Ball Invitation

The invitation had come from the ambassador of the Lordaeron Embassy in Dalaran, a court count of the Lordaeron Kingdom.

Court counts differed from landed nobles like Orendo. So-called court nobles were those who served the royal family, remained in the capital or the kingdoms' directly governed territories, and held titles as bureaucrats.

Court nobles of the same rank were naturally a notch beneath landed nobles, but they were also naturally more trusted by the royal families.

Like the other human kingdoms, the Lordaeron Embassy in Dalaran consisted of diplomatic personnel dispatched by its kingdom to reside in Dalaran.

Dalaran held a unique position among the seven human kingdoms. The other human kingdoms each possessed vast territories and populations, while Dalaran had only one city and the villages around it.

The upper class of Dalaran was not ruled jointly by nobles and a king as in the other kingdoms. Dalaran had been built entirely by mages, so naturally, it was the mages who ruled it.

The ancestors of Dalaran's citizens, meanwhile, had almost all been ordinary humans from various kingdoms, leaving them with ties to every nation.

Furthermore, Dalaran stood right along the necessary route between several powerful human nations, giving it an excellent geographical location.

For all these reasons, Dalaran had become one of the de facto political centers of the human kingdoms.

Every human kingdom maintained diplomatic personnel here. Whenever exchanges, disputes, or negotiations between human kingdoms were involved, they were generally conducted in Dalaran.

Its unique ruling class, prime central location, politically neutral stance, the mysterious and elegant mage lifestyle that nobles yearned for, and even the elves rumored to dwell within the human world...

All these factors attracted large numbers of humans to settle here. The nobles of the northern human kingdoms took particular pride in being able to purchase property in Dalaran and own a vacation villa.

Without a sufficiently high title or enough wealth, one simply could not afford to live in Dalaran.

Thus, after several thousand years of development, Dalaran had also become one of the economic centers of the human world.

As one of humanity's political and economic centers, Dalaran served a role similar to the United Nations on Earth for the human kingdoms. It allowed them to argue and negotiate peacefully in Dalaran under the mages' supervision, preventing bloody conflicts from arising.

It was precisely because of Dalaran's oversight, intervention, and mediation that, although the divided human kingdoms had experienced minor frictions over the millennia, internal wars had never broken out between them.

Dalaran therefore had nine embassies and diplomatic offices. In addition to the embassies of the six human kingdoms, there were also diplomatic offices for Quel'Thalas, Ironforge, and Gnomeregan.

The nobles of various nations often held all sorts of balls at their respective embassies.

The Lordaeron ambassador's invitation was for one such ball.

In truth, ever since Orendo had risen to prominence, he had received more than a dozen such invitations every month. Most of them had been tossed aside and ignored.

This time, however, Orendo wanted to go, because the stated purpose of the invitation made him feel that the wheels of Azeroth's history had not stopped turning because of his arrival.

The Lordaeron Embassy's invitation stated the purpose of the ball: [The birth of Lordaeron's heir to the throne. By the king's command, the ambassador invites diplomatic personnel from all nations to celebrate together and announce the birth of the Lordaeron prince to all nations friendly with Lordaeron.]

And that little Lordaeron prince, who had been designated heir to the throne from the moment of his birth, was named—Terenas Menethil!

Naturally, the King of Lordaeron and Crown Prince Terenas Menethil, who was not yet a year old, would not be attending the ball. It was merely a diplomatic ball held in Dalaran in the crown prince's name.

Over the past six months, the Lordaeron Embassy had gradually sent Orendo more than a dozen ball invitations, and he had not attended a single one.

This time, aside from seeing Terenas Menethil's name, Orendo also wanted to go because Aegwynn was gone and he wanted to have some fun...

The Lordaeron Embassy was located within Dalaran, in an excellent spot at the heart of Violet Avenue, the city's very center.

It was Dalaran's liveliest, most prosperous, and most expensive commercial district. The fact that Lordaeron could build an embassy there only proved that the strongest kingdom possessed greater national strength than the others.

The Dalaran of this time was whole and complete, a human city that had developed for thousands of years. Compared with the Dalaran of several decades later in the "original plot," which could at most be called a small village, it was countless times more prosperous and had countless times more citizens and residents.

Orendo rarely went anywhere beyond Violet Academy, and rarely ventured into Dalaran itself.

Because Aegwynn did not allow him to run around!

Now that she was gone and Solarian could not control him, Orendo felt free!

So, after receiving the invitation, although the ball would not officially begin until evening, Orendo left the quiet academy early to explore Dalaran's liveliest and most prosperous district.

After all, even the Eye of Truth had advised, [Appropriate leisure can relax the host's mood and increase learning efficiency to a certain extent.]

After changing into an ordinary mage robe, Orendo quietly left the academy and stepped onto Dalaran's bustling streets.

Walking through the busiest commercial street, Orendo saw sacks of salt, spices, and sugar piled from the shops all the way onto the road. Fully laden merchants pushed handcarts back and forth, while the air was filled with the mingled fragrance of countless spices.

After more than a year in Azeroth, as long as he ignored the skin colors and clothing of Dalaran's residents and merchants, and did not listen to their language, Orendo truly felt as though he were in the market street of an urban-rural fringe back on Earth!

Everything felt fresh to Orendo, but he was not wandering without a destination. He headed straight for his own magical shop, Severosa Fine Goods, located in the busiest central stretch of Violet Avenue.

He had not returned to Severosa Domain in a year. The domain was still managed by his butler Dobby, while the new business in Dalaran was run by Dobby's son, Jobby.

Orendo was not worried that the father and son would change their loyalties, overthrow their superiors, and seize the nest for themselves.

Aside from the fact that, as a mage, he held an overwhelming advantage over ordinary people like them, it was also because class distinctions in Azeroth's human world were extremely rigid. It was much like medieval Europe on Earth: dragons gave birth to dragons, phoenixes gave birth to phoenixes, and the sons of rats could only dig holes.

The royal families of the seven kingdoms that had split from the Arathor Empire had no desire to one day be replaced by their own descendants. Thus, the kings of every human kingdom throughout the generations had vigorously promoted a ruling concept centered on bloodlines.

Nobles were nobles, and commoners were commoners. Humanity had not yet undergone the great destruction and rebuilding necessary to produce common-born elites like Khadgar, Rhonin, and Turalyon.

If Dobby and his son betrayed Severosa Domain, Orendo would not even need to do anything. The noble class of the Hillsbrad Foothills would not let them live!

It was like after World War I, when the Soviet Union was founded: the nations of Europe and America frantically suppressed the red giant while also desperately guarding against anything similar appearing within their own borders—a class instinct born from the fear of sharing the same fate.

Therefore, unless an irresistible force intervened, such as them being controlled by magic, human noble retainers of this era rarely betrayed their masters.

Especially when their master possessed extraordinary power.