Loyalty or No SV you Are the Daedra

[Kyrina]

Okay... this elf just frost magicked the wrong daedra.

You burst into motion towards her, throwing yourself left and right in a random zigzag pattern. She gathers another ball of frost and freezing air and pauses. Just as you turn, when you're momentarily motionless she hurls the magic towards you. It catches you clean in the chest, it's absolutely freezing and if you had a heart it would probably have stopped for a couple of beats there. You tank it like a boss.

"Blasted creature!" She shouts and you slash at her, arms moving clumsily as the cold radiates from your chest. You miss... by a mile. The elf didn't even have to move aside to avoid the edge of your sword. That's just insulting.

"You know," you call only a little desperately over your shoulder, "you could chip in any time here! She only wants to kill you and take your stuff, not necessarily in that order!"

"I-I..." your elf stutters and you growl incoherently, stomping down viciously with your foot. The hostile elf screams in agony and you hear something go crunch. Turns out she should have worn steel toed boots or something rather than fancy fur lined slippers or whatever she has on there.

You wind your fist back, telegraphing horribly but who cares, and smash it forwards into her sternum. She makes a terribly undignified noise as the air vacates her lungs at speed.

Hey, you're getting the hang of this! Eagerly you grab your sword in both hands and smash it across your body, blade aimed perfectly to bisect the hostile elf. She stumbles back and you may have been a little... overzealous with that swing. You sword flies clean out of your hands and thumps point first into a tree, driving itself three or four inches into the trunk.

Shit. The hostile elf snarls out a curse as she hits a tuft of grass with her broken foot and falls heavily onto her right side. Naturally that's when your elf tries to help and fails. A dull red ball of fire sails over your head.... That's actually quite the impressive miss.

So impressive you nearly miss the lightning the fallen bandit hurls at you. You dive to one side comically and the lightning shoots harmlessly into the sky. Well... that could have gone better. At least the bandit is injured now... and can't really walk, like at all. You might have busted some of her ribs as well.

Health: 74/90
Magicka: 130/130
Fatigue: 120/150​

[ ] Tackle her!
[ ] Punch to the face!
[ ] Run away!
[ ] Write in

 

[Kyrina]

You advance on the downed elf bandit. You are done with this. When you reach her you grab her right arm in both hands. So many images of people beating others with their own arms flood your head. Welp, time to find out if it really works!

You pull, with all your titanic might you haul on her arm. You can imagine her bones grinding together. With a jerk you realise you've made a very large error. You forgot to brace her down with your foot or one of your hands.

She's hoisted into the air. Oh well, even if you can't dis-arm her you and still.... She twists just right to fly free. You aren't even sure how she did that! Her luck score must be obscene.

The blue clad elf flies towards the horizon. You swear you see a twinkle of light around her when she passes behind the treeline. Huh... that reminds you of something but you can't quite think what. Whatever it is you put it out of your mind. The hostile elf is dealt with, you really doubt she's coming back after that, and wonder why you're so freaking terrible with your sword. Clearly something is up with this body, there's got to be a trick or something to making it do what it needs to do.

Unfortunately the daedra trapped in here with you is... cryptic at best. Probably doesn't like you too much. Jackass.

You turn back to your summoner, expecting her to at least say thanks. "What was that! You should have caught her so I could get a bounty for her arrest! Stupid golem!" She sticks her nose in the air and stalks past you. "At least you did protect me well enough... I suppose." She adds as an afterthought. Shaking your head you follow her to the Brina Cross Inn. She could probably aggro every hostile thing between here and Anvil!

You reach the inn and she turns to you. "Don't disturb anyone in the inn and stay!" She points her finger at the ground a little in front of your crystal feet and enters the inn.

Well... she said not to disturb anyone not to specifically stay out here right?

[ ] What do?

 

[Kyrina]

Thinking back on that fight with that bandit your sword skills kinda sucked. You let go of the thing and got it stuck in a tree! That's an impressive amount of fail. You should probably work on that.

