#wolfskull cave

[my-screenshot-dump]

[scribeofskyrim]

Fredas, 8th of Frostfall, 4E 201

We're at the Winking Skeever, trying to get the chill out of our bones.

I wish I was just talking about the weather.

So, we got up earlier than we usually do so we could have a nice hot breakfast before trudging back up the mountain. It was bitterly cold, and a heavy snow started to fall as we made our way up a path we hadn't tried before.

We ran into an "old" Orc at the top of the hill, surrounded by dead sabercats.

He said that he was old, and that Malacath had given him a vision of a glorious death, so long as he waits right there. He wanted to know if I could give him one.

Yes, he was asking me to kill him. I tried to convince him that he wasn't that old (seriously, he didn't look old at all) and had no reason to die. He was still clearly a strong fighter, and could do a lot more if he wanted to. He explained that Orc men don't like to stick around too far past their prime, for fear of becoming "useless."

He then told us to leave unless we were there to give him the death he wanted.

I wished him luck, and started to walk away when Erandur stopped me, then asked the others to huddle in for a talk.

He begged me to reconsider!

I was shocked that a priest of Mara would ask me to kill someone, but he explained that leaving the Orc here to wait for his death isn't an act of kindness or love at all. It's cruelty. This is his last wish. I granted one to Nurelion; why not him?

I cussed in as many languages as I could, but he was right. There was a problem, though - I'm me, and the Orc was a huge warrior twice my size who clearly had no problem taking out multiple sabercats all at once!

Valdimar argued that maybe the Orc's god was right. He was to wait there, and who should show up but the Dragonborn? Being slain by the Dragonborn would surely be a noble death, right?

I know having some great "Destiny" sounds fun and exciting, but in reality it's short for "Work You Never Asked For And Can't Get Out Of Because The Divines Said So."

Lydia sighed and said that she'd step in if I needed her to.

So, I went back and challenged the Orc to a fight.

He gave me a once over, saw the mage robes, almost complete lack of armor (I have boots), and that I was more than a head shorter than him, and asked if I was sure about that?

I told him to prepare to die in as fierce a voice I could muster (I know it's not very intimidating. I heard Valdimar and Lydia wheezing, then Erandur try to shush them while also holding back a laugh.) and then we fought. I made sure to use a Shout on him so he and his god would know who he was fighting!

Lydia did have to jump in, but honestly I think that made it better for him, if you think about it. The Dragonborn challenged him, and she needed backup! That should sound good in the afterlife, right?

Erandur did a bit of Healing for me, then he and Valdimar set the body aside as respectfully as they could. He said a prayer thanking Mara for the opportunity to share Her Warmth and Benevolence in a such a cold place.

Lydia whispered she always thought all priests were a bit strange in the head, but he was the strangest.

She doesn't know the half of it.

The funny thing is, that felt Real to me. Thinking back to when we met him in Dawnstar, when he was trying his best to calm the townsfolk and everything, it felt a bit… I don't know, kind of like a show? I mean, his care and everything IS real, but how he was doing it felt "off" to me. I could tell he was lying right from the start.

I think I picked up that some of it was fake, like his accent. Went about as well as the time the little theatre troupe that likes to set up in Tiber Square hired a swordsman to play a swordsman. It sounded like a good idea at the time, but in the end it was awful because the swordsman was a swordsman, and not an actor.

Seeing Erandur standing by the dead Orc, in all that wind and ice, saying a prayer while Valdimar stood quietly next to him with his helmet in his hand… That was Real. He was the only warm thing there, like back in Shroud Hearth Barrow.

We were back on the road after that, looking for the bandit's hideout.

It wasn't far, actually, and we found out that Falk Firebeard and the people of Dragon Bridge were wrong about the place. Wolfskull Cave was NOT full of bandits. It was full of Necromancers and the undead!

Also an ancient evil, but I'll get to that.

