Skyrim: Hammar Time

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

Brhuce does not apologize for the small text.

We find Medeliu's son, Brhuce, in the lowest bowels of a derelict pumphouse in Blackreach. He's pretty funny, but also a bit of a dick. He quickly offends Fawadin who storms off in a huff. I tell him that his father is looking for him but he doesn't care. Instead he wants to go after the Tankard of Why, some insanely alcoholic beverage which also grants the ability to know everything(?). I tell him I don't drink, but Sofia quickly pipes up that she does so... I guess we're roped in to helping!

That's specific.

It actually takes me some time to find the ruin the tankard is hiding in, because Brhuce doesn't believe in quest markers. I eventually find it near Falkreath, but someone else is there waiting for us - a mage knight named Zavakin who clearly wants us dead. The guy is a monstrous tank, but not too strong in the damage dealing department. To that end I stand back and let my allies deal with him.

Apparently Brhuce's main form of attack is throwing miniature trains that inflict severe knockback. This, combined with Sofia's high damage output is too much for him and Sofia finishes him off while he begs for his life.

Burrrrrned!

Finally we reach Hfernerfberf and I'm a little surprised that Brhuce doesn't enter the place with us. While it is guarded by lowly draugr there is some trippy stuff going on here, like tables overflowing with ale (which Sofia stops to partake at), giant skooma bottles, corridors full of moon sugar and traps which spawn immortal giant ghost spiders whom you have to simply run from. In a circle.

LOL!

Skyrim: Yngvarr's Folly

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

Running low on henchmen there Mr. Bad guy.

We find Yngvarr and the last of his troops at the temple which holds the Heart of the Gods. Too bad for him, his wizards hadn't yet disabled the magic shield protecting it and so he began trying to stall by giving the longest speeches ever. For some, unfathomable reason he challenges me to a duel right then and there. I laugh at his face and accept, slaying him with the very first strike which he couldn't even react to. I'm guessing that's not what was supposed to happen? Haha.

Shocked by this Yngvarr's remaining men surrendered to Jarl Agnar who then got them to seal the temple. With our work here complete, I teleported my team back to Skyrim (that Asylum spell is fantastic) and spent a night of quiet celebratory dinner at my Riften home. Lucia and Sofie were happy to see us too and enjoyed the the gifts I brought back for them. Sofie apparently tamed a rabbit as well and I let her keep it as a pet.

I don't remember what the food was, but judging from the empty plates it was good.

It was nice to have a short time of not doing anything important, playing tag with the kids and listening to Sofia's stories. A message from Medeliu Hammar ended that though as he had a job for us: to find his son in Blackreach.

Did I just Die Again?

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

Katria, Agmaer and myself rode the lift far down into the depths where we finally found the Aetherium Forge our spirit guide was looking for. She then told me to turn off the steam. Are you nuts? That generally makes things explode! Anyway, after a mandatory fight with its guardians (where I turn the steam back on) I use the rare ore of the key itself to make a crown for Katria. She is happy and finally goes off to Sovngarde (I guess). I run one more rescue mission with Agmaer wherein we slay another master vamp and free a bearded male orc civilian who calls Agmaer "my love". Uhhh, awkward.

With a lot of experience now under his belt I bring Agmaer back to Dawnguard HQ then proceed to meet Serana where she is waiting for me  - but not before I instruct one of my people, Bane the khajiit, to tail us covertly from a good distance. I'm not dumb enough to wander around with a bunch of elder scrolls and have no backup, and I figure if anyone can sneak up on a vamp it would be a cat. So into the castle we go via a side entrance. Skeletons and gargoyles seem to be the main guards here, but are generally no match for Serana's magic anyway. A feral vamp and her doggies are the only fangs I get to slay on this excursion.

