I write this now in the two-hundredth and first year of the Fourth Era, one-thousand and ninety-nine years, two months and four days since I last stood upon Tamriel. To hold a quill again is a comfort, the sound of it scratching over parchment feels like an indescribable release because, finally, I can attempt to get some of my thoughts out of my head.
To whoever reads this journal, know my name is Doctor Alfidia Lupus, former Imperial Ethnographer for Potentate Savirien-Chorak, and I have returned from the chasm of madness.
The Build
Race
Etc
Etc
Etc
I don't even know where to start, can barely fathom where the beginning is anymore. Time was irrelevant in the places I went to, and my mind now feels forever fractured from the things I have seen. One-thousand and ninety-nine years seem too short a span for all that has happened and yet, now that I sit within a dimly-lit room in the Temple of the Divines in Solitude, I am barley cognisant of their passage. I guess time is meaningless.
To try to start from something like a beginning, then: It was Divayth Fyr's betrayal and my desire to follow my friend, Morian Zenas, into Apocrypha. My last words written from that life were:
"Morian is gone. Gone to Apocrypha. Where he stays. And so I walk, from district to district. Wondering. What price had the Lord of Apocrypha named to Divayth Fyr? What price for the entrancement, the captivity of Morian Zenas? I walk the streets, the avenues and alleys. Wondering. Wondering when I, too, will be ready to pay the price."
As it turned out, I was ready all too soon. I remember the summoning ritual, can perfectly recall kneeling on the floor of my chamber in the Imperial City, and can vividly recollect opening that dreadful book. My thoughts become hazy then. I can see a black mist in my mind's eye now as I cast my thoughts back to a person who is no longer entirely me, and I hear a voice, Hermaeus Mora's voice, promising me I would see Professor Zenas again in return for my cooperation for a while. I should have known there and then "a while" is a relative concept. But I didn't, and no amount of wishes and regrets can undo that now.
You see, I was brought up a good Imperial girl from an affluent family in the Imperial City. Pure, pious, I never questioned my faith in the Eight. My education was paramount, my days spent studying all manner of subjects from mathematics to astronomy. It was anthropology and ethnology, though, that caught my passions. I relished learning about different peoples inhabiting the vast continent of Tamriel, and could clearly see in my imagination how all these peoples were guided and guarded by the Divines.
However, in Apocrypha where I gave Hermaeus Mora my cooperation, I started to see how wrong I was.
Alteration
Conjuration
Enchanting
One-Handed
Restoration
I was transported to an island of books within a sea of ink lit by a green sky. Apocrypha, the Daedric realm of Hermaeus Mora. A strange and alien place where Mora himself would periodically appear in the sky, a writhing ball of appendages each tipped with shifting eyes, looking for all the world like some great sea monster risen from the depths.
I called out, demanded to see Professor Zenas. Ha! "Demanded." As though I were in any position to make demands of a Prince. We spoke at length, and I was told my end of the deal first: My "cooperation for a while." That was the real beginning, and where I caught my first glimpse of the awful truth.
The eyes, once bleached by falling stars of utmost revelation, will forever see the faint insight drawn by the overwhelming question, as only the True Enquiry shapes the edge of thought. The rest is vulgar fiction, attempts to impose order on the consensus mantlings of an uncaring godhead. First...
Those words are forever etched upon my memory. I think Professor Zenas wrote them for they are so familiar it's as though I can hear his voice speak them. When I opened the book containing those words, revelations tumbled like falling stars, each one a staggering secret too quick for the mind to grasp hold of, and my eyes beheld the Starry Heart, Tamriel, as if I were standing an impossibly high distance above it. It became smaller and smaller like I was moving away, although it wasn't I that was moving but rather Nirn receding. The planets passed me next, and I was struck by how small and inconsequential they seemed. I felt their power, but only like the last radiant heat from a cooling fire.
