There are evenings in Stormwind when the wind carries more than gossip and fog. When the stone streets echo with more than boots and song. When you, just a humble reporter with a coffee thermos and a half-decent camera and a box of half-eaten take-out stumble into something so raw it grabs you by the collar and says: “Write this down.”
Last night was one of those evenings.
There’s an old Stormwind saying: if you walk in Old Town long enough, you’ll find either a mugger, a poet, or a corpse. I had been hoping for a poet.
Instead, I found blood.
I had been wandering through Old Town, letting the city speak to me. The tunnel to the Trade District loomed ahead, quiet — until it wasn’t. A guard stood poised, Constable Veronica "Ronnie" Cooper, and opposite her, a woman cloaked in hostility, rage, and leather. No names were exchanged. Just immediate violence.
The wild-eyed woman, mad, furious, armed to the teeth—lunged at the guard without warning. Cultist? Traitor? Lunatic? I didn’t know. What I did know was that she moved like a woman who had danced with knives before. She struck fast, stabbing at gaps in Cooper’s armour.
Daggers flew. Blood spilled.
The woman, wild-eyed and raving, shouted of broken crowns and burning cities. Her eyes didn’t just blaze with hate; they sparkled with something worse. Purpose.
This wasn’t a street mugging. This was ideology with a knife.
I yelled for help and just as I reached for my camera, the attacker’s eyes locked on me.
A dagger flew through the air in reply to my yelling.
It missed by inches. I threw up what can only be described as a frantic magic barrier—a mix of arcane panic and pure survival instinct. It worked. Barely. I kept yelling for help, because someone had to, and took the photo anyway. Because someone had to.
The guard met her assailant with tooth and claw (literally) as she shifted into feline form, her druidic training transforming defence into feral retaliation. As she bled from thigh, belly, and face, she managed to land a disarming strike, pinning the cultist to the ground. But victory, like peace in this city, was fleeting. A hidden blade flashed upward—crimson streaked the cobbles once more.
I yelled for help again.
Help did come—though not in the orderly fashion you’d hope. A masked female soldier struck hard and fast. Then a pandaren healer arrived, serene but resolute. Or maybe it was the other way around? The madwoman fought on—slashing, shrieking about traitors and burning cities.
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Then came a familiar figure—Captain Anestre Thodim, grizzled veteran, Commander. Not a man for idle speeches, he used the pommel of his sword like a sculptor uses a chisel. Precision. Impact. Results.
Another nameless soldier had arrived and helped lift Cooper who had passed out from the loss of blood. She was carried to the Cathedral for healing, her wounds tended by those who arrived in time.
As for the madwoman? She was knocked out cold, the knives dropped, the cuffs applied, dragged off.
I made sure to collect the daggers left behind wrapped in my shirt, untouched for the sake of any investigation. Because sometimes, the free press has to do a guard’s job—and mind its fingerprints while it’s at it.
The attacker, it turned out, was no mere street criminal. Questioned by a hardened female soldier with the bearing of a Legionnaire, she revealed herself to be a former Corporal from the Thirteenth Division. Her name was not given, but her words were sharp and filled with venom.
“The Legion left us. The Crown betrayed us,” she spat, before claiming she had been following orders to plant and detonate a device in City Hall. She spoke of a new kingdom rising from the ashes.
Captain Anestre Thodim—grizzled, ever-composed, and no stranger to guard duty—oversaw her detainment. The Corporal was cuffed and escorted to the Stockades, pending trial. Her intended target, Constable Veronica “Ronnie” Cooper, had already been taken to safety and treated by nearby citizens. She will survive.
And Hamfist?
He was there. Screaming.
“Hardhy, The Pig and Whistle! Quickly!” came the unmistakable shriek of Hamfist Stonecan—gnome, bard, man of fifty ways to yell and just as many stories. He offered to sing and introduce me to his wife—maybe not his wife. Maybe a killer. Maybe not. I declined. I was cold. I was tired. And I still smelled faintly of adrenaline.
I’ll tell his story another time.
This one belongs to the guard who stood her ground, to the soldiers who answered the call, and to the quiet madness that sometimes creeps beneath our city’s surface.
Because this is Stormwind, after all.
Stormwind breathes. Stormwind bleeds.
And this time, Stormwind fought back.