consider this: when diagna was first “enchanted” it was with tattoos inked with orichalc dye, and his prior semi-divinity coupled with the enchanted runes in the tattoos made them glow dark green. but something about the enchantments required fuel in the form of faith, which was how diagna was able to achieve permanence as a god beyond just being a hoonding. as faith in him waned over the years, the runes’ glow faded, and where it faded, so did the tattoos, his skin absorbing the now mundane dyes, tinting his brown skin a somewhat dull greenish color. when ogash finds him in the third century of the fourth era, they illuminate only very faintly, only visible at all in bits and pieces in complete darkness.
some of the tattoos that faded did leave sort of “channels” in his skin, the vague outlines of scars from the runes. the process of restoring diagna’s divinity required first and foremost that they be reformed and refilled with a conduit. the ancient yokudan recipe for magic-conducting orichalc ink was lost, but ogash felt that dwemer brass would likely be a better conduit for divine energy, anyway, since it was specially designed by the tonal architects for this purpose.
being tattooed from head-to-toe is one thing. having to pour molten metal into your every scar is another entirely. ogash also had one of his femurs replaced with an enchanted brass replica, designed to emulate the mythopoeic power of anumaril’s white-gold staff of towers section. all of this process was, obviously, excruciatingly painful. but diagna was an ancient god of war, and pain was nothing new to him.
after the new lines were in place, all that was left was designing the optimal system of tonal enchantment across diagna’s body. this part of the process, however, nearly took longest of all, as not only were they working with very old dwemeri and yokudan formulas for very complex procedures, they found that many of the enchantments were difficult to make cooperate with one another. further, there was much back-and-forth disagreement between diagna, ogash, and the king of orsinium, who each had different ideas and demands of what all went into the system, and how it should all be accomplished. but at a certain point, it became difficult if not impossible not to concede to diagna, as so much power had already been given to him, ogash and the orsinium government were almost completely at his mercy.
