With a healer keeping him topped up, Gabryell could withstand Araj's spells without much trouble. Between the two Mages and Hugo's shots, Araj, who only had a little over 8,000 health, went down quickly.
"This spot is great."
After seeing once again how much terrain could break World of Warcraft, Carlos sighed. "WoW really is the kind of game where everything gets easier once you learn how to abuse the map."
When Araj died, Araj's Phylactery appeared on the ground.
"We'll go down and clear the trash. You two loot the phylactery."
Gabryell waited until he had dropped combat and finished eating and drinking before jumping down.
"We can loot it too?" Carlos asked in surprise. He and DeathScum had not even joined the fight.
"As long as the phylactery hasn't despawned, anyone can loot it. No limit on uses or players."
DeathScum immediately perked up. "Now that's good design. Free quest credit, free happiness."
Without Araj, the remaining mobs were easy to clean up. After inviting Carlos and DeathScum into the party, they quickly wiped out the trash around the ruins.
Gabryell looted Araj's corpse and obtained Araj's Scarab. Now he could return to Chillwind Camp, turn in the quest, and finish the Skeleton Key.
"Back to Chillwind."
Once everyone had finished looting the phylactery, he led them back to camp.
After turning in the quest, Gabryell received the Skeleton Key from Commander Ashlam Valorfist. From now on, whenever they went to Scholomance, he could open the door and walk straight in. No more corpse-running through the gate as a ghost and resurrecting inside like an idiot.
"Carlos, you guys keep questing here. Coldhands, come with me to Eastern Plaguelands."
He was ready to move on and continue questing in EPL.
They split into two groups. Carlos and the others stayed behind in Western Plaguelands, while Gabryell and Coldhands headed east.
After arriving in Eastern Plaguelands, they followed the riverbank toward the secluded home of Tirion Fordring.
At the end of the path stood a small house, an old horse, and an old man holding a mace.
No one would have imagined that Tirion Fordring, one of the original five paladins of the Order of the Silver Hand, would end up living in seclusion after his exile, hidden away in a remote corner of the Eastern Plaguelands.
A legendary Paladin.
The others had no idea what Tirion would accomplish in the future, but Gabryell knew it all too well.
He would become the wielder of Ashbringer, the Highlord of the Argent Crusade, and the man who led the heroes of the Alliance and Horde against Arthas, the Lich King. A protector of Lordaeron's paladins, he would eventually fall to the Burning Legion on the Broken Shore during Legion.
After his death, Ashbringer—the blade that symbolized the Light and justice—would become the artifact weapon of Retribution Paladins.
And all of that traced back to one questline.
Of Love and Family.
That was why Gabryell had come here. Although he could not enter Stratholme and retrieve the painting yet, nothing stopped him from completing the prerequisite steps first.
Coldhands studied the old man for a moment. "You can tell just by looking at him. This guy isn't some random quest NPC."
Gabryell glanced at him. "Come on. You knew who Medivh was. Don't tell me you don't recognize Tirion Fordring."
Coldhands laughed. "All right, all right. I know the name. One of the original paladins of the Silver Hand, right? I remember he had something to do with the orcs too. Helped one of them, didn't he? Doesn't that make him a traitor to the Alliance?"
"Honor isn't about race," Gabryell said. "You don't condemn someone just because they're different."
That was Tirion Fordring's answer when his son once asked him whether all orcs were evil.
Tirion was a great Paladin. He fought for Azeroth his entire life. It was precisely because he had once saved the orc Eitrigg, and because he later founded the Argent Crusade, that both factions could accept him as the leader of the campaign in Northrend.
"Pick up the quests."
To earn Tirion's approval, they first had to complete three kill quests. Only after that would they unlock one of Vanilla's most classic questlines, Of Love and Family.
Of Love and Family was praised by countless World of Warcraft players. Its plot had twists, its story hit hard, and through it, the love between father and son, the weight of family, and the true spirit of a Paladin were all laid bare.
