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Warning: potential side quest (Fighters Guild) spoilers ahead!

From Garn’s recollections:

Theft and Abduction

As soon as I stepped into the Anvil guildhall I was greeted by Azzan who told me that he only had one contract on the books for me, but he had me in mind for it and wanted it taken care of as soon as possible. The job sounded interesting: apparently the Stone of Saint Alessia, a religious artifact of some significance to followers of the Nine, had been stolen from the Chapel of Talos in Bruma and I was to track it down and see it returned. I joined in a small banquet with some of my Fighters Guild brothers and then set off on the long ride north from Anvil to Bruma.

“Like a sore thumb, the Chapel of Talos in Bruma.”

Arriving at the Great Chapel of Talos in Bruma I was quickly greeted by Cirroc who introduced himself as the chapel’s resident healer. Cirroc said that 4 or 5 men were spotted leaving the chapel and heading east on the road out of the city on the night that the artifact was stolen. Bandits? Thieves? Pagans? It didn’t really matter – I left immediately, mounted up, and began riding along the road to the east.

Soon I came upon a lone Khajiit limping along the road back towards the city. By his dress I suspected that he was a bandit or a thief of some sort so I rode up upon him, leveled my sword to his throat, and began to question him. Surprisingly the Khajiit gave no resistance at all – without much prompting he fully admitted to being part of the group of thieves who had stolen the stone and that he suspected I was the one who was hired to retrieve it. He then told me that the gang had camped near the Ayleid ruin of Sedor when they were ambushed in the night by a large group of ogres. Apparently he was the only one who managed to get away. With the stone most likely in the possession of the ogres now I sheathed my sword and rode onward to the east.

“Almost more appealing than staying out here in the biting, frigid cold… almost.”

True to his word I found the freshly devastated site of the camp exactly as the Khajiit thief had described it. There wasn’t too much to investigate though as it had apparently been looted clean by the ogres. Given the proximity to it, I figured there was a good chance that the ogres lived in the old ruins and made my way there. While Sedor resembled most Ayleid ruins on the surface when I breached the subterranean level it was obvious that something else had been living there, and recently too.

“It’s an ogre party!”

Creeping into the lower passages it was only a matter of time before I encountered my first ogre. Soon, one ogre became two, and then three, with the sounds of battle attracting them from all around. By the time I had cleared the ruin I had faced more ogres than I’d ever encountered in one place before and they were of a particularly fierce variety as well. Still, between my blade and my magic they posed little threat to me. I then tended to the unpleasant task of rummaging through their stores to find the precious artifact. Finally I found the stone placed carefully upon an pedestal – apparently the church weren’t the only ones fond of it.

Azzan had no more contracts for me and didn’t think Burz did either. Work was really starting to dry up for the Guild. When I made a casual mention of the Blackwood Company being at least partly to blame Azzan dropped several hints that I should give Modryn Oreyn a visit at his home in Chorrol. Curious… and at his home? Having nothing else on my agenda I set off back up north to Chorrol.

A rather dejected and somewhat washed-up looking Modryn answered his door. He explained how he had been relieved of his title and his duties in the Fighters Guild after the death of Viranus Donton. He didn’t seem too upset about it though, at least not in contrast to his focus on exposing and/or destroying the Blackwood Company. In fact apparently his time away from the guild had proven quite productive, as he had already started hatching a plan to delve deeper into uncovering their secrets.

“”Seriously, you can just say we’re going to torture him for information. It’s not like I haven’t already ruthlessly murdered like 500 people for you…”

Modryn wanted to capture some high-ranking members of the group. This might have been fairly challenging under normal circumstances but he had learned of a camp being setup in a cave off of the Orange Road, to the east of the city. He theorized that this new hideout was probably meant to be strategically located near the Fighters Guild’s headquarters in Chorrol, perhaps they even had plans for a full scale war against the Guild. Regardless, one of their leaders, an Argonian mage named Ajum-Kajin, was said to be overseeing the project. Modryn then asked me if I’d do the honors of attempting to infiltrate the hideout and capture the Arongian. He feared that his Guild status and notoriety made him pretty poor choice for pulling such a stunt. I was definitely no fan of the Blackwood Company and had of course witnessed some of their schemes first hand so gladly volunteered to help out Modryn even if this time the job came without pay.

