Gleaming the Dwemer-Cube: Falmer's Market

Greetings, sportsfans!

It's that time again; Monday morning, you're just in to work/class/not-a-job, and have to sift through all those emails/social media posts/reddits, and y'know what I don't blame you.  I'd rather be fishing as well.  But that's OK, we're here now, lets have some coffee and start our day off RIGHT.

So, Gunmar has tasked me with dispatching an errant vampire, masquerading as a lowly pilgrim searching the Skyrim countryside for wayshrines to pray at.  More like prey upon.  Thing is?  These vampire folks are tricksy; they can cloud peoples' minds and coerce them to hurt you.  So I have to be discreet about it, if I don't want to tarnish the Dawnguard's reputation.  Which is already shaky at best right now.

Portrait of a bloodsucker

I'm not usually one for ruse or guile, and have not invested any points within the Speech tree at all.  So this'll take a whole lot of luck.  At a time like this I somewhat miss the old Oblivion dialogue wheel where you could cajole & sweet-talk your way into someone's good graces; or just buy them out.

No funny stuff?  Well there goes my 5 minute balloon animal musical number.

So-far the "come with me, we'll defeat monsters!" ploy has worked.  He does seem hesitant, but he follows me to the outskirts of town behind a few abandoned and destroyed houses.  Only two scenarios start like this.  Horror or Porno.  And he ain't my type.

Not sure if want.

Sumbitch is TOUGH.  He doesn't look like much, but he's got the gumption to keep at it, and is pretty good with that blade.  However my spirit is strong; and my body stronger.  Ultimately, the predator becomes the prey.  Get me out of this stinkin' hole, Billy.  I am a broke-dick dog.

If you kill a vampire in the tundra with no city guards around to see it; do they still tell their arrow story?

This task for Gunmar is also directly next to the main meat & potatoes of this Dawnguard DLC; I'm to find the Blood and Dragon Elder Scrolls, so Mr. Moth Priest can read them and further get the info about Serana's kin and their dastardly plan.  Where would I find an Elder Scroll, or at the least information about one?

COLLEGE.

The mage's college of Winterhold, to be specific.  Which is where Mr vampire was hiding out!  Convenient!

WHAT is the weight of an unladen MY FIST IN YOUR FACE!?

I charm my way through the 'intiation' which is lame and involves lighting signal fires with magic.  Whatever poindexter I'm not here to learn how to shoot lightning out of my ass, I'm here to talk to your utmost scholarly expert on Elder Scrolls you got.

That expert is an Orc who's trying to 'drink' bread.

Great.  Pappy smell-butt here is the foremost Elder Scroll expert Skyrim has.  He's given me no real help other than to find the other foremost expert who came before him, and was driven insane by their work on Elder Scrolls in general.  Great.  Just great.

A room with a view to a kill. (PUNTASTIC! x5 Tricky!)

Oh look; is that a window with a majestic view of Winterhold's cliffs?  Is that your favorite goblet and personal bottle of fine cyrodiilic aged cheerwine?

FUCK. YO.

SHIT. SON.

You want that shit back?  Its at the bottom, go fetch.  I'm gonna go swim out through the ice floes to find the crazy dude you recommended me, because my life as Dragonborn isn't nearly filled with enough crazyfolk as-is you gigantic asshat.

Why do I feel like MacReady right now...

So Crazy-guy lives inside a glacier out in the middle of nowhere.  Gee I wonder wh--

Ancient dwemer rubik's cube.  BRILLIANT.

Turns out he found the thing a decade ago outside; and after consistently tinkering with it, he got it to work.  Once.  And then it melted into the glacier and so he had to dig down into it to further his studies.  Which involves me taking a tiny version of this thing to an ancient dwemer excavation site, and having it 'read' an Elder Scroll because somehow the dwarves figured it ALLLLLLLL OUT.

If they were so smart why are they all dead as shit?

Broken dwemer artifacts; staple decoration for an ancient dwemer ruin.

Whew; those things look scary.  I'm glad they're broken and none of them are ali--

So scary, I randomly ate ingredients in my backpack out of fear.  Yes I ate vampire dust.  Its gross.

Smaller than the frostbite spiders out in the real world, these guys are chugging metal deathmachines that some can shoot lightning out of their faceholes.  They are susceptible to punches though.  That's good to know.

Wasn't aware viagra was available in Skyrim.  

Oh glitches.  It even wavered in the slight breeze blowing through the caves.  This is also the first part of the ill-fated expedition in this place.  These two were brothers.  And they turned on one another at some point.  Sucks.  Sibling cat rivalry has to be the most treacherous of rivalries.  On account that cats are assholes.

MECHANICAL MONSTROSITY!

