If you want to read 20 Chapters ahead and more, be sure to check out my P-Tang12!!!
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(A/N: Don't forget to give those power stones to Skyrim everyone!)
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"Hold it, Aeloria!" Aerion roared back, dropping his Restoration magic and rapidly funneling pure, absolute zero Frost magic into his palms. "Wait for the impact!" Sahloknir opened his massive jaws, the wind screaming past his bronze scales as he plummeted toward the earth, ready to crush the entire vanguard beneath his immense weight.
Sahloknir plummeted down at fast speed the tempestuous gray clouds like a massive, bronze meteor, the sheer velocity of his dive tearing through the freezing air with a high pitched, deafening shriek. His massive jaws that are already wide open, revealed rows of razor sharp teeth each the size of a mortal longsword, perfectly aligned to just destiry whatever in it's path.
Aerion stood directly in the beast's trajectory, his dark robes whipping violently in the descending wind pressure. He did not take a single step backward.
He rapidly cycled his magicka even further, funneling more power to the absolute zero temperatures of his Frost spells into his palms, preparing to blast the dragon's open maw with a hyper condensed ice spear to shatter its teeth on impact.
But Sahloknir was not a mindless, feral beast of the wilds. He was an ancient, intelligent warlord who had conquered entire continents during the Merethic Era.
As the bronze dragon closed the distance, its burning, reptilian eyes snapped downward, actively assessing the battlefield geometry. It saw the towering Nord woman with the blazing axe, identifying the resonance of the Dragonborn.
But its gaze immediately shifted to the High Elf standing calmly in the center of the formation. Sahloknir recognized the lingering, fading aura of the massive, divine golden light that had just miraculously knitted the crushed bones and scorched flesh of the mortals back together.
The dragon's ancient intellect instantly recalculated the threat priority.
The Dragonborn possessed the soul, but the High Elf possessed the raw, reality warping power to completely negate the dragon's destruction. The mage was the true, immediate nightmare for it if he weren't taken care first.
With a terrifying display of aerodynamic agility, Sahloknir violently twisted his massive neck mid dive. He completely ignored Aeloria. He locked his burning red eyes entirely upon Aerion.
The bronze dragon did not attempt to crush the High Elf with its physical weight. It drew upon the deep, thrumming furnace within its chest.
A massive, continuous, roaring torrent of superheated, blindingly bright fire erupted from Sahloknir's maw, entirely localized and concentrated directly at Aerion.
"Patron!" Jenassa screamed, recognizing the lethal shift in the beast's aggression.
Aerion's eyes widened a fraction of an inch, his highly analytical mind instantly registering the dragon's intelligent tactical pivot. He seamlessly aborted the offensive Frost spell. There was absolutely no time to dodge the descending inferno, and no physical shield in Nirn could withstand that level of concentrated, sustained thermal output.
He tapped directly into his heavily augmented Restoration matrix.
Aerion slammed both of his hands forward, his palms facing the descending sky.
Greater Ward.
A massive, brilliant, shimmering, multi layered dome of translucent golden magic violently materialized in the air directly above him, anchoring itself to his extended hands.
A microsecond later, the dragon's fire hit the ward.
The impact was utterly apocalyptic. The sheer, kinetic and thermal violence of the breath attack slammed into the magical barrier with the force of a collapsing mountain. The golden ward hissed and crackled furiously, rippling violently under the unimaginable pressure. The superheated flames roared over the magical dome, splashing harmlessly down the sides and instantly turning the dirt around Aerion's boots into bubbling, molten glass.
The ambient heat was suffocating, but Aerion stood perfectly resolute. The immense and bottomless like ocean of his Magicka pool flawlessly sustained the barrier, completely denying the ancient dragon its execution.
"I have its breath on me!" Aerion roared over the deafening sound of the flames, his golden eyes locking onto his strike team through the shimmering ward. "Take out its big wings! So we can ground the beast! Now!"
Jenassa, possessing the ice cold nerves of a master assassin, immediately stepped out from the cover of the tree line. She didn't aim for the heavily armored, bronze scaled chest. She drew her bowstring back to her cheek, her crimson eyes tracking the massive, leathery wings keeping the dragon suspended in its dive.
THWIP. THWIP. THWIP.
She fired a rapid succession of heavy steel arrows with flawless, surgical precision. The steel tipped projectiles tore through the air, violently piercing the softer, vulnerable webbing of Sahloknir's left wing.
Simultaneously, the dragon's lungs finally emptied, the torrent of fire abruptly ceasing.
