Karp
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Chapter 148
🕑 Added 2025-01-14 20:24:32 +0000 UTC(Malfurion POV)
Chasing after the pair of nightmare creatures, Malfurion rode upon his spirit stag, and was followed by the father of nature, Cenarius.
“Young Stormrage, is it not enough for us to simply slay these minions of Xavius, and return to the keep?” Cenarius questioned.
“I am afraid not, honored teacher. The creatures have taunted us, and are leading us into an obvious ambush. One where my intuition is telling me Varrus Vandercross awaits.” Malfurion steadily replied.
“This obsession is dangerous, Malfurion. Should we fall here, Ysera will be left practically defenseless. Ripe for Xavius's plundering. Are you certain in your actions? Do you have the confidence that we can lay low the man who slew you in the first place?” Cenarius placed a hand on Malfurion's shoulder, and said with concern.
“He has not adapted to the Emerald Dream as we have. His magic and body are still attuned to the material world. Any weapon he wields, or spell he casts shall be a fraction of the power with which he displayed on Azeroth.” Malfurion replied in a confident tone.
“It is as you say, young one. Yet what then, gives him the confidence to ambush us so? Xavius must know that should we destroy his ally, and his minions, Ysera shall hold the upper hand, and we shall cast the Satyr to wind.” Cenarius spoke in a concerned, yet threatening manner.
“Confidence? More like the arrogance of youth. I saw it in his eyes, honored teacher. The boy has been acting according to what is in front of him, never reaching deeper, never exploiting that which careful thought and proper planning could achieve.” Malfurion chided as if he were speaking about a student who he knew was intelligent, but never once paid attention to the subject material, and coasted by on C's.
“Ah. So you say he is seeing the forest for the trees, hmm? Yes, the youth of today have no respect for patience or decorum. I look forward to meeting this Vandercross fellow. Perhaps he is worthy of reformation and redemption.” Cenarius mused.
“...perhaps. But that is something to consider once we have defeated the boy, and stand over his shattered form. To make something beautiful, it must be shattered first.” Malfurion said with a vengeance, and clasped his staff tightly.
“Agreed, I shared such sentiments with you when you first meditated outside of my garden for a century before I was willing to teach you the secrets of nature. Your pride had to be broken before you were willing to learn. If only Illidan had been as diligent as you.” Cenarius clucked his tongue, and said in sorrow at what could have been.
“My brother has paid for his arrogance, now we shall visit a similar lesson upon this youth. Behold his folly.” Malfurion gestured before them.
After they had been running for some time, they finally entered the nightmare section of the Emerald Dream, and they spotted all of Varrus's multiple elemental attacks suffusing the sky, ground and everywhere in between.
“Certainly this is impressive. The sheer number of spells clouding the surroundings makes detecting anything difficult due to the sheer amount of mana coursing through the atmosphere.” Cenarius praised as if he were grading a paper.
“It is without form or substance. Pure chaos without thought. The fire and ice are thawing one another, creating harmless water to spill everywhere.’ Malfurion clucked his tongue in disappointment.
“Hrm, it is so. Yes, I can feel the power thrumming from this magic. It is impressive. For a low level Hero, however, it is nothing when compared to us. You had to fight this at full power akin to a demigod though, correct?” Cenarius arched an eyebrow in question.
“That and more. Vandercross is an elusive one with many tricks. Keep up your guard.” Malfurion replied as he scanned the area in search of the boy.
“Ah, there is the praise I was looking for. I had feared that you, Malfurion, had grown arrogant in your quest for revenge. This is good to hear.” Cenarius chuckled good naturedly.
“Yes, I think he is lurking invisibly nearby. He has a sinister ability that can be unleashed, but only when he touches you. I suspect he plans on distracting us with these brightly colored spells, and intends to stab us in the back whilst we deal with this pair of nightmare creatures.” Malfurion shared with his friend his analysis.
