Death Never Dies

by Milton Garby

  It was a nice house, she had to admit. Dusty, but nothing she couldn't clean. The neighborhood was on the dangerous side, but between the peacekeepers and her own warrior training, Leira didn't have to fear for her life even in the dead of night. Especially not now, in broad daylight.

  She took off down the road, greeting people around her with 'good mornings' and 'how are you?'s. She didn't know any of them yet, but she was learning. She'd have to learn, if this was to be her home, if this was to be where she got a job. Sure she could live off the conjuration ritual Sara had left, but she didn't want to depend on the Old God for everything.

  Old God... was she forgetting something?

  Leira turned a few corners and headed towards the nearest temple of the Light. She hadn't gotten to be able to do it much during the war, but she always liked to come to a temple and bask in the Holy Light's presence. The temple in question was in the Lower City's eastern quadrant, and while technically the naaru A'dal was closer, she didn't want to bother it. The temple was tall and grand, with Shattrath City's greenish metal wrapped around its outside. It was shaped like a miniature Terrace of Light, except no fountain of energy poured from its spire.

  Leira walked in the front door just in time. There was already a congregation gathering in the circular innards, sitting in pews framed with brass and bowing their heads. In the center of the room, surrounded by arcs of seats, was a draenic woman dressed up in priestess robes, her hands raised as she chanted. The sigil of the naaru floated before her head, and above her was a shimmering orb of golden energy.

  She quietly clip-clopped over to an empty seat and wordlessly took her place there. She bowed her head and extended her mind to the Holy Light. She sighed as its warmth brushed over her head and soothed her limbs. It was like a long day at the spa. Leira could never tire of this.

  Something pushed at her head. She ignored it, and focused on the warm embrace of the Holy Light around her. It was the most glorious thing she'd ever been given the privilege to experience, time and time again, and she just couldn't understand why such an omnipotent being would give even the slightest bit of attention to just some woman who'd not even seen her third decade.

  The pressure continued, and she winced. But then it came again, and with it came the warm, soothing presence of the Holy Light. It didn't speak to her audibly, or even with telepathy as Sara sometimes did. It spoke to her directly in concepts, it spoke to her by making her suddenly know things she didn't know before. It was trying to help her, she suddenly knew. It had detected something wrong with her, it was trying to undo something that had been done to her, it was trying to make her relax because this could get uncomfortable. The pressure kept growing, and it was like her head was splitting apart.

  Leira was getting stares as she groaned into her hands, twitching slightly as the Holy Light pushed against her more and more, invited by her faith and trust, and then something deep, deep in her soul was rewritten and -

  SNAP!

  Then it was over. Everything was the same as before. Leira opened her eyes and looked around, blinking. "I'm fine," she reassured those around her. "The Holy Light was just particularly intense today." That was an understatement. That feeling, of her thoughts changing around her, it was almost like the feeling of when Sara -

  Sara.

  Her stomach did a flip. Leira stood and bolted out, not pausing for anything. She needed to get to the Terrace of Light.

  That bitch! she raged internally. I can't believe she actually fucking mind controlled me!

  Leira put her endurance to the test and ran. She knocked aside pedestrians and barreled through stands, but who cared about all of that when the world was going to end? She thanked the Light for clearing her mind and undoing Sara's magic, and made it to the Terrace of Light in record time.

  She came rushing in through one of the gates and looked around frantically. After a moment she found what she was looking for and made tracks to get it. She didn't know if Ironforge was still intact, but if Shattrath was keeping its portal open then it must've been alright. Leira didn't pay attention to the peacekeepers staring at her, or the way the blessed naaru A'dal swiveled its body to face her, or the way the energy being's body parts came together and rubbed as if it were shivering. All that mattered was getting to the portal right away.

  The shimmering arcane gate stumbled into her vision. She took a moment to confirm it was the right portal, and dove into it headfirst. Leira swam through the arcane currents and braced herself for the sudden drop. When the portal travel ended, the warrior dropped into a roll and came up sprinting through the Mystic Ward. Should she find help there? No, she needed to get right to the military. It would take time for someone in the Mystic Ward to get there, why spend the time?

