A joy, a disappointment, and a puzzle

6/4 afternoon

When I looked around Valhalla, things were a little different. The mound of green dragons guarded by a few dozen whelps, for one thing. Including the guards, I’d say around fifty dragons, mostly quite small, were gathered around Emeriss. While I stood and observed, another two drakes arrived and settled into the pile. It was with some anticipation that I checked my app.

3700 energy. More than doubled from yesterday, just from all the new scaly immigrants. Many more of of which had arrived since yesterday’s census. There will be more tomorrow, and in all likelihood more the day after that. You might ask me, “damn, Erich, what are you going to spend all that on?” The answer, dear reader, is wisps. Wisps, a better tree, and a magic stick. Figuring this was as good a time as any, I finally bought a staff of preservation. It would allow me to magically pull someone out of a fight and send them back to my nearest base, and more importantly it was reusable. I could only buy one; apparently the ancient needed a few hours to restock.

I needed essence if I wanted to spend energy efficiently. All of my units cost at least some essence except for wisps. Ergo, if I am about to get a ridiculous amount of energy I need a proportionately appropriate number of wisps. Of course, with only 4 trees of life I could only really queue up 28 wisps today. Which would hopefully be enough. If not, 28 more wisps tomorrow.I also upgraded my main tree, Emeriss, into a Tree of Eternity. She didn’t need to be rooted to meet prerequisites; she just needed to exist. She could reap the benefits of improved physical strength and toughness while fighting in the Emerald Dream. More importantly, it unlocked the full Night Elf tech tree. I was just a few upgrades away from being able to dedicate my full resources to cranking out elite, fully upgraded troops every day. With the massive influx of resources that might just be squared away tomorrow.

Speaking of troops… Apparently my stunt with Theradras’s press releases was enough to finish my mission with the centaur. Leh’Prah was now recognized as a real khan by his peers. That meant I could capture him, if I wanted, though at the moment my resources were probably better used in places other than enslaving someone who was already doing what I wanted.

It also meant I got a new bonus building; a Mercenary Camp. This one was associated with the Barrens biome, so the units were all creatures from central Kalimdor. I decided to say fuck it and buy one of each possible mercenary so I could see how they panned out. This was perhaps not my best financial decision, but I had a whole new community of troggs who fought mostly off of instinct. I could afford to trade out the skillsets of six of the nonmagical ones, at least. Actually five. I didn’t have quite enough essence to pick up all six, so I excluded the Harpy Rogue on the assumption that her skillset would be “is a harpy.”

The results were a little disappointing. I’d forgotten that mercenaries were balanced so that they wouldn’t dominate the early game, and more importantly they didn’t get any of the upgrades I’d spent so much on. That meant no inventory and pretty mediocre gear. If I’d gotten the mercenary camp very early on, it probably would have warped my whole strategy by giving me premium units upfront, but at this point they were mostly lateral shifts or overpriced.

The centaur archer was priced about the same as the Night Elf archer unit in terms of essence, and in terms of skills it was comparable except that it ran faster. Decent, right? Not really. They didn’t have magic resistance, they didn’t have shadow meld, and their gear was a single short bow made of some kind of animal horn and a leather vest. Despite the night elven impulse to show off the female form, sentinel armor still provided more overall protection. Plus, with each upgrade it had gotten a redesign that included more coverage, though an enthusiastic appreciation for girl abs and thick thighs was still on display. I’m fairly sure it was still horribly designed for practical combat applications, but it was enchanted, it was free, and it was much better than a ratty leather vest. The centaur archer was probably the worst of the bunch, at least. Fitting for the cheapest unit.

The quillboar hunter had a little more promise. It came with thick leather pants (not the sexy kind), and an infinite supply of reasonably well made iron javelins that vanished after hitting. They could throw them pretty damn far and accurately, and had heightened senses like Darcell developed once she became a demon hunter. They could sense attacks coming and start dodge them a split second early. They were also a little better in melee overall, compared to an archer. If I was willing to actually equip them properly with armor, they would be decent switch hitters that could fight in melee or at range.

The centaur outrunner was an axe wielding warrior, a little better in melee than a humanoid-form druid of the claw. Without spells. Not exactly impressing me so far. They were, however, relatively cheap and had absolutely zero essence cost. If I found myself in a situation where I reliably had no essence for whatever reason, it would be these guys, wisps, or items from the ancient of wonders. Which would be fine except for the fact that they had zero abilities that a few days of training with Varian or Gina couldn’t impart on someone. Probably a wash; this guy would be indistinguishable from any other Brute with an axe in a week or so.