We finally reach the tower of her mom and find a portal to the Soul Cairn, the only catch being I have to be partially "dead" to enter. Serana offers again to vamp me out or alternatively partially soul trap me which will weaken me somewhat. I obviously  choose the soul trap option (because vampires suck!) and then descend into the realm of not quite death, but more like used black soul-trap land? It is a bizzare and somewhat large place, but thankfully it is not as huge nor as darkly foreboding as Blackreach. Oddly the skeleton theme continues here, with bonemen being my primary adversaries. Pity for them my aura whisper removes any surprise attacks they have, since I can pinpoint them, bash them through the sand to make them climb out, and finish off with a sneak attack when they are defenseless.

Lots of non-hostile souls here too, the funniest being "Saint" Jiub, the slayer of Cliffracers! Unfortunately he also has a damned collection quest in here too. Blaaaargh! x_x

Whoa that takes me back.

Duelling the Dead

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

En garde!

Took the Knight Alyssa for her tests next, starting with the forsworn just outside my new base. We then moved on to colder regions where she handled multiple draugr deathlords just fine and survived an ancient dragon - however this winged beast got away! Checked in with Esbern who thought he had a lead where it may have gone so I left Alyssa there (her finishers on the overlords were impressive) and took her friend Rayna instead, who had already previously proven her skills. Once we reached the spot, Mjoll was there too and so was... Athis!? How many times did I have to kill this soon-to-be-draugr!?

No time to worry about that though as we came under attack by the -wrong- dragon. This one was just an elder one and we slaughtered it just fine. I then asked Athis about his state and he was very dismissive, continously walking away so I used this as a good test of Rayna's skills - telling her to duel the freak dunmer while Mjoll and I just stood back and watched. It was a long fight but Athis was just outclassed and once again was run through. Mjoll then promised to find whoever did this (I assume whoever brought Athis to back life, again). Hopefully this time he stays dead as a courier came by to deliver his inheritance?

After leaving Rayna at the Temple, I took the brash knight Cutter next as he was getting bored in Solitude. For as much as I dislike him he still proved himself, managing to help me clear an unfinished dwemer ruin (despite his fear of such places), defeating a wisp mother on his own, and surviving a big mammoth and two troll combo. Having passed, I sent him off to the temple too and took the lizardman archer Anu next. After surviving an easy frost dragon and a few bandits I decided to revisit the Dawnstar sanctuary to make sure the brotherhood (that is down to one little girl and a corpse) was in check. Sure enough when I got there I found they had recruited a new male initiate! Figured this would be a good test of Anu's skills and got him to duel the new guy in a knife fight. This time, the fight was not in my favour though - and the lizardman was gutted from navel to neck before falling lifelessly to the ground. Just as the initiate breathed a sigh of relief I appeared from the shadows and slit his throat.

Returned to Solitude where Njada wanted to give me some tips on blocking. After that I brought Alle the high elf for her trials next. Esbern had found another dragon to slay, and my little band had also researched a second one to be hunted down deep underground! After warming up on an easy Blood Dragon (where Mjoll was late to arrive on the scene) we descended into Blackreach to hunt Vulthyrol. I needed to get close enough to yell at the giant "sun" which meant a quick covert run through the Silent City via the tunnels, silently sniping the patrolling falmer. Eventually I did manage to summon the dragon, and Alle was too hasty in charging it as a shadow master and his pet dwarven centurion arrived on the scene. The dragon was caned quickly but then while I handled the giant centurion, I lost track of Alle and her pursuing falmer. Eventually I found her corpse behind some buildings with the shadowmaster doing some obscene things to her face. After extracting revenge it was time to get out of there.

A Test of Skill

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

Moved on to the last bit of training using some of the challenges found on the Skyrim Blog. For obvious reasons, some of these had to be reloaded either because I died, killed someone I didn't want to, or temporarily paid my bounty to run the challenge. Also it seems some of the towns have also been reading the blog, since they were hiring skilled unscroupulous people to test the defenses and skills of their guardsmen! Since I fit the bill, they granted me a short truce to put them to the test. ;)

A bit like this!

