MangoArt

Pelegren sits, staring deeply at the letter written to him by his last old friend. ”They’re all dead now, then.” He says, swirling ice around in his glass of whiskey and staring through the drink into the painting hanging above his dining room table. ”Here’s to you, old pal.” He takes another long, deep drink from his glass and places it down.

”Knox dammit!” Shouted Pel, reacting increasingly more with anger than sadness to the recent deaths. He was beginning to fear he’d outlive all his friends as he went to drown his sorrows once again.

”What the hell happened to the Driftwood-Applebrooks?” Wonders a quite frankly confused and heartbroken member of their extended family, Pelegren Applebrook.

Pelegren was positively catatonic upon hearing the news. Similarly to Micah, he disappeared briefly, spending several days sitting in his burrow on the hunt for the bottom of a bottle of whiskey. ”There goes the last spot of sunlight in t’is Knox-fersaken village.”

A younger Uruk, green in skin and experience, grins with excitement at the prospect of his very first battle. The gravity of the situation has not reached the young man as he marks a page in his journal for his first war poem.

Pelegren sighed deeply, ”Oi told ‘em- don’’ shoot t’e Eel! Harold said t’ere was something following it! Bu’ t’ey did nay listen. Now wha’ever t’ing could kill an eel t’at soize t’inks our shore is a feckin buffet. Dumb bastards.”

Pelegren suddenly remembers Halflings are an Irish expy and squeals in terror.

Gnome it up Big wheels keep on turning Carry me gnome to see his kin Singing songs about the gnome-land I miss 'ole' 'brandy once again And I think it's a sin, yes Well I heard Mister Gnome sing about her Well I heard old Neil put her down Well, I hope Neil Gnome will remember A Gnomely man don't need him around anyhow Sweet GNOME Alabama Where the skies are so blue Sweet GNOME Alabama Lord, I'm gnoming all o’ you In Brandybrook they love the Thain, boo hoo ooo Now we all did what we could do Now Watergate does not bother me Does your conscience bother you? Tell the truth Sweet GNOME Alabama Where the skies are so blue Sweet GNOME Alabama Lord, I'm Gnomin’ all o’ you, (here I come Alabama) Now Muscle Shoals has got the Swampers And they've been known to pick a gnome or two Lord they get me off so much They pick me up when I'm done gnomin’ you Now how bout you? Sweet GNOME Alabama Where the skies are so blue Sweet GNOME Alabama Lord, I'm gnomin’ all of you Sweet GNOME Alabama, oh sweet gnome... Where the skies are so blue and the Thain's true Sweet GNOME Alabama Lord, I'm gnomin’ all of you, yeah yeh -Ancient Gnome Shanty

“Oi didn’t even know they was datin’! Good on ‘em!” Says a legless Halfling, happy for his sister and soon-to-be brother in law.

Shui-Luo stews in his anger over this. He had not known Xiahou, but he knew the crimes of the fat, false Emperor. He examined the arrow he had used to help kill the Imperial Guard alongside Guihua, fresh blood still on it. He sighed, never having wanted to enter a state where he genuinely wanted someone dead. But that was just the way things were now.

“Fuckin zeros, bro.” Remarks a passerby

Nazgud fixes the numbers and pretends nothing happened

Nazgud, before leaving the city, tacks an extra sheet of paper onto the missive and writes in pen like a normal person. 1. As lat can see, ‘overthrowing the Rex’ am a typo as in the letter, Murak says ‘overthrowing lat as Rex’. Unless lat apparently believe bein’ an arbitrarily declared Waghchief makes lat the Rex, it is clearly a typo. 2. Mi am nub afraid to admit that mi did blah wit Murak’Gorkil. But, he blah’d that he views Braduk as a threat, agh thus would like a more incompetent Uruk in power. 3. Lat appear to believe lat are the Rex, as an Uruk cannot banish someone from Krugmar. What you are instead proposing is that mi whitewash miself, which mi will nub. 4. If lat have cast me out of the clan, lat do nub have the power to actually punish me according to clan laws, as mi am no longer a Braduk 5. Mi have more allies on this than lat. Mi can count among me number at least gakh other bruddahz, who shall remain nameless 6. Buildin’ the city does nub make lat a capable waghchief 7. How can lat trust an Uruk who would betray a bruddah? Surely, lat realize he may betray lat in tik 8. Next tik, write something latself lat lazy bastard 9. Blood is nub a very permanent writin’ material. Get some ink on this. An Addendum is quickly added to the sheet 10. While mi did break the azh’t law, which is already dubious in its fairness, laws H’Azh and H’Gakh have not been broken, and are incredibly subjective to boot. Mi believe me DID have proper cause to challenge lat, wub with lat gettin’ rid of traditions and behavin like a braindead maniac. Since lat am behaving in such a way, that also means mi pursuit of power am hardly damagin the clan!

A Halfling speaks up. “Oi do not appreciate t’e death o’ me cousin bein’ used as propaganda for t’e war she was tryin’ so ‘ard to stop. Yer people also nearly killed her and tried tah make me into a soldier in yer army. Yer nay sain’ either. Daiseh woulda wanted t’e war tah end, nay fer ya to ‘er as a morale booster. Ya make me sick! You care not abou’ t’is, just t’at you can use it to manipulate yer men into killin’ t’eir brothers an’ slaughterin’ innocents almost as indiscriminately as t’e Renatians! Ya make me sick you lousy, warmongerin’ bigguns! Sick!”

