Duke was utterly, gloriously, catastrophically stunned. The very breath that escaped his mouth and nose was a ragged gasp, thick with surprise, as if he'd just swallowed a live mosquito.
The ancient wizard, whose face was a roadmap of wrinkles, looked at Duke, his old and cloudy eyes sparkling with a wisdom so profound it probably tasted like ancient dust and forgotten spells. The furnishings in the room were Spartan, almost aggressively simple: soft beige walls that seemed to absorb all joy, two surprisingly comfortable armchairs that looked like they'd seen too many centuries, and a low coffee table that probably held more secrets than the King's personal diary. It was so stark, so utterly devoid of distraction, that it was impossible to find anything to divert one's attention from the other person in the room. Which, in this case, meant the terrifyingly powerful, surprisingly emotional old man.
After a brief, almost comical moment of wide-eyed surprise, Duke, with a heroic effort, pulled himself together and looked squarely at the old wizard who had, against all odds and common sense, given him a chance and a new, ridiculously lucrative start in the chaotic, monster-infested world of Azeroth.
It was a very complicated look indeed, etched with the profound disappointment of giving up on one's own grand, unfulfilled dreams, and the desperate, flickering hope of placing those dreams, those impossible burdens, onto the unsuspecting shoulders of another. It was the look of a man passing on a very heavy, very dusty torch.
On the old man's face, Duke seemed to glimpse the last, poignant wish of an ancient soul, a wizard who had been utterly, hopelessly obsessed with magic, who had fought for arcane knowledge all his life, but had, by his own estimation, achieved little more than a respectable collection of dusty scrolls and a perpetually grumpy demeanor. Duke, despite his burgeoning cynicism, found he simply couldn't bear to refuse the raw, desperate expectation of an old man at the very twilight of his life. He swallowed hard, a lump forming in his throat, and finally, with a solemn nod, he agreed.
"If you agree," Duke declared, his voice firm, "I will call you 'teacher' from now on. Prepare for endless questions about why my spells aren't exploding with more glitter."
Old man Norton seemed to be struck by a bolt of pure, unadulterated lightning. His entire, ancient body was shaken, rattling like a skeleton in a strong breeze, as if his ears had suddenly decided to stop working, leaving him to hallucinate the most glorious, most impossible words. He widened his eyes, already cloudy with age, to the size of saucers, staring at Duke with a mixture of disbelief and utter, profound shock. What?! he thought, his ancient mind reeling. The arrogant little punk who even looked down on the world's strongest wizard, Medivh himself, actually called me teacher?! Is this a prank? Am I finally losing it?!
Happiness, a rare and fleeting emotion for the perpetually grumpy librarian, came so suddenly, so overwhelmingly, that the old man was a little bit, delightfully, unbelievably unhinged.
"Uh, Duke, um... I did originally want to be your teacher... but Medivh... um... I, actually..." The old man stammered, his words tumbling out in a glorious, incoherent mess, like a pile of spell components that had decided to stage a rebellion. He looked like he was about to burst into tears, or perhaps spontaneously combust from sheer joy and confusion.
Duke, with a surprising display of genuine warmth, stepped forward and gently, but firmly, grasped old Norton's trembling hand. "Don't underestimate yourself, Teacher," Duke said, his voice imbued with a sincerity that was almost unsettling. "If it weren't for your timely, brilliant suggestion at Northshire Monastery, I might have been beaten to death by that brute Brando, and then this entire Pearl Road thing would have been a non-starter. As for why I refuse to be Medivh's disciple, it's not just because of ambition, though I have plenty of that. It's for a deeper, far more complicated reason. You will understand my difficulties in the future, when the very fabric of reality starts to unravel."
The old man's mouth moved, his ancient lips trembling, and his eyes, already moist with emotion, welled up with unshed tears. In the end, he did not cry. Instead, he let out a profound, shuddering sigh, a sound that seemed to carry the weight of centuries. "Please forgive me, Duke," he rasped, his voice thick with emotion, "an old man who knows some magic, yes, but has no courage. I am truly unworthy to be your teacher. If I were to be your teacher, I should have used my very body to be your safe haven, to shield you from all harm. At that crucial moment, I did not stand up, and I knew then that I had lost the opportunity to be your teacher forever. However, I would be profoundly honored to be your guide, to officially usher you into the magnificent, terrifying palace of magic."
Seeing that the old man, despite his emotional turmoil, had made up his mind, Duke could only nod. Teacher and guide were not exactly the same concept, but it was close enough. And frankly, having a "red skull" level guide was probably better than having a "red skull" level enemy.
Old man Norton, with a sudden, almost comical snap, immediately put on the look of a strict, no-nonsense teacher. He took out the ancient, leather-bound Introduction to the High Elf Wizard Apprentice in one hand, its pages crackling with forgotten magic. Then, with a flourish, he took out a meticulously translated version, painstakingly written by his own hand, probably over several decades of sleepless nights.
"I have carefully studied this Introduction Notebook for a very, very long time," Norton began, his voice now crisp and academic, "and I found that over the past thousand years, humans' research in the field of magic has actually taken a long, convoluted, and utterly unnecessary detour."
"Take a detour?" Duke repeated, his eyebrows shooting up. That sounded suspiciously like "we've been doing it wrong for a millennium."
"Yes! A detour!" the old man spat, his voice laced with academic disdain. "Traditional magic training is nothing more than first teaching a qualified child a large, mind-numbing amount of magic knowledge. Then, you let him awkwardly communicate with the elemental world and other different worlds through raw magic energy, usually resulting in a lot of accidental explosions. And then, you guide the magic energy into his body through endless, soul-crushing meditation, transforming himself, and then, eventually, forming a magic circuit. After that, he practices day after day, year after year, to make the magic circuit thicker and stronger, like a very slow, very painful bodybuilding routine."