The last two were spellcasters, and probably the best illustration of my statement from earlier about them being better than unupgraded units. The Harpy Wind Witch was essentially a moderately upgraded druid of the talon when you get right down to it. She could fly, she could shoot lightning, and she could cast Fairy Fire to turn someone’s armor partly insubstantial. If I had invested in an ancient of winds already, she’d probably be a bad idea, but as things stood now, I was looking at an excellent flyer with a strong zero mana cost attack spell and a useful debuff. The main drawback? Almost twice the cost. If I wanted a lot of wind witches, it would quickly become economical to invest in upgrading the Druids until they were as good or better, turn them into a draconid or spellscale, and teach them how to fly with athletic talent.

The last one was the most promising, and was naturally the most expensive. The Razormane Medicine Man was a Quillboar, and a rather big and strong one. They were armed with a flail and had shamanic magic. They were better fighters than my Druids, for what that’s worth in an army with martial talent, but they more importantly came with a powerful healing spell that caused all of their allies in a moderate area to regenerate quickly, and the ability to summon a couple of spirit pigs to attack their enemies. They were great! Except that I could get two huntresses or dryads for less. If I trained these, it would be for the healing wards, or so that I could start a battle with a suicidal charge of 30-50 feral hogs.

These test cases weren’t wasted per se, since they would definitely contribute to team Valhalla, but we’ll see if I actually make any more. There was stiff competition for resources. Speaking of the allocation of resources, I finished another moderate mission. That meant I had another major mission.

Space Goats Make Me HappyConvert the Kurenai tribe of Draenei in Nagrand to the worship of you specifically, fully abandoning the worship of the Naaru in the process. You may not personally speak to any of them until you have succeeded in this mission, or you will be penalized.Rewards: 10 credits, 20 credit budget for demiplane upgrades.

While space goats do indeed make me happy, this mission does not. They want me to go all the way to Nagrand? Right now? That’s in Outland. A shattered, demon infested wasteland ruled by a possibly crazy, possibly misunderstood antihero demon hunter. Converting communities full of draenei is something I’ve been known to dabble in. The task is nothing I object to. It’s just remote as all hell. I’ll ask Aegwynn… or I suppose Doan, actually, if they know any spells to get to Outland. If they don’t, I might need to go through Nozara or purchase someone in the area. Or just use a mission ticket and hope for something else. Or… actually I could just save it for later. It’s not like I’m running low on demands for my time.

••••••••••

Keryn didn’t have much trouble finding Vaelen. The amulet led her right to him. Varvara was a good partner, she’d been issued a few potions of invisibility for the job, and she even had a dedicated handler from the shadow ops team. Darcell had to relearn everything about stealth from scratch, but she was better than ever now and could handle any combat that cropped up.

There was a strange buzzing in the air, which Keryn was doing her best to ignore. Darcell’s senses were a lot better than Keryn’s, and she said they were coming from the crystals embedded in the walls of the biggest rooms. There were whispers embedded in the buzzing, mantras of obedience of Lord Victor Nefarius. That seemed worth reporting back, and her shadow priest was writing up an analysis on it right now. Lady Aelthalyste was observing instead.

With soothing spells and invisibility, it was almost too easy, but she wanted to get in and out quickly. This buzzing worried her, and Vaelastrasz was supposedly in a lot of danger.

When they found him, he was in his dragon form, staring at a crystal with a vacant expression. Aelthalyste sent her a pulse of sympathy; she knew what this was and she didn’t like it.

K *what’s the plan? Can we do the extraction still?*A *We are sending a ranger to sweep the area with tracking. It looks like a trap to me.*K *If it isn’t, can we collar him?A *We can certainly try*

While Caledra appeared, invisible thanks to one of the new arcanists, Keryn got a long length of gold chain to wrap around his leg… wait… her leg? Keryn hadn’t been part dragon for long, but that was definitely a female dragon.

K *Are we sure that’s the right one? I assume the mission is similar either way, but that one is definitely female.*C *sweep finished. There are guards in the next room. I estimate less than a minute between us being noticed and contact with the enemy.*A *Congratulations Keryn. Darcell will be applying the bracelet. You get to be the first person to test a new piece of kit. Whether or not this specific red dragon is Vaelastrasz, the master will want her extracted. Hopefully she recognizes us as allies when we wake her up.*K *Can’t you just get in her head and brief her?*A *Not while she’s looking at that crystal. It would ensnare my mind just as much as hers.*

Keryn felt a long staff appear in her hands. Very smooth, like polished marble. She was to use it on the dragon the moment it was awake and they had been identified. Darcell started the party by dashing up and wrapping the golden chain around the great red dragon’s wrist, then dodging a swipe of her claw with a backflip.

“Stop! Don’t attack! We are here on behalf of Erius!”

“Oh! The green dragon that was going to help me defeat Alexstrasza.” No time to unpack that right now. She was coming home via the staff of preservation. Darcell and Keryn followed a few seconds later, summoned by their handlers.