Out first hints were the skeletons guarding the place. I actually checked the map again, just to be sure. There's a lot of caves up here, but it looked like where the steward marked, so in we went.

It was fairly standard as far as caves go as we went down. It looked like some mining had been going on at some point, and there were a lot of empty wine bottles around. We mostly fought draugr as we went, along with some more skeletons, but soon we ran into a necromancer. Shortly after that we came to a small but high chamber, and a handful more burst out from behind a doorway set into the stone wall, along with their undead minions.

We took care of them, though it was a hard fight. My exploding fire familiar came in handy!

We took a moment to heal up and have some food before continuing through the doorway. Erandur said he could feel an Evil here, and the others nodded. Maybe I felt it, too, but it might have been just because the place was a little creepy.

It got a lot creepier after we went through the door.

We could hear chanting, and a whooshing sound like a strong wind as we went further down. It sort of reminded me of the sound I hear when I learn a word from a Dragon Wall. Before long, the passageway opened up to reveal a massive cavern! There was a huge keep with a big tower built right in the center of it!

Shreds of white -blue light were coming out from cracks in the cave walls, in a series of streams. They came together on top of the tower, and were semi-formed into a glowing feminine figure that floated above the building. It was quite pretty, actually, and I said as much.

Lydia smacked the back of my head, and Valdimar tried to suppress a laugh. Erandur sighed heavily, and I know he had his face in his hand.

The lights were pretty! I mean, if you ignored the fact that we could understand the chanting now, and could tell that the necromancers on top of the tower were trying to summon Potema, the Wolf Queen, it was actually very pretty in that ethereal way, even with the whole "manifestation of evil" thing. It just wasn't a good thing!

On a practical note, we could see several mages performing their ritual on top of the tower, one wandering below us, and a handful of various types of draugr wandering in various levels of the keep. I gestured everyone in for a talk, and said that our usual tactic of going in swinging was probably NOT the best idea, here.

I had a good bead on several of the draugr, so I suggested a combination of stealth and full-on battle. They agreed that was a good strategy, and took up positions on the earthen ramp that led up to our little landing from the main area. I took out as many as I could with my bow (not the best, but good enough) and then we pressed forward, going as quietly as we could.

I just want to say that Septim's such a good boy! He earned himself a mammoth steak tonight! He was very quiet and hardly barked the whole time. He's such a good boy!

Anyway, we went down the ramp and circled through a small tunnel before getting to the keep itself. I hadn't gotten all the draugr, but I had thinned them out enough that we were able to handle them singly, until we ran into several Necromancers on a bridge above us.

Normally that wouldn't be great for us, but I summoned a fire atronach right up next to them! It kept them occupied while Erandur, Valdimar and I hit them with magic. Those two took a while because they kept bringing back the draugr we'd killed, but I'd looted the draugr already, so they weren't able to do much. Septim and Lydia were behind us, literally keeping the undead off our backs.

We made our way quietly up to the top of the tower, but the spirit of Potema sensed us coming. She warned the summoners we were there, so we rushed up the steps. By that time there were only a handful of mages left, and like most mages, they were terrible at fighting up close. Septim attacked the main conjurer, and made her stop the ritual while I got out my axe. The other necromancers tried to block me, but I pushed past and let the others take care of them.

After we killed the main summoner, the ghostly white light - Potema's spirit - rushed out through a hole in the ceiling. I had the distinct feeling it was running away.

With her gone and the ritual interrupted, we took a moment to look over the tower. There was a large circular altar-type slab that took up most of the space. It was covered in a huge sigil written in blood. Valdimar muttered something under his breath and spat when he saw it. Erandur, like at the Butcher's, gave the markings a close examination with his hand over his heart.

Dark Magic, obviously. He whispered to me that he'd seen some of the worst of it during his time with Vaermina, and this… This was Bad. He said we had to get back here, to Solitude, as quickly as possible.