Dwarven Spheres!  The Droidekas of Skyrim.  These guys are actually pretty cool; they unfold out of their little sphere casings, then use that bit to roll around and their pneumatic stabby arms to well; stab you with.  Stronger than a spider construct, but less fear-inducing to me.  I handle my shit, and move on.

Ominous, yet alluring.  Like a dark alleyway with a 'free kittens' sign...

Something is laying eggs down here.  Why do I feel I'm on LV426 now all of a sudden.

Clearly I'm not alone.  Also SWEET! Health potion.

More of the excavation party found; this time this guy clearly looks like he stood his ground against something; but what.  The dwarven spheres?  Maybe.  but there's a whole mess of arrows and axes, so I don't think that's the case.  Also; there were egg sacs earlier.  Last time I scienced, I was pretty sure that mechanical creatures animated with eldricht forces could not reproduce, and if they could the gestation clearly would mimic mammals.  No eggs would be involved.

So that leaves the unknown; something ELSE is down here with me.  What could it b---

Oh god it has a vajayjay for a face

FALMERS OH GOD FALMERS.  In the Elder Scrolls lore, these guys are essentially the dark elves of the world.  Except we already have dark elves in Skyrim.  These are the real deal.  They're blind albino cave dweller subrace of elfdom who over the years have devolved to a point where they are little more than chittering ghouls feeding on bold adventurers staking claims within the long forgotten dwemer holds.

They. are. scary. as. fuck.

New & Improved!  Now comes in Magic flavor!

Oh god the caster version is even more rugged.  These guys are FAST.  Not only do they dodge my power attacks, they get a whole bunch in on me, drastically reducing my healing potion count.  I overcome, but I'm gonna have to go shopping at some point.  This is ridonk.

Even more of the excavation party.  Poor gal.

I don't.  No.  Not gonna. Nope nope nope. [FILLS BAGS WITH MYSTERY MEAT]

I don't know if there's anybody left of this expedition, but it sure isn't looking good.  For them at least.  Me?  I'm fine.  Never been better.  Havin' a bad hair day, but I got this here helmet on, so nobody will notice.  Thanks for asking!

I have to go deeper underground.  Again.

Well shit.

Door's locked.  I then proceed to run around the wall, and for a good 10 minutes attempt to glitch my way up and over, when I finally realize the mechanism for lowering the gate is RIGHT NEXT TO THE GATE.

I feel stupid, but hit that switch and...

I. AM. IRON. MAN.  ♫ BREEEEOOOOOWWWNNNNNN ♫

HUGE ROBOT IS HUGE.  The game's really tossing the big guns out now.  I love a good challenge!  This guy involved a lot of running around him and punching him in the ass; his weak spot.  also the one place he cannot commit murder on me from.

I won, because I'm quicker, and I ate my wheaties that morning.

The remainder of this ill-fated expedition.

So this is what happens when you survive for this long inside an acient dwemer city.  You're driven mad.  The last two members are busy duking it out until they see me.  Where they decide to stop their feuding for just long enough to kill me.  Sad really.  I offer them their final release, sending them to Sovngarde as champions for they died in battle.  Then I take the elevator down into the even deeper depths.

I don't think we're in Whiterun anymore, Barbas.

So it led to this giant and I mean GIANT underground system of caverns filled with huge glowing mushrooms, lakes and other phosphorescent fungi, as well as what looks to be a whole ancient dwemer kingdom, complete with a castle and surrounding hamlet.  I actually find a quest here to research red Nirnroots, but that'll be for another time.  Seriously this place feels like an entire section of content.  But first things first: Elder Scroll shenanigans.

Dwemer optometrist contraption?

The puzzle here isn't that puzzling.  Put the cube into the machine; check.  Press each button repeatedly until it 'locks' in the correct place; check.  Have the information of the Elder Scroll contained within large machine put onto cube for easy reading; check.  BONUS: pick up Elder Scroll while at it, since it's just there for the taking.  Hooray!

Now back to the crazy guy.  He's pleased as punch for sure, but now says I need blood to work the thing.  He can do it, he just needs blood from every elven race ever.  Plus orcs blood.  Why?  because I don't know.  He's crazy.  Whatever sure.  I need this to stop vampires and they want all the blood ever; so a little sacrifice for the greater good and all that.

What the; oh noes, a cthulhu!

Eeew.  I need an adult.

This tentacle wall is trying to recruit me to its cause of chaos and nonsense once I unlock this dwemer lament configuration.  I told it "No." only because it gave me the heebly jeeblies, and went back to Fort Dawnguard to tell Gunmar the job was done.

While there, I figure why not try out this 'Falmer Armor' I found off those dead falmers I killed and stuff.  Maybe it looks cool, y'know?

KSSSSSSSS!

So I look like a giant cockroach now.  Eew.  I'll save it for later, maybe.  As much as I want to wear it since its better than my current Dawnguard threads, I don't know if I can handle looking that.


UNTIL NEXT TIME!