#its all just fucking mountains and then westfall lmao

[0l1v3juice]

First Impressions

There was landfall, and we felt ourselves tense. We had entered a completely new territory. As we looked around, there was almost nothing that we recognized. Trees with unnatural shapes and sizes compared to the ones we remembered, shrubs that were lacking in color (as it seemed most of the land was just...green), and most importantly, leaves that blocked the whole of the sky. We couldn't see a thing. Everyone was terrified to start moving, so I took the lead. 

“Everyone, follow me. Wherever we are, we are strangers. Do tread lightly,” I ordered.

We stuck closely together and climbed off of our ship, passing over the warm sands and onto the greenery. When we began making progress, we began to see even more peculiarities. 

Along with the strange fauna, we began to see other life similar-but-not-identical to ones we recognized. Small, rodent-like creatures bounded across the grass and scurried up the trees. Wolf-looking creatures constantly chased the small ones around trying to get their next meal. Flowers and leaves bloomed in the endless beauty of the land. It was still quite foreign, but there was a sense of familiarity in our surroundings that brought us great comfort. Though nothing was exactly the same, it was reminiscent of the blossoming forests which our village would gather honey from. Even the sunset's colors reminded us that there are things unchanging about the world we live in. We knew we had found our new home.

“I think I see a fence up ahead!” exclaimed Mao Cung as he started for it.

“Mao, wait!” Maysam shouted as she ran after him.

Soon, we were all chasing after Mao Cung while he darted straight for the fence. When he reached it, he stopped and stared. Upon catching up to him, we saw why.

“Well… which way should we go?” Maysam asked the obvious question.

Behind the fence, there was a path. The path led in two directions. One went to the left, the other, to the right. In blank confusion, we all sat unsettled for a moment. What if we went the wrong way? This was a sign of civilization, was it not? What if they were not friendly? How could we be sure it was not a trap?

“Everyone, stay calm. Let us think this through,” Mao Cung began.

“Well, Mao, I don’t believe there is a way to think this through,” Songxue interrupted him, “Both sides look the same, and there is nothing pointing us to one specific direction.”

“She's right,” Shen agreed, “Let's just pick a direction and go with it.”

Not long passed before I decided for us the direction which we would take.

“Left,” I stated.

No one questioned why, as I am sure that they knew I had no reason. Intuition would have been my excuse. What happened next, though, I had no way of foreseeing.

Just a ways down the path, I began to hear a low growling sound. Looking around, we saw nothing. Yet, the sound grew louder and louder. We became very afraid, and Maysam poised herself to fight. As Shen and I were healing folk, Maysam and Songxue were our hopes for defenses, and Mao Cung could only aid in distractions or diplomacy. We stopped, watching carefully. With Maysam and Songxue preparing themselves, Shen and I took to protection behind them. However, the source of the growling revealed itself to me instead of our fighters. 

Looking at the path ahead of me while watching Maysam's back, I saw a shadowy figure slowly tread out of the darkness, revealing a huge, cat-like creature. Terrified, I instantly screamed and fell backwards into Maysam, taking her and Songxue down with me. Shen positioned himself to protect us, and Mao Cung followed suit. But the creature did not attack. It just...stared at us. The growling even turned into more of a low and steady purr. Perplexed, Mao Cung slowly approached it, taking each step with caution. Songxue and Maysam watched as they were too petrified to move. 

The cat stood in the middle of the path, awaiting Mao Cung's slow approach. Purring in anticipation, its tail waved back and forth. We could not tell if it was hostile or docile. It almost seemed playful. But we could not let our guard down; Mao Cung was our hope. 

He finally stood face to face with the creature, letting it look him over and supposedly decide how to react. It began circling him, smelling him and watching him. Though he was most definitely experiencing sheer terror, a mask of calm adorned his face as he underwent the beast's judgement. We made silent prayers for him. He did not move.

Suddenly, the unexpected happened upon us once more. The beast, having decided it would spare Mao Cung, looked to the rest of us. Its glowing eyes fixated on each one of us as it silently padded across the path. It came toward me. 

I laid there on the ground, still too terrified to move from my position after falling. The panther approached me and gave me the same treatment as Mao Cung, although closer. When it was done, we had no idea how to respond to what happened next. 

Suddenly, the beast backed up from over me, and began to transform. It turned into a person: a tall, pink-skinned humanoid with flowing purple hair and the same glowing eyes we had seen on the panther.

