I braced my paws to protect my snout and absorbed the lightning bolts thrown my way by one of the cag bird women in the sky. My metallic cws served as parabolic rods while my hide mitigated most of the damage, for it was magically resistant due to the mana suffusing it, even if it retty weak.

  But sidering the bark from my living backpack, the fur, thick skin with yers of fat and muscle below, along with my weight and the fact that I stood on the ground, the amps o be way higher if the desired result wasn't sporadic muscle twists and minor burns healed the sed.

  If there ever were a definition of a tank, it would be me.

  As to why I was being sieged… Simply put, I flew here to brutally murder harpies–the ones pointlessly attag me–and raze their , along with everything they held dear, to the ground.

  But might I say harpies were fug annoying to fight? By the aors, the bird bitches stunk like an unholy mix of guano, rot, vomit–their s were far worse–and other bodily fluids and their voices, oh their voices… they were akin to nails on a bckboard only somehow several notches worse. And their gazes... yuck, you could tell what was happening iheir minds.

  It ainful to my senses, no matter how many times I did this since I arrived.

  As for the fighting that wasn't about wantio rip my nose and ears off, I would call them annoying, too. They weren't uably dangerous like satyrs, but they could fly faster than me. And o of five rofit in rudimentary shamanism, almost always fog on air elementals.

  I couldn't just turn into a bloodwing bat ahem apart uhey felt stupidly brave or I caught one by surprise; evidently, the sky was their domain. But that didn't ge the fact that the entire flock assaulting me did little to nothing beyond pissing me off.

  To kill me, they needed more than that: either execute me swiftly or exhaust me slowly. There wasn't an iween besides overwhelming power, but that was the same for everyone.

  So, despite the onsught, I strode on, my eyes aive nose protected with my right paw while I grasped a bunch of pebble-sized seeds from one of my belt pouches—stormvine was the pnt they would bee.

  They were dioecious–o could only have female flowers and the other only male–blue thorny vines with thorns full of paralytic toxins that, when stabbed, gave a sensation akin to gettirocuted.

  I gred at the harpies, the only pollution in this otherwise magnifit night grag the world with its stars and twin moons.

  I took my stance, paws holding the seeds low as mana ushed into them, and then I threw. Many dodged and cackled, but not all of them mao do so, and for those that didn't, among them, the oldest–most likely the leader–elted with burgeoning seeds.

  The hits themselves didn't do much, but the sinewy, bluish-spiky vines ensnaring their bodies proved to be incapacitating and agonizing. Being distracted and hindered in self-powered flight had only o: falling to the embrace of the ground or the Earthmother screaming in agony.

  Chaos ensued, and I grinned almost maniacally.

  The feathery hag squawked the loudest, filing with her free wing and desperately trying to get away from the thorny vines and roots that were also highly paralyzing and irritating, thanks to yours truly.

  With her and her kin that I tagged, they plummeted all at once, each smmily against the jagged mountaihey had been taunting me from above. It oetry in its bloodiest form.

  They bounced many times, some stopping their screeg at the first impact, while others tinued up to seven times until I couldn't hear them anymore or see their bodies as they vanished among the rocks aation.

  It was ical. I couldn't help but ugh. The kind that came from the heart and boomed like a firework went off.

  My heartfelt ugh seemed to send them into a frenzy. One, followed by three more, dived down with unbridled fury in their eyes and talons wide open. I didn't attempt to dodge, not that I could, and the first one reached me; her aim was my nape.

  It was a logical choi principle. It's hard to reach quickly, and my cervicals were a pretty obvious ot. But that was if I were a male tauren.

  A painfully high-pitched war cry escaped her lungs as her sharp talons pierced my loose neck skin. It was no different than needles for me–pinpricks of pain at best–but I doubted she realized and why I supposed the fused turrident voice took was from shock. Shod fusion became panic as she couldn't immediately back off.

  I traped one of her talons in a bone grown to that effect. Exterior manipution was less workable in a quick-paced fight, but making minor outgrowths inside my body on an area void ans to impede them was child's py at this point.

  It didn't take long and wasn't even painful. Well, it was a bit weird at first, but it wasn't akin to stabbing myself in reverse! The body table, and it wasn't like I was moving sharp or abrasive fn objects below my skin, and I knew my body.

  It wouldn't hold her for more than two seds at best, but that was ay in a fight. It was ay I fully took advantage of by grabbing her legs, making sure to get both at once.

