Working in Stormwind: A Warcraft Isekai

Before dawn, they finally dragged the black panther onto the deck.

Goblins and other sailors had been ordered down to help, and together they’d wound ropes around the beast again and again. It had lost all desire to resist and lay motionless like a mummy. Even its mouth was bound shut. Only its eyes moved a little.

But Jess was more concerned about his cloak than the panther.

He dipped some cloth in seawater and rubbed at the claw marks. They seemed to fade a little, so he kept rubbing, hoping to erase the white streaks entirely.

After a long time, faint marks remained. They were still visible if he looked closely.

There wasn’t any real damage beyond that. The panther had been weak by the time it struck him. Otherwise things might have been worse.

Surely repairing this much damage wouldn’t cost thirty silver coins, even if it needed repairing at all?

The marks weren’t very noticeable. Maybe he should just let them be.

As Jess cleaned his cloak, the panther lay bound in the middle of the deck and stared at him continuously, as though it knew what he had done.

It seemed to understand why it had suddenly grown so weak, and why it had been captured in the end.

Jess could almost feel the beast’s fierce hatred of dark magic. Perhaps it had encountered orc warlocks during the invasion and suffered at their hands. What else could explain such hatred?

Only now did the arena guard responsible for transporting and watching the Baron of the Night finally dare to step forward and take responsibility for the mistake.

He was a sturdy fellow with the brown hair and strong features typical of Stormwind. His skin, however, had turned a deep reddish shade after years of working outdoors.

Addressing passengers who were just recovering from their night of terror, he said, ”Next time we’ll check the cage’s security more carefully. To be safe, we’d actually kept the animal sedated with drugs the whole time. Perhaps the storm made the medicine wear off earlier than expected. Whatever the reason, this should never have happened. I’m willing to pay half the reward myself as compensation.”

”Why didn’t you go down and catch it?” the bare-chested man demanded, stepping forward. ”You must know better than anyone how to bring that panther back. You could at least have given us some advice!”

”There’s no need to argue about it, sir,” the goblin captain interrupted. ”I don’t enjoy saying this, because I’m grateful for what you did. But taking payment means getting the job done. If he’d provided you with some vital advice, shouldn’t you have given him a share of the reward too? The whole point of this hunting job was to make up for the losses caused by that man and his owner. You’ve received the agreed payment, and he’s willing to pay a price as well. I hope we can leave it at that.”

The bare-chested hunter looked angry but couldn’t think of an answer.

NovelPhoenix holds the author’s published chapter, but someone copied it here without permission; the source supports the person who wrote it.

Jess and Gred had no interest in the argument. Instead of taking their full reward in silver, they’d chosen to receive one gold coin and forty silver coins together. Gold held its value more steadily, after all.

Since the two were traveling together, there was no need to divide the money between them right now. They wanted to keep it in the most valuable form they could.

Jess turned the gold coin over and over in his fingers. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d held a gold coin with his own hands.

It was a Gurubashi gold coin with the image of a winged serpent stamped on it.

Its weight was close to the many kinds of gold coins circulating inside the Alliance. And after so much money from the declining Gurubashi Empire had spread across the world, most places accepted it.

Gred stretched out his hand. ”Let me see that. Just because you’re holding it doesn’t mean it’s all yours.”

Jess gave it to him. The dwarf rubbed the serpent design and laughed foolishly a couple of times. As long as the goblin had paid them enough, everything else was secondary.

Jess noticed the nobleman who’d told them about the Baron of the Night leaning against the rail and studying the bound panther. He walked over.

”Sir, do you know where they’re taking the beast?”

”You don’t know?” the man replied. ”To Blackmoore’s arena at Durnholde Keep. It opened recently and has already made quite a name for itself in Lordaeron. Nobles come from Alterac, even Arathi, traveling great distances to watch, because that arena has orcs! Who wouldn’t want to see how a star beast from Gurubashi performs against the orcs at Durnholde?”

So that was it. The panther was on its way to fight enslaved orcs at Durnholde Keep.

No wonder the shipping fees were so high. Just the appearance fee for a star like this must be enormous, never mind a share of the ticket sales.

Someone like Jess, who earned a fixed wage, couldn’t even imagine the money people made in the entertainment business.

”You two surprised me,” the nobleman said. ”I thought you’d die down there. Instead, you all made it back. Though that fellow with the ponytail was in a truly awful state.”

Jess had been busy helping move the panther and hadn’t paid attention when they carried the ponytailed man back to a cabin. Only now, as things settled down, did he remember that the last time he’d seen him, the man had still been struggling to breathe.

Several human sailors were arguing fiercely with the captain and some goblins. They weren’t speaking Common, but the humans kept pointing northeast, toward Menethil Harbor.

Jess guessed they were arguing about whether to stop at Menethil for repairs and treatment.

The captain clearly wanted to stick to his plan: sail straight to Southshore. There were roughly four days left. They could still arrive before December first, giving Jess and Gred a little more time for their journey.

Jess hoped they would. Diverting to Menethil Harbor could cost them another two or three days.

From what the passengers were saying, the ponytailed hunter wasn’t in immediate danger of dying, but no one could predict what might happen at sea.

Jess was relieved he wasn’t the captain and didn’t have to make such a difficult choice.

Though for a goblin captain, perhaps it wasn’t difficult at all. Goblins weren’t going to delay a voyage just to treat an injured person.

Eventually, the argument seemed to end.

The captain stepped forward again and looked across the deck. Many passengers had already returned to their cabins.

”Are there any priests aboard? We’ve got three or four injured people, two of them very seriously hurt. We need a trained priest!” he shouted. ”If there are no priests, then druids, shamans, witch doctors, sages, tide priests—anyone who knows how to keep a person alive a little longer, using any method at all, step forward! I’ll pay you! We only need to keep these people alive until we reach Southshore!”

Watching people go to answer the captain’s call, Gred leaned against a crate and muttered, ”I didn’t even know we had priests aboard. Why weren’t they so eager to help earlier? Come to think of it, if I’d joined the Church of the Holy Light back in Stormwind, they might have taught me some healing. I could have earned quite a bit more silver.”

”Perhaps that’s exactly why you couldn’t become a priest,” Jess said.

”You should be a priest yourself, Jess.” Gred sat up. ”You sound exactly like those bald fellows at the Cathedral of Light.”