[OOC] The Elder Scrolls: Fruits of Contention - Chapter 1 (Completed)

[Peik]

See? Less paper is good for everyone. ;D

@Dervish

I wonder if one can say that while in the toilet.

[Chrononaut]

@Spoopy Scary
Why the Daedric Princes don't just directly communicate confuses me as well. So, Sheogorath at one point TELEPORTS YOU INTO HIS FOLLOWERS MIND and a shrine isn't even there. Then he communicates to you from the mans mind. So they can speak to you in another persons brain, but can't speak through them/to them? Then you have Sanguine, who can freely walk into the mortal world with no one stopping him. Then Sheogorath, again, who can randomly choose to intervene in any summoning ritual of a Daedric prince and replace their appearance with himself.

Then there's Hermeus Mora, who can just appear fucking anywhere if he wants to apparently.

[Peik]

@Spoopy Scary
Why the Daedric Princes don't just directly communicate confuses me as well. So, Sheogorath at one point TELEPORTS YOU INTO HIS FOLLOWERS MIND and a shrine isn't even there. Then he communicates to you from the mans mind. So they can speak to you in another persons brain, but can't speak through them/to them? Then you have Sanguine, who can freely walk into the mortal world with no one stopping him. Then Sheogorath, again, who can randomly choose to intervene in any summoning ritual of a Daedric prince and replace their appearance with himself.

Then there's Hermeus Mora, who can just appear fucking anywhere if he wants to apparently.

Edit: I misread the posts, but still, the abilities of the Princes are all over the damn place.

@Chrononaut

something something different morality and points of view, something something higher consciousness

Isn't like TES is known for its consistency anyway.

[Chrononaut]

<Snipped quote by Chrononaut>

something something different morality and points of view, something something higher consciousness

Isn't like TES is known for its consistency anyway.

@Peik

To be fair, maybe the other princes are just holding off the crazier ones like Molag Bal from doing shit they want to do and letting the least dangerous to Tamriel do what they want.

[Peik]

<Snipped quote by Peik>

To be fair, maybe the other princes are just holding off the crazier ones like Molag Bal from doing shit they want to do and letting the least dangerous to Tamriel do what they want.

@Chrononaut

For some reason I can't see them giving a fuck.

The Oblivion Crisis was led by the Lord of Destruction after all.

[Chrononaut]

<Snipped quote by Chrononaut>

For some reason I can't see them giving a fuck.

The Oblivion Crisis was led by the Lord of Destruction after all.

@Peik

They might have interfered if he was actually able to succeed, Jyggalag was an older prince turned into Sheogorath because the other Princes were scared that he became too powerful. The Lord of destruction destroying the entire known world might be "too powerful". Who knows, maybe they empowered the protagonist during all the optional quests because it would possibly help him stop Molag Bal.

On another note, Hircine would care because if Mehrunes Dagon destroyed the world there could be no hunt, the only thing he cares about. Molag Bal couldn't dominate that which was destroyed. So really it depended on whether or not Mehrunes planned to destroy ALL THE THINGS. Because the Princes do tend to care about their specific aspect.

[ButtsnBalls]

I wonder if one can say that while in the toilet.

@Peik

[Dervish]

<Snipped quote by Dervish>

I wonder if one can say that while in the toilet.

@Peik

Just use your hand you coward.

[Peik]

<Snipped quote by Peik>

@gcold

stop oppressing me primary language scum

<Snipped quote by Peik>

They might have interfered if he was actually able to succeed, Jyggalag was an older prince turned into Sheogorath because the other Princes were scared that he became too powerful. The Lord of destruction destroying the entire known world might be "too powerful". Who knows, maybe they empowered the protagonist during all the optional quests because it would possibly help him stop Molag Bal.

On another note, Hircine would care because if Mehrunes Dagon destroyed the world there could be no hunt, the only thing he cares about. Molag Bal couldn't dominate that which was destroyed. So really it depended on whether or not Mehrunes planned to destroy ALL THE THINGS. Because the Princes do tend to care about their specific aspect.

@Chrononaut

Dagon is about renewal as much as he's about destruction - he only destroys things that are so they become new things, so he can destroy again and give new life again and so on (he is, after all, also the Lord of Change and Energy). Considering that this gives him a chaotic and life-giving note, compared to the dull and lifeless order that Jyggalag brings (honestly he feels more like an Aedra than a Daedra, what with his essence being against the Padomaic theme all Daedra have), I'm not sure if the Daedric Princes would intervene.

I remember reading somewhere that this was the reason he wished to invade Tamriel - in Daedric realms everything goes back to what they are (Daedra don't die and end up resurrecting, lost things are found again and so on), which pissed him off.

[Spoopy Scary]

I actually had this conversation about Jyggalag earlier today. Whereas the Divines represent aspects of life and of community, these individual traits, the Daedra are less about contributing to life, but rather to meddle with or control it. Dagon was a great example, Molag another - even Meridia. She's so damn insulted by something, that she sends you somewhere as her hand, to directly interfere with the plans or actions of another and to snuff out this evil. There is no real choice in the matter, no bargain, simply the direct interference of Nirn.

Jyggalag, as harmless as his domain of order might seem, would actually be a huge threat to Tamriel. Imagine a tall office building, with cubicles among cubicles among cubicles. Zombies in their cubicles. Going in. Going out. They move like clockwork, are totally obedient, and there's no soul in this place. Humanity has enough order to function, but we're far too much a free spirit to really accept that, especially in Tamriel. I don't think any race in Tamriel would be open to that sort of subjugation.

[ButtsnBalls]

@Spoopy Scary, @Dervish and I talked a bit in private, so what he said are mostly what we agreed on. Here's my extra bits.

Overall

Quality writing all around. You've spent 12 hours writing the sheet, and the quality shines through because of it. The only formatting issues I see are: missing underline for adept conjuration and Bosmeri, and maybe bold each weakness title (up to you here). Your polished formatting, lack of grammar and spelling mistake shows amazing attention to detail; great work.

Strength

Agreeing with everything you and Dervish discussed. Another angle to approach her Bals out berserk is to emphasize surprise and aggression over raw strength. Self damage is the right price for pushing her body beyond her typical limit. Not only is this a fair trade, but also gives her berserk a negative aspect that makes it truly something she despises.

Daedric Possession

Just to clarify, the werewolf Dervish mentioned was actually imprisoned through a group vote; she was later killed off-screen.

Now, my take on Daedra possession is that it requires some sort of trigger. Whether that be a shrine, an artifact or proximity to Oblivion due to phenomena like portals or the Planemeld. If you want to keep some possession action, you need to setup an extraordinary circumstance for it to happen. Maybe she wandered too close to a Bal shrine, or maybe she found a cult trinket and wore it without knowing. Should you choose this route, you need to make sure it ends when she gets to Dawnstar. Removing the trigger not only prevents Wylendriel from being overpowered, but also makes sense for her to be moving away from the cult/summoning location and/or throw away the Daedric trinket.

Voices

I believe Daedric princes spend so much time talking to the protagonists is because of their role as the prophesied hero/prisoner. For an average Jane like Wylendriel, big bads like Bal have better hobbies than watching her 24/7. Dervs does have a point in that she is actively shutting out Molag Bal, rather than a cultist embracing his voices. Since Martin dragoned himself to seal off Oblivion, importing anything Daedric to Tamriel is going to take more efforts than before. Sure, princes like Sanguine and Sheogorath can manifest on Nirn, but I've noticed their activities are restricted to indirect influences; tempting and deceiving over straight up attacks. The Dragonborn had to agree to the princes before they try anything crazy.

Here's an alternative; hear voices once and only once. Molag Bal only talks to her to seal deal and directs her on a path of rampage, then everything after become blurry flashes. Tying back to possession, the one-time Daedric lecture can be attributed to something like a nearby cult site. Wylendriel will not have any more voice mails from Bal, not unless Dervish or myself decide to revisit. She probably doesn't know that, and can continue to fear for more voices.

Conjuration

You guys got this all figured out. Keep it adept, add she was a novice before and introduce non-Daedric skills she uses regularly.

Mercenaries

Wylendriel can be officially employed as a medic and/or chaplain. The chaplain route is interesting because our company could use someone with religious knowledge to defuse our crises of faith. She can also be contracted by the jarl and attached to our mercenary company "temporarily". It's best we discuss her entry into the group after we've addressed all other concerns.

Dominion

The purges exist. Delphine claims Malborn's family is victim to it. This post on TESLore subreddit has some good points that I'm going to adopt. I have no problem with your references of the purges.

The Dominion Wylendriel lived in was the Third Aldmeri Dominion. It was founded in 4E 22, following a Thalmor backed coup removing pro-Cyrodiil rulers. So as Dervish have said, being born around 140 would mean she lived under Dominion jurisdiction since birth.

Dominion 4E 202-205 (Optional)

Fruits of Contention has custom lore from 4E 202 to 205 derived from the nations RP TES: Rising Storm.

Basically, the expelled traditional Altmer monarchy came back to Alinor on 202, a previously exiled prince had confrontations with the Thalmor and there had to be a forced coalition government. Elsweyr rebelled and left the Dominion with Imperial support in 204. Cyrodiil tried to sponsor a similar uprising in Valenwood two IC months ago, but ended up invading and then signing an armistice dividing Valenwood. Hammerfell also joined in and fought major naval battles again Alinor. Three weeks before the current IC date, the Thalmor started a failed coup and was taken apart by the royalists. These royalists have now reformed the Dominion into the Fourth Dominion.

For further information, read "Other Places and People" and the Tamrielic Gazette issues in the World Information post.

That ought to do it. Sorry for the delay.

[MacabreFox]

@Hank o.o why do I have the feeling that Narzul is going to kill someone? That last sentence tho.

[Frizan]

@Hank o.o why do I have the feeling that Narzul is going to kill someone? That last sentence tho.

@MacabreFox

rip Do'karth

[Dervish]

<Snipped quote by MacabreFox>

rip Do'karth

@Frizan

DK in like 5 min.

[Spoopy Scary]

@gcold, @Dervish, so all of the changes were made. All of the important edits are highlighted in yellow, things would significantly impact the character. I made other edits along the way that fixed typos, funny wording, and moved some things around so that it simply read better and might evoke a more powerful response. One of the spells, Banish Daedra, is actually an adept level spell that Wylendriel would not have been able to learn upon joining the temple in Skyrim - but, given how Molag Bal giving her knowledge of conjuration, and her having a basis to work on with knowing how to repel undead, what training she did received in attempting to learn how to banish daedra, I'd imagine that it wouldn't be too hard for her to figure out how to do that after the Prince's daedric boogaloo (I love that phrase now).