There was a drawbridge that led to a small ledge that took us back near where we had first come in. I hadn't seen it at all when we'd walked past it, but I suppose that's the point. Very handy if you need to escape the cavern in a hurry!

It wasn't that late when we emerged, and I decided to head towards Solitude to see if there was a more direct route down the hill. There's a stone arch on top of some steps leading down not far from the cave, so I went down.

I could see some sort of ruin through the mist and the trees, and when we got closer, I froze in my tracks as a voice suddenly filled my head. It was Meridia!

As before, back when I'd found the Beacon, the others said my eyes glowed white and I spoke in a voice that wasn't entirely my own. Meridia complained about how her temple lay in ruin, and she wanted me to put her Beacon back in its place to claim my destiny!

When I came back to myself I turned right around and went back up the steps.

I've had enough of "Destiny" for one day, thank you very much.

As we went back the way we came (forget looking for another way down, I didn't care) I explained to a very confused Erandur what that was all about. I showed him the Beacon, and he couldn't believe that I had been hauling around a Daedric artifact this entire time.

Me, neither! I can't seem to get it out of my pack!

I mean, I want the space back, so I'll have to do it eventually, and he was reassured that we'd be cleansing the place of evil, so… It can't be that bad, right?

But I'll do that later. By the time we got here it was too late to go see Firebeard, so we're calling it a night.

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[themonsterundermystairs]

falk firebeard is a psychic. i just tried to pickpocket him. did not do the wolfskull cave quest, haven‘t even accepted it yet. but he has a letter referencing the cave and begging me to come back since i already took care of it once. even though i havn‘t been near it

[elavoria]

testober 2020 prompt 31: villain

The Wolf Queen of Solitude, Potema! As seen during her summoning ritual in Skyrim~

[the-hoarse-bard]

As I was in the Blue Palace, I overheard Falk Firebeard, the local steward, talking with Jarl Elisif about strange lights and noises coming from a nearby cave. It seems they didn’t have many guards to spare, so I offered to take care of it for them. It was probably a bunch of necromancers up to no good, and I have a great track record with delivering those gross nerds a well deserved beatdown. Elisif seemed pleased with the idea, but Falk was less sure. He still accepted my offer, but also warned me to be careful. They had lost the last few men they sent.

I found the cave easily enough near the peak of Mount Kilkreath. The pair of animate skeletons guarding the entrance were a dead giveaway. Figures these kinds of shenanigans are going on right down the road from Merid-Nunda’s front door. You’d think she’d take care of it herself considering the proximity.

There was a draugr patrolling the passageway down from the mouth of the cave. I hid on a nearby ledge, waited for it to pass by and dropped down behind it, beheading the wight with Dawnbreaker. I was very much expecting undead, but if the necromancers down here are making draugr, they must be up to something on another level.

The passageway lead down to a room with a door and a campfire off to the left of the entrance. There were two necromancers apparently warming themselves by the fire. I crept up behind them and planted a dagger in ones back, managing to cover his mouth before he could alert the other, leaving me to give the other one a stab through the back of his neck.

I took a moment to examine the table near the fire and found some rather odd items, even as necromancers go. There was a spell tome detailing a strange magic by which a mage could transmute their blood into magicka, which is.... A bit grim, but definitely sounds like something that could come in handy. The tome also warned that death by use of this spell was a very real possibility.

As for the note, it had a segment of a poem on it. Something about a Bosmer and an Orc plotting to kill a queen by poisoning her drink at a party. Certainly seems like the kind of thing necromancers would be into, but I didn’t take them for the artsy type. The excerpt piqued my interest, so I held onto it. Maybe I could use the fragment to track down the rest of it some time.

The room through the door contained a pair of draugr and another necromancer, I could smell them through the door. I was able to slip in and get the drop on the necromancer, but not without alerting the draugr. I summoned Lucien to even the odds. One of the draugr focused on him with a frost spell, which didn’t do much considering Lucien’s spectral form. The other wielded a great axe, making him easy prey for me. I struck him down right as Lucien finished off the magic using one.

