If Sir Vyvoor had a Talos amulet, or mistakenly dropped a "By Talos!" when he stubbed his toe, that would have gotten him executed.

Sir V sounds like a remarkably laid back kind of guy. Are you sure he's a Nord?

Vyvoor had to undergo a very original and "fair" test of proving innocence.

But hey, at least he s'rvived.

Ah, thanks for the warm welcome, you three. I appreciate it. Yes, his game is dragon-free for the moment, but it will have some flying about eventually.

Yes, SR he is a Nord, ha ha.

I figure in the medieval era, this is how things were done sometimes. Like with the Salem witch trials they'd put some poor woman into a pool of water, to see if she floated or not (was a witch or not). Vyvoor flinched, according to his watch captain. But that watch captain will eventually wish he hadn't put my Nord onto that cart, yeah, he's gonna get shown.

-----------


Loredas, Last Seed 22

On the previous night, Sir Vyvoor was so poor, he couldn't afford to sleep inside the inn. Not that this bothered him much; he's slept outside twice now, and probably multiple times in the past. Another thing though: like one of my previous characters (Master Baytor), Sir Vyvoor also can't stand the bard's constant singing. Unlike MB, Vyvoor isn't forward enough to tell the bard to stop; instead he goes outside so he can think and eventually sleep.

But now it is morning, and Vyvoor finally locates Hod, and finally gets paid for all the firewood he chopped the day before. 21 gold, yippee.

Vyvoor grabbed some food from Hod & Gerdur's hearth area, again because he is too poor to really buy much of anything to eat. That 21 gold's going to need to go for awhile. After Vyvoor begins to eat though, all the sudden Hod tells him "He has to leave," and he repeats this statement several times.



In a way this is good. Vyvoor has been in Riverwood too long now. He had managed to smith his own iron armor the day before, and tomorrow it is Sundas. Sundas.... Sir Vyvoor needs to find some sort of chapel. As a devout follower of The Nine (and more specifically, Talos, Mara, and Stendarr), prayer in the chapel on Sundas is a huge thing for him.

He wonders if Whiterun has some places of worship.

Sir V is a worshiper of the Nine, not the Eight. That is saying a lot. He might appreciate Heimskr. For a while at least...

It's rarely that our characters are poor but I know the special feeling when some of mine couldn't afford a room or to buy even some basic supplies. Though it probably won't be long before Sir Vyvoor will be full of caps.

You're using mods that change prices in inns and gold earned for chopping wood, right? I used some that made rooms more expensive and chopping less rewarding.

And voila! SV has a perfect excuse to go to Whiterun and remain dragon-free!

I've spent a while with a Bosmer who's building her home in a Rift cave in SE, checking out the SKSE64 alpha. I had her give the Old Orc his good death, so we could confirm that the Hulk Transformation script works (and it does), so now she's meeting his siblings (and their dead sabre cats) along every road she travels. That's not supposed to be a once-off encounter, so it's not actually a bug or glitch, but I wasn't expecting it so often. Still, the bones from the cats have been useful.

I'm also noticing some oddities with other Wilderness Encounters. She's met the Carvain woman on her own without husband or guard. A single Stormcloak who was separated from his patrol, rather than the usual solo courier. A dead Dunmer alchemist lying beside the road, rather than in a pool near nirnroot plants. All since installing the SKSE61 alpha, but I don't yet see a connection. Nothing game-breaking, just odd.

Sundas, Last Seed 24

Sir Vyvoor arrives to Whiterun about mid-afternoon. Hungry he is, and the small amount of gold he's got is spent fast on one red apple, one carrot, and one salt cube which he'll use to cook some salmon meat with.

Hungry and poor. But he does find a "place of worship", and spends a couple hours listening to a priest who preaches about Talos, right in the middle of town.

Each time I read about Sir Vyvoor, I will survive comes to my mind.

Har har Lopov. I can promise you, Sir Vyvoor is all Nord. No way he's going to go disco-dancing across Skyrim, like somebody we know.

------------------

Morndas, Last Seed 25

Location: Whiterun

Slept outside the night before, and breakfast was a couple cabbage heads with two baked potatoes, all of which were taken covertly from a nearby farm. Sir Vyvoor, unsure if it'd be considered stealing to take food from a farm.