Also, Molag spoke twice and not once because I'm a rebel (not really I'm a huge softie and loud voices scare me). I figured, once, to seal the deal (and she was on top of an ancient altar site), and the second time because she carried a piece of it with her. Even then... it's not much. A couple of words.

Let me know if I missed something. As usual, input is appreciated.

Wylendriel Greensky

Wylendriel Greensky

_{Female Bosmer | 60 | The Lady}

Profile

Place of Origin

Grahtwood, Valenwood

Appearance

Her overall demeanor is as unsuspecting and as humble as she is dressed, in the layered robes bequeathed to her by the temple where she worships her goddess, Kynereth. One critical look at the Bosmer and her identity as a priestess becomes quite apparent. She seems as gentle and dainty a thing as one might suspect, looking doe-eyed around her as though she were at constant risk, and ever agile like so many of her kind with her lithe frame moving with disguised grace. She has become fairly fit though a nomadic lifestyle, though weighing in at just 110 lbs. Standing at 5'5", her height seems as any other wood-elven folk, but her stance is a tall one, or at least like she's attempting to make herself seem taller than she really has; how the arc in her back seems to exist to support shoulders weary from hardship. You wouldn't think so to look at her, but she's actually lived through 60 years of life! That's technically pretty short for a Bosmer and is considered to be barely scraping by as an adult.

A heart-shaped face bears a stiff upper lip, but perhaps only to steady her quivering bottom one as she tries her damnedest to stay strong. It bears an upturned button nose raised high, as if to hold herself above whatever degrading or shameful – inexplicable thing, in lack of better wording, for she does not carry with her an air of arrogance or nobility; more as though there are intrusive thoughts that she seeks to prove herself to be above. Her long, silky auburn hair is usually braided up haphazardly into a bun. It reveals a pretty face in the innocent sense, what with the thin jawline and pointed chin, the high cheekbones and wide forehead - but only attractive if a person could bring themselves to look past the those wide Bosmer eyes and the array of sharp teeth.

Her robes are made from hide and thin leather in the middle of layers for durability and protection, with wool stitched over the outside as the outer layer, and treated with wax to protect against the rain. The inside of the robes is all grizzly bear fur warming her skin and absorbing whatever perspiration there may be. These robes adorned with a number of buttons made from polished bone and apparently just as many pouches hanging from a belt made from a thick leather, and with it, a curious trophy of an eagle skull. The robe's tailoring even applies to the hood, making this outfit a very heavy one to be lugging around - good for the regions of Skyrim, High Rock, and Wrothgar, but less so anywhere else south of Bruma. Beneath, she wears tight-fitted, black-colored, wool undergarments that cover her torso and thighs, but otherwise leaves exposed her arms and her legs from the knees down. Her feet are covered with fur boots and her hands are usually bare, but as a part time alchemist who follows the Green Pact, her hands are stained with all manners of ichors and ingredients, and frequently smell... obnoxiously robust, to be putting it gently. The sight of pointed nails that seem like claws can only lend more anxious energy to the smell of her hands. A leather satchel hangs at her side from a strap going across her chest and over one of her shoulders.

The robes can fortunately be separated from the inside layer of bear fur in case of warmer weather. The hide and wool outside layers function like a shell or windbreaker of the inside. Underneath her garments however, this young elf's sand colored skin is littered with scars. Some small, and others very, very large. If one didn't know better, they would think she had died terribly and was stitched right back up. Gnarly gouging scars in her abdomen, punctures in her legs, slashes over her arms, a smaller one down the side of both her lips, a bite mark on her chest, lashes across her back, and a slash around her throat. Any attempt at questioning these are met with silence and never answered. So gruesome is this sight, you may not immediately noticed the tattoos on her body, markings of the winged herald. Feathered wings stretch out from the center of the back with the tips of its furthest feathers reaching down the back of her arms. Smaller wings are placed on her chest by her collarbones, reaching to her shoulders. Feathers rest above both of her eyebrows.

Personality

Lately, there has been a buildup of disturbing events that have left her emotionally distant and afraid to get close to people. She doesn't want to put anybody at risk out of this acquired fear of accidentally hurting those around her through whatever accident may arise from her compulsions. Yet, there also exists an element of distrust that makes it difficult for her to get close to people. This distrust is not so pervasive in her personality that it breeds conflicts with others, but impedes any progress in the development of a real, meaningful relationship. How this distrust affects her most is how, over the last couple of weeks, she has learned to put her own life in her own hands instead of relying on others. She has great potential for love, platonic or otherwise - she feels those emotions, but she fearfully rejects any oncoming advances and closes her heart to interested parties.

Continuing with this duality theme of withdrawn concern, she, as suggested before, prefers to take measures into her own hands. While some of it may come from a priestess' humility in not wanting to burden others with her own responsibilities, it too comes from that same distrust factor. Unaccountable variables could compromise the outcome, and therefore she would prefer to do it herself and take responsibility for any failure should failure occur. Insisting to her that it does not have to be that way, that she can rely on others sometimes, is a vain effort since her stubbornness blocks off any attempt to appeal to her vulnerability. She is paranoid, stubborn, caught up in her own sense of responsibility, and would just as quickly sit them down by force if they continue to pester her. This hedgehog's dilemma is not an ingrained flaw, but was acquired, and only recently.

This doesn't Wylendriel make callous though. She is still a healer, she has compassionate - on that same note, she's not a pushover. Her commanding tone is useful for bedside manner and her timid nature is thrown out the window when her areas of responsibilities (healing, sermon, etc.) come around. This dutiful disposition is tempered with motherly care, putting every ounce of effort into making sure her patients have a healthy recovery. Additionally, she is nonjudgmental of the other races. This even applies to the Nords – she understands that she entered Skyrim during a time of fear and struggle. She takes no absurd amount of pride in her elven heritage like the Thalmor do. Instead, she believes that there is something to learn from every culture. Still, she is understandably cautious while approaching nords he hasn't met yet (or any race of men for that matter, considering the Dominion's siege on the rest of Tamriel has left them suspicious of elves, and even the Dominion itself wants her head on a pike). She also has a love for poetry.

Even through her endearing visage, it is not difficult to tell that there is something more beneath the surface, and it cannot be pointed toward any one thing. It is an anger, it is an itch, it is a compulsion, an intrusive thought - it is a guilty conscience. It is as though a seed of evil was planted in her heart, and with all of her might she tries to reject it - bury it - kill it - but try as she may, it is like a craving and it only grows hungrier with time. The line between her desires and the compulsions of this seed are blurred, the feelings that she feels feel alien, because - Gods help her, she's a priestess for Kyne's sake, a healer. All of these little suggestions in her head, ever-so-sublte, this feeling of craving - is almost like a lust for violence, to feel in control, a sort of bestial blood-lust that is so damn insatiable that she just barely feeds into it with just the barest degree of violence so that it does not totally overwhelm her. She knows it's not her, she knows it does not belong there, and she knows exactly where it came from.

Her guilt stems from many things – one being the doubt of her faith to her Lady. This guilt best summarizes her her real self. She feels guilty for making the decision of accepting a deal that costed her soul, for choosing a daedra over Kynereth, this evil that has planted itself inside her, and about her growing doubt in the Nine Divines. She once tried to justify it, after all, had they not left her to die at the hands of her betrayers? For Arkay's sake, perhaps it would be right for her to die, but where was Stendarr's mercy? Or Kynereth's gift to her faithful? Then comes the feelings of guilt regarding that sense of entitlement and her expectations of the gods. The guilt of her bloody crimes. The guilt of her own betrayal of another. She is torn in many different ways and wishes for peace inside herself to ease that discord, and there's little question as to why she has so little inner strength to spare.

With all her years as a healer and priestess under her belt, she thought herself ready for death, but in the end she found herself no more at peace than the lost and wounded souls she preached to. She beats herself up for it and belittles herself, and Molag Bal's corruption further taints her. With all of this inner turmoil, Wylendriel is growing more convinced there is no saving one such as herself. In the end though, she has come to find that there is greater justice to be found in healing as many as she can than in taking the easy way out. After some time and coming to terms with herself, she feels that it would be best to work at bettering herself one step at a time, and that the first step would be to remove the daedra's influence once and for all - which in itself is a monumental task, but prays that the mercy of the Nine Divines would be such that they would cleanse her spirit: the last few shreds of her faith clings to this desperate gambit: the deciding act that would finally determine the fate of what remained.

Background

The Journey

Wylendriel was born in Valenwood, to a respected mother and father that devoted their lives to Y'ffre in Elder Root, Grahtwood. They especially had taken to the Green Pact and were loyally faithful to the religion as Spinners, its enforcers. So much, in fact, their first born daughter, named Wylendriel, was conditioned to follow the Green Pact out the womb and would be raised with the intentions of making her a priestess as well. For the earliest years, the young and impressionable Bosmer lass adhered to family tradition, studying her people's history and following each and every rule obediently - there was nothing else, only Y'ffre - and was on the road to receiving the same kind of respect her parents had in her society. It went this way for a couple years, learning more and more about Valenwood, it's friends and enemies, healing; and all the while, the Aldmeri Dominion, formed a couple hundred years before she was even born, assumed a larger presence inside Valenwood. As she learned more about her allies, she learned more about their culture and about the Dominion's enemies, she discovered something about the Imperial Empire: their Nine Divines. They had a parallel to Y'ffre through Kynereth, except that she seemed to exemplify the beauty and force of nature. Wylendriel's family did not expect her to discover Kynereth in the world around her.

She didn't replace Y'ffre, no. Rather, the goddess only added to the enrichment of Wy's world. If Y'ffre was the father, the state of existing, of only being - Kynereth was the mother, its force, it's passion, beauty and danger, she breathed the soul into life and made it beautiful. Life was essential, yes, but it was simply existing - what would life be were it not the soul and beauty that made life worthwhile? Kynereth was nature. This self-found philosophy touched Wylendriel so profoundly that she chose to educate herself how she could in order to follow in the footsteps of her newfound Lady. Such material was hard to come by in Valenwood, so her knowledge was only rudimentry, and her family never quite looked at her the same after it - but as long as she didn't forsake the Green Pact, they figured there was nothing wrong with it. She looked happy! She was interested in helping others. They still intended on keeping her faith a secret from the Thalmor of the Dominion. Who knows what they might think of it?

