HP: Sacred Gear Chat Group (2) - Chapter 42 (Patreon)

AN: Sorry about the slight delay in Chapters. Had a few busy days, including a bigger Birthday and loosing my Luggage with my Laptop on the way to visit my Parents for a while. (An interesting first time Experience learning that the Flight Company somehow send your Stuff to the other end of the World.)

Will be back to normal in a few days. Expect at least another Chapter today, maybe more.

Chapter 42 - Magnus

“I don’t know how to explain it, but Skelli was cooler,” Astoria commented while I rummaged through the remains of Morokei.

The Dragon Priest stood no chance once we could actually face him. Sure, every Dragon Priest is extremely powerful individually, but not to that extent. They are still just a single being.

And while they are decently strong physically and quite tanky for magic users thanks to their Lichdom and the fact that the Ancient Nords didn't rely entirely on magic alone, it was still difficult for Morokei to survive an organized onslaught from all six of us.

They would be much more of a threat if they used their Draugr servants properly, keeping us busy while bombarding us with their deadly spells. But as single spellcasters?

Sure, they are powerful when it comes to magic, but not on such an insane level that they can wipe you out with a wave of their hand. The Elder Scrolls universe has a clear ceiling for mortals. While there's some crazy lore out there, and the Daedra are omnipotent within their own dimensions, there are still limits to power in Mundus.

With a good strategy and enough people, you can handle any Dragon Priest.

And that's exactly what we did.

Once we took down the spirits that Savos Aren had bound to maintain the seal on Morokei, we began fighting him using a simple strategy we had agreed on beforehand.

Ghislaine is on a completely different level speedwise compared to most things in the Elder Scrolls universe. Even if she couldn't kill a tanky undead Dragon Priest instantly, she was more than capable of keeping Morokei occupied in close combat without putting herself in any danger.

Meanwhile, Mom and I combined our powerful defensive magic to protect ourselves from whatever lightning spells Morokei threw at us. At the same time, Tracey, Daphne, and Astoria provided offensive support for Ghislaine, turning Morokei into a target ready for slaughter.

We steadily picked him apart, no matter how strong he was.

To fight like the Dragon Priests, you need overwhelming power. That might be the case for them in this world, but on a larger scale, they have glaring weaknesses that can be exploited.

And without any further trouble, we brought him down. He really shouldn't have fought alone, and I could only agree with Astoria's assessment. Even that lesser Dremora-possessed pile of dragon bones had at least brought other skeletons along to fight with it, keeping even a well-organized group like ours busy.

"Well, dragons are always cool. Maybe you're just a bit annoyed because Morokei kept draining our magic on the way here." I shrugged as I pulled Morokei's Dragon Priest Mask from his ashes.

Tracey had really gotten good at Fire Magic.

According to the game, the mask itself helps with magic regeneration, increasing the rate by a full 100%. Having already tried similar items we'd purchased around Skyrim, we knew that such an enchantment translated into the speed at which magic power flowed in and out of the body.

Simply put, while it was true that the mask allowed magic to regenerate 100% faster, it also let us gather magic for spells at that same accelerated rate. This meant we could essentially cast spells a little faster, though certainly not by 100%, since gathering the necessary magic power was only one part of the casting process.

However, my interest lay elsewhere.

"So that's the staff he used to annoy us?" Daphne asked, eyeing the staff I'd just pulled from the ashes on the floor with a cold look.

It was a magnificent object, a beautifully crafted and powerful ancient magical artifact made from unknown materials, all fashioned into the shape of a staff. The main body was inscribed with runes I couldn't recognize, while the top held a glowing orb that looked remarkably similar to the Eye of Magnus.

Or at least, that's how it looked in the games, since I hadn't seen the Eye myself yet. Still, from what I could tell, the staff should look the same here.

The orb at the top looked incredibly mystical, surrounded by glowing runes that I couldn't recognize either.

And if the lore was anything to go by, the Staff of Magnus was as old as this world itself, if not older.

Back in the day, as its name suggested, it belonged to Magnus and had probably even been created by him. Magnus, the architect of Mundus, this world, was also widely known as the God of Magic.

During the days of creation, Magnus, as the chief architect of Mundus, realized that creating the world would cost the Aedra involved in its creation most of their power, binding them to this realm forever. The Daedra, on the other hand, had never participated in its creation and had remained in their own realms.

