Welcome back to Seb’s Journal of his adventures in Skyrim where I have the intention of doing ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING that the game has to offer. These articles will be of some of the best or most amusing experiences I have in the game and I will hopefully be coming out with them fairly regularly. If you are interested you can see where I left off last time here.
There have been a great many happenings in the world of Skyrim, mostly involving the completion of a lot of smaller quests and side quest chains which generally involve little of particular interest and only result in experience and a whole lot of new shit to sell to Belethor (who, by the way must hate me by now for taking all his gold every single time he gets some more). There were a few new experiences worth mentioning though, but right now I believe I will tell you the tale of how it is that I have now, after much strife and difficulty, managed to become the Archmage of the College of Winterhold.
I know right? Me! In a position of arcane authority! The people of Tamriel weep…
It was a long and interesting journey which involved travel to the Dwemer ruins of Mzulft (yes, yes it is a ridiculous name) trying to find the Synod. And yes, indeed, that IS yet ANOTHER mysterious and unknown magical organisation who everyone has heard about apart from me. Seriously… All these mysterious magical organisations just crawl out of the woodwork these days. Back in my day being recognized as an official magical organisation was a difficult task and involved at LEAST owning a gigantic tower in the middle of a city.
Whoever these Synod fools are they certainly didn’t fill me with any hope for the standard of magic in Tamriel these days. Mere seconds after entering the ruins I find one of the poor sods dying on the entrance stairs. I somehow know that his name is Gavros Plinius and am able to just stand there and watch him die as he mentions some stolen crystal. Well, that’s clearly going to be important somehow… Oh well… better loot the poor bastard! But he doesn’t drop anything of any particular interest except his journal which I leaf through quickly. Apparently he messed up with the previous crystal and had to go back to his superiors. Only to come back and get brutally murdered? Unlucky if you ask me.
I shrug off my amusement (and the guilt I feel at feeling amusement) of the poor Imperial’s predicament and head off into the ruins. Clearing them is mostly child’s play. The Dwarves did indeed work wonders with their spiders and their spheres but they mostly fall easily beneath fire and Skyforged axe and Thu’um. One or two encounters do prove slightly more challenging, usually in cases where there are actually several of the little Dwarven bastards. Two particularly hard fights are worth mentioning though, one against a Master Sphere which is a fair few levels higher than myself, luckily though fighting it involved running around a podium and shooting firebolts in it’s smug little face as it tried, and failed to catch me. The other fight was actually against a Chaurus Reaper, a creature almost certainly not intended to be there by the Dwarves. Ironic really, one of the hardest fights in some massive Dwemer ruins was actually by something not intended to be there, not a great result if you ask me for the Dwarven engineers.
Eventually I manage to hack my way to the ONE remaining survivor. He is, naturally, less than grateful for me saving his worthless hide, but I manage to force myself to be civil and he proceeds to reveal the location of the Staff of Magnus, which was what I was coming here for in the first place. I continue to be civil, even though he seems to be dying to have me beat some sense into him (pun intended) and leave without looking back. I then proceed to come back the next day to finish looting the stupid place… I swear there was SOOO much heavy crap in their it’s not even funny…
Armed with empty bags and new information I head back to the College only to discover that the grand-fuckwit himself, That-Bastard-Ancano, has started to mess around with the Eye of Magnus and is surrounded by an impenetrable shield. I rush off to secure the grounds, which is supposed to involve fighting a number of magical anomalies alongside the other mages but was made more difficult by the sudden arrival of a dragon right on top of the College. I proceed to kill absolutely everything, Orc berserk is an ability which results in just ridiculous damage, and then head back to That-Bastard-Ancano.
Somehow he manages to kill the Archmage and hits some of the other mages including myself with massive power, almost certainly being drawn from the Eye of Magnus, which he is channeling continuously. I discover that my Thu’um can pass through the magical shield but then also passes through That-Bastard-Ancano. Well… Fuck that shit! I’m about to leave That-Bastard-Ancano to his well deserved fate (because he’s clearly going to blow himself up like this) but I am intercepted by some of the other mages insisting that I have to go and retrieve the Staff of Magnus. Well, luckily I know where THAT is! Labyrinthian! Hah! And also, coincidentally the Archmage apparently had a Torc of Labyrinthian… Well… That’s a bit odd… But okay! And so, just like that, I have to go and grab the Staff of Magnus. And yes… This whole exchange took about 10 minutes, nobody even seemed that bothered by Savos Aren’s death… I know that I wasn’t!
Labyrinthian proved to be a bit more challenging than Mzulft. Ice-trolls, an undead dragon, an absolute fuck-tonne of skeletons and draugr and then to top it off the Staff was guarded by one of those ridiculously difficult Dragon Priests. There were also a number of ghostly apparitions which I worked out were the late Archmage and some colleagues of his. Unfortunately due to a glitch in the game, any dialogue and scripted scenes which occurred between the ghosts were somehow omitted from my game (which a simple reload WOULD have fixed) and so honestly I have literally no idea what happened there…
Whatevs!
I end up with the Staff of Magnus which apparently drains magic and then the life-force from it’s target. It sounds strong. I quickly learn it isn’t. On my way out another bloody Thalmor intercepts me and I’m forced to put him down. Seriously… These guys… Not the best first impression… AT ALL! The fight started off as quite difficult because my attempts to use the supposedly incredibly powerful Staff of Magnus seemed to do fuck all to the elf… Well… Nice to know that weapons of ultimate power aren’t actually all that powerful… I guess…
Getting back to the College and the fight with That-Bastard-Ancano was swifter and easier than I was expecting. The Staff made short work of his shield and indeed was the only thing which could damage That-Bastard-Ancano himself, but when I managed to blast my way to him he seemed to spend most of his efforts focusing other mages and only when his health was low did he finally decide that maybe attacking me was a good idea. Silly Ancano, you brought that axe in your face on yourself…
So That-Bastard-Ancano was slain and I stood upon his corpse the victor, allowing myself a grim smile of satisfaction. Too many had died at the hands of this mad-man and with nothing to show for it. The Psyjic Order appear swiftly from the Ether and take the orb away leaving me with the now empty and (probably) pointless Staff. It’s a sad and desolate scene, the College probably will take time to recover and mourn it’s losses.
Tolfdir comes up to me STRAIGHT AWAY and makes me Archmage on the spot. I frown at him in shock. The previous Archmage probably isn’t even buried yet. Almost certainly only cold in his grave because Winterhold is bloody freezing. Oh well! I shrug it off and swagger into my new apartments with all the awesome that is standard for me. Nothing really special, even my new robes and staff don’t really feel suiting of my situation but I’ll take them over nothing. I stand by the end of my bed with my hands on my hips, owner of all I survey.
It’s good to be the King baby!
P.s. That-Bastard-Ancano can suck it!
So Sabor has become the Archmage of Winterhold? Will he finally be given the respect and praise he deserves as not just the Dragonborn but also the savior of (probably) Skyrim. No? Well, there will be other chances for fame and loot later! Until next time friends!
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