Gabryell was working through Stranglethorn Vale's famous tiger, panther, and raptor hunting quest chains. With no one around to compete for mobs, he was making fast progress. Halfway through, a message in guild chat caught his attention.
"Everyone, be careful! There's a level 36 Horde Mage killing people in Duskwood."
"Ah, I got killed too. That Mage is way too high-level. We can't beat him. A few of us grouped up and tried to fight back, but he instantly killed one of us, turned around, and ran. We couldn't catch him at all."
"Damn, so you guys got killed by him too? I ran into him earlier and got killed twice. The third time, I was so scared I bubbled and hearthed straight back to town."
"This guy is disgusting. He never fights head-on, only ambushes people. If you gather a group to go after him, he runs. The moment someone is alone, he comes back and kills them."
That tactic sounded very familiar.
Gabryell frowned. Wasn't that exactly Ganklord's style? Killing Alliance lowbies in Duskwood, fighting when he could win and running when he couldn't. If the Alliance gathered people to hunt him down, he would hide. Once they scattered, he would come back and keep killing lone low-level players.
"Ganklord should be on Ashenvale-US. Did he come to our server?"
Ganklord was far too famous. Gabryell would never misremember his server.
Ganklord had PvPed Ashenvale-US from an Alliance-favored realm into a Horde-favored one.
As the old meme went: one Mage, standing against entire guilds, calling himself Lord, roaming Duskwood and Stranglethorn Vale and ganking players wherever he went.
New players felt their hearts sink at the mere mention of his name. Seeing his shadow terrified them, and running into him meant another corpse on the ground.
The Alliance raged and joined forces to hunt him down, yet even after narrowly escaping death again and again, he still slipped through every ambush and became a legend among players.
Tens of thousands of pursuers came after him with blades drawn, each one eager to claim his head. Ganklord moved like a ghost across the Eastern Kingdoms, vanishing from ambushes, slipping through traps, and leaving low-level players dead behind him. Year after year, he kept ganking, kept surviving, and turned himself into a world PvP legend.
Ganklord tirelessly slaughtered low-level characters, and the Alliance simply had no way to deal with him. He wasn't afraid of dying. If he died, he resurrected and kept killing. You couldn't camp him forever. As long as you couldn't outlast him, you lost.
Inspired by him, the Horde followed suit and started killing Alliance low-level characters too, forcibly turning an Alliance-favored realm into a Horde-favored one.
"What's his name?" Gabryell had to confirm it himself. If it really was Ganklord, that would be a serious headache.
"His name is NoTrace."
It wasn't Ganklord.
Gabryell was actually a little disappointed. If it had really been Ganklord, he could have gone to Duskwood and had some fun with him.
Since it wasn't Ganklord, he lost interest in looking for the guy. Anyone other than Ganklord wouldn't have that kind of patience. At most, he was probably just killing low-level players to vent after getting crushed in the big battle the day before.
"Hmph, NoTrace? More like NoChance. Just wait until I hit max level. I'll camp the gates of Orgrimmar and show you all what a real PvPer looks like."
A player named Skybro spoke up in guild chat.
Gabryell saw the name and immediately opened the guild roster. He was a level 8 Human Warrior.
"Forget it. You're only level 8. One Frostbolt would be enough to drop you."
"A Warrior camping the gates of Orgrimmar? Isn't that just delivering free kills?"
A crowd of guild members immediately chimed in, mocking Skybro.
Skybro said, "I rolled here later than you guys, so yeah, my level's low for now. I came over after watching your big Hillsbrad fight against the Horde. Once I catch up, you'll see I'm not just running my mouth."
"I'm a PvP god, alright? Ten guys at once? Easy. Once I level up, I'll lead you guys against the Horde and show you what real skill looks like."
Skybro added, "Leader, make me PvP lead. I'm the real deal."
Gabryell laughed. Judging from this guy's tone, he really might be one of WoW's legendary meme PvPers: the PvP god, highly skilled pro player Skybro, who was either doing a corpse run or on his way to doing one every time he PvPed.
Who would have thought this guy would be inspired by the Battle of Hillsbrad Foothills, come to Tichondrius, and join Fearless?
"Interesting."
With him around, Gabryell believed the days ahead would be very entertaining. He was looking forward to the Honor System and battlegrounds opening, so this "PvP god" could really show off.
Since Skybro had come to the Alliance side of Tichondrius and joined Fearless, Gabryell thought of even more people, such as Xia Yige. The addon happened to need someone suitable to record voice lines, and she would be perfect.
Gabryell continued with the tiger, panther, and raptor hunting quests. He needed to reach level 42 as soon as possible so he could solo farm the Zul'Farrak graveyard.
Of the tiger, panther, and raptor quest chains, the tiger chain was the easiest. The final step only required killing one ordinary named level 37 tiger. The raptor and panther chains required killing level 43 and level 40 elites, which he couldn't complete alone. For efficiency's sake, he gave up on them for now.
Gabryell switched to other quests instead, doing whichever ones were simple and gave good XP. There was no need to stubbornly grind through overly complicated elite quests.
He kept questing until lunchtime, and his level finally rose to 42.
Gabryell opened his friends list. Dreamshade was level 41, while Carlos, Igor, and Hugo were all level 37.
"Carlos, how far are you guys from level 38?" Gabryell asked directly in real life.
Carlos said, "We're 11% away. One more run and we'll hit 38."
They were currently farming Scarlet Monastery Armory.
Gabryell said, "Once you guys hit level 39, I'll come to Scarlet Monastery, and we'll run Cathedral together."
Scarlet Commander Mograine and High Inquisitor Whitemane, that shameless pair, were level 42 elites. At level 39, they could definitely take them down. In World of Warcraft, a three-level gap was a major threshold. Once the gap exceeded three levels, hit chance dropped sharply, and the chance of being crushed became extremely high.
"Alright. We should be able to hit level 39 before tonight," Carlos said confidently.
At level 42, Gabryell no longer needed to quest in Stranglethorn Vale. He decided to go to Booty Bay first to unlock the flight path. On the way, he would stop by Gurubashi Arena to open the chest and see whether he could get some blue arena gear.
Of course, what Gabryell cared about most wasn't the blue gear, nor was it the Arena Master trinket. It was Traveler's Backpack. A 16-slot bag was worth far more than blue gear at this stage.
A Mage's bags were never big enough. Gabryell wanted to solo farm the Zul'Farrak graveyard, so he needed bigger bags. That way, he could stay in Zul'Farrak for a long time instead of frequently returning to Gadgetzan to clear his inventory.
He headed south and arrived outside Gurubashi Arena. A goblin's voice rang out, telling adventurers that treasure had been placed inside the arena for everyone to fight over.
Gabryell entered the arena, and the moment he stepped inside, a Frostbolt flew at him.
Someone was here!
Gabryell immediately looked in the direction the Frostbolt had come from. Just inside the arena entrance, a Horde Mage was casting Polymorph.
NoTrace!
Gabryell recognized the name. It was the fake Ganklord, the one killing low-level players in Duskwood.
Trying to sheep me?
Gabryell sneered and opened with Counterspell, interrupting NoTrace's Polymorph and locking him out of Arcane spells. That meant he couldn't Blink away.
"You've killed too many low-level players. Did you really think I was made of paper?"
A level 36 Mage attacking a level 42 Mage.
It really matched Illidan Stormrage's famous line:
"You are not prepared!"