even old enough to get a license for this?!¡± he screamed. ¡°Of course! I am the top of my class for this! Even your dad praised me!¡± Valeera retorted while at the same time, brag about her achievement. ¡°Old man, I swear I will set your hair on fire the moment I return! Just you wait!¡± Aethas cursed loudly as they passed curious pedestrians while kicking up a ruckus along the way, the local seem to not bother by this scene anymore, as they have already seen this as a daily occurance with the new resident- plus being the local wealthy landowner and generous with the local population, they don¡¯t really care for such antics.The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation. This brought back the fact that the day after arrival, Aethas mother immediately put her massive capital into good use by investing in local businesses and buying up lands- surrounding Tranquillien and the abandoned villages nearby( which practically cost close to nothing!) thus the locals have quite a positive opinions about their family, first by helping them fight Scourge and secondly contributing to the local economy. ¡°Ah how nice it is to be young.¡± a Forsaken woman said in a raspy voice that her half decomposed voicebox could produce while smiling. ¡°Aren¡¯t we too look like that when we were young? I remember our day back in Lordaeron.¡± said the man with a rotting face next to her before pulling for a smooch, lip to lip. If Aethas was there to witness such a scene, the first thing we would do is running into a bush, hiding from the old rotting couple and puke his guts out, not to be rude, but anyone witnessing such a scene would end up losing a piece of themselves afterward. Part 2 Their journey took them half an hour, riding at top speed on the Hawkstrider before they finally arrived at their destination- which to Aethas surprise, was an old abandoned Arcane Sanctum. ¡°Valeera, don¡¯t tell me this is what you wanted me to see¡­¡± Aethas asked with the look of surprise still on his face. ¡°Yes, I know you like studying knowledge about magic, thus where else would I want to bring you?¡± she said in a low but shy tone of voice, Aethas swore he could see her glowing pink while speaking those words, looking at the long abandoned Arcane Sanctum below, it turn out- this trip wasn¡¯t so bad after all, he thought knowing there must be lost knowledge buried below in the rubble. ¡°Let go on a treasure hunt!¡± immediately Aethas grabbed her hand and took off down to the Sanctum, while being held by the boy, Valeera couldn¡¯t help but blushed even further. Along the way, they were met with the local ¡°wildlife¡± that inhabited the old broken down Arcane Sanctum, which include Mana Wyrm and Mana Elemental- lets just say there is way too many of them gathering here and that draining and destroying a few won¡¯t harm the general population. Looking at the broken down Sanctum up close, Aethas can somewhat make out the words ¡°Sanctum of the Moon¡± on the old broken down stone tablet that was worn down by the ages, seeing this Aethas couldn¡¯t help but grinned like an evil villain. ¡°Sanctum of the Moon huh? Look like we hit a jackpot- and it¡¯s all thanks to you my beautiful and talented secretary.¡± as fact already stated, they are currently on top of the ruins of the Sanctum of the Moon, quoted to be the ¡°Testament of the Mastery of the Arcane¡± by none other than Alleria Windrunner herself during the glory of the kingdom of Quel¡¯Thalas, now all that is left are ruins and rubble, but of course- being a sorcerer himself and the disciple of a powerful former warlock now mage, professor Sunreach, he learned a method of two in discovering lost arcane knowledge. ¡°Let look for the focusing core of the sanctum, hopefully it is still intact when the former denizen abandon this mana factory.¡± Aethas told her, even though the hope of digging one up might be close to zero, but if they do manage to find it, even if it was damaged- it could help their people( mostly the Blood Elves population in Ghostlands) with a source of magic to feed on, instead of scraping every bit of magic they can get from anything that remotely felt magical. ¡°But where are we going to find it? And how do you even know that it even there- plus is there a reason why you would want such a thing?¡± Valeera look confused, Aethas could only sigh at her ignorance while quote ¡°ignorance can be such a bliss.