  I he motion of yanking her from my baash two of her sisters as a makeshift baseball bat ripped off her talons, leaving it like a bee stinger. But that passing thought was swiftly put away as I spped the third bird woman with my free paw, throwing her off a cliff with her viscera, witnessing the magnifit Azerothian sky for the first time.

  What followed roper massacre. But as, this wasn't a video game, ahan five mier, the highly diminished flock of harpies decided to flee into the sky, leavio paw the ground in frustration as my mana, like a well-oiled mae, shifted to heal my wounds. Or scratches, really.

  "Cowards won't even y their lives for their cubs." I spat, "Whatever, it's the expected oute… And it's not a bad survival tactic."

  Still, it was irritating, no matter how used to it I was.

  I couldn't pursue them for the same reason I didn't fight them shapeshifted or destroy them from a distance. I just didn't have the capabilities to do so.

  Anyway…

  It was sce time! Well, magic, but that was the same. For now, it was the preservation of the astonishingly suct an that was the brain after an failure, destroyed internals, beheading, and the many fvors of it!

  I could reect spinal cords; there were many es, but ultimately, it was straightforward. However, the brain was airely differe.

  Healing wasn't the problem. Neurons could be regeed–there wasn't an arbitrary limit–but rebuilding the plex neuronal pathway exactly how they had been before the damages… yeah, no. It was so ridiculously above my ent pay grade it wasn't even funny.

  If I still went with it, I wouldn't end up with the same individual if the result wasn't a vegetable or an utterly broken mess of shattered memories and instincts depending ohing to heal.

  I k; I did tests, and they were unlucky prey when I was bored or, most retly, harpies. I suppose neancy could help; liches were pretty eloquent for skeletons, but that was, like with my Fel pnt idea, a nebulous possibility.

  Simply put, I wasn't going to be able to surpass this hurdle any time soon, if ever. Regardless, the skills to keep a brain iively good dition for extended periods if the body could support it no more was life-saving for the ones I would work on and myself.

  If humans oh could keep brains alive in vitro for up to days, so could I, and the result I got till then proved it wasn't a flimsy hypothesis.

  Some time passed until I noticed it was time to do the sed part. It was quick; I took care of the eggs, and there weren't any cubs to put to what amouo dreamless sleep before painlessly shutting down the brains. It made it infinitely easier.

  Not that doing the same to viable embryos in eggs was aer; killing was killing, hatched or not, didn't ge that. The problem wasn't doing it but not aowledging the act for what it was. I wasn't a fan of this part, but it was my responsibility. I could make valid excuses, not that they held any values.

  Without their mothers, doom was a certainty. I cut short their sufferings, but the horuth of the matter was that I was too zy to find alternatives. It was ve and shattered many problems before they became one.

  It was me or them.

  While I did this, I collected my loot.

  'Hn. Plenty of gold and sparkly bits here, probably teamwork with kobolds or stolen a flock that did.' I guessed.

  I found the underground rodent people iing. A mutually beneficial retionship could be built with the proper y, as many harpies did. They loved dles; we had beeswax. They had preetals aones we cked. They were weak, we were strong, and we didn't step oher toes.

  It was as close to perfe as it could get.

  My thought halted at the sight of a rge pile of taurens skulls, almost exclusively posed of males from the horns. The kidaurens' horrific fate was evident, but their remains were for their respective tribe shamans to focus on, not me.

  I still put them away with their bones in a lio the sides for me to begin making this pce harpy-free. It was a simple process: pnt local seeds, mainly the toxic or thorny kinds, then grow them until I had the desired result.

  Bodies, trash around, and a bit of magic to start it, and I had a sizable little er of life that should have been here without the feathery bitches reckless as.

  But there was more.

  "You shall do…" I pced a paw on an old and tall piree and pushed Life and Nature themselves into it, ging it into a e trembled as a mouth formed, followed by eyes as a face took shape, and the moment after, thick stubby legs with big log-like arms.

  In under five minutes, I had a treant, bigger and strohan Groot but less intelligent and not loyal to me. It irit of nature bound to defend this pce to the death. There were no words exged as I did the same process to two other trees, the current limits of this ecosystem.

