XIII

 

It was high time we began with our accounts of scientific discoveries in respect to the looming dark at hand. We were still shaken from the events that had transpired the day before. Even after burying our two friends about fifty meters away from the encampment southwestward, we felt that our sadness would not subside. We said our last goodbyes then. But the faintest sense of something with greater purport than mere death kept lingering about as our group gathered by dawn in the big tent. It was not in mourning of our losses that we felt uneasy. Rather it were the singular observations and perturbing coincidences we made and had been pointed to.

All the evidence that we had gathered and put on paper, telling the tale of a prodigious calamity. That night, none were on guard duty. And as peculiar of a sentiment this is, it was good that way.

When Horace, Ravaia and I got up in the morning to discuss all our findings, we noticed that for the first time, some entity must've been traipsing around our camp. Whatever it was, we thought, that nocturnal visitor was fortunately oblivious to our presence for no one was alerted. My heart dropped, however, when I pointed out to my associates whence the footsteps I meticulously tracked, originated from. 

 

Southwestward. With some hesitation we approached the crude graves, following the trail of warped prints in the tainted mud. We found both holes empty. "Don't tell me that..." Ravaia started a sentence she dared not complete.

Azarain's grave was dug up from the inside, whereas Lili's had been opened from the outside. The conclusions we drew were maddening. After a brief moment of stupefied taciturnity I all of a sudden cursed wildly, exclaiming that I shan't wait for it to kill me as well. This snapped my colleagues out of their nightmarish trance.

Truth be told, injury and despondence had taken away from me. But I didn't intend to venture this far only to despair now. To take action was in order. And our first step would be collecting and archiving all that we knew of the blight from the stars. When we gathered in the tent, we shared all our combined findings with each other. We were two days late and two men short. If we had not lost Azarain, a lot may have been prevented.

 

We came to valid hypotheses that I shall relay to you now. These will be of vital importance should you decide to send help.

Based on our first observations, this alien substance 'infests' the area around it, transforming it into crystalline things of sparkly grandeur. It goes through stone and other inanimate things but appallingly does not stop at living tissue. When we observed the contaminated soil, the grass changed colour but the earth showed only hints of shards. This led us to assume that, at least in plants, the changes are not that severe.

On the other hand, this alien material appeared to sport necromantic qualities. I've first handedly experienced them. Once in the tenebrous sepulchre as we all almost perished in the deathly battle against the blighted. Another time as Azarain had, after expiry, risen as one of them. Worse, he seemingly rose yet again, even after careful extraction of the substance from his body. By what power we could fathom not. Only that Lili's split corpse has been taken away as well.

 

Moreover, the observations we had so unluckily made during Azarain's slaying of Lili in such brutal fashion pointed towards a grim assumption. That any blighted creature must possess inherent soul trapping capabilities. As any avid enchanter knows, a wisp-like light emerging from any living organism that flew into any gem of some proportion could mean only one thing. Hence, we also took to infer this starry affliction grew no mere prismatic appendages - they actually were, so we believed, soul gems!

Highly concerning and impactful theories mounted as we discussed with intensifying anxiety and utter anguish the prophetic import of what all this meant. We quickly realized that the cosmic sickness was much more alerting than we at first thought. And a sickness it truly presented itself to be.

 

Ever since Horace and I had come back from the tomb, we suffered from some pneumonic disease every now and then provoking vigorous coughing fits. So during our conference, Horace happened to expectorate yet again with force. Thereunto cascaded down a cataract of bloodied radiance on the collapsible table, staining some of our notes.

Now there was no mistaking the threat. Desperation set in after we collectively grasped what kind of situation we got ourselves in. To think we'd some day end like Azarain had was a detestable cogitation. And there was no known remedy. There was, though, one singularly frightening detail Ravaia pointed out after having listened to our ramblings. Bear in mind that she had been a warrior, no scholar or mage in any capacity. But even she knew a fair bit about soul gems.

 

After Horace and I talked about the possibility that these shiny stones might be just that, she enunciated that there was only one place Ravaia knew about where those would grow naturally. The Soul Cairn. We held our breaths for a moment as the sentiment sunk in. Could it be? This unconsecrated sorcery, could it hail from a place, dimensions away? By our studies we were well aware that within that plane, a gate existed separating our reality from theirs. If Ravaia was correct it'd mean that the gate somehow has opened. Impossible to imagine what that would spell for our world.

