//------------------------------// // Azsuna: Helping the Spirits // Story: World of Warcraft: The Ties that Bind // by Blackdrag-rose //------------------------------// "Okay, so what exactly do we need to do before Prince Farondis shows us where the Tidestone is located?" Lyra asked, as she had stopped paying attention to what the prince had been saying when some naga had tried getting up the nearby hill, to which she took them out while Trixie and Azuregos gathered the information they needed. "Prince Farondis personally wants us to recover the bones of his ancestors, that were stolen by the murlocs and their naga allies." Trixie replied, knowing that Lyra was on a one track mind, one that reminded her of people who focused on one thing and one thing only, before she continued with the list she was reading from, "Lady Irisse asked us to find Elder Aldryth, who apparently went for a walk ten thousand years ago and never returned, and seeing how the naga are attack she is concerned for his safety. Magister Garuhod asked us to recover six arcane-infused eggs, which we can secure from the herons down by where the naga and murlocs are, as well as obtain the six eyes of Gangamesh... because he wants to use those specific items in creating a special drink." "Those sound like easy tasks to complete." Lyra said, to which she actually smiled as she looked out over the area that the naga were coming from, where she spotted a cave in the distance and guessed that they could find Gangamesh inside it, as well as the herons and their eggs, "Let's get down there and knock those tasks out." Trixie nodded and let Lyra walk down the path first, before she and Azuregos followed after her, where the three of them headed down to where the naga and their murlocs were running around, doing whatever they happened to be doing at the moment. As they approached the area Lyra tossed one of her warglaives at a naga and forced it to come over towards her, to which Trixie and Azuregos targeted other groups of enemies that happened to be in the area, using Trixie's power up to her magic to their advantage. Trixie was able to take out a small group of five murlocs by casting one spell and having it detonate in the middle of their group, which seemed to be another change to her magic thanks to her sudden transformation. Lyra, on the other hand, moved around her opponents as she made sure to avoid their spells and their attacks, which was all due to the training she had gone through back at the Black Temple. She had actually trained against several members of the Coilskar, the naga that were allied with the main forces of the Illidari, so she knew the movements of her opponents quite well... sometimes even predicting them before they even made their attack. One of the naga surprised her and managed to cut her cheek a little bit, which prompted her to quickly slay the naga where she stood, though she slipped one of her warglaives onto her back and touched the cut. She found the same fel green colored blood that one found when they killed demons, once more illustrating how taking the fel energy into her body, which had turned the eredar into demons, had changed her. Up to this point she had actually never sustained any damage to her body, which she was lucky when she considered everything that she had been up against, but she wiped the blood away, pulled her other warglaive out, and resumed fighting the naga and murlocs that were around them. "You okay Lyra?" Trixie asked, though she was shocked by seeing her friend get wounded for the first time since they had found each other, as she had assumed that the reason she always avoided damage was because of her training. "Yeah. That guy got a lucky hit... one I don't intend to repeat." Lyra replied, though as they started searching for the bones of the long dead elves, which the murlocs had been carrying a lot of, she also found a red glass bottle that had a note locked inside it, "Strange, this murloc was carrying a red bottle that had a note in it... one that claims that a Okuna Longtusk and his shipmates are being held prisoner by sea giants." "Really?" Trixie inquired, to which she walked over and looked at the note that Lyra was holding, finding that her friend was telling the truth, "Well, when we get back to Prince Farondis we can ask one of his Elders if they know anything about these giants... and maybe help us determine whether or not we should pursue the contents of this note." Lyra nodded and tucked the note into her bag, to which she and Trixie counted all of the bones that they happened to have recovered up to this point, where they determined that they had found at least fifty-five individual bones from all of the murlocs they had killed. Once they decided that they might have enough bones to satisfy Prince Farondis' request, which brought them one step closer to finding the Tidestone, Lyra pointed out the cave she had been staring at and revealed that she believed that Gangamesh lived in that area. Azuregos, who had been patiently waiting beside them, agreed with