TESO: The Last March

Adventures of Skyrim - spoilers ahead! You can follow the rest of the story here!

Reaper's March is a breath of fresh air after the stifling forests of Malabal Tor. Apart from the Imperials assaulting this zone (led by Tharns no less) there's also an evil khajiit spirit called the Dark Mane (also conjured by a Tharn) raising scary looking Khajiit warriors wherever it goes. The main quest involves assisting a pair of twin sisters in stopping this threat, which is great.

Capoeira esquivas are useful here too!

Unfortunately that "threat" occupies only maybe 1/3rd of the region, with the rest occupied by local bandits, gamblers, an arena and skooma peddlers. I do get to free Barbas (the talking dog) from a prison of his master, Clavicus Vile, though. There is also an awesome side quest at a scary mansion with a massive cavern underneath occupied by Imperials who are looking for the Oghma Infinitum. Hermaeus Mora tells me they cannot have it.

Quite a literal army of bad dudes in the tunnels.

Finally I'm at a level where I can solo handle the group of 8 or so mobs here, and manage to take down the boss too. For all my work, Mora appears and snatches the Infinitum at the last moment - rephrasing that "no mortal" can have it. I manage to retain a single page, still enough to make most people insane.

After beating back the Tharns and destroying the Dark Mane, Queen Ayrenn seems more agreeable to an alliance or at least a cease fire with the Pact but I don't know. She looks, talks and smells like a Thalmor scum. Odds that she will keep her word are next to nil.

TESO: What is dead may never die

Adventures of Skyrim - spoilers ahead! You can follow the rest of the story here!

It turns out I was beaten to the very item I was sent to fetch by the Queen's own Vice Reeve who reveals himself as part of the Veiled Heritance who are present in large numbers here, as well as their sea elf allies the Maromer. Nearby orc clans also cause trouble for the locals but they are just road kill on my chase for the Vice Reeve whom I finally catch up to in an ocean confrontation thanks to a tip from Hermaeus Mora (seriously, don't steal from a Daedric Prince).

As for the Vice Reeve: I sunk his battleship.

The second half is more interesting, as the evil Prince Naemon who I had already killed last time had been revived as a lich by the late Vice Reeve, and is attempting to bring this part of the forest into the shadow realm. Slaying his undead minions, shades and ultimately the Prince himself (again) is quite fun as warping between the two states changes the spawn on the map. Doesn't matter so much for people who just kill everything but for a sneak like me I quite appreciated it.

Raz and Mai'q get honorable mentions for being my travelling "companions" in the zone since they keep showing up unexpectedly. Also on my journey I do ponder why some skeletons hold torches. Does it let them see better? Anyway it's then on to Malabal Tor which is under attack by... Redguards?

TESO: Not so Graht

Adventures of Skyrim - spoilers ahead! You can follow the rest of the story here!

Despite all my efforts it seems the Lion's Guard went ahead and captured some pact soldiers which led to my return to their valley encampment the Nord dagger man, Craizee, and together we killed every single Lion Guard scum left in there. At this point I definitely regret reviving King Emeric. Anyway, there's still hope for an alliance with Queen Ayrenn so I sail over to the giant forest of Grahtwood next, and this place is a mess - story wise.

The trees here are massive!

It's like they put piece meal ideas everywhere, such as a rebellion, a vampire den, the Worm Cult messing around, freeing forest spirits, a showdown against Sheogorath's new favorite mortal, assisting an Ordinator of Almalexia shutting down a dolmen and so on with no main thread tying them together like in past zones.

At least I got to push a drunk wizard off a tower.

Ultimately I just need to retrieve pieces of an ancient machine so that the Bosmer (who are actually cannibalistic since they don't eat plants) recognize Ayrenn as their true leader. Her brother Naemon tries to use the machine first which turns him into an ugly daedra which I destroy easily. Ayrenn (who did no work for any of this I might add) doesn't change at all, just powers up(?) and then sends me to fetch her next accessory over at Greenshade.

TESO: The Alchemy of Graphics Cards

Adventures of Skyrim - spoilers ahead! You can follow the rest of the story here!