Then we were left with the only path onwards. A hole in the floor. Lucien gestured for me to go first. I leapt down onto one of the outcroppings in the wall of the hole first to avoid hurting myself, and then dropped down onto the ground below. Lucien attempted the same thing, but ended up slipping off the outcropping, landing in front of me on his face. He managed to not dispel from the fall, remarkably, and we pressed onward.

In the next chamber, it was plain to see that something very not good was going on. Big orbs of power are never a good thing, especially coupled with the ominous chanting. There was a single necromancer on the path down to the main floor of the cavern. She was facing away from the door, so it was easy to off her with a dagger to the back. As I was looking through her pockets, I found a black soul gem. I’d heard of these nasty things. Soul gems purposefully corrupted to hold the souls of sentient beings. A tragic and horrible fate, and a terrible thing, but I held on to it. Give one of these creeps a taste of their own medicine.

From the floor of the cavern, it was clear the structure the orb was on top of was some kind of fortress of clearly Imperial construction. Lucien kicked a shovel as we were ascending the steps. The chanting stopped, and we heard a shout from where the orb sat, “Intruders! Don’t let them stop the ritual!” I cursed at Lucien, the wafiit, and readied myself for battle. We rushed for the top as fast as we could. Three necromancers stood before the door to the top of the tower. One summoned a spectral troll, one cast an armor spell and unsheathed a wicked looking dagger, and the last brandished a staff at us. I dodged a tackle from the spectral troll and leapt upon the one who summoned it, as Lucien attacked the one with the staff. I slashed the summoners throat open as Lucien finally wrested the staff from its owners hands, and channeled its magic, encasing the former master in ice. Then we both turned to the dagger wielder, who suddenly looked a lot less brave. He fled before we could do anything to him, one of the ones performing the ritual, a woman this time, shouting down at him, calling him a fool and a coward.

We rushed through the door and up the spiral staircase to the top of the tower. All three of the necromancers channeling their power into the ritual seemed frozen in place, but the woman looked at me, merely saying, “Crap.” I ran them through one by one, the woman just rattling off obscenities at an impressive rate until I finally got to her, taking extra care to use my soul trapping dagger on her. As she fell dead, and her soul was siphoned into the soul gem, the orb of energy seemed to destabilize and break apart. Satisfied, I turned my attention to the large chest nearby to see what kind of treasures were within.

Not much was of interest except for another very weird spell tome. The spell in this one was even more grim than the last. Its intended effect is to teleport the victims heart out of its body, but even if it fails, it causes pretty nasty internal bleeding. I’ll take it, but I don’t see myself using it often... It’s just kind of gross and overly cruel, but that’s probably why it’s in the hands of necromancers.

I returned to Falk and informed him of what I had found in there, I had overheard the name “Potema” during the ritual and that seemed to shock him. He said Potema was one of the worst tyrants to ever rule Skyrim. The very cause of the War of the Red Diamond when she and her husband seized the throne. He was very relieved to hear I stopped the resurrection, and paid me a handsome sum as thanks. If Queen Potema had returned in the midst of the civil war, that could have been disaster for all involved. He also bade me not to tell anyone so as not to raise a panic, and I told him my lips were sealed. He thanked me and I set off for Riften to tell Delvin of the day I had.

[rodyasadventures]

Wolfskull cave//Wolfsschädelhöhle

[a-sunflower-in-skyrim]

So I have no idea what just happened. I was in Wolfskull Cave for The Man Who Cried Wolf. I was on my way up to the top of the tower where the ritual was being performed. But right before I even got to the bottom of the tower, the Ritual Master says something about an intruder. Then a minute later, the purple glow leaves, a glowing Draugr (???) comes running so I kill it, and then everyone else is just wandering around before seeing me and attacking. I've never had that happen before, but I'm assuming it was some kind of glitch?

[skyrim-landscapes-blog]