her statement, as there were enough heron around the cave for a large creature to eat... meaning that they could definitely recover both items that the one Elder wanted them to recover. He also revealed that he believed that the Elder they were supposed to be looking for might be trapped under the water, but warned that they should get their other objectives cleared before they bother searching the water... to which both Lyra and Trixie agreed with him. Once they were in agreement with each other, and knew what they were doing, they resumed their attack on the naga forces that were in front of them, focusing on their opponents at the same time instead of pulling separate groups and targeting them all in unison. Fortunately if they didn't target a second group they could make decent progress towards the cave, where they cut down the opponents in front of them and blasted apart the ones that were standing at the back of the pack. When they reached the front of the cave, however, the herons that were standing near the entrance fled from them, allowing them to turn their attention to the three headed creature that was lurking in the back of the cave. "So that is why Magister Garuhod wanted us to grab all six of his eyes," Trixie commented, beckoning to the creature's three heads, which happened to have two eyes apiece, "because Gangamesh is actually a hydra. This will be an interesting fight for sure." Lyra, who had no idea what was different between an Azeroth hydra and a Equus hydra, simply held the Twinblades out and charged at the three headed creature, though while the middle one focused on her the other two got blasted in the face with magic, from both Azuregos and Trixie. Thanks to the three of them they were able to take out the hydra, though in order to do so Lyra had to cut off the head that was focused on her before she could turn her attention to one of the other ones. Once all three of the creature's heads were cut off, and the body had stopped moving, Lyra sheathed the Twinblades and reached into all three of the fallen heads, plucking the eyes from their socks and pocketing them inside her bag... wrapped in some cloth to prevent additional harm. Once they had claimed all six of the eyes, and Azuregos actually applauded Lyra for taking the initiative to actually tear them out herself without any prompts from him or Trixie, they walked outside the cave and approached one of the nests that were around the entrance. When Azuregos gently pulled the egg from the nest, however, the heron that called the place home attacked him, to which Lyra quickly caught it and shoved it away with the edge of her weapons. She didn't want to kill an innocent creature, one that was clearly protecting its own nest, but her rough nature seemed to eventually change the animal's mind and caused it to turn away. They repeated the process with the remaining five nests, one more relying on Lyra to turn away the herons before they got hurt, before they had the required number of eggs that Magister Garuhod wanted them to grab. With that taken care of Azuregos beckoned to the ruins that were submerged in the water, where he told them that he believed that the Elder they were searching for was somewhere in there. When Trixie asked if he had any ideas to prove that, especially with a sea giant roaming the underwater ruins, Azuregos grinned and morphed into his dragon form and flew over the water. Lyra and Trixie watched as the sea giant took notice of Azuregos and tried to grab him, though while their friend distracted the sea giant they dove into the water and swam down to the ruins... where they found a spirit somehow trapped under one of the fallen pillars. Together Trixie and Lyra helped the trapped spirit out from where he was pinned down, knowing that he had to be the Elder that Lady Irisse had asked them to find... Elder Aldryth if their memory served them. "Thank you, strangers." Elder Aldryth said, though at the same time all three of them returned to the surface of the water and made their way to the nearest shore, "I don't know what happened. I heard a loud crashing noise, and then I found myself stuck beneath that beam. Since then, I've just been waiting. Now then, I had best be getting back to the others... they must be worried sick about me." Trixie and Lyra would have said something to the spirit, though before they could actually opened their mouths the spirit started walking back to where Prince Farondis was waiting for them, where he mentioned something about a lovely girl that was lost on the two of them. A few seconds later Azuregos came down near them and beckoned to his legs, to which they grabbed on and allowed him to take to the skies, leaving behind a rather confused sea giant that had been trying to grab him. He took them over to where the Prince and his Elders were waiting for them and allowed both Trixie and Lyra to drop to the ground, before assuming his disguised form once more... to which the three of them approached the room that Prince Farondis was standing in. Once they arrived they