Chapter 231 – Offerings

“Come and see!”

Grid shouted, pointing to the fact that next to it was a simple tent made of rags.

As Jace walked over, he noticed a number of things laid out in the half-human-tall tent, a few coins similar to the ogre coin from earlier, a black short sword, and a scattered pile of paper of varying materials.

The strangest thing was that they were surrounded by a circle of half-burned white candles – where did they all come from?

The dwarf bowed his head and picked up all those coins into a bag, and Jace picked up one of the candles and looked at it, noticing that there were still some stray hairs on the base.

This couldn’t have been gripped from a dog’s head, could it?

He put down the candle, picked up the short black sword, and held it at the end and asked, “What do you think of this?”

Grid reached out and took the sword, shook it back and forth and said, “This is the weapon of the guy who died out there?”

Jace looked at the sword with some familiarity, especially when holding it, it reminded him of the long dagger held by the Death Knight he had encountered back in Dalaran.

Anyway, it’s mine.

He took the sword and tied it with a rope to hang it on his waist, and then he picked up the papers to check them, some of which looked …… like darkened human skin. The words written on them were densely packed together, and were neither Common nor Orcish, and looked different from Demonese as well.

Also, they all look like they were ripped out of a book.

A book made out of human skin?

Jace flipped the papers back and forth for a moment, feeling that if they were human skin, they did look a little too dark.

Although there are darker-skinned communities within the human race, it’s not like they’re all black people making human skin books, what kind of weird fucking fetish is that, and the bottom line is that the writing isn’t legible.

If it’s orc skins, it’s neither green nor yellow enough, these skins are strictly grayish bluish ……

Draconian skin?

The Draenei are a group of Aeridan exiles who fled their homeland of Argus when the Aeridans fell to the demons of the Burning Legion, and Velen, one of the Three Kings of Aeridan, is their leader.

Eventually they settled in the Outlands and came into conflict with the orcs, and finally the orcs defeated the Draconians with the help of the demons and enslaved the countless Draconian slaves who failed to escape, and their end can be …… said to be quite tragic.

Jace felt his scalp tighten at the thought, which was quite possible considering the series of maneuvers the orcs had performed on the draenei when they crossed the Dark Gate to attack Azeroth.

“Can you read this stuff, Saeuno.” Jace asked.

“Some of the language of Nasrezim, master!” The little ghost lifted up a piece of paper and said, “Records of the incantations and uses of necromancy! But I can’t speak well of the other …… other …… ones.”

“What else is there besides the spell?”

“The language of Nasrezim is commonly used by few demons other than themselves, I can pronounce it, but translating …… it I only know a very small portion of what’s on here.” The kid confessed.

Jace looked at the evil fire coming from the brat, and then at the dead grass and tents all over the place, and said, “You come into the bag first, Saeuno, and don’t hang around here.”

“Yes!”

The Kid climbed into Jace’s cape and dug into the bag.

“What’s a Nasrezim?” Grid asked.

“It’s the Dreadnought.” Jace said zipping into the mouth of the bag.

“A Dreadlord?” Grid frowned, “Some kind of dread human lord, or landlord?”

It took Jace a moment to realize that the Dreadlord hadn’t made a public appearance on this continent since the Battle of the Ancients, and very few people other than some of the most powerful mages had an accurate knowledge of this demon.

“You can think of it as a very clever kind of demon. The kind that knows a lot of dark magic, especially necromancy and shadow magic.” Jace looked at the human corpse outside and said, “Gul’dan was able to create Death Knights, and I suspect it’s likely that they had a hand in it, and if you look at that human corpse out there, I think it’s the carapace of a Death Knight.”

“How do you know?” The dwarf asked.

“Talon Blood Demon left his shell behind when he escaped, and I went to take a look at it the other night, and it was that disgusting-looking thing.”

Jace said, remembering the scene in that alleyway that night, where there was even a walker sprawled out next to the blood demon’s carcass.

“Do you think these undead jackals, were they resurrected by the necromantic energy of this shell?” Jace said, “Those jackals found out about it, so they piled their dead companions here for it to continue to resurrect.”

“Are you sure?” Grid asked.

Jace said, “How else did the walkers here get here, you saw the ones the necromancer resurrected, they’re obviously different from the ones here.”

Grid asked again, “The ones resurrected by the necromancer are still more resourceful than these brainless zombies! Then why did the jackals put the corpses here, can’t all of them be resurrected by that necromancer?”

