Chapter 167: Under the Pine Tree

The next day, December 11th, was finally the day of the Orcish Language Exchange.

It was after ten when Jace woke up, and thinking about the meeting he had to have in the afternoon, he always felt like he should take advantage of the little time he had before he left to perfect his speech.

He took out the draft paper that he had written earlier with words so densely packed that it looked like it was bumpy with little tumors, and thought about how to help the mages of Dalaran realize that the artifact, the Eye of Dalaran, might be under threat without naming the three artifacts.

The three artifacts on the order were already very obvious, and there weren’t many places in the world that humans knew of that were dedicated to storing artifacts; Karazhan was one, Dalaran was one, Quel’Thalas was one, the royal capital of Lordaeron was one, and of course Stormwind City counted as one in the past, and it couldn’t be counted after it had been looted once.

Karazhan can be ruled out, because the periphery of Karazhan was basically controlled by the orcs during the war, not to mention that his master was originally the initiator of the Dark Gate incident, as long as the mages who have some judgment on the war situation, all tacitly agree that if there was any treasure in Karazhan that could help the orcs continue their attack on the world of Azeroth, it would have been taken out by Madiwen and given to Gul’dan.

Stormwind City used to be the place where the Book of Medivine was stored, then the Book of Medivine was stolen, and only after the fall of the city of Outlander did the people realize that the Book of Medivine had been stolen by someone sent by the Pyrrhonid family, the royal family of Outlander, but of course by the time they realized this the Talon-Blood Demons had already marched in on the city, and it was all too late. Quel’thalas, despite being hit hard in the second war, the main city still stood without any serious damage even under that terrible attack, and the elves’ conservative guarding of their own territory, walls and treasures was so reassuring to the entire continent that people shouldn’t have to worry about a foreign thief being able to get into the city of Silvermoon to steal anything.

So it’s almost logical to have everyone beware of Dalaran and Lordaeron.

And it was well known that although the capital of Lordaeron was prosperous and rich, it by no means stored as many magic-related holy artifacts as Dalaran.

By arguing the case around this point, you will surely be able to convince everyone that Dalaran is in danger.

Of course, he cut out a few more particularly offensive, or particularly smug, sentences to convince everyone that he was actually worried about Dalaran’s safety after extrapolating from it, rather than trying to deliberately steer Kenrito’s old guys into doing something when he clearly knew something and didn’t want to say it.

Of course, he also reminded himself to stop this dangerous channeling as soon as the mages present sensed something was wrong.

He cared about the Eye of Dalaran, of course, but more than that he cared about his own little life, and couldn’t expose himself as a traveler who could foretell the future.

At 3:30 PM, Jace arrived at the meeting place early, and there weren’t many people yet in front of the building Dushan had explained to him. It wasn’t far from the Violet Castle, and the pedestrians on the street hardly saw anyone other than mages, all wearing purple or blue robes.

It had rained intermittently last night, and everyone was wearing wide mage hats and heavy cloaks, and it looked like only Jace was just drenching himself hard with his head case like a fool.

The main part of Dalaran is more like a giant school than a city.

Jace had heard that when the academy reopened after the New Year’s Eve, this large area near Violet Castle was off limits to outsiders not related to the mages, and was even more strictly inspected than many schools.

So that he wouldn’t be thrown out suddenly, he was dressed rather neatly, with a shirt that his mother had sewn up for him, a mage tunic from the Sorcerer’s Sanctuary on the outside, and new pants that his mother had bought for him, and he looked down to be almost in the same taste as the mage assistants on the street.

He made a final check of the documents and materials he’d brought, most importantly the order, and his own transcribed version to make sure he hadn’t brought the wrong one, that he hadn’t missed it, and that it hadn’t been damaged.

And of course there was the Sorcerer’s Temple emblem of apprenticeship, which represented his identity, and Dushan had reminded him several times to remember to bring his ring to this meeting.

Admission to the meeting was to begin at 4:00, and Dushan hadn’t said for sure what time it would start, but Jess felt sure it would go well into the night, so he’d taken a small afternoon nap and was still kind of refreshed.

He had no intention of going in early and waiting for everyone to show up one by one, but instead he hid in the street park outside this domed building, circling back and forth around the trunk of a huge pine tree in the shade.

He spun and recited the key words of his prepared script while keeping an eye out for any appearance of Dushan’s figure.

At that moment, Jace saw a group of elves walking briskly, the lead red-haired elf walking fast and walking through the door as he commanded something to his fellow travelers.

This would be the group of elves attending the orc conference, it wasn’t that Jace hadn’t expected there to be elves attending the conference, but he really hadn’t expected there to be this many.

It has been mentioned before that the Prince of the Elves, Kael’thas Sunseeker, has a very poor attitude towards Orcs, and that he approves of the establishment of the Shelter, but that he approves of it in the hope that it will be an efficient place to gather all the Orc captives, and then centrally “dispose of” them to avoid any future problems.