We sat down, puzzled. What were we to do? How could we possibly oppose this corruption? Our only solace was the circumstance that the growths appeared to come to a halt after a certain distance. So at least, the continent as a whole would stay intact, even if the luminescent undead were to resurrect an army. We sat there, thinking, until at last I from my stash produced that black soapstone with its Ayleid embellishments.

 

I relayed what happened after I made the mistake of uttering aloud the engraved phrase chiseled into its surface. How some sort of anti-light embraced me and defiled my magic. And how it tainted a varla stone that had subsequently been stolen from me by shadowy figures.

Taking all our information into account, we finalized on theorizing that some entity from the Soul Cairn had initiated all of this to happen for reasons unknown. We inferred that it was most likely an undertaking to gather even more souls or just to harm Nirn. Maybe both. And whatever primal might I've unleashed upon the world plays an important part in this enigma of evil as well. I wondered, just what kind of threat are we up against?

 

XIV

 

If anything of what we believed turned out to be true, we'd face an adversary we could not defeat. After all, we were scientists and scholars, no heroes. Notwithstanding all the adversities this perdition presented, we resolved to venture into the ruins again. We needed to know more if we at some point intended to lay waste to it. Though it greatly disturbed us how the bodies were missing. It hinted at another resurrection. But how?

Our perturbedness did not dissuade our increasingly questioning minds, however. If anything, the bellows of thought blasted even more strongly now. We knew we couldn't save our friends. But perhaps we could avert the doom that rose from that mound of madness just long enough before it became a more serious problem. One that would affect all of Tamriel.

 

Horace and I readied ourselves to yet again plunge into the lion's mouth, sitting atop the pits of the age old tunnels and chambers. As we perched at the aperture's precipice we beheld the brooding gem. It had now blackened completely, engulfed in seething fumes. A demoralizing sight, that stone. It told of whatever processes were at work here made steady progress.

The two of us decided to leave Ravaia in the camp. She was the only one who had not yet succumbed to the blight in some fashion and we intended to leave it that way. It proved to be at length fatal to be even near those extra dimensional things. So only Horace and my good self were left to combat this foe.

 

Not stalling any longer, we traversed the escape tunnel to reach again the location in which was contained a writhing malice of utmost abhorrence. The way back in turned out to be much quicker, though we anticipated another fight. But to our surprise, the gloomy hall was devoid of both life and unlife. Had I only, in my anxiety, imagined those shades? A mirage?

With uncertainty we pressed forward, knowing not what to expect. The black varla stone was gone. No shapes or blighted in sight. An atmosphere of relative safety eased our minds for the time being. For a fair bit, I lost track of how long exactly we wandered around that chamber looking for anything out of the ordinary amongst all the extraordinary murals, carvings and architectural salinity. Curiously, we encountered no combatants during the entirety of our expedition.

 

We were about to give up and leave again when Horace tipped my shoulder, pointing at a hitherto invisible mural on a wall that had just lit up. On it there was depicted a map of Cyrodiil with every Ayleid ruin marked by a glowing spot. Above the rocky image it said a single word, the implications of which sent chills down my spine. "Tarni". "Gates"?

If our suspicions were at all true and Malada was to be used as some kind of entry point for the denizens of other, more ungodly dimensions, then this map told us clearly and without a doubt that every Ayleid ruin had the capabilities necessary to be used as such. Was this a carefully planned failsafe? An act of last vengeance fastidiously devised by the Hidden Ones of ancient times in the event that their empire fell and Umaril failed? If so, by what power did they design it? The questions piled up tremendously. But now we could say with certainty that the entire province was at stake.

 

I quickly and coarsely copied the map from the terrible relief on a sheet of paper. Albeit we had no knowledge in respect to stop any of this from happening, we resolved to do something that straight thinking folk would never have seen as an option. Break the gem.

