Thadious and Lydia had made their way to Riverwood. There they stayed the night at the Sleeping Giant Inn. They awoke early, ready to embark from Riverwood to Ivarsgread, where Thadious would make the climb up the 7000 steps to High Hrothgar to answer the summons of the Greybeards.

After a trip to the Riverwood Trader, Thadious stopped off at Alvor's to use his friend's forge. But before Thadious could use the forge, he heard the shouting:

"Everybody, get inside! Now!"

Thadious stepped out in the street to see the guards drawing their arms, and pointing their bows and arrows towards the sky. Thadious looked up, and there he saw it.

He had fought one of these before, when he and Irileth led a group of Whiterun's best to fight off a dragon that was threatening Whiterun. But he had never encountered one on his own before.

The dragon would swoop down, perching itself upon gateways and rooftops, reigning it's chilling ice breath from above. Thadious, not skilled much in the way of ranged combat, read off as many Fireball scrolls as he could. Thadious charged the house where the dragon sat atop of. As the dragon focused its breath on Thadious, he quickly had to duck and dodge, getting what little cover he could underneath the house's awning.

Finally, the dragon descended, landing near the woodmill. Thadious fired up his Dragonskin shield, and charged head first, his two swords drawn. He finally got to the dragon, slicing at it with a fury he had never experienced before. Caught up in the moment, Thadious jumped up on top of the dragon's head, and began stabbing and slicing at it, until finally the dragon fell limp and lifeless.

Magical flames began to engulf the dragon's carcass as Thadious absorbed the soul of the creature he had just slain. The citizens of Riverwood began to gather around, in awe, while the guards tried to get everything back in order.

Except for one man. Alvor rushed towards the scene, held back by the guards, as he looked upon the lifeless body of his wife Sigrid.

Thadious approached his friend.

"Please, leave me be" Alvor replied.

Seeing the casualties that lay before him, Thadious now knew it was of the utmost importance to get to the Greybeards and learn how to defeat these dragons. Thadious had lost one friend too many. Thadious and Lydia would venture off, on their way to High Hrothgar, while Alvor would lock himself away in his home, mourning the loss of his love.

-----

Just happened. Had to post about it. It was great.

And before any of the killjoys come in complaining about needing "imagination" to cover up lack of consequence, nothing in that writeup is made up. Sigrid really is dead, and Alvor really is in mourning. What he said to me actually happened (although I may have paraphrased more than directly quoted).

Loved it!

Great story.

It took me about 10 times fighting dragons before I got a match that was worth remembering. Most of the time I have to follow the dragon half way accrossed Skyrim before it lands and either raqes me or sits there while smack it in the head twenty times.

Two would venture forth from Riverwood to High Hrothgar, however, only one would finish the trek.

While traversing the mountains between Riverwood and Ivarsgread, Thadious and Lydia would stumble upon a group of bandits who had just ambushed a squad of Imperial soldiers. Donning their new found gear off the corpses of their victims, the bandits tried to bully Thadious and Lydia into giving up their goods. Thadious would not stand for it.

A fight would ensue. Thadious would attempt to use his cunning to isolate the bandits, taking them one by one. As he dropped the first soldier, he quickly re-raised her with the powers of his necromancy. A new ally by his side, Thadious charged in to the remaining two bandits.

Behind the bandits, he had seen Lydia downed, on one knee trying to gather herself. He knew she was weak, and thus, tried to keep the bandits away from her. It would work, and Thadious would slay the two bandits with the help of his zombie ally.

He quickly rushed back to Lydia, intent on attending to her wounds. Only he was too late.

There she lay, face down in the mountain, lifeless. Thadious mourned her loss, and let her lay in honor, armor and shield kept close to her.

The threat for Thadious wasn't over, however, and Lydia would have one fight left in her yet.

In the distance, he heard the sound of explosions. As he investigated, he saw two mages charging his location, slinging spells his way. Thadious, armed with magic of his own, used his own talents to breath one last bit of life into Lydia's body.

"It's what she would have wanted" Thadious rationalized to himself.

Slowly, a magical energy filled Lydia's body with one last rush of animation, and the two friends and allies would charge side by side into their last battle together.