Not wanting to be used in such a way, Magnus led the Magna Ge, consisting of his followers and children, out of the Mortal Plane and toward the realm of Aetherius before it was too late.

In doing so, they tore holes in the fabric of reality, allowing the light of Aetherius, and with it Magicka, to seep into the Mortal Plane. Magnus created the largest hole of them all, which later became known as the Sun, while the other Magna Ge created the Stars.

And that's how Magic became part of the Mortal Plane.

At least, that's the lore. The details are, as always, debatable.

If their departure brought Magic into the world, how could Magnus have already created and left behind a Staff capable of manipulating Magicka? Perhaps the Magicka in this world is his personal form of energy, much like how each Daedric Prince is assumed to possess a unique form of energy that they use within their own realms.

But that's just my own speculation based on inaccurate lore. Much of what happened during that time is little more than legend, and there's no way to be certain of the truth.

"Yes, this Staff is said to be capable of controlling the Eye of Magnus. It's our insurance policy in case anything goes wrong with the Eye," I explained before adding, "It also doesn't hurt that it's an artifact that once belonged to the God of Magic. Who knows what it's capable of? As far as I know, its effects differed between individual games. It's supposedly able to suppress magic, absorb spells and Magicka from others, and even drain a target's life force once they run out of Magicka. All while healing its wielder, too."

"It sounds to me like an artifact that can absorb all kinds of energy," Mom commented as she took a closer look at the Staff in my hand. "At least, its ability to absorb spells, Magicka, and, most importantly, life force suggests as much. But we'll have to run some tests on it. I can't wait to discover what secrets it's hiding."

"Maybe we should wait until we're somewhere safe? This is still a Nordic ruin," Tracey remarked dryly, fully aware of just how enthusiastic Mom could get.

"Are you sure?" Astoria chimed in with a gleeful smile. "It seems perfectly safe to me!"

That little troublemaker.

"Let's collect everything here and head out. Tracey's right; we shouldn't get carried away testing such an extremely interesting and fascinating artifact just yet." Maybe I'd inherited that side of her? Or had I always been this curious, even in my past life? I couldn't really remember. "Ghislaine, keep an eye out for any threats!"

———

The moment Ghislaine raised her hand to signal us, we stopped and immediately took cover.

No one doubted the sharpness of her senses. I'd spent months with Ghislaine and knew just how incredible they were, while the others had experienced them often enough by now to trust her without hesitation.

Our enemies didn't even bother hiding themselves, though. They had no need to.

My real question was, why and how had they known we were here?

Savos Aren was one thing. He pretty much knew everything that went on at the College of Winterhold, and hiding anything from him within those incredibly powerful wards was extremely difficult, if not impossible.

But these people? They shouldn't even have known much about the others. Perhaps they'd heard about me, since I'd made a bit of a name for myself. Even so, my reputation alone shouldn't have been enough to justify setting up an ambush like this.

We were in the very chamber where we'd fought the Skeletal Dragon... I mean, Skelli.

"Not bad for a bunch of barbarians," an arrogant voice echoed through the chamber. "You're sharper than I expected."

At the end of the tunnel leading back up to the entrance of Labyrinthian, a small army of Thalmor agents emerged from the shadows, practically blocking the only way out.

To make matters worse, they could also lower the gate leading out of the chamber from their side.

Under normal circumstances, that wouldn't have been much of an inconvenience, since Transfiguration could easily solve the problem. However, from a strategic perspective, it put us at a clear disadvantage in the middle of combat.

And things got even worse when I realized that, unlike our fight against Morokei, we were now the ones outnumbered. From what I could see, they had at least three times as many people as we did.

Even worse, every single one of them was an intelligent opponent, unlike that dumb, low-level, Daedra-possessed pile of bones we'd fought earlier.

Their composition was solid, too. Some of the Thalmor agents wielded blades, while the others were clearly mages.

No matter how I looked at it, we were at a disadvantage.

“Must be that strange Khajiit among you. I've never heard of a Khajiit who looks so much like a Mer,” the same female voice said confidently, her arrogance practically dripping from every word. “Perhaps there's actually some truth to the legend that you Khajiit were once Mer.”