With the Mages Guild quest line coming along nicely, I also help the Fighters Guild  do some research on a secondary weapon of Molag Bal and begin the process to craft countermeasures to it. Bal must be really weak since he could only muster a few skeletons led by a weak lich to try stop that. On a side note: The Ghosts in TESO really need some better/more obvious lore. Not only do they have ghost clothes but they also hit me with ghost arrows from their ghost bows... what? Is there ghost gold where they buy ghost equipment from a ghost shop?

It is then time to get the rest of the Shadowfen back under control, and while the Worm Cult has a small presence here the main enemy are Dominion troops - soldiers of Queen Ayrenn! The Thalmor scum are causing all sorts of problems in the swamp, though truthfully it would help if the Argonians stopped leaving their powerful relics lying around.

Ooh, can I tame one as my steed?

There are awesome lightning dragon things in this region too, who look really cool. Alas, the biggest problem I have in this zone is the "blue hue" that enjoys crashing my graphics card making it a real pain to traverse! Fortunately following this forum post alleviates the problem, enabling me to not crash during dolmen invasions (because Molag Bal hasn't given up) and slaying the Dominion leader and alchemist Ruuvitar in the region. As if hearing my advice, the lizardmen then send their relics by ship up to Windhelm for safe keeping. Since my work here is done I decide to tag along.

TESO: Nothing goes to Plan

Adventures of Skyrim - spoilers ahead! You can follow the rest of the story here!

With Queen Ayrenn on board, I figured it was time to report to King Jorunn about my progress and Wayshrined back to Davon's Watch. Jorunn said he'd be at Mournhold which is to the South in Deshann, so that's the road I took. I had to deal with a minor terrorist group spreading chemical weapons to turn people into zombie things on the way and ended them via the "backfire" method with the help of Naryu, a Dunmer assassin. We were getting pretty friendly until she revealed she was Morag Tong. Now she's on my "to kill" list (also I'm pretty sure this is her in the Morrowind trailer).

Anyway, bigger fish to fry first. At the Capital one of the mages from the mage's guild acts as my transport in organizing the three leaders (of whom King Casimir isn't one, oops) to meet at a summit on a neutral isle. Fortunately the Covenant High King Emeric must have heard good things about me as he agrees to attend. The talks don't go well at first, with no lead willing to redirect their troops from the Cyrodil war into Coldharbour. A short visit from Molag Bal and his minions does make them agree to send the war-neutral Fighters and Mages guild though - with me in the lead.

Spoiler: They don't.

Not that it matters because in our hasty and unplanned counter-attack I arrive alone in Coldharbour, at least this time in the open world version of it. I soon find the Hollow City, a town sent here and protected by Meridia (also possibly a Dark Souls reference). It suits its name in that it is almost completely deserted. The local grounds keeper, who I suspect is Meridia herself, offers me to use the city as my base to build up an army. Meridia really dislikes Molag Bal. First things first - I find a cooking fire and make an armies worth of food (which I sell because, shineys are shiney)! Provisioning is seriously the easiest craft skill to level. With my pack lightened and my belly full, it's time to go exploring.

TESO: Elf Nazis

Adventures of Skyrim - spoilers ahead! You can follow the rest of the story here!

It is with good fortune that we arrive at the Khajiit isle of Khenarthi's Roost right after an unnatural hurricane destroyed most of the Dominion ships in the harbor. While helping out the survivors it is made clear that the local Sea Elf pirates are behind the magical storm and thus forfeit their residency when a Dominion envoy arrives. The pirates continue to be a nuisance on the larger isle of Auridon, which is my next stop where I am surprised to already run into Queen Ayrenn while saving her from an assassination attempt and am recruited as one of her spies.

Those magic storms are cool though!

With the help of a most humorous khajit named Raz, we protect the newly crowned Queen and her retinue as they tour the island from the Veiled Heritance, who are basically High Elf Nazis. It's strange that there are worse elves than Thalmor huh? Most of the Veils turn out to be turncoats from Ayrenn's own court with their "Veiled Queen" being Ayrenn's demonized sister in law, who coincidentally worships Mehrunes Dagon and allies with Mannimarco too. After most violently dealing with the Nazis and their dremora I feel optimistic about the Queen's outlook for the peace truce.

Worth noting that the side-quests here strangely are all heavily focused on "mages who screwed up". One who petrified a town to cover up his experiments, one who feeds people to his vampire son, and so on and so forth. Trust the Altmer to try fix what ain't broken.