Rastislav
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Arc 8 Chapter LIV: Throwing Hands
🕑 Added 2024-12-24 15:40:37 +0000 UTC(General POV)
Dagoth Ulthis was not having a good day today, in fact he would go so far as to say he was having the worst day in his life. First they enter a Daedric temple without a care, then the very Daedra drags all of them into a vision, and now... this.
"We meet once again." The Daedra spoke in an amused gravely voice "Little Aedra."
Naturally things only got worse once Ulthis' mind caught up to what was just said, the tension in the room growing massively as all the Mer present beyond the odd snow elf and the archmage had their very wordlviews shaken.
It was all broken in an instant as Lord Dagoth struck his face with an open palm.
(Reyvin's POV)
"Really?" I deadpan at Dagon.
"What? It is technically true." The once-destroyer's lip twitched slightly.
"The best kind of true" I finish for him with a long sigh, accepting the impeccable logic "Has anyone ever told you you are a massive cunt?"
Everyone around me tenses.
"They thought it." Mehrunes answers nonchalantly "Usually they are too afraid to say it however."
"How very boring." I drawl and he nods "Anyway is there an actual reason you chose to drag all of them here or were you just looking to fuck with me."
"The latter." He answers without a second's pause, one of the Unmourned outright choking at the lack of care "Your beloved Webweaver keeps telling me it is very fun. I find myself in agreement."
Now it is Vayrin's turn to have a crisis of faith.
"Of course she does." I pinch the bridge of my nose.
He leans in slightly, his presence growing more weighty by the moment "Now, what is your purpose in this temple?"
"I need to enter Red Mountain, and you and your three 'colleagues' seem to be blocking the way." I answer without bothering to mince words.
"Do not associate me with those fools." Dagon growls "Out of all of them only Malakath is not worthy of outright scorn and that is only because he draws my pity instead." His eyes scan the crowd before ending up on Vayrin "Just because the Dunmer need to label everything so they can feel like they know things, does not mean those same things will change by their whims."
"And yet here you are" I drawl "Blocking the path to the mountain, likely protecting them without their own knowledge."
He leans back and ever so slightly smirks "Just because I disdain them does not mean I will reject a favor owed."
"Fair enough" I roll my eyes "So you going to open the way or do I need to pose threateningly for a few minutes first?"
"As entertaining as the attempt would be" He drawls back "I only need my curiosity satisfied this time. What is your plan with the mountain?"
I cup my chin and let out a light hum "Why don't you wait and see?"
"Favor." He says simply.
Which meant he was obligated to actually protect Vvardenfell from straight up blowing up... Huh.
"I assure you it will be nothing negative." I grin at him "In fact, I would go so far as to say your work here will be quite thoroughly done by the time I am finished."
He stares at me for a long while, all the Mer that accompanied me feeling their throats tightening under the invisible pressure while I simply stared back. Only three minutes later did the harsh gaze retract and the Daedra nod "Very well. You have done as you promised once already, I will be watching you."
"Always a delight working with you, Lord Dagon" I offer him a respectful bow and pause "Say, you wouldn't happen to know anything about a certain rebel in Skingrad blowing people up with some distinct destructive magic?"
"Of course I know of him."" The Daedra answers simply, though I see the amusement hidden in his eyes "He was my cultist after all."
"Rather pointless to give someone so near death your blessing." I comment "Why bother at all?"
"Because he was rather devout, in his own foolish way" Dagon explains languidly "But just because he has proven worthy of my blessing did not mean he was strong enough to use it. We Daedra are not simply power to be used, and he learned that lesson the hard way."
It takes me only a moment to decipher his actual meaning as I deadpan "So you did it because you found it entertaining."
He grins a terrifying grin "Yes."
"Of course" I sigh.
The Daedra smirks at me as the vision begins retracting "I will be watching, Dagoth."
I grin "Trust me Dagon, the show will be more than worth it."
=====
The moment our silent group stepped out of the temple, its odd atmosphere retracted and I felt the air around the others grow heavy.
The two Ashlanders looked traumatized, and while the taller one merely stared into the distance, his younger brother sat and leaned against one of the great stone spikes and began shivering while muttering half-audible prayers.
The Unmourned looked just as shocked, though all of them at least had the presence of mind to only remain silent while dealing with their world views being violently twisted mere moments prior.
