Chapter 24

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Chapter 024: The Strange Scroll

"It’s not my blood, it’s its." The dwarf approached the wolf’s head and examined for a while, saying, "This isn’t Elwynn’s wolf, it’s an Orc’s Worg. Orcs brought many creatures from Draenor, and among the most harmful besides the Ogres are these wolves. On the other side of the Dark Portal, there are no horses to ride, so those Orcs ride these wolves into battle."

Looking at the huge wolf lying on the ground, Jesse gripped his axe and asked, "Are its claws Wicked Claws?"

"This is very evil," the dwarf agreed.

Jesse was about to lift the axe to chop off its claws, then suddenly realized a question – can the claws of creatures from Outland, like those from Azeroth’s creatures, be used as Wicked Claw materials?

Never mind if it can be done, chop them off first and then we’ll see.

Greed pulled up the Worg’s upper jaw, inspecting its knife-like canine teeth back and forth.

"What do you think, Jesse, what is it like over there?"

Jesse picked up the axe, aimed the blade at the wolf paw, and asked, "Which way?"

"Of course, over there by the Dark Portal," Greed patted the giant wolf’s forehead, "Look at this wolf, it has a mouth, teeth galore, ears as well, fur, and blood as red as any. It’s like an enlarged version of a grey wolf with a long neck and legs. If I didn’t know what this creature was before, I would believe it’s a wolf for sure. Maybe there are deer and sheep over there to feed these wolves, also grass, flowers, and trees. Perhaps there are dwarfs and humans too, Draenor people and Draenor dwarfs."

Jesse held back his desire to enlighten him about the world, and said, "Perhaps."

"Everything will become clear when the expedition returns," the dwarf shrugged his shoulders and head, saying, "I can’t wait."

Two people worked for half an hour. Greed cut some meat and chopped off a leg bone to bring back to Raven Hill for a meal, while Jesse took the claws.

Unfortunately, this whole wolf skin, this wolf was unusually heavy. Removing the skin was several times more difficult than the small wolf, and even if they managed to remove it whole, it would be very difficult to take it back. They could only leave it here.

Just as they were about to leave, Jesse suddenly seemed to remember something.

"Aren’t we here to find the Orc Warlock?" he asked.

"Wasn’t there only one wolf here?" the dwarf asked back.

"Then what was this wolf just eating?" Jesse asked again.

The two of them turned their heads at the same time, looking at the corner where the giant beast had been eating just now.

The wolf carcass filled the whole space with a bloody smell. There lay a mess of broken limbs, shredded meat, and bones in the corner, clearly not belonging to the wolf.

"Look at this, Jesse," Greed called out from the other corner of the room. Jesse looked over and saw a dark brown head at his feet, lying round with wide eyes staring in that direction.

The head belonged to an Orc, with much darker skin than normal Orcs. It was rare to see such a dark skin color on either the green-skinned Orcs who drank demon blood or the brown-skinned Orcs who did not.

The dwarf said, "You check over there, I’ll look here, there are some things here too."

Jesse nodded and lifted a piece of torn clothing. It was a black and gray rag with faint patterns on it that were hard to see clearly due to being stained with blood.

He saw an iron chain buried under bones and rags and carefully pulled it out, revealing a blood-stained leather pouch as he tugged on it.

The bag’s leather material was unidentified, finely crafted, and did not resemble Orc style.

Undoing the pouch’s ties, the first thing that came into view was the spine of a book.

Jesse’s heart raced with excitement as he cautiously pulled out the book, only to find that the spine was intact while most of the pages had been burnt, with the remaining ones curled and yellowed from the heat.

The bag was intact, but the book was burnt, indicating that it was probably picked up by the Orc. The pages had little ash and the severely burnt parts, where the writing was unreadable, seemed to have been carefully removed, leaving mostly yellowed areas where the text was still visible. It appeared the Orc had taken good care of this damaged book.

Since he was willing to keep it, the book must have some use.

He couldn’t understand any of the words in the book. He couldn’t tell if it was Demonic or Orcish language, as he had never seen these before. Anyway, he planned to take them back to study.

Jesse kept flipping through and found the second book.

The book seemed mostly intact, but the pages were stained with blood. Jesse couldn’t understand any of the densely packed words on them. There were no drawings or runes, just lots of small text and what looked like annotations, which gave him a headache.

Based on Jesse’s knowledge, he could sense that the book seemed to have two different languages, which seemed to have some kind of relationship.

Could this be a language learning book? Teaching Orcs to learn Demonic?