At this point, the old man jabbed a gnarled finger at the elegant Elven writing on the notebook, and suddenly spat, a sound of pure, unadulterated contempt. "This is the safest way to practice. Thousands of years ago, when humans had no contact with magic, when we were still banging rocks together, this method was indeed the safest and most reliable way to practice. But the cunning, manipulative, utterly devious elves kept a trick up their sleeve! A secret so profound, it makes me want to pull out my beard!"
"Holding a trick?" Duke pricked up his ears, his curiosity piqued. This sounded like juicy, ancient scandal.
"Yes! I have a trick up my sleeve!" the old man declared, his eyes gleaming with triumphant vindication. "Do you know why high elves are naturally better at magic than humans? Why they practically sneeze arcane energy?"
Duke frowned, considering. "Racial talent?" he ventured, recalling the common knowledge.
"While this is certainly a factor, a rather annoying one, I might add, there is another, far more significant reason – the Sunwell!" Norton boomed, his voice echoing in the small room.
Duke's eyes widened. He immediately realized something, a cold dread creeping into his stomach. "You mean..."
"Yes!" Norton practically shouted, a triumphant, slightly unhinged grin spreading across his face. "In fact, for good seedlings with excellent physical fitness, the basics of magic can be quickly mastered. No, even apprentices with average physical fitness can easily be promoted to the level of master wizard. The prerequisite is that you need a source of mana with highly concentrated magic power to transform your body day and night, and it absolutely must be the body of a child whose body is still in the developmental stage! It's like a magical growth spurt!"
Duke was in a state of utter, internal panic. Where in the blazes could he find a Sunwell?! The high elves kept it tighter than a dragon guarding its hoard, and they would fight anyone who tried to even breathe on it. He didn't think he had the ability to go to Quel'Thalas and take down the Sun King, not even with a hundred middle-finger-waving wizard hands. He'd probably just end up as a very expensive, very dead, pearl-collecting trophy.
At this moment, old man Norton, sensing Duke's internal turmoil, patted him roughly on the shoulder, a gesture that almost dislocated Duke's collarbone. "I bet," Norton declared, his eyes twinkling with mischievous delight, "that even the person who so carelessly gave you this Apprentice's Notes didn't realize what an amazing, world-shattering treasure they had just handed you!"
Duke added internally, with a wry, self-deprecating sigh: It's 'she,' not 'he,' you old fool. And she probably thought it was just a dusty old book.
"The first 49 pages," Norton continued, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper, "are essentially no different from the standard human wizard apprentice training manual. They are just a little more refined, a bit more elegant, at best. But the last page..." The old man dramatically turned to the very last page of the notebook, his finger hovering over the ancient parchment. Duke did not know Elvish, but that did not prevent him from noticing that the Elvish written on it suddenly became sloppy, completely different from the fair, majestic, almost calligraphic handwriting on the previous pages. It seemed rushed, casual, almost like a drunken doodle.
The old man also opened Duke's translated version of the notebook. Duke found, to his surprise, that the last page was completely blank. It hadn't been translated.
"Do you know why I didn't translate it?" Norton asked, a triumphant gleam in his eye.
Duke shook his head, utterly baffled.
"Because the Thalassian on this page is utter, unadulterated bullshit!" the old man declared, squinting his eyes and letting out a wheezing, triumphant laugh that sounded like a flock of very old, very happy crows. "Just like you, young man, created a pearl road out of thin air, I was suddenly, gloriously inspired! This is not a language at all, but a special, hidden layout of magic circuits! A secret code, hidden in plain sight!"
The old man suddenly became wildly excited, practically vibrating with arcane energy. "Haha! It's only right that an arcane expert like me, a master of the hidden truths, could discover the secret above! This, my dear boy, is a special magic circuit design that can absorb the surrounding free arcane energy into the body like a whirlpool! A literal arcane vacuum cleaner!"
"This..." Duke stammered, utterly surprised, his mind reeling. This was a game-changer. This was beyond a cheat code.
"Moreover," Norton continued, his voice now a triumphant roar, "this is a completely different method of practicing magic circuits from the common, rather tedious practice of the elves! It is a more extensive, more efficient, and far more aggressive way of expanding magic circuits for absorbing arcane energy! I don't know why the Sun King suggested that Prince Kael'thas practice this way, perhaps he was feeling particularly devious, but this is tantamount to helping you! If you practice according to this method, you can quickly increase and strengthen your magic circuits even without the Sunwell! You can become a walking Sunwell yourself!"
As soon as old man Norton said this, Duke immediately understood why. According to the historical process in the game, in the near future, Quel'Thalas would fall, and all the remaining high elves would fall into a strong, agonizing addiction to arcane energy, unable to extricate themselves, like a very glamorous, very addicted junkie.
As the king of the high elves, Sun King Anasterian certainly knew how bad the addiction of the Sunwell was for the elves, how it slowly poisoned their very souls. So he sent Kael'thas to Dalaran to study, which was also a disguised way to give Kael'thas more hope and a broader, less addicted future.
However, the Sun King, in his infinite, short-sighted wisdom, did not expect that his little selfish desire, this secret method he thought would never be discovered, would eventually fall into the hands of the legendary Alleria, and then, with a casual flick of her wrist, be given to Duke.
Duke suddenly sighed, a profound, almost reverent sigh. Alleria was truly his benefactor! She had, unknowingly, given him the keys to a magical kingdom, and perhaps, a way to avoid a very embarrassing arcane addiction. He might just have to send her a very large, very expensive pearl as a thank you.