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12. Danger Hidden in Plain Sight
🕑 Added 2024-12-04 20:00:06 +0000 UTCDeep within the temperate pine forest of Grizzly Hills, a massive predatory creature of legend awakened. Its piercing golden eyes contrasted sharply with its bluish fur, glowing softly in the dimly lit den.
A most unusual den for a most unusual bear; books and parchment were neatly stored in the carved stone wall of the cavern. Gemstones served as light sources while curated pelts and hides of various beasts covered the ground.
Wooden pillars, totems, and sculptures of bears reinforced the artificial cavern's structure. They thrummed with the ancient powers of the spirits and elements for one gifted in the art of shamanism, druidism, or even the less world-attuned magic.
This creature was the owner of this cavern, Ursol, and as he stood up, the sound of his armors clicking together echoed. It was his den, made and hidden by the elemental spirits to those uninvited. Stretching shortly, he began to move out, power and grace behind every movement.
Yet it was only an alternative until his twin brother Ursoc walked once again upon the world of the living. Their shared den was seated atop one of the highest hills of Grizzly Hill, bringing a pain too sharp for him to rest within, as such, his preference for this den.
The Wise Bear was rarely seen since this fateful day, the Great Sundering, the end of the War of the Ancients, when Kalimdor shattered, as was his brotherly bond.
The temporary nature of the matter and communication between them wasn't impossible–though taxing for his brother's recovery–changed little. The pain and sight of it all were carved into his soul.
It had diminished his interaction with the outside beyond the necessity to feed and occasionally listen to the spirits about the occurrence of the wider world or the likeness.
But today was different. Ursol was troubled by the information he was given half an hour ago by a peculiar furbolg. It echoed in his mind with growing urgency as he pondered on them and the one who spoke them.
An urgency that he now knew why this cub had shown from the first instances of awareness. A young male furbolg in the transitional phase to adulthood, the Wild God had found himself most intrigued by.
It was a rather exceptional feat considering his state of mind in his reclusion, no matter that it had significantly ameliorated as of last.
Ohto of the Greenweald had always been a unique one, his interaction with him only confirming it with how direct and unflinching the youngling had been. To an insolent degree for some, Ursol reckoned. A characteristic that amused him and caused great melancholy.
'Brother...' He shook his head. That wasn't the matter.
To have gained the attention of the Bear Lord of Wisdom meant it was a given that Ohto wouldn't be normal beyond the luck of having been spotted by him at the right moment.
He stood out like a sore thumb. The two most striking features were his mental faculties and drive for progress and development far beyond any Ursol had seen for a furbolg cub or adult. While not unprecedented, it was rare, a theme the young one was intrinsically tied to.
The non-negligible magical talent Ohto possessed and knew to nurture only added to his previous qualities.
Showing the affinities in seemingly diametrically opposite paths of life–a statement that couldn't be further from the truth–only added. It was rare for this fringe branch of furbolg to come into existence, even rarer for a furbolg the age of Ohto. Generally, less than a dozen existed at once.
It was far from being an unknown phenomenon.
Usually, it was not excessively the product of noble goals. It was the result of bored or curious ursa totemic–primarily of advanced age, shamans as well could, but it was even more uncommon–with the necessary affinity requesting to be taught to the shamans and the ancestral spirits gave their approval.
Alas, it didn't go far in the majority, but when they put effort and mastered both aspects of themselves… They were seen as the epitome of might, honor, and wisdom for any furbolg.
If the traits from before weren't sufficient to pick the Wise Bear's interest, that was more than enough. But that wasn't all. The oddness of this cub was in layers, like the bulb of an allium.
Then came one of Ohto's most intriguing features: if there were doubts about his identity in body, mind, and soul as a furbolg, if unique. Ursol would have assumed he was a green dragon with some blood of a red dragon masquerading as a member of the Greenweald tribe.
But it wasn't so. Ohto wasn't the mortal guise of some foolish dragon; it was improbable as it implicated the murder of a cub, a child, a heretical act for the ones of ruby and emerald scales.