The first stars passed by next, entire constellations in miniature, and then I was through the wall of our universe, a tiny, glittering bubble alone in the darkness. My eyes adjusted to this dark place, a void devoid of all colour rendering it black to the mortal eye. Other tiny globes of glittering matter appeared in that gloom until the void was studded with them. It became like looking at the night sky and seeing the firmament, each little sphere its own star speckling the blackness of the void, but too small and ineffectual at lighting the sheer size and magnitude of the darkness despite their numbers. Within that infinite moment, I would sometimes witness a far distant sphere, a different reality, grow darker until it was swallowed up by the night.
As I stood there I discovered the void wasn't a true void - it wasn't absent of everything. Things moved within it, ancient and vast sentiences with their own secret places. One such place travelled toward me, getting bigger and bigger while the tiny stars of distant realities receded to mere specks in the night. As it came closer I saw that it, too, was a small globe containing stars like my own, it had a similar planetary system but they were dead worlds like barren rocks lit by a dim diamond.
It came closer and I could see land masses upon its surface, mountains and dried-up seas. Closer still and I could see ruins, crumbling structures of alien minerals rising up from fossilised forests. My eyes focused upon a singular edifice, close enough now to float before it, a spire-like thing still standing while all its brothers had long since crumbled and fallen. I could see its surface and began to make out patterns crisscrossing it. Could it have been language? Written words carved onto its exterior? I couldn't tell, whatever it was was incomprehensibly alien to me. I couldn't concentrate on it more for, out the corner of my eyes, I caught glimpses of things that slithered.
My heartbeat quickened as I realised I wasn't alone on this dead planet, and I had no idea how to get back. The more my eyes darted this way and that, the more I saw. It wasn't many things but one massive thing with a multitude of limbs, something slumbering across the ruined landscape that I had just roused with my presence. It lifted what can only be described as its head, but not like any head of man, mer or beast. It was a bulbous cranium, remotely similar to those of squid or octopi, but yet utterly different in that it had no clear front or back, each angle as it swivelled to look upon me seemed to have numerous eyes and beaked maws. It rose up upon its countless, boneless limbs that covered the entire surface of the world, and I screamed.
Recommended Quests
The sound of slow, deep laughter punctuated my scream, and the familiar, green light of Apocrypha greeted me as I opened my eyes. Hermaeus Mora once again loomed above me, expressionless yet exhultant. I collapsed to my knees, sobbing, as my mind reeled. I couldn't comprehend the enormity of all I had seen, and the utter horror of that dead world, and the monstrous thing slumbering there, I feared, would haunt both my dreams and waking thoughts for the rest of my life.
At length I raised my head to regard the Daedra floating above me. "What..? Why..? What was that... Thing?" I had hoped to sound firm, but instead my voice trembled and my words came out as a hoarse whisper.
"That was exactly as you saw it. Name it whatever you wish, it will neither know nor care." Mora's voice was matter of fact in his low, somnolant delivery.
"It was real, then? Was what I saw real?" I replied, trepidation audible in my voice.
Hermaeus Mora was silent for a long moment, his eyes slowly blinking as he looked at me. At last he spoke, but quietly, almost a whisper. "Yes. In that reality, at least. Come now, Doctor Lupus. You have spent your life among the races of your world, have recorded their beliefs, their way of life. You know each has their own legends about their end. Why would it not be so for other places? In their hearts, in your heart, you know the truth: You know your gods are powerless against that which lurks in the darkness."
"I don't understand. Nothing makes sense. What do you even want with me? Just let me go home."
The Daedric Prince's voice was calm, but with an edge of impatience. "You're next task awaits if you are to be properly prepared. Perhaps in the next book you will find clarity and answers to your questions. My library contains all the answers. Read."
Before me appeared another tome, large and black like the first. I shrank back in fear, lothe now for any answers, unwilling and unable to want them. "No. Prepared for what? Not until you keep your promise. I want to see Professor Zenas."
"All in good time. I will keep my word, have no doubt. So say I, Hermaeus Mora, master of the tides of fate. Now. Read!" Mora seemed to grow in size until he filled the entire sky, his voice echoing like a mighty wave against rocks.
The book flew open, and black mist reached out to entrap me. With a gasp, I felt myself pulled into its pages.