“And we cannot sense him either in this environment. Ordinarily, we would consult the roots, or hear the whisper of the wind when searching for an invisible target. However, since the land is corrupted, we have no recourse. Are you so sure of his inability to plan ahead, my student?” Cenarius once again chuckled in amusement.
“...our course is clear, we must destroy these nightmare creatures, the minions known as Scoff & Ransom, and then draw out the snake from his hole.” Malfurion said in a tone that brokered no refusal.
The massive Night Elf then transformed himself into a snarling bear, and charged at the nearest nightmare creature, a being with three heads.
Malfurion let loose a roar that vibrated the air. The sonic attack tore up branches, and destroyed a nearby volcano into nothing more than ash, and cooled its lava.
As the shockwave made contact with Ransom, the tri-headed monster let loose a sonic screech of its own.
A pale-purple wave left its three mouths, and collided with Malfurion’s attack.
Neither one gained supremacy over the other, yet the pale-purple screech carried with it the additional unidentifiable ‘element’ of nightmare.
This conceptual idea reinforced Ransom's attack, and perverted Malfurion’s roar into the Night Elve's worst nightmare.
Instead of being a great sonic, bear's roar, his attack transformed into a harmless duck's quack!
Ransom's screech then broke through this quack as if it were nothing, and continued towards the mighty bear.
“The hope of dreams outweighs the fear of any nightmare.” Malfurion growled.
Conjuring up his love and devotion for Tyrande, Malfurion clasped his hands together, and created a light blue orb.
“Let the light of devotion cast you out, nightmare!” Malfurion grandly said, and held the ball above his head.
Ransom shot out a tri-beam attack of fire, lightning and ice from each mouth, in an effort to reinforce its screech, and break Malfurion's concentration.
Flexing his knowledge of the Emerald Dream, Malfurion conjured two more additional orbs as he pushed forth his hopes and dreams for his people, and even that of the soul of his younger brother.
The orbs grew in size, and ate away at the nightmare landscape, growing more powerful as they devoured the surrounding corruption.
The wave of sonic pale-purple collided with these orbs, and disappeared as if it were nothing more substantial than a fart.
Soon after, the tri-beam elemental attack tried to destroy the orbs. A massive collision of energy took place, and when it appeared the orbs would break and explode, Malfurion closed his eyes, and fell asleep!
In his dream state, Malfurion channeled even more power into the orbs, and allowed them to resist the elemental energies.
The Night Elf druid then directed these three menacing blue balls towards Ransom, who at this point, had started to flee once more.
“There is no escape, creature.” Malfurion’s voice boomed from one of the orbs.
In response, Ransom conjured up three perfect illusions from each face.
“Malfurion, my love, please!” One of the heads transformed into Tyrande's face, and begged.
“Brother, I am gone. The Demons have my soul, I need your help!” Illidan's form appeared on another.
“You failed me. I grew to protect all life…and you killed me.” The spirit of Nordrassil, the greatest World Tree cried.
Malfurion paused in his attack as he felt as if his world was being crushed.
He was familiar with this minion of Xavius's. He knew that the only things it could mimic were those faces it had stolen, or it could mimic the ghosts of the dead.
“Tyrande!” Malfurion screamed in shocked sorrow.
His orbs, powered by the hopes of his dreams, began to falter.
The sinister laughter of all three of Ransom's heads in the background seemed to be like a spell that sealed the doom of Malfurion's fate.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Meanwhile, at the outset of the fight, Cenarius had squared off against Scoff, the ooze of many eyes and mouths.
Cenarius chuckled once more as an oozing creature that stank to high heaven began to lob putrid gunk shots at him.
Swiping his hands, a trio of green nature attuned crescents spawned in, and tore the gunk into pieces. The magic attack continued on its trajectory, and impacted the ooze. However, the ooze absorbed the green crescents as if they were nothing. The only indication that it had been struck was that it jiggled from side to side.
‘Interesting.’ Cenarius thought to himself.
