Caravan Attacked

"Yes, Lord Malfurion!" Larsen shot a hateful glance at Andy from the corner of his eye. "Then... how should we deal with that Orc?"

"If things are as Andy says, it is highly inappropriate to keep such a dangerous race in Darnassus," Tyrande said, glancing at Malfurion. "Why don't you take him back and lock him in the cells of your Sentinel Unit?"

Malfurion smiled; Tyrande always understood him perfectly, and his own thoughts were identical to hers. He replied, "Excellent. Tyrande is right. Larsen, go handle it!"

"Since he is so dangerous, we might as well just kill him!" A look of ruthlessness flashed across Larsen's face.

"You can't kill him!" Andy shouted. "If you kill him, the fel energy within his body will become uncontrollable and contaminate this place. While the pollution from a single Orc isn't massive, there is no guarantee what that fel-corrupted elf might do!"

"Hmph, we cannot simply kill without first uncovering the truth!" Malfurion glared at Larsen. "Elves are a race that reveres nature. Even if he is of another race, we cannot kill him until we understand his true nature."

"Yes, I shall see to it at once!" After saying this, Larsen bowed to Malfurion and the other, then turned to leave. As he passed Andy, he glared at him fiercely and whispered, "We'll see about this!"

After Larsen left, Tyrande smiled at Andy and said, "Andy, you should head back as well. Thank you for coming to inform us of these matters."

Andy bowed and turned to leave, but was stopped by Malfurion: "Andy, when I return from the Eastern Kingdoms, I expect you to tell me why you know so many things that we do not!"

Andy smiled and walked out. That final sentence from Malfurion, along with his gaze and tone, felt as if he could see straight through his soul.

Setting aside Malfurion's solo journey to Stormwind City to investigate the situation, let us focus on Larsen.

Larsen felt utterly miserable that day. He had expected that completing this escort mission would earn him a few days of leave, which would have allowed him to spend time with Hilar. Hilar had always been the woman of his heart; although he hadn't achieved much yet, he was at least a squad leader in the Sentinel Unit, and a future promotion to captain of a detachment was surely his. Who would have thought his grand plans would be ruined by that brat, Andy.

Larsen had been furious when he saw Andy and Hilar together, acting intimate, upon entering the city. After today's events, he had come to truly loathe Andy.

"Little brat, you bastard, we'll see!" Larsen gritted his teeth in secret.

"What are you staring at? Load this Orc cage onto the cart and take it back to the main camp!" Larsen roared at his subordinates. He walked up to the Orc's cage and hissed, "If it weren't for you, I wouldn't have lost face like this!" With that, he kicked the cage hard with his right foot.

"Load it, quickly!" Larsen shouted.

The team of elven subordinates scrambled to load the cage onto the cart, none daring to provoke Larsen at such a moment, lest they be met with his whip.

Once the loading was finished, Larsen leaped onto his Sabers mount and shouted, heading toward the gates of Darnassus.

Nursing a belly full of fire and lost in thought, Larsen gradually drifted from the front of the line to a position near the back, parallel to the prisoner cart. Looking up inadvertently, he didn't see the scenery ahead, but rather an ugly Orc face baring its teeth at him. Feeling a wave of nausea and irritation, Larsen raised his whip and lashed it hard against the Orc.

With a "crack," a series of sparks erupted from the Orc's body. The weapons carried by the Sentinel Unit were enchanted, and the whip was no exception. The Orc let out a roar from inside the cage, his face twisted in fury.

"Keep screaming! Go ahead!" Larsen's whip didn't stop. "Keep glaring at me! You dare threaten me! Keep screaming!"

"Captain, Captain!" A soldier nearby, risking a lashing, approached Larsen and said, "Captain, stop hitting him, something seems wrong!"

"Mind your own business, what could be wrong!" After muttering to himself, Larsen suddenly stopped and asked, "What's wrong?"

"Look at this Orc!" the soldier said, pointing at the cage.

Larsen took one look, and cold sweat began to stream down his face. The Orc in the cage had visibly grown a size larger, and his roars were becoming increasingly loud. The veins on his shackled hands were bulging. With a "bang," the wrist-thick iron chains snapped, and the Orc grabbed the bars of the cage, shaking them violently. Watching the bars bend with the naked eye, Larsen began to panic.

"Quick, someone! Kill him!" Larsen shouted.

