The Tale of Muglazum

Orgrimmar, the city has stood for hundreds of years, holding back countless invasion attempts and standing against the mighty siege engines that have been unleashed upon it’s stone bulwark. Built into a hollowed gorge in the Stonetalon Mountains, the city of Orgrimmar has been a stronghold for the warlike orcs for generations, as well as a home for greater than half the orc population in Durator. Orgrimmar’s guaranteed safety of its occupants makes it a popular place to seek refuge on a long journey across the lands and along with these travelers comes the many goods that are exchanged, increasing Orgrimmar’s importance as a center of commerce.
On constant watch, the guards of Orgrimmar patrol the ramparts and catwalks looking for any sign of a threat. Various outposts strategically located along the mountain chain and upon hilltops will light a signal fire that sends a high plume of smoke into the air if danger is spotted, giving forewarning to Orgrimmar so defenses can be formed.
It is ironic though that at the moment the biggest threat to the city is coming from the very core of the metropolis, right below the thousands of feet that traverse the dirt roads and paths. The grounds below the city are hollowed caverns, there is only one entrance into the caverns, and that is through a shady area in Orgrimmar’s Cleft of Shadows district. The opening into the dark abyss is always on guard and no one is allowed in. Many legends have been told about the caverns, one being how an ancient cabal named THE SEARING BLADE uses the caverns as a meeting place to plan their insurgence and prepare to kill Warchief Thrall, the orc’s respected leader. Dismissed as purely myth by many, events of late have shifted several residents’ opinion of the matter. A week ago a shaved wolf was found tied to a stalagmite within viewing distance of the caverns entrance. When the guards neared the wolf they discovered a burn on the wolf’s bare skin, the burn was in the shape of a sword, and the sword crossed over scars on the wolf that spelled out T-H-R-A-L-L. The guards immediately alerted the Warchief, and Thrall’s generals sent out a small group of warriors to venture into the caverns. The warriors have not yet returned.
Thrall himself sent further instruction to his captains to send another group of warriors to survey the caverns, destroying any threat that is come across, and hopefully locate the missing warriors. Twelve strong, the orc company fearlessly made their way into the caverns, intent on solving this urban-legend once and for all.
The orcs not only discovered remnants of a secret meeting, they ran into one taking place. THE SEARING BLADE was alive, active, and ready to fight. The battle that started is where our story begins…

The orc warrior licked the perspiration off his upper lip to moisten his dry mouth. The caverns were tremendously hot. He always thought that it would be stale and damp this far below the surface, but for some unknown reason it was boiling. The warrior walked in a loose formation with the other warriors around him. Armed with their own personal choice of weapons the party of warriors looked more like a militia then a trained organized force. The warrior looked at the orc to his left who was armed with a gleaming rectangular shield, a sharp sword and was covered in thick chain mail. Muglazum looked back towards where they were all headed. A few of the Orcs carried torches, which cast shadows onto the rock walls, creating a haunting effect. It did not bother Muglazum-nor any other orc. Fear is intimidating, and orcs like to intimidate. All the orcs continued on in silence as they trekked deeper into the ominous darkness ahead.
Muglazum was sweating all over now, he thought that maybe it was because the torches made it hot, but the torches were small, and he no longer believed that to be the cause. He looked up towards the ceiling of the cave as if the answer was to be inscribed there. The heat was continuously increasing now. Why is it so hot? Distracted by his wonderment, Muglazum did not notice the soldiers around him had stopped moving and he walked into the warrior in front of him.
“Careful comrade,” the orc grunted to Muglazum, “I think the scouts have found something.” The orc turned back and looked ahead trying to see what was going on. A hand was raised over the pack of orcs, realizing the signal the orcs split into smaller packs. The scouts had surly discovered something. The squads soon begin to disperse one by one ahead into the unknown. Swords unsheathed, daggers were drawn, arrows bowed and hands tightened around grips, the orcs charged into the unknown. The mass of orcs began silently charging like ghosts through a slender fissure between two rock walls, apparently what they were looking for was in the next cavern.