  After a dirt bath and a bit of grooming to take off most of the dried blood from my fur, it was finally time to go. My mana reserve was the opposite of full; the moons were low in the sky, and I was hungry. My destination was the camp where the Grimtotem caravaled, and soon I saw my destination.

  I accepted the invitation to follow after the ceremony and was weled. Well, mostly. It wasn't the smoothest ride.

  It didn't mean I didn't nearly set out the arm by flying above two guards who metaphorically shat themselves, to my amusement. I might love that too much, but I wouldn't hurt them if they didn't try first.

  "s North clear." Transf back, I gruffly informed them. My grasp of their tongue oor, but broken speech was enough. Using the aors as transtors was a slog for minor iion.

  Immediately, I went to the food reserve, freely taking what I wao prepare my big sad of roasted grains, fruits, and the like with the bit of honey I brought remaining as a pliment. The cy pot was nearly empty. It was a horrible reality, but blinking didn't fill it back up.

  It was a great tragedy, but I could endure g the bear ies for some time.

  Halfway through my meal, my ear swiveled to the shuffling of tiny hooves and panicked infantile yelps–not that I overlooked my little stalkers far before then–and from the fp of the tippy fell three calves, one female of grey fur falling first, followed by two males of bck fur speckled with brown on their muzzles and ears.

  I snorted, barely taining a s the three sprawled in a pile of limbs. As our eyes met and they froze, big, wide eyes locked on me as I tilted my head with a grin on my snout.

  "If you want to see me or steal food, I don't know nor care, but take this," I whispered as best as my size let me and ihe seeds of edible berry bushes before throwing them at their hooves. Gazes shifted to the seeds, and the bountiful pnts ripe with juicy fruits they became in seds.

  Their sparkling eyes told a lot until they threw themselves at the berries as if they had never eaten while fighting to get the most. It was cute, but it was more than pying around. It was what separated the Grimtotem from other taurens.

  They weren't peaceful in the least, and it showed here that they knew how to fight. And it was key to why they were so successful. They were proactive. They attacked, anticipated, aroyed with extreme prejudice, violence, and viciousheir ehey had drive, ambition for a better future, and the will to make it true or die trying.

  They weren't menting and grieving, not that there was anything wrong with that, but whereas an average tauren would fight to the death as a st resort, a Grimtotem would eh that. Generally, with the uanding that winning ossible, Helka was just a suicidal nutjob.

  I wahat for my tribe and, by extension, furbolgs. Oh, not the savage part; it was unneeded. We weren't pacifists. Superficially, yes, with the kaldorei, but they were one of the exceptions. Our cws were easily raised otherwise, and ursa totemics existed to rip and tear shits. We remaierritorial bears at the end of the day.

  We hat spark.

  Besides the extreme arrogand sense of superiority, that is. And that was nearly enough to make me fuck right off to greener pasture, but these taurens weren't elves, and their rules gave an alternative. And those were delightfully destressing alternatives.

  Violence table, even enced. If someone pissed me off by provoking me–even as a guest–I could demand a duel of many fvors, and refusing was seen as a show of weakness. It was only amplified as I was an outsider and, to top it off, not even a tauren. So they obliged, putting their view of themselves under my tender cws and beyond.

  Of course, I didn't murder anyone, but for me, what death meant didly correspond to the ideas most had. Not that fighting was all I did. I wasn't a mindless brute.

  I got a reputation from that. Adding my as and respe general, and with Magatha pulling the strings in the shadow, only the dumbest dared openly show animosity toward me.

  And speaking of the Devil, she arrived, her voice causing the three tauren cubs to scamper away, abandoning the berries and broken bushes in their haste. Heh, I don't think they even uood who they ran from.

  "Was your hunt successful, Ohto?" The Elder e asked, frowning softly at the mess left on the ground while I tinued swallowing my food, barely stopping while I spoke.

  "Yes, very, Magatha. The areas you poio were ri prey." I grioothily, and she remaieady at that, something not many could, "Three s destroyed, and I had a fruitful time."

  "Indeed, excellent work. My hospitality is rightfully earned, and my trust well pced." The old female nodded with a tent smile, and then what she did made me raise an eyebrow.

  Her staff glowed a dull brown, and she maniputed the earth to make pots. The the battered pnts in them not before pig one.

  The tip of my index cw glowed green with specks of red, and so did the pnts as I fixed them. I studied Magatha's face as she did the same for my magic; it was one of the closest times she got to seeing it, and she wa. Not personally, per se… she saowerful tool for her tribe.