Even if it were the case, dragons, no matter their flight, would have been spotted in short order if they had not been honest about their purpose from the beginning. Their smells would have betrayed their guises, and if not, the spirits would have known and informed the shamans if they hadn't sensed the false nature first.
Furbolgs were extremely sensitive.
What followed would depend heavily. But any overconfident dragons would comprehend how mortal they were for one last agonizing moment.
Furbolgs reacted strongly, quickly, and viciously to threats, all in particular to the kind that were apex predators, having shown magical abilities and a taste for deceit. And the dragons weren't the only ones to have learned the hard way.
Either way, it couldn't be a member of the Red Dragonflight; the slivers of Life energies suffusing the cub were too distinct, unrestrained, and of the wrong ratio to be mistaken for theirs.
It was lacking in certain aspects and greater in others.
If there were a word Ursol would use to describe it, it would be that it was raw and unrestrained if not for Nature as a buffer.
As such, it was evident neither was Ohto blessed by their Queen beyond the lack of any draconic traits one should have if it were the case.
The Bear Ancient didn't know how this came to be, but he had ideas, one of which he was strongly veering toward. One built on the chance of a mutation happening to the cub at conception, but instead of making spots on his fur, it altered his connection to the Emerald Dream.
Or so he assumed. There was a vague familiarity to the Rift of Aln and other such abyssal corners of the Emerald Dream where primordial energies ran rampant.
There was also a very faint trace of Death–a part of nature born from possible complications in gestation–but it was extremely subtle. It was likely why he had a great affinity to the spirits and was stable–more or less, there wasn't an average–with Life and Nature.
It was a miracle.
Be that it may, it wouldn't be the first case of such happening, even if not specifically this; evolution was taking its course, slow or fast, little or big. If it was that, it remained to be confirmed, but it was undoubtedly a welcome novelty.
It was something not to blatantly ignore, for it had and would have more repercussions, more than uniquely colored eyes. Magic always and without fault influenced the individual. Life was not as balanced or controlled as Nature, the second a facet of the first changing little.
From all of these points, the cub's potential piqued Ursol's endless curiosity. He wondered what this promising young furbolg might become as he matured. He was already one of the most skilled healers Ursol had encountered; his unconventional path intrigued the Bear Lord further, and there always seemed to be more.
But it wasn't enough for him to envision the worst and put his snout where it would infringe boundaries. Though it had been a long time since he took on a student–the War of the Ancients–this cub was a mighty convincing and exciting contender to put an end to that hiatus permanently.
It was also a way to venture the explanation of Ohto's visions… not that the need for a reason was strictly required.
There wasn't any absolute method or general consistency regarding seeing. Innumerable reasons could lead to a vision not only in images, as its name wrongly suggested.
They could be centered on memory fragments, smell, sound, information, imagery, etc. They also weren't solely about the future or were linear or complete. If nothing else, they were anarchic and, in extreme circumstances, dangerous for even the strongest-willed.
It was important to listen to them and try to understand their multifaceted nuances without blindly trusting them, metaphorical and literal retelling alike. Understanding a seer's mind was also vital to avoid tragedy.
And it wasn't only the visions the young ursa totemic gave that preoccupied the Bear Ancient. The demand for confidentiality was close behind; there wasn't anything concrete to conclude from, but it was abnormal.
If it was a valid fear Ohto had related to beings threatening his life or an unrelated quirk of his personality, Ursol was uncertain, and ultimately, it changed little. He would honor the request in both cases if it's the former… there would be problems with the dangers in question. To ask at a later time, he presumed.
Speaking of…
"The Burning Legion…" He growled, his eyes shining like two golden stars. Rage barely began to describe the eternal firestorm of hate in his heart. They were the ones to have robbed him of his twin, cursing his brother, slowing down a new life all Wild Gods had if their physical shell succumbed.
However, the matters relating to the second demonic invasion were less pressing to Ursol than what was said afterward. The World Tree, Andrassil… A source of much emotion, anger, shame, and regret, none of use in the present but to fuel his desire not to commit the same mistake. A painful mistake and lesson of nearly five millennia ago, this misplaced trust in the great wisdom of the Cenarion Circle's archdruids led to the bloom of the Emerald Nightmare.