"Captain, didn't you say we weren't supposed to kill him?" an elf asked.

"That was in the city; we are outside the city now!" Larsen raged. "Do you want to die? Look at him, he doesn't look easy to deal with."

Larsen was anxious; seeing the Orc in this state, he wasn't sure if they could even take him down. "Hurry, kill him quickly!" Larsen yelled, drawing his longsword and charging forward. One of the Orc's feet had already slipped through the gap in the cage bars.

Seeing their captain charge, the other elves drew their swords and bent their bows, unleashing a barrage upon the Orc. No matter how strong an Orc might be, there was no surviving such an onslaught from a group of elves, especially while trapped in a cage. In barely ten seconds, the Orc collapsed inside the cage, dark red blood mixed with a pale green substance leaking out.

"Captain, how should we handle the corpse?" a warrior asked.

"Take it to the east end of the road and dump it there to feed the beasts!" Larsen said, wiping his sword on the Orc's corpse.

The group echoed their agreement. Before long, they abandoned the cage and the cart in the woods east of the road, and the elven squad resumed their journey. Having vented his frustration, Larsen felt his anger subside significantly, and he led his men at a gallop toward the Sentinel Unit's main camp in Ashenvale.

One month later.

"Hurry up, we can reach Darnassus before dark, put your backs into it, lads!" Hawkins, the caravan boss, shouted, and his young men responded in unison.

Hawkins was a caravan boss from Dolanaar who had been traveling this road for nearly thirty years; he knew every inch of it like the back of his hand.

"Boss, once we reach Darnassus, we can finally have two days off, right?" a young man asked loudly.

"Pilias, are you missing your little flower again? Hahaha!" a middle-aged driver said, drawing a roar of laughter from the other elves. The young elf named Pilias, whose face was not exactly pale to begin with, flushed a deep red.

"Pilias, why are you shy?" Hawkins laughed from the middle cart. "Do you think you're the only one? Ask any of them if they aren't missing their sweethearts!"

Hawkins' words made everyone laugh awkwardly, and Pilias was left speechless, mouth agape.

"Awoo!"

"What was that sound?" Hawkins stood up and scanned his surroundings, but finding nothing, he sat back down.

"Probably just some wild beast," Pilias said.

Suddenly, a stone hammer flew out of the woods with a whistle, striking Pilias squarely in the lower leg. "Ah! My leg!" Pilias screamed, collapsing in pain.

"Pilias!" Hawkins stood up and brought the caravan to a halt.

"Whoosh!" Another stone hammer came spinning toward Hawkins. Hearing the wind, he dove off the cart just in time, the hammer flying over his head and knocking off his pointed hat. Hawkins gasped at the narrow escape, scrambled to his feet, and ran to Pilias's side. "Are you alright?"

"Boss, my leg is broken!" Pilias's face was twisted in agony, beads of sweat rolling down his forehead.

"Damn it, who dares attack us?" The middle-aged man jumped off his cart, drew a spear, and stood with his back against the carriage, cursing.

"Awoo!" After a howl, two or three dozen monsters with bear heads and claws, clutching stone hammers and spears, charged out from the dense woods on both sides. They roared with gaping maws and rushed forward, weapons raised.

"Prepare for battle, prepare for battle, it's Furbolgs!" Hawkins shouted, quickly drawing his longsword.

The Furbolgs howled as Stonehammer swung left and right; the elves were no match for the Furbolgs' strength, and three or four were knocked flat in the very first exchange. Hawkins calmly directed his men to fend off the enemy while contemplating how to break through the encirclement.

Hawkins retreated as he fought, realizing his men were trapped in the center with their supply wagons right behind them. "Eric, you're the fastest—we'll open a gap for you, and you must hurry to Darnassus to report this and bring reinforcements!"

"Boss, but what about you all..." Before Eric could finish, Hawkins cut him off with a loud shout, "Go quickly! We aren't that far from Darnassus anymore. Move, don't be a coward!"

Eric's eyes reddened, and he bit his lip before nodding. At a shout from Hawkins and the others, they forcibly smashed open a gap, and Eric darted through the chaos, sprinting away.

Watching the gap slowly close and seeing Eric running into the distance, Hawkins used every ounce of his strength to roar, "Eric, my entire life and livelihood are riding on you!"

Eric heard the cry from afar, and tears finally spilled from his eyes as he murmured, "Boss, you all have to hold on until I get back!"