The enemy mages quickly defeated, Thadious said his final goodbye to Lydia as her body dissolved away into ash.

I just get upset when a named NPC dies. It makes you want to be as strong as you can to prevent it from happening again. Skyrim is just about the only video game that has ever made me values a fake person's life because I know if they die they will never come back.

*tear*

I have been thinking about starting a character and keeping a jornal of his adventures and I think this post may have just pushed me over the edge to do it. Off topic you must not have much luck with the ladies. It seems like they just keep dying around you.

Haha, well it was definitely a rough day in the life of my character.

I so badly wanted to reload my game to save Lydia, but my "house rule" is that except for Dead Is Dead, I played Whatever Happens, Happens. And I had already reloaded an earlier save previously when Lydia had died once already - I made an exception because I was the one who killed Lydia with an accidental dual wield power attack because she got mixed up with a bunch of Alik'r, and I didn't realize it was her until mid attack. But I couldn't do it twice. I really wanted to though, because I really thought she was alive, the last time I had seen her she had taken that "on one knee" position, and the bandits had left her alone. I was trying to rush over to her and hit her with some Healing Hands, but by the time I got there, it was too late. I wonder if she got hit with some bleeding damage or something though that finished her off.

I don't normally write out my adventures like that, but it felt fitting this time. I would be all for this thread being turned into a "talk about your adventures in Skyrim" thread, where people post what their characters are up to, either in narrative form, or just talking about it. I know we've had threads like that in the Morrowind and Oblivion sections, I don't mind this thread being turned into Skyrim's version of that. Feel free to reply with your character's adventures!

But then where would all the people that just want to complain about the game go?

Not this thread!

Yea, it's fun when you can enrich gameplay with that kind of thing. That's how I really got into playing Skyrim, when I realized that Raksha's quest to find herself Khajiit friends became separate story, which nicely entangled itself with some of Skyrim's original quests and random encounters.

I can't write so nicely so I'll just watch you guys writing your great stories

Thanks for the compliment!

Luckily, what made the experience so great though was that while I did write it all out, it all happened just how I wrote it.

It all literally started with hearing yelling and screaming and commotion as I was gonna go use the forge. I went to go investigate, and that's when I saw all the guards with their bows drawn towards the sky, so obviously I knew what had happened. I literally had to flatten myself against the wall of a house, underneath the awning, as the dragon sat on the roof blowing his ice breath down upon me, I got as flat against the wall as I could to get as much protection from the awning as possible. And after the dragon had died, with the killcam in full force, guards blocked the way as Alvor was attempting to get to the body of his dead wife. I went to go speak to him, wondering if he would acknowledge his dead wife (knowing how everyone always complains about how the game acknowledges nothing), and sure enough, all he said to me was "Leave me be, let me mourn in peace" (not a quote, but a paraphrase). As I regrouped with Lydia in the center of town, Alvor began running towards his house, yelling and screaming, and after entering his home, proceeded to lock the door behind him, keeping all others out.

I thought it was a rather incredible sequence for a game that supposedly doesn't respond to what happens in the world.

I have had a lot of lackluster dragon attacks, but this one certain lived up to the hype!

Even if you don't want to write it out in a fictionalize narrative form, feel free to share your character's adventures in this thread!

Haha I love the dragon killcam where you jump on it's head

That's cool. I knew that NPCs react to death of members of their family, but I've never seen it in action

if Braith of whiterun dies, there is a chance that a group of people will surround her the next day and the guards are doing an investigation. One of them will ask you if you know what happened and report to commander caius if you know something. Whats more saddening is Amren and (saffir i think), parents of braith, were crying, yes crying.
And alvor is suicidal.

Great read.

I remember my best dragon encounter:

Harold, the nordic warrior, had slain many dragons in his time and was now a powerful wielder of the Thu'um. After spending the night in Rorikstead he started his journey into the Reach, seeking the head of a Forsworn Briarheart.

As he entered the valleys of the Reach he heard an all to familiar roar from the skies. A dragon.
As soon as the dragon noticed him it circled around and engaged him in melee combat. While he was fighting the beast he can hear another roar: It was two against one.
The dragons fought as one creature, switching roles and forcing Harold to stay in the open to prevent him from being trapped.

