"I know this place."
The moment they reached the entrance to the Viewing Room, Smooch perked up.
"Quick, kill everything. I want revenge."
This was the exact spot where she had fallen to her death earlier. Seeing the mobs responsible immediately put her in a fighting mood. If she could have killed every undead and spider in sight with a single arrow, she probably would have.
"Clear the right side. Leave the left alone," Gabryell said.
There was no reason to waste time clearing the entire area.
"Shoot, shoot, shoot!"
Smooch was easily the most enthusiastic person in the group.
Once the right side was clear, they reached the Viewing Room door and opened it with the key.
"Whoa. That's a lot of yellow names."
Inside, dozens of neutral Scholomance Students sat around attending class.
"Don't touch anything. We're walking straight through."
The students were neutral for now, along with their instructors, Marduk Blackpool and Vectus.
That friendliness had limits.
Attack either instructor and the entire class would immediately turn on the party. With that many elite students packed into one room, trying to brute-force the encounter without preparing first was a good way to get buried under bodies.
Gabryell hadn't done Dawn's Gambit, so there was no reason to fight Vectus today.
Once that quest and its useful farming targets became relevant, Warlocks and Shadow Priests would have plenty of reason to come back. Vectus could drop the Dark Advisor's Pendant, a very strong Shadow-damage necklace, and using Dawn's Gambit made clearing the students vastly easier.
For now, though, the Viewing Room was just a hallway.
The room connected to two important areas. The southern exit led to the Laboratory, where Ras Frostwhisper waited. The eastern path led toward the Headmaster's Study.
Gabryell took everyone south first.
There were five famous high-end flasks in Vanilla: Flask of Petrification, Flask of Chromatic Resistance, Flask of Distilled Wisdom, Flask of Supreme Power, and Flask of the Titans.
Crafting them required an Alchemy Lab.
There were only two such labs in level-60 content: one here in Ras Frostwhisper's room, and another in Blackwing Lair, just beyond Broodlord Lashlayer, the raid's third boss.
That inconvenience was one of the reasons flasks were so expensive.
The materials alone already cost a fortune, and then the alchemist still had to physically reach one of the labs. On some servers, players even paid for access to a mostly cleared Scholomance instance just so they could walk in and craft without running the entire dungeon themselves.
Later, once Blackwing Lair was open, it would become common for guild alchemists to make flasks while the raid was already passing through the lab after Broodlord.
Much easier than organizing a Scholomance trip every time.
"When we have some free time, I'll bring Igor here and have him make a batch of Flasks of the Titans for progression."
Gabryell had already given Igor the Recipe: Flask of the Titans to learn.
Fearless would begin Molten Core progression next Tuesday, so they needed to stockpile plenty of consumables beforehand. Until Blackwing Lair opened, Scholomance would be their only practical Alchemy Lab.
The Deed to Brill was located near Ras Frostwhisper.
Which meant the Lich had to die.
Ras was level 62.
That alone was enough to make Gabryell interested.
"Blame your level."
Outside raids, there weren't many level-62 bosses in the major endgame dungeons, and Ras Frostwhisper was one of them.
Years later, Gabryell had even seen people on NGA claim that a Hunter had gotten Teebu's from Ras while farming him.
Whether that story had been true or not, Gabryell had never forgotten it.
"Kill him."
He looked at Ras as if the Lich were carrying Teebu's in plain sight.
"He's obviously a caster. Watch his spells."
Ras Frostwhisper was a Frost caster with a particularly irritating toolkit.
He had Frost attacks, AoE, crowd control...
And for some reason, Fear.
Apparently being a Lich meant nobody cared which class spellbook you stole from.
Carlos charged in.
Almost immediately, Ras blasted him with Chill Nova, knocking him back and slowing him.
"Damn it."
Danielly reacted instantly and dispelled the slow.
Carlos laughed. "Priests are awesome."
"Paladins can dispel too," Gabryell said.
Carlos snorted. "Tell Igor that."
Igor technically had the tools.
Whether he noticed the debuff before everyone else had already solved the problem was another matter.
Carlos charged back in.
"I hate Frost Mages."
For Carlos, that was reason enough for Ras to die.
"Interrupt his casts."
Ras could use Frostbolt Volley, but the more dangerous spell was Freeze.
Freeze stunned its target and dealt additional Frost damage every few seconds. If it landed on a DPS player, it was annoying.
If it landed on Carlos or Danielly at the wrong moment, things could become much uglier.
"Prioritize interrupting Freeze. Snowy, keep everyone stable through Frostbolt Volley."
Gabryell deliberately didn't mention Fear yet.
He wanted everyone to see it once.
A few moments later—
"Ah! I'm Feared!"
DeathScum suddenly turned and started running around the room.
There it was.