If there's anything we could try to keep the darkness at bay, we were ready for it. With great haste we hurried back to the surface. Swift steps echoed as the daylight at the end of the narrow passage drew closer. But our resolve should soon be tested when we were interrupted by an utterly frightened scream. It was Ravaia's voice. Had Lili and Azarain returned? Risen again as unholy abominations of tainted space? We lost no time in sprinting to the exit. The empty swings of a sword slicing through air could be heard amidst an audible panting and a faint droning sound that would make my heart jump in panic. I was the first to climb up the still working rope ladder, fatigued as I was from all the bodily exertion. Then, I beheld a vista that should change my outlook on the situation forever.

 

Confidence faltered gradually as I watched Ravaia some distance away battle with an unnameable terror. A denizen born from the deepest recesses of an outer hell. A ghastly apparition, half solid, half incorporeal, encircling with riveting speed and dexterity our Redguard warrior, clawing at her viciously. So at last, I despaired, the living shadows have emerged from their domain. Looking at it in broad daylight, I was still inept to readily ascertain as to what it actually was. Even now, remembering its exact appearance proves to be devilishly difficult.

This wraith-like grotesqueness sporting the queer likeness of a hooded man is nigh indescribable. It seemed to be only in part composed of solid matter. Being utterly black and oozing where it was, fuming and smoking half transparently where it wasn't. The horror didn't have any legs but rather a tattered, seeping blackness that dripped down only to dissipate before it could hit the ground. The apparent 'torso', if one could call it that, possessed two or maybe four arms. I wasn't able to clearly observe it for my crooked perception of the levitating daemon changed whenever it moved.

Accentuating the thing's utmost bizarrerie was a warping spot in or on its chest which I can only describe as some 'pulsating emptiness'. A space-bending anomaly that twisted the vision of the beholder from every angle. Thusly, it is impossible to describe adequately its true appearance and form due to whatever anomaly this was, it sufficiently obfuscated its features to a point at which its anatomy looked unearthly and completely outrageous. Improbable and implausible.

 

As it floated hither and thither, everything around it, including the apparition itself, shifted and mangled puzzlingly. This... just should not be. Its mere presence and the very premise of its existence mocking and insulting nature herself, sapping defilement from every orifice. Less steadfast men may even go mad just by gazing at it. By the divines, I almost fall into delirium myself as I try to recall it now.

Horace, who by this time had also resurfaced, was equally speechless. I remember him saying only this: "The Nine save us...". The unspeakable nightmare must have taken note of us and turned its head to face both him and me in response.

There was no face under its suspected cowl. Only the gaping void that seemed to pull us in as we peered into the stars and cosmic fever of the abyss. And from it released a deafening wail beyond mortal understanding causing our blood to boil and freeze solid at the same time. A sound unheard of, it presented no causality betwixt itself and Nirn.

 

No, this was the work of nameless outer spheres from the vastness of untold existences. I can never unhear that noise. Nor can I unsee what followed.

While the thing was distracted by our intrusion, Ravaia undertook an attempt at stabbing it right in its droning nothingness. Shockingly, the sword was pulled in and crushed with a gravitational surge of energy. Now I experienced just how narrowly I escaped death amidst the Ayleid graves. This was the type of entity I looked at down there. But if that's true, there were at least six more.

Ravaia had been disarmed. She attempted flight but was inexplicably pulled back. The shifting, floating parody of a being lifted its despicable talons to get a hold of her. Ravaia's face stiffened upon being touched by it, her mouth wide open, eyes bulging. She was unable to scream as we observed in her eyes how the mind must've shattered to pieces. Proceeding to howl again the shape shouted in what I assumed to be the dragon language.

 

Echoing across the landscape we heard: "AUS SAH NAHKRIIN!".

Out from its supposed face that was not a face shot a stream of solid night, gathering around Ravaia as it threatened to choke her to death. She was brought to her knees. Then we witnessed her bones breaking, one by one. Thereunto her body began to fold in on itself! I have severe trouble to explain how it truly was. I've seen it with my own eyes, yet I cannot fully grasp what exactly transpired. I can not believe what I saw.

Her limbs were crushed by an invisible force against her torso and abdomen, splattering fractured bone and frayed flesh everywhere. Some of which was swallowed by the creature's anomaly, I believe. The entire process was accompanied by incomprehensibly agonized screams emanating from her throat until it, too, was bent and twisted inwards. The rest of her corpus then folded. First it snapped in half and then ever smaller until all had vanished inside a compact, little mass of fleshy drippings and iron bits, leaving behind no trace of the woman that used to guard us and our expeditions for several years in the past.