After a long and tough battle the dragon were dead, and Harold was free to continue his journey.

nice writeup!
im not as poetic as the op but my best dragon so far..

i ended up on top of a huge mountain at dead of night.snow blowing in curls off the top,and a beutifull aurora borealis lighting up the sky which totaly mesmerised me.
a bloody great dragon crashes to the ground about 3feet behind me scaring the bejeezis out of me.
my boy charges in hammer swinging,blasted by flame only to hear a roar from the right as two bears charge out of a bush to attack me at the same time!
my boy manages to take the dragon down and one bear but the second finaly does for him.
this was only the second dragon id seen,but gaming moments like this are gold.that moment alone was worth the price of the game!
nice thread. cheers

Awesome stuff! Keep it coming.

Hmmmf, i never seem to get dragons in towns; the dragons in my game are all scared of crowds

Ugh, your incident with Lydia makes my heart wrench. Although imo raising her as an undead seems like a worse fate compared to dying outright.

That was awesome. Thanks for posting. When Sigrid was killed in my game, Alvor never returned. I keep hoping at any minute a re-spawn will occur and he will be back as a smith in Riverwood.

My Nord Warrior Vaden Stormhammer, on his way back to Whiterun to attend Kodlak’s funeral. I am mounting the steps leading from the market place to the Hall when the roar of a dragon sounds (this is at night, btw). I engage in a chaotic battle thought out the residences and temples, till finally bringing the beast down right near the central tree. After the fires die down and the soul absorbed, I look around to see the town’s people and half the Companions in awe of what happened

Illyana had stood on the north slope of the mountain, staring down at the shoreline below, for what might have
been half the night. Her mind was filled with rage, and her heart with vengeance; she knew it was the wrong
way to enter battle, so she had tried to calm herself, to steel herself for what she had to do. In time, the
freezing, salty winds cooled her blood and she could think clearly again. Relaxing some, she began to scan the
shore and the forbidding keep, where she knew her friend's son was being held, forming something of a battle
plan.

Checking her armor, honing and oiling her blade at a deliberately leisurely pace, she finally felt the time
was right. The silver light of both moons, hanging low enough she felt she could touch them if she reached
up a bit, lit the silent world as she descended. At the bottom of the cliff, she walked casually, as if out
for a stroll with not a concern in the world, toward the manned, but oddly open gates of the aged castle.

As she neared, non-chalantly drawing her sword and smiling at the nearest guardsman, a Thalmor soldier with a
very concerned look on his angular face commanded her to stop. The two Elves drew their own weapons in an
attempt to demonstrate to her just how serious was her error in choosing this time and place for her evening outing,
the nearest one saying, "Turn yourself around now, Nord, you have no business here!"

She smiled gently, raised her arms skyward, and from her throat issued a deep, earth-shaking and sky-sundering
roar. To say the Elves were surprised would be a dramatic understatement. "By the Eight, it's HER!" yelled a
third guard from atop the walls, "Kill her, do NOT let her live!" His last words.

She had called up a storm of epic and deadly force

Laughing merrily, she began her dance of death, untouched by the gale, undaunted by the score of foes trying
their best to stay on their feet, trying to end her life, trying in vain to survive. In just a few minutes,
all twenty of them lay dead, their blood covering her and the ground, as the storm continued to pound the
open courtyard.

Unscathed, untouched by any weapon, impervious to the storm, she opened the keep's door and stepped inside,
her face an unearthly streaking of rivulets of blood and rain, her eyes brilliant blue beacons of justice.

The narrow corridors of the keep weren't ideal for a sword fight, but she had little choice now. Turning
back never entered her mind, she was committed and determined to save her friends' son and brother, no matter
the odds. "Intruder!" came a keening, nasal, annoying shout. Coming toward her, a pair of sword wielding
soldiers, clad in golden armor, yelled their battle cries and close with her. She quickly dispatched them,
as three more rounded a corner ahead, drawn by the commotion. It wasn't long before pandemonium filled the
halls and crannies, the sounds of hard-shod feet growing louder as it seemed an entire regiment of Elven
fighters and wizards streamed to the fray.