All that the Altmer and the Aldmeri Dominion had brought to Valenwood were not so great, though. They brought also strife to some few, select Bosmer communities. Rumors of purges spread across Valenwood, of isolated executions by the hands of Altmer inquisitors in the north. Word had it that the victims were deserving of such a fate. They were "unworthy savages, not befitting to be part of this grand alliance of Mer." Not many questioned it, they had this idea that their "close bond" with the Altmer was far too valuable to forsake. Wylendriel's family would of course be spared, being far too valuable and important to Bosmer society. It was not unheard of that some Bosmer took the Green Pact to extremes, and it was no wonder that the Altmer thought they were a barbaric people. While Wylendriel followed a watered-down version of it, where she and others rejected cannibalism, the purists hunted their enemies and consumed their flesh. It was a revolting thought in her mind, though despite that, there was still the sense of racial kinship. Then you have the ones supporting Imperial occupation, which would no doubt prove them as traitors. It was depressing to hear of the Altmer killing them, but she followed two deities of nature, and death and survival was part of the cycle of nature. All she felt she could do was pray for them in honor of perpetuating that cycle.

The years had gone on and Wylendriel was growing into a full-fledged woman, and she and some others of her community has remained fairly ignorant of the events occurring in the outside world. She practiced her skills of restoration magic to heal wounded hunters after their return from the forest, and using conventional medicine to follow after, or if the wounds were too small. As her reputation grew, she found herself healing soldiers doing only-Gods-know-what, but it wasn't her place to ask or to judge. While she had taken a path of faith that had warranted some disappointment from her family, she gained value in the eyes of some few Altmer agents of the Dominion. They took notice of not just her intense devotion, but her skills as a healer. Offered ever so diplomatically to enlist with the Dominion as a field medic, Wylendriel felt obligated to decline for she was no warrior. They saw it as a reasonable defense, though she was curious about the influx of Aldmeri soldiers coming their way. Had they been at war all along? Though they found her naivety cute, all they said to her was that it was nothing to worry about. Just some few skirmishes with the human empire up north. They let her be without further harassment on that note, but continued to send Altmer infantry to her in Valenwood if they were near enough. She came to be idolized as a highly regarded citizen in her community, endeared for her compassion and healing ability.

She found it pretty humorous. Rarely was one found without the other.

Though ignorant of world events she may have been, the news of conflict that broke out in northern Valenwood spread like wildfire. Separatist dissenters lashed out against the Aldmeri Dominion, and with the help of the Empire, drove them south. Dominion presence became more prevalent in the south and were organizing to make counter-attacks against the separatists and the Imperial Empire that backed them. The outside world's trouble have broken in, and truth of the Dominion's deeds had gotten clearer. The rumors of executions of the Bosmeri people were more than just rumors, and they weren't just isolated incidents. The purges were more like a systematic slaughter. Indeed, they saw the Bosmer as little more than barbarians. Though elven, they were still more like second class citizens than trusted allies. When a close friend of Wylendriel was ruthlessly murdered, only because they found her on her haunches and leaning over a bloody rabbit - for simply eating - she saw these purges for what it really was: cultural cleansing. They were the judge, jury, and executioner of any that the Altmer thought weren't good or "civilized" enough to be their underlings.

It was at the turn of her adulthood when Wylendriel defamed the Aldmeri Dominion, and sure enough, it wasn't a popular opinion. She was branded as a traitor, and before she could turn to flee Valenwood, she was briefly stopped by her family. They parted ways with a hug and a kiss, proud of their daughter's courage, and with a gift in the form of an eagle's skull. It was the acknowledgement and acceptance of her faith in Kynereth. What could have been more symbolic of the nature goddess of the wind than that? She escaped shortly after to the far corners of Tamriel attempting to evade the Dominion with war waging around her as she went. Whether it was by foot or by caravan, she eventually found herself in the wilds of southern Skyrim by the end of the year. She was found by a Markarth patrol in the Reach, and they reigned her in for questioning – mostly to her potential ties to the Dominion. She managed to convince them that she was no friend of the Thalmor, but they were still suspicious of the elf passing through. Still fearful of the Dominion's discovery of her, Wylendriel fled once again as soon as she was fed and rested towards the east, where the Nords of Eastmarch were notorious for their particular disdain of elven kind. This didn't worry her though; whatever vulgarity or mud they wanted to sling her way would be nothing compared to the punishment the Thalmor would deliver unto her.

She payed the carriage a hearty sum to take her to the other side of Skyrim, and instead she landed in front of Whiterun. They learned that the road ahead was blockaded by bandits and the man refused to go further. So she remained in central Skyrim. From the beginning, things were hard, but it was though the goddess herself was watching over her - she found her place in a Temple of Kynereth, much to her fortune, in front of the Gildergreen. Here, her restoration magic and medicinal skills were highly valued. Her safety was assured here, behind tall walls and Skyrim's staunch stance against the Aldmeri Dominion. Also being a servant of the goddess, she could find respite from the Dominion under the Jarl's protection. When she first arrived at the temple, she stood at the door in ragged furs and hide, nearly destroyed by the long trip across Tamriel. She nearly looked like a beggar! But her devotion was unquestionable. They took her in and made her sturdy, warm, and reliable robes that reflected her Green Pact, but was befitting of a priestess. They reminded her of home.

The path ahead presented far more difficulties than she had anticipated. Cultural roadblocks, miscommunication, and just a general misunderstanding of how nord society even functioned. It proved difficult to gain the trust of the local nords, but her devotion to the goddess Kynereth was almost tangible and she treated every visitor with the utmost respect and humility. She poured everything she had into every restoration spell and genuinely cared about her patients. Such diligence guaranteed her respect from Skyrim's most stubborn nords. It was heartwarming to find a place where she belonged. During her stay at the Temple of Kyne, the priestesses that already lived there taught her everything there was to know about Kynereth. Wy's rudimentary understanding was greatly expanded upon and she was taught practices that seemed totally unnecessary back home. For instance, it was tradition to learn how to summon a familiar, a guardian of nature, to perhaps protect or lead the way. The familiar would, in one way or another, guide the caster along their path. In addition, human priesthood expanded their services beyond just healing. She was expected to learn how to repel and banish the undead and daedric forces that threatened Nirn. They helped to bolster her powers of Restoration magic, and gave her a basic understanding of Conjuration. Conjuring familiars came easy, but banishment is where she really struggled with. Turns out she has a much harder time with making things go away than she does with making things stay.

It wasn't before long that she decided to go on a pilgrimage to visit the Eldergleam. She hired mercenaries, Nords from Eastmarch, to escort her on her hike eastward and protect her from the likes of bandits or increase her chance of survival should a dragon find her (assuming that there was still one in hiding that the last Dragonbon had not yet slain). She left with her temple's blessing and set out on the long road ahead.

But all went south once they circled around the mountain, High Hrothgar. In the middle of nowhere, miles from any sign of civilization, Wylendriel was struck by betrayal. The very men she payed to protect her turned around and jumped her, before dragging her off to some remote location at a ruined site where she was thrown onto a stone slab. She was mugged, beaten, stolen from, and... Gods, violated. They passed her around, taking turns, laughing! They told her, every time they beat her... stabbed her... lashed her, bit her - they told her that she had this coming. This was she got for being an elf. When they were finally finished with her, when she finally thought they would leave her be and let her wallow in her suffering, one of them slid their knife across her throat. She was spat on and left for dead, Wylendriel was spending her final moments bleeding out, gurgling and drowning in her own blood and unable to breath, laying there and clutching her throat. She spent her last moments fearful and in tears and in silent prayer. First to her lady Kynereth, but she was silent. Thoughts of the circle of life intruded into her mind, the lessons of the temple - but she couldn't let go feeling so betrayed – it was too unfair. As she felt her life slipping away, she prayed to any of the Divines asking for mercy and a second chance. Her prayers went unheard, and with her consciousness on the verge of slipping, she made a final cry for mercy to anything that would listen.

A gutteral, malevolent voice filled her mind. "I can save your life," it offered, "if just for now, and if you would pledge your soul to me..."

Blinded by desperation, she accepted the offer.

She awoke several days later in the small village of Ivarstead. Seemingly in complete recovery, covered in gruesome looking scars strewn across her body - as it happens, a hunter found her unconscious a couple miles out, but said he found her unharmed. If he didn't know better, it looked as though she lied down and took a nap... were her clothes not torn in several places, mostly over her chest and around her waist. They were folded next to her with a needle and some thread for her to fix her torn clothing – apparently whoever took her in didn't have any confidence in patching it. Physically, she felt fine save for a gross feeling pit in the center of her chest. It felt empty. She felt violated. As she recalled back to the last thing she could remember, the horrifying scenes of her abusers wracked her mind. The mere memory was torture and she no longer felt at home in her own skin - as her memory returned, so did the same malevolent voice. What happened? What had she just done?

Painful headaches wracked her head. Ear-splitting droning sounds, a cacopheny of whispers, all trying to talk ove rone another - nothing was getting through - all of it - too much - an onslaught of sensory overload as she felt tears well up her eyes over the stress of everything over the last couple of hours - what had to have been hours - the sounds, the screeching, the incoherent chaos - it fell silent. She took deep, heavy breathes as she looked around the room feeling traumatized.

"What... what in Oblivion was tha--" The piercing frequency came out louder than before and was accompanied by what had to have been a thousand red images in rapid succession, "--AAAAAHHH! Gah! Ha... ha! What... What is--"

A thousand more images, barely decipherable, and she was clutching her head and squeezing her eyes shut as the chaos unraveled itself in her head. A man burst through the door of the cabin she was in, a fretful looking man, alarmed by Wylendriel's screaming, found her in this position with tears silently rolling down her cheeks. Among these images, she was able to discern the bloodied maw of a laughing daedric face and the realization of what she has done finally hit her. The blasphemy of her actions stabbed sharper into her chest than any weapon her betrayers used.

"What happened?" Asked the panicked man. She couldn't see what he looked like, she was just wanting to make everything stop.

"This... this migraine..." She told him in weeping. "Make it stop..."

"You look like you've gone through Oblivion and back," he commented, "what's with all of your scars, what happened to you?"

Another thousand images played in her head, but they played slightly slower, almost like a recording of what happened to her. Her mind's eye stretched over Skyrim through red-colored spectacles, and found herself watching her own abuse from a bird's eye view. Over... and over again... she felt the rage and fury build up inside of her, this hatred. The images shot across Skyrim to the northeastern region of Eastmarch and into a cabin, where she got a close up view of her betrayers, their ugly mugs, laughing and drinking... Gods, this unnatural hatred that she did not understand, but at the same time... wasn't it natural? Wasn't it natural to hate the people who did this to hurt, the people who violated her as she watched over and over again... to crave their pitiful! Bloody! Murder--

No... no, no, no! No! This! Wasn't! Normal! Why is she thinking this? Why is she wanting and craving this?!

