“Ah, Milord… are you sure this is…” Eh started to ask, but fumbled over his words. He was going to say safe, but it obviously wasn’t. He was going to ask if it was even a good idea, but that was very questionable as well. “Is this even possible?”

“It is very possible. In fact, I have it on good authority that people do this kind of stuff all the time, not just for what you and the men are doing, but mainly for recreation.” John replied, trying to reassure his Captain.

Plate mail or a rucksack with a rifle and mags, they both actually weigh about the same. The men will be fine. 

“But what if it doesn’t work?”

“Then I permit you to haunt me for the rest of my days. Now get going.”

“But the ground… it is so far away.”

“That wasn’t a problem when we practised last night.”

“Last night I couldn’t see the ground.”

“Just do what I told you and remember to roll when you land.”

“I really don’t think this is a go-“

“GET ON WIT IT, LADDIE! WE GOT UNDEAD TA KILL!” Ferador Steeltoe shouted, the cannon wielding dwarf crashing into the back of Eh and launching him.

“AHHhhhhh!!!!” Eh’s shout grew quieter rapidly as he fell.

“That was one way to do that,” John said to the dwarf brothers. 

“Ye bein too soft on ’em. We dwarves, have done stuff like this fer awhile, though now that I see it in the daylight, we are quite a bit higher than we’re used to.” The other brother, Feranor, replied, then turned back to the rest of The Alphabets. “C’mon ya dolts! The Captain is waitin fer us on the ground. For the Prince!”

With that, the dwarf brothers with their artillery piece jumped out the back of the hovering Pelican Dropship, their parachutes deploying automatically. They were followed quickly by the remaining twenty members of the Alphabets, the newly established 1st Lordaeron Armoured Airborne Drop Squadron, Alphabet Company.

The LAADS. 

Last Night

Strahnbrad

John quickly got his gear together, a plan rapidly forming in his mind. He had that vehicle token, a drop ship of some sort, so Elvis had said. Four days’ travel from here to Hearthglen on foot, going around the mountains to the north, should only take a few minutes for a literal space ship to get there. He would load up as many men as it could hold, then rocket them there as reinforcements. Then he could either act as an almost untouchable fire support, or fly back to the Capital and quickly grab more soldiers. 

This wasn’t how he had wanted to act in this world. Despite getting maimed in that battle, he was actually enjoying most aspects of it so far. He wanted to learn how to be a ruler, he wanted to see this Dalaran and the magic they wielded.  He wanted to visit this elven nation, both to learn if the resurrection magic he was searching for was there and to just see what a nation of elves had built. 

That all changed when tears from Jaina Proudmoore’s earnest crying dampened his chest. She had thought she had lost her friend and the love of her life to another woman, which wasn’t quite true. She had lost him when John took over this body, but she just didn’t know that yet. It broke him inside when he said they were not through, broke him when he saw the relief in her eyes. It broke him because he had feelings for her that were not his own.

This isn’t right, Alec! 

He screamed that thought again and again in his mind, hoping the deity heard him. Giving him a body that had little to no attachments to others in these worlds was one thing, but throwing him in an adult body that had deep relationships with many people was just wrong. Not to mention that when they only provided him with a fraction of the knowledge about those relationships, it was just a matter of time before something like this occurred.

He popped another Substance X pill to wake himself up more, then left the room, his paladin hammer and armour sans the silver plates, the only thing remaining behind. He had the silver plates in one of the pockets of his leathers, the dwarves having attached a thin chain to them so he could at least drape them around his neck the next time he saw Uther. 

He stepped out into the street in front of the manor with several of his men in tow. He brought them outside the nearest gate and into a clearing, then pulled out the black Pelican dropship figurine from his pocket and placed it on the ground. He took one last glance at it, then at the nearly dozen men who had followed him. 

“Stand back. I picked up this, this relic a while ago. I know it’s big, but I am not sure exactly how big.” He said, then fed it some of his mana.