  Leira felt like she sprinted the entire way to the Military Ward, and by the time she got there she was soaked with sweat. She doubled over and took a few heaving gasps for breath to try and clear the exhausted buzzing in her head. Her toast nearly came back up and she gagged, but forced it back down with an iron will.

  She looked around the Military Ward. There were a few people out running errands. Some guards, some casters, some warriors and paladins. She found the nearest person and ran up to him. He was a dwarven man, with bright red hair and a beard to be spoken of in legends. At the moment his back was to her and he was dressed in casuals, but the presence of the Light was thick about him.

  "Sir!" she shouted, and he turned around. She stumbled to him and caught her breath. "Sir, sir it's an emergency. It's, it's - "

  "Whoa there lass," he said, coming closer and holding her up so she didn't collapse. "Take a moment and breathe!"

  "We don't have a moment," she wheezed. "Damn it, I might even be too late. It's the end of the world, it's - "

  "Hang on a moment!" the dwarf shouted, grinning at him through a mouth nearly swallowed by beard. "You're Leira! Well by my beard what's got you in a tizzy? I've not seen ya since Silithus!"

  She focused on him. "Fardol? Huh. Wait, you're in Paradox right?"

  "Aye..." he said slowly, cautiously. "What's this about the end of the world? You got somethin' about the demons?"

  What? Demons? Demons were the farthest thing from her mind. "No, no. It's Sara." The blood instantly drained from the man's face. "She sent me to Shattrath with mind control, but I broke out. She's going to bring back Yogg-Saron. She could be in Ulduar right now, and believe me she can do it."

  "Sara Smithers?" he whispered. "She's bringin' back an Old God?"

  "She is the Old God," Leira said.

  "Damn it all I was right!" he shouted, throwing a punch at the air. "I hate it when I'm right! Leira, follow me! We gotta move!"

  The paladin started running, and Leira was right behind him. She just hoped they weren't too late.

  Sara

  Sara stood atop one of the female dragons' neck, hands wrapped around a horn as she stared at the scene in front of her. Ulduar, in all its glory. Metal pillars rose to the heavens, stone streets defied the snow. And hidden deep, deep within was her prize.

  "Alright," she announced to the others. "Here's how this is going to go down. Ulduar has a lot of potential safety mechanisms, but most of them aren't our problem. For instance, the reorigination mechanism. It'll still be attuned to Algalon, who's gone rogue so his death won't signal the Pantheon, and the reorigination device itself was destroyed. The signals to call the Watchers back to Ulduar are designed to go off if Yogg-Saron tries to get out, not if it tries to get in. We're flying over them with distraction gems and once we're at the transporter we go in. Dragons, you switch back to mortal forms then."

  She continued speaking. "Once inside, the time for stealth is over. We burn our way straight to the prison of Yogg-Saron. We aren't breaking the glass dome though, we're going through the Descent into Madness. After that we'll be in the prison, and we go from there. Ready, dragons?"

  The lizards muttered their confirmations. "Then let's go!"

  With the sound of
giant wings flapping, the four red wyrms launched from the mountainside. They glided down a narrow slope, then pulled up into the sky to approach Ulduar. This was so similar to when she'd come here with Derestrasz. Except now her mission was far more pressing, and only one person was going to leave the Titan prison. It was far quicker too; the sharply angled maze of corridors beneath them passed by far quicker than they had when she rode on a drake.

  In no time at all they were descending, and Sara had to fight to keep a familiar lump in her throat from rising. The vast number of iron soldiers had not abated. But it also didn't seem to have grown, so her last visit to Ulduar apparently had not caused too big of a stir. She was not afraid. Her magic was an order of magnitude stronger compared to when she'd last been here, and she had four red dragons enslaved to her will instead of one drake.

  They landed as quietly as four hulking dragons could, and once they got off the lizards they shifted into their mortal forms. As one, they approached the humming teleporter and were whisked away to the innards of Ulduar. Sara was the first one in, hovering inside and letting the arcane magic take over her body.

  When the power faded away, she was in the antechamber of Ulduar, still shrouded with her magic.