As she watched these images, as fast and as abrupt as they were, stalled for just a second on the slab she was layed on. Beneath the dust, she could barely trace out the faint imprints of daedric runes. One last image of herself being hurled into the mouth of a massive daedric beast before it stopped and a single whisper echoed through her ears: "I own you."

Suddenly, everything stopped liked she was hoping it would. The stranger's voice was barely able to break through and Wylendriel was barely able to understand the flashes of images behind her eyes at face value, but something inside her gave this intuitive understanding of what was happening to her. The daedric face she was seeing had imprinted on her, and for some reason, recognizable. It's name was clear, and it wanted her to know what exactly that was. Molag Bal. Prince of Domination. Of Schemes.

"Ma'am? Can you hear me?" The stranger asked. "Where did you get your scars?"

The thought of her betrayers sprung back to mind. The sheer anger that she felt at just the image of their faces made her hands shake.

"Ask about my scars again, and I'll show you exactly how I got them." Wylendriels said without thinking. She paused and reeled for a moment. "That did not just happen..." she muttered to herself. The words had just fallen out of her mouth, there wasn't any hesitation, they just - they just...

"Shor's bones, fine!" The stranger retorted. "I won't pry any further, but I was just trying to help, damn it!"

Wylendriel speechlessly watched him march out of the cabin. She knew this wasn't good, but emphatically, for some reason, could not bring herself to care. What she was an image of the people who hurt her, and as far as she felt concerned, Molag Bal offered her a chance for revenge and she planned on taking him up on that offer. Stitching her robes back together the best she could (making it more of a patch job, she wasn't concerned with prettiness), and set out on the open robe with nothing but the clothes on her back. Without rest, marching across Eastmarch, finding raw food on the way - utilizing aspects of of Restoration magic she never dared to use before by sapping the vitality of animals and leaving their husks behind. She eventually found the cabin in Eastmarch.

Staring it down, the same house from the images that flickered in her head, seemed to trigger flashes of individual images, almost like a magical flow, but something more sinister like a daedric energy. They made her aware of something that was apparently there from the moment she awoken in Ivarstead. Whatever it was she knew of Conjuration magic, it felt expanded upon. A sort of intuitive knowledge, but it didn't quite belong in the brain. She knew what it meant to take magicka and use it to summon a familiar. The sort of direction in which to swing it. The intuitive knowledge that Molag Bal had imparted unto her only concerned itself from where she could pull it from. There was no plan of action. Calling upon this Conjuration magic, an ethereal daedric mace rippled into existence into her hand before she kicked open the door, surprising the three nords inside - and they looked at her in horror when recognition of her face set in.

Wylendriel roared at them in unbridled rage, fueling the hatred and blood lust that had seeped into her heart. "Did you think you could betray me?!"

Two of them scrambled for their weapons, but one of them was too surprised and confused as to how the Bosmer bitch was still alive, so much that he wasn't expecting the wild aggression that she exhibited as she lunged towards him and grabbed him by the throat with one hand with crushing force, her sharp nails sinking into her throat, and a green aura surrounded her hand that sapped away the nord's energy. His arms fell weakly at his sides. The second and third nord came rushing towards her with axe and sword in hand. In her berserk, she ripped out the first nord's esophagus to be flung at one of their faces and swung the mace with all of her unrestrained might, knocking the second bearded attacker onto the ground with a crack of his sternum and another swift swing knocked away the third who was stunned by the bloody piece of flesh she threw at him - destroying his spine through the fur armor. Wylendriel contently watched them both squirm on the floor, savoring this moment while it lasted.

"I own you." She growled.

She turned to the bearded nord, squirming and scrambling to get away. She dropped onto her knees over his body with one palm firmly planted on his chest. It glowed a sickly green and steadily drained away the man's stamina, fueling repeated rage-filled swings of the the spectral mace into the nord's head until virtually nothing was left but shards of bone and liquefied gore. She was unable to feel it at this moment, but muscles in her shoulder were tearing with each swing, unable to hold themselves together with all the force she was forcing herself to exert. The third, crippled nord was later met the same fate.

When the last deed was done, the energy and the bloodlust that she felt coursing through her body dissipated until her body felt pained and weary. The mace evaporated into the air, and she weakly fell to her knees. Her conscience was now clear, and she looked around at the scene that surrounded her. Three utterly obliterated men, now unidentifiable, their blood seeping into floorboards - the scenes kept replaying inside her traumatized head. The emotions. Rage and blood lust. Their faces - splitting, with each and every crack... crack! Crack! Crunch! She - she... these unspeakable acts of, just... violence - committed by her own hand - they betrayed her! They were supposed to deserve this! Yet - her memories fell back to home, both in Valenwood and to her place in the Temple of Kyne. Recalling everything they had known then, and her values - even the Green Pact said not to kill wastefully. It all came rushing back to her, and all of the justification she thought she had melted away. What she had done here was indisputably evil, and here she was... almost... enjoying it. She broke down into sobs, all the while hugging her arms in trying to bear the agony they were under. It took a long time to bring herself to move, but she eventually mustered herself the will to use Restoration magic on herself. She felt the muscles sort of stitch themselves back together, and she would be okay - at least physically - but the the phantom pains will remain for a little while longer.

The moment she could bring herself to her feet, she ran. She fled from the scene, from the cabin, as fast as she could - as far south as her legs could carry her. Until finally, she fell down exhausted in the middle of Eastmarch. After their deaths, Molag Bal's corruption seemed to have disappeared from her mind. The images hadn't returned, but she still feared the possibility of hearing his voice again like from the time he offered to "save" her life. She prayed and prayed as her tears soaked the ground, but the Divines were deathly silent. They'd forsaken her. She had to do something about this. She had to do something other than run - she had to make a pledge to herself to reject the daedric prince. She'd prove it through a pilgrimage around Tamriel. She had to pray to each of the Nine Divines at their shrines, then maybe she could cleanse herself of this evil... but a sinking feeling told her that she would have to do a lot more than just simply pray to earn their forgiveness.

In spite of her doubts, she knew from her studies that there was a shrine to Akatosh here in Eastmarch, and it should have been nearby. It took some looking around, but when she found it, she spent an entire day devoted to prayer in front of the dragon god's shrine. Even after an entire day of prayer, she heard nothing. Found nothing, just silence. She had to be persistent. Word had it that Fort Amol held a shrine of Julianos, which wasn't far from here – it was still in Eastmarch. When she arrived at the fort, it was bristling with activity, filled with nervous and suspicious nords. They questioned her immediately, brandishing weapons, and she quickly explained herself while withholding some of the truth: she was on pilgrimage. They allowed her to stay for just that one day only because she was on pilgrimage, but warned her not to head to Windhelm to pray at Arkay's shrine. That was when she learned the city was completely overrun and taken over by an Akaviri army. This was the reason for the crowded occupancy of Fort Amol.

“Please,” Wylendriel pleaded, “let me help you. Show me your wounded.”

“There aren't many to show you.” One of the soldiers replied. It wasn't as much a blessing as the soldier made it sound – the battle was catastrophic. Those who participated were lucky to escape with wounds. Most of them died. Those “lucky” few could only manage to escape at the cost of missing limbs. With what few there were to take care of, the medics had already attended to them. But they did manage to do one more thing for Wylendriel after her unanswered prayer to Julianos: they pointed her into the direction. To the west was a shrine of Dibella inside this old abandoned fort, but was likely overridden with bandits or occult practitioners. Necromancy, and the like. Wylendriel was hesitant to pursue this shrine, fearful of not just the risk of going, but because there was also no telling what Molag Bal's curse might do to her. She asked for a different shrine.

“Well, to the northwest are a couple shrines to mighty Talos, just hugging the base of High Hrothgar. The closest one is where you follow the river to until you're in the valley, then go east and pass Cradlecrush Rock.” They suggested. Then he narrowed his eyes at the Bosmer. “But last I checked, you knife-ears didn't like him very much. Damn near outlawed Talos worship a couple years back – I fought that war.”

“That was the Thalmor.” Wylendriel insisted. “I may not have prayed to Talos before, but I promise you that I will get to know him.”

After Wylendriel rested up and replenished her supplies, she took a couple days to travel to the shrine north-east of High Hrothgar, making sure to follow the river. Though a rather wet journey, she was greeted by the gorgeous sight of a weathered statue overlooking a pond. There she found another person in prayer. When she greeted him, he reeled back. His face revealed pain with red eyes and a puffy faces. He was a man whose tears had run dry.

“What happened?” She asked.

“My wife,” the nord sobbed, “my home! Windhelm, ransacked. The akaviri... I... I've never seen anything like... like--”

The stranger took a deep breath to compose himself. Wylendriel's heart swelled with pain and fear. She had no idea what it meant when they spoke of the akaviri. An entire city was seized. By men or creatures she heard of only just yesterday by name. An alien force of unknown strength – chills ran up Wylendriel's spine as she looked over her shoulder expecting a monster, but found nothing there. When she looked at the man sitting on the ground, in the most humiliated and humble state possible, wracked with pain, she could help but feel tears well in her own eyes. He had something precious taken from him, and that was all it took for her to form an attachment with this stranger's kindred spirit.

“I'm just trying to make sense of it all.” The nord continued. “I want to know what Talos would do. What he'd have me do.”

Wylendriel sat beside the miserable widower, placed a soft hand over his own. “What's your name?” She asked.

“Torvald...” He answered.

“Wylendriel.” She whispered to him. “Let me pray with you, Torvald.” Torvald said nothing, but she felt his fingers wrap tightly around hers, occasionally quivering. The two sat in silence for what must've been hours, and she prayed and prayed – not just for forgiveness and not just in pledge to a god who, honestly, she did not even know, but also on Torvald's behalf. She prayed for his safety, his heart, and his fulfillment. She also prayed not for answers and direction, but for understanding, so that she could know who Talos was – she felt a guilty conscious for having ignorantly supported the Aldmeri Dominion and Thalmor. She wanted to seek peace with Talos on behalf of elven-kind. Her thoughts returned to home and those she left behind, wondering if they were safe or if any more of her friends or family would see themselves be victim to one of the Altmer's purges. A sudden chill breeze blew against her neck, prompting her eyes open. The sun had begun to set, casting a pink canopy across the sky. Her years of interpreting the signs of the divines instinctively led her to an epiphany, and read the situation as though the voice of an emperor was speaking to her:

“I am all that makes Skyrim; it's bite and it's boldness – but also it's beauty and it's glory. We are of blood spilled, but strength provided, we reward in bounty. Visit the North star at the break of dawn, then retrace your steps.”

