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SPOILER INFO
This fanfic novel is largely based on the events that occurred in an actual game of Skyrim I played. Therefore, it's inevitably a spoiler.
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previous day
4-201-10-28 04:43
Dead Man's Drink, Falkert, Falkreath, Skyrim
I had a dream about a wonderful land. I am rapidly forgetting the details, but I still remember some magnificent, stunningly beautiful buildings. I am sure it was the land of the Gray Cowl quest. I feel I have to see it for real. That's why we'll try and find that "initiation hall" today. It's so near that it would be silly to just pass by.leave ot for another time.
Unless it turns out to be a lengthy adventure, we'll travel to the Rift after that, where we give the Gaybores their sacred horn and proceed to Bitchen, killing a dragon at the Autumnwatch Tower along the way.
We leave Falkert and turn off the road. Our destination lies beyond Ancient's Ascent. I have no idea if it's even physically possible to get to the Initiation Hall from Ancient's Ascent or is one supposed to find another road. We just go southwards and look for places where the map suggests the mountains may be not entirely unpassable, and try to ascend there.
With great effort (and a lot of time) I have managed to climb about to the halfway of this very slippery slope.
It has turned out absolutely impossible to ascend further, so I'll have to go down again and try another way.
And this is before Ancient's Ascent.
It has turned out absolutely impossible to ascend further, so I'll have to go down again and try another way.
And this is before Ancient's Ascent.
After several unsuccessful attempts of getting across the mountains, we end up on the familiar staircase to Ancient's Ascent. There's even a dragon up there, albeit a very weak one. Miraak steals the dragonsoul and claims he's growing stronger all the time. But is there a way further south? With some effort, we succeed in climbing onto the rocks on the southern edge from which we can jump down to a halfway decent path.
We can see some very impressive high strucures in the distance.
Soon we end up at a fortress called Bloodlet Throne. A door leads to big caves where we have to kill a large number of vampires, horrible bloodhounds and even flying monsters called gargoyles. They're frightening, but our discipline is flawless and we are never in real danger.
This wasn't that Gray Cowl thing, though. We exit and move on towards those amazing towers. They're quite near. The place is called Eye of Cyrodiil. That must be it.
There's an entrance that seems right, except that our progress is blocked by a grating that can't be opened in any way. The grating leads to an open passage, I mean a long narrow corridor without a roof. I find a place from which I can climb over the wall into the passage. Unfortunately, I soon reach another closed grating and I can see yet another further on. I have no choice but to climb out again.
The small staircase right of the two spruces is where the closed grating is.
If it were open, it would lead to that long corridor with further gratings I just mentioned.
In the foreground, before the two spruces, is a long staircase that leads to the towers (see below).
If it were open, it would lead to that long corridor with further gratings I just mentioned.
In the foreground, before the two spruces, is a long staircase that leads to the towers (see below).
I look around and find a long staircase that leads to a door. Inside is a magic elevator of sorts which brings me onto a long and narrow walkbridge high in the air. It connects two towers. There's a door at the other end. I enter and another magic elevator takes me higher still, to the top of a tower with an awesome view but nowhere further to go.
That's me on top of the nearer high tower, next to the trapdoor.
I return to the ground the way I came. We keep looking around and eventually find another door that leads to a lever. I pull it, hoping it'll open one of those gratings. I return to the door that led me to those magic elevators on the last picture. I find another lever up there which I missed the first time. I pull it. Now I go to that passage with gratings. The outer grating is still closed, but the other two seem to be open. I return to the place where I climbed over the wall earlier. After several unsuccessful attempts, I succeed in doing it again. Yes, the two gratings are open now.
I walk to the end of the passage, alone for the time being. A door opens to the Hall of the Initiation . It's an oblong dimly-lit profoundly joyless room with large rough stone steps along the left and right wall, as well as a wide staircase and something that resembles a bricked-up well at the far end. The latter looks very much like a portal to somewhere and I'm apparently supposed to guess how to make it work.
I try to remember if Seviana gave me any hints. I don't think she did. I go back to the entrance door without discovering absolutely anything. Then I look towards the "well" again. Now I notice something on the floor halfway down the hall. I go closer and see that it's a Gray Fox bust . I can activate it and after I've done so, the arch in the back of the hall lights up with purple energy and a beam of bright light rises up from the well.
It's indeed a portal to a place called Old Way of the Thief . I go through and find myself on a high narrow bridge that leads across some horrible green liquid.
I enter a dungeon and end up on a platform with a large pool of fire in front of me. There's a door on the other side to which I'll have to find a way. On this side, there's another Gray Fox bust , which upon activation gives me cryptic instructions that mean absolutely nothing to me. Utterly clueless and with my patience just about running out, I have Bardslayer float me across. The door leads to a dungeon that looks basically like The Ratway in Bitchen, only worse. And twenty times bigger. There's no one attacking me, but that's the only good thing that can be said about this dismal place.
Eventually I arrive at a portal to Hidden Chambers of Sancre Tor. That's an even more appalling dungeon with passages leading in various directions without any way to tell where I should go. I find the volume 2 of a journal that suggests I'll have to find the other 5 volumes and contains otherwise nothing that would make sense to me. I just walk in random directions. It's hopeless to follow any plan. Everything is so uniform I can barely recognize places where I've already been.
I'm naming this system of dungeons The Ratarseway. Just as The Ratway gets its name from the rat, this place gets its name from the rat's rectum. It's truly the arse-end of the world. I won't even apologize for my vocabulary. I'm not sure I've ever felt so betrayed. The only reason why I even considered giving this pointless quest a try was to see those faboulous palaces and towers from my dream, and what I got instead is this world of filth and bad light where my entire mind is focused on the sole desire to find a way out. (Going back the way I came is impossible.) What kind of a twisted mind designed this crazy maze? Not only is orientation utterly impossible, some of the occasional gratings blocking my way don't even have locks to pick. Undoubtedly there are switches for them in some other passages, but even if I would find one or another switch, I'd have no chance finding my way back to the grating it opened. That's why Bardslayer helps me through them. In fact, I'm very close to begging him to teleport me back to Skyrim. I know he can do it. I'm just going to walk around some more until I've lost those last traces of hope I still have.
I get hurt extremely bad several times by traps that are activated by my walking over something completely invisible. In one of the so-called rooms I see a map on the wall that suggests that Sancre Tor is in Cyrodiil. Apart from an occasional book and such, nothing suggests that there may be a human civilization within a thousand miles.
Eventually I end up on a platform where I'm given a task of finding 4 keys. Don't tell me I'll have to go back into that dungeon.
I step up to one of the doors and find it can be opened without any key. It leads me to a place called Jauffre's Rooms. There's a man, the first living creature I'm seeing in The Ratarseway. He seems hostile, so I kill him without waiting to see if he's going to attack me or not.
I am now in a large room with beds. I realize it's already evening and I could well use some sleep. Who knows when I'll get another chance?
next awakening
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