¡± ¡°I don¡¯t, just have a sliver of hope- if we manage to find it, professor Sunreach and the other sorcerers can probably create a makeshift mana generator using the local leyline, which could supply the entire town with powers for years to come.¡± he enlightened the girl, to which she finally understood his attention, she too know well of the suffering their people have to gone through after the destruction of the Sunwell, she knew her parents were facing such difficulty as well, controlling their thirst for mana and crying quietly from time to time at night. If they could find such object here, and Aethas, along with professor Sunreach could recreate such device¡­ ¡°Aethas¡­ if you and professor Sunreach could recreate such device, do you think my parents could move here as well?¡± she looked at him with eyes full of hope. ¡°Of course you silly girl! Why else would I want it for? My own amusement and the foundation for my conquest on this world? No! I want to sate the mana addiction of our people!?¡± Aethas proclaimed proudly, only to notice Valeera giggling at him, he could only turned his head away in embarrassment thinking ¡°why the hell did I say such a thing!!¡± Chapter 13: Aberration! I can do it too! Aethas and Valeera continued to wander around the abandoned sanctum that had fallen ruined to the ages, looking for any possible clues for treasures and hidden knowledge, based on Aethas knowledge about Ancient arcane sanctum that was recorded down in books and many other literature, Aethas can somewhat reference these structures to a type of ancient ¡°nuclear¡± power plant and Thermal Energy plant back on Earth if there was any similarity, these structures had one purpose, and that one purpose only- that is to generate as much power as possible under a certain period of time, of course the energy has to be under controlled, else it would just be a disaster. Just like all power plants back on Earth, the Arcane Sanctum also needed a place to store their excess powers, along with a key component that generate those powers in the first place, and that is what Aethas was looking for, the ¡°Keystone¡± of the Arcane sanctum, along with any possible crystallized mana that were left untouched when the population abandoned the region to escape back to Eversong and Silvermoon. ¡°Aethas! Look at this!¡± Valeera quickly went to where Aethas was while holding a small piece of purple crystal that is radiating with ancient mana from the leyline, this is no doubt what Aethas was looking for! [Ancient Mana]- based on it description from the wiki, Ancient mana is basically crystallized mana from the Leyline beneath the Ancient City of Suramar- but in the end, it is just crystallized mana from the Leyline, and where does all Arcane Sanctum were built on? You guessed it! Leyline. ¡°Great work! Where did you find this?¡± Aethas asked her, with this clue- it showed they were on the right track, or at least close to where the source is- Valeera then pointed at a pile of broken shelf full of worn out books where their words are barely visible anymore in fortunate case, but most of it were completely rotten for being exposed to the elements. Seeing that their path is blocked by such obstacle, Aethas cracked his knuckles while looking at the pile of debris, one can guess that he is ready for a spell incantation. ¡°Valeera, you might want to move away, I¡¯m going to put what professor Sunreach taught me to good use.¡± hearing that, Valeera quickly moved behind him and stare with curiosity. After knowing professor Sunreach for years back in Eversong, if there¡¯s one thing Aethas could confidently tell ANYONE about the old elf, is that he is the master of fire magic! Or in many cases, anything that is related to the art of setting things on fire, enchanting and disenchanting is only secondary to him, and as for magic theories and researching into arcane knowledge, that is just a hobby. By now Aethas has successfully managed to gather a percentage of mana from himself and weaved it into a small infernal between the palm of his hands- this is the spell that Aethas had successfully mastered under the tutelage of his teacher. ¡°[Incinerate]!