Blades flashing, lightning bolts screaming into her, she gloried in a ballet of blood, heads flying one way
and bodies another. She stabbed, slashed, pommeled, kicked and staggered foe after foe, her own wounds
unnoticed and doing nothing to slow her progress. A grim farmer bent on a deadly harvest, she cleared
the ground floor of all opposition. The walls and floors were her canvas, and Elven blood her paint, as she
created her masterpiece of destruction.

Opposition thinned as she neared the end of her self-assigned mission. Head high, back straight, shoulders
squared, she strode through the few remaining Elves with an almost casual air, and finally, drenched by now
in blood, she found what she'd come for. He was hanging from the far wall of a chamber littered with the
implements of torture and the skeletal remains of prior "guests" of the Thalmor. Too weak to even raise
his eyes, he muttered something about, "Just finish it, you cowards." "Sorry," she sighed, "your Elven friends
are all dead. I'm afraid it's just me and you, now."

"Wh- who are- who are you?" he managed to ask.

"I'm here to take you home. Can you walk?" She smiled at him and removed his shackles, then helped him to his
feet. "Steady, take your time, you need to drink some water." Bringing water and small bits of food, she
tended to his more recent wounds, binding them as best she could. They set about getting him some clothing,
and he grabbed a waraxe from one of the bodies she'd recently sent flying into the wall nearby.

"Lean on me, we need to get out of here." Grabbing some furs and warm clothing for him, she led him to the
outer courtyard. "You know what's funny about all this?" she asked bemusedly.

"What's that?" he wondered.

She grinned at him and said, "Look around you. Every room we've come through is littered with empty Nord mead
bottles. So much for Elven superiority, eh?"

He managed a little laugh, and seemed to be a bit cheered by her disposition.


As they exited the keep, the storm was dying, coughing its last few gusts of rain. Breathing in the fresh air
did wonders for them both, and they shared some cheese, bread and mead. "So, will you return to Whiterun?" she
asked him.

He shook his head, saying, "No, that would be suicide. I have to get back to the Stormcloaks and recover. Look,
I don't even know your name. Or why you did this. Or for that matter, HOW you did this. I don't think "thank you"
covers it, but I have nothing else to offer."

Holding her hand up, she said, "No need. Believe me, it was my pleasure."

Making sure he had weapons, armor, food, and all that he needed to survive for a while, she bade him farewell, and
turned southward, to deliver his message to his mother.

I'll be sure to post the adventures of my current thief/ assassin, Serenya, soon, but for now, here's a tale from my previous character, Kriger Ice Breaker.

Kriger handed over the Elder Scroll to the Orc librarian, a strange occupation for an Orismer. He made his way for the exit of the College of Winterhold, but stopped. The warrior instead made his way out to the balcony, the balcony facing east, towards the smoldering wreckage of Vvardenfell. Kriger stood there in silent remembrance, ignoring the gathering snow storm.

It must've been a minute before it came, flying in front of Kriger, the Dragonborn. Kriger had fought many dragons, but none like this ancient creature. The dragon landed landed on the College's central tower, raining down freezing ice onto the fierce Nord, who shrugged it off, thanks to his Nordic blood and shield. The beast circled around the college, landing on the balcony in front of Kriger, tearing in to his armour with its great jaws.

Blood oozing from his chest, as the dragon stomped towards him, the Nord saw it preparing another frost attack. Becoming Ethereal, Kriger leapt off the balcony into the snow below just as the dragon drew another breath of ice. Gulping down as many healing potions possible, Kriger prepared for the dragon to swoop down.

As the dragon landed, the Nord warrior circled it, hacking and slashing with all of his might. The dragon flew no longer, sticking to the earth. Hacking away at the creature's head, Kriger leapt on to it, forcing his sword right into its skull. The dragon seemed to burn away as did its soul, entering Kriger, strengthening him. He breathed heavily, only truly feeling the cold now. He headed for his home, for Whiterun, for some damn peace!

Nice replies, all!

Sounds like an awesome experience.

That was pretty awesome