Scoff ever so slowly slithered his way towards Cenarius, yet he wasn't fooled by this creature's seeming sloth. They had been chasing after the duo of nightmares at high speeds. Truly the youth of today lacked higher thought.
Conjuring several roots from the ground, Cenarius smiled once the disgusting creature slipped through their grasp.
Changing the nature of his spell, Cenarius had the roots begin to sup up the slime as if it were a nutrient from the soil.
“Ha. Ah ha. You hold no power here. Cenarius!” The many mouths mocked.
“Hoh?” Cenarius replied, and twisted his finger as he modified his spell.
The decaying roots suddenly reversed their situation by sprouting flowers.
Bright yellow and orange patterned petals absorbed the foul energy, and released it as purified pollen into the air.
Mindful of a potential invisible opponent lurking nearby, Cenarius coated his surroundings with the tiny microbes, so that he could spot the enemy that had befouled Malfurion into such a revenge seeking state.
Cenarius was quite worried about his student. Hopefully victory here would strengthen his spirit, and they could finally put Xavius to rest.
Whilst Cenarius was thinking, Scoff was howling in despair as his ooze was constantly being sucked up, and dispersed to clean the environment.
“What. Are. You?!” Scoff repeatedly cried in despair.
The ooze tried to explode with a powerful stench in one last bid to escape, yet the pollen in the air clustered around him, and dried him up like a sponge gliding across a wet pan.
“Nature's Blessing upon you.” Cenarius bowed his head at the creature.
Scoff began to dry out, and crack, before ultimately turning into dust.
Cenarius eyed the being dispassionately. If only all such nightmares were so easy to banish.
Shaking his head, he turned to see how his student was dealing with the enemy.
All seemed to be in order, however…
“Tyrande!!!” The pained howl shook the very foundations of the Emerald Dream.
The blue orbs that represented Malfurion's hopes and dreams were crumbling, and were on the verge of collapse.
Ransom screeched in glee, and began to bombard Malfurion's sleeping form. If this carried on for a minute longer, he would be dead!
Cenarius was about to aid his long-time student, when suddenly, the blue orbs turned orange and were colored with an aura of nightmarish corruption.
“Malfurion, no!” Cenarius held out his hand in shock, and stopped just as he had reached Malfurion's side.
The first druid rose from his slumber, a crimson light shining in his eyes, and a power of despair radiated from his form.
“A world without her is not one worth living, Cenarius. I am sorry, old friend.” Malfurion said slowly, then pierced his hand through Cenarius's chest.
Cenarius tried to pull back and resist, but he felt all his life force drain into his student, and his vision darken.
“STORMRAGE.” Malfurion cried out, and all hell broke loose as a lightning storm that stretched the entire realm exploded into existence.
The world trembled, and cried out in shock as a new star was born.
Azeroth felt the tremors of the dream world, and wept. A thousand thousand clouds spread across the sky, and poured rain across the planet.
Malfurion Stormrage, the incorruptible Champion of Nature had fallen. In his place stood a new Champion of Nightmare.
Comments
Kasikan
The arrogant morons went from two to one. Now as long as Varrus finishes off Malfurion, the Kaldorei have a good chance of having a future. The sheer amount of stupidity that came from Malfurion, Tyrande and Cenarius was enough to basically destroy any future for their race. With the main morons dead and Syra's grandmother in charge, they may actually have a chance to thrive again. Though probably a whole lot of them are going to have to die before they can rebuild. Too many worshiped those three idiots to ever hope for change before their followers all die off.
Smitty
Pathetic but pretty canonical unfortunately. Mc v stormrage Round 2 coming up
santhinal
damn these stupid images not loading!
Joey
As usual Karp good stuff. As expected the Stormrage is once more idiotic and pathetic beyond belief. The wraith of failure finally fading can't come soon enough.
Conor McGroarty
All it took was knowing his wife died due to a fight he chose. Well good thing MC is here to clean up the mess.