The absolute millisecond the flames vanished, Aerion dropped the Greater Ward. He smoothly transitioned back to his Destruction matrix, raising his right hand.
He didn't use fire. He used raw, concussive electricity.
A blinding, jagged bolt of Thunderbolt violently erupted from his palm. The hyper condensed lightning struck Sahloknir directly in the primary joint of its right wing. The electrical shock caused the massive muscles governing the dragon's flight to violently, involuntarily spasm and lock up.
With arrows tearing through one wing membrane and the opposing joint completely paralyzed by high voltage magic, Sahloknir instantly lost all aerodynamic stability.
The massive bronze dragon shrieked, its immense weight suddenly pulling it out of the sky. It plummeted the final fifty feet, crashing brutally into the center of the burial mound.
The impact violently shook the earth, sending a massive shockwave of displaced dirt and shattered stone tearing across the clearing.
"It's grounded!" Valdemar bellowed, his heavy steel boots crunching against the dirt. "Move in! Do not let it recover!"
The melee vanguard surged forward with absolute, unyielding Nordic fury.
Sahloknir was severely disoriented by the crash, but the beast was far from defeated. It pushed its massive, scaled body up from the crater, its eyes burning with pure, unadulterated hatred for the mortals who had dared to pull it from the sky.
The bronze dragon snapped its massive jaws, attempting to bite Delphine in half. The spymaster danced backward with terrifying speed, her Akaviri katana deflecting off the heavy bronze scales of the dragon's snout with a loud, metallic clang.
Aeloria charged directly at the beast's exposed flank, the blazing Axe of Morthal raised high above her head.
But Sahloknir, possessing centuries of combat experience, anticipated the flank. The massive beast pivoted on its hind legs, whipping its incredibly long, heavily spiked tail around in a devastating, blindingly fast horizontal arc, aiming directly for the Dragonborn's chest.
Aeloria saw the spiked tail coming, but the sheer size and speed of the appendage made evasion impossible.
"Shield wall!"
Lydia and Valdemar, acting entirely on their ingrained, absolute Housecarl instincts, did not hesitate. The two seasoned Whiterun warriors threw themselves directly into the path of the devastating tail strike, violently interposing their heavy iron shields between the dragon and their Thane.
CRACK!
The impact was absolutely catastrophic. The spiked tail slammed into the overlapping steel shields with the kinetic force of a speeding carriage.
The sheer physical power of the ancient dragon completely overwhelmed their mortal stances. The heavy Whiterun steel dented violently inward under the pressure. Lydia and Valdemar were instantly, brutally thrown off their feet, flying backward through the air before crashing heavily into the hard dirt of the mound. They gasped for air, the wind completely knocked out of their lungs, their arms numb from absorbing the heavy blow.
But their sacrifice had created the opening.
Aeloria, entirely untouched by the tail strike thanks to her protectors, stepped flawlessly into the beast's guard.
The Dragonborn did not swing her axe. She planted her steel boots into the dirt, staring directly up into the burning red eyes of the massive bronze dragon.
She took a massive, deep breath, pulling the ancient Thu'um directly from her soul.
"FUS RO!"
The sharp, localized cone of raw, kinetic violence erupted from her lips. The invisible shockwave slammed directly into the side of Sahloknir's massive skull at point blank range.
The impact was devastating. The concussive force violently snapped the dragon's head sideways, entirely shattering its equilibrium. Sahloknir let out a dazed, guttural groan, its massive front legs buckling slightly as the beast was violently staggered, its snout dropping low toward the dirt.
Aeloria did not pause to admire her work. She seized the tactical advantage with absolute, suicidal bravery.
The Dragonborn sprinted forward, using the beast's lowered, staggered head as a ramp. She leapt onto Sahloknir's massive snout, her heavy steel boots finding traction between the thick bronze scales, and violently scrambled her way up toward the crown of the dragon's skull.
Sahloknir's eyes snapped wide open, realizing the mortal was physically mounting its head. The beast roared in absolute, primal fury, violently thrashing its massive neck from side to side, desperately attempting to throw the heavily armored woman off.
Aeloria dropped to one knee, her left hand gripping a massive, jagged bronze horn to anchor herself, while her right hand raised the blazing Axe of Morthal high into the air.
"Now, Aerion!" Aeloria screamed over the thrashing of the beast. "Hit its chest!"
Aerion, who had already seamlessly closed the distance while the vanguard drew the dragon's physical attacks, was standing mere feet from Sahloknir's exposed, significantly less-armored underbelly.
