User blog:Psychomantis108/Daggerfall: Chapter 20 - Bane of The Worm King

' A:N '' Due to an error in the game, I’ve incorrectly labelled Morgiah as a Breton, she is actually a Dark Elf. '''

''' Yeah, I’m an idiot for not seeing the obvious Dark Elf there, when looking at that tanned woman, who's ears are covered up by her long hair. :< '''

''' Anyway, I’m retconning her race. Sorry to do this, I try to avoid shit like this but in fairness, this is more of a fuck up by the developers than myself as she’s Barenziah’s Daughter. '''

 Her Dunmer Form is only available through an unofficial patch, so yeah, Beth buggered up again. ^.^   

Agatha considered the possibilities, way back at the start of all of this...

She wondered if Mannimarco could still exist and yet, like any boogieman, she deemed it impossible.

He was left at Molag Bal’s Mercy... How on earth could anyone survive that? Does that mean that he hates her more than ever?

Probably not, she considered the possibility that the family feud was somewhat one sided but being tortured for years, possibly even centuries, isn’t exactly something you can forget. The way he looked at her... he didn’t know, hopefully not, how could he know?

Agatha’s trail of thought, a trail that resembled an infinity symbol was interrupted as she tripped. She scowled in irritation a stubborn rock refused to move as her toe struck it. She fell forward, taking two or three steps before turning back and examining the culprit. Unfortunately, they all looked the same and she couldn’t tell which one it was.

<span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">Not that it mattered, it’s not like she could hurt it or anything. She needed to learn curses for this very reason, it was the only way that she could get back at random inanimate objects that tried to break her toes.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">“Careful Ags, don’t want to have to carry you back to the Guildhall.” Dodger pointed out, prompting Urzoga to laugh a little.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">“Glad to see some things don’t change.” The Bandit Queen admitted, with a faint smirk.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">This got a small sigh out of the Breton, only because it was true. Today proved that if nothing else...

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">“Erm... You okay?” Dodger decided to ask, honestly not knowing at this point.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">“You’ve been... Quiet...”

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">“Yeah...” Agatha sighed, though she wasn’t exactly convincing.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">“No... I’m... I’m not.” She finally admitted, glancing up to Dodger, with eyes glistening.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">“I saw him, it was actually Mannimarco!”

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">“Wait, you know him?” Urzoga asked, seeming just as confused as everyone else at this point.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">“Friend of yours from the Guild?”

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">“N-No... He’s my family’s sworn enemy. The King of Worms, the bringer of the Plane Meld, back in the second Era.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">It was him, it couldn’t be anyone else!”

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">“Well, he is an Altmer, so... He could’ve lived that long...” Dodger pointed out, she was aware that his kind lived for a long time...

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">“He should be dead.” Agatha countered, noticing the outskirts of the City.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">“N-No... It should be worse than death for him, he should be being tortured in Coldharbour right now.”

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">“Wait, I thought it was just your family, that pissed off Molag Bal.” Dodger pointed out as they came up to the gate.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">“We did but so did Mannimarco, he wasn’t faithful to Bal and believed that he could outsmart him and steal his mantle. Needless to say, it didn’t exactly work and Molag Bal didn’t take the trespass too lightly.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">Verran... Had a chance to free him at one point but left him to die. I guess he figured it was what he deserved after all that he’d put the world through. What he’d put Verran and everyone who came after him through.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">I wish he’d killed him instead... Saved the future from him, maybe he thought leaving him there would kill him or... maybe he figured that he couldn’t possibly escape. <p class="MsoNormal" style="border:none;mso-border-bottom-alt:solid windowtext .75pt; padding:0cm;mso-padding-alt:0cm 0cm 1.0pt 0cm"><span style="font-size:12.0pt; line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">Regardless... He was wrong.” <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">It was all so perfectly set up, the plane meld, the removal of one prince and the birth of another. All of it built up to a single moment of hesitation, a simple mistake, a zig instead of a zag. He had underestimated the Five Companions, that twisted fool Varen Aquilarios and that weasel, Abnur Tharn.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">Though the ones he underestimated most were the vestiges, the many escapees from his mass sacrifice, that managed to overpower him and have him subdued. Iron clasps gripped his wrists and ankles, pinning them to the stone surface, that Molag Bal had conjured to punish him.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">He was whisked away to this chamber, waiting for each surge of pain to shoot through him, making every nerve in his being feel like they were being attacked in every way possible. He felt winter’s kiss and the fires of the Deadlands at the same time, he felt the pain of a thousand serrated knives sliding in and out of his stomach, his organs failed, one by one and his heart remained still the whole time.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">Every tendon felt stretched to breaking point, every bone felt like it was fracturing, he could feel his blood bubbling and going black inside him.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">Yet, nothing was happening. He felt this pain but none of it was physically happening to him. He felt anguish through the power of the Daedric torture device, that held him bound and for few seconds its energies surged through him, forcing him to face it again and again on repeat until he either died or was finally granted some form of mercy.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">Honestly, equally were just as likely, given that the torture device was designed to keep him alive, so that he could experience every agonizing second for all eternity.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">Through his blurring gaze, he noticed a figure moving towards him, staff drawn at the ready. This prompting him to struggle, for a brief moment, hoping to free himself and save him the embarrassment of the pain and misery of having this moment of helplessness shown to his enemy.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">“Mannimarco... Fitting that it is you, lay on the table, no?” Verran asked, stepping up to the table and revealing himself to the light. He was a little paler than last time Mannimarco saw him, given that the effects of his connection to Coldharbour were starting to affect his appearance. It wouldn’t be long now, until his skin turned grey and the energy inside him cracked through it.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">He had been assured that this would have no effect on his mind, though he realised that the world around him will react accordingly.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">He had several pieces of armour cobbled together from whatever he could find. Back then, Verran had to just take what he could get to keep himself well protected. As a result, he often looked a little mismatched, sporting a mix of Deadric, Dwarven and Breton armours.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">“You! Come to gloat at my torment? Or is your appearance here a part of it? You insipid bastard!” Mannimarco’s rants were cut short by another surge shooting through him, causing him to wince before crying out in pain.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">Verran looked him over, in all honesty, he was surprised that Molag Bal hadn’t just stepped on him, like a cockroach.