Glademist Cave was dusty, well lit with torches, with corridors lined with fresh supplies. Further into the cave I started coming across Blackwood Company guards. Although I had hoped to make a stealthy infiltration the layout of the cave system made avoiding direct action impossible. Perhaps if I had been able to disguise myself as a Blackwood Company member, but alas, after the first time I was spotted I was left with little choice but to slaughter my way to my goal. The Blackwood Company guards and other workers here seemed to be fairly inexperience and fell easily. Soon I was face to face with my target.

“Fancy meeting you here, my friend!”

The Argonian called for his guards but upon hearing nothing but silence in response, agreed to come with me. I lead him out of the cave with the tip of my sword in his back, then tied him up, blind folded him, threw him on my horse, and brought him to Modryn’s house.

“This is where it gets ugly… (Argonian joke!)”

Untying Ajum-Kajin and having him sit down, Modryn and I began to interrogate him. He wasn’t cooperative at first. Modryn insisted we force him to talk but I decided to try to win him over by making it seem like we were sympathetic to him. At first he refused to have any of it but eventually I succeeded in swaying him a little. We learned of the Company’s size and who their leader was, but as we started to put more and more pressure on him to provide more details he suddenly screamed in defiance and exploded into a fireball nearly taking us up with him. He must have had some sort of enchanted item on him, or had some kind of a suicide spell, but regardless our interrogation was widely unsuccessful.

Modryn’s next course of action was slightly less direct but perhaps much more risky: He suggested that I infiltrate the Blackwood Company itself by pretending to be a perspective member. This was definitely a surefire way to learn more about them but how long would it take? Still, it seemed like an easy way to get started, providing of course that my identity hadn’t been linked to any of the previous assaults on the Company. I rode for Leyawiin while Modryn stayed behind to clean up the mess…

Warning: potential side quest (Fighters Guild) spoilers ahead!

From Garn’s recollections:

Trolls and Traps

My next assignment was another seemingly typical job from my Fighters Guild experience up till that point. Modryn asked me to check up on a band of Guild members who were supposed to be cleaning out a troll infested cave but hadn’t been heard back from in some time. Modryn was particularly troubled by this one though, as the group was headed up by none other than Viranus Donton, the son of the Guildmaster whom I had brought along with me on an earlier assignment as a sort of confidence building and mentoring exercise. He was sure Viranus and his group would be able to handle the assignment and, even if it had been taking longer than anticipated, would have kept in communication with the Guild. Off I went to “Forsaken Mine” located near the city of Leyawiin.

“I like my trolls served flaming hot.”

As soon as I entered the old mine it became obvious that something had gone terribly awry – there were a few bodies of Fighters Guild members scattered throughout the various shafts and rooms. Of course, I discovered troll corpses as well, but nothing that seemed to indicate that the trolls were putting up a particularly fierce fight. Curious, I checked the bodies of some of the dead Guild members and noted that they seemed to have mostly been struck by weapons – swords, axes, and arrows. Trolls are not known to be very intelligent creatures and definitely did not use more than the most primitive weapons such as sticks and rocks in my experience. While this was quite puzzling the riddle was soon solved in blunt fashion: amongst the bodies I found the body of a man wearing the telltale armor of the Blackwood Company. Had the Blackwood Company been here as well? It seemed likely that they were responsible for whatever happened here. Still, I had yet to encounter a body recognizable as as Viranus and had started to encounter the more and more living trolls so I figured I’d continue exploring the mines and at least attempt to finish the original contract.

“Found him!”

