The night was pitch-black. Jess was walking in complete darkness. The ground under his feet was wet, as if it had just rained or was like the mud in a swamp.
He didn't know where he was. In the sewers of Stormwind? Or...
He didn't know how long he had walked. He vaguely felt as if someone was following him from behind. But when he looked back, there was only complete darkness and he couldn't see anything clearly.
Even if someone was following, he couldn't see them at all.
Jess felt as if he was trapped in a strange maze. There was only one way to get out of this maze, and that was to walk along one side of the wall.
Thinking like this, he reached out to support the wall with his hand, but his palm felt as if it had pressed on something cold and soft.
Looking closely, this was actually a face!
The entire wall was made up of piled-up human heads. Countless faces were squeezed together, gazing in pain. Jess felt a chill run down the back of his head and suddenly opened his eyes.
In front of him, the sunlight had already shone in through the small window, and fine dust was floating in the air.
Hanging the sweaty bedding out of the window, facing the canal sparkling with morning waves, it was truly a beautiful sight.
Oh no, it was late.
Jess grabbed his shirt and pants and ran down the stairs. He threw them onto the riverbank and directly jumped into the canal. Before he could wash his hair, he saw the young people bathing around him jump onto the riverbank in a panic like frightened ducks and flee in disarray.
The guards had come to chase them away.
Jess skillfully lunged onto the riverbank, grabbed his clothes and ran towards the wooden canal bridge. While running, he put on his clothes. Looking back, he saw the guards on the other side of the river chasing people around like catching chicks.
In fact, bathing in the newly repaired canal in Stormwind is not allowed. The king or some lord thinks that this affects the appearance of the new city.
From Jess's perspective, a group of naked men wriggling on the main road of the city every morning is indeed a bit immoral. Moreover, he really doesn't want the canal flowing in front of his rented house to end up like the Ganges River.
But bathing in this river is really much more enjoyable than fetching water with a basin. It is absolutely impossible for him to give up this right.
And the guards of Stormwind seem to have long since let it go. Even if they catch someone, they just give them a kick. No one has ever been taken away. And from coming to chase people away every two or three days at the beginning, now it may not happen once in a week or two.
Arriving at Marin's residence, the mage had not arrived yet. Jess quickly cleaned the room and then took Marin's quill and a sheet of paper scroll to write down the spell from last night.
When he returned home last night, his mind was in a daze and he was also very tired. He forgot the work he was supposed to do. Fortunately, after sleeping and having a nightmare, he still remembered what Gajin said last night.
Veyikt.
Jess planned to roughly write down the pronunciation of the spell he heard in English letters to help him remember. After all, Chinese characters looked more and more like some unknown magic runes. If others saw them, it would be more likely to arouse suspicion.
As he was writing, he muttered twice.
This spell was heard by Gajin from somewhere unknown. According to Jess's guess, it must not be accurate enough.
Because these warlocks have no channels to learn dark spells, that is, transformations based on void languages such as demon language. The sounds they make must not be able to exert the full power of the spell.
Thinking of last night, Gajin's spellcasting effect on him was very limited. It might be related to the shadow protection potion. And he successfully counterattacked Gajin with this spell.
However, he didn't make any spellcasting movements and didn't consume any mana. How did he complete the spellcasting?
He didn't know when he could reproduce this magic.
While thinking, Marin had already walked behind him.
Jess was startled and turned around and asked, "Master, when did you come? I didn't even hear the door open."
"Because you didn't close the door at all." Marin pointed at the note under Jess's hand and asked, "What kind of writing is this?"
"This is..." Jess took a look at what he had written and stammered for a while, saying, "Well, Latin."
"Latin?"
"It's a code invented by a playmate when I was young. His name is Latin."
"Interesting." Marin asked again, "What does this word mean?"
"The problem is right here. I don't know." Jess said, "I dreamed last night that my friends were shouting this word. I thought about it but couldn't recall what it was. Just now I rested here for a while, and this word popped up in my mind again. I thought writing it down might be helpful, and then you came in."