¡± he called out the name of the spell, which is one of the basic spells of the Destruction specialization of the Warlock class. Maybe it was due to the amount of mana that Aethas had built for himself over the years, but just 2% of that amount put into the spell is enough to completely vaporized the debris that was in front of him, leaving a charred scar radiating an intense amount of heat and revealing a pathway before them, after which Aethas couldn¡¯t help but let out a long high pitched whistle, seeing the amount of destruction he can cause with just one spell. ¡°Just love the smell of burning books in the morning huh- wait no! Wrong! Books are precious! Those who burn books kill knowledge! But whatever, these books are no longer readable anyways.¡± Aethas shrugged, it wasn¡¯t much of a loss to him anyway, if they left such tome lying about in the public area- he doubt they would worth much. What really juicy are hidden deeper within the sanctum and locked away to keep the public from ever laying eyes on them- those are the real treasures! To which might hidden ahead of them- with that said they venture deeper into the maw of darkness itself, on the path that is littered with crystallized mana, either on the ceiling, the wall or the very ground they walked on, it was saturated with magic- even the air they breathe in cannot escape the mana radiation as it too, was filled to the brim with mana.If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it. ¡°Can you feel it Valeera? Of what¡¯s ahead, I there¡¯s a huge condensed power just up ahead.¡± his eyes glowed brightly as the pressure from the passage ahead of them seeped into his skin, causing his hair to stand right up, they were very close. When the two children reached the end of the ancient passageway- where a massive door stood, being children and curiosity overwhelmed them they push it open, what greeted them was just awe, perhaps mixed with a portion of sheer terror as they laid their eyes to what¡¯s in front of them, a mass of unstable arcane energy concentrated in an area deep underground. Part 2 ¡°Isn¡¯t it beautiful, Valeera?¡± Aethas asked the girl, witnessing such a mass of power, left untouched for so long caused one to be baffled at such a phenomenon, there are many questions Aethas wished to ask after seeing such a scene, such as ¡°why the Scourge didn¡¯t make use of this power?¡± or ¡°why does no one seem to pick up on this at all?¡±, only to turn around and found that Valeera is frozen in fear just from the pure pressure giving off from the arcane anomaly. Unfortunately, his question is soon to be answer as the mass of power began to give off pulse of arcane waves that radiated it surrounding and energized them to an extreme state. ¡°Oh crap¡­ we need to get out! Now!¡± noticing that something is wrong, Aethas quickly pushed Valeera down- as soon as he pushed her down, an even stronger wave of power blast out, followed by a deep furious howl. ¡°FREEDOM!!!!¡± from the arcane anomaly, borne an aberration made from purely of Arcane energy take form into the physical world- if one could describe the children situation, it would be extremely bad, they need to get out of the sanctum immediately! Screw the Keystone and ancient knowledge! There¡¯s no point in that if they can¡¯t live to use it! Plus they quickly need to warn the local militia! However, it doesn¡¯t look like it was possible as the creature shot out a beam of energy and collapse their only escape route and trapping the children inside the chamber. ¡°Shit, we are so dead¡­¡± Aethas last shred of hope of escaping alive vanished the moment the tunnel collapsed, ¡°Aethas¡­ are we going to die?¡± Valeera asked in a shaky voice, finally understanding their current situation. ¡°Well my beautiful secretary, that might be the case if we don¡¯t find a way to escape.¡± that is hopeless to begin with, after quickly looking around, Aethas can¡¯t seem to find any possible escape route, this chamber is like a prison if there¡¯s a better word to describe it. ¡°DIE MORTAL!!! I SHALL NEVER BE IMPRISON AGAIN!!!¡± the creature quickly turn hostile toward the innocent children below and began to amass mana, ready to launch an attack to obliterate them from the world of the living. Seeing imminent death, Aethas steeled his nerve, he too himself ready to launch the first attack before the monster, he turned back to Valeera, who surprising already knocking her bow and shot a couple of arrows at the creature. ¡°Well, at least we¡¯re doing something.¡± Aethas thought as he smiled. ¡°Time to go all out! [INCINERATE]!