I did eventually discover Viranus’s body. I found a bloody journal laying nearby which was quite revealing. It seemed that Viranus’s group was clearing out the trolls when Blackwood Company members suddenly ambushed. As quickly as they appeared they then vanished. Viranus was gravely wounded in the attack but managed to crawl away and record his last moments in the journal as some of the surviving trolls searched for him. A disturbing end and one that would no doubt trouble the leadership of The Fighters Guild to as of yet unforeseen levels.

“Rank amateurs? That’s all he has to say after that?”

Modryn was quite angry. I could see the hatred in his eyes has he cursed the Blackwood Company and vowed revenge. He told me that he’d break the bad news to Vilena, the Guildmaster, himself but asked me to keep a low profile in the meantime. Given the circumstance and respecting Modryn’s wishes, I decided to ride far back to the East to see if Burz had any work for me at the Cheydinhal guildhall.

Good old Burz gro-Khash had a simple job, or at least it would have been pretty simple if he weren’t so concerned with berating me about making sure I did it properly. Still, I was getting used to his temperament and he was an Orc after all. I was tasked with locating and returning Orc nobleman Lord Rugdumph gro-Shurgak’s missing daughter. An Orc nobleman? Perhaps there was more to Burz’s tone this time around.

Arriving at Lord Rugdumph’s Estate I spoke with Lord Rugdumph himself about the contract. While Lord Rugdumph was quite an interesting character the case seemed pretty cut and dry: his daughter was likely abducted by a group of ogres who lived in a nearby cave. Off I went.

“Look at these cute little guys!”

After a short hike around the perimeter of the estate looking for clues I headed east towards the area that Lord Rugdumph had suspected I might find her. Sure enough, as I crept through the woods I spotted her surrounded by three brutish ogres. She seemed to be unharmed but without knowing for how much longer I jumped out from behind a tree and hurled a rock towards them to get their attention. It worked, as all three ogres started my way leaving Lady Rogbut to make a run for it. I drew my sword and fought the three ogres. Despite their size these ogres obviously hadn’t done much fighting in their day and were no match for a blade and a few well timed fire spells. As I wiped my sword clean on the last of the ogres I called for Lady Rogbut to escort her home.

“Order is restored… weirdos!”

Burz was quite pleased about the fact that I was able to close out that contract so easily even if he seemed to be incapable of offering a complement that wasn’t backhanded. Thankfully I didn’t have to endure his unpleasant demeanor for too long as he had another job already waiting and offered it to me right then and there. The people of Harlun’s Watch, a small village south of the city, had been recently experienced a number of disappearances and wanted the Fighters Guild to track down their missing villagers.

I rode down to Harlun’s Watch and spoke to the contact for the contract, a Dunmer woman named Drarana Thelis. Drarana told me that the residents had started seeing strange lights in the swamp at night for the past several days and that some villages had foolishly gone out to investigate at different times, never returning. I waited for nightfall and then set off towards the swamp, sword in hand.

“Ouch! Ouch! Fuck! Fuck!”

As I reached the swampy western shore of the Reed River I could definitely see them. Three bright yellow glowing balls hovering around the entrance to a rocky cave face. I watched them for a moment and noted them disappearing and reappearing. How unusual. I attempted to approach them stealthily but the terrain made it difficult to conceal my footsteps and soon I found myself stepping into a deep, wet hole causing my armor and packs to clang together loudly. Soon they were upon me and I could feel them sapping the very life from me as they hovered closer. These weren’t just lights, they weren’t some kind of mage’s enchantment or natural phenomena, these were will-o-the-wisps! I’d never encountered a will-o-the-wisp since escaping my cell many months ago but I’ve heard tale of them both in prison and since. I had personally always regarded them as legend… but here they were, attacking me.

I freed my foot and raised my shield to attempt to push the wisps off, giving myself just enough time to summon a Dremora Lord to help me fend off the attack. Although it took some time to take the wisps down I found that they caused a lot less damage to me than the rumors would have had me believe, thankfully.

“Again! Trolls plus fire: a winning combination!”