Warmth filled her chest and she looked to Torvald beside her with a smile, his eyes still shut. There was a riddle to be solved. She was about to stand and help him to his feet, to help guide him along his way.

Her body suddenly seized. Her blood began boiling. Pain was stabbing her from behind her eyes. Her hand clenched around Torvald's -- he was shouting in pain!

'N-no... no! No, no!' Wylendriel thought desperately as squeezed her eyes as tightly she could. 'Gods, no, please! Save me!'

Dozens more of gruesome, haunting images burned her mind as they flickered through with hundreds of angry whispers in the background, but there was a difference this time. When before they sounded mindless and were whispering over one another, these were unified and had one clear message: punish.

Her emotions began flaring and became more intense with each passing second. She felt furious, but also powerful, tantalized, excited - but for what? She felt a growing hunger develop in the pit of her stomach as one suggestion after another inserted itself into her mind. For a moment, she managed hold down the urges and thoughts as her own emotions kept them at bay. They had arisen as soon as she realized what she was being made to do, and horror had begun to envelop her.

"Please... don't..." Wylendriel muttered to herself, struggling to keep herself from enjoying this moment as the corners of her mouth began twitching. “I don't want this.”

Torvald, too, in his fear and confusion, found tears welling in his eyes. “W-what are you doing? Wylendriel? Please... get off me!”

More images began rushing to her, the same blood-red sort of haze as they gave her rapid, broken up glimpses of Skyrim. Suddenly she saw herself. Walking, almost zombie-like, covered in blood. The gap across her throat was slowly closing itself. She fell limply onto the ground. Another image, almost as if it rewinded, and then more - she mindlessly picked something up while she was at the sight. A stone. The last few images that flickered into her head and revealed to her that it was a fragmented piece of the slab she was thrown upon, and on it was a daedric sigil. Then suddenly, there was darkness.

A slow laughter filled every crevice of her mind and felt to stretch on for years, until finally, after a long pause, she could hear Molag Bal's voice clear as day.

"Enjoy the meal."

Wylendriel felt her muscles jerk as every urge and every emotion she tried so hard to suppress came rushing back and overwhelmed her. This time, she was overcome by an animalistic frenzy, and she felt with her a presence infinitely more evil. She felt feelings inside her that she knew did not belong to her, but to something else that co-resided with her. Regardless of whatever it was she was feeling at the time, the priestess' cannibalized Torvald alive with a sense of euphoria. Her poor friend's screams and sobs cut the air. It, and the sound of wet gnashing of flesh and the tearing rips of muscle and skin were the most horrific band of instruments she'd ever heard, and for some reason, just made it more reason to love what was happening.

When Torvald's last scream finally cut short, her eyes stared into his as his eyes slowly fell back and the light vanished. The energy she felt coursing through her body vanished as well, just as quickly as it came. Everything that she knew to be normal came back, and what flesh that still resided in her mouth fell out as her jaw dropped in horror. Her gut wrenched and she threw her head to the side to let bile come pouring out. With each gag and each convulsion, her stomach removed the last drop of fluid in her stomach that it could until she was dry-hurling into the river. Gasping for breath, she took a long look at Torvald, lying lifeless on the ground with a gaping hole in his neck with streams of blood trickling down into the river. With tears streaming down her face, she went scrambling to rip open her robes and search every damned pocket to find the stone she saw in her visions. When she finally did, she pulled it out and threw it as hard as could with a scream and set herself off balance. She fell to her knees layed her head on the ground until sobs turned into whimpers.

'Kynereth, what have I done?'

She jumped down into the water to wash the blood off of her face. When she climbed back up the rocks, she stared at Torvald a couple minutes, her face just as red and puffy and tears ran dry as Torvald when she first found him. She dragged his eyelids shut with her fingers, and prayed for his spirit to cross safely into Sovngarde. Among her sorrows, being wracked with devastation at the loss of a new friend and a newfound crippling fear of the daedric prince's curse, what plagued her most was the sense of betrayal that Torvald must've felt in his last moments by her own hand. She knew what that betrayal was like. She felt she had to find solace in that he was lucky to remain dead. She had to find solace in blaming Molag Bal for this. She had to convince herself that this wasn't her fault, no matter how much it hurt. Wylendriel moved his body in front of Talos' statue and set a hand on his head – already cold – and her other hand grasping the eagle skull hanging from her belt. Closing her eyes, throat swollen in her mourning, she focused all of her restoration magic on him as she began reciting Arkay's rites of consecration. His spirit deserved to rest in peace and reunite with his lost love.

As she finished the final verses, she closed her eyes and sighed deeply. Leaning down to gently kiss Torvald's forehead, she quickly muttered under her breath, “rest easy in Sovngarde, my friend...”

Later that night she turned west back towards the river, with her mind replaying the thoughts that played in her head. North star. Break of dawn. Retrace your steps. The only problem with this is that sunlight sheds the sky of its stars. Unless there was something she can only see in daylight, or if it referred to something else. Was it Dawnstar? It's along the northern coast, about another two days of travel! Sighing in resignation, she thought about setting up camp until torchlight shone some distance away, just north of a bunch of other flickering lights. This was Whiterun Hold! That was Whitewatch Tower! Another twenty minute of straight running on her weary, pained legs was dulled slightly at the sight of a familiar landmark, and as she inched closer, even the guards at the tower seems to have taken an interest.

“Who goes there?” One called out, waving their torch in front of them. As Wylendriel got closer, unable to answer through her panting, the light lit up her face. “Shor's bones – priestess! Where have you been! You've been missing for weeks!”

“Commander Sinmir!” Wylendriel exclaimed between breaths.

“Is that Wylendriel?” Another asked.

“It's... it's a long story...” Wylendriel answered. “But my journey has turned into pilgrimage... would you mind if I rest here?”

“Uh, of course priestess,” Sinmir replied, “but wouldn't you much rather resting inside the city where it's comfortable?”

She just laugh slightly in response, but it sounded hollow and fake in the face of what she has had to suffer through lately. “I'm afraid I don't feel up to spending all night explaining myself to the whole city...”

“Are you okay?”

“I will heal.” Wylendriel answered softly. “In time...”

That night, before she slept, she prayed a silent, unanswered prayer to the daedric prince - to allow her to finish her pilgrimage. She suggested it would present the lord with an opportunity not often seen: an opportunity to battle and dominate a Divine. While Wylendriel has great faith that the divines could easily purge the daedra and recover her soul, Molag Bal has so far remained silent and seems to be permitting her pilgrimage, indicating that she might have appealed to his arrogance and lust for power...

The next morning, she met with the carriage outside Whiterun and payed the man to bring her to Dawnstar. It would take her there in half the time, and would allow her an opportunity to reflect on the road that has brought her here. On Torvald as well, but her mind, in the end, always returned to home. Back to Valenwood.

Capabilities

Skills

Expert: Restoration – (Wylendriel's long time commitment to Kynereth did not go without merit – she is valued as a healer and has fixed up even gutted soldiers on the brink of death, while supplementing her magic with practical medical expertise. On the other side of the coin, she can use the same magical powers that allows her to revitalized others to inflict great harm upon them... not that she'd ever willingly do so.)

Adept: Medicine – (The healers back home and the priestesses in the Temple of Kyne in Skyrim both taught her many things about medicine, and how to heal by utilizing Her Graciousness' gifts instead of relying on magicka. Specially talented, perhaps, as her Green Pact forbids her from harvesting her own vegetation for her craft. Working around that gave her a specialized niche in medicine using strictly animal-based ingredients, but still knows a select few recipes utilizing plant-life.)

Adept: Conjuration – (At first, Wylendriel was just a novice. Just like any of us are when we learn something new. But in this case, Wylendriel has very little gained or practical knowledge. Most of what she now knows is intuitively gained. One of Molag Bal's "gifts". His boon used her existing knowledge of Conjuration as a foundation for him to selectively impart his intuitive understanding of magic onto her, and determining what she is and is not allowed to know. There's a cruel irony to be found in that he chooses not to champion Wylendriel with the true Mace of Molag Bal, yet arms her with a magic spectral daedric mace anyways.)

Adept: Bosmeri – (She's a Bosmer who grew up in the center of Valenwood, enough said.)

Apprentice: One-handed (Blunt) – (Wylendriel doesn't have much in the way of actual skill in using maces. It's more like Molag Bal's curse making her really angry and putting her into a berserker state, and swinging it really fucking hard.)

Novice: Athletics – (Bosmer are naturally stringy and swift, and it only helps matters that Wylendriel enjoys being active and is prone to embarking on pilgrimages.)

Novice: Acrobatics – (Bosmer are agile, and Wylendriel is no exception. She spent much of her time growing up traversing the wilds, and she can climb trees with ease.)

Novice: Tailoring – (She has a basic grasp on how to stitch her clothing back together, but it's gonna look like patchwork. It's either that or sporting holes. Your choice.)

Weaknesses

Pseudo-pacifist: Wylendriel's naturally pacifistic nature is actually somewhat compromised, but now she consciously tries to avoid getting involved in the middle of the fray. She'll do anything to get out of fighting in all-out battle to avoid the risk of going mad. Also, a lack of conditioning and natural strength keeps her from helping with any of the heavy lifting without hurting herself. Though to some degree, she has to learn to give herself in to these impulses just enough and direct them towards people who would do others ill, just so the glass won't overfill.

Hedgehog's dilemma: She's distant and emotionally unavailable even to her friends and allies. It's different parts paranoia – on one hand, even if you're close enough to her that there's zero chance of you betraying her, she fears there's the possibility of her hurting you.

Foreign ignornace: She's was isolated in Valenwood for a while without much news of the outside world seeping into her circle. When she left Valenwood, she barely knew a thing about the other cultures outside of home except for a few details that are typically common knowledge across the world. I.E. Nords don't like elves, Altmer don't like humans or beast races, and Dunmer don't like anybody at all. Not even each other.

Cursed: The curse is a slowly eroding corruption of her soul. She gets intrusive thoughts, feelings that shouldn't be there, and there are subtle inklings of violent urges implanted into her nature, and the compulsion to dominate. Another unfortunate side effect is, when she finally does give in to this curse, the sort of berserker mode she enters does not serve her well. She is going to hurt herself. The body puts limits on itself, and it's to keep things like that from happening.