He didn't cast a standard fireball. He had actively, meticulously modified his master level spell specifically for localized, armor piercing destruction.
Aerion thrust his hands upward, directly beneath the thrashing beast's ribcage.
Fire Storm (Condensed).
A hyper focused, blindingly bright pillar of superheated, roaring plasma violently erupted from his palms, driving straight up into the softer, leathery scales of the dragon's underbelly.
The heat was absolute. The plasma instantly melted through the bronze scales, searing directly into the ancient muscle tissue and boiling the dragon's internal organs.
Sahloknir experienced a level of sheer, unadulterated agony it had not felt since the Merethic Era. The beast let out a deafening, earth shattering roar of pure pain. Its massive back arched violently, its powerful hind legs propelling its upper body upward as it instinctively reared up on its hind legs to escape the localized inferno burning its chest.
The violent, upwards bucking motion of the massive dragon acted exactly like a heavy siege catapult.
Aeloria, clinging desperately to the horn on the beast's snout, was violently flung backward off the dragon's head, launched thirty feet straight up into the air.
For a terrifying, breathless second, the Dragonborn hung suspended against the tempestuous gray clouds.
But Aeloria did not panic. She did not flail. She possessed the absolute, unyielding blood of Akatosh.
At the apex of her trajectory, Aeloria violently contorted her body mid-air. She flipped flawlessly, locking both of her heavily gauntleted hands tightly around the long leather haft of the Axe of Morthal, pointing the blazing, rune etched ebony blade directly downward.
Gravity aggressively reasserted its hold.
Aeloria plummeted back toward the earth, utilizing her entire body weight, the thirty pounds of heavy Steel Plate armor, and the sheer velocity of her fall to exponentially multiply the kinetic force of her strike.
Sahloknir, its chest still smoking from Aerion's plasma, looked up just in time to see the descending mortal.
CRUNCH.
The heavy, blazing blade of the Axe of Morthal slammed directly into the absolute center of Sahloknir's skull, right between its burning red eyes. The sheer, overwhelming kinetic force of the gravitational strike, combined with the razor-sharp ebony steel, cleaved cleanly through the thick bronze scales and shattered the incredibly dense dragon bone beneath.
The blazing axe buried itself to the hilt, securely lodging itself directly into the dragon's brain.
Sahloknir's massive body went entirely, instantly rigid. The red fire burning within its reptilian eyes violently flickered, and then extinguished entirely, leaving only dull, lifeless black orbs behind.
The massive beast let out a final, pathetic, gurgling sigh, and completely slumped forward.
Aeloria did not let go of the axe. She held onto the haft with a death grip as the massive, multi ton beast collapsed, riding the dragon's skull all the way down until it slammed heavily into the dirt of the burial mound, shaking the ground one final time.
The clearing fell completely, suffocatingly silent, save for the crackling of the lingering magical fires.
Sahloknir, the bronze general of Alduin, was dead.
"Thane Aeloria!"
Valdemar, ignoring the bruised ribs and the ringing in his ears, immediately scrambled up from the dirt, rushing forward toward the massive, slumped head of the dragon.
Aeloria, panting heavily, slowly released her grip on the axe haft.
She slid off the beast's snout, her boots hitting the dirt. She stumbled slightly, her adrenaline finally crashing, but she remained on her feet, offering her Housecarl a massive, exhausted, deeply victorious grin.
"I am fine, Valdemar," Aeloria assured him, clapping a heavy hand on his shoulder. "Thank you for the shield. You saved my ribs."
Lydia, having similarly recovered from the tail strike, immediately jogged across the cratered dirt, moving flawlessly to flank Aerion. Jenassa emerged from the tree line, lowering her bow, and took up position on the High Elf's opposite side, completing the protective diamond.
"A flawless execution, Patron," Jenassa noted softly, her crimson eyes scanning the dead beast.
"The coordination between all of us was what managed to kill this beast," Aerion agreed, brushing a few stray specks of ash from his dark robes. He looked toward Aeloria. "Well fought, Dragonborn."
Standing a few yards away, her Akaviri katana lowered, Delphine watched the scene unfold with absolute, profound amazement.
The spymaster had studied the ancient lore her entire life. She had read the Akaviri texts, memorized the prophecies, and dedicated her existence to hunting the dragons. But to actually, physically witness a mortal woman drive an axe into the skull of an ancient wyrm... it was a deeply religious experience for the Blade.
But the true confirmation of her life's purpose was only just beginning.
Suddenly, the massive, bronze scaled corpse of Sahloknir began to violently shudder.
