Original Bloodtusk Ravine Horc and Troll routes

Bloodtusk — the questions at the crossroads

The Horcs and Trolls shared Bloodtusk Ravine, but centuries of grievance divided their homes. The Horcs of K’Thurr guarded their independence and their connection to the mountain. The Trolls of Arashtii prized art, history and learning. Neither people trusted the other to possess the power of a Chaos Lord. When the Hero arrived, that fear gave the Chaos Twins an opening: each side might accept dangerous help rather than let its neighbors gain an advantage.

The path into their confidence differed according to whom the Hero approached. Druuz, among the Trolls, and Rawg, among the Horcs, both demanded that the outsider wash away the supposed smell of the other tribe. Beyond the insult lay two ways of preparing to summon the Twin Watchers. The Troll elder Sokrakiis needed materials to repair an eclipse predictor. The Horc spirit master Zot explained the eclipse through the lore of her people and the work required to prepare for it.

Druuz’s ritual used a mirror representing paired opposites: sun and moon, sky and land, and the Twins themselves. Rawg instead described a protective bundle whose stones, river water, ivory and bindings represented the mountain’s care and the warriors defending it. Both preparations required incense. She Who Answers, the Oracle respected by both peoples, questioned the Hero; afterward, the Troll path called for a statue honoring its people, while the Horc path called for a totem expressing an understanding of the mountain spirit. These were alternative approaches to the same meeting at the crossroads.

During the eclipse, the Hero summoned Xing and Xang and demanded the five honest answers the ritual promised. The Twins immediately counted the request to confirm the rules as one question, and the request to start again as another. Even so, the Hero learned why the pair no longer balanced Good against Evil. Drakath had exchanged this world’s good Xang for her evil counterpart from the Mirror World. The two evil Twins now worked together for Chaos, while the two good counterparts remained in the other world.

The Hero’s next question exposed the deception threatening Bloodtusk. Drakath had already chosen his next Chaos Lord. The apparent competition between the tribes only kept them frightened and obedient while the Twins encouraged increasingly destructive decisions. The Hero’s startled response used up another question, allowing the Twins to refuse the intended final question about defeating Drakath. They departed as the eclipse ended, confident that neither people would believe the warning or risk displeasing them.

Fear became war. Behind the conflict, the Twins watched for the Hero to do what their chosen accomplice expected. The battle brought a monstrously Chaorrupted Troll onto the field. From there, the two paths showed different sides of the disaster. In the Troll account, the Hero defeated the creature and Druuz carried him home for funeral rites. The victim was Antiphuus, the younger brother of the prophets Krellenos and Khasaanda. Sokrakiis recognized that ending his suffering had prevented further destruction, yet grief and anger turned the village against the Horcs.

In the Horc account, the Hero sent Rawg away to warn Kagg and Zot while remaining to face the creature. Rawg’s report convinced him that the Trolls were even more dangerous than he had believed. Zot resisted that conclusion: the Trolls she knew did not seem capable of such an act, and she wanted the mountain’s guidance before judging them. Rawg and the war chief Tlax instead called for attacks against the Trolls themselves. Kagg’s image of the Horcs enduring like stone no longer satisfied warriors demanding an active defense.

The Hero had learned that the rivalry was being manipulated, but knowing the truth had not made the tribes listen. Antiphuus’s death and the prospect of an enemy Chaos Lord pushed them further apart. Beyond the ravine, Alteon and Gravelyn were preparing their own response. Their Alliance would enter Bloodtusk to prevent Chaos from gaining its strength, bringing another struggle over who had the right to decide its future.

Bloodtusk — the broken alliance

Generals Cynari and Tibias arrived with the combined forces of Good and Evil. Alteon had ordered Cynari to stop the spread of Chaos while preserving what he could of Horc and Troll pride. Gravelyn charged Tibias with protecting the Alliance and ensuring compliance. In Bloodtusk, the generals imposed martial law: the tribes lost their autonomy, movement and gatherings were restricted, and weapons were to be surrendered. Both peoples feared that disarmament would leave them defenseless against the other.