“Where do you come from?” the strange woman asked us. 

Dumbstruck, we could not answer. Shen simply returned with a question. 

“Where are we?” 

The creature cocked her head at us, confused by the question. 

“What do you mean ‘where are we’? You've never been outside the city before? Or maybe you're not from there?” she asked again.

“City? What city?” Mao Cung questioned. We were afraid to tell the shapeshifter that we had arrived from Pandaria in case we were not welcome wherever we were.

Instead of returning a question again, she stood silent for a moment before coming closer to me and extending her arm. Realizing I was still on the ground, I took her hand and stood. 

“You're not from the Eastern Kingdoms, are you?” she asked me while still holding my hand. Her tone was accusatory, but not hostile. Probably, she was just irritated that we had not been giving her answers - just questions.

“No, miss, we are not from here. We…” I started and looked to the group. I felt that we would only make progress if we told the mysterious person our origin. The group seemed frightened. Should I tell her where we were from?, I thought.

“...are refugees,” I finished. The tension was still there, but eased just so. Yet, she had figured it out herself. Her eyes filled with bright excitement, and she gasped and said:

“You all are from Pandaria!”

We stiffened. Our breaths hitched. How did she know? What gave it away? Would we be okay?

“My lady,” Mao Cung began to speak hesitantly. “Would you kindly tell us where we are?” I was unsure why he still asked the question.

“Of course, my apologies. We're in Elwynn Forest! How did you make it here? Why are you here?” she spoke that last question with an unsettling tone. The rest of our exchange seemed to have honest affability behind it. The last question, however, seemed like it would be the difference between a favorable or unfavorable experience with the cat lady. We observed our settings and chose our words carefully. 

“We came here on a ship, guided by our fallen companion. Our only goal here is to seek refuge from our war-torn homes,” Maysam spoke.

The woman seemed unsatisfied with that answer, but moved on to the question of why we were wandering around at night and headed up the path.

“It has been weeks since we have seen civilization or even land, my lady. We seek the warmth of a safe place to lay our heads for the night,” I told her. 

She studied my face as I spoke, scrutinizing everything. I am certain she analyzed my breathing too, but she insists that she did not. Following her analysis, she asked me a simple question. 

“What is your name?”

I froze. Her eyes stayed fixated on mine while mine frantically searched her for signs of attack. Glancing at the familiar scenery around me, I took a deep breath to calm down.

“Hunjun,” I said, eyes on hers. “My name is Hunjun, miss.”

After a short moment, she simply replied,

“I believe you.”

We smiled at each other, and, after realizing that we shared a genuine moment, we smiled again. The woman trusted me, and so I trusted her. 

“If you don't mind my asking, what is your name, my lady?” Mao Cung interjected. 

The lady watched all of us intensely before deciding to share her name with us.

“Jalvia.”

I nodded at her in acknowledgment. My group stepped forward one by one, offering their names as a show of trust. Finally, Songxue asked the important question. 

“Do you...do you think, Jalvia, that you could show us up this path?”

She thought for a moment, processing the idea. She seemed to go back and forth deciding on pros and cons. Eventually, she decided she would show us. But we had to follow her rules.

“You are to stay in front of me where I can watch you, and you do not speak to anyone, understand?” Jalvia ordered.

We all agreed to comply, and we headed off up the path. There was no talking, no lagging behind, and no fooling around. It seemed that Jalvia knew what was ahead of us up the path. In my head, I wondered if I chose the right direction. Was she leading us to a trap? What would have happened if we went the other way?

“Not to worry, Hunjun. All that's behind us are logging camps and bandit groups. You chose the right way,” Jalvia assured me, noticing that I had been constantly looking behind me at the path. “I guess that clears my suspicions, then,” she said with a relieved sigh.

Songxue turned around as soon as Jalvia finished speaking and asked “Why were you so suspicious of us? Do we appear as a threat somehow?”

“It was definitely obvious that you were hiding something,” Jalvia replied nonchalantly. “I just wasn't sure what.”

As she said that, I felt just a twinge of guilt. This Jalvia, however strange and wonderful she seemed, was offering us help. We thanked her by hiding our motives and origins? It didn’t seem right to me. I stopped walking to confess our story, and I believe the others knew my intention as Maysam shook her head. 