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;line-height:107%;mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Calibri;mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-language:EN-GB">“You’re still alive, I see…”

<p class="MsoNormal"> “I am neither dead nor alive.” He was cut off, by another surge, striking through his body. It was like an hour’s worth of torment hit him again and again, every few seconds.

<p class="MsoNormal"> “I am trapped in a gout of ash and bile and swirling vapours. My ears are filled with the screams of a thousand nails being drawn. The Pain! The Pain is endless.”

<p class="MsoNormal"> “Why not just kill you and be done with it? Why is Molag Bal keeping you here?” Verran pointed out, somewhat bitterly as he leant over the Altmer, staring him down.

<p class="MsoNormal"> “I am his plaything. An abject lesson to others who would thwart him. My plan was flawless. My machinations were executed to perfection. I would have been a god, if not for you.”

<p class="MsoNormal"> “Did you honestly you’d succeed, after destroying so many lives? How many people, sacrificed had families? Even if none of us came back, your callous actions would’ve inspired someone to thwart you eventually.

<p class="MsoNormal"> I’d call this poetic justice, were it not barbaric overkill.”

<p class="MsoNormal"> “Y-You aren’t safe, Tira…

<p class="MsoNormal"> You think… You can.” Mannimarco was cut off again, by another surge. His shrieks almost made Verran recoil, his desire to not show weakness to his enemy was the only thing that prevented him from doing so.

<p class="MsoNormal"> “You… Your children… Their children… None of you will know safety again!” Mannimarco hissed, managing to suppress his desire to scream as the pain surged through him, his eyes widened as he intensely stared into the elder Breton’s eyes.

<p class="MsoNormal"> “H-Hear me now… If I get out of here, I’ll make sure to make. Hrgh!” His fingers curled up as he took on another wave of pain, his fingernails were destroyed as they snapped against the rock.

<p class="MsoNormal"> “M-M-Make them know nothing but fear and despair! My consolation in all of this? The one thing that keeps me… S-sane. Knowing that you will know this pain, soon enough.”

<p class="MsoNormal"> “Unlikely. I’m here to defeat him and reclaim my soul.

<p class="MsoNormal"> Unlike you, I’ve been building bridges, rather than burn them.” Verran shrugged, indifferently, putting his hands behind his back.

<p class="MsoNormal"> “Arrogant, presumptuous, egotistical twaddle! That bit of costume jewellery is nothing compared to the master’s power.” Mannimarco grinned, throwing his head back as another wave of pain coursed through him.

<p class="MsoNormal"> “I expect I’ll be seeing you soon. My only joy for the rest of eternity… Hearing your tortured screams!”

<p class="MsoNormal"> “Such a sad existence, you now lead.” Verran sighed, satisfied.

<p class="MsoNormal"> “You know, I could free you from it.” He added, examining the table. There was a rather easy release latch to disable to device. Possibly part of the torment, knowing how easy it would be to be freed and yet finding yourself unable to do so.

<p class="MsoNormal"> “After all that’s transpired?” Mannimarco scoffed.

<p class="MsoNormal"> “I killed you, you simpleton. I saw your life gutter and fade like a candle flame in a tempest. My undead servants drank your blood and I reanimated your corpse.

<p class="MsoNormal"> Do not taunt me with such hilarity.”

<p class="MsoNormal"> “Hmm… Well, I did say that I could, not that I would.” Verran pointed out, with an indifferent shrug.

<p class="MsoNormal"> “I was hoping for a better pitch, though it must be hard to bargain for a life, that is truly worthless. I can only hope that you come out a better person at the end of all of this. For both of our sakes.”

<p class="MsoNormal"> With that, Verran turned away, deciding that he had nothing further to give Mannimarco, he marched off into the darkness, ready to face destiny.