¡± Aethas launch a blazing streak of infernal at the Mana elemental, blasting a chunk out of the monster and interrupting it casting ability. ¡°PUNY MORTAL!!! HOW DARE YOU!!!¡± the Mana elemental is enraged after being interrupted by an insignificant ants that it dwarf over in both size and power! Seeing that it spell was interrupted, the creature began conjuring up mana elemental to attack. ¡°You think that you¡¯re the only one who can summon minion! Valeera! Buy me some time, it¡¯s time to show this monster that we¡¯re weakling and just wait to be slaughtered!¡± with the air of a commander around him, Aethas order the girl- whom quickly rain down arrows upon the numberless Mana Surges that wanted to rip them apart. Aethas himself utilized this chance and immediately call forth another skill that the Warlock class gained infamy from in this Universe- the art of conjuring forth demons! Although this might be a bad idea as conjuring demons and controlling them had to be done through laborious effort, such as subduing the creature and force it into the Warlock service through the domination of will or master and servant contract, else the creature will just be a menace to all. But that is just what Aethas needed right now! [Summon: Imp]! A magic circle radiated and a small sprite engulfed in fel flame appeared and shooting fireball like it was fireworks! However Aethas doesn¡¯t stop there, he continued to put in even more of his mana to call forth more horror from the twisting nether and Aethas doubt that he lacked anything but mana itself here! It wasn¡¯t all for naught and soon a terrifying creature heard of his summon, but it seems like Aethas got more than he had bargained the moment he laid his eyes on the creature that step forth from the portal. ¡°WHO DARE SUMMON ME! THE GREAT ANNIHALASH!¡± roared the giant creature that looks like a massive lizard with 6 limbs with a humanoid torso with tusk and wings with flames blazing, this creature is without a doubt, a species of Annihilan, better known as the Pit Lords! *BANG! The Arcane anomaly shot a ball of concentrated arcane energy at the face of the Pit Lord and broke off a tusk. ¡°Okay, this might work¡­¡± that all Aethas could muster out in words after witnessing the stupid action of the Arcane elemental. Chapter 14: Monster against Monster- Well, I found it. Part 1 ¡°PUNY CREATURE!!! YOU DARE TO ATTACK THE GREAT ANNIHALASH!!!¡± it seem like the attack from the aberration of mana are ineffective against the monstrous Pitlord, causing the demon to become enraged and charge at the elemental. ¡°I think we might have a shot at this.¡± Aethas whisper to Valeera, trying to keep a low profile in the chaotic fight between the 2 monsters. ¡°Imp, what are you waiting for! Go and attack!¡± Aethas order his demonic imp who seems to share the same idea as himself to keep away from the fight. ¡°Master! Hold on- I have a better idea, why not us wait for those brute to destroy themselves and we reap the reward?¡± the imp suggested. ¡°Well that¡¯s my business, what¡¯s the point of summoning you if you can¡¯t help me fight?¡± Aethas sneered at the pitifully cunning little creature. ¡°Ah my master, that is where you are wrong! Rizglop has a lot of use! But fighting is never one of them!¡± the demon bargained. ¡°If I were to join the fight, it will draw attention to you and the mistress! Then everyone would die! Yes! Die! Hahaha!¡± ¡°However, if mater keep me here, I can help you look for treasures! Yes treasures! Rizglop good at finding treasures! We can split it 50/50! What do you say?¡± the demon eyes shone with greed as it glance at it surrounding. ¡°Aethas, you can¡¯t possibly trust this demon¡­¡± Valeera whisper to Aethas, even without experience or knowledge, she knows for a fact that demon cannot be trusted, based on instinct alone. ¡°Alright Rizglop, we have ourselves a deal, but where are we supposed to find any treasures in this chaotic mess?¡± he questioned the cunning little devil. ¡°Don¡¯t worry about that master and mistress! In the name of the contract! I shall serve my master faithfully!¡± the creature swore, of course Aethas know for a fact that Rizglop will try to exploit any possible loophole that could bring itself benefits. ¡°Then my master, mistress- let us wait and witness your servant true prowess!