 

This most powerful of black magic was of wholly unnatural origin, I was sure. Nothing inherent to our world could even remotely try to do anything such as that. If, indeed, what I saw was real and not an elaborate fancy. We could do nothing for her now.

In fright, Horace and I stumbled backwards and tumbled back into the pit that held the root of this evil. My heart raced with quickened blood. The adrenaline almost bursting out of my pores. With shaky, sweat soaked hands I stood up, intent on fleeing madly into the everdark of the ruins. In my trembling consciousness it mattered not whence I went. I knew that I could only die. But if I died at the hands of one of the blighted, I crazily told myself in drunken equilibrium, such a fate would be a better option as opposed to what I had just bore witness to.

But all was lost when out of every corridor , every hallway and every chamber poured the malign shapes of these monsters. The remaining six wailingly approaching me and Horace. An eighth shadow barely visible in the distance holding a staff with a mounted gem in hand. There was nothing we could do to stop them.

 

In a last resort effort, to save myself and Horace from suffering such a fate, I ripped Horace's pickaxe from his ice cold palms and brutally hacked into the great stone that fell from the sky so many days ago. An unbearable crying answered my brutish assault. But I ceased not. In hopelessness I continued to destroy the lurking evil to the best of my ability. I felt the entities flee into their pits as at last the gem broke.

The crystalline monolith shattered into pieces and revealed a writhing, wriggling black mass radiating with a pungent odour of death, decay and filth. It reeked just as if one would when decomposing alive. With a loud thwack it crashed to the ground from inside the gem and then, quicker as my pickaxe could strike it, slithered into the cyclopean entombments along with the black ghosts. It left no trace.

 

XV

 

How we escaped our ruin I am not certain. We didn't destroy the blight. Nor did we eradicate the blighted or whatever things crept in the abyss. But I think we've weakened them, giving us the time we need to collect our thoughts. Their retreat into the cold recesses of Ayleid ancestry a faint glimmer of hope. Maybe all is not lost.

As I sit here and write all of this down, I'm still unable to get a firm grasp of it. Of what happened. Everything that took place up to this point bends my shaken mind. Likewise, I can not tell what the shuffling, morphing black mass was that wriggled and slid its way into the crypt. All I can say for certain is that Horace and I are lucky to still be alive. Albeit who knows for how long. Both of us are afflicted, after all.

 

All of this happened four weeks ago. In all this time, I managed to hide my sickness by perpetually drinking various remedies. But I can feel how it weakens me day by day. I am deathly afraid to brace the outside at night in fear of the vile stars shining down on me with contempt. In fear of yet more of these monoliths falling from the sky. But perhaps we could delay the process somehow.

 

We both collected our bearings after the things dispersed and traveled back to Leyawiin without further incident. I managed to avoid answering numerous inquiries in respect to my health by telling tall tales of great pilgrimage and how much it has worn on me. None may yet know the truth. None but you.

When we arrived, we settled down in the Lodge again to return to our studies to the best of our abilities. Horace skimmed over countless books whereas I took to formulating this epistle to be delivered to you. But even so, our progress is very slow for our bodies are broken past the point of mending.

 

I can hear Horace vomit and retch with repulsion just in the other room. His condition worsens. I, too, feel incredibly squeamish. We will all perish in the end. Every single one of us. But not in vain, for I'll ensure this letter reaches you, my old friend. I deeply hope that my accounts have convinced you of the severity of the situation. The fiends have been driven back for now, certainly. But I fear they will yet return. And when they do, we must be ready, lest Cyrodiil withers and dies like a drained flower. At least for now I'm safe. When I'm done, I will send Horace to deliver this letter. Maybe you know a way to cure him. I am much too weak for the journey to Anvil but Horace is still strong enough and may be saved.

 

Please, I beg you. Send notices, rouse the townsfolk, pass word around. We need heroes down there to deal with this disastrous catastrophe before it gets out of hand! I can't guarantee I'm still alive when this letter reaches you. But I can guarantee that, should you not listen, we all are destined to be flung into the yawning void or walk Nirn as crystalline perversions of existence.

 

In frightful anticipation,

Yagir Ferenis

 

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