Challenge: Whiterun Crime Caper
5 minutes to cause chaos and rack up the highest bounty you can! No shouts, no potions, no switching of weapons and no surrender!
Lvl 49 using Daedric Bow of Freezing - Best score: 8401. Terrain was favourable for my bow here and got this first go.

Challenge: Windhelm Crime Caper
5 minutes to cause chaos and rack up the highest bounty you can! No shouts, no potions, no switching of weapons and no surrender!
Lvl 49 using Blade of Woe and Superior Ebony Dagger - Best score: 7281. This was nightmarishly tough for me as the guards constantly killed me in the tight confines of the tavern.

Challenge: Markarth Crime Caper
5 minutes to cause chaos and rack up the highest bounty you can! No shouts, no potions, no switching of weapons and no surrender!
Lvl 49 using Blade of Woe, Superior Ebony Dagger - Best score: 11520. My experience fighting the bastards of Markarth paid off here, since I already knew how to make them run in circles. They still killed me a few times though.

Challenge: Solitude Crime Caper
5 minutes to cause chaos and rack up the highest bounty you can! No shouts, no potions, no switching of weapons and no surrender!
Lvl 49 using Blade of Woe, Superior Ebony Dagger - Best score: 9285. Needed so many retries here for a totally different reason - I kept killing my witnesses and reducing my own bounty! Doh! :P

Challenge: Crimson Nirnroot Hunting (timed)
Starting at the Alchemist's Shack in Blackreach (near the Afland Lift) how long does it take you to get 10 crimson nirnroots?
After angering the guards in all those places I figured I needed to lay low for awhile, and there's not much lower a place than Blackreach! This took me 10:53.2. :P

Now that I'm feeling back in shape it was time to test out how my soldiers were doing and since Anni the elven archer was the longest "untested" one there she was up first. We went to visit Esbern at Sky Haven temple and to my surprise Mjoll had returned from being AWOL! She was very evasive when I asked where she ran off to before though. Disturbingly the bodies of the other two blades members were there too. Eww. Anyway, first up was a dragon hunt, and Anni had no problems taking down the blood dragon we were sent up against. After reporting our victory we headed to Rorikstead, where during my training I discovered some places I had "missed".

Before we got very far though we were attacked by a guard who had brought with him a mercenary in full ebony plate! Anni again proved herself here and was given that armor as a reward. She continued to impress in the Falmer cave of Gloomreach, though a shadow master did manage to hurt her leg at one point. After clearing the place I figured she had passed the test and was about to return her to the home base in Solitude when I realised I already had a -secret- base elsewhere. *facepalm* With secret agent girl having been killed by Mjoll awhile back, I figured it was up to me to rebuild the blades now and left Anni in the much more spacious fortress of Sky Haven Temple.

Preparing for the End

Adventures in Skyrim - spoilers ahead! You can follow the whole story here!

Back at the Dark Brotherhood HQ (sounds like a racist group huh), the little jester guy I helped previously is here with the coffin of his mother. The Night Mother. I find it quite funny that this bunch of killers have the most personality among the dozens of other NPCs in the world. Distubingly, the dead lady in the coffin decides to talk to me. The Jester Cicero claims I am the new "listener". The current leader is unsure and instead sends me to off a couple of vampires and the orc coward in Morthal, both of which I have no problems with. While I'm out, I decide to have another try at getting the Elder Scroll at Blackreach as well as another collection quest down in its depths. While my expedition this time is successful, Borgath is slain by the falmer "king" at Silent City and his servants. I decide to bring her kinsman Ogol with me next (seems most of that village is willing to follow me after their chief was killed).

Turns out the contract for the Brotherhood is the Emperor himself! This is excellent news, because he's the one who bent the entire empire over to the Thalmor's whims in the first place. There will be things to setup first though, and step one is the bait. Murdering his cousin on her wedding day. I did feel guilty for this one as she was trying to unite the Empire and Stormcloaks, but when it comes down to it - why would I want to ally with a nation full of losers? Caused quite a commotion when I crushed her with that statue, and now the guards in Solitude are after my hide too. Fortunately both Ogol and I got out in one piece and decided to lay low at the top of the world.