"Long, long ago, before there were any people at all; even before the gods, Tamriel was chosen as a battleground by two -- things. It is difficult to find words that fit them well. I call them the Light and the Dark. Others use different names. Good and Evil, Bird and Serpent, Order and Chaos. None of these names really apply. It suffices that they are opposites, and totally antithetical. Neither is really good or evil, as we know the words. They are immortal since they do not really live, but they do exist. Even the gods and their daedric enemies are pale reflections of the eternal conflict between them. It's as though their struggle creates energies that distort their surroundings, and those energies are so powerful that life can appear, like an eddy in a stream..."
Once again I found myself an observer, but the scene before me now was one of tranquility and beauty. Gently rolling hills, well-kept woods, and an afternoon sun over a quaint village. It was spring, swallows darted through the air, and the scent of flowers carried on the warm breeze. Sounds of life met my ears - children at play, a gently meandering stream, the distant chatter of folks at the market, and my anxiety slowly slipped away. It all felt familiar, and I found myself thinking about returning home to prepare the evening meal, draw water from the well, and buy a fresh loaf from the bakery. I was vaguely aware these thoughts were not my own but rather belonged to someone else, yet they felt so natural and so like my own that I had no resistance to offer. As I turned to head back to the village, I caught sight of an old man sitting upon a rock, two children sitting crossed-legged below him. His voice was strong despite his age, and it was clear from his words he was telling the children a tale.
"Therein lies the danger; to most of us the Light is more congenial, even inspiring, and moves us to behavior that we would call good. To creatures like us, the Dark is -- horrible. Those who have visions of it are often driven mad, and the ones who are not would be better dead. The Dark is to us a monstrous emptiness, an emptiness that sucks the soul toward it -- to be twisted, maimed, and ultimately destroyed. What we can see of it seems utterly evil. Perhaps somewhere else this would not be so, but in our world, it is."
The old man paused to gather his thoughts, gazing once more at the fresh new life of spring.
"What we must do is never to forget that the Dark is always there, beckoning to the weak-souled among us. Should it gain ascendancy over Tamriel, through agents perverted by its awful attraction, terrible things could happen. All that we hold beautiful or desirable, even love itself, would be swept away. Peace and hope would be no more. For Tamriel, that would be the worst possible disaster. The forces of the Dark are on the march again, and new heroes must rise to join the..."
The old man stopped speaking abruptly right then as a cacophany of screams arose from the village, a sound of absolute terror vocalised by all the inhabitants. Leaping to his feet, his mouth open in stunned alarm, he pointed to something in the sky. I looked up, and there above the village, I beheld what appeared to be a tear, a rip in the heavens. The blue sky with its puffy, white clouds had been rent assunder, appearing like a painting being gashed with a blade. The flaps of sky curled downwards and inwards as the rip grew larger and longer, now reaching from horizon to horizon and widening each passing second. Through the tear I could see light, but not a healthy radiance, more like that of coal after a long fire, black with a red and orange glow. It was a deep darkness, nightmarish and shot through with lightning bolts of green and blue, and from it a force could be felt. At first it was weak, but gaining in strength each moment, a repulsive force pushing against me. pushing against the sky, and against the entire world. And then it was all over. With a last wail of utter dread, the sky ripped apart and the world was swallowed by the dark.
Aeons passed in seconds within that roiling sea of fire and lightning, a maelstrom of destruction whirling around me though leaving me unharmed. I witnessed the planets shredded and blown into the Aurbis, while the world burned leaving nothing but ash. Watching the constellations wink out one star at a time, I found myself standing upon the well-cooled cinder that was once Nirn, gazing out at a slowly fading sun, and trying to recall the vanished brilliance of the origin of the worlds. And I wept.
Gameplay
Gradually the familiar green glow of Apocrypha replaced the ash, fire and tumultuous skies over a dead Nirn, and I slowly ceased sobbing. Hermaeus Mora once again floated above, regarding me with an unreadbale expression. I felt utterly crushed by the horror and inevitability of all I had seen, yet still confused as to why Mora kept subjecting me to such experiences. I stayed silent, however, and remained on my knees before the Daedric Prince, shoulders slumped and weary to the core.