¡± Rizglop proclaimed- just from the tone alone, Aethas and Valeera can safely assume that this creature is very egoistic, but at least this thing can be somewhat trustworthy, as the contract between Servant and Master are absolute, if it were to go against him- being banished or imprisoned is the least of it worry. As a warlock apprentice, professor Sunreach made sure to teach him the method of punishing his minions if there¡¯s a day that they goes against his will. After letting Rizglop snoop around a bit undetected, the little imp finally managed to pick up on something. ¡°Master! I pick up a source of magic here!¡± the creature called out to him, he could see what the little imp was talking about, it was a trunk placed under a pile of rubble covered in magical runes- it look promising yes, however the main problem is, the trunk is behind the enemy line, which now include a rampaging Pit Lord in the mess. ¡°DIE!!!¡± Annihalash roared as the monstrosity stomped both of it front foot onto the stone, creating a fiery infernal of fel-fire, annihilating the Mana Surges that was summoned forth by the Arcane Aberration, the stomp felt like a minor Earthquake as the entire structure itself vibrates under the force, of course being the engine of destruction and carnage itself, Annihalash didn¡¯t just stop there and body slam the Arcane elemental into the wall and give it a hard beatdown with a fist covered in Felsteel spikes. The Arcane elemental howled in pain as the Felsteel spike ripping of mana off from it body, however this is not the end, as their location is right above the drilled point of the Leyline, the Arcane elemental quickly made use of such advantages and began draining power from the Leyline itself and heal it damaged body. ¡°WHY WON¡¯T YOU DIE!!!¡± Annihalash pushed on the offense, of course the Mana Elemental doesn¡¯t just let itself be a punching bag, the aberration clawed and bite the demon with it arcane energized claws and teeth, burning the demon with each attack.If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. As for Aethas, Valeera and Rizglop, the three went unnoticed under the chaos and destruction caused by the two titans, if there¡¯s a better words to describe the situation of the fight, Aethas could concluded that this will be a draw and most likely ended in mutual destruction, assuming the Pit Lord don¡¯t just randomly rip a portal and ran back to the Twisting Nether and abandoned the fight all together. However, it doesn¡¯t look like that¡¯s going to happen anytime soon, the Mana elemental had riled up the angry Pit Lord way beyond the point of salvation, now the Demon just want the creature dead at all cost. Part 2 Using the giant distraction that is the summoned Pit Lord, Aethas stealthily went to the area that the imp pointed him to and pushed away the rubble and debris that¡¯s around. ¡°It look like an ancient enchantment of some sort¡­¡± Aethas mumbled as he placed his hand on the trunk and felt the ancient mana coursing through his finger. ¡°Well no shit genius! Oh my apology master- I have a bad habit of sprewing cursed, existing in the Twisting Nether can change someone as noble as I, quite drastically.¡± Rizglop ran to the trunk and pulled out a small stone with an evil looking rune carved on it. ¡°Load and behold! Witness the prowess of I! Rizglop, the treasure hunters of worlds! The plunderer!¡± the little minions gave a little speech before smacking the stone onto the lock, creating a small explosion and kicking up dust. ¡°What the hell you little shit!¡± Aethas cursed as he tried to cover Valeera who was next to him from the shards of stones and dust flying outward of the explosion. Luckily, it seems like no matter how much of a ruckus they caused, the two monsters that is currently fighting for dominance is too busy to notice them. ¡°Alright, let see what¡¯s inside.¡± Aethas open the trunk, and the content were revealed to his eyes, which is a pile crystallized Mana Crystals, however this one seemed different from the rest that were laying around the corridors and passageways. ¡°Well¡­ that was a waste, just a bunch of crystallized mana crystal, here I thought it would be some artifact¡­¡± Aethas sighted, in the end, it¡¯s just mana crystal, but at least it would be of some use once he manage to bring this trunk back to Tranquillien- but of course, he had to find a way to get out of here first. ¡°Hey Rizglop is there a way out of here?