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[Supercharazad]

As I've said, going tomb raiding is going to get us lynched, executed or straight up killed by unkillable ghosts.
We should go to Cossades and talk about dragons, that's something that only he is likely to know.

[Rakonas]

Talk to Cossades about dragons, about how we know dragons used to exist, and how we know that dragons will return within the next two hundred and fifty years or so. Also that we know the Blades are dragon hunters.

I really don't see this as a good idea.
It's like going up to an undercover cop and being like "I know you're an undercover cop"

[Supercharazad]

No, that's like going to an undercover cop and going, "I know you're an undercover cop and I also know that your organisation is actually dragon hunters"

[GlyphGryph]

Talk to the maid, solve the murder as others have mentioned, with the help of a guard.

And loot random stuff.

[WillowLuman]

So, here's the plan. Make damn sure we remember the decisive evidence that proves that guy's guilt. Have the guard accompany us, but have them stay outside the door in ambush. Talk to the guy while he thinks we're alone, say whatever gets him to admit the murder and attack you, then call the guards.

I'll admit I never did that quest, but I'm going to guess he attacks you.

[LordBucket]

Episode 18: Let's do the Timewarp

Solve the Ralen Hlaalo murder, letting the Ordinators do the fighting.

Talk to the maid, solve the murder as others have mentioned, with the help of a guard.

have the guard accompany us, but have them stay outside the door in ambush. Talk to the guy while he
thinks we're alone, say whatever gets him to admit the murder and attack you, then call the guards.

: "So your plan is to deliberately get him to attack me and hope the guard can get inside to intervene before I die? That doesn't sound like the greatest idea in the world to me. But...I guess I'll just trust that you guys know what you're talking about."


You go back to the Manor and knock. There's no answer at first, but after knocking a second time the door opens slightly, and the maid, Uryne Nirith, peers out.

: "Yes? What is it?"

: "I'm investigating the murder of Ralen Hlaalo. May I come in?"

The maid lets you in and you take a quick look around. The first thing you notice is the obvious lack of a body on the ground.



: "I'm not sure what I can tell you that I didn't already tell the guards, but I'll answer any questions you have,"

: "What happened?"

: "I'd just prepared dinner for Master Hlaalo when there was a knock at the door. I answered and it was a weathered looking dunmer, the non-nonsense type. Red mohawk, mismatched earrings in both ears, and not a tiny amount of armor and weapons on him. He asked to speak with my master, so I let him in. By the time I'd finished closing the door behind him...he'd leapt up...onto the table....he was swinging that golden axe all over..."

She's shaking now, having difficulty speaking.

: "It's ok. Take your time, but I need to hear everything."

She swallows and forces herself to continue.

: "The fight didn't last long. Master Hlaalo was the scholarly sort, but he was no battlemage. I ran to the stairs, but tripped. Before I could get up again the fight was over, and I decided it was safest to stay down...make myself look harmless. The man barely looked at me, then left without saying a word. I reported it to the guard right away and it wasn't until the investigation that I learned the name of the man. Thanelan Velas. He's with the Camona Tong."

: "What happened to the body?"

: "The guards took it. The murder was two days ago."

: "Anything else you can tell me?"

: "No, sera. I dare say no more. The Hlaalu council permitted me to stay here while they sent word to his family. They'll settle his affairs, and hopefully they'll take me in. I've nowhere else to go."

You thank the maid for her help and go to flag down a guard.

: "Excuse me."

: "Yes, citizen?"

: "You're aware of the investigation of Ralen Hlaalo's death, yes? I think I know who murdered him, and I believe I can get a confession. Would you be my witness?"

: "Yes, I can bear witness. Where to?"

: "The Council Club."

The notice the guard's right hand move a few inches closer to his weapon.

: "You believe you can get a confession?"

: "Yes."

: "Very well. I will go with you. If you can convince Thanelen to confess, I will take him into custody."

: "Thanelen? You mean you already know who it is?"

: "We all know that Ralen's housekeeper accused him of the murder, but while she is a maid, he is a member of the Camona Tong. Orvas Dren is the brother of the Duke of all of Vvardenfell. You don't arrest one of his men simply on the word of a maid. We spoke with Thanelen. He denied involvement and there's no other evidence to incriminate him. What more can we do?"

: "All you need is a confession, right?"

: "Yes."

: "Then let's go."

have the guard accompany us, but have them stay outside the door in ambush. Talk to the guy while he
thinks we're alone, say whatever gets him to admit the murder and attack you, then call the guards.

: "Ok, if he sees you he'll keep quiet. So you stay here and I'll get him to admit he did it. When he does, you come in and arrest him. Sounds good?"

: "Yes. I will wait."

You open the door to the Council Club and step in. Thenelas being the greeter, he is conveniently close to the door. Though it's also a solid wooden door, and now that you think about it, the odds of anyone outside hearing what's spoken inside seem pretty remote. You'll have to get him to yell, or something.