After a long time listening to ambient sounds of apocrypha, the quiet rustling of pages and distant sounds of viscous liquid from the inky sea, Hermaeus Mora spoke. "You are almost ready to become my champion, you have done well. It is time you met an old friend."
I jumped to my feet, elation replacing my fatigue. "Professor Zenas?"
"Yes, but be warned. His time in Apocrypha has... influenced him." Mora whispered.
Before my eyes there materialised a being, grotesque and terrible to behold, a hovering figure that looked vaguely humonoid and yet where legs should have been there were instaed a group of tentacles constantly writhing. Two pale, spindly arms extended from ragged and dirty robes draping its mishapen form, but it was the creature's face which caused me to gasp and recoil. It was squid-like, but flattened and streteched, and tentacles extended from each side while yet more hung down from the region a chin should have been. More than anything, though, it was the creature's eyes that I found most disturbing. For gazing back at me were the familiar, brown orbs of Morian Zenas.
"Morian...? My gods. What has he done to you?" I don't know if I expected a reply, none were forthcoming. The creature that was once Professor Zenas just blinked at me before turning to float away to a nearby stack of books.
I turned to Hermaues Mora. "You monster."
The Daedric Prince laughed then, a hissing and sibiliant sound at first before it deepened in pitch to a booming thunderous sound. "Come now Doctor Lupus. You have seen that which you needed to see, you know there are far worse terrors than I. All I have done is that which is needed, and I - indeed, the entire world - need a champion before all that is left of everything you hold dear is but a barren, lifeless rock adrfit in a sea of nothing. Be the one the world needs, be my champion, and all the knowledge I have is yours. When we next meet, Professor Zenas will be yours to summon at will. Time spent back in your world may well be good for him"
I am not sure now as I write these last paragraphs whether I ever had any choice or whether the Lord of the Tides of Fate had set an inescapable path before me but, for the second time, I agreed to Mora's bargain. I came here for Morian Zenas, and I won't abandon him yet. Not while there is still hope. So I closed my eyes with a sigh, and nodded.
I write this now in the two-hundredth and first year of the Fourth Era, one-thousand and ninety-nine years, two months and four days since I last stood upon Tamriel. To hold a quill again is a comfort, the sound of it scratching over parchment feels like an indescribable release because, finally, I can attempt to get some of my thoughts out of my head.
To whoever reads this journal, know my name is Doctor Alfidia Lupus, former Imperial Ethnographer for Potentate Savirien-Chorak, and I have returned from the chasm of madness.
The Build
Race
Etc
Etc
Etc
I don't even know where to start, can barely fathom where the beginning is anymore. Time was irrelevant in the places I went to, and my mind now feels forever fractured from the things I have seen. One-thousand and ninety-nine years seem too short a span for all that has happened and yet, now that I sit within a dimly-lit room in the Temple of the Divines in Solitude, I am barley cognisant of their passage. I guess time is meaningless.
To try to start from something like a beginning, then: It was Divayth Fyr's betrayal and my desire to follow my friend, Morian Zenas, into Apocrypha. My last words written from that life were:
"Morian is gone. Gone to Apocrypha. Where he stays. And so I walk, from district to district. Wondering. What price had the Lord of Apocrypha named to Divayth Fyr? What price for the entrancement, the captivity of Morian Zenas? I walk the streets, the avenues and alleys. Wondering. Wondering when I, too, will be ready to pay the price."
As it turned out, I was ready all too soon. I remember the summoning ritual, can perfectly recall kneeling on the floor of my chamber in the Imperial City, and can vividly recollect opening that dreadful book. My thoughts become hazy then. I can see a black mist in my mind's eye now as I cast my thoughts back to a person who is no longer entirely me, and I hear a voice, Hermaeus Mora's voice, promising me I would see Professor Zenas again in return for my cooperation for a while. I should have known there and then "a while" is a relative concept. But I didn't, and no amount of wishes and regrets can undo that now.
