So I've left the Dark Brotherhood ques tline until after I've done just about everything else I want to do, mainly due to the fact that you will be killing people, people that may be important for other quests (ie. Blood on the Ice...now why in God's name would anyone in their right mind make quests that can affect other, completely unrelated quests is beyond me, I mean, really, does no one really say to themselves "Hey Self, we have this quest line here that you'll go killing a bunch of people, perhaps we should ensure that those we kill aren't related to any other quest...perhaps even generate people specifically for this quest or use people who aren't important for anything else...like the homeless...but I digress).

As I said, I left the quest line until very late and I finished the first couple quests and came to "Mourning Never Comes". I'm told that some chick in Markarth needs someone rubbed out. Fine, let's oil the blade and get on this. I go to Markarth and look for this naughty girl. I find her drowning her sorrows in the pub. I'm like,

"Yo, I hear you need someone rubbed out"

and she's all like

"Hells yeah, I needs Alain Dufont got"

and it was my response that shocked me, I said,

"Pffft, Dufont ? I already wasted that jerk"

YEAH! DAMN RIGHT I DID!!! Wait.... what ? I did ? When ? Where ? How ? I don't just go around murdering folk unless there's a damn good reason, like they attacked me specifically or coin....coin is a damn good reason... but anyway, no one told me to whack the guy that I could remember and I already have ? Well this confirms two things. First, I'm obviously psychic and second, which is directly linked to the first, I'm simply awesome. But this is when curiosity got the better of me and I just had to see who this guy was that I apparently already killed. After some research, it would seem I just encountered him in my travels, most likely when I was exploring Blackreach and the places that connected it. I probably just stumbled across him, he attacked me and I killed him. Weak. :/

What burns me is that because I was attacked and defended myself AGES ago, I now miss out on a Unique Ring (near as I can tell, the best unique alchemy ring in the game) because I can never trigger the Optional task in this quest. What kind of crap is that ? Even if I go and kill the optional target, I still don't get it. Furthermore I'm chastised by both the Chick I'm coming to do this for AND chicky at the Dark Bro. Sanctuary. Seriously ? I should be given a medal for the foresight to have slaughtered this punk before anyone even knew they wanted him dead.

Being the collector that I am, I feel pretty bummed about the whole ordeal. The developers obviously knew that this could happen, they scripted responses for this event. Couldn't they have just let it play out normally and force me to talk to her again to end the mission, or even added a dialog option requesting the other person being killed if I wanted, with a "Listen Lady, you only paid for ONE killing. One killing is all you get/More Killing?? Wheeeeeee" option. Or even better, make it one of those "Random Location/Random Guy" kind of things like many other quests do ?

I guess I'm screwed out of this ring ? I want this ring ! lol

The ring isnt worth it, it only gives a 15% bonus, i can double that as a skilled alchemist (with the perks) as for accidentally killing Alain, i would avoid going to Raldbthar (this is where he is) if you revert your saved game

Oh, I know the ring isn't worth it in the grand scheme for alchemy, but again, it's not that I want the ring because I want to use it, I'm just a collector, I like to see how many Unique Items I can get and was wondering if there was a way around it, steal it or something.

As far as reverting to an earlier save, I have no idea how far back that would be, I might not even have a save that far back (I keep a dozen or so saves and rotate them) but honestly, even if I had one it would be really far back and I'm not going to redo 30+ hours for a stupid ring lol

It's just stupid the game puts you in this position in the first place and was wondering if anyone had a workaround. Currently I've completed Blood on the Ice successfully with no issues and I've initiated this quest but have yet to actually speak with Muiri.

I don't think theres any way around it if you already killed him, im a collector myself (even collect all peices to all armor) but even so, doesnt seem worth all of the work, you could always just make a replica lol