Chasing the Beast

This roleplay will mostly play on the island of Vvardenfell, so if you played Morrowind you should know a great part of the game's settings. For further information I suggest the Imperial Library (http://til.gamingsource.net/) as it is pretty much the biggest source of The Elder Scrolls lore.

It's an open roleplay, meaning anyone is allowed to join, even while the story processed assuming you make it plausable for your character to join at that point. It would be most convenient if you create a little personalia for your character with his age, physical appearance, past and stuff like this. Doesn't have to be whole essay, just a line or 10 would be okay. If you PM me your personalie, I'll put it up this first post, so we'll have all personalia together for a nice overview. I'll post mine when I have a bit more time on my hands (hopefully later today).

Other than that, play nice, have fun, don't 'auto' (take control of another character's actions) and stuff. I'll act as a kind of GM/DM (apart from the fact I never done such a thing), but if you have ideas/think you can do better, please DO send me a PM!

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Finally, after all these months, the monster had nowhere to go. The mansion it had chosen as its last resort was surrounded on three sides by Ebonheart city guards, and on the last side by the cliffs. Sure, it could jump to its death, but Syarda Ralen knew that it would rather die a honourable death. It was mad, not stupid.

Once, the creature that was now called ‘Dare’ had been an Orc chieftain, a rebel, and a pest to the Orc king. He was chased out of Orsinium and he fled further eastwards together with a few loyal followers. The Orcs of Orsinium had giving him his nickname ‘Dare’ because he was the only one who had the guts to revolt against the Orc king Gortwog. He travelled out of High Rock and reached the Reach, the western barrens of Skyrim. Meanwhile, he had gathered a small army of rogue Orcs and he was planning on attacking his former king after he got settled in Skyrim. Several local rulers, including the king of Solitude, had no interest in a war between Orcs, and just wanted an Orc-free Reach (as its passes formed the only connection between Skyrim and the provinces of High Rock and Hammerfell. The king of Solitude send an army to Dare’s encampment and demanded the Orcs should head back to High Rock. When they refused, the Skyrim armies attacked the outnumbered Orcs and they were forced to flee deeper into the mountains. Dare, however, managed to escape the onslaught and fled further east with only a few other subjects. When the king of Solitude heard of Dare’s flight, he put a large bounty on his head, and soon a whole army of bounty hunters travelled around south and western Skyrim.

Syarda Ralen had quickly found his trail, and she learned that Dare quickly travelled even further east. While others were searching central Skyrim, Syarda chased Dare into the Velothi Mountains. Though she was the best tracker and traveller in the Eastern Provinces (or so she claimed), she had trouble keeping up with the Orc. She managed to kill his remaining servants, but Dare always slipped away, clearly on the run. Syarda wondered why in Oblivion’s name he would go though so much trouble, as there was nobody to help him anyway and he would never be able to escape her. After weeks, she stumbled upon an abandoned mine which he had used as a sanctuary. There she found two other bounty hunters, Morrowind locals she had known dead… or rather ripped apart, and there she learned the reason why Dare had apparently became mad. The Orc had been infested with corpus disease, the terrible, incurable disease which transforms the bearer in a mad pile of meat. Syarda quickened her pace, as no one could tell what a mad corpus beast could do in the densely populated valleys of Morrowind. His nickname ‘Dare’ would get a new meaning, as no one would want to get near him.

But now she had got him. He made a grave mistake by taking this one-way path to the abandoned mansion on the cliffs just outside Old Ebonheart. The town militia had been called to make sure the beast wouldn’t escape if Syarda Ralen would fail to slay him. This was no longer about bounty; it was also about the safety of Old Ebonheart, and the rest of Morrowind. Syarda gestured to the militia to stay put and prepare themselves. She hung her short sword on her belt and prepared her crossbow. Then, she put a handful of enchanted silver bolts in her small quiver. She looked back and waved at the guard captain. “Wish me luck”, she mumbled, as the entered the run-down mansion.

The hallway of the mansion was dark, even though it was pretty nice weather outside. The rooms connected to the entrance also gained a minimum of sunlight from the closed blindings. Spider webs covered large portions of the walls and the ceiling. It smelled very stuffy inside, and Syarda believed it smelled like rat disposals. According to the guard captain, the mansion was uninhabited for at least three decades. She heard the cracking of wood in another room, and held her crossbow more tightly. More wood cracked, it was as if someone was ripping the wooden panels from the wall. Syarda wouldn’t be surprised if that was actually the case. Then the noise stopped. She held her breath.