  "What a magnifit gift, to wield the Earthmother's emerald children and breathe life where her body was desecrated." She let out before sharpening into ivity, "A gift we have lost the memories of long ago."

  "I have noticed. You don't have any druids like I believed you would. It's odd." I said holy, and the reas to my abilities proved this much. They never met druids, not even night elves, which wasn't surprising sihey slept for turies.

  "Quite, no tauren were born with the talents since our sacred homend had been defiled twenty geions ago, and so druidism whittled down to ash like our a nd. One of too many aspects of our life the taurs have robbed us from." There ause, and I took advantage of it.

  'I don't think that's the taurs' fault for once… if you don't naturally have the affinity and somehow ahe one who gave you his blessing, probably arius. Then, no pnt magic for you. But at that point, the bme is pointless.' I mused in sile was an essential of information.

  As creatures of the wild, furbolgs take this step to be druid, just like wildkins. A teacher to guide you and enough talent was required, but the mana and e were inborn. It e were so sensible to the shifts in our enviro. Or at least that's what I theorized.

  But taurens did need a e to be built, a blessing to be given, a mark to be pced–they still had an inkling of something, but it was far from anywhere close to being a druid–it was funny to think night elves were no different in that regard.

  "I think I get what you want. But I o know what you want. I 't read minds, and presumptions are dangerous." I intoned matter of factly, notig her minute shift, ears flig, and eyes widening—frustration and irritation under a veneer of trol.

  The thick herbal smell around her and my unfamiliarity with tauren facial expressions didn't impede me from grasping that. Her range of emotions was small from what I have seen; it was either anger or satisfa.

  The elder tauren wao trol me; I was a literal golden goose, but she couldn't in any way. I khat, and she knew I khat. It was the big reason we were so 'casual' and open in our iions, which she seemed to approve and disapprove of.

  She wasn't used to that, but she would o if any friendly future between us were to happen.

  The one who he other most certainly wasn't me.

  "You are far too clever for a furbolg and one ye, Ohto of the Greenweald." Magatha said with a measured gre before calming down, "I wish for the taurens to march proudly once more under An'she as druids, and I see you as the way toward this noble destiny."

  "I see…" I drawled. It was as expected, I guess. But that wasn't a thing to choose lightly, and I currently cked the know-how to do as asked, and it went deeper than that, "I'm ined to agree if you prove yourself worthy and trustworthy, but my will is not that of the tribe. I will speak of your wish to my fellow shamans, Magatha, and a decision will be made under Ursol's wisdom and the auidance. Don't make me realize that was a mistake."

  "Naturally." She nodded with a pleased smile, but her fur bristled at my warning then a few seds ter, she said walking out, "This had been a short but productive discussion. May we have many more of such."

  And I was left to ponder aloh my food, my mind rapidly moving to something else.

  The_Bip_Boop2003

  Thanks, EmilBigErk, Mike Stewart, Dyn Mayfield, BzeSavage, Jeff Fischer, Hope Bain, Vex, Jackietron201, 124f5, Joshua Crowell, Crach Grey, Michael Carter, Croc, Kunta, Nezih Süzer, Zekitz, Dyn S, PeerlessCaster, Devon Emmons, Furry Bear, Jarvis Schellinger, Cudius, Lucky 13, Echo54g, Anima506, jacob griffin, Mitch, Velzon, Cameron Youngman, TheFuzzySamurai, Grey Heart, Marc Smith, James Wood, Proxy, Kurgarraz, shadowSeth, Talberts, Gal Anonim, Leonardo Kirchhoff, PIEGURU8, léroy jenkins, Tobias, Jose Matos, Alex pritchard, Falk Hüser, SirSp, Sam Mbya, Alexander Amann, Name, Man Robertson, Aaron Taylor, Mika Willems, phil, Brian Beard, JchuckS, Wold Layman, Gee Dean, Nateica Burlock, Wildvoid, andre, Eioe, Scarletmenace, Pilot Pirx, er Ja, Thomas Dey, Asura, Gronnr, Lucas Gossett, ton Jenkins, Desote, Tristan Nadeau, Mest450, Ang, Sabypyz, charlie wagner, SwiftFate, Hedgeboar, JJ JJ, Linus Bengtssone, Mason for the support it's greatly appreciated.

  [colpse]