Translation by: Myroya - Quel'Thalas, Andrew Hallam
Almost two months past.
I have accepted the fact that
Azeroth is not a dream. The first joys of exploration have died away, when
faced with the sad reality - we, the players are strangers here. I have not
known anything about this world.
Also I cannot find my guild. Apparently there were not so many of us -
newcomers: They say about ten million people play the game. In Stormwind, there
was clearly not that many - otherwise the city would long ago have burst at the
seams. However, they could be in Dalaran as it was an overpopulated center of
trade. But even those that lived here were more than enough. The city could not
provide shelter to everybody, so very soon a settlement appeared at the edge of
the port, in an abandoned shipyard. The most influential or rather numerous and
"adult" guilds took several unfinished ships. Smaller guilds or
singles, housed around them, putting sheds or boxes along the walls, nestling
like barnacles on the bottom of an old ship.
Many had large sums of money, but most of the city residents did not
want to sell their houses. Frightened by the skirmishes with the Horde, the
Defias Brotherhood and eyewitness accounts of the plague, the townspeople did
not want to leave the safety of the city walls. Some of them, however, rented
rooms for inflated prices - the first time such a small room cost about five
hundred gold a night, but guests rented it with pleasure. At that time everyone
thought that all those guests would be staying just for a while, but the day after
day, the spent their money fast, and riots started. Citizens were no longer
willing to deal with rude, sassy teenagers, and more adult "guests"
caused a lot of troubles too.
Thus the ghetto appeared. Its inhabitants lived from hand to mouth.
Priorities were changing rapidly. Previously it was gear and the killing of
bosses that had value. Now the old valor had gone. The majority were completely
deprived of their power. However, some people quickly got a fixed position in
the world. Barbers, tailors, cooks found a ready market, and soon moved to the
Trade District. Occasionally, in the settlement, talented ones appeared: mages,
who remembered how to cast spells, fed their friends, but soon disappeared
without a word too.
***
I was lucky.
After my misfortune with that
duel, I dragged the guy to the Trade District, where "blind" McNabb helped
me to drag him up to Cathedral Square.
However, when we were at the orphanage, he saw a nobleman, and hurried to say
goodbye, finding place at the nobleman’s pass. After a couple of minutes I
heard those familiar words: "Help a poor bloke out?" After resting, I
grabbed the still unconscious guy by the collar, and was about to make a last
push to the Cathedral when I caught ... a slap! It was so unexpected that I
almost fell down. What the hell? Obscuring the sun on the staircase of the
orphanage stood a weak-sighted old woman with a broom at the ready. Squinting
myopically, and limping, she walked to me, raising a voice that was probably
heard even at the King's residence:
“Look here, fair people!” she shacked her gnarled finger at my very
nose, “In even the daylight they do neglect children!” - she said interrupting
my attempts to clarify the situation, “Do say nothing, you have no excuse.”
“And how could you do this, a young mother! Oh I know, you'd never
expected to conceive doing that naughty thing? Shameless! And now, what to do
with a poor lil'girl? Yes, I have a spare bed there, but you'd regret
it if you left the baby for sure you'd regret it! But bear in mind we do not
return children to unworthy mothers! Mark my words!”
“Is this a baby? But he is old enough ... and he is a guy at least, he
just needs his wound seen to and...”
“Ah, you are shameless, it was
not enough for you to conceive a child somewhere under the stairs, but you were
going to murder a poor baby as well! You deserve to be kicked out with the help
of this broom...”
“But I...”
“Get out of here, out of my sight!”
Thus, under her smacking of the
broom, I fled the district. Well, the only thing that still can be done for the
warrior - I can light a candle in the temple for him not be murdered in the
orphanage. Although it will benefit him of course. Hopefully he will brought up
not to harass with his “duels”.
***
The next day I wandered aimlessly around the city, with my mouth open
looking at the local beauty. Not surprisingly, in the evening I got hungry and
made a terrible discovery that I only had the laces left of a purse which was hanging
on a belt. So I had no money, and what could be done without it? At the sunset
of the second day, my only desire was to wake up, and finally eat something.
But neither washing the face, nor pinching myself were giving me result I
desired - I could not wake up. Primitive life still prevails here. There is no
sewage system in the city, waste water flows into the city canal. Due to this
adverse condition, they said, a crocodile suddenly appeared there. They also
said that this crocodile caught a child. Or maybe it was n old wife’s tale, to
frighten their children, so they stay far from the sewer "Stormwind Canal." It is terrible to imagine
what happens in the capital of the undead then, because, according to legend,
the rivers of slime flow there...