"How is it pronounced?" Marin touched the teapot and asked.
"F*ck." Jess pronounced it clearly.
Marin nodded and said, "I can't help you, Mr. Sesso. But I think this Mr. Latin has great potential to become a mage."
"He's dead." Jess sighed and said, "He disappeared in Silverpine Forest later. He might have been killed by orcs or captured by werewolves. Thinking about it now still makes me very sad."
"Too bad." Marin said, "This also means that we will never know the meaning of 'F*ck'."
Jess suppressed a smile and coughed twice while covering his forehead as a cover.
But speaking of werewolves, the werewolves that Morgan Ladimore and all the residents of Raven Hill are afraid of. He and Gerred didn't see any during their two days of adventure.
Could it be that huge silver wolf?
Impossible. How could the townspeople who have experienced the orc invasion in Raven Hill not know what werewolves look like.
If one goes out at night, perhaps there is a chance to see them.
A strong curiosity was scratching Jess, but he wasn't so stupid as to risk his life just to satisfy his curiosity. Moreover, Gerred would definitely not agree.
"By the way, Master Marin, do you know if there are werewolves in Duskwood?"
Marin took a piece of sugar and threw it into the teacup and said, "You mean the southern Elwynn region, right? I've heard that many people now call that place Duskwood. I don't know what the natives think of this nickname. You mean the werewolf legend of Raven Hill, right?"
Jess asked in surprise, "You also know about this?"
"Of course." Marin said, "Although the Wizard's Sanctum is independent of Dalaran and the Kirin Tor, we still inherit the spirit of the ancient Council of Tirisfal spiritually. That is to protect humans from the influence of otherworldly monsters and study any signs of the influence of foreign invaders on Azeroth. In recent years, we have come into contact with many immigrants from the two towns. They also mentioned the werewolf legend of Raven Hill, and many people strongly requested the Wizard's Sanctum to send someone to take a look."
"And then?"
"No result." Marin said, "We sent out three teams composed of mages and apprentice mages successively. Among them were some of our best students. Their talents are no less than those of the new generation of young people emerging after the war in Dalaran. Even so, in the end, nothing was found except some resurrected dead. We suspect that someone is using that dark energy to learn necromancy and secretly disrupt the cemeteries in Raven Hill and Darkshire. In the end, we also found nothing about this."
"Was it searched at night?" Jess asked.
Marin nodded and said, "Yes. Master Andomas even emphasized the appearance at night mentioned by the refugees. But still, even at night, there was no so-called werewolf appearing."
Jess felt that this matter was starting to get confusing: "Since there are no werewolves, why did the townspeople who have never seen werewolves connect the wounds on the victims with werewolves? Why not orcs? If there are remnants of shadow energy... then orc warlocks should also be able to do this."
The old mage threw a few copper coins to Jess's hand. Jess picked up one of them.
"What does this mean? Is someone hired to spread panic and rumors between Raven Hill and Grand Hamlet to make the people in these two areas leave earlier and achieve their ulterior motives?"
Marin said, "No. Go to the Blue Recluse and buy me a small piece of crab cake. I'll tell you our several speculations."
Jess had no choice but to put all the copper coins in his pocket and go out.
The Blue Recluse was still quite lively in the morning. A large group of apprentices and mages gathered here, chatting while eating and drinking like college students running to the cafeteria during class breaks.
Jess spent two copper coins to order a cup of black coffee. It was cheap and refreshing. Drinking it in two gulps cleared away the mental distress caused by last night's nightmare.
In Stormwind, tea is many times more expensive than coffee. Like Eden Marin's tea, Goldthorn, is itself a kind of medicinal material and is extremely expensive.
Although coffee beans can boost energy, they have little medicinal value in terms of magic. For many workers, drinking coffee is not as stimulating as drinking alcohol directly. So most of the consumers of coffee are students, clerical staff and other ordinary people who don't have much money.
