The Tourbillon

The Tourbillon is the brainchild of an ingenious gnome tinkerer, Albux Silverspark, invented years before the first invasion of the Orcish Horde. Dwarven explorer Dodran Stonewright, a friend of Albux, unearthed a small but highly complex artifact during one precarious expedition to the ancient city of Uldaman. Unable to appraise the treasure, and reluctant to surrender it to the Explorer's League, Dodran offered it to Lux as a gift. Eager to accept such a rare find, Lux named it The Escapement and promptly began research. Before too long, he'd already identified its Titanic origin, as well as a hidden power he would have never expected.

Albux became obsessed with the artifact, spending every waking hour tampering with it in his private laboratory in Gnomeregan. So fervent was his research that his peers began to question his health and sanity. He became even more secretive as the months passed, but also more zealous in his works. He began hiring labor to build a vessel with incredibly precise specifications around the artifact, sparing no expense. After exhausting his family's wealth, he began to take out loans to fund its construction.

The alarmingly desperate measures of Albux to complete his project prompted Dodran to seek out his friend and bring him to reason. What began as a stern conversation between the two inevitably devolved into deadly violence. Albux, in the heat of his passion, slew Dodran with a bolt gun. Authorities were quick to find out about the murder, and only days away from the vessel's completion. Albux was forced to flee Gnomeregan with The Escapement and abandon his work.

Construction of the vessel was finished regardless of Albux's absence, then immediately confiscated by the authorities. It was stored away for many decades, then later forgotten when the city was lost to the troggs and the lepers. When Gnomeregan was later reclaimed, the vessel was rediscovered. What was left of Albux's deranged notes revealed little of his grand designs, but they did shed light on its name: The Tourbillon. And so, the enigmatic airship was put up for auction by authorities and sold to the highest bidder. It was just barely won out by an eccentric goblin tycoon named Greble Greasebolt of the Steamwheedle Cartel, much to the humiliation of the outbid human noble Lord Saunders.

Saunders, in an act of petty greed and vengeance, hired mercenaries to assassinate Greble and take the Tourbillon for himself. And so did the zeppelin and all of its secrets come into the possession of the noble until the day it was once again stolen by an unlikely band of ruffians from Westfall...