  "Not for long," she whispered, before dispelling the distraction aura. Suddenly, a half dozen iron dwarves saw her appear and charged her. Sara simply raised her left hand to her right ear and charged it with bright green magic, then unleashed a cresting wave of Old God power over them. The sheer quantity of her magic scraped painfully on her bones, but it didn't matter how much she damaged her body now. Just as long as it got to the end. The dwarves fell to the ground, dead as doornails.

  The others finished teleporting in just as Sara finished killing two stone watchers. They weren't nearly as powerful as she had feared.

  "Alright, march forward," she ordered. As an afterthought, she flicked her wrist and summoned her shadowy barrier. It was so easy to do it, here. The power of her old body coursed through the halls. It seeped through the cracks in the stone and filled the air, as tangible as a ghost and as pervasive as air. Her servants followed after her, packs filled with everything they needed to finish the ritual.

  The Antechamber posed little difficulty for them. Now that Sara was here a second time, she took more time to take in the sights. The architecture was truly impressive. Brasses and reds, blues and golds, it all blended together perfectly. The designs were stylistic, the constellation holograms breathtaking. It was perhaps the most guilded cage to have ever been built, and she would take great pleasure in tearing it down brick by brick for daring to have imprisoned her!

  They reached the top of the Antechamber's stairwell and trekked across the walkway to the Observation Ring. It was just as colossal as she remembered, a room the size of a city with what looked like an empty hourglass blocking entry to the prison of Yogg-Saron. More stone watchers stood here, guarding the exits to each of the four Watchers' lairs. But the Watchers wouldn't be here, they'd be outside in the Storm Peaks, at their respective towers. Not in Ulduar.

  Not close enough to stop her if they tried.

  The stone watchers roared and came after her. She was tempted to tell the red dragons to change back and rip them to shreds, but she couldn't risk their lives. She needed all the mana she could get for the ritual, but mana could be replenished. Even with her resurrection magic, now wasn't the time to take chances. Maybe she was just being paranoid. All the same, she took the brunt of their attention while the others pelted them with magic from afar.

  Then Ulduar was quiet and still. Far in the distance, living plants went about their lives in the Conservatory of Life. Boombots would be circling around the Spark of Imagination, iron soldiers would be gleefully watching a gladiator match in the Clash of Thunder, and ice elementals would be rumbling up and down the Halls of Winter. Apathy would set in, because they weren't needed to guard the prison's inmate anymore.

  Far to the left, away from all of it, was her goal. She was so close she licked her lips.

  She made the trip in silence. They passed through the hallway, and her minions swiveled their heads left and right to take in the sight of the stained glass windows. Then they came upon the first faceless corpse.

  Sara came to a halt and, still hovering, held up a hand to order her minions to stop. She drifted closer to the faceless one's body. She placed a hand on its scaly forehead and moved it around. She poked its trunk, then backed away and lit up her magic, extending it into the faceless one.

  It had died over two and a half decades ago, but its soul was as close to the body as if it were freshly dead. And despite the draconic size of the monstrosity, moving its soul was as easy as moving a tauren's. The faceless one had waited for her. Its soul wanted to be manipulated by her, and that was exactly what she did, fusing body and soul and jolting the faceless creature back to life with a flash of death magic.

  The beast sprung to its feet and bellowed triumphantly. The others with her took a step back, but Sara didn't flinch. She stared up at it, and it turned its head to face her. Then it spoke, gesturing with both arms to the air. The sounds were wretched and gurgled, exactly like the language was meant to be.

  "Zaix Yogg-Saron!" it bellowed. "Ilfah qam! Qwaz arwi Shath'Yar!"

  She snapped her fingers and gestured to the others. "K'yi hoq. Hoq'qam woth'gl'Vezax, hoqm'igl ma hoq'gag qam'hoq shezk'trgl," she explained. Her accent was no doubt atrocious, but she could be understood.

  The faceless raised both arms and scissored them around the base of its head. "Gag iggksh'maq, Yogg-Saron!" It plodded back to her side and she resumed floating forward.

