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Investigation Into the Blight and Its Testing
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Post by
Skreeran
Alright, I was going to post this in Taurenmoo's thread, but I think it's too big. So I'll post it here.
First of all, we have exhibit A: The passage from RotLK:
Sylvanas Windrunner, former ranger-general of Quel’thalas, banshee, and Dark Lady of the Forsaken, strode from the royal quarters with the same quick, lithe stride she had in life. She preferred her corporeal for ordinary, everyday activities. Her leather boots made no sound on the stone floor of the Undercity, but all heads turned to watch the lady. She was unique and unmistakable.
Once, her hair had been golden, her eyes blue, her skin the color of a fresh peach. Once, she had been alive. Now, her hair, often covered by a blue-black cowl, was black as midnight with white streaks and her formerly peach-hued skin a faint, pearly blue-gray. She’d chosen to don the armor she had worn in life, well-tooled leather that revealed most of her slender but muscular torso. Her ears twitched at the murmurings; she did not often venture forth from her chambers. She was ruler of this city, and the world came to her.
Beside her hurried Master Apothecary Faranell, head of the Royal Apothecary Society, who was talking animatedly and simpering. “I am most grateful you agreed to come, my lady,” he said, trying to bow and walk at the same time. “You did say you wished to be informed when the experiments were successful, and you wanted to see them yourself once we—”
“I am well aware of my own orders, Doctor,” Sylvanas snapped as they began to descend a winding corridor into the bowels of the Undercity.
“Of course, of course. Here we are.” They emerged into a room that to one with weaker sensibilities would seem like a house of horrors. On a large table, a stooped undead was busily sewing together pieces of different corpses, humming a little under his breath. Sylvanas smiled slightly.
“It is good to see someone who enjoys his work so,” she replied a trifle archly. The apprentice started slightly, and then bowed deeply.
There was a low buzz of some kind of energy crackling. Other alchemists bustled about, mixing potions, weighing ingredients, jotting note. The smell was a combination of putrefaction, chemicals, and, incongruously, the clean sweet smell of certain herbs. Sylvanas was startled by her reaction. The scent of herbs made her oddly . . . Homesick. Fortunately, the softer emotion did not last long. Such emotions never did.
“Show me,” she demanded. Faranell bowed and ushered her through the main area, past pieces of bodies, into a side room.
The faint sound of sobbing reached her ears. As she entered, Sylvanas saw several cages on the floor or swinging slowly from chains, all of them filled with test subjects. Some were human. Some were Forsaken. All were dull-eyed with fear that had pierced so deep and had gone on so long that they were almost numb.
They would not be for much longer.
“As you can imagine, my lady,” Faranell was saying, “it is difficult to transport Scourge as test subjects. Of course for experimental purposes, Forsaken are identical to Scourge. But I am delighted to report that our tests in the field have been well documented and quite successful.”
Excitement began to stir in Sylvanas, and she graced the apothecary with a rare and still beautiful smile. “That pleases me greatly,” she said. The undead doctor fairly quivered in delight. He beckoned to his assistant Keever, a Forsaken whose brain had obviously been damaged by his first death and who muttered to himself in the third person as he removed two test subjects. One was a human woman ], who was apparently not so lost in fear and despair as not to start weeping silently when Keever dragged her from her cage. The Forsaken male, however, was utterly impassive and stood quietly. Sylvanas eyed him.
“Criminal?”
“Of course, my lady.” She wondered if it were true. But in the end, it didn’t matter. He would serve the Forsaken, even so. The human girl was on her knees. Keever stooped down, yanked her head up by her hair, and when she opened her mouth to cry out in pain, he poured a cup of something down her throat and covered her mouth, forcing her to swallow.
Sylvanas watched while she struggled. Beside her, the Forsaken male accepted the cup that Faranell offered without protest, draining it dry.
It happened quickly. The human girl soon stopped struggling, her body tensing, and then going into paroxysms. Keever let her go, watching almost curiously as blood began to stream from her mouth, nose, eyes, and ears. Sylvanas turned her gaze to the Forsaken. He still regarded her steadily, silently. She began to frown.
“Perhaps this is not as effective as your—”
The Forsaken shuddered. He struggled to stand erect for a moment longer, but his rapidly weakening body betrayed him and he stumbled, falling hard. Everyone stepped back. Sylvanas watched raptly, her lips parted in excitement.
“The same strain?” she asked Faranell. The human female whimpered once and then was still, her eyes open. The alchemist nodded happily.