With no more will-o-the-wisps in sight I lit a torch and began to look for signs of what became of the missing villagers. With nothing obvious cluing me in I decided to venture into the near by cave. As I explored the dark, damp cave I soon came across a swamp troll which I quickly put down with my usual combination of fire magic and steel. Venturing further into the cave I came across more and more trolls. This place was absolutely rampant with the beasts, comparable to what the Forsaken Mine must have looked like before Viranus and company began clearing it out. Eventually I came upon a room where I found a grizzly site: a pile of bodies in various states of decomposition. The wisps must have lured the villages into the cave where they were then killed and eaten by trolls. Disgusting. I decided that since I couldn’t return any good news about the fate of the villages I should at least clear out the entire cave of these bloodthirsty creatures.

“Wow, that’s some genuine concern…”

With my task complete I returned to Harlun’s Watch to bring Drarana the grim news. While she was disturbed to hear of the fate of her villagers she was at least pleased that I had taken care of the problem and rewarded me with a nice enchanted ring. I tried to refuse the reward but she insisted and I returned to Cheydinhal to report to Burz. With no more contracts available in the area I said my farewells, loaded my belongings onto my horse, and began to journey back out west to Anvil.

Random observation: Gah, you do a lot of looking for people in caves in these Fighters Guild quests!

Warning: potential side quest (Fighters Guild) spoilers ahead!

From Garn’s recollections:

Loyalty and Deception

I hoped that I was in for a more interesting assignment when Modryn called me into his office on the upper level of the Chorrol Fighters Guild but no such luck – it was Maglir yet again! Modryn explained that he appeared to have defaulted on another contract and he wanted me to ride to Bravil to check out the situation and finish out the job if possible.

“Incredible that he could guess considering that this is the second time I’ve had to check up on his lame ass.”

Upon reaching Bravil my first order of business was to attempt to locate Maglir. Asking around town yielded immediate results – citizens and guards alike knew of him quite readily and pointed me to The Lonely Suitor Lodge on the south side of town. As I walked up to the bar Maglir slowly turned to me, a look of recognition quickly turning into a sour expression. He greeted me by calling me a rat, asking if I was there to check up on him for Modryn again. This time he wasted no time trying to dance around the truth or feign pleasantries and bluntly told me that he had left the Fighters Guild for the Blackwood Company and that we’d need someone else to finish out his previous contract. I could tell by the body language of his Argonian friend, dressed in similar Blackwood Company regalia, that he wasn’t thrilled with Maglir potentially starting a brawl in public, so I decided to simply return to Modryn and let him know what I had discovered.

Modryn was furious to learn of Maglir’s defection though his focus quickly turned to the Blackwood Company themselves, as he claimed that, losing members to them aside, they had been taking a lot of work from the guild recently, especially down in the south. Modryn told me that my next assignment was to meet up with a woman named Aryarie who was to be Maglir’s contact in Bravil. Aryarie was at the Bravil Mages Guild and was none too pleased with the Fighters Guild’s lack of progress on her contract so far. I could see why – it was a simple enough task. She needed to gather some Imp Gall for some alchemy research she was conducting. I humbly offered my apologies and told her that I’d deliver her double the Imp Gall for the same fee to make up for our poor performance up till then.

“Imps are one thing but Gargoyles? Ugh.”

Imp Gall was, of course, found on imps. Given all of the imps I’d encountered since I began my adventures you’d think I’d have a massive stash of them by now but I had been frequently selling my alchemical ingredients on my regular Imperial City market visits and didn’t have enough on me. Luckily imps were relatively common pests to run into in secluded areas and sometimes even congregated in caves and ruins. With some luck, the first cave I visited outside of Bravil, Robber’s Glen Cave, had quite a population of the little fiends. I cleared out the cave with little effort, save for that spent on the occasional gargoyle amongst them, and the bodies brought back to the city to have carved up.

