Chapter 24 – Strange Scroll

“It’s not my blood, it’s its.” The dwarf looked closer at the wolf’s head for a moment and said, “This is not a wolf of Aelwyn, this is an orc’s direwolf. The orcs brought many otherworldly creatures with them from Draenor, and the scourge of the worst of them, besides the ogres, is this wolf. There are no horses that can be ridden on that side of the Dark Gate, those orcs ride these wolves to fight.”

Looking at this giant wolf that had fallen to the ground, Jace gripped his axe and asked, “Are its claws the claws of evil?”

“That’s wicked enough.” The dwarf agreed.

Jace was just about to raise his axe and chop off its claws when he suddenly realized another problem – could the claws of the beasts of the Outlands, along with the claws of the creatures of Azeroth, be used as raw materials for the Claws of Evil?

Who cares if it’s doable, chop it down first.

Grid yanked up the seat wolf’s upper jaw and broke its knife-like canines to look back and forth.

“What do you think, Jess, what’s it really like over there?”

Jace picked up the axe, aimed the blade at the wolf’s paw, and asked, “Which way?”

“Of course it’s the Dark Gate side.” Grid tapped the forehead of the giant wolf, “Look at this wolf, he has a long mouth, a mouth full of teeth, the same ears, the same fur on his body, the same bright red blood …… can be said to be like an enlarged version of a gray wolf with a long neck and long legs. If I didn t know what kind of animal it was before, I would definitely believe you when you said it was a wolf. Maybe there are deer over there too, and sheep to feed these wolves, and grass, and flowers and trees, and maybe there are dwarves and humans too, Draenorians and Draenorian dwarves.”

Jace fought back his desire to give him an early dose of worldview and said, “Maybe.”

“It will all be clear when the Expeditioners return.” The dwarf shook his shoulders and head and said, “Can’t wait.”

The two worked for half an hour, Grid cut some meat, chopped up a leg bone and lifted it up ready to take back to Raven Ridge for an extra meal, and left the claws for Jace to carry.

Unfortunately, this whole wolf skin, this wolf was ridiculously heavy, the difficulty of skinning was several times higher than that of the coyote, and even if it was completely skinned, it would be difficult for the two to bring it back, so it could only be left to dry here.

Just as he was about to walk away, Jess suddenly seemed to remember something.

“Aren’t we here to find an orc warlock?”

“Isn’t there only one wolf here?” The dwarf asked rhetorically.

“And what was this wolf just eating?” Jess asked again.

Both of them turned back at the same time and looked to the corner where the behemoth had just been feeding.

Wolf carcasses filled the entire space with blood and gore, and there was a messy pile of severed limbs in the corner, broken flesh and bones placed in a messy manner, that was clearly not a wolf carcass.

“Look here, Jace.” Grid shouted from the corner there on the other side of the wall, and Jace looked over to see a dark brown head at his feet, just sitting there with round eyes staring in that direction.

That head was an orc’s head, and his skin was much darker than a normal orc’s; it was rare to see such a dark complexion, either in a green-skinned orc who had drunk the demon’s blood or a brown-skinned orc who hadn’t.

The dwarf said, “Check there, I’ll look over here, there’s something over here too.”

Jace nodded and uncovered a torn piece of clothing, a black and gray rag with a less obvious pattern, somewhat less visible because it was completely stained with blood.

He saw an iron chain buried under bones and rags, so he grabbed it and pulled it out a little bit, and as he did so, he pulled out a blood-stained leather bag.

The pouch could not be seen to be made of any kind of leather, and it was well made, not like an orc’s style.

Unbinding the bag, the first thing to come into view was surprisingly the spine of a book.

Feeling his heart thump violently with excitement, Jace carefully pulled the books out, only to find that this was the only spine that was intact; most of the paper had been burned off, and what was left was tinged with charred curls.

The bag was good, but the book was burnt, suggesting that it was probably picked up by this orc as well; there wasn’t much ash on the book, and the parts that were so badly scorched and browned that you couldn’t make out the writing seemed to have been carefully removed, leaving basically the yellowed areas where the writing was still readable, so it seemed that the orc had handled the remnants of this book properly as well.

Since he was willing to keep it, it meant that the book must be of some use.

He couldn’t understand any of the words on the book, he couldn’t even figure out if it was demonic or orcish, after all, he hadn’t seen either of them before, in any case, he would know if he brought it back to study it.

Continuing to flip inside, Jess came across the second book.

The book was roughly complete, except that the pages were much bloodstained, and all the writing on it was so densely packed Jace couldn’t read it at all, and there were no drawings in the book, no runes, it was full of small and large words and additional lines resembling notes, and it gave him a headache just looking at it.

But with Jace’s knowledge, he could just about detect that the book had two sets of language, one that seemed to have some sort of correspondence with the other.

Could this be a language learning book? For orcs to learn demonic languages?