The questline also held an important place in Warcraft's later history. Without Of Love and Family, there would have been no Argent Crusade as players knew it.
Through this chain, Tirion Fordring regained the Holy Light he had once been stripped of after the Eitrigg incident. Driven by grief and fury, he killed Isillien and his followers, then swore to bring a new order to Lordaeron.
After his son's death, Tirion gathered members of the Order of the Silver Hand from across the world and merged the order with the Argent Dawn. That new force became the most important faction of the Wrath of the Lich King era: the Argent Crusade.
The Corrupted Ashbringer from Naxxramas would also be purified by Tirion's Holy Light, restoring it into the true Ashbringer. With that blade, he would strike down the Lich King and shatter Frostmourne.
To begin Of Love and Family, the two of them had to complete three monster-slaying quests. Gabryell and Coldhands accepted them and headed out together.
With no one competing for mobs, the quests went quickly. They finished everything in just over half an hour.
After turning them in and earning Tirion's approval, they listened to his story. Then he asked Gabryell to travel to the crypts at the southern end of Eastern Plaguelands and retrieve Taelan's Hammer.
They found the crypts but did not enter. The hammer was at a grave behind them, though they still had to fight through mobs to get it. It would have been a little annoying alone, but with two Mages there, they simply pulled everything together and AoE'd it down.
"This quest is such a pain."
After retrieving Taelan's Hammer and turning it in, they received the next step, Of Lost Honor. Coldhands, who hated long quest chains more than anything, could not help complaining.
Gabryell laughed. "This is nothing."
At this point, Of Love and Family was only halfway done. The second half was where the real heart of the chain began.
For players doing this quest for the first time, finding the symbol that once represented the honor of the Order of the Silver Hand was extremely difficult without a quest addon. But Gabryell was a reincarnator, basically the most broken human quest addon in existence.
He found the Symbol of Lost Honor in the water, then went back to report to Tirion.
This was where Of Love and Family truly began.
The next step was to head to Caer Darrow and search for clues about the painting. Caer Darrow sat on the island in the middle of Darrowmere Lake, down in the southern Plaguelands.
"Where the hell is Caer Darrow?" Coldhands asked.
This was another quest description made to punish new players. Without reading The Deed to Caer Darrow from the Barov Family Fortune questline, most people would never guess that Caer Darrow was the island where Scholomance stood.
Caer Darrow had once been the territory of the wealthy Barov family, and Scholomance had originally been their castle.
"Back to Western Plaguelands."
This step required them to find the painter's spirit on Caer Darrow. From him, they would learn that the painting Of Love and Family was hidden inside the Scarlet Crusade stronghold in Stratholme.
That meant the quest had to be put aside for now.
Stratholme required a proper group.
Gabryell could only wait until Carlos and the others reached level 60. Then, before entering Stratholme together, they could fight their way into the Scarlet Bastion and find the painting in the Archivist's room.
"Where's Stratholme?" Coldhands asked. "Let's just go get the painting."
"It's a level 60 dungeon. The two of us aren't clearing it. We'll go once Carlos and the others hit 60."
"A level 60 dungeon?" Coldhands groaned. "This quest chain is a trap."
Gabryell mounted up, preparing to return to Eastern Plaguelands.
"Where to now?"
Coldhands stared at the epic mount and desperately wanted to reach level 60 already, just so he could replace the slow horse under him.
"We're going to Darrowshire."
Darrowshire was a village in the southern mountains of Lordaeron, its name taken from Darrowmere Lake to the west. The people there were simple and hardworking. For most of Lordaeron's history, it had been a quiet, unremarkable place.
Then the Second War began.
During those battles, countless heroes rose from Darrowshire, and countless heroes fell there.
In Vanilla, the Darrowshire questline was one of the game's all-time classics. Pamela Redpath's tragic story moved countless players, making them swear, at least for a moment, that they would wipe the Scourge from the face of Azeroth.