Aryarie was quite pleased with the quality of the Imp Gall I brought her and gave me an enchanted ring as a token of her appreciation. Another job well done by the Fighters Guild, despite Maglir’s meddling.

“Modryn’s rousing speech…”

When I spoke to Modryn upon returning to Chorrol he seemed to be of an odd demeanor – he covertly asked me to meet him at his home later that night. That evening Modryn laid out his suspicions about the Blackwood Company’s involvement with Azani Blackheart, a well known and powerful outlaw. The Fighters Guild had taken a contract from a mage named Argoth to retrieve Azani’s enchanted sword, Sinweaver. The guild raided the ruins where Azani had been known to be hiding out with an impressive band of twenty brothers in arms but was routed without being able to defeat Azani, losing fifteen of their number before pulling back to safety. The Blackwood Company claimed it completed the contracted afterwards, both establishing themselves as a legitimate rival to the Fighters Guild and making the guild look inferior in the process.

Being involved in the original raid personally, Modryn had doubts about the Blackwood Company handling the task which such apparent ease, particularly when Argoth was found to be mysteriously killed shortly afterwards and with no sign of the sword Sinweaver left behind. Modryn instead suspected that the Blackwood Company had made a deal with Azani to fake his death and later retrieve his sword from the mage. Modryn had apparently been harboring these suspicions for some time but was finally ready to uncover the truth. He wanted me to go back with him to Azani’s hideout in the ruins of Arpenia – he stressed the dangers inherent in this mission and that my participation was purely at my digression but I saw no reason stay behind, and if Azani was really such a threat Modryn would need all the help he could take.

“Quietly stalking up to the ruins…”

The two of us met just before sunrise in front of the Chorrol guildhall and road out together for Arpenia. After breaching the doorway into the lower catacombs we both slowly crept under cover of darkness through the corridors, weapons drawn and tensions high, but before I knew it we had reached the main chamber with no sign of anything save a few rats. In the main chamber there were no bodies or much of anything else and indeed no sign of any recent battles. Modryn sheathed his sword and, a look of disgust washing over his face, proclaimed that his suspicions were likely correct. After a little cursing he suggested I check the rest of the ruins while he did some research. As suspected the rest of the ruins yielded very little as if most of the items of significance were relocated in an orderly fashion. When I returned the surface I found Modryn near our horses studying some maps.

Modryn suspected that, in accordance with whatever deal the Blackwood Company had struck with him, Azani had relocated to another Ayleid ruin, likely somewhere nearby. He guessed that it would most likely be Atatar, not far to the northeast. We road a short distance towards the ruin then lead our horses before finally leaving them and quietly walking the rest of the way towards the entrance. While the outside of Atatar was quiet there were obvious signs of recent, heavy foot traffic around the entrance. We drew our swords and entered.

“Azani Blackheart, dead again!”

Unlike the last dungeon we almost immediately encountered bandits in some of the larger rooms in this one – some camping, some obviously patrolling, but as unusual as the presence of a large number of bandits occupying an Elven ruin might be it wasn’t necessarily a sign of Azani’s involvement. The two of us managed to take down every bandit we encountered without making too much noise and spreading the alert of our presence. When we reached the main chamber of this ruin, however, we found Azani Blackheart himself waiting for us. Azani seemed surprised to see us but not at all unprepared to face us. He drew his blade with one hand as flame rose from the other. He charged Modryn, likely recognizing him as a leader of the last assault, while hurling a firebolt at me. I dodged and rushed to flank him. As Modryn and I desperately attempted to land blows Azani skillfully weaved away from and occasionally deflected both of our strikes while peppering us with his own. Still, as frantic as this fight was it was only a matter of time before someone was hit and luckily it was Azani who ended up falling, my blade plunged hilt deep into his Elven mail.

After catching our breaths and seeing to our wounds Modryn and I split up as he searched and looted Azani’s chambers and Azani’s body, making sure to recover his signet ring and, of course, Sinweaver. Upon handing the ring over to Modryn and cautiously exfiltrating the ruin, the job was complete…