Bab 545: The Dragon and the Tower
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** Also, guys, just so you know, I've spent 2 days headbutting with the people from r/teslore on Reddit and I learned some fantastic stuff. Like 2 days of Reddit argument. Imagine it! Feel it in your bones! You're a wizard Har… no, wrong story. You are a Dragonborn! Now we're rollin'. So to be straight (no homo), this chapter ends with some juicy Lore that I squeezed for the past couple of days from all the official lore sources, UESP, TIL, TESLore… and I need help.
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A Dragon in the Sky.
Nearly everyone in the hold heard the mighty roar of the Dovah that shook their hearts and souls. Scanning the sky left and right, the people finally saw the grim beast.
Far above, there was a Dragon effortlessly gliding between the clouds while witnessing all that happened in Winterhold. A feeling of anger drove him to roar as all the Daedric Minions, Vampire and Werewolves he created over the span of the past couple of months got completely obliterated in their first time on the offense.
Nahkinax (Ferocious Cruelty) was one of the most hated Dragons from the First Era. His and his priest's attitude towards their followers made the most tragic of tales back in the day when Dragons ruled the men. Even the Ayleid could learn a thing or two from Nahkinax and his methods.
Officially, Nahkinax was a follower of Onikkeindrog, the Strategist of the Dragon Cult, and his mission was to train as many worshippers as he could to terrorize the resistance during the Dragon War by using his Daedric Minion enslavement magic which he was best at. He was also one of the Dragons that could gather information effectively as long as he stays hidden in the clouds.
But he was humiliated, utterly disgraced by the shameful display he just witnessed around Winterhold. Everything his followers planned was seen through and countered against in the most infuriating way possible. The Faction of Winterhold was not only capable but deep and mysterious. One moment the Followers attack, the next moment some freaks of nature appear and dismantle all the plans.
It felt as if… as if Winterhold was prepared.
Not just a day or two of preparation. It is the work of a long time of calculating and covering every angle correctly. Vampires were put down by anti-vampires weapons, Werewolves were stunned by explosives, Daedric Minions were purged by strange powers. Who in the world saw through all that and planned for it?
The short temper of Nahkinax was finally getting the best of him as he roared and nose-dived downward towards Winterhold, exactly towards Saarthal.
One can imagine how frightened the people were after seeing the beast come from the sky like that. Saarthal, Winterhold's crown jewel, was facing a danger it didn't witness before. The citizens who took a peek outside their homes screamed as they never knew how will this end.
Thane Jon is on a trip, the hold is in chaos, the war is raging outside and now, a Dragon?
Prayers were all that most people could do but these damn prayers were what a Dragon like Nahkinax enjoyed hearing the most. He would stand in pride and glee as the mortal worms pray to their Divines for help before he devours them all.
What happens next is his favorite game, he descends on a settlement, ruins the most obvious sign of human supremacy in that place then starts breathing fire and chasing the humans to their demise. He could see it all happen now that the settlement is in the reach of his shout, he can see his fires devouring these buildings, he can hear the mortal worms scream and wail, he can taste their tender meat in his mouth.
He just needed to topple down that Tower which stood in the middle of the town opposing the Heavens.
Just how infuriating was the Tower, which was built by those mortal worms, to a Dragon? It is as if the mortals forgot their place and started fancying themselves to be something.
Nahkinax aimed himself after the nose-dive to fly straight to the Dare Tower that stood in the middle of Saarthal and ram it to the ground. The highest section of the tower alone can fall and completely bury a portion of the town under rubble.
"Cower in fear, Mortals! YOL TOOR SHUL!"
The mighty beast breathed his searing flames and rammed the tower and with all his huge body, the world shook from the clash.
And everything went dark.
It was strange, weird and really confusing.
No one felt this saw this dark except the Dragon Nahkinax. However, if anyone witnessed him, they would be sharing in utter confusion.
He indeed was flying just now and crashed into the Dare Tower with the intent to bring it down on the heads of these mortal worms… but… why is this tower still standing?
Also… why is a Dragon such as himself sliding slowly off the smooth wall of the tower? He could hardly regain his senses just before he crashed on the ground at the base of the tower.
The mortals have long since run away and no one was looking. Absolutely not a soul was staying around.
Nahkinax opened his eyes seeing the world from a new perspective as he was lying on his back just thinking.
How did this go wrong? He thought.