Vayrin Indoril felt like he was panicking, but his eyes were narrowed with incredible focus as he pulled out a large book and began scribbling down the whole meeting. He'd probably go up a rank or three in his house if he brought that back to Necrom.
Good on him for snatching the opportunity I suppose.
Anondor and Akulakhan remained completely stoic, feeling like rocks in the storm of emotion, one because of millennia of experience and the other because of a general lack of fear.
And finally, Savos Aren, who was currently giving me a look of tired concern "Reyvin... why?"
I give him a faux look of confusion "What? I just went in and had a nice chat, went far better this time as well. He didn't even try cutting me in half!"
Savos blanches "He did what?"
Rolling my eyes I approach him and pat his shoulder reassuringly "Oh don't worry about it, we only need to go through three more similar situations." As I speak my hand worms to his neck and I effortlessly pull out the necklace hidden below his robes "Also, a bit hypocritical, no?"
His eyes narrow for a moment before he huffs "Just be careful with them, one mistake is usually all you can make."
"Yeah" I sigh, he wasn't wrong, I just operated on an entirely different level than what even he knew.
He stares at me as I begin walking to the other Dunmer, shaking them awake and snapping my fingers in front of their vacant eyes "Why do I feel things are only going to get worse?" I hear him mutter.
Pretty good intuition there gramps.
Before we left the temple I felt a distant gaze flicker in for only the slightest moment, but before I could follow it to its source it was cloaked in innumerable subtle layers that would take days to unveil.
Someone was watching us, and all I could glean was that they were related to neither myself nor the Daedra.
-----
Mile after mile through the momentarily cleansed ash we marched, pausing only to take meals from time to time and to pick up any heartstones we came upon, my instinct to consume them only growing with their quantity.
Good thing Akulakhan held them and was positioned to the rear of our formation while I stood at the front. Even if I doubted I would at any point fall to the temptation, it was never a bad idea to make sure.
It was only a day or so later that we arrived at Vvardenfell's western reaches, our journey drastically sped up with magic to both clear a path and rejuvenate the tired, and soon we found our way to the encampment of the Ahemussa Ashlanders.
Their camp, lacking in the powerful magi that the Urshilaku had, was not graced with a powerful ward and was instead positioned to Vvardenfell's harsh western cliffside, the old tribe of hunters and fisherfolk barely getting by through their ancient trade as the seas roiled without ceasing.
The Ashkhan was an ancient old Mer, and even with his obvious dislike for my house, he welcomed us with an almost ritualistic hospitality, even as my sharp hearing and vast sight told me some of them would hunger for it.
At first I pretended to simply accept their invitation but once I saw with my own eyes that they were not at all bluffing about it, I summoned a veritable feast for them, all of it in the form of easily storable food that they could keep for a long time.
We left their encampment the next morning, the cliffside settlement remaining much the same except if one were to take a good look at their fishing boats, all of which now sported lightly glowing runes at the bottom of their hulls.
They would not suffer nearly as many accidents at sea until my work was done.
---
Our next destination, as directed by the Ashkhan Rasidor was a temple to Malakath to our south, it was no ancient edifice but a small camp housing a single Orsimer who came there months ago and made contact with the Ahemussa tribe by trading his kills of the local monstrosities spawned by the often magical storm.
They were mostly akin to ice atronachs in form and function but were instead made of ash, and while they were mildly interesting to me they took the vast majority of Savos' interest as we travelled.
With how energetic he looked all of a sudden I wouldn't be surprised if he came up with a spell to both summon and bind the creatures within a few days, something I was more than happy to leave to him as summons were never truly my forte.
Back to the orc, an elder warrior if the Ashlanders' information was correct, he currently resided in one of the numerous abandoned kwama mines, and spent most of his time either hunting or carving a shrine to his God-King by hand.
The closest thing the orcs will ever get to a monk I suppose.
He was a bald Mer, all of his hair seemingly going to his impressive groin-length beard, the sea of hair seemingly never ending as he stood up to greet us. There was no surprise in his eyes, only acceptance and eagerness "So you finally come." He spoke in a gruff voice akin to grinding stones.
"You were expecting me?" I quirk an eyebrow.
His gaze loses focus for a brief moment but he quickly gathers himself "I am old." He says simply, the sheer gravitas in his voice telling more of a story than his words ever could "My body weakens, and my death comes."