You see, I was brought up a good Imperial girl from an affluent family in the Imperial City. Pure, pious, I never questioned my faith in the Eight. My education was paramount, my days spent studying all manner of subjects from mathematics to astronomy. It was anthropology and ethnology, though, that caught my passions. I relished learning about different peoples inhabiting the vast continent of Tamriel, and could clearly see in my imagination how all these peoples were guided and guarded by the Divines.
However, in Apocrypha where I gave Hermaeus Mora my cooperation, I started to see how wrong I was.
Alteration
Conjuration
Enchanting
One-Handed
Restoration
I was transported to an island of books within a sea of ink lit by a green sky. Apocrypha, the Daedric realm of Hermaeus Mora. A strange and alien place where Mora himself would periodically appear in the sky, a writhing ball of appendages each tipped with shifting eyes, looking for all the world like some great sea monster risen from the depths.
I called out, demanded to see Professor Zenas. Ha! "Demanded." As though I were in any position to make demands of a Prince. We spoke at length, and I was told my end of the deal first: My "cooperation for a while." That was the real beginning, and where I caught my first glimpse of the awful truth.
The eyes, once bleached by falling stars of utmost revelation, will forever see the faint insight drawn by the overwhelming question, as only the True Enquiry shapes the edge of thought. The rest is vulgar fiction, attempts to impose order on the consensus mantlings of an uncaring godhead. First...
Those words are forever etched upon my memory. I think Professor Zenas wrote them for they are so familiar it's as though I can hear his voice speak them. When I opened the book containing those words, revelations tumbled like falling stars, each one a staggering secret too quick for the mind to grasp hold of, and my eyes beheld the Starry Heart, Tamriel, as if I were standing an impossibly high distance above it. It became smaller and smaller like I was moving away, although it wasn't I that was moving but rather Nirn receding. The planets passed me next, and I was struck by how small and inconsequential they seemed. I felt their power, but only like the last radiant heat from a cooling fire.
The first stars passed by next, entire constellations in miniature, and then I was through the wall of our universe, a tiny, glittering bubble alone in the darkness. My eyes adjusted to this dark place, a void devoid of all colour rendering it black to the mortal eye. Other tiny globes of glittering matter appeared in that gloom until the void was studded with them. It became like looking at the night sky and seeing the firmament, each little sphere its own star speckling the blackness of the void, but too small and ineffectual at lighting the sheer size and magnitude of the darkness despite their numbers. Within that infinite moment, I would sometimes witness a far distant sphere, a different reality, grow darker until it was swallowed up by the night.
As I stood there I discovered the void wasn't a true void - it wasn't absent of everything. Things moved within it, ancient and vast sentiences with their own secret places. One such place travelled toward me, getting bigger and bigger while the tiny stars of distant realities receded to mere specks in the night. As it came closer I saw that it, too, was a small globe containing stars like my own, it had a similar planetary system but they were dead worlds like barren rocks lit by a dim diamond.
It came closer and I could see land masses upon its surface, mountains and dried-up seas. Closer still and I could see ruins, crumbling structures of alien minerals rising up from fossilised forests. My eyes focused upon a singular edifice, close enough now to float before it, a spire-like thing still standing while all its brothers had long since crumbled and fallen. I could see its surface and began to make out patterns crisscrossing it. Could it have been language? Written words carved onto its exterior? I couldn't tell, whatever it was was incomprehensibly alien to me. I couldn't concentrate on it more for, out the corner of my eyes, I caught glimpses of things that slithered.
My heartbeat quickened as I realised I wasn't alone on this dead planet, and I had no idea how to get back. The more my eyes darted this way and that, the more I saw. It wasn't many things but one massive thing with a multitude of limbs, something slumbering across the ruined landscape that I had just roused with my presence. It lifted what can only be described as its head, but not like any head of man, mer or beast. It was a bulbous cranium, remotely similar to those of squid or octopi, but yet utterly different in that it had no clear front or back, each angle as it swivelled to look upon me seemed to have numerous eyes and beaked maws. It rose up upon its countless, boneless limbs that covered the entire surface of the world, and I screamed.