With that in mind you walk over to the door and face away from it. You pull out your sword then do a double take. Didn't you leave it in that devil tree because a certain someone is an impatient drama queen? Well it is useful that it comes back, might be able to weaponise it into a boomerang blade or something. Absently you start humming something appropriate to the situation.

You start with a series of basic swipes and slashes, trying to imitate a really cool flurry style of move you've seen in movies. You swing your sword once, twice, thrice and then again and you're surprised you didn't chop off your own arm or leg or head or wreck a part of the inn. The swings were wild and pretty tiring. Probably not something you'd want to try around people you don't want to horribly maim.

Settling back onto the balls of your feet you pause for a second before hurling yourself into a forward thrust. You let out a loud cry, that's supposed to help with focus or power or something you think. That the music in your head swells at just the right time and that cry sounds suspiciously like 'ofthetiger!' has nothing to do with it at all. Nope, no, not a chance.

That seemed to work fairly well and you decide to try the powerful slash that got your sword embedded in a tree last time. You tighten your grip, humming getting louder as you psyche yourself up to not let go of it this time.

You strike, putting your shoulders and hips into the swing. It goes remarkably well. You feel like you know the weight and reach of the sword better than before and it's not embedded in a tree so that's good.

You let out a triumphant shout, that might sound suspiciously like song lyrics to the untrained ear, and go to try that flurry style of move again. You're confident you can make it work right if you keep trying it. Except....

"What in Onsi's name was that?" You turn and see a gaggle of people, all the races of Tamriel seem to be represented, clustered around the door. Their faces are all a mix of horror and anger and all of them are looking at you.

The elf that summoned you is smacking her palm into her forehead repeatedly and muttering something.

[ ] What do?

 

[Kyrina]

"Please direct any inquiries to the face-palming elf. And what? Have you never seen anyone train before? Really you people are so rude." You say in your best impersonation of a saccharine sweet, butter wouldn't melt in their mouth receptionist who would really like you to stop bothering them. It sounds surprisingly pleasant in the tones of your crystal grinding voice.

"You ba-" you can guess what she was about to say but you never actually hear it over the sudden shouts of the inn's patrons. Humming to yourself, more eye of the tiger, you start back towards the tree that stole your sword. It deserves a beating for that and it'll help you with your skill with a blade. Yay!

Your walk decapitates a couple of plants, you aren't sure what kind they are only that they have kinda pretty purple flowers. Finally the tree comes into view. It looks exactly like all the others, silver barked, tall with delicate little leaves. The only distinguishing feature is the deep gash leaking sap down the silver barked trunk. At last, you will have your revenge!

The Eye of the Tiger intensifies in your head and you flourish your sword manfully at the tree. It shows no sign of fear or remorse. With a manly war cry, which is totally not the highest note of Eye of the Tiger, you slash your blade at it over and over again, getting used to the swing, the weight and speeding up until it feels like your blade is a mere crystalline blur in the air.

You are the fastest, the most amazing, the....

There's a sound of groaning wood and the trees starts to list dangerously. The trunk is barely more than a pale mess of wood chips and splinters. Maybe you should have thought this through a little more?

You step smartly out of the way and someone behind you lets out an earsplitting scream. You turn just in time to see the elf who summoned you narrowly avoid being brained by a tree branch by falling on her arse. That wasn't a cool as your dodge but at least she's alright and....

"You clumsy, impudent, failure of a daedra!" She shouts at you. "I told you to stop the Divines damned singing and you won't, now you try and drop a tree on me! You'd be more useful to me as a soul gem!"

Well that's just rude.

[ ] What do now?

 

[Kyrina]

"Well, unfortunately for you I'm controlled by a hive-mind of idiots, with my actions depending on the values of literal dice!" That would explain the odd rattling noises that echo through your head whenever you swing your sword with purpose, or dodge.... Not when you talk though, that appears to be all you. That might be a part of the problem.

"Dice?" The elf asks in a morbidly curious tone. You nod, vigorously.