“Indeed it is,” he said. “As you can imagine, we are quite—”
The undead spasmed, his skin breaking out in spots and weeping black ichor, and then he, too, was still.
“—pleased with the results.”
“Indeed,” Sylvanas said. She was hard put to conceal her own elation; “pleased” was a pale word indeed. “A plague that kills both humans and Scourge. And, obviously, affects my own people as well, as they, too, are undead.”
She gave him a look from glowing silver eyes. “We must take care that this never falls into the wrong hands. The results could be . . . Devastating.”
He gulped. “Indeed, my lady, indeed they could.”
She forced a natural expression as she returned to the royal quarters. Her mind was racing with a thousand things, but foremost among them, burning as brightly and wildly as the wicker man she lit every Hallow’s End, was a single thought:
At last, Arthas, you will pay for what you have done. The humans who spawned such as you will be slaughtered. Your Scourge shall be stopped in their tracks. You will no longer be able to hide behind your armies of mindless undead puppets. And we will grace you with the same mercy and compassion you showed us.
Despite her great control, she found herself smiling.
All right, what did we learn here?
Forsaken test on both Humans and Forsaken.
One of them was a human woman.
Another was possibly a Forsaken criminal.
They've been there a long time.
The Blight has been tested in the field.
Alright, so first of all, it makes no direct mention of the female's age, but called her both "woman" and "girl." That alone should be enough to refute claims that she was a child.
Second, we learn that the Forsaken are experimenting on their own due to difficulty in obtaining Scourge. It would seem that criminals are prioritized, but it is a strong possibility that when criminals are not available, normal Forsaken can be substituted, under the basis that they are serving their people.
I’m going to try and remain objective on this, so I’m not going to provide much commentary. This is strictly an investigation. I’ll bring forth the facts, and then you can form your opinion.
Alright… Next, we’ll look at it in-game…
In the Undercity, we have the prisoner chamber in the Apothecarium. Apothecary Keever is here, and says the following:
"Hmm, it would seem Keever needs a new subject. If that fool
Abernathy
keeps
taking Keever's subjects
, Keever may have to have a word with him."
"Ahh, there we go. Now, Keever must try this vial and see if it works."
Apothecary Keever forces the fluid down the weary man's throat.
*Caged Human Male turns into a toad*
Apothercary Keever pokes the small toad.
"Not what Keever was hoping for. Keever may have added too much earthroot. Let's see if the second serum will do what I need."
Apothecary Keever feeds the toad some of the strange liquid.
*Toad turns into squirrel*
Apothercary Keever pokes the small fuzzy squirrel with obvious disappointment.
"Well, this is just not right. The creature is far too small. Let us see what Keever's third batch will do."
Apothecary Keever feed the squirrel some of the viscous fluid.
*Squirrel turns into rabbit*
Apothecary Keever pokes the skittish rabbit.
"Keever is unhappy with this. Perhaps if Keever were to try a larger dose, that may fix this dilemma."
Apothecary Keever grabs the rabbit and pours the fluid down its throat, then sets it back inside the cage.
*Rabbit turns into sheep*
"What is this? Did Keever ask for a sheep? Keever wanted a weapon of great power and all he got was this sheep. Keever is very disappointed."
Apothecary Keever pokes the wooly sheep repeatedly.
*Sheep explodes*
"Keever is most pleased."
*repeat*
There are three types of humanoid prisoner: Human Male, Human Female, and Dwarf Male. Note that they are all adults. Let us investigate where they may have come from.
There are four nearby regions from which to obtain the humans. Scarlet Crusade in Tirifal Glades,
Kirin Tor
and
refugees
in Silverpine, Syndicate members in Alterac, and Hillsbrad and Southshore in the Hillsbrad Foothills.
Which would the Forsaken be most likely to use? Well, all four if it can be managed. But let us look at what would require the least effort…
Transportation from the Hillsbrad Foothills would require either going through Ogre and Syndicate infested Alterac and then through the Scourge-controlled Plaguelands, or going by land across miles and miles through the Foothills and then Silverpine Forest, or going through Dalaran controlled land to Lordemere Lake, and then across the lake. Based on this, it’s unlikely many from the Hillsbrad Foothills are being transported to the Undercity.
From Silverpine, they can choose to make a few days journey across land to Undercity, or they can take the lake. It’s possible that some of the subjects were brought from here.
For the Syndicate, see transportation from the Hillsbrad Foothills.