Wanted: Avoid Dominion soldiers.

Other priorities: She's still on a pilgrimage, and that might put her at odds with some of the party's plans. She's dead-set on finishing what she started and cleansing the curse from her soul as soon as possible.

Spells

Spells

Expert: Restoration

• Expert: Grand Healing
• Expert: Circle of Protection
• Expert: Repel Undead
• Expert: Devour Health^
• Adept: Close Wounds
• Adept: Heal Other
• Adept: Greater Ward
• Adept: Cure Disease
• Apprentice: Healing Hands
• Apprentice: Fast Healing
• Apprentice: Cure Poison
• Apprentice: Cure Paralysis
• Apprentice: Greater Fortify Fatigue*
• Novice: Healing
• Novice: Absorb Fatigue^

Adept: Conjuration

• Adept: Conjure Mace!
• Adept: Conjure Dremora Caitiff!
• Adept: Banish Daedra
• Apprentice: Reanimate Corpse!
• Apprentice: Soul Trap!
• Apprentice: Summon Scamp!
• Novice: Summon Familiar

^ Isn't normally used. She actually knows this spell.
* Re-flavored as a blessing of Kynereth. Re-purposed so that it can be cast on others.
! This spell was not learned naturally. This is part of Molag Bal's boon.

Tactics

If she can help it, Wylendriel won't. Aside from being a healer at heart, the stress of combat and intense feelings such as anger, misery, or fear actually has her run the risk of succumbing to Molag Bal's suggestions and her own dark urges and intrusive thoughts. Say she succumbs, though: there isn't any real strategy. She seeks to surprise and overpower her foes with unbridled aggression and summons a bound mace. Then she can use her restoration skills to drain away her foes' health or stamina, rendering them weak and helpless as she beats them repeatedly into the ground until they're liquefied. Her mind is not so clouded and her willpower is not so weak that she cannot tell between foe or ally, so she will (at least for the most part) will be able to restrain herself from taking out that same aggression on her friends. Anyways, in this respect, her "berserker mode" has her serve as a glass cannon. She cripples and executing enemies, but is totally armorless and lacks the natural durability to take very many blows herself. Only in dire situations where she cannot fight an enemy or horde of enemies on her own will she call upon Molag Bal's conjuration magic to summon dremoras or reanimate corpses. Note that never in her right mind would she consider using such vile magic.

Relations and Affiliations

Wylendriel is a priestess of the Temple of Kyne in Whiterun, and is a rather respected member of the clergy among the locals despite her elven blood. She has not been there for very long, but she has proven her devotion and ability to the nords and they've taken her as one of their own. Most have, at least.

Opinions

N/A

Other Capabilities

Has a cast iron stomach and is able to digest damn near any edible piece of food available. Having a strict meat-based diet, some of it even raw, tends to build up your immune system like crazy. She has some resistance to disease and poison effects because of this.

Inventory

Cash

Her last 10 Septims

Keys and Lockpicks

Only the key to the Temple of Kyne in Whiterun.

Clothing and Armor

• A set of robes; water-resistant (waxed wool), leather supported, cold-weather (bear fur), hooded, seperable (bear fur)
• Fur boots
• Black wool top, sleeveless
• Black wool tights, down to knees
• A leather belt

Weapon and Ammunition

It's not really a weapon, but she has a skinning knife if she's feeling desperate.

Potion and Arcane Supplies

• 3 bottles of Potion of Magicka

Jewelry and Novelty Items

An amulet of Kynereth with a minor stamina enchantment, and an eagle skull hanging from her belt (a memento from home, also serves as a second divine focus).

Books and Documents

• Unsent letters addressed to Valenwood, sealed with wax.
• Several pieces of blank parchment and empty envelopes.
• A copy of each: Healers Fieldbook, Herbalist's Guide to Skyrim, Notes on Racial Phylogeny, Nine Commands of the Eight Divines, The Consecrations of Arkay, and the poems Hymn to Kyne and Kyne's Tears on single pieces of parchment.
• A book containing a compilation of poetry, alphabetically listed, from the Death Blow of Abernanit to The Warrior's charge, and all of the lesser known poems that came before, in-between, and after.

Food, Drinks, Provisions

Preserved beef and venison, water, medicinal herbs, a mortar and pestle, dressings, bandages, a splint, and a tourniquet.

Load Bearing Equipment

• A satchel, carrying most of her stuff.
• Five pouches hanging from her belt, carrying medicinal herbs.
• A waterskin, on sling slung over her shoulder.

Other

• A feathered quill and inkjar.
• Threading needles and a spool of sinew fiber.

[Dervish]

Character Submission number deux!

Y'all might remember her from Solveig's "meet a character from another game" story.

Marassa

Portrait

Marassa

Female Khajiit (Cathay Breed)| 25 | The Thief

Profile

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Birthplace

Senchal, Pelletine

Appearance

Travel-worn, rugged, and hard in both disposition and appearance, Marassa is the embodiment of someone who’s spent their entire adult life on the road, braving the weather, wildlife, and dangerous people alike. Standing at a modest 5’07” in height, Marassa certainly towers over few people, but she is certainly formidable for her somewhat defined musculature; although hardly approaching a well-fed and constantly training gladiator in terms of physique, she is in exceptional physical condition despite her somewhat scrawny appearance, given her training and long days marching and fighting in heavy armour; most of what she eats is burned away through physical exertion thanks to her non-sedimentary lifestyle.

Typical of a Cathay Khajiit, Marassa walks flatfooted like a human or elf and employs a short but symmetrical snout and muzzle that conceal a set of sharp, pointed feline teeth. Sporting high cheekbones and a wide jaw, she certainly appears to be robust, and she has the stories to confirm that. Her wide brow is adorned with a short-kept mane that is braided to neck-length black hair, each of which is ended with a golden ring, engraved in Pelletinian style. Likewise, her ears are pierced in a similar fashion, contrasting nicely against her stripped and spotted chocolate-brown fur coat that is lighter about the muzzle and chest, and the underside of her tail, arms, and her calves.

Perhaps Marassa’s most striking feature are her eyes, a dark amber that stare back with narrow feline slits nestled in a depression of dark brown fur, giving her the impression of having war paint that affords her a somewhat fierce appearance that matches her rather unapproachable personality. If any were to see her outside of her armour in her simple cotton clothing, her body has several scars that are mostly covered by fur, but still leave a few visible white streaks across her back, arms and abdomen, along with a couple of very slight markings on her right cheek that are barely visible to the casual onlooker.

Personality

Brutally honest, uninviting, and arrogant are all words that have described Marassa at some point or another. Preferring the company of herself and herself alone, Marassa wastes few words with people she does not know, and she expresses minimal interest in getting to know people. Unafraid of confrontation and at times deliberately antagonizing, she can be rather provocative when she sets her mind to it.

While most would expect a Khajiit to share a dimilar dialect and disposition as their peers, Marassa is an anomaly among her kind in that she speaks with a clear, almost Imperial infliction and entirely in first-person pronouns. She has explained this as such, ”Men and Mer do not cut Khajiit slack when interacting with them; to them, we’re all thieves, murderers, and skooma pushing low-lives that will ruin their lives. Even the most enlightened person can be a racist piece of troll shit, so I’ve found if you walk like them, talk like them, and act like them, the occasional person might forget that I’m not like them. Talk like a weirdo, get treated like a weirdo, it seems.” While some Khajiit might criticize her for hiding from her cultural heritage if not outright rejecting it, Marassa couldn’t care less about what they think. ”It’s earned me meals and safe places to rest my head at night. Let them squawk; I’m allowed in cities they aren’t.”

Marassa is very slow to trust, and she thinks even the kindest person has a selfish agenda behind their self-gratifying smiles. She thinks little of rank or station of birth, finding nobles in particular amusing in that they think their names mean anything worthwhile. She has a laser-like focus on her personal mission, to find her half-brother, and everything else is rather secondary to that. However, Marassa is a survivor and will do whatever it takes to make it another day, even if it means offering her services to people who have something she needs.

While she is indeed standoffish and quick to brush people off, Marassa is a lonely individual who enjoys remote companionship, even if she would never admit it, and nights around a camp fire listening to other traveller’s stories have been some of the few bright spots on an otherwise trying life. While she doesn’t typically show vulnerability, she’s struggled since childhood with feeling discarded and inadequate, and much of her current behaviour and outlook is a result of her striking back at the world so she’ll never be seen as weak or a mistake again. This unfortunately results in her often having little empathy for others, even if they are in peril. It simply is not her problem to address.

Most of her interests are rustic in nature, including relaxing by the fireside, swimming, trapping, and the sounds of the forests. She enjoys wild flowers, songbirds, and even the howls of wolves. Not one who enjoys cities or crowds, Marassa nevertheless treasures good foods and the few times she doesn’t actually have to provide for herself. She is also an accomplished reader, and books have often been one of the few entertainment outlets she’s had while traveling, often bartering and trading books with other travelers to keep herself stimulated and her mind sharp. She also has an impressive visual memory and attention to detail, and she has often drawn up maps of places she’s been and routes traveled, a necessity if one does not wish to become lost.

Background

Born during a terrible winter storm in the tropical Southern peninsula of the Kingdom of Pelletine under the sign of the Thief several months after her family was assaulted and mother raped by corsairs that had prowled along the Southern Elsweyr coast and finding a lone moon sugar plantation outside of the Senchal city limits to be an easy target, Marassa was thrust into the world with the odds already stacked against the unwanted bastard infant. Things would not get any easier, even from day one.

As an adolescent, Marassa’s parents, S’Riraya (mother) and Ra’Nair (father) tried to love and care of the 4th child of their family, but she remained a symbol of the horrible event that had seen their youngest son abducted and the mother defiled by one of the corsairs, a Khajiit man they had heard referred to as Dar’Nara. Having her biological father’s eyes and mane, Marassa took after the hated man more so than her mother, which infrequently set her father into fits of rage, loudly expressing his displeasure at having to care for a child that wasn’t his and should not have been born. It was a sentiment that was engrained in the young Khajiit, one her two brothers, J’Tagah and J’Zaddi were all too eager to embrace to not only please their father, but to express their own outrage that they lost their younger brother to the young girl who was thrust upon their family. It did not help that both parents were Cathay, like the youngest brother who was taken, Zaveed. J’Tagah was an Alfiq and incapable of speech, and J’Zaddi was an Ohmes, and as such looked far closer to a Bosmer than a typical Khajiit. The fact Marassa was of the same breed as both of her parents was seen as a slight and a cruel joke by the gods. As such, Marassa’s family never bothered to give her a prefix to her name. She simply wasn’t worthy of the endearment or acknowledgement past the bare essentials of keeping this girl alive.