"What is happening?" Valdemar demanded, reaching for his sword, fearing the beast was reviving once more.
"Stand back," Aerion commanded smoothly, recognizing the sequence. "The true show has arrived."
The thick, leathery bronze scales and the heavy, dense muscle tissue of the massive dragon began to glow with a blinding, ethereal, golden orange light. The flesh of the beast violently began to sublimate, actively dissolving from solid matter directly into pure, raw, flowing magical energy.
A massive, localized gust of wind violently erupted from the corpse, whipping through the clearing and blowing the autumn leaves into the air.
The blinding, flowing streams of pure dragon soul actively tore themselves away from the bones. They swirled through the air like a localized hurricane of golden fire, rushing directly toward Aeloria.
The Dragonborn stood her ground, opening her arms slightly as the massive, thrumming energy slammed directly into her chest. The soul absorbed flawlessly into her blood, entirely replenishing her stamina and solidifying her divine connection to the universe.
When the blinding light finally faded and the roaring wind died down, the physical reality of the clearing had fundamentally changed.
Aeloria stood tall, completely unharmed, radiating an aura of immense, quiet power.
And resting heavily upon the scorched dirt of the burial mound, entirely stripped of its flesh, muscle, and scales, was the massive, bleached white skeleton of Sahloknir.
Scattered around the massive bones were thick piles of incredibly durable, perfectly preserved bronze dragon scales that had sloughed off during the absorption process.
Delphine stared at Aeloria, her sharp eyes wide, her paranoid doubts completely, permanently erased. The lore was absolute. The soul had been consumed.
She is the one, Delphine realized, a profound sense of awe washing over her. She is the true Dragonborn.
While the spymaster experienced a deep, mythological epiphany, Aerion's transmigrator mind was focused on something vastly more practical.
Aerion's golden eyes slowly swept over the massive, gleaming white dragon skeleton and the thick piles of heavy bronze scales resting upon the dirt. He wasn't looking at a religious relic. He was looking at an absolute, unadulterated fortune in raw crafting materials.
'Dragon bones and dragon scales,' Aerion calculated rapidly, a deep, highly pragmatic, deeply sociopathic smirk forming in his mind. The absolute highest tier smithing materials in existence on this continent. 'Incredibly rare, virtually indestructible, and worth an absolute fortune to the right buyers. Furthermore, if I grind my Smithing skill to the maximum cap, I can forge a full set of Dragonbone heavy armor. I can equip Sinmir, Uthgerd, and my core mercenary elites with gear that would make them functionally invincible against standard mortal steel.'
He needed to transport this loot back to the heavily guarded vaults of the Aerion Estate immediately. He absolutely could not leave this massive pile of mythological wealth sitting out in the open in Eastmarch, practically inviting Ulfric Stormcloak's patrols to stumble upon it and claim it for the rebellion's war effort.
The immediate, instinctual solution was simple, utilize his digital inventory.
He could simply walk up to the skeleton, touch the bones, and seamlessly absorb the entire, haul of bones directly into his spatial void. It would instantly skyrocket his carry weight, making him massively over encumbered within the system's parameters. But he could easily mitigate that. He could simply act as if the continuous, master level Destruction and Restoration magic had entirely drained his physical stamina.
He could lean heavily on Lydia, pretending to be an exhausted, frail mage, and slowly walk back down to the carriage.
It was a flawless, logical plan. Until he factored in the audience.
Aerion subtly shifted his gaze, looking at the two rigidly attentive Whiterun Housecarls and also, the hyper vigilant Blade spymaster.
'Absolutely not,' Aerion instantly vetoed his own plan, his tactical paranoia overriding his greed.
Making several tons of massive, heavy dragon bones instantly vanish into thin air without a single spell incantation or visible magical portal was vastly too suspicious. Lydia and Valdemar, possessing a basic Nordic understanding of magic, would undoubtedly ask deeply probing questions.
But the true threat was Delphine. If the spymaster witnessed him actively utilizing an impossible, reality breaking form of infinite spatial storage, she would immediately flag him not just as a powerful mage, but as an unknown, potentially apocalyptic entity.
She would dedicate the entire remnants of the Blades spy network to uncovering his true nature. It would completely shatter the carefully constructed illusion of his 'humble scholar' persona.
The system was his absolute greatest advantage, and he had to keep it entirely hidden from the intelligence operatives of Nirn.