And lastly, we have the Scarlet Crusade, who are living on the Forsaken’s doorstep in Tirisfal. In addition, the Forsaken have a particular hatred towards the Crusade, which hunts them fervently and frequently tortures them. It thus makes sense that captured Crusaders have the highest priority as human test subjects.
As for the Dwarf, there is only really one place to get them nearby, and that is Dun Garok in the Hillsbrad Foothills. The reason Dwarves would be here is to perfect the strain. Take a look at
this quest
in New Agamand:
Let's face it, <name>, by now our Plague has been exposed to humans, dwarves, dogs, livestock... you name it. As our strains adapt to their hosts, more impurities get thrown in the mix. What we need is a strain made custom for the vrykul's biology.
As it is stated, the Blight has to be adapted for each individual race. The Forsaken want it to work on dwarves, so they have to test it on Dwarves. Interestingly enough, this could also mean that it was made to function on orcs, trolls, tauren, and elves, considering that it killed everyone at the Wrathgate. This does not necessarily imply that those races were made prisoners, after all, they were able to adapt it to Vrykul with a mere blood sample, but it’s food for thought. It’s also possible that when they “perfected” the Blight, they were able to make it function on all life without necessarily testing it on every species on Azeroth.
Alright, next, let’s look at other prisoners:
We have a
Captured Scarlet Zealot
and a
Captured Mountaineer
in the basement of the Gallows’ End Inn in Brill.
Apparently
“the Deathguard likes to use the cellar of the Gallows End Tavern as a holding cell until prisoners can be "properly" dealt with.”
This provides evidence to the fact that Dun Garok Mountaineers and Scarlet Crusaders are both used as subjects in Undercity.
Next we have
captured farmers
in Hillsbrad Foothills, who are
used to test another strain of the Blight.
Apparently: “Next door the Deathguards are holding a few captured farmers hostage. High Executor Darthalia suspected one of the military strategists from Stormwind to be hiding out amongst them. Apparently the military chap was found dead in the Plaguelands last night. Darthalia, always looking out for me, decided the prisoners would be left to my disposal.”
In closing, let me just say that, despite the evil that the RAS and Sylvanas have done, not all Forsaken are evil. One only needs to look at Leonid Barthalomew and Trevor the Priest to see that. If they are good people, who’s to say that they are the only ones?
Post by
159454
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Skreeran
A few things.
Very well thought out and arranged Skeeran, great job.
"Hmm, it would seem Keever needs a new subject. If that fool Abernathy keeps taking Keever's subjects, Keever may have to have a word with him."
Both of the links in that line lead to the same thing.Not quite. The second link leads to a comment of recorded dialogue, explaining how Abernathy has been taking prisoners.
And for the 'field tests' they talk about, it could reference the Forsaken who take out the town of Hillsbrad. In terms of lore, I don't believe one person actually took out the whole town. It was probably a group of Forsaken. That offers the perfect time for field testing.Indeed, the "field tests" most likely refer to
this
,
this
,
this
, and
this
.
And for testing on other members of the Horde, they might use prisoners already sentenced to death.But the suspicious thing is why they would need it to work on the Horde in the first place. It's quite possible some of the RAS members
did
intend to use it on all life.
I doubt Sylvanas did though. At least not yet.
Post by
159454
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Skreeran
Exactly whate I was thinking. And it is possible there are some out of game capturing and experimenting that takes place when the Forsaken take over Hillsbrad, the town.It's quite possible, but I didn't discuss it much since there is no actual evidence to discuss... :P
It could be possible that they later planned to use the Blight on other enemies that share a common ancestry with the Horde.
I.E. Fel Orcs, Other Troll Tribes, Grimtotoem.Indeed, but it should not be up to the Forsaken to commission that, in my opinion. They probably did it quietly, and without reporting to the Warchief. And that seems suspicious.
Post by
159454
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Skreeran
Indeed, but it should not be up to the Forsaken to commission that, in my opinion. They probably did it quietly, and without reporting to the Warchief. And that seems suspicious.
Good point. I may not trust Sylvanas as far as I could throw her, but I don't like seeing her evil.
And there is no proof she actually experimented on the Horde, or even Horde races for that matter. They could've used bandits, or Scourge cultists.Exactly. I was just speculating a bit based on what was said in that quest. There's no proof that they ever actually did.