¡± feeling that it¡¯s pointless to stay here any longer and get caught in this hot mess, Aethas couldn¡¯t help but ask made the foolish action of asking a Demon for help, of course, being a Demon Rizglop. ¡°My apology master, but I doubt my option would¡­ well, be healthy for your well-being¡­¡± Rizglop answered, Aethas could already guessed it- a trip to the Twisting Nether, not the best place for kids to be in, since the place is infested with Demons and horror from the Dark Beyond. ¡°But I don¡¯t think you have to look for that route to escape master, as you can see- it looks like those 2 brutes are about to be done¡­ well maybe for the Pit Lord.¡± Rizglop commented, seeing that the Pit Lord body had been horribly mutilated. ¡°You need a way to prevent that Arcane elemental from regenerating! Cut off it power supply!¡± Rizglop pointed out. ¡°We have to locate the focusing Keystone! That¡¯s what must be supply the Arcane elemental!¡± Valeera voiced her opinion, of course she isn¡¯t the only one who thought of that plan, but the problem was where is the damn Keystone hidden. ¡°You mean this thing right here?¡± however, beyond Aethas expectation, Rizglop dug out a rune cover stone from it pouch and showed it the 2 children¡¯s. ¡°Are you messing with me Rizglop¡­¡± Aethas couldn¡¯t help but to have the urge of chaining up this little bastard and burn it soul for years to come. ¡°Now what¡¯s going to happen to that Arcane Elemental.¡± Valeera couldn¡¯t help but to voice out her curiosity, technically it should feel the effect of regeneration weakened the moment the focusing Keystone was taken away- however it seem like the Pit Lord is doing a nice job of keeping it distracted. ¡°MY POWER! WHAT IS HAPPENING!!!¡± the Mana elemental howled, feeling it power being weakened considerable, and the regeneration effect had long been stopped, seeing the Arcane elemental regenerating effect had disappeared, Annihalash laughed menacingly and continued it vigorous rampage using the last of it vitality. ¡°BE DESTROY!!!¡± the Pit Lord bellowed and grab tightly onto the Arcane Aberration and ready itself for self-destruction. ¡°Master, Mistress- I think you might want to find some cover¡­¡± Rizglop advised the two children, knowing how dangerous a Pit Lord can be at the moment of death before it returning to the Twisting Nether, upon picking up what Rizglop was trying to warn them, he immediately pulled Valeera behind a large fallen pillar and duck- what happened next almost rupture their drums. *BOOOOM! *crash! *crash! The Pit Lord Annihalash blows itself up and brought half of the chamber down with it, all Aethas hope for is that the Arcane elemental perish alongside that piece of menace from the Twisting Nether. ¡°Did both of them perish together?¡± Valeera asked, clearly shaken up by the event that happened today, clearly this too is more adventure than she could have bargained for. ¡°...hopefully it is- dear god, just how resilience is this thing?!¡± look like they had their hopes up too high, when the dust finally cleared, the figure of the Arcane aberration can still be seem, however this one is clearly weakened to the extreme and is fizzling out from the plane of existence. ¡°Just stay right here, I¡¯ll be right back.¡± Aethas gently patted Valeera head before heading toward the residue of the Arcane elemental. ¡°Aethas! Wait stop!¡± Valeera try to follow her crush, however Rizglop grab hold of her hand. ¡°I don¡¯t think you want to get in between what he¡¯s about to do.¡± the little demon advised. Chapter 15: The Sealing(End of Volume 1) Part 1 Aethas stand before the near death door Arcane elemental fearlessly, the monster stare at Aethas with endless hatred in it eyes, ready to rip him into pieces. ¡°This is what you want right?¡± Aethas held up the focusing Keystone in his hand, taunting the aberration, right now- the only thing that could possibly save it from the brink of Mana exhaustion, which is deadly in the case of a creature that was made of pure mana, is this object which held a control over the Leyline power and the surrounding mana. The Arcane elemental immediately rushed toward him- ¡°Like hell I would let you have it!¡± Aethas quickly tossed the Keystone aside, attracting the creature attention which give him a brief window of time for his secret trump card. ¡°What remnant of your power is now mine! [Drain Life]!