6/5 morning
I had Tyrygosa enthusiastically writing notes about her experience when I woke up. She was really, really into it; writing notes in the amulet about the amulet with perfect recall of events provided by the amulet. I'd put her back to normal after I was finished taking advantage of her worship. I found that fucking to exhaustion was an amazing way to get to sleep with sexual calibration. Normally, the quality of sex would logically go down with fatigue, but with sexual calibration anyone in my retinue could go all night long with no diminishing returns. Of course, then I'd need to sleep, but that was the whole point. Giving appropriate attention to at least some members of my harem is important, but it was also a sleep aid.
"Anything interesting?" I asked Tyrygosa.
"Hmm? Oh, no particularly new insights yet, no. I'm having difficulty finding limits to what can be imparted by the amulet. So far I've got that it can grant knowledge, but I think it may only apply if someone in the retinue already has knowledge. Otherwise the false memories will just make something up that sounds plausible. It also can't grant skills… well, not to any substantial degree. Your prime consort agreed to try to learn how to use a sword that way and it didn't pan out. She seemed to find it very frustrating to remember studying the blade but not actually be any good at it."
"It really is. I still haven't gotten around to relearning shadow magic for that exact reason."
"After about twenty minutes she decided that melee combat was a waste of her time, as magic was better anyway."
"Yeah. Sounds about right. Let me know if you figure anything else out. Oh, and go back to Malygos if you expect that he will get suspicious, ok?" She nodded and went back to the amulet. For now.
I pulled out the letter from Brann, figuring I could read it over breakfast. I could probably find a use for a seal of joy, but the real prize from yesterday's hive assault was this letter. Brann was always up to something.
••••••••••
To Whom It May Concern:
If you're reading this, I'm either dead or soon to be dead. It's hard to say. Most of the crew is dead anyhow.
Found information about a Titan. Great battle between him and an Old God. Yes, a bona fide Old God. Found ancient tunnel leading to Ahn'Qiraj. Taking it.
Take this letter to my old camp. Make sure my monkey is getting adequate food, water, and hugs.
-Brann Bronzebeard, Explorer Extreme
P.S. Watch out for crazy Old God worshipping night elf.
••••••••••
Up to something indeed. A tunnel into Ahn'Quiraj, you say? The crazy night elf was, if my memory served, a high level elite somewhere in Hive'Regal. The commander of the Cenarian Circle forces had an unfortunately brainwashed wife. I'd sorta forgotten about her in all the excitement, but I wanted to capture her at some point. Partly because she was powerful enough to be useful and night elf girls are hot, partly because I've recently become very sensitive to brainwashing crystals, mostly because it's the neighborly thing to do for my ally in the area.
A tunnel into Ahn'Quiraj, especially a tunnel that Brann canonically survived checking out, was very interesting. Brann was a survivor and very crafty, but he was essentially a much shorter version of Indiana Jones. A damn good fighter by the standards of a more reasonable world, but this was Azeroth. If there was a tunnel someone in his weight class could safely use to get into AQ and I could find it, I could quietly slip some of my troops into AQ long enough to kill Ossirian the Unscarred. That would be another notch in my belt, without starting a full scale war with C'thun by opening the Scarab Gate. Of course, I had Nefarian to worry about, so that could probably wait a week or two. I should probably ask around about that camp, though. A monkey's well-being may be at stake.
I'd set my new minor mission to pop up in Felwood. I figured that I should get back to systematically unlocking regional missions. They are just too good to sleep on now that I have so many really powerful individuals to upgrade. Before each regional mission, however, is a normal mission. In this case, minor.
Tunnel Love
Have sexual intercourse with Nafien, Timbermaw Representative.
Reward: Rabbit Insignia
Calling all furries, calling all furries. Anyone interested in getting down and dirty with a bear man in the name of the cause, report for deployment. It hopefully wouldn't be too hard. After all, I'd captured around thirty Furbolg a while back and sexual preferences weren't impacted by transformation. Well, unless I had it manually changed. I think I made every woman in my retinue super… pansexual? Is that the word where there is no phenotype that will turn you off automatically? Anyway, my point is that surely someone in my retinue is up for some Bear loving, and I was planning on sending a delegation to the hold at some point anyway. Probably consisting entirely of Furbolgs, to make diplomacy easier. The Timbermaw were a little touchy.
I also had a moderate mission. One which annoyed me by being simultaneously valuable, complicated, and time sensitive.
Taste my Wrathtail
Turn Vorsha the Lasher against the Wrathtail Naga of Zoram Strand. Bonus if you accomplish this before 6/7.
Rewards: 1 credit, Greater Temptress Bell (10/5)
Bonus: Wrathtail Priestess Skill chip (5/2)
Ugh. Convincing a hydra to attack someone shouldn't be hard, but presumably they were already affiliated somehow. Plus Hydras were multiheaded, which might complicate mind control. I'd need to send a whole team of ghosts… like, right now actually. I told Natalie about it, and she sent some of her ghosts that didn't have amulets yet, led by one that did. We were starting to run low on Worgen to capture, so some field work would do them good.