“Actually, Jalvia, we are hiding something,” I sighed. “While it was true that we are from Pandaria - as you correctly guessed - we were actually looking for a new place to call our own. Not just someplace to rest ourselves, but a new place we could continue on the legacy of our village in,” I finished. As I spoke, I could not look her in the eyes. I felt so guilty for lying to her even though I barely knew her. When I finished speaking, I finally looked up at her with hope that she would not be angry with us. In actuality, she appeared to be feeling quite sorrowful. She looked at me like she shared my pain and felt what I felt.

“It's okay. I know,” Jalvia said. 

Shocked and confused, Mao Cung immediately tried to discredit her. “How could you possibly know? That does not make any sense. Why are you so calm?”

Shen tried to calm him as Jalvia sighed heavily and shared with us what gave it away.

“Mao Cung, your belt. I've seen that symbol before. That's the crest of your family, right? The ones who lead the village? I've been there before. My best friend is an Alliance commander, and her first assignment a few years ago was a small peacekeeping operation in your part of the country. She established trade with the bigger cities of the system you were a part of, but she made sure to visit all the neighboring small villages. Your people were very sweet. They let us taste the honey they used for the liquor you brewed. I didn't want to believe that your kind little village was war-torn. So torn, you ran from it…” she trailed off and became silent before continuing. “If you were refugees fleeing a war-zone, I didn't want to believe you were from where your apparel indicates you are. And...I didn't want to believe that my people were the ones responsible.” Her eyes began to well up with tears, and the light in her eyes seemed to grow dimmer. 

“If...if it is any consolation, I did not see any people that appeared as you do. They were different. Shorter, louder, and they did not shapeshift. It was them, adorned in the colors you wear, against a louder group of people with green skin and sharp teeth,” Shen recounted.

Jalvia's expression shifted from disappointed to agitated.

“Of course. It always comes back to those reckless humans and orcs,” she began, intensely frustrated. “When will they understand that their war is pointless and must end? They're fighting over land that's already inhabited! What kind of self-serving, spineless--”

“Jalvia!” Maysam exclaimed. “Please, calm yourself.”

“Thank you for being outraged at these tragic events, but we must look only forward,” I thanked her and hugged her. She squeezed me tightly, breathing in slowly and letting herself be calm. 

“For now, there is someone I must introduce you to. Remember that friend that I was talking about?” Jalvia asked us.

“The Alliance commander?” Songxue recalled. “Why would she want to see us?”

“Well, she would want to know what's become of your people. Also, she’s not a human. She's like me!” Jalvia beamed. 

 “And you are…?” Shen cautiously inquired.

“My sweet pandaren, I am of the kaldorei. I'm a night elf, in the common tongue. I suppose you've never seen one of my kind,” she gleefully informed us. 

“What does your friend look like?” Mao Cung asked.

“Oh, you'll meet her soon enough. While I wish it were under better circumstances, I can’t wait to bring you to her. She’ll probably want to offer you all a place to stay with her,” Jalvia giggled.

“Well, she sounds very nice, but, uh…” Shen chimed in again but trailed off, afraid to finish his sentence. “Is she…you know...like you?” 

Jalvia's smile faded slightly, and she cocked her head to the side. You could tell she was trying not to be offended and instead trying to understand. “What do you mean by that?” she asked. 

Mao Cung stepped forward before Shen could dig himself a bigger hole. “I think what he means, miss Jalvia, is if your friend is able to...shapeshift as you do. It was quite fantastical to witness. Do all night elves do that?” he politely questioned.

Her smile returned and she shook her head. “I see. No, she cannot shapeshift. I can only do that because I’m a druid. My bond with the nature of my home is so strong that I am able to take her forms at my will. I use it to protect Her, myself, and others. Just then, I used it to protect the people up this path which leads to the castle. Guards patrol this path, but they have a longer route to survey at this time of night. My friend, on the other hand, is merely a hunter. But, make no mistake - she's the best hunter I know! I’ve never seen her miss a shot or meet an animal she couldn’t tame. It truly is a gift.”

“She sounds amazing,” I said. “When will we get to meet her?”

“Soon, my dear, soon. First, we have to find you all someplace to rest for the night. If my memory serves me, there is an inn up ahead. It's been a while since I've visited, but I'm sure they remember me.” Jalvia giggled to herself on the last comment. The rest of us shrugged our shoulders and continued up the path. 

