Chapter 231

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Chapter 231: Offering

"Come look!"

Greed called out, pointing to a makeshift tent made of tattered cloth nearby.

After Jesse walked over, he discovered that inside this half-height tent were many things: several coins similar to the ones from the Ogre before, a black short sword, and a scattered pile of various materials of paper.

What was strange was that they were surrounded by a circle of white candles burnt halfway. Where did these candles come from?

The dwarf stooped down to pick up all the coins into a bag, Jesse picked up one candle and noticed some hair stuck to the base.

Could this have been plucked from a Kobold’s head?

He put down the candle, picked up the black sword and asked, "What do you think of this?"

Greed took the sword, swung it back and forth, and said, "Is this the weapon of that dead guy outside?"

Jesse looked at the sword and it felt familiar, especially when he held it, reminding him of the long dagger a Death Knight in Dalaran had.

Either way, it’s mine now.

He took the sword and tied it to his waist with a rope, then picked up the papers to look at them. Some of the papers looked… like darkened human skin. The words on them were written closely together, not in a common language or Orcish. They seemed different from Demonic too.

And they all seemed like they were torn from a book.

Books made from human skin?

Jesse flipped through the papers and felt that if it was human skin, it was indeed a bit too dark.

While there are darker-skinned people among humans, surely they wouldn’t use only black people to make human skin books. What a creepy preference, and the writing is also illegible.

If it’s Orc skin, it’s neither green enough nor yellow enough. Strictly speaking, this skin looks grayish-blue…

Draenei skin?

Draenei are a group of Eredar exiles who fled their home planet of Argus when they surrendered to the Burning Legion demons. The leader of the Draenei is Velen, one of the three Eredar kings.

Eventually, they settled in Outland and clashed with the Orcs. With the help of demons, the Orcs defeated the Draenei and enslaved many of them who couldn’t escape, leading to a tragic fate for them.

Thinking about this, Jesse felt a shiver down his spine, considering the series of actions the Orcs took against the Draenei when they crossed the Dark Portal to attack Azeroth, it seemed possible.

"Can you understand these things, Saenor?" Jesse asked.

"Some Nathrezim language, master!" imp held up a paper and said, "It records the spells and practices of Necromancy! But other… other… I’m not so sure about."

"Besides spells, what else?"

"The Nathrezim language is rarely used by demons other than themselves. I can read it, but translating… I only know a small part of it," imp admitted.

Jesse looked at the infernal fire emanating from imp and then at the dead grass and tents around. He said, "Come inside your cage, Saenor, don’t wander around here."

"Yes!"

Climbing onto Jesse’s cloak, imp crawled into the bag.

"What is a Nathrezim?" Greed asked.

"It’s a Dread Lord," Jesse whispered into the opening of the bag.

"Dread Lord?" Greed frowned. "Some kind of scary nobleman or landlord?"

Jesse realized that since the War of the Ancients, Dread Lords had not openly appeared on this continent. Few people, apart from the most powerful mages, had accurate knowledge about these demons.

"You can think of them as very clever demons with a lot of dark magic, especially Necromancy and Shadow Magic," Jesse said, looking at the human body outside. "Gul’dan was able to create Death Knights, and I suspect they might be involved. Look at that human body outside, I think it’s the remains of a Death Knight."

"How do you know?" the dwarf asked.

"When Teron Gorefiend escaped, he left behind his body. I took a look that night, and it was quite a grotesque sight."

Jesse spoke, remembering the scene in the alley that night, with Gorefiend’s body next to an undead creature.

Jesse asked, "Do you think these undead Gnolls are being brought back to life by the dead spirit energy in this husk?" Jesse explained, "The Gnolls discovered this, so they pile up their dead companions here to keep them coming back to life."

Greed asked, "Are you sure?"

Jesse said, "Otherwise, how do you explain the animated corpses here? You’ve seen the ones resurrected by the Necromancer, it’s clearly different from what’s happening here."

Greed asked again, "The ones resurrected by the Necromancer are even smarter than these mindless zombies! Why don’t the Gnolls just let the Necromancer handle all the resurrecting?"

Jesse pondered, "That’s true. So, how did the Necromancer come here?"

Greed asked, "What do you mean?"