'I must utilize mundane, logistical methods,' Aerion resolved smoothly, adapting his strategy. 'Bjorlam is currently waiting on the road near Windhelm. We will march down to the carriage. From there, I will hire Bjorlam to help him go to Windhelm to rent three heavy, reinforced mining wagons and their drivers. I will pay them an exorbitant sum of gold to transport these bones and scales directly back to my Whiterun homestead under the heavy guard of my mercenary company.'
It was slower, vastly more expensive, and tedious, but it was entirely, perfectly normal within the bounds of this reality. It maintained the cover perfectly.
As Aerion finalized the logistical transport details in his mind, Aeloria let out a long, heavy, deeply satisfied sigh.
The Dragonborn opened her bright blue eyes, turning her gaze toward the High Elf and her strike team. She raised a heavily gauntleted hand, flexing her fingers as if testing the new, profound weight of the magic resting within her blood.
"I can feel it," Aeloria announced, her voice thrumming with a quiet, ancient resonance that had not been there before the battle. She looked directly at Aerion, a massive smile splitting her face. "The word we found up in the mountains of the Pale... in the cavern inside Ustengrav. The magic was hollow before, but the soul I just absorbed... it filled the word perfectly." She lowered her hand, her eyes shining with absolute certainty. "I can unlock it now," Aeloria declared. "I know exactly how to shout the Word of Life."
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[Main Panel]
Name: Aerion
Race: High Elf (Altmer)
Health: 540/540 Stamina: 560/560 Magicka: 750/750
Level: 158
Skills: Animal Affinity (MAX LEVEL), Fast Skill Levelling (MAX LEVEL), Fast Magic Mastery (MAX LEVEL), Instant Shout (MAX LEVEL), Dragon Master (MAX LEVEL), Destruction (Fire(+3)/Lightning(+1)/Frost(+1)) (Level 67/92/56), Restoration (Healing(+1)/Purify(+2)) (Level 52/50), Alteration (Level 35), Illusion (Level 50), Conjuration (Necromancy/Summoning(+1)) (Level 37/38), Persuasion(+1) (Level 89), Smithing (Level 22), Sneak (Level MAX), One Handed(+1) (Level 72), Two Handed (Level 81), Lockpicking (Level 35), Archery (Level 72), Enchanting (Level 66), Light Armor(+1) (Level 18), Block (Level 70), & Pickpocket (Level 8)
Shouts: Fus Roh Dah (Force Balance Push), Tiid (Time), Krii (Kill), Feim Zii (Fade Spirit), Su (Air), & Laas (Life)
[Inventory Panel]
1x Small Sack, Poacher's Axe, Mammoth Tusk, the Golden Claw, Calm Spellbook, Arvel's Journal, Inkwell & Quill, Thief Book, Scroll Of Summoning (Wolf), Scroll Of Healing, Weak Potion of Paralysis, Golden Staff of Flames, Parchment Rolls Of Mammoths Farm And Loan, Ebony Claw, Orcish Dagger, Jagged Crown, The Mirror, Ring of Pure Mixtures, Grand Soul Gem (Filled), Reanimate Corpse Tome, Staff of Lightning, Deed to Tundra Homestead, Sapphire, Ruby, Dawnbreaker, Traveling Backpack (Supplies), Potion of Minor Magicka, Vampire Armor, Vampire Boots, Movarth's Golden Ash (Unique), Dwarven Sword, Hide Boots Of Sneak, Gold Ruby Ring of Fortify Magicka, Iron Garnet Ring of Fortify Conjuration & Magicka Regen, Elven Dagger, Potion of Healing, Honed Ancient Nord Sword of Sparks, Gold Emerald Circlet, & Scroll of Fire Storm, Ring of Archery,Hide Boots of Stamina, Ancient Nord Sword of Absorbing, Iron Garnet Circlet, Iron Sapphire Circlet, Grand Soul Gem (Filled), Glass Boots, Dwarven Sword, & Dwarven Shield
2x Common Soul Gem (Empty), Black Soul Gem (Empty), Elven Sword, Amethysts, Potions of Plentiful Magicka, Scroll of Conjure Familiar, & Scroll of Magelight
3x Glowing Mushrooms, Potions of Minor Stamina, Flawless Sapphires, Gold Necklace, Iron Necklace, Petty Soul Gem (Filled), & Potions of Minor Magicka
4x Spider Eggs, Garnets, & Common Soul Gem (Filled)
5x Lesser Soul Gem (Filled)
7x Vampires Dust
8x Iron Arrows & Ancient Nord Arrows
9x Potions Of Minor Healing
12x Black Soul Gem (Filled)
Weight: 95.21 KG / 580 KG
Septims: 83,177