Given her mother’s predisposition to overindulge in moon sugar and in a few cases, Skooma, it was clear she was struggling with her predicament and choices. On one particularly memorable day, a tearful, intoxicated and enraged S’Riraya threw a vase at Marassa, screaming that she should have thrown her into the sea when she was born. The admission shocked Marassa, who before that moment looked at her mother as the only supportive person in her life, and S’Riraya had tried to raise her and live her, as difficult as it was. However, the past was not easily overcome, and that single night changed Marassa’s destiny forever. After years of hearing how the family wanted Zaveed back and Marassa gone, the only way she would earn their love and acceptance would be to find him and bring him home.

And so the very next day, three weeks after her seventh birthday, Marassa left home and ventured into the city of Senchal, an hour walk away. Since Senchal was a port city, perhaps Zaveed was there, Marassa figured. A child walking the streets of one of the most dangerous and crime ridden cities in all of Tamriel was asking for trouble, and sure enough, it found her before long. Confronted by two men, sailors from the Dominion on shore leave, Marassa was cornered in a back alley, with nothing but a stick to defend herself. It was a fearful situation she would never forget, but also, where her fortunes turned for the better; as one of the men grabbed her by the wrist, her suddenly cried out in pain as an unseen assailant bludgeoned him with a cane. Marassa was awestruck; an older gentleman, a Suthay-raht of middle age with greying fur brought down the two sailors with speed, grace, and precision that the young girl had never imagined possible. Having rescued the child, the man asked Marassa what she was thinking wandering the streets alone. His voice, weathered like an oak and unlike any she’d heard before, was kindly but authoritative. She answered dutifully that she was searching for her brother. Without breaking stride or hesitation, she immediately asked if he would teach her how to fight like he did.

With a smile, the gentleman said, “We’ll see.”

The man’s name was Ra’Rasargo, a modestly famous adventurer from years ago that had travelled Tamriel and writing a series of memoirs that became popular not only in the Khajiit kingdoms, but even finding their way within Bosmeri and even Imperial, Redguard, and Breton circles, since the Khajiit’s adventures took him to those exotic lands and he painted them all in a vivid, favorable light. In his retirement years, he decided to open a dojo to pass on his skills to those willing to pay the price of a man who had put Senchal on the map for something other than its unflattering reputation for crime and piracy. He had happened across Marassa when he was on the way back from the market, and he was intensely curious about how such a naïve and young girl was wandering Senchal’s streets alone.

Marassa explained her predicament at home, what her family was like and her plan to find her half-brother, to which Ra’Rasargo listened politely. He explained that he was not taking on any students, but he would offer a few lessons to help her be at least a little prepared for the world, but he’d have to take her back to her family since they’d be worried about her missing. Disheartened, but not in a position to argue, Marassa allowed herself to be escorted back home via carriage, where Ra’Rasargo witnessed firsthand exactly how unpleasant Marassa’s home was. Explaining to her parents exactly what had happened, they did not even wait for him to leave to begin chastising her. Intervening, Ra’Rasargo introduced himself formally, and with Marassa’s father, at least, the man was well known. Ra’Rasargo said that he was looking to take on a helper since his body wasn’t what it once was and that Marassa had proven to have been an exceptional help already. Agreeing to allow Marassa to help under Ra’Rasargo if for no other reason than to get her out of their lives for a good portion of each day, Marassa’s parents agreed, even arranging a carriage there and back to the plantation every day. And so, unbeknownst to Marassa’s family and the young girl, her apprenticeship had officially begun.

After a full year of cleaning the dojo, helping prepare meals and other housekeeping tasks, Marassa went to pick up the broom one day and found a long wooden practice sword in its place. Taking the practice weapon in hand, she sought out Ra’Rasargo out, asking if it were a gift. The mentor smiled, telling her that she’d have to earn it. Spending the day teaching her the basics of sword stances, Ra’Rasargo finished the day by telling her that she had earned her place, and his respect, by being responsible and a diligent worker for someone so young and he asked her if her goal was still to find her brother. Upon hearing her answer, the Suthay-raht enrolled Marassa as one of his students. And so began her training in earnest.

For the next ten years, Marassa developed from a young scrawny girl into a young woman who was disciplined, a quick study, and irrepressibly enthusiastic. While she was trained with a one-handed practice sword, her own lack of strength and bad habits that just couldn’t be drilled out of her made Marassa grow into a two-handed swordfighter, developing something of an unorthodox stance, but not something that was entirely unheard of. Even after her strength built, Marassa preferred the longer and heavier blades, finding confidence in the reach and power one could put into the weapon, and by her own sheepish admission, it made her look heroic. Likewise, while she was quick and agile, she did not have the instincts and reflexes to block blows reliably, and so heavier armour was introduced, which in turn built her strength and confidence considerably. By the end of her training, Marassa was an exceptional student and a proficient swordswoman.

At the age of nine, some measure of innate magical ability was noted in Marassa when herself and a pair of other students had found a beginner’s spell tome to try and cast Candlelight. While the other two gave up fairly easily, Marassa felt something of a connection and her own determination to succeed, especially after hearing Ra’Rasargo’s wife, Dra’Sasheira who was an accomplished mage and taught her own lessons to aspiring Khajiit mages in the same dojo, mention in one of her lessons that magical energy was present in all living things, but some people like the Altmer had the innate ability to tap into that energy like a runner taps into his stamina. Others, she reasoned, could learn to do such a thing through great concentration and practice. Marassa wanted to put that to the test. After two weeks of struggling with the tome, reading it cover to cover and treating its methods like her own swordsmanship and physical conditioning, the incredible happened; for a fleeting moment, a brilliant incandescent orb the size of an acorn emerged in her palm before becoming snuffed out. Elated and encouraged, even after several days between successes, and after two months of practice and guidance from Dra’Sasheira, Marassa was able to form a fully developed mage light spell. Marassa was well on her way to becoming a mage- of sorts. Augmenting her regular training with quick side lessons after training sessions, Marassa spent the next several years mastering a small handful of spells. While she still has a long way to go to even match the level of the average rung of magical intuitional proficiency one would expect from the College of Winterhold or the long defunct Mage’s Guild. That was never her end goal, regardless; it was simply another talent that could aid her in her eventual mission, a destination she never wavered from.

It wasn’t a secret that Marassa was Ra’Rasargo’s favoured pupil; the two had shared an immediate bond from the first day they met by chance, and a strong bond of mutual respect developed between the two, even going so far that in some ways, Ra’Rasargo was like a surrogate father for Marassa, while she became something like the daughter him and Dra’Sasheira never had. He shared his tales with her of his time as an adventurer, his treasure collection, correspondence with some famous individuals across Tamriel, and a number of other things that only she was privileged to. As she decided she was of age to begin her journey, Ra’Rasargo had a gift for her; using the Septims he had been saving from the leftover carriage fare her family had allotted over the years, Ra’Rasargo had managed to commission a Skyforge Steel greatsword through his contacts in Whiterun for Marassa, wanting to give her the best possible chance moving forward. Included in this parcel was a set of common steel armour of Nord craftsmanship, since Ra’Rasargo believed it to be the best quality one could buy on a modest budget. While the sword was something of a rarity and in some ways priceless due to its scarcity, it turns out calling in favours years after saving a life has perks.

Clad in new armour and with a deeply personal weapon in hand, Marassa bid her two mentors a tearful goodbye and promised to return when she found Zaveed, Marassa departed Senchal, heading North, years of planning about to be put to the test. Showing up at her home one last time in her new equipment, finally putting to rest the suspicion she was receiving training at the dojo, Marassa told her family not to expect to see her again. There was no love lost at this departure; she no longer cared for their approval or acceptance.

That was nearly ten years ago, and it almost ended within a month when Marassa had attempted to cross the Anequina desert unprepared, only surviving thanks to one of the nomadic tribes of the North. Nursed back to health and given more adequate traveling materials to survive a desert crossing as well as the wisdom of those who called the desert sands home, Marassa set out again and in earnest began her quest, learning quickly that the road was a merciless place for the unprepared and the inexperienced. Still, despite the countless hardships she faced, learning how to make snares to catch small game, scavenging food, where to find clean water, each lesson prefaced with near-death experiences quite often including starvation and near-dehydration on top of illness, animal attacks, and exposure to the elements, each settlement and building was salvation, and whatever books on local flora and fauna, important landmarks and sources of water became worth their price in gold. Often paying her way with labour and odd jobs, Marassa was within two years no longer the wild-eyed and excitable young girl she used to be; the woman who emerged was something remarkably harder and far less enthusiastic. Every day was a new and often painful lesson, and even figuring out how to survive and make shelters resulted in burns, entrapment, puncture wounds, and all sorts of other unpleasant calamities. Had it not been for the handful of healing spells Marassa had learned from Dra’Sasheira, she would have died long ago. Despite the attack from wildlife and creatures of the lands, it turned out the real heartless beasts were those of the two legged variety; other people.

Marassa was only 17 when she first had to take a life; a trio of bandits that saw her as an easy mark as she was traversing Cyrodiil, not far from the Argonian border. The experience rattled her; she had always known people were capable of such depravity, but to witness it first hand was something else entirely. This was a situation of life and death, there would be no walking away from it if things didn’t turn the way she hoped. Forcing herself to remain calm and remember the years of drills and stances she’d trained with for years, she was surprised to find herself not only able to fend off their blows but the openings in their own defences were glaring and easy to exploit. The difference between a trained warrior, albeit inexperience, and a group of opportunistic bandits who likely only ever targeted victims they thought would be a quick kill, or at least wealthy enough to take the risk. The sword alone would have been enough to make Marassa a prime target for irrefutable sorts, she discovered. Killing one of the attackers with a decapitating swing and amputating a hand of another, the surviving bandits made off, leaving Marassa with a corpse. Not quite prepared for the harsh reality of such ferocious bloodshed, Marassa was awash with a typhoon of conflicting feelings, but she was pleasantly surprised she didn’t shed a tear over the incident. The bastard had what was coming.

And he certainly wasn’t the last to try.