¡± another Warlock ability that was taught to Aethas by his teacher, the skill that sucked the essence of a creature and benefit the caster, a sinister vampiric skill- however, Aethas had thought of another possibility for this spell! ¡°Aethas! What are you doing! Run! Quickly get out of there!¡± Valeera shouted. ¡°My mistress! Can you not see what the master is trying to do! He is draining the very essence of the creature and absorbing it for himself! Such ingenious move!¡± Rizglob cannot be give his master, Aethas praises- if his master were to succeed, his power would receive a qualitative changes! It wouldn''t be that bad serving such a master, Rizglob dream of becoming a Demon Lord wouldn¡¯t just be a dream anymore! ¡°JUST ACCEPT YOUR FATE ALREADY!¡± Aethas roared at the wailing aberration of Mana, whom were struggling with all of it might, trying to break free and get away at all cost, clawing itself into the stone floor of the chamber while howling, seeing this scene Aethas pressed on more pressure and increased the output power of his [Drain Life] spell, slowly the Arcane elemental body began to get absorbed into the palm of his hand, bit by bit. ¡°ARGHHH!!! DAMN IT!!! JUST DIE ALREADY!!!¡± The raw power of the creature- even if it¡¯s only a shadow of it former self is enough to cause burns on his arms, which then extended up into his body caused Aethas to growl in agony, the massive amount of mana flowing through Aethas right now is enough to cause his blood vein to glow vibrantly by the time he finished absorbing the last drop of mana from the monster, leaving only a rolling blue core behind. ¡°God damn it! Finally- argghhh the pain¡­¡± the only comparison he had for the amount of agony he gone through right now is getting run over by a train! He wailed on the ground. ¡°Aethas!¡± Valeera quickly ran over to Aethas to check on his condition, when she got there, Valeera was shocked and horrified seeing the extensive amount of damage he had suffered- his hands were blackened and cracked with mana residue gushing out. ¡°I¡¯m fine Valeera, this is nothing but a scratch.¡± he chuckles, with great power comes great agony- or so that¡¯s what they said, look like it is indeed true. ¡°How are you feeling my master?¡± Rizglop appeared and questioned his master with great expectations. ¡°The feeling is just great!¡± Aethas slowly stood up- now after the pain has subsided, he could feel the power coursing through his very blood- Aethas knew that he had saturated every single cells within his body to their limit capacity and with a flip of his hand, a blast of pure condensed arcane energy crashed onto the debris that had previously blocked their path of escape. ¡°This could be quite addicting¡­¡± Aethas look down on his hands and contemplated. His parents are going to question him about these battle injuries most likely, another fact is, since the battle is over, it''s time to gather his loot and get the hell out of this place, the Keystone and the Arcane core definitely needed to be collect- he could use those materials to possibly craft Epic quality if not Legendary artifact in the future- sure it might be a farfetch dream, but when you¡¯re young, dream big they said.Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road. ¡°Valeera, help me gather up as much treasure as possible, we need to get out of here.¡± he ordered, Valeera was stunned for a moment before she snapped back and quickly pick up as many crystallized mana crystal and stuffed them into her satchel, and as for Aethas- he had already pocket the 2 most important items already. ¡°Rizglop, your share will be what remained in that trunk, 50% of the amount we have looted today- our deal is complete, you may return to the Twisting Nether.¡± Rizglop has no complain- or much to complain anyway, he could not voiced his object as it is indeed true, 50% of the loot- ¡°Summon me more often master! I shall serve you faithfully from now on.