Post by
159454
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Rankkor
exelent, just exelent bro' :D this is why u're the undisputed king of these kind of debates.....
let's see who's crazy enough to refute this huge amount of research.
let me add my own toughts into this.
as to the passage of ROTLK, there are other examples of people using the word "boy" or "Girl" to fully adult but not quite old individuals.
Quote from Uther in Warcraft 3 as well as the Culling of strath instance: "Watch your tone with me
boy
, you may be my prince but I'm still your superior as paladin"
Quote from Mannoroth to Gromm also from Warcraft 3: "The
boy
believed you could be saved, but he didn't know what lies within your Soul, when in your heart you know WE are the same"
Quote from Medivh from War3 too: "Listen to me
boy
, this land is lost! The shadow has already fallen, and nothing you do will deter it! If you truly wish to save your people, lead them across the sea...to the west! "
Quote from Uther on HoR: "No,
girl
. Arthas is not here. Arthas is merely a presence within the Lich King's mind. A dwindling presence"
Quote from Uther on HoR: "Snap out of it,
girl
. You must destroy the Lich King at the place where he merged with Ner'zhul - atop the spire, at the Frozen Throne. It is the only way"
as you can see, merely using the words "Boy" or "Girl" isn't enough proof of being underage, after all, thrall, arthas and jaina are all in their 30's and yet all 3 of them have been called boy or girl in the past.......
furthermore.......
being forsaken isn't the same as being evil, as leonid isn't the only noble forsaken in the game, there's this dude too :
High Executor Anselm
who is a really cool forsaken who rejects evil, and turns down an offer to be made high general of the scourge by keleshet himself, out of loyalty to the horde and to sylvannas.....
just like him there are many others......
is really inmature as well as stupid as to rationalize an entire civilization or group of individuals as 1 single unchangeable unmutable entity.
just cuz all draenei are holy doesn't mean the race is inmune to evil, after all, the wyrmcult has draenei on it, the cult of the dammed has draenei on it, the twillight hammer has draenei on it, and no, these aren't man'ari eredar, these are "Draenei" draenei if u catch my drift.
so just cuz 90% of the race is holy doesn't make all of the race holy and inmune to the taint of evil.
same goes for forsaken, much of this race is misguided, and down-right evil, but not all of them are, quite a few of them are very noble actually, and it's this stigma that several refuse to shake off.
overall really nice job skree =) grats man.
Post by
Skreeran
Yeah. On the subject of the Forsaken prisoner, isn't it odd he seemed to accept his fate so voluntarily? It seems..... unnatural.There are three particular reasons for that.
A) The Forsaken are not particular prone to fear. They may not even feel fear.
B) Time: He's been there locked in a tiny cage for a really long time. Even the living are nearly numb to the fear, so the Forsaken would most likely be completely numb.
C) He's undead. He probably doesn't even enjoy being undead very much. I doubt it makes much difference to him whether he's alive or dead.
Edit: Thanks Rank. :) Nice quotes, too. ;)
Post by
Adamsm
The Prisoner is a servant of the Forsaken, who in turn are the worker bees to Sylvanas the Queen; if she says form a wall in front of me and let those weapons cut you down, they'll do it.
I disagree with the idea that Sylvanas wasn't intending to use the Blight on everyone: She is insane, and feels that if she is dead... everyone should be dead, that no one should be allowed to be alive if she can't be, but you can lay that at the feet of Arthas. She's a mad dog, who created a weapon of mass destruction, tried to keep it hidden, and nearly died for it.... which is a pity, had she died, we wouldn't be worrying about all of this.
Hopefully the Blight will never be used again, but we all know that won't happen, but... maybe we'll all get lucky and Graymane will get his teeth on Sylvanas before the end of Cata.
Post by
Skreeran
I really don't think she's insane. Definitely a psychopath, but not psychotic.
Just look at what she says in the Battle of Undercity. She doesn't seem like a raving lunatic to me.
Post by
ArgentSun
I applaud the depth of your research :)
Post by
Skreeran
I applaud the depth of your research :)Thanks, I felt that this matter should be settled once and for all... :)
Post by
Rankkor
oh oh skree, about the test subjects, u forgot to add aonther one.
on venomspite, they have yet another test subject, and he is...... surprise surprise, another scarlet crusader :D
and venomspite is quite close to an alliance town (Wintergarde keep) and a Scarlet town (New Heartglenn) doesn't this ring any bells?
hell yhea it does, with the UC and hillsbrad, on UC they have a scarlet settlement nearby, and an alliance town not so nearby, so having 2 sources of humans, they chose the scarlets.
on northrend this goes even further, as they litterealy have wintergarde and new heartglenn at their doorsteps, and while wintergarde is smaller, and weaker (the base is heavily besieged by scourge and 3/4 of the whole town is burned downm thus the defense on the outer perimeter would be minimun) they chose to go at new heartlenn (wich if u look at it you have to admit is the largest town in dragonblight, even larger than agmar's hammer, it's heavily defended not only by crusader but also by siege weapons and ballistae)
and even then, they chose a scarlet as a test subject.
this on dragonblight, where choosing an alliance test subject would be far easier and less dangerous.
now put that scenario on tirisfal glades, where to add dificulty to the mix, the alliance town of southshore and of hillsbrad are not only better defended but quite far away.....
it's soooooo obious that the humans on the lab are crusaders....
I think this is the final Nail on the coffin.
Post by
306612
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Rankkor
had she died, we wouldn't be worrying about all of this.
I don't like to go to the "what if" scenarios, but let's have some fun with this shall we?
it's not in the best interest of the alliance or horde that sylvannas dies........
for all her flaws (and god knows she has MANY) she keeps the forsaken on a tight leash, she is the absolute, total, indisputable, unquestionable and unchangeable lead of the forsaken, she's almost their goddess, and they obey her in every command she gives (she's almost to the forsaken what Azhara was to the nigh-elves and later the naga)
if she dies, a new forsaken leader would had to be elected, chaos and unstability would arrise, as every power-hungry maniac would try to take over the throne, and judgin by how most forsaken behave like, the next lead woudn't had been as controlled and as reserved as silvannas was.
she's a woman who's allways in controll of herself, and has high discipline, while lesser leads would be rash, irrational, quick to anger, quick to trick and fool.... you get the picture.
I think this blight business is done fer good.
look at it this way:
blizzard during the earlier days of wow, desinged the forsaken to be a Scourge Junior faction, with them wanting to wipe out all life on azeroth, and intending on using the horde till the time was right, much of the quests in eastern kingdoms and kalimdor show their disdain for the horde, and their clear unconfortness of being in the horde out of necesity.....
but along the way, blizzard changed their mind about this obsolete lore, and intended the forsaken to be fully fledged proud members of the horde, but the problem was that they had that nasty new plage (it was't called blight back then) in development.
they needed to get rid of that obstacle to be able to develop the forsaken in a new direction, but in order to make sure the plage is not developed, it should go away in a tragedy, a tragedy so bad that it would cripple the foundations of not only forsaken and horde but of alliance as well.
and presto, we got the wrathgate.
I honestly extrememly doubt we will ever see more of that blight, as blizzard wanted to get rid of the stuff to develop forsaken in a new direction.
if we do see that blight again, it won't be at the hands of forsaken, most likely an apothecary or 2 managed to survive and fled, and so, we'll see that plage on the hands of an enemy faction like the twillight hammer (their motto is "if it kills all life, it will bring armageddon to azeroth" so I can tottaly see them wishing to have a sample to use somewhere)
Post by
Adamsm
I really don't think she's insane. Definitely a psychopath, but not psychotic.
Just look at what she says in the Battle of Undercity. She doesn't seem like a raving lunatic to me.
If you put Arthas/the Lich King in front of her watch how she changes.....
Post by
Rankkor
I really don't think she's insane. Definitely a psychopath, but not psychotic.
Just look at what she says in the Battle of Undercity. She doesn't seem like a raving lunatic to me.
If you put Arthas/the Lich King in front of her watch how she changes.....
I saw the lich king in front of her in HoR, and she didn't acted crazy, she was determined to confront him (much the same way jaina was) and when she saw that she was no match for him, she wasn't as fanatic to keep fighting to the death and rather did the most logic option, retreat.......
I'm telling you, an insane person doen't listen to reason, but sylvannas has been reasonable in the past, it's her attitude what gets me :S but she's more cunning than anything.
insane is not quite an correct word to describe her.....
malygos was insane, deathwing is insane, the whole twillight (and I mean both book and cult xD) is insane......
but those patterns aren't reflected on her......
Post by
Adamsm
She created a weapon designed to kill the Living and the Dead, put a lot of thought into it... she's not all there. For all we know, even given the order from Garrosh, she might have sent her Forsaken after the Gilnean's anyways; after all, Glenn was one of those who didn't respond to help her when she was alive and come fight the Scourge.
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