It's a pretty good hiding place actually.
While up there I decided to read that Elder Scroll and after a nifty blinding flashback, Alduin himself appears for battle! Optimus Pri... I mean Paarthumax and Ogol the orc help me out too and we defeat him! But in traditional main bad guy fashion, he laughs at us as he runs away. Ermmm ok. Apparently he powers up by eating people in the world, then going to the afterlife and eating them again. Did that make sense? Yeah it sounded a bit wierd to me too. To chase him I needed to catch another dragon first, and needed the already built facilities at Whiterun to do so. Jarl Bossman there wasn't stupid enough to let a dragon in while he was playing the neutral card between two armies though so with the Grey Beards help I called a truce meeting between Ulfric Stormcloak and general stupid skirt, the representative leader of the empire.

How much fun I had when they decided I could call the terms of the treaty. Naturally I sided with Ulfric with everything, and most importantly gave Markarth from the imperials to the stormcloaks in exchange for the measly small port of Dawnstar, already weakening their hold in my land. I mean... this land. *Cough cough*. Also, this switches all the guards in the city of stone to Stormcloak soldiers who don't attack me everytime I visit! Woohoo! :)

Master Thief

Adventures in Skyrim - spoilers ahead! You can follow the whole story here!

Decided to try go after the Elder Scroll I needed to defeat the main bad dragon today. Hired the merc Stenvar to provide support and while he did help kill a Frost Dragon on the way to the dwemer ruins and a bunch of falmer bastards inside he didn't last very long to a group led by a falmer shadowmaster, who turned his insides into ice. I just backstab those and kill them in one hit. Proceeded down, down, down to goblin town until I came upon... Blackreach. WHAT THE HELL. This place is HUGE, and crawling with nasties. It also connects to other large dwemer dungeons. I tried to map the alien landscape as much as I could until the damn glowy shrooms started to give me a headache so I took the nearest grand elevator out of there to do something else first. Picked up the orc warrioress Borgath too, since I was running out of followers to choose from elsewhere. :P

The Dark Brotherhood had tasked me with three kills, two of which were eliminating people who non-productive to society so I had no problem with that. The last one, a hardworking miner gal in Dawnstar, I had moral issues killing. Turns out the problem solved itself as we arrived because the city was under attack from an Elder Dragon and he happened to turn my target into crispy pata before I could save her. Also visited Solitude to shadow a contact of an enemy to the thieves guild. Borgath didn't do much shadowing though, she just tried to fight her way through guard after guard to no avail. Stupid orc. Saved her life a bajillion times in that warehouse. We also cleared out a dwemer ruin and encountered a named dragon when we exited... sounded like... Vin Diesel?

Anyway, Mercer - the leader of the Thieves guild has finally tracked this nemesis of theirs and wants me to help him take them down. Sure thing. Borgath is too afraid to come with us so she stays behind. For good reason too. Mercer is an absolute kickass when it comes to dustman dusting. Better still, at the end of that it turns out HE is the bad guy and manages to "kill" me. Fortunately Athis showed me his trick of coming back to life and it seems Borgath and the nemesis person who is actually good (to an extent) help me regain my health. We head back to Riften to clear the she-nemesis' name with the guild and slay a dragon attacking the town while doing so. After all things are settled (and after she gives me a really cool set of armor) the obvious quest to hunt down Mercer begins and I am more than happy to do so. Borgath again chooses to stay out of it knowing she'd just get in the way. For the record, the final fight against Mercer is perhaps the best one I've had in the game so far (for my build anyway, Juris who did this as a mage just let his dremora do all the work :P).

What a battle between real master thieves looks like:

Can't see anything? That's the point.
After defeating him I have been elected as guild master for the thieves guild. Really? Well that's just great. They request I help them rebuild their group by doing criminal acts across the land. I have a better idea. I turn them all in. Alas that option doesn't exist, so instead I let them rot in their squallor living in the sewers like the turds they are.