Looking through the contents of the backpack for a meal, I found only raw
meat but green and slimy. It smelled
like a mixture of acetone with rancid butter. "What is it?" - I was
surprised, and tried to remember what food I could have. In Azeroth, I had never
cooked so I could not have anything edible.
Putting aside the questionable delicacy, I saw a handful of identical
rings, and remembered: a couple of days ago I happened to make a trip to
Outland, where I collected these bijoux to improve the reputation and I killed a
Warp Stalker on the way. That is the kind of meat lay before me now.
If I cannot cook it myself, I have to find ready meals. I have no money,
but I can sell something from the backpack, just need to find who. Meanwhile, I
did not notice that the blue tiles of the Trade District were replaced by green
ones. The magic Park lay before me.
"The Druids" - flashed through my mind. "Of course! I can
remember the skills with the help of local teachers. That's when I'm alive!
"
A druid, whose name was Terenord,
looked disgruntledly at me, but in no way was surprised at my question. Turns
out that I was not the first to make such a request, and I was not even in the
"leaders’ team".
“I have already spoken to all before you, and will repeat it to you too.
Wisdom that the Great Spirit Bear gave you, do you remember it?”
“Uh ... uh ... “... as a mother
bear protects her children or how an old the bear guards his lair ...””
“It's a metaphor. Do you retain
the meaning?”
“Not at all...”
“That's what I'm talking about. "The Druids" ... Shame! If I
haven’t meet dozens of others like you, recently, I would not even talk to.
Where did that come from so many thoughtless elves? Hunter's trainer said too,
"Now the elves are not the ones that were. Even stormwind dogs bite them.
Is it possible to entrust them to a wild hawk or a panther? ". Well, well.
There is nothing funny about that.”
The Druid held out his hand and a large ripe apple fell on it. The falcon,
which brought it, shrieked and flew away. The old teacher wiped the dirt from
the fruit. I bite my lips silently - I hadn't a crumb in my mouth from
yesterday, but I tried not to show the feeling. But my stomach was a stranger
to etiquette: it groaned like a violin, telling everyone that it would be great
to accept the apple as a gift. I felt my cheeks burn, and did not know what to
do with my eyes. Silence fell. Terenord put food in my hand and looked into my
eyes:
“Where is your home, girl?”
“Far away, - I replied in a
hoarse voice. - Too far away and I don't know how to get back. I don't know how
to get there. I'm ... I'm lost.”
That's right - I got lost. I don't know how to get back. Lonely. First
time I thought about it. Is my husband
in Azeroth? Or he stuck in Northrend. Is he alive? Will we be able to meet
again? Now I became really scared.
Feeling my eyes tingle I furiously rubbed my forehead, trying to breathe
slowly and think about something else so as not to weep right here. But still
one tear escaped to freedom, sparkled and scattered into tiny drops on the
apple that had been squeezed in my hand. Turning away, I hastened to say
goodbye absently, but the druid stopped me:
“Do not cry, girl. You've got a
grain of the gift. Mother Nature holds out the hand to every living creature.
Do you want to be a druid?”
Binding hysterical laughter, I
had no choice but to become a druid for a second time.
***
Since then I live in the basement, where seedlings and seeds are stored.
Initially there was not even a smell of magic. Whole days I was rushing for
assignments, tilling the garden, looking after plants. And I studied. This was
probably a good thing because at the beginning I usually fell into the traps.
One day, listening to a boring lecture, by the middle of which I was
almost asleep, I went to plant a grass seedling, which was useful for me to
practice magic. But I completely forgot that it is important to grow it in the
shade because under the sun, it allocates a poison that lures and kills all
life in the county. That was the way how an anthill, a pair of mice, a few rats
and lots of cockroaches were killed: they were coming from all the houses up to
the moment when the druid touched his head, then his breast, pulled the plant
from the soil, taking it to the dark of the basement.
Mixing up agrimony and nettles is quite natural for a city dweller, who has
never seen one or another with own eyes, and who knows the words themselves
from the books only. Inference "pricked - means stinging nettle"
caused lots of laughter from the hunter, to whom I had to carry it. Then he told me that "this is the kind
of nettle, which any dog has lots of on its back."