Each new day brought peril, and even bedding down for the night was something that necessitated light sleeping and a hand on her sword at all times. This state of hypervigilance quickly drove Marassa into the distrustful person she would eventually become; literally anyone could be a threat, and often, they were. Some, like the bandits, were overt. Others were manipulative and tried to take her when her guard was down after some token generosity. Her armour became damaged in time, and what coin she could pick off her failed assailants were often spent on maintaining her equipment when she arrived in settlements. What precious little remained often went to a bed for the night or some fresh food, but for the most part, Marassa was alone in the wilds and discovering the reality that just because you’ve planned on something your entire life doesn’t mean it was going to be simple. Determined not to turn back and return in shame, she pressed on, and like shedding pieces of excess clothing, the young idealistic and naïve girl that had resolved many years ago to save Zaveed was left behind mile by mile, eventually refining her into the hard young woman she is today.

Sticking mainly to the coasts (but avoiding Argonia as a whole due to how utterly traversable the swamps and jungles are, and the copious diseases that fester in those lands), Marassa’s journey has taken her through Eastern Cyrodiil, Morrowind, and more recently Skyrim, where she has been the last three years after exhausting leads in Morrowind. To Marassa’s surprise, she had rather enjoyed her four year stay in Morrowind as the climate and people were unlike any she had met before, and in the more rural regions that weren’t governed by regional politics nearly as intensely as the cities, proved to be much more hospitable to outsiders provided they were willing to volunteer their services in exchange for goods and a place to rest. Marassa exchanged physical labour, trapping, and dealing with bandits and highway men in exchange for staying in barns, stables, and sheds, meals, and information. Often checking coastal shipwrecks and becoming well acquainted to the use of water breathing and resist cold potions to carry on her search, signs of Zaveed had proven elusive. However, the time in Morrowind was well spent; Marassa had learned a handful of spells, had become somewhat immersed in Dunmeri culture and language, learned what plants and animals were safe to eat and how to prepare them, and in particular found a kinship with the Ashlanders who seemed to be somewhat of an outsider subculture in the Dunmer social strata.

However, after the Nerevarine re-emerged, change was in the air and with it a sense of foreboding. With the civil war in Skyrim having drawn to a conclusion, the Khajiit decided it was time to carry on her search in the frigid Northern promise, where she has been residing the past three years, dealing with encounters with Stormcloak hardliners, ferocious wildlife, Forsworn, and the usual assortment of ill-intentioned bastards that only respect the end of a blade. Although not integrating or finding as much success or enjoyment in Skyrim, partially because her trail has gone literally and figuratively cold, Marassa has tried to keep one step ahead of the Akaviri invasion, following information provided by displaced refugees, soldiers, couriers and even the Khajiit caravans, she knows that the noose is tightening and there isn’t going to be very many places to go to escape the Kamal creatures. And so, upon learning that many of Windhelm’s evacuees fled to Dawnstar, Marassa made her way to the diminutive harbour town and quickly learned of a mercenary company that had a ship. It wouldn’t be the first time she offered her services to get what she wanted, and it wouldn’t be the last, and safe passage to escape an incoming invasion force seemed to be a fair trade for becoming a sword for hire.

That is, until she picked up her trail once more.

Capabilities

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Skills

Expert: 2H Blade
Adept: Heavy Armour, Alteration Magic
Apprentice: Restoration Magic, Ta'agra, Athletics, Provisioning
Novice: Dunmeris

Weaknesses

Tactless: Marassa is prone to indifference at best, open callousness at worst to people she doesn’t care for, which is most. A combination of brutal honesty and a lack of empathy make her a difficult person to coexist with at times. She will say what she’s thinking, consequences be damned.

Aloof: Cold and distant, Marassa doesn’t take a keen interest in situations or people that don’t immediately involve her. A lack of passion for the severity of causes that don’t immediately relate to her own personal goals mean she is not one to volunteer or stick her neck out for others most of the time.

Distrustful: It takes a lot of work to have Marassa open up to strangers, and even more to trust their motivations. She keeps people at swords’ length and is neither surprised nor upset by betrayals; it’s simply what people do in her mind.

Non-military values and experience: Used to solitude and individual skill at arms, learning even rudimentary tactics and strategies is something that will be entirely new for her, and she will likely hate every minute of it. Not used to taking orders, giving them, or recognizing military maneuvers and strategies, she has no mind for logistics save for provisioning and all that matters to her is the moment she’s in.

Mild phobia towards Argonians: Growing up, Marassa heard the stories of how mysterious and deadly Argonia and its denizens were. This was a large reason for her avoiding the province altogether, and her time among the Dunmer reinforced the negative views of Argonians. She views Argonians as disease carriers that steal people away in the night and may or may not be mentally linked by the Hist. She keeps them at a distance.

Resentment towards Altmer: Altmer means Thalmor, and Thalmor means oppression. While she personally didn’t suffer at the hands of the Thalmor during Elsweyr’s time as a Dominion vassal state, Marassa heard enough stories and felt the resentment the public held towards the Thalmor in private. Being under the heel of another race, and an extremely militant and conquest minded one at that, has made Marassa more openly hostile towards Altmer on principle.

Resentment towards bosmer: Centuries of border clashes between Elsweyr and Valenwood have left their mark where even as former allies there was never any love lost between the Khajiit and the Bosmer. Seeing Bosmer as cannibalistic weirdos that rather butcher children than eat a corn cob have made them somewhat loathsome in her eyes.

Spells

Spell list:

Adept: Waterbreathing, Ironflesh, Ash Shell, Detect Life, Candlelight, Magelight, Lighten Load (Feather)
Apprentice: Fast Healing, Healing Hands, Steadfast Ward, Ease Burden (Feather)

Tactics

An excellent fighter and something of an exceptionally trained brawler, Marassa is a fairly disciplined if unorthodox fighter who doesn’t believe in fair fights. Using even her alteration spells as weapons, the Khajiit seeks to create an opening by distracting or disabling an opponent and taking advantage with her massive greatsword, which offers an excellent reach unmatched by all but polearms. She is very aware of her surroundings and will use the terrain to her advantage, open putting things between her and her adversary to force them to work around it, taking the fight to somewhere with poor footing or ledges, and so on. She doesn’t shy away from brutality and dismemberment, and the psychological effects of that along with the Khajiits’ innate Eye of Fear give her a psychological edge on many opponents. She is capable of fighting multiple foes, and she is often able to close the gap between herself and mages with ward spells. For archers, she tries to keep terrain between herself and the archer, and will often seek to disengage to either escape or lure the archer into a situation of her choosing. Any hits that she is unable to parry are often absorbed by her armour, and simple healing spells can often limp her through a fight if need be.

Marassa can move with deceptive speed thanks to her Feather spells, which ultimately negate the weight of her weapon and armour, giving her reflexes and agility almost similar to someone wearing light armour. Using Ash Shell, she is capable of disabling limbs or weapons and creating an opening she can exploit, often fatally. Magelight is also used as a blinding weapon, often aimed for the face while she rushes in behind it. Marassa prefers to keep on the offense and not give her foes a change to get their footing.

Relations & Affiliations

S’Riraya (Khajiit, Cathay): Step-mother, estranged
Ra’Nair (Khajiit, Cathay): ep-father, estranged
Dar’Nara (Khajiit, unknown): Biological father, missing
J’Tagah (Khajiit, Alfiq): Half-Brother, estranged
Zaveed (Khajiit, Cathay): Half-Brother, missing
J’Zaddi (Khajiit, Ohmes): Half-Brother, estranged
Dra’Sasheira (Khajiit, Ohmes-Raht): Friend and mentor, magic studies
Ra’Rasargo (Khajiit, Cathay): Friend and mentor, swordsmaster; Surrogate father figure

Opinions

(For group members; fill after IC introduction)

Other

Marassa is a survivalist at her core. She thinks nothing of spending extended times in the wilderness surviving off the land and she has an excellent instinct for trapping. As such, she can dress and skin an animal about as casually as a housewife can knit a scarf. She also enjoys the perks of her race, including Eye of Fear, Night Eye, and a deadly set of claws. She is also something of an amateur cartographer and she can reliably draw up a map of places she’s recently been, she has an excellent sense of special awareness and a memory for detail.

Inventory

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Cash

20 Septims

Keys & Lockpicks

A single key for her master’s dojo

Tools & Crafting Materials

Whetstone & oil, polishing cloth
Tinderbox
Snare wires
A jar of fire salts

Clothing & Armor

Standard Nordic armour (non-Skaal)
Leather jerkin
Miner clothing
Dunmer outfit
Red scarf
Travel cloak

Weapon & Ammo

Skyforge Steel Greatsword
Orcish dagger

Potion & Arcane Supplies

2x potion of cure disease
3x stamina potions
2x magica potions

Jewelry & Valuables

Other than her sword and what coin she carries, nothing.

Books & Documents

Immortal Blood

History of Raven Rock

The Wolf Queen

Food/Drinks/Ingredients

1x smoked hare
A bushel of snow berries
1x venison flank
2x water skin
1x wine skin
Bag of bait

Load Bearing Equipment

Netch leather rucksack
Leather utility belt with 5 pouches of various sizes

Other

Bed roll
Tarp
4 thin ropes

[Chrononaut]

@Hank @Peik

Raelyn could join in on peacekeeping efforts, if only because she has a vested interest in keeping Do'Karth (and any other member of the mercenary company aside from Gustav) from being murdered.

[Dervish]

@Spoopy Scary I'll get to checking over the revision tomorrow! Stepped away from the compooper for a while.

[Spoopy Scary]

Thanks for the update, Dervy-bird!

@Hank @Peik

Raelyn could join in on peacekeeping efforts, if only because she has a vested interest in keeping Do'Karth (and any other member of the mercenary company aside from Gustav) from being murdered.

@Chrononaut

Assuming I'm accepted, and accepted in time, Wylendriel might be able to help Do'karth recover, should her help be required, from said murder attempt!

I mean, there's a lot of novice and apprentice level restoration practitioners, sure, but you know.

[Peik]

Thanks for the update, Dervy-bird!

<Snipped quote by Chrononaut>

Assuming I'm accepted, and accepted in time, Wylendriel might be able to help Do'karth recover, should her help be required, from said murder attempt!

I mean, there's a lot of novice and apprentice level restoration practitioners, sure, but you know.

@Spoopy Scary

@Hank @Peik

Raelyn could join in on peacekeeping efforts, if only because she has a vested interest in keeping Do'Karth (and any other member of the mercenary company aside from Gustav) from being murdered.

@Chrononaut

The attempt seems well averted so far. Probably a couple of IC days later when Niernen pisses off her brother again.