He looked at the Tower which was clearly large but how could a building be this sturdy? Nahkinax may never know but he felt genuine shock and fear from the unknown. If there is something a Dragon can't destroy then there is something that can destroy a dragon. For the first time in a long while, a Dragon, a being that can carve through mountains and dry out rivers, realized his own fragility.
In an image of disgrace, Nahkinax pushed himself against the ground and fixed his body posture then quickly spread his wings and took the sky without even looking back. Saving himself some face, he didn't turn around and kept flying away before anyone took notice of what happened.
Then again, what is wrong with that Tower?
***
"Ahaha! Brother Jon, you are a sly one."
"Haha! It was just an idea. Brother Knut, I wouldn't really do such a reckless thing."
"Indeed indeed. Time Magic is dangerous, the whole concept of freezing an object in time to make it indestructible using an Elder Scroll is… well, it is genius but not the right kind of genius."
"Ah… I see… I see."
"As I said. Please, don't do it."
"I said I won't."
"You won't doesn't mean you haven't done it already, right?"
"I said I won't do it. Chill, man." Jon said as he hid his face with his cup gulping down all its content.
"Jon Dare… we have been roommates for two weeks now. I know you are up to something when you just mindlessly try to pass it quietly as a question."
"Dayum, son! You're getting good at this."
"For Kyne's sake…" Knut couldn't help but massage his temples and look at Jon with a tired face, "Just tell me."
Seeing Knut cornering him, Jon dropped his shoulders as well and spoke.
"So I built this big beautiful building in the middle of my town and it is a really tremendous building. You gonna love it if you see it, you can come and visi… oh! Sorry, you are a monk, you don't go down, almost forgot…"
"…"
"Anyway, the building is built on a good Magicka Focus point which I personally installed, it has this inner circuits of Dwemer wires, which are excellent magic conductors, these circuits work like the enchantment script inside an artifact and channel all the Magicka generated to the heart of the enchantment which needs an Elder Scroll to function."
"Are you… out of your mind?"
"Hmmm… didn't we agree on it second day I was here?"
"Kyne's Mercy! What can such an abomination do?"
"It's not an abomination, it is a Tower of Music. It literally can interfere with the fabric of reality. Imagine this, the Tower can freeze itself in time which cancels any input that tries to alter. It doesn't age, it can't be destroyed by literally anything, the interior is exempted from the Temporal effect but I can still apply it. It can even Produce and Cancel Tonal Signals like making a pretty awesome orchestra that buffs everyone or Canceling the Music of the World temporarily making it impossible to use magic… but these are just the Basic Functions, you know. Still, I may have created the most indestructible fortress in the world that looks like a legendary lighthouse from my past life."
"Divines!"
"I know, right? Even they can't touch me there. The only problem is, I need to figure out how to make that Tower Teleport."
"…"
"Truth be told, I never imagined High Hrothgar Temple to be a place of such infinite knowledge and wisdom. To think that you guys know about the Lost Magic and all that jazz; if I have known, I would have ignored those damn Labors and hid here instead."
"Jon, don't… just don't."
"Brother Knut! Wait!"
Jon watched as Knut stepped out of the Muffled Zone he created for them to speak. Causing noise in High Hrothgar is prohibited so the Adepts would muffle an area and converse in it to not cause any disturbance for the Masters. Jon and Knut were very talkative and had great talents in magic each. Being one of the likely candidates to achieve Mastery of the Way of the Voice in the next 20 years, Knut knew a great deal about the Tonal Magic and other ancient forms of the Arcane Arts. Turns out the Greybeards were experts on more than just the Thu'um as it seemed that they were keeping and recording insights of their own ways of handling Magicka and had extensive studies in the Arcane Arts. Like… what would a monastery full of monks sitting on the highest point in a world full magic do anyway?
Even though these studies were all deep and profound, they only served the purpose of worship and meditation to further understand the truth about the World and the Divines. For non-Dragonborn mortals, understanding a single word of Power meant delving into the deepest delves that surround that word and fully realizing all its concepts. If a Voice Master can shout Fire then they have spent years studying the laws of Flame and the best way to do that is to study Flame Magic. So on and so forth.
The reason why Jon and Knut hit it off regarding studying together was because of how the two met eye to eye in many theories and Jon shared a great deal of Knowledge with Knut making the latter put him in high regards during the past few days but… Knut soon came to learn the dire truth about Jon's Aptitude for Disaster like making a Superweapon in the shape of a Tower in the middle of a town or making Ships that sail without sails. Leaving Jon for a few years on this momentum may end up with him digging up another Heart of Lorkhan or reconstructing a new Numidium.