  "Don't get left behind," she shouted over her shoulder to the others. "I'll revive the faceless, and they will cover our path. Now quit gawking and follow me!" she shouted, growing impatient with anticipation.

  With the towering faceless one at her side, she felt far more at ease as she descended towards her old prison. The bodies of dead mortals littered the ground, too far gone for her to revive. They continued their descent. Sara simply floated down the gaps and the faceless one, with its colossal height, took them as hops. The dragons shifted back to their true forms to flap down, and the mortals helped each other, stepping carefully onto various slabs of stone. They came across another faceless corpse, and she resurrected that one too. It followed at her right, as opposed to her left.

  Before long, they came into the chamber containing General Vezax's corpse. She first revived the two faceless flanking him, then approached the faceless general. Her first time around, she'd felt a pang of sadness to see such an ancient being felled by something that was supposed to be far below him. Now, she was filled with nothing but grim determination as she forced her magic into him. She found his soul and grabbed it in imaginary fingers, pulling it back the short trip to his body. She fixed the wounds. She fixed the gashes and the brain damage and more until his body was pristine, death energy pouring off his armored plates. The great and terrible General Vezax pushed himself up with his pincers and roared to the heavens.

  Then he saw her and instantly remembered his place, bowing as deeply as his stocky body would allow.

  "Woth'gl'Vezax, hoq'qam," she said. "Hoqm'igl ma hoq'gag qam'hoq shezk'trgl. Ilfah'maq YWAQ'iggksh nwah ghs ma ag'tkksa!" she explained, punctuating her command by clenching her hand into a fist.

  He nodded. "Gag ytwa, ez vem vwah! Qi'agth vhesplah ilfah'plkez. Thoq fssh Yogg-Saron!"

  It took her a few moments longer to give the orders to the lesser faceless. They fell into place beside General Vezax, and she treated herself to draining some of the general's mana. What was he going to do, refuse her?

  Once she was at full mana, she led her group past the faceless and into the prison of Yogg-Saron where, for the first time, they caught a glimpse of the Beast with a Thousand Maws.

  One by one, they all threw up.

  "Are you finished?" she asked eventually. "Good." She looked back at the entry, where the faceless were already sculptin
g saronite into impassible barriers. "The faceless will fortify our backs just in case. Dragons, get over there - yes, to the dead Old God, I don't care if you feel sick - and start healing it. It won't react to your magic." She wouldn't react. "There should be the normal injuries associated with trauma, cuts, and magic. You're also looking for an enormous amount of brain damage. Don't try to revive it, just make the body as pristine as you possibly can."

  "Meanwhile," she continued. "Higris, Elma, get the dream dust ready. You twelve, get over there and practice your parts of the ritual; we'll only have one shot at this so we need to get this right on the first go. Setting this thing up is going to take all day, so let's get started."

  Ellemayne

  She could hardly believe she was setting foot in Ulduar again.

  Especially not for the same reason she'd gone there the first time.

  Yogg-Saron was coming back. The call had come out from a trusted member of Paradox. The hard-and-fast evidence was circumstantial, just some Old God magic glyphs in a few members of a guild, but the accounts from both Fardol Brighthammer and Leira Vindalis painted a terrible, terrible picture. And since the Liberality Confederacy was making no progress against the Legion anyway, they'd gone storming to Ulduar via portal as fast as physically possible.

  An emerging Old God had just a little more priority than the demons.

  They finished teleporting into the Antechamber, and right away Ellemayne had a bad feeling about this. Iron soldiers littered the ground, inanimate. There was no evidence of any kind of injury, so whoever did this had powerful magic.

  "Move forward!" Turaniles shouted. "Pack up!"

  Ellemayne nodded and reached into herself. She focused, and called upon the aspect of a pack of animals. The magic radiated into her allies, and their feet thundered hard as they tore down the Antechamber.

  The bodies of iron constructs passed them on either side as they went up the stairs of the Antechamber. Around her, the members of her guild who hadn't been part of their Ulduar expedition - mostly due to youth, it had been twenty-five years ago - swung their heads in all direction as they marveled at the sights. They finished climbing the stairs and raced across the reconstructed walkway to the inner sanctum.