"It's not my blood. It's its blood." The dwarf looked at the wolf's head for a while and said, "This isn't a wolf from Elwynn. This is an orc's wolf mount. The orcs brought many extraterrestrial creatures from Draenor. Apart from ogres, the most harmful ones are these wolves. There are no horses to ride on the other side of the Dark Portal. Those orcs ride these wolves to fight."
Looking at the giant wolf lying on the ground, Jess held the axe and asked, "Is its claw an Evil Claw?"
"This is evil enough." The dwarf agreed.
Jess was just about to raise the axe and chop off its claw when he suddenly realized a problem - Can the claws of beasts from Outland and the claws of Azeroth creatures all be used as raw materials for making Evil Claws?
No matter if it can be done or not, chop it off first.
Gerred lifted the upper jaw of the wolf mount and looked back and forth at its knife-like canine teeth.
"You said, Jess. What's it like over there?"
Jess picked up the axe, aimed the blade at the wolf's claw and asked, "Which side?"
"Of course it's the other side of the Dark Portal." Gerred patted the giant wolf's forehead. "Look at this wolf. It has a mouth, a mouth full of teeth. It also has ears, fur, and equally bright red blood... It can be said to be like an enlarged version of a gray wolf with a long neck and long legs. If I didn't know what animal this was before, if you said this was a wolf, I would definitely believe it. Maybe there are deer and sheep over there for these wolves to eat. There are also grass, flowers and trees. Maybe there are dwarves and humans too, Draenei people and Draenor dwarves."
Jess forcibly suppressed his urge to give him a preview of the worldview in advance and said, "Maybe."
"When the expeditionary forces come back, everything will be clear." The dwarf shook his shoulders and head and said, "I can't wait."
The two of them were busy for half an hour. Gerred cut some meat and chopped off a leg bone and was about to take it back to Raven Hill for a meal. The claws were given to Jess to carry.
Unfortunately, this entire wolf skin. This wolf is incredibly heavy. The difficulty of skinning it is several times higher than that of a small wolf. And even if it is completely skinned, the two of them can hardly take it back. It can only be left here.
Just as they were about to leave, Jess suddenly seemed to remember something.
"Didn't we come to look for an orc warlock?"
"There's only one wolf here." The dwarf retorted.
"Then what was this wolf eating just now?" Jess asked again.
The two of them turned around at the same time and looked at the corner where the giant beast was eating.
The wolf corpse filled the entire space with a bloody smell. In the corner, there was a mess of severed limbs, minced meat and bones lying around disorderly. That was clearly not the corpse of a wolf.
"Look here, Jess." Gerred shouted from the other corner. Jess looked over and saw a dark brown head under his feet, just lying there with its eyes wide open staring in this direction.
That head was an orc's head. His skin was much darker than that of a normal orc. Whether it was a green-skinned orc who had drunk demon blood or a brown-skinned orc who hadn't drunk blood, it was very rare to see such a dark complexion.
The dwarf said, "You check there. I'll look here. There are also some things here."
Jess nodded and lifted a torn piece of clothing. This was a tattered cloth with black and gray stripes. There were some not very obvious patterns on it. Because it was completely stained with blood, it was a bit unclear.
He saw an iron chain buried under the bones and rags. He grabbed it and pulled it out little by little. As he pulled, he pulled out a blood-stained leather bag.
The bag couldn't be seen what kind of leather it was made of. The workmanship was very exquisite and didn't seem like the style of orcs.
Untying the binding rope of the bag, the first thing that came into view was actually the spine of a book.
Jess felt his excited heart thump suddenly. He carefully pulled out the book, but found that only the spine of this book was intact. Most of the paper had been burned, and the remaining parts were all curled and yellowish-brown.
The bag was fine, but the book was burned and ruined. This indicated that this book was probably picked up by this orc. There was no ash on the book. The severely charred parts that were so dark that the handwriting couldn't be seen seemed to have been carefully removed. The remaining parts were basically the yellowish areas where the words could still be seen. It seemed that the orc had also properly processed this damaged copy.
Since he was willing to keep it, it meant that this book must be useful.
He couldn't understand a single word on the book. He couldn't even figure out if it was in demon language or orc language. After all, he had never seen either of these two languages. In any case, he would know if he took it back and studied it.
Continuing to flip through, Jess saw a second book.
This book was roughly intact. Only the pages were stained with a lot of blood. Jess couldn't understand any of the densely packed words on it at all. Moreover, there were no drawings or runes in this book. It was full of large and small words and additional lines similar to annotations. Looking at it gave him a headache.
But from Jess's knowledge, he could roughly detect that this book had two sets of languages. One set seemed to have a certain corresponding relationship with the other.
Could this be a language learning book? For orcs to learn demon language?