In Draenor, many of the younger orcs have only been turning to the Void and Evil for a few years, and it’s likely that they won’t be able to familiarize themselves with the demonic incantations used for dark magic anytime soon, and it’s not out of the question that they will need to keep learning them on an ongoing basis, even when they come to Azeroth.

But he couldn’t jump to conclusions, after all, he was really in the dark and didn’t have a clue.

Unlike a native English speaker going to a French article, or a person who knows Chinese going to a Japanese news article, there are at least a few words or characters in a page that you can almost understand, and you can roughly guess the type of topic.

Now the two books were no different to him than Arabic, he didn’t know if he should start reading from the left or the right, he didn’t even know if he was holding them the other way around.

Beneath the book, at the far end of the bag, was another leather scroll.

The scroll was undamaged and untainted by any blood or other stains, and was well cared for.

Jace picked it up and looked at it, and just like earlier, couldn’t read any of the words at all, but a symbol in the bottom right corner caught his attention.

It was a purple rune that looked like a letter S and a lightning bolt, and the overriding writing style looked like a stone rune carved out by a knife.

There is a dot in the upper curve of this S, making the overall style of the symbol resemble a later tribal emblem.

Jace always remembered where he had seen this symbol before, in the game …… It was the emblem of the Shadow Council.

Yes, the level 70 version of the Burning Expedition’s Outlands, the planet of Draenor that remains after the destruction, and the Shadow Labyrinth in the Draenei catacombs of Auchindoun are littered with purple flags flying this symbol; it is, after all, one of the Shadow Council’s main gathering points.

This orc, is he even a member of the Shadow Council?

The Shadow Council is not a society of dirt, it was founded and headed by Gul’dan, the first orc warlock, and recruited orcs and even ogre wise men to learn shadow and demonic magic, it was the most powerful group of warlocks at the time, and it is speculated that the members of the Shadow Council even included real demons.

The Shadow Council colluded with Madivan, who was controlled by Sargeras, and led the fall of the orcs and the opening of the Dark Gate, and after the tribe’s great chief, the Black Hand, listened to Gul’dan’s compulsion, he became the manipulator behind the scenes of the entire tribe.

It could be said that during this period, every member of the Shadow Council was not only a fervent follower of Gul’dan, but also an absolute elite in the tribe.

The eyes of these warlocks were glowing with either a dark purple or emerald green magical light from the excessive intake of Shadow and Evil energy, and their skin was blackened from being in close proximity to the Void energy, just in line with the mutation in this guy’s head.

So why did this member of the Shadow Council succumb to death here?

Jace was a little worried that he was associating the symbol with the Shadow Council because of the black skin of this orc, and the gray outer robes together led him to associate it with the Shadow Council, after all, he wasn’t entirely sure that his memories weren’t skewed, and there was a possibility that this warlock didn’t belong to the Shadow Council.

If we can figure out what’s on this letter, we might be able to figure it all out.

“Look what I found.” Grid came from behind the door carrying a black stick and said, “Look at this.”

He held the stick up to Jace, “What do you think it’s made of?”

Jace touched the stick and it did feel like its material was neither metal nor wood, like something in between.

At the end of the stick was a base-like object that looked like it was supposed to hold something, but was now empty.

“This is this orc’s staff, right?” Jace said.

The dwarf asks, “Are you sure this orc is the warlock the elf was talking about?”

Jace shook the bag in his hand and said, “Look at this package, and this scroll …… Look at the markings on it, does it look familiar?”

He handed the scroll to Grid, who flipped it back and forth and looked at it, saying, “How does this look, I can’t read it at all ah, this symbol …… I haven’t seen it before either, it looks like the emblem on the flag of the orc tribe.”

“He’s wearing a black robe, or at least a long coat.” Jace said, “And the two books in here …… I can’t say what they’re about, but the average orc warrior probably doesn’t have the patience to read this kind of book filled with dense writing, right, even if he’s not a warlock, I know it’s a scholar of sorts.”

“Orc scholar.” Grid scratched his chin and said, “Sounds about as outrageous as an ogre thief.”

He took the stick and picked up the package and said, “Whatever it is, a staff, or a walking stick, anyway it’s just the thing to use as a stretcher to help me save some of my strength in carrying the bag, how’s it going, did you find any herbs yet?”

“No.” Jace said, “This orc certainly didn’t come here to gather anything.”

“Wouldn’t that be a wasted trip.” Grid said, “But at least got some meat to eat.”

Jace looked at the scroll and said, “This scroll, do you think, could it possibly be a letter from the orcs? Conveying some orders or something, if translated, it might figure out their movements.”

“We’d better not judge.” Grid glanced at the scroll again and said, “Want to give it to your boss to look at?”

Jace didn’t chime in, he wasn’t sure if giving this scroll to the Wizard’s Sanctuary would be good or bad for him.

He slanted a glance toward the door and said, “We’d better get going, we won’t make it back to Crow’s Ridge before dark.”