The Hero challenged this approach. Neither Kagg nor Sokrakiis could be persuaded out of his certainty that the neighboring tribe had embraced Chaos, but coercing them would not resolve that fear. The generals wanted the Hero’s influence to secure obedience. The Hero instead insisted on pursuing a different solution.

The investigation continued beneath the ravine’s sacred temple. The Hero found its ore missing and gathered signs of Chaorruption. To Sokrakiis, this seemed proof of a Horc betrayal; to Kagg, it seemed proof that a Troll had violated the mountain. The memories recovered from nearby creatures offered only shadows and uncertainty, but neither leader readily questioned the accusation against the other people. Traps and new weapons became their answer to a threat whose author remained hidden.

The Twins, watching the mourners and the arriving soldiers, delighted in the result: their whispers had helped send the Alliance into the ravine. Drakath approved his hidden servant’s plan and the Chaorruption of the living ore. The tribes’ leaders prepared to confront the Alliance representatives. Xing and Xang encouraged their fears, and at the meeting their words echoed through the arguments of the generals and elders. The Hero tried to intervene, but the encounter became a battle. Horcs and Trolls fought the occupying army together, each calling on the Hero for help.

Through the Alliance headquarters, the Hero searched for the generals, fought their soldiers and used traps to reduce the danger. Hidden documents offered evidence of Chaos at work. When soldiers interrupted their recovery, a Horc warrior and a Troll mage came to the Hero’s aid. The investigation then turned against Chaorrupted troops and the generals themselves. Cynari and Tibias were defeated, and the Hero urged the tribes to let the disintegrating army flee rather than prolong the bloodshed.

Cooperation against an occupying force had not yet become peace between neighbors. Sokrakiis still blamed a Horc Chaos Lord, while Kagg saw the mountain’s taint as proof of a Troll threat. The Hero halted another argument and sent them to care for their wounded. Soon, however, visible Chaorruption appeared among both peoples. Troll friends accused one another; Horc companions did the same. Sokrakiis and Kagg finally met to consider whether their shared connection to the missing Arashtite Ore explained what was happening.

Krellenos revealed himself before they could solve the mystery. His prophecy became a declaration of power, and he turned Chaos against his sister Khasaanda. Through the ore, he boasted, he could link Horc strength, Troll magic and his own visions. To secure his hold over their future, he intended to seize the power of their past. His friendly manner and apparently helpful prophecies had concealed the Chaos Lord in plain sight.

The Hero followed into the ancient temple with allies who now knew that neither tribe was collectively responsible. The work there offered a different use for their inheritance: sacred oil recovered from old urns could cleanse the Chaorrupted guardian spirits of both peoples. The Hero fought the tainted creatures, helped release those spirits, and gathered serpent venom to clear the vegetation blocking the temple’s heart. Both traditions remembered a time when Horcs and Trolls had stood together; now that memory could become a practical answer to Chaos.

At the heart of the temple, Krellenos prepared to use the Sh’karr Needle to tap its power and make both peoples vulnerable to him. Khasaanda confronted her brother and spoke a vision of intertwined tribes, falling rulers and a woman left standing alone. The Hero proposed an attack requiring Kagg and Sokrakiis to act together. They struck and withdrew, but the threat survived. Krellenos continued gaining strength and binding a creature to Chaos.

Afterward, the Hero regretted missing the clues in the stolen documents. Sokrakiis remembered the helpful prophet they had trusted. Kagg, facing another attempt to blame all Trolls, answered that Krellenos had hurt his own people as well: he had brought about his younger brother’s death. The elders called for unity, not another round of collective punishment. Horcs and Trolls would have to combine their strengths to save Bloodtusk. Khasaanda’s pain warned them that there was little time left.