¡± the imp laughed before a Fel-fire magic circle appeared beneath him and the tiny imp exploded. Part 2 The once ¡°peaceful¡± town of Tranquillien now busy with activity as workers moved back and forth, dragging stones and bricks toward the construction site, it has been 4 months since the day Aethas retrieved the Keystone from the Sanctum of the Moon- his goal now was with the instruction of professor Sunreach, and the fellow mages, construct a new Arcane Sanctum, one that is large enough to supply the town with endless mana and possibly the entire Ghostlands region once it is fully reclaimed. Aethas was now currently walking around the site, viewing and overseeing the progress that had been done thus far, strangely enough both of his hands were wrapped with a thick clothes of silk acting as bandages, of course the injuries had completely healed, however the remnant, the scar is still there, Aethas wanted to hide these injuries away from the public eyes as to not draw attention to himself- it would be strange if one were to see a child walking down the road with both of his hands shown visible burn scar with glowing veins. ¡°Foreman, when is the expected time that this sanctum be completed?¡± he asked the elf with a yellow hard hat, holding the blueprint of what seemed to be a giant castle tower. ¡°Oh boss! Glad to see you here, if everything goes according to plan, your Sanctum will be completed in another 6 months.¡± the foreman told him- to Aethas 6 months is indeed a long time, seeing that they only managed to dig out the foundation and completed laying the groundwork just a week prior, however thinking of all the process that had to go through for the sanctum to activate, he couldn¡¯t possibly voiced his complaints, the building itself, the materials that needed to be transported, the labor force that needed, the coins that those workers want and finally- the mages shifting and directing the leyline. After Aethas finished a tour of the construction site, he quietly walk back home- to his teacher, professor Sunreach resident, which is a renovated spire that were abandoned years ago but now purchased over to Aethas family. ¡°Ah my dear apprentice, you¡¯re finally returned to see your teacher, how was the note I gave you? Any inspiration? Demon summoning can be quite dangerous, you must always make preparations!¡± the old elf advised, during those 4 months, Aethas did nothing but to seek more knowledge from his teacher on the dark art- the old elf was reluctant at first, however after Aethas demonstrated a bit of his newfound power, he was MORE than happy to give up those knowledges for his cute disciple. Which ranges from spells from mages, advance enchanting and disenchanting, and the juiciest of them all, Warlock spells on Demon summoning- the old man might be a warlock whom specialized in the way of destruction during his prime, but it doesn¡¯t mean that he didn¡¯t know anything about other specializations, which range from the curses of Affliction to the conjuring of powerful demonic entities- and Aethas was more interest on the latter part. During those months, he had completely mastered all the knowledge the old warlock had to offer- the only option he had left now is either wait for the portal to Dalaran to be stabilized- or seek an adventure of his own, since based on his teacher''s description of the ¡°new¡± Azeroth power scale. Aethas could be considered to be a full fledged sorcerer with the Apprentice badge to show for proof- unlike the game which is based on the level of the player to determine power. In this new world, an individual power level is determined by the power they have proofed and what they earned- such as the apprentice badge. In the world, there are Novice, Apprentice, Journeyman, Expert and Master- above that are the realm beyond any mortal could achieved- only under strict conditions can they possibly be met, a Paragon or a Champion, to put it into easier terms to understand, Aethas estimate that if these titles and ranks- Paragon or Champion would be on the same level as the leader of a race or faction back in the game, unfortunately his teacher does not know what is above that realm, as he is only a Master Warlock before his retirement. Fortunately, unlike the game which were just a simulation, this is reality, thus of course there is a chance and possibility that even a Novice could find a way to take down someone who is at the master level, it might be low but it still exists and knowing that his own power is above that of many people in this world does give him a sense of accomplishment- however if his teacher had a better estimation, Aethas ranking is in no way below that of the Journeyman realm, quite possibly an expert with just the ridiculous amount of mana he had inside of himself. The only limitation he had is experiences and the way he utilized his spell.