Dalaran is the area with the largest coffee consumption on the entire continent. The poor mages and alchemists there developed countless strange "magic fertilizers" to increase coffee production in order to drink coffee. In the end, they pushed the price of coffee ridiculously low.
But most herbs are species that have been influenced by the natural magical energy of Azeroth for tens of thousands of years. They cannot be produced by simple magic. So there has been no breakthrough in this aspect. And teas without special effects are not considered real teas, so the price remains high.
Unexpectedly, the drink that he was reluctant to buy in his previous life has become something he is forced to drink due to poverty in a more backward place.
Putting down the small cup, Jess habitually glanced into a corner of the tavern and unexpectedly saw Gerred. He even thought he was seeing things.
"Gerred?"
"Hmm?" Gerred looked up and saw Jess.
Jess walked over and sat next to Gerred and said, "Why are you in the mage district?"
"Of course it's to wait for you. Why did you come out so early?"
"I haven't finished work yet. I'm just here to rest for a while."
Gerred glanced at the surrounding environment and said, "It's good to be a mage. The workplace is also beautiful enough, with fresh air and looks like a garden. Not to mention, the students are also good-looking."
Jess laughed and asked, "You must have something to do when you come to find me, right?"
Gerred took a sip of milk from the large cup in front of him and said, "Remember the Warrior's Guild, right?"
"I remember it, of course." Jess narrowed his eyes and looked at his cup and said, "Why are you drinking milk?"
"No drinking during work." Gerred said seriously, "The Warrior's Guild has assigned me a job. A very important job with good pay. I don't want to keep it all to myself. Isn't this thinking of you?"
Jess asked suspiciously, "I'm afraid you can't handle it alone?"
The dwarf laughed, "If I can't handle it alone, what's the difference if I bring you along?"
"Awesome, griffin knight." Jess took some milk from the dwarf's cup and poured it into his coffee and said, "I'll go back to my boss first. He also asked me to bring him some pastries."
"Hey, wait..." The dwarf stopped Jess and said, "To be honest, this time it's to deal with wolves. There may be more than one. It's really difficult without some backup. Moreover, in Duskwood, I would have died several times without you. I was just joking. Don't take it seriously... I don't have any other trustworthy helpers."
"Where are the wolves?" Jess asked.
"There is said to be a wolf den in a farm southeast of Goldshire. Setting traps several times has been useless." The dwarf took out a piece of crumpled paper and smoothed it out on the table and said, "It's a bounty issued by the Stormwind Guards. Maybe the farmer there asked them for help. They are short of manpower."
Jess took a look. This only had the address and the person seeking help written on it, but there was no reward written.
"Where is the bounty written?"
"Five silver coins." The dwarf said, "It's not bad."
Jess repeated, "I mean where is the bounty on this? If it's a bounty issued in the city, shouldn't it be clearly written?"
At this point, he already felt that there was something wrong with this piece of paper.
Gerred finally admitted, "This was written by the Warrior's Guild. They took on the task and then issued it to us members."
Jess asked, "Do you mean they are taking a cut in the middle?"
Gerred said, "After I complete the task, I can upgrade my rank and then get more difficult tasks. The guild determines the level of each member according to their rank and assigns tasks of different difficulties. For example, if my current rank is recruit, then I can't go and help the guards of Redridge Mountains deal with the threat of the gnoll tribes. After completing several tasks and upgrading my rank, then I can."
Jess slowly nodded and then asked, "So why don't you go directly to Redridge Mountains? I believe they would definitely be willing to incorporate you directly into the guard."
Gerred blinked and said, "Then I won't get a rank."
Jess said, "This rank is the rank of the Warrior's Guild, not the military rank of the kingdom, right? It doesn't seem very useful."
"You're right." Gerred rubbed his beard and said, "However, I'm too lazy to deal with those humans. Let the Warrior's Guild negotiate with them. As for the money taken by the Warrior's Guild, just think of it as me spending money to hire them to help me contact people."
Jess asked, "When are you going?"
"This afternoon."
"Too soon, isn't it?"
"Jess, what if that family is harassed by wolves again one day later?"