"Sometimes I'll nearly crush you with a tree." She scowls at you for bringing that up. "Other times I will literally be able to fist fight gods and win!" Provided they get terrible, terrible rolls and you critically succeed almost every action. It has been known to happen though. She stares at you, her mouth hanging open in shock.

"The short version is, Sheogorath wishes he had my ability to cause chaos." You add proudly. "Plus, you can blame him for the tree-thing. I'm pretty sure it was one of his." You kick the stump, chipping off a good chunk of it. Yeah! Suck on that demon tree!

"I think you may be right about causing more chaos than the Mad-God." The elf mumbles before shaking her head and straightening her shoulders. "Here is what will happen... mad-daedra-thing. I am going to sleep in the inn, you are going to... do whatever daedra do to rest in the stables. In the morning we're going back to Kvatch and... and finding leads a-about what ha-happened to my family." There are tears sparkling in her eyes as she says that. You consider telling her about the creepy basement in Cheydinhal but you should probably level grind a bit before then and so far this elf has been nothing if not impatient and impulsive. You start to say something but she cuts you off... you aren't sure she actually noticed you begin to speak.

"So, what shall I call you?" She asks. "I refuse to have a nameless servitor and what are you anyway? You never actually answered me. Are you some kind of golem or some kind of automaton from the Mad-God's realm?"

[ ] Write in a name?

[ ] What do?

 

[Kyrina]

Putting aside her rudeness, for now, you find an answer for her with surprising speed all things considered. "You are interacting with a Knight of Order, one of the daedra of Jyggalag. This particular Knight has the... quirk of having their actions controlled by the sum of the decisions made by a bunch of unruly entities from elsewhere. We are..." you pause then figure you may as well straight up admit it.

"We're basically just fucking with him for shits and giggles. I don't think the Knight actually has a name, but the gaggle of twats who are in control are collectively known as Sufficient Velocity." You announce, puffing your crystalline chest out proudly. The elf frowns at you.

"You're called... Fast Enough?" She asks and you very nearly fall flat on your face.

"No it's Sufficient Velocity." You insist, pronouncing each word carefully. She frowns more.

"That's what you just said, Fast Enough." You try the name again, this time you listen to what you're actually saying. Sure enough you hear yourself telling her that your name is Fast Enough. Damn it!

"Urgh fine, stupid translation mechanic," you grumble. "Anyway, since we like you, you can call us Fast for short." Velocity sounds waaaay better but alas you can't get that translated for some reason.

"Okay then," the elf says slowly. "You will refer to me as Morlia Ardyn, not elf." Like you're going to remember that among all the other names bouncing around in your head.

"Uh huh, anyway, giving us actions that involve us staying anywhere and not causing a ruckus would be problematic and unwise. Just throwing it out there." She should probably have worked that out by herself. Maybe she has, considering she tried to order you to go to sleep or whatever daedra do to try and pass the time peacefully.

"As for the rest of us...!" It's only polite to introduce everyone in your head to everyone outside it after all. Morlia's eyes bulge.

"Please no," she whispers. You carry on regardless. You're being polite, she should approve!

"There's bell, stacy, her, Jane—hey!—Right,Janie, Bob, Taint, Dark Ness, JOOOOHN CEEEENAAAAAH!"

"Shut up, that's enough!" Morlia Shouts back at you, hands over her ears after you conveyed the legend that is JOOOOHN CEEEENAAAAAH! "Just... just please, be quiet and wait for morning in the stables, or around the stables. I don't care what you do precisely so long as you're quiet about it."

She does look like she needs to get some sleep and now's as good a time as any to figure if daedra can sleep. You walk her back to the inn then find the small stable just off it to the left. You enter and discover that the other occupants are a pair of mangy looking chestnut horses munching slowly on some hay. They don't look very friendly.

You sit down in a corner far away from them and try to close your eyes.... Since you don't have any it doesn't actually work. You sigh and attempt to focus on nothing, like you're supposed to do when you meditate.