Jesse explained, "The Necromancer itself is an undead, Greed. I realized that during our battle… that creature feels no fear, no pain, you have to smash its head to defeat it."

Greed scratched his head and whispered, "An undead Necromancer…"

The dwarf agreed, "If the Necromancer can bring back stronger undead, the Gnolls wouldn’t be piling bodies here, hoping this husk can only resurrect mindless corpses."

Also, from the wandering undead here, even the Riverpaw clan led by Hogger seems uninterested in resurrecting corpses.

Why did Hogger run towards this direction like he’s gone crazy before he died?

"If this body can really revive the dead, did Hogger come here hoping that after he dies, that thing outside will revive him?" the dwarf asked.

"I thought about that too," Jesse said. "But why didn’t it go back to its own headquarters and let the Necromancer resurrect it?"

"Maybe the whole Riverpaw clan has only one Necromancer, Jesse!" Greed said. "You forgot that when I wanted to kill it, Hogger went crazy trying to stop me…"

"There is only one… I suddenly thought of a possibility," Jesse said. "Could it be possible that this body resurrected a spellcasting undead, which is the Necromancer, so the Gnoll put all the warlock bodies here, hoping to resurrect another Necromancer? Look at these Gnolls, they are smaller than the ones outside, Gnoll Warlocks are generally smaller!"

"Apart from the one, all the resurrected ones turn out to be these rubbish small zombies," Greed added. "It’s very likely, I feel like these Gnolls are treating these human bodies like gods, look at this scene."

The dwarf’s expression became complicated as he looked at this small space surrounded by dry tree branches, saying softly, "But do you think this Death Knight was killed or escaped like Gorefiend?"

"Killed by the Gnolls? How likely do you think it is…" Jesse sighed. "In that case, let’s take these things away first, this is not a good place, we have been staying here for too long."

He bent down to pick up the remaining papers one by one, saying, "Let’s find a safe place to talk first."

Greed grabbed Jesse’s wrist and said, "What are you planning to do with these papers? We should burn everything here!"

"I agree to burn this place," Jesse said, "but I will hand over these documents to…"

It was then that he realized he couldn’t give these things to the mage at Wizard’s Sanctum.

If he were to deliver these things himself and word got out to Kirin Tor, would Kel’Thuzad find a reason to imprison or destroy him?

Worse yet, would he force Jesse to become his apprentice?

He didn’t want to have any further dealings with Kel’Thuzad.

"What are you hesitating for, Jesse?" Greed asked, gripping his sturdy collar. "Are you thinking of learning Necromancy from these papers?"

"Learn what!" Jesse exclaimed. "If I hand these things over to the mage, I might be mistaken for a Necromancer, Greed. I can’t just give them away like that. Do you know how serious this is?"

"I hope I can trust you, Jesse." Greed said, " If you choose to become a Necromancer, I will not let you go."

"Even for elves, Necromancy is a forbidden taboo, let alone for us. I would rather burn both of us and this cursed place than let these things leak out. Did you see what that Necromancer was doing just now? Unless you want the entire Elwynn Forest and Stormwind to become like Duskwood? Maybe the reason why nothing happened at the Raven Hill Great Mausoleum at first was because a mage like you wanted to learn the things left behind by the Orcs?"

"I won’t learn it, but this is crucial evidence that can’t just be burned like that." Jesse said, "What if there are clues about other Necromancers in the Horde, or information about that Death Knight, not just some magic spells? After all, even the imp can’t make out what’s on here. Burning it will only cut off the trail here! Even if there are only spells… there could still be clues to use. That elf, the one from Reliquary, told me that they can use magic to detect any magical traces left on items, to find out who touched these objects! Just imagine if we could hand this over to those elves… Yes, so why not sell it to the elves?"

Greed paused, saying, "That makes sense, let those elves deal with it, give it to that Windrunner, isn’t she looking for the Death Knight? Let her do it… darn it, I don’t want to deal with this stuff anymore, do you know where she lives?"

"She lives in my house."

"What?!" Greed grabbed Jesse’s cloak and asked, "Why?"

"I… have another home, let go of me."

"What? You have a second house in Stormwind?"

"The Wizard’s Sanctum apartment… let go of me."