The presence of this elven group was enough to show that there were also people in Quel’thalas who disagreed with Kael’thas. After all, if all the orcs were dealt with, there wouldn’t be much need to learn the orcish language.

After a few leading elves entered the building, a group of elves dressed in relatively simpler and plainer clothes stayed outside the door, looking at their scattered stations, they might be the guards responsible for providing security for the group of elves just now.

Some of the elven guards stood to this side, and Jace saw a familiar face within.

It’s Kefal Minwing.

When Jace saw Kefal, the other man noticed him as well. He gave this side a smile and walked over.

“Jace Sesso, what, are you here for the orc meeting as well? I thought you were rather enlightened, like someone who would learn the language of those beasts.”

“It’s not like I’m learning orcish to be enlightened.” Jace said, “What about you, you wouldn’t be interested in orcish as well, would you?”

“Interested, but I haven’t learned yet.” Kefal lifted his belt of blue magic-printed cloth sewn with gold filigree and said, “I’m just here to work as a security guard for the Sun Raiders.”

“The Sun Raider?”

“Aethas Sunbreaker.” Kefal said, “You’ve never heard of the name? He’s Quel’thalas’s ambassador in Dalaran, interested in learning the orcish language and in favor of continuing to dig into the culture behind the Orcs and the Dark Gate, that ‘Abomination of Rano’.”

“I didn’t realize you elves had officials who were so curious about the outside world, I remember Prince Kelthas not liking orcs.” Jace said.

Kefal said, “Aethas has a relative in the Relic Society, and the Relic Society has never cared about any outsiders, insiders. As long as it’s a spell that holds power, a holy relic, they’re all interested. After digging up this land for the past few hundred years, they were worried that there was nothing to study and no books to write, when suddenly a group of otherworldly madmen came, speaking strange languages, wielding unique swords and weapons, and using rare magic, do you think that they would let go of this opportunity? Those researchers supported by the Sun King don’t care about offending an erratic prince.” When he finished he glared up and pretended to corners his mouth saying, “Accidentally telling the truth.”

Jace let out a chuckle and asked, “Do you farseers have to take on defense duties as well?”

“It would not have been necessary.” Kefal said, “But thanks to you and those brave Dragonborn, Jace, the Black Dragon has rarely been seen these past two days. And now that there are no new orders from General Silvanus’ side, and the defenders of the Dalaran Embassy’s soil have gone to defend the prince, then the defenders of the Sun Raiders will have to be us rangers who have nothing better to do.”

“The Black Dragon hasn’t shown up in the last two days? Why.” Jace asked.

Kefal explained, “It’s been a few days now, the last time was on the 7th, when a black young dragon was seen flying over Stannblad. Several nearby towns, both Lordaeron and Dalaran, have dispatched sufficient numbers of mages and archers to defend them, and with this perfect defense, I don’t think those black dragons would want to make a pointless attack after touching dust a few times.”

Jace felt his throat go a little dry and couldn’t help but swallow.

Maybe it was because the meeting was about to start a little nervously, or maybe it just didn’t feel right.

If the defenses of the surrounding towns are complete, doesn’t that mean that Dalaran’s defenses are at their weakest?

He turned his head to look at the magnificent Violet Castle, towering over the city like it wasn’t something that was realistically built with human hands, especially the floating structure at the very top that was if anything obscured by clouds, a magical wonder at all. Perhaps the people who lived at the very top never imagined that such a place could be subjected to aggression, right?

“But it’s not bad to be a guard, right?” Jace said, “At least in a place as safe as Dalaran, you can take a pulse and be lazy, not as if you’re in one of those off-the-beaten-path forests …… where you always have to be on your toes, afraid of where there’s an orc trap, or as if the enemy is ambushing you.”

“Safety equals boredom.” Kefal wiped away the raindrops that had fallen from the pine needles onto his forehead with his fingers and said, “Otherwise I wouldn’t have run here to find you to pass the time, I’d rather find you and that dwarf for another fight. Another couple hours of punishment to follow, and it’s excruciatingly painful to think about, especially when you think that someone on the same team could have gotten away with not having to come here.”

“Who?”

“Who else could it be, our Ms. Winressa of course.” Kefal smiled.

“Why isn’t she coming, is there another mission?” Jace asked.

Kefal narrowed his eyes and asked, “Are you serious?”

“Weird?”

“You’ve got the Silvermoon City Ranger General’s own sister protecting this Sun Raider?”

“Seems, indeed, not quite right.” Jace laughed awkwardly, just as he saw Dushan coming this way from the distance.

“Time’s up, I’m going in, good luck finding any other fun here.”

“Aldielshala,” One Kefal sighed, leaning against the wet trunk of a tree and speaking casually in Elvish.

Jace looked back at him as he caught the words.Aldielshala, have a safe trip.