Curiously while you sit there focusing on nothing but the argument that is your mind you start to feel better. No that's not the word. You feel less worn down and the lingering cold from the frost spells you tanked slowly vanishes. By the morning you feel back to where you were when you were summoned. Neat.

"Come along Fast," Morlia appears in the doorway to the stable, "time to go to Kvatch a-and start looking for clues." Her lip trembles a little but she doesn't start crying again.

[ ] What, if anything, do you do on the way to Kvatch?

I am returned! Y'all can bug me again if you want.

 

[Kyrina]

"Do you have any magic books on you by chance?" You ask as you stand up to follow her lead towards the doomed city of Kvatch.

"No." She reacts like that was a really stupid question. "Why would I bring expensive tomes out to this less than impressive accommodation where they would inevitably be stolen?" Well she definitely has a low opinion of this place.

On the road to Kvatch you keep a sharp eye out for anything unusual. Icy-britches bandit elf is probably still out there somewhere if she knew feather-fall so it's better to be safe than sorry. While you walk you practice some more with your sword, swinging it away from Morlia to get used to it even more. It doesn't really help much. You know the sword, you know what it feels like in your hands. If you want to improve more you get the feeling you'll need to be a bit more practical.

Morlia stops a few hours in for a rest, you get the feeling she's not really cut out for this walking everywhere business. "I have been considering the fact that the Dark Brotherhood has individuals that are more powerful than either of us. I know of an artefact that provides a way of triumphing against a far superior foe, but you are unlikely to like it." To be honest the seriousness of the tone of your voice already looks like it's scaring her.

"Go on..." she says cautiously, like she's poking a landmine with one finger and praying it doesn't go off in her face. Given what you're telling her about you can't really blame her for that.

"There is a staff called the Wabbajack, which randomly transforms anyone struck by its effect for half a minute, and while some of the forms are quite dangerous, it is possible to repeatedly apply it until you get something harmless. The ability to turn elite dark brotherhood assassins into defenceless sheep would be invaluable to our quest, but acquiring it means interacting with Sheogorath." You continue and, at the mention of the Mad-God, she giggles a little madly.

"Haha... the mad daedra telling me that the Mad-God can help." She says weakly. "Why am I not surprised?" She puts her head in her hands and lets out another slightly mad sounding laugh.

"If ever you deem it worthwhile, the path to find it starts at the statue outside Leyawin." The Wabbajack would be useful, even in its randomness, and you are serious about getting your, or her, hands on it. Besides Sheogorath will love you and the crazed hive-mind you call a brain. Okay maybe he'd just destroy you since you look an awful lot like a Knight of Order but once he got to know you.... Haskil would probably get even more dry witted as a coping mechanism.

When Morlia starts again, you tried more sword drills but got virtually nothing from it given you have only the vaguest idea of what to actually do, and you think you can see Kvatch ahead. It looks rather pretty, pity that it's going to be destroyed in a year but oh well.

You keep looking ahead, behind, to either side and making sure nothing is about to attack you an Morlia. It's only this that gives you enough of a chance to get off the road, with Morlia dragged along for the ride, before a skirmish spills onto the road. You think, given the black robes and two walking, fighting, decaying zombies, that one side is necromancers. The other side are wearing mismatched armour and brandishing chipped and dinged weapons. God knows who or what they are.

An arrow from the bow of a lightly armoured woman near the back of the combat sinks into one necromancer's throat. The robed guy goes down, one zombie dropping like its strings have been cut. The other necromancer lets out a bloodcurdling scream of rage and the other zombie slams into the archer woman. that gets... messy.

One of the archer's friends takes the zombie's head off but it's too late for the archer. There are three warriors of indeterminate allegiance and one necromancer left standing. The headless zombie is still sort-of moving around but it seems to be much less effective than before.

[ ] What do?