Recommended Quests
The sound of slow, deep laughter punctuated my scream, and the familiar, green light of Apocrypha greeted me as I opened my eyes. Hermaeus Mora once again loomed above me, expressionless yet exhultant. I collapsed to my knees, sobbing, as my mind reeled. I couldn't comprehend the enormity of all I had seen, and the utter horror of that dead world, and the monstrous thing slumbering there, I feared, would haunt both my dreams and waking thoughts for the rest of my life.
At length I raised my head to regard the Daedra floating above me. "What..? Why..? What was that... Thing?" I had hoped to sound firm, but instead my voice trembled and my words came out as a hoarse whisper.
"That was exactly as you saw it. Name it whatever you wish, it will neither know nor care." Mora's voice was matter of fact in his low, somnolant delivery.
"It was real, then? Was what I saw real?" I replied, trepidation audible in my voice.
Hermaeus Mora was silent for a long moment, his eyes slowly blinking as he looked at me. At last he spoke, but quietly, almost a whisper. "Yes. In that reality, at least. Come now, Doctor Lupus. You have spent your life among the races of your world, have recorded their beliefs, their way of life. You know each has their own legends about their end. Why would it not be so for other places? In their hearts, in your heart, you know the truth: You know your gods are powerless against that which lurks in the darkness."
"I don't understand. Nothing makes sense. What do you even want with me? Just let me go home."
The Daedric Prince's voice was calm, but with an edge of impatience. "You're next task awaits if you are to be properly prepared. Perhaps in the next book you will find clarity and answers to your questions. My library contains all the answers. Read."
Before me appeared another tome, large and black like the first. I shrank back in fear, lothe now for any answers, unwilling and unable to want them. "No. Prepared for what? Not until you keep your promise. I want to see Professor Zenas."
"All in good time. I will keep my word, have no doubt. So say I, Hermaeus Mora, master of the tides of fate. Now. Read!" Mora seemed to grow in size until he filled the entire sky, his voice echoing like a mighty wave against rocks.
The book flew open, and black mist reached out to entrap me. With a gasp, I felt myself pulled into its pages.
"Long, long ago, before there were any people at all; even before the gods, Tamriel was chosen as a battleground by two -- things. It is difficult to find words that fit them well. I call them the Light and the Dark. Others use different names. Good and Evil, Bird and Serpent, Order and Chaos. None of these names really apply. It suffices that they are opposites, and totally antithetical. Neither is really good or evil, as we know the words. They are immortal since they do not really live, but they do exist. Even the gods and their daedric enemies are pale reflections of the eternal conflict between them. It's as though their struggle creates energies that distort their surroundings, and those energies are so powerful that life can appear, like an eddy in a stream..."
Once again I found myself an observer, but the scene before me now was one of tranquility and beauty. Gently rolling hills, well-kept woods, and an afternoon sun over a quaint village. It was spring, swallows darted through the air, and the scent of flowers carried on the warm breeze. Sounds of life met my ears - children at play, a gently meandering stream, the distant chatter of folks at the market, and my anxiety slowly slipped away. It all felt familiar, and I found myself thinking about returning home to prepare the evening meal, draw water from the well, and buy a fresh loaf from the bakery. I was vaguely aware these thoughts were not my own but rather belonged to someone else, yet they felt so natural and so like my own that I had no resistance to offer. As I turned to head back to the village, I caught sight of an old man sitting upon a rock, two children sitting crossed-legged below him. His voice was strong despite his age, and it was clear from his words he was telling the children a tale.
"Therein lies the danger; to most of us the Light is more congenial, even inspiring, and moves us to behavior that we would call good. To creatures like us, the Dark is -- horrible. Those who have visions of it are often driven mad, and the ones who are not would be better dead. The Dark is to us a monstrous emptiness, an emptiness that sucks the soul toward it -- to be twisted, maimed, and ultimately destroyed. What we can see of it seems utterly evil. Perhaps somewhere else this would not be so, but in our world, it is."
The old man paused to gather his thoughts, gazing once more at the fresh new life of spring.
