Strengthen the Ancients

Objective: Use Bark of the Walkers to strengthen 3 Lothalor Ancients in the Lothalor Woodlands. Return to Sarendryana at Stars’ Rest.

Quick Facts

• Location: Lothalor Woodlands, southeast of Stars’ Rest [~30-34, 67-72]
• Prerequisite: Requires completion of The Focus on the Beach
• Do Alongside: Atop the Woodlands (from Image of Archmage Modera). Same area. Grab both before heading to the woods.

Walkthrough

Step 1: Get Bark from Woodlands Walkers

• Find Woodlands Walkers in the Lothalor Woodlands, around [~30-34, 67-70]. They’re small treant creatures roaming through the forest.
• You must be dismounted to interact with them. Right-click a Walker to request bark.
• What happens next is random:
  • The Walker may turn hostile and attack. Kill it to loot Bark of the Walkers.
  • The Walker may simply hand you a piece of bark and despawn peacefully.
• Efficiency tip: Spam right-click when interacting. Even if the Walker goes hostile, you can sometimes receive 1 to 3 pieces of bark before combat starts. This can dramatically reduce the number of Walkers you need to find.

Step 2: Use Bark on Lothalor Ancients

• Find Lothalor Ancients in the same area. They’re the large, friendly ancient trees scattered through the woods. Target one and use the Bark of the Walkers from your inventory.
• Critical: The bark only works on non-corrupted ancients. Corrupted Lothalor Ancients are hostile and will attack you on sight. They look similar, so check the nameplate color before approaching. If it’s red, stay away.
• You need to strengthen 3 ancients total. If you got multiple bark pieces per Walker, you can do this in a single pass through the woods.

Step 3: Return to Stars’ Rest

• Report to Sarendryana at Stars’ Rest. She thanks you for saving “the most majestic of Northrend’s children” and plans to visit the ancients to ask for their help against the Alliance’s enemies.

Tips

• Gather bark first, then use. Collect 3+ pieces of bark before targeting ancients. The Walkers and ancients aren’t always near each other, so batching the bark collection saves travel time.
• Watch for arcane wyrms. The Lothalor Woodlands are dense with Arcane Serpents (flying arcane wyrms) that patrol aggressively. They guard both the Walkers and the ancients. Clear them first, especially as a lower-level character where multiple pulls can be lethal.
• Avoid corrupted ancients at all costs. As Sarendryana warns in the quest text, corrupted ancients are dangerous. They’re elite-equivalent encounters that hit hard.

Lore Context

The Lothalor Woodlands are suffering direct collateral damage from the blue dragonflight’s ley line manipulation. The redirected arcane energy has seeped into the forest floor, spawning arcane wyrms from the ground and corrupting the ancient protectors who have guarded these woods for millennia.

The treant Walkers, being smaller and more adaptable, are somehow immune to the corruption, making their bark the only viable remedy.

Sarendryana notes that saving the ancients isn’t just altruistic: if the Alliance saves them before the Horde does, the ancients might ally with the Alliance.

The Horde version of this quest (Strengthen the Ancients, from Earthwarden Grife at Agmar’s Hammer) frames the same idea from the opposite angle: save them before the night elves and dryads of Stars’ Rest do. Both factions are racing to win the ancients’ favor.