“Koinda sounds loike ‘e’s jus’ sayin’ spookeh buzzwords an’ playin’ our insecurity. Oi’m also surprised ‘e managed to wroite entire essays on evereh door in brandybrook wit’ noone noticin’. An’ come to t’ink of it, ‘ow would t’ey know about t’is?” The Halfling looks very incredulous at these writings, but not the least bit scared by them.

Pelegren recalls Haense also nearly killing Daisy.

Pelegren sobs at the death of his cousin, nursing his bruises and broken rib in Brandybrook. He resolves to give her a proper funeral, if they were to find her body.

Keshig Mograh’Yar watched from an archer’s nest in Helena as battering rams and trebuchet shots peppered the gates. Humans stood in the distance, the size of ants, trying to bust into this city that she might have decided to burn herself had it not been the circumstances. She wasn’t sure why she was on the side that she was on, but her government and her gods had guided her to this point, so she fought with zeal despite her utter indifference to the conflict. She nocked arrows and fired blindly at the swarming humans, their forms becoming larger as they approached the keep and scrambled over rooftops to reach her nest. Cursing, she lined up a shot for her newfound opponents only to hear the whistle of a heavy stone being chucked through the air by a trebuchet. Before she knew it, her armored form was flung from the nest and into a recess between homes. As she hit the ground, managing to tenuously do so on her feet, she heard and felt a snap in her ankle. She didn’t care to figure out what had happened, her only interest was survival so she called incessantly to be freed by ladder. The day waned on as no-one came to the Fe-Uruk’s aid. However, someone did find their way into her prison of rubble- an Orenian. He swung at her from above, jabbing down with his blade but only scratching her across her betusked face. Roaring in fury, she slammed her mace into his kneecap, sending the young man tumbling into the mud alongside her. The Orenian scrambled to his feet, keeping his buckler raised. This did little to help him as she bludgeoned her way through his shield, mercilessly spreading the poor man’s brains in the mud. The clash of steel and splintering wood had gained someone else’s attention, and with a soft prayer to the spirit of luck she looked up to see who it was. Lucky for the Snagagoth, it was a Renatian with a rope ladder. He lowered it for her and she managed to clamber onto the debris riddled roof of a building alongside a small detachment of Renatians. Slowly but surely, they made their way across the rooftops toward a section of wall which had been taken by Orenians. Arrows rained down on the group but she managed to escape their whistling, biting wrath. Quickly, the Orenians seemed to vanish from that section of the wall. Mograh, however, had realized she had trapped herself on this section of roof. She carefully made her way toward the ground, a section of alleyway primarily devoid of any sort of conflict but relatively close to the bottom floor of the keep. She trudged through the mud toward a ladder which lead out into the conspicuously empty, fortified street. Slowly she made her way up it, peering out to see a handful of men doing battle. Carefully, she slipped past them with minimal damage and made her way into the first floor of the keep where she and several Renatians would make their stand. Breathing a heavy sigh before beginning to catch her breath, her sprained ankle caught up with her. She sluggishly crept to a ledge overlooking the street and nocked an arrow, beginning to take a few shots at some of the Orenians making their way up the street. To the Yar Elder’s surprise, there went from naught but four or five Orenians to a full force, as if flood gates had been opened. The defenders were quickly overwhelmed, pushed back to Mograh’s newfound archer’s nest as the attackers worked their way in. Adrenaline pumping through her veins, the Fe-Uruk crept back while swinging wildly at any Orenian who approached her. The pain in her ankle vanished as she fought tooth and nail to keep them back, but it was to little avail. Even after putting down one man, she still found herself on the far edge of the room. The heavy metal gates on one side of the cobblestone chamber slammed shut, but Snow Elven and Orenian soldiers still flooded in through the opposite gate. She fought with a small number of Renatians to keep them back, but was forced up to a narrow and short tunnel in the roof. At this point, all she could think of was not survival but revenge on those that would seek to bring her to her now inevitable demise. Every time one of her adversaries made their way up the ladder, she swung her mace down to keep them down. This plan did not work for long as the tunnel was soon filled with what was left of the Renatian defenders and a handful of snow elves. The fighting was bloody and Mograh began to accrue more and more bruises, cuts and scrapes. Her nose broken, her eye black, her teeth missing, her armor and flesh torn and several fingers missing and bleeding, she and those in the tunnel with her finally managed to push back. By some twist of fate or luck, she managed to slip out and into where most of the fighting was occuring. It was like a sea of soldiers, the Renatians outnumbered but fighting bravely to the bitter end. She let loose a warcry as she hurled herself at the foe. Even with her body broken and the blood of a freshly killed Orenian on her hands, her mind strayed to thoughts of home, of her clan, of her children- these are what she was fighting for. As she realized her purpose of being here, of slaughtering men and elves until she met her demise, she was struck in the side of the head by a mace. Sent toppling to the ground, she was trampled and buried under debris and mud. In this moment, she was no longer Elder of Clan Yar, no longer Keshig of Rex Burbur, no longer Snagagoth of Krugmar. No, she was just a young mother lying in mud, ash and blood.

Mograh remembers fondly showing up just in the nick of time with her very miniscule amount of comrades