Eventually, when the moon hit its peak, we began to see buildings ahead of us. We became excited and scared at the same time. Finally, civilization of some sort, however small. Jalvia hushed our excitement before we could get carried away, though, reminding us to watch our tongues around the travelers and adventurers passing through. 

Soon enough, we arrived at the inn. There were two buildings; one held a pen with livestock in the front, while the other appeared to house a forge. Jalvia lead us into the building with the pen in front had us sit down while she talked to the innkeeper. He kept glancing at us and muttering things to Jalvia with a worried expression. But I could tell that Jalvia was good at vouching for our intentions. He nodded and smiled at us, and she headed back over with her arms spread wide. 

“Welcome to Goldshire!” she announced and threw her arms around us. 

[zofias]

tod spoliers 

ever since i finished tower of dawn i’ve been wanting to write down my thoughts about it so here goes nothing lmao feel free to ignore this 

ok so tod started off pretty nicely sjm laid out the southern continent very descriptively and i was thoroughly invested bc well i was totally excited to read tod from the start and when i finally got my hands on it i was ready but not ready lol my emotions about it are just all over the place basically 

anyways i really enjoyed the aspects of the southern continent and the history of it the story of the khagans and how they are chosen was interesting the whole khagan gets to choose which child he/she wants as his/her heir was smth i got truly interested in bc its always the first born child who gets to take the crown or w/e so that was a nice change and the siblings that were introduced in tod were all dissimilar they all had such strengths to be heirs since they all specialized/lead different things like hasar had armadas and lead them sartaq had his aerial army kashin was a solider and controlled the armies on land arghun had his network of spies like i enjoyed that they all were individually so powerful i guess like thru each chapter you’d think the khagan would choose a different sibling but i was really happy that sartaq was chosen tho i did kinda feel like he would end up being heir like it became a bit obvious bc he seemed to be the one who took a stand and was like imma leave if you dont help aelin and co. 

ok lets move onto yrene towers at first i didnt know how to feel about her only bc we didnt get into her character as much yet but when she went to see chaol and nesryn for the first time i was literally laughing also idk why but the dynamic between her chaol in that first meeting made just go yup they gonna fall in love im a sucker for haters to lovers trope ok she literally despised him for a good few chapters lol yrene is freaking amazing and so badass her story was smth i really enjoyed i was really interested in her powers and all about the healers she wanted to make a difference and help her ppl and she got her wish in the end what was really cool about her was that she taught young ppl self defense even tho she knew not so much she wanted to give those girls a change to fight back and when the torre was attacked she knew how frightened that made them and made chaol come teach bc he’d be a good distraction from all the horrors i just really loved the way her mind works she was invested in the art of healing so thoroughly and yrene never backed down she was so determined to find answers like i loved her so much she was amazing slm may have faults but the way she writes female characters is really empowering LISTEN I NEED TO TALK ABOUT HOW YRENE PUSHED HASAR INTO THE WATER i legit started laughing so hard like i needed that it was so good yrene is everything if you dont want to read this book bc of chaol read for yrene ok that’s all im going to say yrene was wonderful 

chaol westfall my first thought about him was ‘my baby i hope you heal and get to fight again’ like reading about how much he didnt like it in his chair was really sad i mean i get it chaol was always really determined and he like being ready to fight and then he lost movement in his legs and his world turned upside down like when yrene was healing him and he was feeling all the darkness and remembering what his father did to him when i read that his father literally pushed/threw him out of the house made me tear up chaol hit his head hard and the son of a bitch father didnt even let chaol’s mother come to him and terrin saw and chaol felt guilty for leaving him i just was so hurt reading that and also few guards helped him leave anielle and his damn father banished them to the mountains like i hated chaol’s father and now i just cant the darkness chaol had in him was so much did he hate himself? i think so but he was so angry and things were haunting him it just made my heart hurt i loved tower of dawn bc we got to see everything about chaol what he felt what he realized it was really good throughout he kept thinking about dorian and always was so loyal to him i love it when they reunite i need sjm to have them hug for a good hour or more tbh like its needed what also made my heart shatter was what he felt for aelin in his darkness you can see how he loved her and his hate for her too like i dont know how to explain it it made me feel idk his darkness was terrible and at some parts i had to put the book down to stop feeling too much idk chaol has gone through so much and it was nice to see what he felt he conquered his darkness and realized and accepted himself his journey was rough but he found himself i was so excited to read this book only bc of him he has always been one of my fav book characters and this made me love him so much more 