Ghislaine clearly realized that the woman was talking about her, but she looked visibly confused. She most likely didn't even know that Mer was another word for Elves, a general term for all the Elven races in this world. It's also where the Merethic Era got its name.

“You landfolk are part of our Aldmeri Dominion. Come, abandon your comrades and join us. We always have a place for capable members of our Dominion!”

Yeah, right. More like they wanted to study Ghislaine.

“No, thank you,” the cat-like Amazonian replied calmly.

“Your loss.”

We were still in some serious trouble, though. Why was Elenwen here in the first place? And how had we attracted her attention?

Had the Memory Charm on Ancano failed? Or had he managed to send information about us to the Thalmor before I wiped his memories? Perhaps he'd noticed the gaps in his recollections, grown a few brain cells, and decided to investigate without alerting me.

“Would you kindly let us pass? I don't believe we've had any disputes with you Thalmor,” I said, addressing Elenwen, the leader of the entire Thalmor operation in Skyrim, with all due politeness. I had no desire to provoke her into making a move.

But why was such a high-ranking member personally here?

“That's not out of the question,” Elenwen mused confidently, not even bothering to raise her guard.

Which was good for us. I could understand her confidence, considering how badly we were outnumbered and how we'd have to fight our way through their ranks to get past them.

Then again, there might be another exit somewhere. Labyrinthian was a vast and mysterious place, filled with secrets we hadn't uncovered yet. But looking for another way out would be a gamble.

“What do you want from us?” I asked, buying us some time.

I had a few options, but I didn't want to reveal any of them to the Thalmor. Still, I couldn't see what other choice we had. It was already bad enough that they might know about the Memory Charm.

“It's simple. Even you barbarians should be able to understand it,” the racist bitch said condescendingly. “First, you'll surrender your weapons and all your belongings. You should have a mask in your possession. Or rather, if I'm correct, you should have eight of them. From what we've gathered, you've been quite busy all over Skyrim, often appearing near places of particular interest to us. Hand them over, and you may live.”

Okay! That's good to know.

They didn't seem to know about the Memory Charm, which meant Ancano wasn't the leak. That was one less thing to worry about.

But they were after me. I was the leak, or rather, my actions all over Skyrim had been. They'd apparently connected the dots and managed to track at least some of my movements.

Handing over the masks was out of the question. But should we fight?

It was a very bad idea.

I wasn't particularly worried about Mom. She was experienced enough to handle herself. Before coming to Skyrim, she might have been a little rusty, but she'd already regained her edge over the past few weeks.

And Ghislaine? There was no need to even mention her. She was my biggest source of support in this situation.

No, my real concerns were the girls.

Tracey, Daphne, and Astoria had grown quite a lot, but these weren't Draugr or skeletons. Undead were mentally restricted and nowhere near as intelligent as living opponents. And we weren't dealing with mere creatures here.

Although Elves weren't human, they were close enough to be considered people in every meaningful sense of the word. There was a difference between fighting the undead, animals, or monsters and fighting sentient beings.

As far as I knew, the girls had encountered a few bandits during their journey through Skyrim, but they'd managed to avoid killing them. Most bandits were relatively primitive fighters who relied on close combat.

This situation was completely different. There was no room for hesitation here. They couldn't afford to hold back or avoid using lethal magic.

And killing someone was an entirely different matter.

Even I struggled with it every time I had to kill someone, and I preferred to avoid it whenever possible. I had no doubt the girls would be able to do what was necessary if they were forced to, but it would still mentally cripple them during the battle.

And I wasn't certain I could protect them. The entire situation had developed far too suddenly. Although we had plans for situations like this, we couldn't prepare beforehand the way we had for Morokei.

The moment we made our move, the life-or-death battle would begin.

So, what was I supposed to—

“Stop stalling. Your choices are clear. Surrender or die.”

“And what happens to us if we surrender?” I asked, directly challenging her.

“You may serve us superior Elves in a position befitting you mere Humans. I've heard you're a Dragonborn, so we may find some use for someone like you. And your companions appear to be of fine enough breeding as well. I'm sure there are some noble Mer who would be more than pleased to take care of them.”

Fucking slaver scum.

“There is no way out. Surrender.”

I didn't really have a choice, did I?

“I'm not so sure about that. You might find that we've already escaped before you can even say hogwash.”

I could see confusion spreading across their faces.

“What?”

[-- End of Chapter --]