The rewards made it worth it. The option of just selling all of them for 8 credits was tempting, but a greater temptress bell would permanently neutralize someone as a physical threat. Their desire to harm me in any way would shift over to looking for ways to fuck me in a far more literal manner. I even checked the descriptor; it specifically noted consensual sex! Was that worth as much as being able to buy Extra Stock… eh… I dunno. The priestess skill chip was definitely worth investigating. Priest is such a broad class, and skill chips are mini template stacking. I kinda doubted that this would give someone mind control, but shields and healing are nice to have on anyone. Hell, giving Gina the ability to cast renew and shield would do wonders for her sustainability.
Today was a relatively busy day. I was planning on invading Blackwing Lair, for one thing. Everything up to that would be prep work or things I couldn't really sleep on. I needed to check on what was going on in Naxx, for example. Malfurion was awake as of last night, but I figure that Tyrande could explain anything that he needed spelled out for him. Zaetar was well along the way to recovery, and by this evening Keristrasza and Helcular should be in the bag.
Poobah had done her job to collar Cairne, and apparently he had zero suspicions because he'd be captured in 66 hours. Malygos was at around 80. Apparently being a little unhinged left him mentally vulnerable. Archaedes and Ironaya were at max ETE; around 150 hours after being collared for most of a day. Their earthen servants apparently didn't have access to the intel on the disks, so I was going to have to get one of the titanic watchers on my side if I wanted to get my eye in the sky. Assuming that's how it worked; if not I'd need to be content with "merely" having a semidivine craftsman and… whatever Ironaya was.
I checked over my base and, had I been drinking anything, would have choked on it. 7065 energy and 900 essence. I should stop being shocked, but my budget just keeps doubling on me. Well. Better put on my government employee hat, because I intended to spend my whole budget no matter what.
I had a big assault planned tonight and a slot for another hero unit who would need exp. In honor of my first collared waifu, I decided to give the position to Annetta. I had to choose between priestess of the Moon or Keeper of the Grove, and despite the priestess title "tiger-riding archer who buffs other ranged units" didn't seem like the right pairing for Annetta. Keeper of the grove had a generally more magical and defensively oriented set of skills, so I assigned her that power set. She could branch out again later. 6665 energy/800 essence.
Druids of the Claw, Dryads, and Mountain Giants seemed like they'd be my big ticket units, so I wanted them as strong as possible. To that end, I got their weapon upgrade up to level 2 and purchased the highest level magic upgrade for Druids of the Claw, letting them turn into grizzly bears. If you can't think of a use for intelligent magical grizzly bears, get out. I have no time for you. 6290/300
Of course, that left me with relatively little essence left. I dropped all the energy I could on Wisps, bringing me to my current population cap of 70 and setting tomorrow's essence budget to 1400. 4790/300
My lower tier units tend to cost much more gold per essence than my higher tier ones, so I queued up 7 huntresses; the maximum that my ancient of war could train in a day. I drew upon new volunteers from Lordaeron. Untrained or barely trained fresh captures from Tirisfal Glades: undead, Nathrezim, or alive. 3425/90
Figuring that my energy budget wasn't done growing, I dropped another 2 moonwells to increase my supply cap; I'd probably build even more wisps tomorrow. One well each in the Emerald Dragonshrine and Valhalla. Might as well spread my buildings out a little, and give the lumberjacks a source of fresh, clean, revitalizing water in the process. 3065/10
I felt an irrational desire I spend those last 10 points of essence on a centaur archer unit. But no. No, I have not fallen that far. Instead I checked the staff of recall to see what it was worth as a war asset. 50 gold. Damn. Then again, it was essentially a shareable hearthstone that anyone could use, and hearthstones were much rarer than the game might make you think.
Speaking of which, I pulled The Innkeeper's Daughter out of my inventory. It was a hearthstone, a tool to teleport the user home, which was of basically zero use to me with Apportation. It was also haunted by a dwarven girl's spirit; one who came pre-captured. Once I got her a ghost hair necklace, I could make this a gift for Falstad Wildhammer. He's a griffon rider with responsibilities at home; he'd probably like a way to get back to his clanhold quickly when he goes abroad. Of course I'd be patching him into the network soon, but giving him a gift that wasn't laced with mind altering chemicals first was probably a good way to make friends.
Anyway, I purchased the staff and the scroll of town portal. There was a cooldown on getting more, but I don't think it was a full day. I told Aelthalyste to put someone on the task of monitoring that timer and buying as many of them as possible. I finished my toast and stood up. More out of habit than anything; I could teleport just fine from a sitting position. I had business to attend to. For one thing, that arcanite I ordered. What's the holdup!?