Thanelen is wearing none of the armor that the housemaid mentioned, but he is carrying a massive dwemer waraxe on his left hip. Given that you struggled with a much lighter axe earlier, the fact that he's sporting what must be a 30 weapon just casually while standing around does nothing to inspire confidence. He looks at you and sneers.

: "What do you want, outlander?"

: "I know you killed Ralen Hlaalo."

: "Oh? So what if I did?"

: "You killed him!" you yell, hoping to get him to yell in return, "Confess!"

Instead of answering, Thanelen steps towards you. You reflexively step back, but you're not his target. The door is. Keeping his eyes on you, he reaches for the handle and twists the deadbolt closed. Then with a thumb he flicks open the clasp holding his axe in place and hefts it with both hands. Then, in a conversational tone that you're quite sure is not nearly loud enough to be heard outside, he replies.

: "Alright. I confess. I killed him. Now, tell me how you know and I'll make your death swift and painless."

: ""Guard! Help!"



As you cry out, Thanelen casts a spell that engulfs his body in a green mist. You draw your tanto and make one useless slash through the air before he plunges his axe diagonally into your torso, cleaving through both your collarbone and the first several sets of ribs. You crumble to the ground, dimly aware of blood gushing from the wound onto the floor. From your angle on the ground you see Thanelen change the position of his feet and then you feel something on the back of your head...then everything goes dark.

But, wait. You can't be dead, can you? you blink a couple times and see Thanelen standing in front of you, wiping your blood from his axe. Strangely, he seems to be ignoring both you and a banging noise you hadn't noticed before. Instead he's looking intently at your feet. You look down to see...oh.



Yeah, you're dead.

The banging continues.

: "Open up! In the name of House Hlaalu, open this door at once!"

It's the guard. Thanelen spits on your corpse then looks frantically around the room as if looking for some way to conceal your body. Given that there's probably a good gallon of blood spread out on the floor by now, that seems unlikely. Eventually Thanelen simply shakes his head and opens the door to let the guard in.

: "Warm wishes, officer. How may I help you?"

The guard looks at your corpse on the ground. You try shouting that Thanelen killed you, but neither of them seem to hear you.

: "Thanelen Velas, you have committed murder. Either pay the fine of 4000 gold, or come with me and serve your sentence of hard labor."

What? The guard is just going to accept that? Pay a fine and that's it? You're dead?

: "I'm sorry, officer. I only have 200 on me right now. But I'm sure my friends downstairs will cover the difference."

The guard nods, and follows Velas down the stairs. About ten seconds later you hear muffled screaming and the sound of metal on armor. Then silence. Then several voices saying things you can't make out, followed by the sound of magic being cast. Then Thanelan and several others you don't recognize walk up the stairs and look at your corpse.



: "This blood is going to be a pain to clean up."

One of them goes back downstairs to retrieve a large roll of cloth, which they use to wrap up your body and drag it  down the stairs.

So, now what? You try to move but can't. You have no body. You try screaming but no sound comes out. And yet, you can see and hear...so maybe...what? You're not sure. You try to look around, and...yes. You can definitely adjust your field of view. Actually, wait...oh, that's interesting. Now that you think about it, you can see both the ceiling and the floor at the same time. Apparently you have fully 360 degree vision. Now if you can just figure out how to-



















: "Could I try that axe?"

: "Of course."

You feel a sense of deja vue as you pick the axe up...slowly. What is it with the heavy weapons here, and why do you feel like you've held the same exact axe before? Shrugging, you hand it back to Ra'virr and continue browsing for other weapons. You're pretty sure he has something light enough to...oh. Score.

You buy the steel tanto complete with scabbard and carrying strings for 10 septims. That's about what you remember them costing. The weapon is a bit heavier than you'd like, but reasonably so, and you're pretty confidant it would hurt a lot to get stabbed with it. Though not nearly as much as it would hurt to get hit by a dwemer war axe. Not that you would know.

Mercantile skill is now 3

You seem to be getting the hang of this haggling thing.

Your look:



: "Yeah, somehow I just knew this hat would look silly."

Spoiler: stats (click to show/hide)

Known stats
Health 39/40
Armor rating: 1

Attributes (Values in parenthesis are starting values)
21.5 Strength (20)
30.2 Speed (30)
31.5 Agility (30)
30.2 Endurance (30)
41.0 Intelligence (40)
41.4 Personality (40)

Skills
15 Acrobatics (0)
 7 Athletics (5)
14 Speechcraft (10)
 3 Mercantile (0)
 5 Alchemy (0)

Worn:
 * Steel tanto, with scabbard and carrying straps
 * Colovian fur "helm"
 * Commoner's shirt
 * Commoner's belt
 * 'Expensive' pants
 * Tennis shoes
 * Interior coinpurse containing 13 septims

Backpack
Main compartment:
 * Yellow notepad with 57 pages left
 * 1 pen
 * 2 soulgems of uncertain size
 * 1 Standard Restore Health potions
 * "20% cooler" Rainbow Dash t-shirt,
 * Denim pants
 * a cellphone and wallet with picture ID and $30 in cash

Small compartment
 * 4 saltrice
 * 2 kwama cuttle

Alchemy Knowledge
Bread - [1] Restore Fatigue
Small Kwama Egg - [1] Restore Fatigue

What do you do?