In Draenor, many young orcs only turned to the Void and Fel energy a few years ago. It's very possible that they can't become familiar with the demon incantations for using dark magic in a short time. Even after coming to Azeroth, it's not impossible that they need to continuously study.
But he couldn't jump to conclusions either. After all, he was completely in the dark and had no clue.
It's not like native English speakers reading French articles or people who know Chinese reading Japanese news. At least there can be a few words or characters that they roughly understand on a page, so they can roughly guess the topic type.
Now these two books were no different from Arabic to him. He didn't know whether he should start reading from the left or the right. He didn't even know if he was holding it upside down.
Under this book, at the innermost part of the bag, there was also a leather scroll.
This scroll had no damage at all and was not stained with any blood or other stains. It was very well preserved.
Jess picked it up and looked at it. Just like before, he couldn't understand a single word at all. But a symbol in the lower right corner caught his attention.
This was a purple rune. It looked like an S letter and also like a lightning bolt. The sharp writing style was like a stone rune carved with a knife.
There was a dot in the upper curve of this S, making the overall style of the symbol extremely similar to the later Horde emblem.
Jess always remembered that he had seen this symbol somewhere before. He had seen it in the game... This was the emblem of the Shadow Council.
Yes, in the Outland of the Burning Crusade level 70 version, that is, the remaining Draenor planet after destruction. In the Shadow Labyrinth of Auchindoun, the Draenei tomb, there were purple flags with this symbol everywhere. After all, it was one of the main gathering points of the Shadow Council.
This orc was actually a member of the Shadow Council?
The Shadow Council was not some insignificant organization. It was founded by the first orc warlock, Gul'dan, and he served as the leader. He recruited orcs and even ogre sages to learn shadow and demon magic. It was the most powerful warlock group at that time. Some people guessed that the members of the Shadow Council even included real demons.
The Shadow Council colluded with Medivh who was controlled by Sargeras and led to the fall of the orcs and the opening of the Dark Portal. After the great chieftain of the Horde, Blackhand, listened to Gul'dan's persuasion, it became the manipulator behind the entire Horde.
It could be said that during this period, every member of the Shadow Council was not only a fanatical believer of Gul'dan but also an absolute elite in the Horde.
These warlocks' eyes emitted a dark purple or emerald green demonic light because they had absorbed too much shadow and Fel energy. Their skin also turned black because they were close to Void energy. This was exactly in line with the mutation of this guy's head.
So, why did this member of the Shadow Council die here unjustly?
Jess was a bit worried that it was because of this orc's black skin and gray robe that jointly led him to think of the relationship between this symbol and the Shadow Council. After all, he couldn't be completely sure that his memory hadn't deviated. There was also a possibility that this warlock didn't belong to the Shadow Council.
As long as he could understand the content on this letter, maybe everything could be figured out.
"Look what I found." Gerred walked over from behind the door carrying a black stick and said, "Look at this."
He held up the stick in front of Jess. "What do you think this is made of?"
Jess touched this stick. Indeed, he felt that the material was neither like metal nor like wood. It was some kind of material between the two.
At the end of the stick was something like a base. It seemed that there should have been something on it originally, but now it was empty.
"This is this orc's staff, right?" Jess said.
The dwarf asked, "Are you sure this orc is the warlock that the elf said?"
Jess shook the bag in his hand and said, "Look at this package and this scroll... Look at the mark on it. Does it seem familiar?"
He handed the scroll to Gerred. The latter flipped it back and forth and looked at it and said, "How can I tell? I can't understand it at all. This symbol... I haven't seen it before either. It looks like the emblem on the orc tribe's flag."
"He is wearing a black robe, at least a long garment." Jess said. "And there are these two books inside... I can't say what they are about. But an ordinary orc warrior probably wouldn't have the patience to read books full of densely packed words. Even if he isn't a warlock, he must be a scholar or something."
"Orc scholar." Gerred scratched his chin and said, "It sounds as absurd as an ogre thief."
He picked up the package with the stick and said, "Whatever it is, a staff or a walking stick. In any case, it can just be used as a pole to help me save some strength in carrying the bag. How about it? Did you find any herbs?"
"No." Jess said. "This orc definitely didn't come here to collect anything."
"Then wouldn't this trip be in vain." Gerred said. "But at least we got some meat to eat."
Jess looked at this scroll and said, "Do you think this scroll could be a letter from the orcs? Conveying some orders or something. If we translate it, maybe we can figure out their movements."
"We'd better not jump to conclusions." Gerred glanced at that scroll again and said, "Why don't we give it to your boss to take a look?"
Jess didn't answer. He didn't know if giving this scroll to the Wizard's Sanctuary would be a good thing or a bad thing for him.
He glanced obliquely outside the door and said, "Let's go quickly. If we don't leave soon, we won't be able to return to Raven Hill before it gets dark."