Just like his car, within a few moments of his magic filling it the Pelican expanded. And expanded. And expanded even more. In front of him was a thirty-foot-tall, hundred-foot-long aircraft that was moments ago about the size of a marble. Like the figure, it had a fat body, a long tail, and a wingspan nearly as wide as it was long. The rear bay door was wide open, its end lying on the ground as a ramp to get in and out of the vehicle.

He turned back to the men. “Go and get everyone, and then return here. We need to rescue Lord Uther, and this…flying machine will be what takes us there.” 

He didn’t wait for their reply and boarded the craft.

Forty-Five minutes later – Pelican Cockpit

John was seated in the pilot’s seat, which was centred at the front of the ship, flipping through the display menus of the ship’s systems. The menus operated similarly to the Phoenix Hawks’, except most of the Pelicans’ displays were either monitors or simple 2D projections and not the 3D holographic projections of the more advanced ship. His piloting skill actually provided him with the knowledge on how to start and operate the craft, but once again, didn’t teach him about anything other than flying this beast. 

And it was a beast of a ship, larger than Greg’s corvette in Infinite Frontiers. If John placed it in his carrier’s hanger, its wings and tail would be partially hanging into the other bays around it. 

The one thing he had found so far that he liked more than what the Phoenix Hawk had to offer was the pilot’s helmet. It had a heads-up display on the inside, providing him with the critical information he might need while flying. It could also be slaved to the camera on the autocannon underneath the cockpit, allowing him to shoot wherever he looked. With his lack of depth perception, he was worried that he would have issues, but this gave him a 2d image and number readouts right in front of his good eye.

What he was currently going through was a menu called ‘Gatcha Shop’. This was something added to the ship from DEN so he could refuel and rearm it in any world he brought it to. Fuel seemed to be cheap, only 100 tokens for a full tank, but ammo was a different story. His eight missiles were 500 tokens each, and a full load of 700 rounds of autocannon ammo cost 3500 tokens. Granted, they were 70mm rounds, similar in size to a Sherman tank round from World War II.

He was about to close the menu when he saw another tab labelled equipment. He opened it, scrolled through the list, and began to laugh. He quickly bought twenty-two auto-deployed slow drop parachutes for 5500 tokens, leaving him with 9150 remaining. Slow was a misnomer here, as they were not that slow, but the other items he could purchase included orbital insertion pods that, by the description, would nearly crash into a planet from orbit, firing their braking thrusters only at the last moment. 

If he was going to destroy the canon of this world, he was going to do it in style. He would save those townsfolk, save that man whom this body thought of as an Uncle. He would save them all. 

He started to laugh again.

Jaina walked out of the town looking for where John had ordered his men to assemble, intent on seeing this weird vessel the men had claimed the prince had magically conjured out of nowhere. She didn’t have to go very far, as the vessel was sitting in a field next to the road, a crowd of John’s men crowding around the far side of it.

Jaina approached the black vessel with both trepidation and curiosity. When she and her mentor, Archmage Antonidas, first arrived in this town, she broke down when she saw John lying on the bed, his face disfigured from an orc blade. After some time, her mentor had pulled her away, allowing him to begin to examine him.

She pulled herself together and began examining the items that were laid out on the table beside the bed, including a figurine that looked nearly identical to the black vessel before her. She could sense the powerful magic that it was enchanted with, but its operation was beyond anything she had experienced before. Enlarge and reduction spells were common enough, but she was positive nothing on this scale had ever been seen in Azeroth before. Or if it was, it was never recorded.  

The vessel itself had some vague similarities to the dwarven flying machines, though much larger and more streamlined. She found herself wanting to study the magic that allowed it to expand to such a size, to learn how it worked. Something told her that if she could figure that out, she would shake the foundations of magic as the Kirin Tor knew it, paving the way for advancements in the arcane that-

She stopped herself before she got lost in scholarly pursuits yet again. That would come later, after the battle, and once she and John had their discussion about their future.

Once John had departed the bedroom, she and Sylvia sat down and had an… enlightening discussion about John. Sylvia had spoken highly of him, how they had been growing closer. She also revealed her intention to ask John to have children with her out of wedlock.