[Man of Paper]

Interesting.

Let's decide on either training our combat or training alchemy and magic. We have exactly zero chance of survival provoking people or putting our necks out in general. I go back to my suggestions of going to Fort Darius and getting some sort of training or finding somewhere near a farm or abundance of usable plant life and work on alchemy.

[Cerol Lenslens]

Thank goodness. It looks like we have some sort of save state, albeit who knows what sets it.

Okay, so here's the thing: We are starting to notice odd discrepancies. Ralen Hlaalu's body was missing. Either the PC still sees it, and can put stuff in it, resulting in some weird localized causality discrepancies, or we've seen something that could affect the PC's gameplay experience.

If it's the former, then it's business as usual: The quests trigger for the PC, not for us. We won't get the results we expect from various actions, and we may not be able to acquire some quests at all. Would the Daedra Lords even bother to give us quests, when a perfectly serviceable Nerevarine is right around the corner? (Well, Sheogarath might, but he'd probably want our shirt in exchange...)

If it's the latter, then... who knows? We could do some interesting things and screw up the game even more. But... If Vivec is correct, then Mike here is in fact the real PC. He's not in the role of the Nerevarine, but he is being played. By us. The Nerevarine is not. She's still effectively an NPC as far as CHIM goes. If she has a player, (not guaranteed) he too is really just an NPC, and we probably can't plan on doing stuff like leaving a note for the player with Caius Cosades asking her player to fire up the mod tools and building us a tower-shrine to Akatosh.

So, let's try something else. We're Mike, not the Nerevarine. Let's ignore the quests for the Nerevarine, and start looking for quests for Mike. See if we can get the Skull of Corruption, the Wabbajack, or the Sanguine Rose, for instance. (Three artifacts the Nerevarine can't get. Talk to NPCs who weren't originally quest-givers. That sort of thing. But before even that, let's find out what Mike's goal is. Does he want to forget about his vague past, explore Vvardenfell, and become rich and powerful? Or does he want to go home? Or both, trying to take his gains with him? What he decides is what we do.

So Mike, what'll it be?

[Xantalos]

Now that we're on a new save, I'd like to get that hat sewn onto our crotch. It'll distract enemies.

[WillowLuman]

I admit, I never did that quest. I wish someone who had had stepped in with the right words. Anyway, calling the guards to apprehend criminals when we know whodunnit is still a viable strategy, let's just not try it on people who have connections. And be smarter with the ambush, that was pathetic. We need a code phrase, and not to try to stab people ourselves. Jump back and let the backup take care of it. I was kind of hoping they'd arrest him at swordpoint, as seems to be standard protocol in game.

Mike, try to remember what happened before you died. And that you died. That's valuable experience.

If we can preserve memories between lives, we can afford to take some more risks. If, also, this is our only save, then we could get some kind of Majora's Mask loop going, see how far we can screw causality before someone notices. We could potentially learn plenty from the same amount of gold, dying afterwards and then using the money to learn something else. Might take it's toll on our mental state, though, if Mike remembers the pain of dying over and over.

Anyway, I recommend working out with some of the random items in the alleys as weights. If they seem to be heavier that normal, why not do some curls? Don't bench press unless we can get someone to spot, though. Hey, maybe we can get a quick stat gain through some kind of "Make A Man Out of You" montage in the Legion?

[Supercharazad]

Yeah, let's go try to join the legion. Maybe they'll help us become, you know, not a complete and utter wimp by Morrowind standards.

[WillowLuman]

I can hear the montage already. "LET'S GET DOWN TO BUSINESS..."

Of course, Mike would have to do the weeks of hard training, but we wouldn't have to wait with him. And we might get paid, too. For guard duty or something. And enlisting comes with free light armor, after all.

Seriously, let's go up to the recruiter, show him our puny noodle arms, and say "If I join the legion, can they make a MAN out of me?"

[Supercharazad]

Or they'll tell us to get lost because they only actually have one position and they've no reason to train us to be normal. Not that I'm still not supporting this idea, though, because maybe they will help us.

[WillowLuman]

But the Legion's always looking for new recruits. And if that doesn't work out, there's always doing preacher-curls with the 5 pound buckets.

Possible new ultimate goal: Become as much of an anonymous nobody as possible. Train everything to perfection. Become Vvardenfell version of Batman, fighting corruption and the Comona Tong.

I just realized, we forgot to do something very important back in Vivec. Crap. The Vassir-Drindat cave, a lost Ebony mine. We know it's location, we could've Ondusi's Unhinge'd the door in the abandoned mansion and talked to Dram, and gotten a handsome reward for telling him where it is. Oh well, I'm sure there are others who'd find the info valuable. Also, anyone else know what I'm talking about? I don't want this to wind up like the murder investigation just did.

[Gamerlord]

Lets try the Imperial Cult religion path. Or maybe the Tribunal one.