“Indeed.” Jace asked, “So, where did the necromancer come from?”

“What do you mean?” Grid asked.

“That necromancer is an undead in its own right, Grid.” Jace said, “I found that out when I fought it …… The creature wasn’t afraid of fear or pain, and had to be smashed in the head to get rid of it.”

Grid scratched his eyebrows and muttered, “Immortal Necromancer ……”

The dwarf was right, if the necromancer had a way to resurrect stronger dead bodies, then the jackals wouldn’t be piling bodies up here and expecting this husk to resurrect them into a bunch of trashy mindless walkers.

And judging by the walkers roaming the area, even the Riverclaw clan led by Hogg doesn’t seem to be interested in what the husks can resurrect out of it.

Then why was Hogg running this way like a madman before he died?

“If this husk really can revive corpses, does Hogg want to come here and expect to die and have that thing out there bring him back to life?” The dwarf asked.

“I thought of that too.” Jace said, “But why doesn’t it go back to its home base and let the necromancer resurrect itself?”

“Maybe the whole Riverclaw clan is that one necromancer, Jace!” Grid said, “You forgot when I was going to kill it and Hogg came to stop me like a madman ……”

“There’s only one …… possibility that occurred to me.” Jace said, “Could it be possible that this carapace resurrected an undead that could cast spells, the necromancer, so the jackals put all the warlock corpses here, expecting to resurrect another necromancer out of it? Look at how these Jackals are shorter than the ones outside, Jackal Warlocks are generally small!”

“Turns out that besides that one, all that came back to life were these trashy little walkers.” Grid added, “It’s indeed quite possible, I feel like these jackals are about to worship this human corpse as a god, just look at the gesture.”

The dwarf’s expression became a bit more complicated as he looked at the small space surrounded by deadwood branches and said softly, “But, would you say that this Death Knight was killed, or did he escape like the Blood Fiend?”

“Killed by jackals? How likely do you think that is ……” Jace sighed and said, “Tell you what, let’s get this stuff out of here first, this isn’t a good place to be, we’ve been here too long.”

He lowered himself down to collect the rest of the papers one by one, saying as he did so, “Let’s find a safe place to talk first.”

Greed grabbed Jace’s wrist and said, “What are you going to do with all that paper back there, we should burn the whole place down!”

“I agree with burning the place down.” Jess said, “But these documents I will give to ……”

Speaking of which he realized that he couldn’t give them to the mages of the Wizard’s Sanctuary.

If if he sent these things up himself and word got out to Kenrito, would Klsugard be found a reason to just lock himself up or physically destroy him?

Even scarier, would he let himself be his apprentice?

He didn’t want to have any more contact with Korsugard.

“What are you hesitating about, Jace?” Grid asked, grabbing the sturdy collar, “Are you trying to learn the necromancy on this?”

“Learn shit!” Jace said, “I could be treated like a necromancy practitioner if I give this stuff to a mage, Grid, so I can’t just hand it over like that, do you realize how serious this is?”

“I wish I could trust you, Jace.” Grid said, “If you plan on being a necromancer, I’ll never let you go.”

“Even for elves, necromancy is an untouchable taboo, let alone for us. I’d rather burn us both down along with this hellhole than let these things leak out, and you saw what that necromancer was doing just now …… God damn it! Unless you want the entire Elwyn Forest and Stormwind City to become like the Twilight Forest? Is it possible that nothing happened to the Great Cemetery in Raven Ridge in the beginning because a mage like you wanted to learn what these orcs left behind?”

“I’m not going to learn it, my word on it, but it’s extremely important evidence that can’t just be burned.” Jace said, “What if there are clues on this about other necromancers in the tribe, or if there is information about that death knight and not just some spell magic? After all, the kid can’t say what’s on it. A fire would only break the clues here! Even if there were only spells on this …… there would be clues that could be utilized. That elf, that Relic Society elf, told me that they can use magic to detect traces of magic left on any object to find the person who touched them! Just think if you can get this into the hands of those elves …… Right, so why not sell it to the elves?”

Gred froze and said, “That makes sense, let those elves get it, forget it, just leave it to that Windwalker, doesn’t she want to go find the Death Knight, let her …… damn it, I don’t want to be bothered with this stuff, do you know where she lives?”

“Stay at my house.”

“What?!” Grider asked, grabbing Jace’s cloak, “On what grounds?”

“I …… another home, you let go.”

“What? You have a second house to live in Stormwind?”

“The Witch Sanctuary’s apartment …… you let go.”