CHAROENE???? i dont know chaol and yrene’s shipname but imma tell you i love them together their dynamic was wonderful they slowly became friends and trusted one another they had to somewhat quickly open up to one another bc it was the only way chaol was going to heal physically and emotionally i enjoyed seeing how they developed their relationship it was nice chaol deserved to love someone who cared for him so much my favorite part was when they got into a fight and yrene was walking away and chaol wanted to go after so he willed himself to walk ever so slightly and as he was somewhat getting closer to yrene she began teasing him and moving away to make him walk more it was so cute i liked their relationship a lot they both felt equally comfortable to talk to one another and it was like a balance you know what actually my fav part was their day out in the city when they just rode horses and yrene was healing ppl it was sweet and calm and when they went out to eat just the two of them with no agenda they both deserved smth like that i loved it ik most ppl are going to say sjm wanted to just pair everyone off with a love interest but i love these two it was unexpected esp the fact that they are linked to each other and they’re married!! but i love it im a sucker for that bond stuff ok this relationship made me love tod so much 

nesryn faliq when she was first introduced in queen of shadows i was 50/50 on how i felt about her like i liked her but also somewhat didnt but let me tell you tod made me love her chaol was an idiot for using her as he did and she realized it and it seemed she was ok with it but i loved that she got to have her adventure i loved that she got to return to home and see her family she got to explore the lands of antica with sartaq and kadara what made me like her more was that she was didnt let opportunities pass her by she decided to go with sartaq and find her adventure on her own tho i did sort of predict that her and sartaq were going to become a thing after their little flight on kadara in the beginning idk it just seemed like they would be a thing which they did but i liked it she deserved someone like sartaq there was a lot of mutual respect in their relationship which i admired i loved that thru nesryn we got to learn more about antica and the history and everything like its her home and we got to see what she felt and loved about it that was my favorite thing i also loved that she got her own ruk!! AND NESRYN CAN SING that was so amazing like it adds so much more to her i love her 

a few other things one FUCKING MAEVE IS A VALG QUEEN I HATE HER like that made me so mad and now i want to know how everyone will react to this and what they will do i hope aelin NO ROWAN RIPS HER TO SHREDS another thing lysandra and falkan being her uncle was amazing i loved that we got to learn somewhat as to how lysandra got her powers butterfly the horse made this book a million times better again yrene pushing hasar into the water was hilarious hasar deserved it lmao i really wished someone did smth like to arghun kadara deserves appreciation for being an awesome ruk when she got trapped in the spiderweb i was a wreck also again MAEVE IS A VALG QUEEN what on earth and duva being possessed by valg and throwing her younger sister off a balcony i cried and duva was pregnant that was just so sad im so happy that yrene saved her life im happy that one else died i mean chaol came close obviously again and yrene and him are now linked which is cool but also like terribly dangerous i want to see what sjm is going to do with that the healers were so cool i loved reading about the torre and the origins and everything i hope we get to see more about them yrene is bringing hundreds of them with her so it could be a possibility there was just so much going on in this book lmao

i know i just hit the surface with a lot of this but i really wanted to get my view on the three mains out chaol yrene and nesryn are amazing and you know what i loved that this book was about them finding out where they fit into this war thats booming chaol was uncertain and felt he had nothing to offer bc he was injured but realized that the chair wasnt limiting him but he himself was nesryn found that she can be her own adventure she found that her home country was her place yrene discovered that her powers could save people who are possessed by the valg and that was epic i loved that this book was more about all these characters discovering who they are rather than anything else i loved it so much i was so excited for it and it didnt disappoint me 

if you read my stupid rambling i am so grateful for you haha thank you if you want to leave your opinion go right ahead whether it agrees with mine or not im up for anything lmao also there are probably so many spelling errors im so sorry lol 

~EDIT~ UM I FORGOT TO ADD ABOUT THE FIREHEART CHAPTER I COULDNT HANDLE IT IT RUINED ME OK IM JUST NOT OK AND THE FACT THAT MAEVE HAS AND MAEVE IS VALG MAKES EVERYTHING WORSE I JUST THIS IS TERRIFYING AELIN BETTER BE OKAY I NEED HER TO BE OKAY!!!