In Draenor, many young Orcs had only turned to void and fel magic a few years ago, and it was likely that they wouldn’t be familiar with the dark magic spells of demons in a short time. Even upon arriving in Azeroth, continuous learning would be necessary.

But he couldn’t jump to conclusions, as he was completely clueless.

Unlike a native English speaker reading a French article or a person who knows Chinese trying to read Japanese news, where they might recognize a few similar words or characters in a page and could guess the general topic.

These two books were as different from Arabic as they were for him. He didn’t know if he should start reading from the left or the right, and he wasn’t even sure if he was holding them upside down.

Under this book, inside the bag, there is a small rolled-up piece of leather.

The scroll is undamaged, without any bloodstains or dirt, and well preserved.

Jesse picked it up and looked at it. Just like before, he couldn’t understand any of the words, but a symbol in the bottom right corner caught his attention.

It was a purple rune, resembling the letter ‘S’ and a lightning bolt, engraved sharply as if carved with a knife into stone.

Inside the top curve of this ‘S’, there was a dot, giving the symbol a resemblance to tribal emblems seen later on.

Jesse vaguely remembered seeing this symbol somewhere before, in a game… It was the emblem of the Shadow Council.

Yes, during the Burning Crusade 70-level version of Outland, the remains of the destroyed planet Draenor, the Draenei tomb Arcatraz’s Shadow Labyrinth was covered with purple flags bearing this symbol, as it was one of the main gathering points for the Shadow Council.

This Orc, was actually a member of the Shadow Council?

The Shadow Council was not an ordinary group. It was founded and led by the first Orc Warlock Gul’dan, recruiting Orcs and even Ogre sages to study shadow and demonic magic, making it the most powerful warlock group at the time. Some speculated that members of the Shadow Council might even include real demons.

The Shadow Council worked with the controlled by Sargeras, Medivh, to lead the corruption of the Orcs and the opening of the Dark Portal. After the Great Chief of the Horde, Blackhand, fell under the influence of Gul’dan, he became the manipulator behind the scenes for the entire Horde.

It can be said that during this time, every member of the Shadow Council was not only a fervent disciple of Gul’dan but also an absolute elite in the Horde.

These warlocks had eyes that emitted magic in dark purple or emerald green colors due to consuming too much shadow and fel magic. Their skin also darkened from exposure to void energy, fitting the description of this guy’s bizarre head.

So, why would this member of the Shadow Council meet his end here?

Jesse was somewhat worried that the combination of the Orc’s black skin and the gray cloak led him to associate this symbol with the Shadow Council. After all, he couldn’t be completely sure that his memory was accurate. There was also a possibility that this warlock did not belong to the Shadow Council.

If he could understand the contents of this letter, he might be able to figure everything out.

"Look what I found." Greed walked over from behind the door with a black stick in hand, saying, "Check this out."

He held the stick up to Jesse, "What do you think this is made of?"

Jesse touched the stick and indeed felt that its material was neither like metal nor wood, seeming to be some sort of material in between the two.

The stick had a base at one end, which looked like it was meant to hold something, but now it was empty.

"Is this the Orc’s magic wand?" Jesse asked.

The dwarf asked, "Are you sure this Orc is the warlock the elf mentioned?"

Jesse shook the bundle in his hand and said, "Look at this package, and this scroll… Do you recognize the symbols on it?"

He handed the scroll to Greed, who looked through it and said, "I can’t make sense of this at all, these symbols… I’ve never seen them before, they look like the emblem on an Orc tribe flag."

"He’s wearing a black robe, or at least a long cloak," Jesse said. "And these two books inside… I can’t tell what they’re about, but regular Orc warriors might not have the patience to read these heavily written books. Even if he’s not a warlock, he seems like a scholar of sorts."

"An Orc scholar," Greed scratched his chin and said, "sounds as unlikely as an Ogre thief."

He used the stick to lift the package and said, "Whatever it is, a magic wand or a walking stick, it can help me carry the bundle and save some energy. By the way, did you find any herbs?"

"No," Jesse said. "This Orc definitely didn’t come here to collect things."

"It was a wasted trip," Greed said. "But at least we got some meat to eat."

Jesse looked at the scroll and said, "Do you think this scroll could be a message from the Orcs? It might contain orders. If we translate it, we might figure out their next move."

"We should not jump to conclusions," Greed glanced at the scroll again and said, "Should we show it to your boss?"

Jesse stayed silent. He wasn’t sure if giving the scroll to the Wizard’s Sanctum would be a good or bad idea for himself.

He glanced outside, saying, "We should hurry. If we don’t leave soon, we won’t make it back to Raven Hill before dark."