“What’s wrong, little Miss Ralen? Did my little redecoration spree scare you?” A voice cracked. Although she never heard him speak, Syarda was sure that was Dare. He sure sounded pretty Orcish for a corpus monster. “Dare, are you there? I have come to end your suffering”. Silence for a second, followed by the strangest kind of laughter she had ever heard. It sounded like someone was coughing very quickly. “Don’t make me laugh, little Miss Ralen. It’s bad for my corpus lobes”. “Right”, Syarda said with a smile. She held the trigger of crossbow and began to guess in which room Dare was hiding. “I’m serious, miss Ralen. I need no help. The Devine Disease brought me more help then I bargained for. Immortality, strength and a connection to the Heart of Lorkhan – the Fallen God”. “Sounds like the rambling of a madman, Dare”. Syarda kicked open one of the doors. Nothing. “It might sound like mad rambling to you, mortal, but I am a Daedra now! A half-god!” “A peon to Sheogorath, the Prince of Madness perhaps. No Daedra and certainly no half-god. A bunch of wild flesh, that’s what you are”. Syarda kicked open another door, but that room behind it wasn’t hiding any corpus beasts either. Then the door behind her blasted open and the ten foot titan revealed himself.

Dare certainly was massive. Whereas normal Orcs were only slightly taller then Dunmer, this transformed creature was at least a half time bigger then Syarda, and she was no small Dunmer. His skin had been dark green once, but now it had became a strange mix of light green and grey, with light pink where corpus flesh had already replaced the authentic flesh. Dare had no neck… in fact, it seemed his head was immediately connected to his body by a big lump of pink corpus meat. His arms seemed disfigured as well, as they were twice as broad and his fingers looked more like tentacles. His face looked unchanged for most part, apart from the large corpus swelling behind his right ear. Dare carried a think rusty iron pipe in both hands as a weapon. It vigorously switched hands, apparently to show Syarda the potency of a simple iron pipe. Then he grabbed it with both hands and whacked it towards his opponent. Syarda jumped back and kneeled down. The pipe smashed the door she had opened, and chips of wood flew all around. She quickly aimed and fired three silver bolts into Dare’s grotesque body. The creature screamed as the silver burned into the corpus flesh, but it seemed only to anger him more. He shouted as he charged towards Syarda, while waving around with the pipe. He had trouble aiming, it seemed. He splintered the closet Syarda had hid behind, and while the woodchips seemed to disorient him, she fired another two bolts. This time she managed to hit the corpus lobe on his head. “Raaah, twitttt”, Dare shouted, as he grabbed his lobe with one of his hands. The pipe was swung to the left and the right and Syarda barely managed to evade. When she shot a final bolt in his neck, Dare dropped the pipe and grabbed his corpus flesh with both hands, trying to rip it off him. Syarda dropped her crossbow and took her short sword off her belt.

Unarmed and in pain, Dare was much less threatening. Syarda had fought corpus beasts often enough to know their weaknesses, and one of them was silver. She prepared to stab the giant, but it continued to back away, into the other chamber. “Wouldn’t you want to know why I went here before you kill me?” Dare asked. His crackling voice showed no fear yet, and therefore Syarda remained on her guard. “Well, enlighten me Dare. Is it because I chased you here?” Dare smiled… or rather, Syarda assumed it was supposed to be a smile. She had never seen an Orc or a corpus beast smile. “Did you honestly think you chased me HERE!? To this god-forgotten Morrowind?” “Well, yeah, I guess I thought I did so”. “Well, you thought wrong. If you are really planning on slaying me, you might as well know I why I fled to Morrowind. You see, my peers are preparing something, something that would make us invincible!” Syarda was puzzled. “Who are those ‘we’?” Sure, there were plenty of other corpus monsters, but they were but pitiful souls who seemed unable to prepare anything worthwhile. Dare laughed again. “You’ll see, Syarda Ralen, you’ll see”. The next moment, something hard and heavy hit the back of her head, and she sank into the darkness of unconsciousness…

When Syarda came to, she noticed she was lying outside. There were two healers next to her, who apparently had tried to patch her up. What had happened? She had a major headache, so much was certain. She remembered she had been attacked from behind. Her memory seemed in tact… apart from why in oblivion she was lying outside. Had the militia stormed the mansion, and rescued her? She wanted to speak, but she noticed her throat hurt badly, so she didn’t. One of the healers saw she had regained conscience. He looked at her, and flapped his hand before her eyes. “Can you hear me?” Syarda nodded. “How do you feel?” The healer asked, but then he seamed to realize she couldn’t talk. “Never mind to talk. Your throat seemed to have been cut open. Don’t worry, it will heal in time”, he comforted her. Syarda Ralen nodded. “The guard captain is on his way. They have slain the beast… or rather; it seems it has slain itself”. The healer continued with a smile on his face. Then he turned away and began to search something in one of his many bags. The other healer stroked her hair. “This can hurt at first, but it will take the pain away”. Then he started draping a kind of brown fluid on her neck. It was stinging it bit at first, but then the pain disappeared nearly completely. “We will get it stitched when we are getting back to Ebonheart”, the second healer said. Then the guard captain arrived.

