Interlude: Stories of Azeroth Feasting (2023)

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foreword Welcome to Interlude: Stories of Azeroth Feasting! Our second collection of stories explores food within the World of Warcraft.

Dragonflight’s ongoing story posed a question for what stories we could tell and showcase next. What theme could be both as broad and as personal as peacetime within the timeskip? As it turns out, Dragonflight helped decide this with its particular focus on soup.

Food within an MMORPG serves as a resource that can replenish or buff a player, but it can also be a vehicle for delivering world building details.

Most players may not think twice about this while conjuring mana buns or dropping a feast for their party, but these items are not simply just “consumables” when one looks at the item in their bag. Mon’dazi, a fried bread that is learned in the Zandalari tree of Cooking, has a

real life inspiration in the Mandazi of the Swahili Coast. Pearl milk tea, similarly, may pass under the radar of those less familiar with the real life counterpart, popularly known as boba tea, or bubble tea. Pungent Vrykul Gamalost is an aged cheese that also has a real life Norwegian counterpart. The traditional Gammelost cheese was once a staple of Norwegian diets with its high protein content.

More examples like these exist throughout Azeroth, allowing for subtle implications of the many cultures represented, the impacts of their geographic – or temporal – locations, and onward. It’s from this that we, as fans and creators, can explore the meaning of food within the context of Warcraft and with our own personal inspirations.

- kholwa

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FOUND Emily L’Orange . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

table of contents

UNDERJELLY Vaethryn . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 COMFORT FOOD Angela Cypret . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 WAITING Kat Ross. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 STARTING FROM SCRATCH Coda Audava. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 CAMPING WITH THE FAMILY Papercutzz & Alladar R.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 LEG DAY Jean Cabot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 IT’S MORE FUNGI WITH FRIENDS Ragewane . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26 A FAREWELL FEAST Gearfeathers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30 MEMORIES OF COMFORT AND BREAKFAST Soppendeuff. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34 THE GREAT BLACKWING BAKE-OFF Perry A . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36 THE FLAVOR OF INNOCENCE Glowcrow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40 KITCHEN DESPERADOS Galbadrakh. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44 MEMORIES Triunviratum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46 TIDEGAZY PIE Meggoart. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50 TASTE OF ANOTHER HOME Helenrira . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54 FOOD IS...

Bleu_Ace . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58 THE LOWER MARKET Circuits & Sorcery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62 UNA’FE Kudgen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66 FULL TABLES Flarenwrath. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70 GIFT OF KINDNESS Fawkses & Northsings. . . . . . . . . . . . . 74 EDITORAL TEAM. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77

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CONTRIBUTOR CONTACT. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78

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Cover Art by Buttart Interior Cover Art and Book Design by Meggoart Spot Illustrations by Meggoart, Buttart and Kholwa Edited by Meggoart, Fawkses, Buttart and Kholwa This is a nonprofit fan project distributed free digitally.

Any future print runs of this piece will be distributed “at-cost” and will similarly be nonprofit.

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editorial team Meggoart Lead Editor, Book Designer, Contributor @meggoart meganjamesart.com Meggoart is overjoyed at having an excuse to draw so many silly looking fish in one comic volume. Her previous comics experience includes writing and illustrating the series Innsmouth, as well as editing and contributing to the first Interlude Anthology. She’d like to say thank you to all the contributors for their hard (and delicious) work diving into comics!

Fawkses Editor, Contributor @Fawckses fawkses.bsky.social Fawkses can usually be spotted as a pile of little creatures stuffed into a trenchcoat. He’s been described as witty, earnest to a fault, great at doing silly voices, and a solid five stars on the friend record. Past work includes reviewing and creating short films for college, drawing as a hobby, and working as an editor on the previous Interlude anthology.

Buttart Editor, Spot and Cover Illustrator @therealbuttart buttart Buttart is a cartoonist, activist, and internet-famous-cat-owner based in Brooklyn NY. She loves roleplaying, and is one of the hosts of the yearly WoW RP event, the Stranglethorn Bonfire Bash. She’s honored to be a part of this anthology’s second volume as its cover artist.

Kholwa Editor, Spot Illustrator @velocipasta ko-fi.com/velocipasta Kholwa, three suspicious raptors in a trench coat that love to roleplay.

Self taught artist and guardian druid enthusiast. Bears AND dinosaurs rolled into zandalari trolls? Even better! Has mostly done art for roleplay and charity events in WoW, including running a past charity stream during pride month.

Always here to help!

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contributor contact Angela cypret @shatharism

Jean Cabot @PrairieHamster hamsterbandit.com

Bleu_Ace @BleuAceStudio

Kat Ross @ Katart8809 katart8809

Circuits & Sorcery

Kudgen

@CircuitNSorcery

@kudgen_art

circuitsandsorcery.com

kudgen

Coda Audava @mshafferart linktr.ee/codaaudava

Northsings @northsings tidesages

Emily L’Orange

Papercutzz art

@emilylorange

@PapercutzzArt

emilylorange

@papercutzzart

Flarenwrath

Perry A

@flarenwrath

@perrya tamacomic.com

galbadrakh

Rage

@baavgaiart

@ragewane

@jiubrose

ragewane.carrd.co

Gearfeathers

Soppendeuff

@gearfeathers

@Soppendeuff

gearfeathers

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Glowcrow

Triunviratum

@glowcrow

triunviratum

glowcrow.carrd.co

triunviratum.bsky.social

Helenrira

Vaethryn

@helenrira

@Vaethryn

lnk.bio/Helenrira

Vaethryn

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interludecomicanthology.carrd.co twitter.com/wowcomicanth

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2023