 

[Kyrina]

You give the raggedy bunch of misfits another once over. Yeah, those are clearly bandits. "Bandits and necromancers, unless you object I'll be killing them all now." You whisper to Morlia. She makes no objection to that. She looks rather disgusted by the sight of the zombie groping around without its head. There's a faint greenish tinge to her cheeks.

"Please," she pulls her sleeve over her mouth, "go ahead."

One bandit closes with the necromancer and slashes at them with his sword. The necromancer yelps and jumps backwards. The bandit's sword cuts only fabric and he lets out a grunt of frustration. Right, time to intervene!

"Fear not servant of the Worm King!" You shout at the top of your voice. The necromancer jolts and looks at you, probably shocked that you know the name let alone shout out here for everyone to hear. You target the bandit attacking the necromancer, an upwards slash that scores a hit from his left hip to right shoulder. Blood starts leaking slowly from the cut.

His friend rounds on you and brings his axe down at your head. You spin left and the axe head bounces off one pauldron with a clinking sound. Haha! Yes! You are getting good at this fighting thing!

The necromancer proceeds to show you how it's done. Fire gathers in her palms and she hurls it at the bandit in front of her. The flames burst over his chest and his armour starts to disintegrate. He lets out a howl of horror as the leather flakes off him. The his sword rusts in his hands, reduced to a useless reddish mess that he lets fall to the ground with a thud.

"You bitch!" He howls and you sort of notice an arrow from the third bandit bounce off your helmet. The zombie flails around uselessly at the archer bandit. Well that was useful.

"Hey, necro-chan, raise one of the other dead dudes!" You are impressed by her fireball of nakedness spell but another... more competent zombie would be nice. It would at least soak up a little damage for you and necromancer-chan.

"I-I can't, I'm not that skilled yet." She, that's definitely a girl's voice, says back. Oh great, you had to come across a baby necromancer fighting a horde of bandits. Oh well, at least backstabbing her will be easier.

In the back of your mind you get the feeling that Order-boy is playing coy with some of the more vocal voices of the hive mind again.

Health: 90/90
Magicka: 130/130
Fatigue: 145/150​

[ ] Basic Attack (5 stamina)
[ ] Power Attack (10 stamina, -10 to hit, 2.5 x damage)
[ ] Standing Power Attack (10 stamina, -10 to hit, +10 for enemy to hit, 3 x damage)
[ ] Attempt flurry (???)
[ ] Write in

 

[Kyrina]

You take the hilt of your sword in two hands, time to end this. Now you know the necromancer's just a girl that betrayal thing is on hold, who wouldn't want a necromancer minion. Even if necromancy is currently illegal in Cyrodiil. No one else has to know. Once you've dealt with the bandits of course. Speaking of....

You let out an impressive war cry and smash your crystal sword into the armourless bandit's abdomen. It has predictable results. Lots of blood and screaming from the bandit. He goes down, frantically trying to shove his intestines back onto his body.

"Master, she's just a young girl, I think I'll call her Necro-chan, can we keep her?" You shout to the bushes behind you. The axe wielding bandit swipes at you, screaming something about how 'Jeff was a nice guy and you killed him, you monster!' The iron head of the axes takes a chip off your arm. It hurts a little, kind of like a paper cut but a little worse.

"Necro-chan can you use your break everything spell on the archer guy." You ask and her hood bounces up and down a couple of times.

Fire ignites in her palms and she throws it with pretty good aim at the archer. His weapon splinters to dust in his hands and his armour flakes off him in moments. He lets out a girly scream and runs directly away from you into the countryside.

A little fireball whizzes over your shoulder, striking the axe bandit in the shoulder. That's the last straw for him. He tries to chop up Necro-chan but she manages to jump out of the way. A little bit of black fabric flutters free of her robes. Then the bandit runs like his friend.

You haul your arm back, aim for him and throw your sword as hard as you can. It misses him and bounces hilt first off a tree. Oh well, if that had worked it would look really cool.