"What we must do is never to forget that the Dark is always there, beckoning to the weak-souled among us. Should it gain ascendancy over Tamriel, through agents perverted by its awful attraction, terrible things could happen. All that we hold beautiful or desirable, even love itself, would be swept away. Peace and hope would be no more. For Tamriel, that would be the worst possible disaster. The forces of the Dark are on the march again, and new heroes must rise to join the..."
The old man stopped speaking abruptly right then as a cacophany of screams arose from the village, a sound of absolute terror vocalised by all the inhabitants. Leaping to his feet, his mouth open in stunned alarm, he pointed to something in the sky. I looked up, and there above the village, I beheld what appeared to be a tear, a rip in the heavens. The blue sky with its puffy, white clouds had been rent assunder, appearing like a painting being gashed with a blade. The flaps of sky curled downwards and inwards as the rip grew larger and longer, now reaching from horizon to horizon and widening each passing second. Through the tear I could see light, but not a healthy radiance, more like that of coal after a long fire, black with a red and orange glow. It was a deep darkness, nightmarish and shot through with lightning bolts of green and blue, and from it a force could be felt. At first it was weak, but gaining in strength each moment, a repulsive force pushing against me. pushing against the sky, and against the entire world. And then it was all over. With a last wail of utter dread, the sky ripped apart and the world was swallowed by the dark.
Aeons passed in seconds within that roiling sea of fire and lightning, a maelstrom of destruction whirling around me though leaving me unharmed. I witnessed the planets shredded and blown into the Aurbis, while the world burned leaving nothing but ash. Watching the constellations wink out one star at a time, I found myself standing upon the well-cooled cinder that was once Nirn, gazing out at a slowly fading sun, and trying to recall the vanished brilliance of the origin of the worlds. And I wept.
Gameplay
Gradually the familiar green glow of Apocrypha replaced the ash, fire and tumultuous skies over a dead Nirn, and I slowly ceased sobbing. Hermaeus Mora once again floated above, regarding me with an unreadbale expression. I felt utterly crushed by the horror and inevitability of all I had seen, yet still confused as to why Mora kept subjecting me to such experiences. I stayed silent, however, and remained on my knees before the Daedric Prince, shoulders slumped and weary to the core.
After a long time listening to ambient sounds of apocrypha, the quiet rustling of pages and distant sounds of viscous liquid from the inky sea, Hermaeus Mora spoke. "You are almost ready to become my champion, you have done well. It is time you met an old friend."
I jumped to my feet, elation replacing my fatigue. "Professor Zenas?"
"Yes, but be warned. His time in Apocrypha has... influenced him." Mora whispered.
Before my eyes there materialised a being, grotesque and terrible to behold, a hovering figure that looked vaguely humonoid and yet where legs should have been there were instaed a group of tentacles constantly writhing. Two pale, spindly arms extended from ragged and dirty robes draping its mishapen form, but it was the creature's face which caused me to gasp and recoil. It was squid-like, but flattened and streteched, and tentacles extended from each side while yet more hung down from the region a chin should have been. More than anything, though, it was the creature's eyes that I found most disturbing. For gazing back at me were the familiar, brown orbs of Morian Zenas.
"Morian...? My gods. What has he done to you?" I don't know if I expected a reply, none were forthcoming. The creature that was once Professor Zenas just blinked at me before turning to float away to a nearby stack of books.
I turned to Hermaues Mora. "You monster."
The Daedric Prince laughed then, a hissing and sibiliant sound at first before it deepened in pitch to a booming thunderous sound. "Come now Doctor Lupus. You have seen that which you needed to see, you know there are far worse terrors than I. All I have done is that which is needed, and I - indeed, the entire world - need a champion before all that is left of everything you hold dear is but a barren, lifeless rock adrfit in a sea of nothing. Be the one the world needs, be my champion, and all the knowledge I have is yours. When we next meet, Professor Zenas will be yours to summon at will. Time spent back in your world may well be good for him"
I am not sure now as I write these last paragraphs whether I ever had any choice or whether the Lord of the Tides of Fate had set an inescapable path before me but, for the second time, I agreed to Mora's bargain. I came here for Morian Zenas, and I won't abandon him yet. Not while there is still hope. So I closed my eyes with a sigh, and nodded.