“The beast dragged you out of the mansion. We thought you were dead”, he said, while he sat next to her. “So we attacked, and it fled. It apparently forgot you, because it just dropped you, right here”. Dare, fleeing? True, the militia might outnumber him, but they were badly equipped, and Dare was surely strong enough to take at least a number of them. The guard captain smiled. “Then it just leaped off the cliffs, into his death”. “ Who…”, Syarda mumbled. “ Pretty sad, really. Just jumped off the cliffs. It’s a big, gory green and pink pudding now, really gross”. Syarda Ralen still couldn’t believe Dare wouldn’t fight his way out, but on the other side… falling to death seemed a much nicer death then being impaled by militia spears. “A healer is going to freeze Dare’s body so that it won’t decay, and then we’ll take it to the mage guild. I’ve heard they’re willing to buy is as studying material”. He laughed, and Syarda had to admit that picture was pretty disturbing as well. She tried to smile. Then the two healers determined she was ready for transport, and carried her off the hill.

She woke up and she fell a bit light in her head. When she looked around, she noticed she was lying in a large room with several beds standing against the wall. Syarda reasoned she was in the Ebonheart infirmary, as that was where the healers were supposed to take her. She remembered how she blacked out on the way there, after one of the healers said something about an ‘anesthetic’. Syarda Ralen looked around, and noticed the other beds were empty. A healer appeared from behind her. “How are you?” the woman asked. “I… I’m okay, I guess”. The woman nodded, and checked her forehead and her right arms, which appeared to be bandaged. “We healed your throat, but your arm appears to be broken. Heylon believed you might even have a few broken ribs”. She smiled. “Heylon’s the healer that brought you here”. “Right”, Syarda answered. As far as she could feel, her ribs were fine. Then again, she might still be under the influence of a painkiller. She didn’t feel her arm either, after all. “The guard captain, Martin, wishes to see you at the mage guild later. If your arm heals properly, you’re allowed out for an hour tomorrow morning”. Syarda smiled grimly. Guess the militia wanted a part of the bounty. Well, there was no point denying it. They did kill Dare, and also saved her life. The women held Syarda’s broken arm with both hands, and it became very warm for a second. Then she looked at her patient again, and showed a soft smile. Then Syarda blacked out again.

“Great you came at such short notice”, the guard captain said. His insignia said ‘Dayo Martin’, and he appeared to be at least partly Redguard. Syarda noticed this wasn’t the same man that had led the militias yesterday. He was probably that man’s superior. “I know why I’m here, I think”, Syarda said straight at the man’s face. “You want a part of the bounty”. The man nodded. “It wouldn’t be fair to claim all of the bounty, even though we did kill it. I mean, you, Miss Ralen, tracked it for months, and thus warned us for a great danger. Without you, he could have caused havoc upon our fair city”. Syarda nodded. “You can have half”. “I was thinking more about three quarters”. Syarda Ralen gasped, and vigorously looked at the man. “Right, sixty percent, and you’ll dispose of his body”. “The mage guild pays good money for corpus creatures, so I guess that’s a deal. I don’t feel the urge to disagree with you, Miss Ralen. Would you like to see the corpse?” Syarda shrugged, and she wanted to reject his offer as she didn’t thing her stomach could cope with a corpus beast. But then the beast was brought in. It was lying on a low cart, and it looked like a pile of pink meat that would smell like Oblivion hadn’t it been magically frozen. Then, something caught her eye. While holding her belly, she walked to the corpse and looked in its face. “This isn’t Dare!” Syarda yelled, somewhat panicking…

“Are you absolutely certain!?” the guard captain asked while the cart was brought out of sight. “Absolutely! This corpse had belonged to a human! If you don’t believe me, ask someone from the mage guild!” Syarda said with a loud voice. “I certainly will!” the guard captain replied, and he sounded pretty angry. He disappeared into the same room the corps laid. For a second, Syarda considered looking at the corps another time, but then quickly dismissed the idea in favor of her breakfast. A moment later, the captain came back, followed by an elder man with a plain wizard robe. A third man pushed the cart in again. The guard captain looked at Syarda for a split second, then focused on the mage, and pointed at the frozen corps. “This woman, she claims the corps has been human, not Orc”, he stated. Syarda guessed the mage had been informed earlier, because he immediately started investigating the corps. It took him about fifteen seconds, before he turned his face back to the captain. “Captain Martin, it’s a bit hard to say with this corps, as it’s frozen, and this certainly damaged some tissue and changed the skin colour. But… judging from the facial structure, this corpus corps hasn’t been an Orc”. The mage paused for a moment, and turned back to the corps. “See, captain, the facial structure is mostly smooth. Orc heads have a large jaw and extended eyebrow lobes, and when Orcs suffer from corpus, those characteristics won’t disappear… quite the opposite”. Both Syarda and Captain Martin held their breath as the mage continued his investigation. “As of such… I fear this corpus beast isn’t the monster Dare… but rather a human corpus sufferer, Breton if I’m not mistaking”. “But…” the captain started, “If this isn’t Dare… then who in Oblivion is this?” Syarda looked at him with a rather grim smile. “Captain Martin, I think a more important question is… if this isn’t Dare… where in Oblivion’s he is then…” a thought stroke her. “The mansion!”