That had been one of the arguments that led to her and John breaking up, he would need to have heirs and at the time, Jaina did not want children.  She loved magic, and becoming the queen of Lordaeron and his ‘Brood Mare’ as she had called it when her temper was up, was not part of her plans. 

To his credit, he understood her desires and backed off talking about having children together, breaking up their unofficial engagement to allow her to pursue her dreams. He even decided to spread the rumour that he was not ready to settle down and have children, so as not to tarnish her reputation.

She didn’t realise quite how much she still loved him until she saw him lying injured on that bed.

She didn’t realise quite how little she had moved on until she walked into that bathroom and saw John and Sylvia in the tub, cuddled tightly together, his arms wrapped around her. Kissing her.

She didn’t realise quite how much she wanted to have John’s children until Sylvie explained that was what she wanted from him, since she couldn’t marry him due to the differences between their social stations. She felt an intense… jealousy at the thought of anyone else having his children but her.

That last thought truly came as a shock to her. That was why she had a sense of trepidation as she approached John’s vessel, she was worried she would say the wrong thing to him and drive the wedge she had already placed between them even deeper. 

As she got closer to the crowd of men, she noticed John among them, handing out oddly shaped grey backpacks. He was wearing a strange but nicely cut set of black leather clothing instead of his normal armour, and had a sword at his side instead of a hammer. She also noticed he was wearing a black eyepatch over his missing eye and parted his hair differently to cover his missing ear. His short beard had miraculously regrown, so if you didn’t look at him too hard, you could easily miss the remaining scarring.

Those simple differences changed him from a heroic looking paladin, into something she wasn’t sure how to describe. Whatever it was, it gave him a more intense, visceral vibe that sent a shiver down her loins. She shook off the feeling and stood off to the side to watch what he was doing, not wanting to interrupt whatever it was yet.

“Once it’s on, hit this switch, and it will activate, and a chute will deploy. As you land, bend your knees and roll forward to cancel your remaining momentum, then hit the switch again. It will drop the chute on the ground, and you will be free to fight.” He spoke, explaining to the listening men how to operate these devices.

She really needed to ask where he found this relic, as it seemed like something that was a national treasure that should have been hidden away unless it was a dire need, not about to go out on the front lines of a battle.

In her opinion, the danger these undead ‘scourge’ were posing to the people living in the north would indeed count as a dire need.  

“Alright, make sure you take that pill; it will help keep you awake and retain tonight’s training. Any questions before we practice a couple of times? We need to head to Hearthglen soon, but I don’t want to send you in without a little practice first.” John asked his men.

“Ahh… Milord?” the Captain said, raising his hand nervously, “What if, hypothetically, mind you, someone had an issue with heights?”

John approached him and placed a hand on his shoulder, a smile forming on his face. “You will try it once, and if you really cannot do this to help save Lord Uther, his men, and the people of Hearthglen, I will understand. We will part ways amicably, and I will send you to a new duty station, away from The Alphabets. Then you can live out the rest of your service, hopefully in peace, while the men you see around you will become legends.”

He then turned to the rest of the men, raising his voice to carry well beyond the immediate vicinity. “That goes for you all. You are all footmen and riflemen, small cogs in the machine that is the Alliance.  Stay with me, and your names will carry the same weight as Paladins like Lord Uther the Lightbringer himself. If you choose to leave, choose to abandon the men beside you in our time of need, well, that is why no one will remember your name. Now, mount up!”

“FOR THE PRINCE! FOR LORDAERON!” The men cheered.

“He makes a good speech, eh, lass?” Someone said beside her. She looked down, and beside her was a dwarven artillery team. She hadn’t noticed them arrive, so focused on John’s words that she didn’t pay attention to her surroundings.

“Yes… Yes, he does.” She replied, completely agreeing with the dwarf.

“Well, brother. Shall we throw in with this prince for real now?” One dwarf asked the other.

“Oi, I told ya he would be interesting ta be around. Let go,” he said, and the pair walked up to John.

Well, I’d better join him, too.

Despite the impending danger, she was getting excited to go on another adventure with John, just like they did when they were kids.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep