One hour earlier.
Valdris. The Orcish Dominion. Northern Wastes.
The pit was exactly three hundred meters across and twice as deep, carved from bedrock through weeks of slave labor that had killed dozens of goblins in the process. The walls were smooth, polished to a mirror finish by earth-shapers working under threat of execution. Runes covered every surface, burned into the stone with techniques that required blood and pain in equal measure.
Shaman Grukthar stood at the pit's edge, his massive frame casting a long shadow across the assembled warriors below. He was old for an orc, nearly seventy winters, his green skin marked with scars from a lifetime of conquest and ritual sacrifice. The bone fetishes hanging from his neck rattled as he moved, each one a trophy from a different campaign.
Behind him, the Warlord watched. Silent. Waiting.
Grukthar raised one clawed hand, and the drumming stopped.