Bloodtusk — Chaos against Chaos

The Alliance generals had tried to withdraw, but Xing and Xang were not finished with them. The Twins seized Cynari, Tibias and their army for Krellenos’s use. Khasaanda, meanwhile, struggled with the betrayal she had sensed through her bond with her brother. She had been mocked and dismissed while Krellenos was welcomed. Now the person who had believed in her seemed ready to abandon her as well.

In the Ore Caverns, the Hero searched for the captive generals and the last unspoiled cache of Arashtite. Light orbs gathered from plants and creatures illuminated the hidden chamber. There Krellenos explained the next part of his scheme: kill the Alliance leaders and blame the Hero. The rebellion against their ambassadors would make the accusation plausible. Lore would lose faith in both its Alliance and its champion, leaving everyone afraid of betrayal and uncertain whom to trust.

Khasaanda intervened when the Hero charged, warning that a direct attack would not bring the ending they wanted. Krellenos strengthened his serpentress Chaos Beast, Gruaige Baas, and left the generals as its prospective meal. Fleeing would abandon them; fighting would pit the Hero against the beast and its guards. The Hero fought, taking care to incapacitate Chaorrupted Alliance soldiers who might someday be cured, and defeated the Chaos Beast. Krellenos’s planned slaughter had been stopped.

Khasaanda then turned the bond between the prophets against her brother. She confronted him over Antiphuus and the future he had been willing to destroy. Drawing his Chaos power into herself, she refused to be left behind again. She restrained the Hero, demanded a soldier’s sword and killed Krellenos. His defeat had not ended the Chaos Lord’s power: his sister had taken it, together with a new connection to Drakath.

Khasaanda challenged the Champion of Chaos and demanded answers. Drakath accepted the meeting, calling her a Chaos Lord. Before departing through a portal, she ordered a soldier to free the generals and send them away. The Hero was to follow her and witness what she intended as a cure at the source. She Who Answers arrived to accompany the Hero, having called on Kagg and Sokrakiis to prepare warriors, protection and healing against the retaliation she feared might follow.

In the Dream Nexus, the Hero worked with the Oracle to prepare for the confrontation: explore its islands, secure a way home, gather the power needed to unlock the DreamDancers’ orbs, and extinguish the flames barring the central island. Khasaanda could not be trusted to provide an escape. Her anger at Drakath also reached the Hero, whom she blamed for failing to stop him before her family was destroyed.

When Drakath appeared, he claimed that choosing Krellenos had always meant affecting Khasaanda through their link. Her killing her brother had surprised him, but the disruption they had caused still pleased him. She attacked; he overpowered and bound her. Then he left the Hero to decide what to do with the captive Chaos Lord. The offered responses differed: one refused to kill a defenseless opponent, while the other refused to let a Chaos Lord threaten Lore and the Empress’s plans. Both led to the Hero cutting her free before their battle. Neither ended the story with her helpless execution.

The Hero defeated Khasaanda, but she survived. She still intended to hunt Drakath, and the Hero recognized an opportunity in his belief that she was dead. She Who Answers urged her to find a purpose beyond the home where her gifts had made others uncomfortable. Khasaanda departed to pursue the Champion of Chaos. The Hero accepted that, for now, using Chaos against Chaos could make them allies rather than enemies.

Back at the crossroads, the Oracle declared that she belonged to both peoples and carried the blood of both, as the Oracles before her had. The elders acknowledged Khasaanda as a child of the ravine despite what she had become. Their own danger remained: with the Arashtite Chaorrupted, She Who Answers warned that all of them would eventually be affected. Druuz and Rawg chose to seek Khasaanda together and become her shield-brothers. Those staying behind would share their knowledge and work toward a cure.

Bloodtusk had found cooperation without escaping every consequence of its war. The Hero prepared the departing warriors to face Chaos, and the elders pledged to blend their peoples’ talents rather than turn them against one another. Where Khasaanda had once stood, a light remained in memory of the child she had been and in hope that she might find her way home. It marked a hope for return, while the work of healing the ravine was still ahead.