Following Jon's Chaotic Neutral behavior, he may cause a lot of trouble more than what he already did. Knut wanted to persuade the Dragonborn to keep to his mission to save the world and let go of his dangerous ideas but Jon was too liberal about his pursue of power.
That's why Knut gave Jon a few books about the Dragons in order to keep him from looking around the dangerous stuff. By accident, Jon took a major interest in these books which originated from Elsweyr, Argonia, Valenwood and Summerset. They spoke about the Dragons and their true relationship to Akatosh.
[A/n: this piece of Lore is new and it came with ESO Elsweyr expansion, it explains a lot about the nature of Aka. It is purely from a Khajiit perspective but I'll explain it the best I can. I will leave my understanding between (...) brackets.]
It all starts with Akha who is the First Cat, son of Ahnurr and Fadomi (Anu and Padomay) when they were still in love. Akha is naturally Aka who also happens to be Auri-El, the Elven Aedra as they all come first. From this point, the story jumps to the part where Auri-El (Akha) wanted Anu to return him and the other Spirits to Aetherius after they fell to mortality. According to the Khajiiti myth, Ahnurr (Anu) tells Akha to roam the land and find Love (Divinity) much like Ahnurr and Fadomi once did. From that point, Akha went across existence and explored the Many Paths (the Six Walking Ways, methods of Immortality). During that, he went around and mated (made love) with the Mother Mammoth of the North, the Dune Queen of the West and the Winged Serpent of the East (mostly figures that existed on Atmora, Yukoda and Akavir) before he finally went to the South (probably where Aldmeris existed). From this mating, his offspring were many spirits. (Not Dragons yet)
After Akha went to the South, the story shifts to the events of Auri-El's transcendence when he ascended to Heaven in full observance of his followers so that they might learn the steps needed to escape the mortal plane. (Auri-El seemed to have shown his followers one way to ascend and kept the rest a secret, especially the Psijic Endeavor).
There when Alkosh (Akatosh) appeared for the first time after Auri-El's ascendance. He came as Alkosh and spoke warnings of the things Akha had made along the Many Paths. Alkosh and his faithful were to watch over the many Children of Akha for they are both terrible and kind.
(It seemed that the disappearance of Aldmeris was consequential to Auri-El's ascendance thus the Continent of the Elves was forever lost but it is just one possibility.)
The text also revealed a rather interesting detail that according to the Elves, Auri-El (Aka) agreed to Lorkhan's plan to create the Mortal Plane only when he was promised to become the King of the New World. Of course Auri-El and the other members of the Elven Pantheon felt betrayed with mortality but this explains that Auri-El's desire to Rule was probably something the Dragons inherited from him.
There was also an interesting event that happened between Akha's offspring and Alkosh which led them to rebel and tear him apart (Dragon Break). Khenarthi (Kynareth or Kyne) intervened and gathered Alkosh back together throughout the Many Paths. The event was translated in a different way in the Argonian Myth that Atakota (Akatosh) had a shadow (Lorkhan) which was what led to the creation of the world and as the world expanded, some Spirits (offspring of Akha) came to Atakota (Akatosh) in hunger so they tore him apart and ate him. After doing so, they started growing fangs and wings, eventually becoming Dragons.
With the intervention of Kynareth, Akatosh was put back once again and the Time Break that may have been caused because of the Dragons ended. Kynareth also learned many things along the Many Paths about what Aka did and what he probably didn't want to be revealed.
(Despite the Dragons are the sons of Akatosh, Akatosh may have post-dated most of them but as he was but they only came to be Dragons after eating him)
One thing to note about these events was that they didn't happen in an orderly fashion. They were events from both the Dawn and Merethic Era when the time was nonlinear so it is impossible to tell if all this happened before the Conviction of Lorkhan or not.
Jon closed the few books as he copied them via the System and started writing on a new notebook titling it as "[The Timely Lie, Vol.2] by Jon Dare, A Multicultural Study on the Era of Dawn and Dragon and Man".
Why not write a book during a Dragon Crisis? Seemed like a perfect idea for Jon at that time.
But that was not the time for writing books. Somehow, he could hear a lot of noise coming from Winterhold and the Greybeards were about to give him a task.
"Luggage… I mean, Lydia! Back up our things. Damn… I am starting to sound like my uncle."
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