The mace was heavy and awkward to run with, but Muglazum would never go into a fight without it. The mace, nicknamed The Black Malice, was a gift given to Muglazum by an old friend, and he could hardly remember a time when he had not wielded it. The pack Muglazum was in was the last to charge through the narrow gap that the rest of the orcs poured through. The orc with the rectangular shield was just in front of Muglazum, his long dark blue cape dancing with each stride of that warrior. Somehow the orc that he bumped into moments before had passed behind Muglazum and was now following Muglazum. The caverns were unbearably hot now but there was nothing he could do about it. Go in, clean this up, and get out. He thought to himself.
The narrow passageway opened up into an enormous cavern. Muglazum stared up at the gigantic stalactites. Looking back down he discovered the source of the massive amount of heat. There was a stream of lava passing slowly through the cavern, passing down into a large pool of lava that then trickled off into various holes and fissures in the walls of this chasm. The orcs stared in wonderment. This could not possibly be right underneath their city; there are no volcanoes around Orgrimmar for miles. How did this lava get here? The question was soon forgotten as the lead scout pointed out what he spotted.
Looking down across the pool of lava a small encampment was set up, and various figures wondered around the lean-tos and huts. The group of Orcs had not yet been seen so there was no sign of disarray in the camp. The captain of the warrior pack stepped forward boldly standing on the edge of the cliff, lava boiling many meters below.
“The gracious warchief Thrall has bestowed two choices upon you traitors; surrender or slaughter!” Yelled the captain as the figures across the lake stopped and turned towards the mass of orcs. The captain let his words finish echoing off the cave’s walls before he began again. “Grant us immediate access to your encampment or be killed for reasons of impeding a militaristic investigation.” A few more figures emerged from the tents and looked upon the orcs. Muglazum could still not see exactly what these figures were; the heat from the lava distorted his vision. From one of the larger tents a figure walked out, paused to look upon the group of warriors that were across the pool on top of the cliff. The figure resumed walking until he came to the edge of the lava pool. The figure was dressed in purple robes and walked with a staff. The figure soon began to speak.
“Warriors…turn back or you will meet a fiery doom.” This statement caused many of the orcs to laugh with arrogance. The captain turned back to his orcs and gave them a twisted grin.
“You heard it boys, they choose slaugher!” All of the orcs, including Muglazum, hollered and slammed their weapons together with one another for luck and took off down towards the pool.
On the opposite side of the pool the cloaked figure whispered just loud enough to hear himself, “I warned you.” And began to leisurely pull items out of his robes’ pockets.
The mysterious occupants had constructed a thick rock bridge that traversed over the lava. The orcs charged without order over this bridge and ran towards the camp. Many of the camp’s occupants fled in terror, but Muglazum found it interesting that many stayed and were standing there, just watching the warriors. Out of the corner of his eye Muglazum saw the hooded figure pour what looked like potions onto a near-by rock and then the figure kicked the rock far into the lava. As the rock hissed into the lava, it did not completely sink and floated half out of the water. Bobbing up and down, the rock began to glow a greenish yellow, and began to rapidly increase in size. Muglazum stopped running and watched the rock, letting the other warriors run by him. The rock began to rise out of the water; it surely must have been growing under the lava because as it was rising the rock seemed to have no end. The hooded figure turned and walked away. The rock appeared to be moving awkwardly now; another rock emerged from the lava and collapsed onto the solid rock of the pool’s side. Then in a great horrifying moment, Muglazum realized what was going on. The rock coming out of the lava was not just any regular lifeless rock, but it was an Elemental. Creatures created out of pure elements, and only those who knew a great deal about the dark arts of the ancient times would know how to properly summon an Elemental. As the Lava Elemental became more obvious more of the warriors began to stop running and gaze at the great fiend. The Elemental raised a rock fist and slammed it down into the lava flowing around it. Specs of lava hit the warriors and caused them to become distracted by the sharp pain. A bit of lava landed on Muglazum’s armor creating brown scorch mark. Muglazum cursed and started running, the rock bridge was the last place he wanted to fight an Elemental. The Elemental began to slowly wade its way through the lava towards the remaining warriors that were on the bridge.