When it came to magic, it became even worse. It did not work. Every
successful attempt, according to the druid, makes me itchy. Hands, elbows, lips
and back - all were itching. Terenord said that this is normal, I'll get used
to it. However, I tried to keep this torture up to the minimum necessary –
treating the plant decided to "spin out" and use the magic scarcely.
As a result, the roots of the plant withered, and despite my attempts, all the
rest too.
It goes easier with alchemy - I
learned pretty quickly how to boil and pour liquids in the right proportions.
But, in spite of my entreaties, I was not allowed to prepare potions to increase
the magic power.
“Learn to use what is given to
you, and only when you discover your limit, you can try an elixir”, - the old
man said to me, examining the quality of work with the bottom of the staff.
Depending on the success it became black or covered with leaves. “Let's learn
how to prepare a rejuvenating potion today.”
***
That day was unlucky from the very beginning.
Early in the morning, I was woken up by anxious Terenord and instructed
to bring water for the garden. Usually, we took it from the nearby well. But
this day it was closed for repair - a nerd seemed to dig a deep pit about three
meters in the nighttime, and the very brickwork of the well was damaged - he
made a muck of the only source of freshwater of the park. Now instead of water
just muddy slush could be seen at the bottom. The causer of this desolation had
not yet been found. The only piece of evidence found at the crime scene was a
fragment of a spherical object like as if it was a flask. The angered master
cursed "damn alchemists" in every possible ways - he had no doubt it
was their antics.
Master Alchemist swore he did not know the elixir capable of causing an
explosion, and winking at the engineers. The representative of the mechanics
arrived was ready to take the blame. Dancing on the edge of the pit, rubbing
his hands, and marveling at the depth of it the gnome asked:
“The crash was it loud? It was
this: "Truh-burumbuh-booh" or the "Ba-ba-boom." Or maybe
"Peeeew-boh-boh-toroh-boh"? How long was it smoky?”
The silence was an only answer he got.
There were no suspicious sounds at night.
When I left for the neighboring quarter to get the water, a new round of
clashes just started. Now the mages were guilty, as usual.
Oh, I'd like to watch this show to the end. Soon the mentor of Pyromancy
Department was to come, to shed light on what happened. Unfortunately, I had no
spare time - roots were withering. Picking up two buckets I had to go for
water. In Stormwind, there were only four wells that I had heard about: in the
old quarter, in the magic quarter and two more, I did not remember where. And
that was for the whole capital! You can, of course, take water from the canal
of the city ... but the magic plants require pure soil and clean water free of
impurities, or different mutations can appear. For example crocodiles emerge.
One was already there...
Still, a pity that we couldn't use the moonwell, which was right there
in the Park. It was regarded as sacred. But lately, in spite of strict
prohibitions, different people came here. Oh, I have seen enough. Pilgrims
earnestly believed that the water gives longevity - but it's not true. Maybe
before that was possible, but this was back in those days, when the elves lived
fourteen or twenty thousand years! Now it remains only a joke: "Honey, I'm
no more immortal any more, we are wasting time".
What about medicinal properties of the water, this is doubtful too. It
is not proven that what can heal trees, grass and other flora and can cure
fauna too. You do not use fertilizers, when you have a leg broken? But the
grass will grow after it with renewed power.
Well, the most basic reason was in those who came for treatment. Most of
them were dirty ragamuffins to purulent wounds of which flies were gathering.
Now, walking round them, I shivered, the well, that should exude a gentle blue
light, was like a puddle with pigs. Do not believe me? Go and see…
As soon as I stepped onto the bridge above the sleeve of the channel
connecting the two districts, as a crash happened. There was a smell of ozone,
and the roof of the Mage
Tower overlooking the
city, was crowned with branched lightning! And there was not even a cloud in
the sky! The next moment a huge wave rushed out of the quarter gate, and then boisterous
flow came rapidly down to the shoaled canal. Foaming silt and waste, the
"tide" ran in the direction of the Trade District. The crowd began to
gather on the bridge. As for me, I was sorry no more that I did not attend to
the handling at the well; such a local-scale tsunami was not to be seen every
day with your own eyes!
I was still admiring the flood, when a furious vixen landed with a loud
bang right next to me. Four girls with notebooks prepared gathered behind her,
ready to write. So this is the Archmage of Stormwind!?They quickly dispersed the
crowd, conjured the opaque magic shield, exactly on the whole surface of the
bridge, and started to quarrel. Unfortunately, the details were not audible.
Cursed all the idiots of the world, I went to the Cathedral Square - hoping there at least I’d
be able to get water.
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