"Snowy, put Fear Ward on Carlos. Once it's ready again, put one on yourself."
As long as the tank and healer stayed functional, Ras wasn't particularly complicated.
The group maintained their positioning, interrupted Freeze whenever possible, and healed through the unavoidable Frost damage.
Ras cycled through Chill Nova, Fear, Freeze, Frostbolt Volley, and his other Frost abilities, but none of them were enough to break the party.
His health steadily dropped.
The fight was slower than Gabryell would have liked, mostly because of the level difference.
Against a level-62 enemy, resists and misses were noticeably more common.
At one point, Gabryell had two spells resisted back-to-back.
He stared at the screen.
"Fantastic."
Apparently his loot luck wasn't the only thing cursed today.
Eventually, Ras Frostwhisper collapsed.
"Don't loot him yet," Gabryell immediately said. "Let the corpse cool."
A level-62 boss deserved proper superstition.
Smooch, surprisingly, obeyed.
While everyone waited, Gabryell walked over and picked up The Deed to Brill.
Three deeds down.
Only The Deed to Caer Darrow remained.
That one was downstairs in the Headmaster's Study, in Lord Alexei Barov's chamber.
If they wanted to fight Darkmaster Gandling, however, they would have to clear all six chambers surrounding the Headmaster's Study, killing the six mini-bosses and the required mobs inside.
Only then would Gandling appear in the center.
And once he aggroed—
"School is in session!"
Gabryell wasn't sure yet whether they would bother.
He planned to grab The Deed to Caer Darrow first, then check on the other three groups.
If they had already finished Stratholme and completed Of Love and Family, there was no reason to stay here just for Gandling.
Gabryell wanted to take advantage of having so many guild members available and bring everyone to Azshara to work on the Hydraxian Waterlords quest chain.
At minimum, he wanted them to reach The Molten Core, the step requiring them to kill a Firelord, Molten Giant, Ancient Core Hound, and Lava Surger inside the raid.
That would save time once progression officially began.
If the other groups were still far behind, though, Gabryell wouldn't mind spending a little longer in Scholomance.
The six mini-bosses in the Headmaster's Study had excellent shared loot tables, including pieces from sets like Necropile Raiment, while Gandling himself had even better drops.
"I think he's cold enough now."
Smooch had waited as long as her patience allowed.
"I'm looting."
Gabryell waved a hand.
"Go ahead."
He wasn't expecting much.
Smooch crouched beside Ras Frostwhisper.
Then suddenly shouted.
"Whoa! Purple!"
Gabryell's head snapped around.
Purple?
His mind immediately forgot about Gandling.
"Teebu's?"
That was still the dream.
Buying Teebu's from the Auction House and actually seeing it drop were completely different experiences.
One meant you were rich.
The other meant RNG had personally chosen you as its favorite child.
In his previous life, Gabryell had once spent more than a month farming level-62 Red Dragonkin in the Wetlands.
Thousands of kills.
No Teebu's.
He had never completely gotten over it.
Unfortunately, today was not the day that wound healed.
Ras Frostwhisper had not dropped Teebu's.
Instead, the loot window showed something else.
Alanna's Embrace (Epic)
Binds when picked up
Chest
Cloth
96 Armor
+20 Intellect
+20 Spirit
+20 Stamina
Durability 100 / 100
Requires Level 57
Equip: Increases damage and healing done by magical spells and effects by up to 20.
"Alanna's Embrace!"
Gabryell's disappointment vanished the moment he saw the name. How had he forgotten about this robe? Its spell damage wasn't especially high, but the overall stats were excellent: twenty Intellect, twenty Spirit, twenty Stamina, and another twenty spell damage and healing.
For PvP and solo farming, that kind of all-around stat spread was hard to beat.
"Snowy, roll with me."
Gabryell wasn't about to claim it outright. Priests could make excellent use of Alanna's Embrace too.
Danielly shook her head. "I already have Robes of the Exalted. You take it."
Gabryell smiled. What a good apprentice. All that teaching hadn't gone to waste.
Smooch immediately agreed. "Ogabs should take it."
DeathScum nodded. "Yeah. That robe is basically made for him."
Carlos laughed. "Congrats. You finally got your purple."
With nobody else contesting it, Gabryell rolled Need, received Alanna's Embrace, and equipped it immediately.
The stats were excellent.
The appearance was another matter.
The purple robe looked elegant on a female Human, but on Gabryell's male Human Mage, it came across as considerably more flamboyant.
Just then, Igor noticed that Gabryell's group had looted an epic in Scholomance and wandered over to see what had dropped.
He took one look at the character model and snorted.
"Damn. That robe is aggressively purple."
Gabryell glanced at him. "What?"
Igor pointed at the screen with a grin. "Gabryell, you look fabulous."