found that Elder Aldryth had returned as well, and was already in a conversation with Lady Irisse, though they knew that they should inform the Elders and Prince Farondis of their success. "I can't tell you how relieved I am that Elder Aldryth has returned." Lady Irisse said, as she already appeared grateful for a break in the conversation with the previously missing Elder, "Honestly, life here in the palace hasn't been the same without him. Everything seemed to have... lost its color. Perhaps now we can get back to our normal lives." "I'm glad to hear that you are adjusting so well," Trixie commented, to which she turned her attention to Magister Garuhod, while at the same time making sure that Lyra handed over the eyes that they had acquired earlier, which seemed to catch the Elder's attention immediately, "Magister Garuhod, we have recovered the arcane-infused eggs and the eyes of Gangamesh that you requested us to acquire." "Capital! A prodigious start." Magister Garuhod exclaimed, taking the arcane-infused eggs from Trixie, apparently choosing to leave the eyes for last, "I implore you to create this marvelous mixture for yourself. I want to share the delight of alchemical spirits with the world! You'll need to get more eggs for yourself, though. And you have the eyes of Gangamesh, excellent!" Trixie, Lyra, and Azuregos watched as the Magister started mixing the arcane-infused eggs with whatever else he had in his possession, to which they wondered what he was doing. They assumed that he was creating the drink that he wanted their help in gathering the other ingredients for, though they patiently waited until he had some sort of drink in his hand, which caused the other spirits to look over at him. They all watched as the eyes served no purpose in the actual mixture of the drink, as they appeared to be a presentation item of sorts, but they patiently waited for him to do whatever he was planning on doing. "I was going to present this mixture to one of the ladies of the court," Magister Garuhod explained, to which he held the drink up for all to see, as even the guards outside the room they were in seemed interested in seeing what they were all doing, "which is bound to increase my standing in certain social circles. But, I just can't bring myself to do it. Who better to drink my latest masterpiece than, well... me?" The group, both the spirits and the living, watched as Magister Garuhod turned the glass for everyone to see, giving them a decent look at what he was holding, before toasting to his brilliant mind. Once he had done that he tipped the glass towards his mouth and drank the contents, though once it was empty he gently set the glass down and turned to face the assembled group. They all waited for a few seconds, as they were curious if his mixture would have any effect or be a dud, before he doubled over in pain for the briefest of seconds and exploded into a wisp... to which he happily zipped through the air and departed from the ruins. Once the excitement was over, as it appeared that Magister Garuhod had developed a potential cure for the curse that plagued the spirits and failed to tell anyone the exact mixture, the trio turned to Prince Farondis and delivered the good news... and the bones that he had asked them to recover. "Our bones are all we have left of an existence we left behind a long time ago." Prince Farondis said, gesturing for one of the soldiers to take the bones from the trio, to which the bones were transferred to a room and the Prince directed their attention back to him, "Stay with me, heroes... I will help you find your Tidestone." As the trio followed Prince Farondis out of the room, however, they heard Lady Irisse questioning Elder Aldryth about his walk, to which the Elder denied visiting the specific girl that she had asked him about... before saying that he had been visiting another girl before his accident befell him. They then followed Prince Farondis towards the massive city that looked like it had been partly swallowed by the water, and damaged by it as well, though at the same time they heard the spirits of the citizens cruse their Prince for what he had done to them. The trio had to admit that this was a curious development, as they had been sure that there was no intense hatred between the citizens and their leader, but that appeared to be wrong thinking on their part. One thing they discovered was Prince Farondis' skill, as he appeared to be an incredibly powerful mage that was able to summon a barrage of flaming boulders to destroy the few naga and murlocs that dared to come his way, without asking them to stand in for them. The trio suspected that there was something larger than what they were seeing, though they kept their mouths shout as they walked towards the fallen city... knowing that it would reveal something about what was going on at the moment. All they had to do was wait and see what they could find out in the ruined city, while helping the Prince with whatever he asked of them... all so they could find and recover the Tidestone.