"Yeah! That showed them! Morlia, Necro-chan high fives!" You turn to the two and hold up your hands expectantly. If you had a face it would have fallen comically. Morlia has a palm full of small scarlet flames shoved almost inside Necro-chan's hood. The necromancer is shaking visibly in fear.

"Necromancy is illegal." Morlia says flatly. "Fast check the bodies for anything useful." She snaps at you. "We'll take this necromancer to the guild, they know how to deal with her kind."

"But..." she didn't sound much older than a kid.

"Now Fast!" Morlia shouts at you. Quickly, so she can't complain, you gather what you can from the dead and the dying. A couple of health potions, several lockpicks and something that looks like a poison. There's an iron bow, a couple of iron maces and some crappy leather armour on some of the other dead bandits.

Necro-sempai yields a pair of health potions, a pair of magicka potions and two scrolls along with a signet ring that looks pretty valuable for the gold in it alone. You hear Necro-chan crying.

[ ] Take the weapons and armour
[ ] Don't take the weapons and armour

[ ] What do?

 

[Kyrina]

You gather up the weapons and armour and realise you have exactly no where to put them. Well you can figure that out before you leave and after you've dealt with the Morlia threatening Necro-chan thing.

"Master, please take a step back and let me handle this. If handled delicately this situation could be made to serve your interests more fully." You say calmly, struggling with the large part of you that wants to just hug Necro-chan and tell her everything's going to be fine. You might do that after you've convinced Morlia to stop shoving fire in the girl's face. Besides you're certain that necromancy isn't of itself illegal in Cyrodiil.

You walk over and put one hand on the girl's shoulder. She flinches a little. "What's your name?" You ask kindly... if crystals rubbing against each other is a sound that can ever be described in that way.

"D-Diana." She answers quietly.

"Well Diana you seem to have fallen in with some bad company. How did you come into the service of necromancers and how deep are you?" You try and eye Morlia in a significant manner but without actual eyes it's rather hard and you give up. She probably got the general message anyway.

"I... T-Thomas u-used a spell on my dog after she died... I-I wanted to help him, to say thank you b-but he...." Her eyes are on the corpse of Necro-sempai, carefully you shift so your body blocks it from her sight. "W-We were going to meet someone. Someone with better contacts." You glance at Morlia, her face has softened into a more sympathetic expression and the magical flames she conjured have snuffed out.

"See, she's just a kid." You tell her. "It's not too late to put her on a better path in life."

"I... I suppose." Morlia sounds uncertain. If you had eyes you could roll....

"Come on, I know I'm a super awesome daedra" Morlia's eyes bug out a little and she snorts in a most undignified manner. "But I'm sure you want someone you can have 'girl-talk' with. Am I right?" She raises an eyebrow at you.

"Isn't at least one member of your supposed hive mind female?" She asks lightly and you hesitate. Is anyone in your head female? You can't tell from just the voices, they don't particularly sound male or female. You shrug, it doesn't really matter. "And fine, since you're so attached to her I suppose an h-honest mistake can be forgiven so long as she doesn't use the necromantic arts again." Morlia looks away from both of you, her hands twisting together in front of her like she's worried or nervous about something.

"T-Thank you," Diana practically flies out from under your hand and hugs Morlia tight. The elf freezes in place, she looks at you eyes screaming for help. "I promise to help you and your daedra for saving me and everything." The hood finally falls from her head. It turns out Diana is an Imperial girl with short cropped blonde hair and a round face that's completely adorable. She's probably about fifteen, maybe sixteen at most.

"The daedra's named Fast," Morlia says, unlatching the girl with a steely grim determination. "It's also insane, so try not to pay too much attention to it if you want to keep your own sanity." If you could pout....

"C-Can we bury T-Thomas? Please? I-I know he did frowned on things but he was nice and kind and I..." Diana sniffs and scrubs her hands over her eyes quickly. "Please?" She adds quietly.

"I don't know... we don't have anything to dig with and..." Morlia starts, she looks pained. This is probably hitting her rather close to home.

[ ] What say/do?