"So you have come here to seek it?" I ask, I knew how these things usually went for his kind, they would only ever reach their afterlife if they died fighting and the only elder orc I haven't seen looking for death was Urag Gro-Shub, and that was probably because he was too powerful to be worried about an afterlife in general.
"Yes." He gives another short answer "Malakath promised me glory if I came here, you will give it to me."
The moment the name was spoken, the Daedra in question directed his gaze here.
"I see." I mutter after a moment of consideration and wave my hand, removing my armor and robes and summoning a simple shirt and pants in their place. The old orc had no weapons of his own, and I was feeling oddly generous today.
Well, that and I knew how these things went when it came to 'honorable' gods.
He grinned as he saw me not arming myself and took a stance, all of my followers swiftly directed by Savos to step away unless they wanted to offend a Daedra in their own right.
Only Anondor hesitated long enough for me to give him a nod.
The orc grinned and didn't waste any more time, rushing at me with berserk madness already suffusing his eyes, not even bothering to wince as I slapped his initial punch away and proving his resilience by not simply loosing the entire arm then and there.
He did not slow down, in fact he even sped up as he used the twisting momentum of my strike to shift his weight forward and spin into a heel kick aimed at the side of my head.
The orc was incredibly strong quick and tough, for a mortal that is.
With an almost lazy grace, I flowed around the strike, appearing behind the now unbalanced warrior and kicking his other foot from under him, and slamming him into the ground with a rapid downwards punch.
He grunted, and jumped up, once more ready to throw down.
Once more he tried striking me and once more I simply dodged around him, breaking every bone in his left arm with a kick of my own and throwing him away, making him tumble and almost skid through the ashen ground.
He spat on the ground with a grin, and got up.
In his berserk rage he managed to throw a punch with his supposedly useless arm, but that only ended up breaking his shoulder further as I slapped it away, my other hand taking the chance to come down on his other shoulder as he was forcefully leaned forward.
That he did not get his neck broken through the sheer shockwave genuinely impressed me, even as his face was buried once more in the ashen soil.
The orc gurgled an uproarious laugh and threw himself up once more.
He danced around me even as his hands hanged about uselessly, delivering rapid kicks that I dodged without any particular difficulty, only to suddenly spin, no doubt directing all of his remaining energy into the final kick to my neck.
And had I been any slower (and admittedly not tough enough to probably tank a freight train) he would have had a chance of actually breaking it.
Too bad I had grown bored with the disparity by this point, he was impressive and I found it a shame that his religion compelled his death when he could do so much still. I had given him enough glory, and gave him the chance to prove himself before his God-King, and that was enough.
I suddenly spun around much faster than before, the back of my hand slamming into his cheek with far greater force as he was thrown into the nearby wall, leaving broken teeth and blood in his wake.
He did not get up this time.
===
"Tough bastard, wasn't he?" I ask as I turn to the suddenly inhabited temple.
"Strong body, strong will." The conceptually ugly creature before me spoke.
"True enough." I nod patiently "Was there any point to this entire thing?"
"Test" Malakath said "For him, and for you."
"Oh?" I quirk an eyebrow, pretending surprise "And I trust I passed?"
"You showed strength." His tone felt almost forcefully simplistic "You showed honor."
"How flattering" I drawl.
There is a hint of something in his eyes as I say this but he goes on "The way forward is open."
"Why thank you kindly" I grin and turn to leave "I do wonder however, how long are you going to keep pretending to be what you are not?"
The Daedra pauses, the clear intelligence in his eyes shining brightly for the first time in our short meeting "Until the time is right."
Guess that is all I am getting here.
As I pass the corpse by I cannot help but ask "What was his name?"
"What does it matter?" Once-Trinimac answered "He is dead."
===
The vision ends then and there, the air around the temple vibrating slightly as I felt it directing some kind of energy to the north east for a brief moment before it once more stilled.
Malakath was a rather odd creature, I had to admit. He was someone betrayed and worse than killed by Boethiah and yet he and the descendants of his subjects kept at it, never once faltering in their vision of a better future...
It was almost worthy of respect, hell it was worthy of a lot of respect! Except the endurance had long since turned to obstinance... How very vexing.
Shaking the thoughts away, I return to my followers and soon we set out further south, towards a sunken city and the third temple in need of appeasement.
Now if only I could track down that fucker peeking at me for a second time in as many days!
