Azar and Falco discovered that the Power of Fury did not arise naturally; it could be brought forth through training. Once they had mastered the fundamentals of combat techniques, they could learn to control their emotions through training and call upon the first stirrings of the Power of Fury within them. One way to think of it was that combat techniques were limited, but the spirit was boundless. When someone's spirit reached a higher level, their combat techniques could deal greater damage and be sustained for longer. This spirit had to be cultivated within oneself; it could be understood as a person's willpower.
But Azar wasn't satisfied with this kind of Power of Fury, because he knew it came with serious side effects. It was a person's vengeful impulse—negative and uncontrollable. Why were the other tribes stronger? Because they were more savage! In truth, the main reason was that they had developed the Power of Fury incorrectly. There was nothing wrong with the power of faith, but power shouldn't be bloodthirsty, furious, or chaotic. Just because you were strong and had won didn't mean you should eat someone else's corpse. And eating someone's heart wouldn't give you their strength, either. There was no scientific basis for that. (I was wrong; this was Azeroth, where science didn't exist.) So our exploration took a new direction: how could we make the Power of Fury within us orderly and beneficial? We spent a great deal of effort on it, but still couldn't find an answer. We had no choice but to set aside our investigation for the time being and focus instead on improving our combat training.
That day, Falco was writing a manual... while Azar sat alone at the docks, lost in thought. How could chaos be made orderly? How could the Power of Fury be better controlled? Through the spirit? Where did the spirit come from? What was the source of the Warrior's path? What did a Warrior believe in? A Warrior? A person who fought. Did fighting come first, or people? If he couldn't work this out, he'd never resolve the contradiction at the heart of the Power of Fury. He believed that, in the earliest stages of development, all living things had struggled to survive, doing whatever it took to stay alive. All their skills, then, had been meant for slaughter—for fighting to claim the right to survive. First came fighting, then came people; otherwise, they couldn't earn the right to survive. Combat techniques—skills learned in battle that made it easier to kill. The Trolls of the past had struggled to survive, and that was how their combative, bloodthirsty, savage tribal culture had taken shape. He was still fighting to survive now, so why did he find it repulsive? Because of civilization! The most obvious expression of civilization was that all things had order, each following its own path. Bloodlust and savagery weren't bad in themselves. They only seemed bad because, deep down, he believed they were bad. That was why they had become symbols of backwardness. The tribe's great migration had happened for the same reason. Its people didn't accept bloodlust and savagery, or cannibalism. They believed the Trolls were uncivilized and that they themselves were civilized, so they had left. They didn't want to be like that; they wanted to separate themselves from the Trolls. Broadly speaking, neither side was right or wrong. They had simply chosen different paths—the cultures they believed in. To them, that was civilization. There was no right or wrong, only different choices. All things had spirits, all things had their own paths, and all things had the right to survive and choose. Order was Azar's choice, his civilization, his path. Order was Azar's faith. With faith came a source of power. He would fight to survive, and even more, he would fight for his faith!
Azar didn't notice that, as he thought, the waters of the Well of Eternity beneath his feet were responding to him! Of course! She was the blood of Azeroth. The blood of a Titan had to hold the most primordial, profound, and pure Power of Order. Though she was only a Titan spirit, not yet a Titan, and had been corrupted by the Old Gods, she was still a future Titan. That was why the Power of Order in her blood was answering Azar, acknowledging his path. He felt his whole body relax as waves of unfamiliar, powerful energy coursed through him. Ah! It felt wonderful. He let out a soft moan, feeling himself slowly lie down, then gently float upward. He felt as if he had become one with heaven and earth, moving up and down, left and right, drawing circles and squares. As the saying went, without rules, there could be no circles or squares. Azar was swimming through an ocean of order, and order was reshaping his body, even trying to reshape his thoughts. But it failed. He had his own path in his mind. He wasn't entirely of order; he also had his own wildness, so the two were incompatible. Azar believed that too much of anything was as bad as too little. Nothing in the world was perfect—or perhaps perfection was itself a kind of imperfection, always liable to veer toward the opposite extreme. That, too, was unacceptable. Only by constantly learning and improving while staying true to your own style could you become a true hero. I admire you. I believe in you. But I will not follow you blindly.
Azar's combat techniques hadn't improved, but his strength had. He now had faith, a source of power, and had gained complete control over the strength his rage gave him. The Power of Order made that strength orderly, controllable, and stronger. Azar could become angry whenever he wished, even fly into a rage. The more fiercely his anger burned, the stronger he became. Azar had mastered a mighty power that came at his call and vanished with a wave of his hand.
Azar began to control his body, making it move as he wished, and it obeyed him. He had regained control of his body. He could feel the energy of order obeying him, adapting to him. Azar and the energy were equals, helping one another. It strengthened Azar's body and will, and he repaid it with his faith. They slowly merged. Azar was the energy, and the energy was Azar. They were lovers in their honeymoon phase. It showed Azar the world of order as it reshaped him, changing every one of his cells. It was enjoying itself—yes, it was savoring the feeling of being worshipped by a living being, the pleasure of creation. Though it had no mind and could not think, it could still feel. All things had spirits, and its joy was its activity. It stirred to life, moving horizontally and vertically, square on the outside and round within, every stroke governed by rules. You could call order rigid, but you could never ignore its beauty: the beauty of rules, the beauty of harmony. It came, entered him, and reached into every one of Azar's blood vessels and every cell, guiding and governing them, bringing them order and discipline. Azar seemed to see his own body, its scars smoothing over, its imperfections becoming perfect. This was the power of order. It took over his body, washing through it again and again, setting it right again and again, soaking into it again and again. Its disposition was gentle; it never flew into a rage. It was like a gentleman, speaking eloquently before you. She was a lady, every gesture and smile perfectly measured.
He had found it. Azar had found his Warrior's path, and found his faith. He fought to survive and for his people. Anything that threatened them was his enemy. He refused to be oppressed or enslaved. The thought of enslavement enraged him; in his fury, he fought, and in fighting, he sought victory. One burst of rage could split mountains; another could topple seas; another could leave corpses stretching for miles. Order gave rage an outlet, then reined it in at just the right moment. If rage was chaotic and irrational, then order taught its wielder when to stop. Rage under control, rage in order, rage wielded for his own ends. He wielded rage, and he wielded order. He was the point between them, neither leaning one way nor the other. He was Azar!
"Sir, can you hear me?"
Azar heard Falco's voice. He slowly opened his eyes and saw Falco, Koral, Yalik, and Muru. He also saw his older sister and the Chieftain. What had happened?
"Child, do you know how long you've been asleep? A whole month."
It was true what they said: no time passed in the mountains, yet a thousand years had gone by in the world below.
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