An error in judgment or bad luck, the results were the same: catastrophic and everlasting, and the blame did fall on his shoulder, having allowed it in his territory.
Scowling at the memories, the Bear of Wisdom ran, his mighty form gaining in speed as he called the wind to carry him, only stopping when at the approaching sight of the carcass of Andrassil, the Broken Crown, what remained of the World Tree after its destruction.
There was something… something in the air, in every root and every rock.
An unnatural peculiarity that only now Ursol noticed or truly paid attention to, but it hadn't been millennia since he walked here beyond mindlessly passing by. It wasn't there before, not even in the past; it was recent and discreet.
"Strange…" He muttered from his vantage point. His eyes narrowed as he solicited the elemental spirits of fire, air, water, and earth to share their senses with him. The response was mild, surprising as it wasn't from his less-than-ideal state of mind but from the feeling of the land itself. But they did assist him to see beyond what was possible with his body alone.
And what he felt through senses, not of his own, was perplexing with this new line of thought born of the snippets given by the cub. Only reinforcing his initial impression.
It was something insidious, meticulous in its deceitful method, that resided in the land. Something Bear Lord admits he wouldn't have remarked until it was too late, far too late. It was a definite mark from the Old Gods' presence festering like cancer, ravenously violating the wild, life, and nature as it did so long ago.
It was wrong on a fundamental level. The longer it went, the worse the sensation became. It whispered to the Wild God to go on and ignore the unnaturalness, yet the stronger the voices tried, the less they worked as the traces of darkness grew brighter. More evident and glaring. He couldn't be easily swayed.
But the World Tree's profound wrongness wasn't the only abnormality Ursol remarked, to his growing horror and guilt of his ancient mistake. The furbolgs were severely agitated. There was tension between the two main tribes.
He had heard of it through the spirits of dead local furbolgs and shamans, yet they were foreign to lying and wouldn't fathom doing so to him if they could. It didn't mean what they would retell in unbridled honesty was the unbiased truth.
He also learned of their dreams to revive his brother or more than view it as an admirable fancy. It was exceptionally well hidden, suspiciously so—another aspect Ursol wouldn't have paid much mind to until now.
A bloody war would eventually break out between the Frostpaw and Redfang and the smaller tribes and scattered clans if it continued like this.
Yet another point the Wise Bear wouldn't have seen necessary to intervene; conflict and violence were part of life, but the situation here was everything but natural.
The furbolgs had built Grizzlemaw and called it home for millennia, and peace had reigned here for just as long. The premise of war was inconceivable as evidence for the rising hostilities was not only absent but nonexistent.
It was from a foe they could instinctively sense that was destabilizing their home, the hearth of their existence, from its very roots. Yet a foe they did not see and understand. And they were powerless to stop their souls, minds, and bodies. Confusion, fear, and anger rose, and if not stopped, so would the point of no return, madness, where the fall to darkness only began.
'This must be stopped.' The Bear Ancient vowed.
If his brother's tragic fate foreseen in maddening corruption was a reality or not, immediate action must be taken. The Wild God wanted to act immediately to avoid further perversion, to protect the ignorant furbolgs of this eternal corpse bringer of damnation who have unknowingly called it home.
But rationality brought by his age eclipsed his righteous fury. He would not risk falling into corruption himself, no matter how slim the chance. Strategizing was required. It was the voices again, he growled.
He would need to inform Orrson and Kodian, his nephews, on his grim discovery and plan accordingly with them for the immediate furbolgs exodus from Grizzlemaw, which housed nearly half of the region's total population, and healing of the victims in need.
Only then could the problem of Vordrassil begin to be addressed, and he would cleanse this unsightly taint off his territory with a vengeance rarely knew he was capable of. He was profoundly angry.
Then there was the rest of what Ohto had revealed and was yet to disclose to Ursol's joy and dread. It was a time of change; the violent and dreadful magical ripple of recent years that had awoken him from hibernation was merely an announcement.
*
Merry Christmas to you all!