The warriors that had already crossed the bridge were drawing their bows to ready a volley. Sweating all over, Muglazum was about halfway across the bridge when the archers loosed a hail of arrows upon the beast. The majority of the arrows bounced off of the beast’s rock hide, but a few hit between the rock plates and stuck into the soft skin of the creature. The beast made a gasping noise and fell back into the lava. The splash sent a small wave of lava onto the rocky shore.
The last of the warriors made if off of the bridge and gazed into the fiery pool where the creature fell. Besides the oozing noise of the lava flowing, there was silence. Muglazum tried to wipe the ash from his chest piece, but it looked like the burn mark was permanent. The orc’s captain did a quick attendance; no one was misplaced so they began to trudge off down the pathway that the fleeing camp occupants took.
The pathway ahead led to an obvious dead end. Had it not been for one of the warriors seeing a camp inhabitant crawl through a small crawlspace, the orcs would have never discovered the well-disguised gap. The captain stepped in front of his men an addressed them.
“We have two choices now, we can continue forward and try to eradicate these traitorous beings, or we can turn around and request for more reinforcements.” All the orcs knew that asking for help was out of the question, the orcs were too proud for that. [“No problem is too great for the hands of Orgrimmar.” a famous Tauren Druid is quoted saying during the second invasion of the Burning Legion.] So naturally none of the orcs voted for reinforcements.
“We will follow you to the end oh great captain!” An orc behind Muglazum shouted causing the rest of the pack to agree in grunts and shouts. Over the shouts of agreement a hissing noise was heard coming from behind the orcs. Getting louder the orcs turned to look back at the source of the sound. The head of the Elemental was out of the lava up to the mouth. Lava was being sucked into the mouth of the creature. Chaos erupted between the orcs as they all tried to run down the narrow path to escape what they all knew was coming. Muglazum never wore heavy armor, as he preferred to be agile when handling the mace. The light armor kept him ahead of the other warriors who favored plate or heavy mail as armor. The group of warriors soon came to the crawlspace, just large enough for one warrior to go through at a time. Being the third to crawl through the gap Muglazum helped those still coming through by holding their weapons as the orcs crawled through. Muglazum saw the captain standing on the other side of the crawlspace, letting his men go first. Muglazum also saw the elemental rise out of the lava and begin to plod towards the escaping orcs. The captain shouted something to the orcs crawling through to Muglazum’s side of the wall. Crouched down Muglazum pulled the last escapee out of the small hole and looked through to the other side. The captain was telling four other orcs that it was useless to stand and fight against the Elemental but the four fearless warriors would not leave their captain’s side. The captain accepted the fact that these orcs would not flee. The five figures stood defiantly against the Elemental as it fully surfaced.
Captain Bazooku pulled his sword out of its scabbard, the familiar sound of metal becoming unsheathed echoed into his ears for what he knew to be the last time. He knew that standing up against the Elemental was suicide, but outrunning from the demon was as useless as fighting it. He knew that according to the Grand Code of War, it was the highest honor for a captain to die before his men met death, especially when death came while saving other comrades. He knew when he volunteered for this run that he might not make it out alive. He knew the risks, and he knew the risks he took for his people.
Muglazum was watching the scene unfold through the small gap that was the crawlspace. Muglazum saw his captain draw his blade, and holler at the mighty beast. Hearing his captain bellow like that almost brought tears to his eyes, Muglazum felt suddenly uplifted, and if he thought he could help in anyway he would have run right out there and stood next to his captain. As the captain’s yell faded into the sound of fire crackling and rocks crumbling, the four brave orcs drew their weapons, shouted in direct defiance of death and ran at the great beast. The great Elemental arched it’s back and Muglazum watched the five Orcs disappear into the blast of lava that sprayed from the monster’s mouth. The fresh flow of lava poured its way through the crawlspace and forced Muglazum to retreat from his position and fall back with the remaining orcs.