After this humbling moment, the rest of his day wasn't so bad. He earned some money chopping wood for Hulda, and took a sword up to the Jarl's steward. And just generally listened to random conversations of the people of Whiterun.

But the crowning moment happened just as the sun was going down: meeting Jarl Balgruuf and his court. Vyvoor earned a small amount of gold after delivering that sword to the Jarl's steward, which was good. 42 gp in his pocket right now, all right!

When the Jarl began trying to get Vyvoor's ear about a "dragon attack in Helgen", Vyvoor told the jarl just enough of what he'd witnessed (without also explaining that he was a prisoner of the Imperials). After explaining tings, some soldiers apparently got deployed to Riverwood.

But then the Jarl began demanding Vyvoor's more immediate attention, and this caused Vyvoor to back away.

He will help the people of Riverwood, but will not do anything for Jarl Balgruuf. He needs to get to Windhelm, starting tomorrow, he decides. What happened to Ulfric Stormcloak? Ulfric had been on the execution cart with Vyvoor...did Ulfric make it back to Windhelm? Vyvoor decides he has to find out.

Oh blast, I was hoping you'd use some animation mod and record a video as he dances with I will survive playing in the background.



With a name like this, he should be allowed to commit such petty crimes.

Off to Windhelm next to see if Ulfric survived? Neat motivation to head up there. I hope SV has some warm furs!

Middas, Last Seed 27

Cold, rainy day. That's one thing Vyvoor remembers from his youth: it can get cold at any time in Skyrim, even during summer.

Sir Vyvoor attacked Valtheim towers (and won) the previous evening. Since it was dark by the time he was done, the best thing to do would be to get some rest.

Some bandits had been milling about when he awoke several hours later though. Three of them. A couple of scroungy women attacked him as he woke, and these two lost quickly. A third attacker (an archer) surrendered after going into bleedout mode. Vyvoor, a true believer in second chances, let the man live.*

Early in the afternoon, he discovered Mixwater Mill, a town whose charm greeted him immediately. He spent the rest of the day & night here.

*Mercy mod

Turdas, Last Seed 28, near midnight

Days Passed: 12
Locations Discovered: 15

Hours Slept: 106
Hours Waited: 17

Sir Vyvoor arrives in Windhelm with just 30 Septims to his name, nowhere near enough to rent a room at Candlehearth Hall. It is late at night when he gets there, and he's tired. Luckily, he speaks to a priestess who tells him that Windhelm is the only town to features a temple devoted to Talos. Vyvoor finds this temple, which conveniently has a bedroll for him to sleep in.

(Unlike many of my other characters, Vyvoor will be spending a lot of time in Windhelm. )

A second priestess inside of the Talos temple asked Vyvoor if he'd be insterested in taking "donations" for the poor, and he agreed. So Vyvoor has been tasked with finding five people to get money from. Nice little mod-added quest to start with.

Looks like SV can take care of himself vs bandits. Nice that the Talosian Temple is helping him in Windhelm.

I need to send my screenshot through the GIMP to brighten it up before I post it, but my character was leaving Solitude, heading for Dragon Bridge, when she met the Carvains coming the other way. So she turned around and followed them, expecting that they'd turn off past Mount Kilkreath.

No, passed that junction and kept going. Maybe off towards the Thalmor Embassy? no, kept going.

They eventually turned at Katla's farm, in full view of the gates of Solitude, and continued under the arch.

I dislike stepping on peoples' toes in these forums, bumping stuff out of the way, and so those of you reading this, make sure you also check out Hecate arriving in Skyrim. Screenshots thread. Thank you.

I wanna continue Sir Vyvoor's back-updates though, just so I can 'catch up' to where I left off with him.

----------


Fredas, Last Seed 29

Even though I installed a Jobs mod into Sir Vyvoor's game, so far he hasn't been interested in doing any of this mod's jobs! He may do some smithing work eventually, but on this morning of Last Seed 29, it's back to chopping wood. Hopefully somebody will buy all this wood too.

On Loredas (next day), Vyvoor discovers Windhelm's Grey Quarter, and feels more at home here. For one thing, nobody in town offers to buy all the wood Vyvoor has chopped, except one of the dark elf merchants who has a shop here. Once that connection is fulfilled, Sir Vyvoor feels a lot more confident, and his money situation doesn't seem so desperate.

Even though he has more money though, he doesn't feel like renting a room. Candlehearth Hall is warm, but there's a bard there (one of Vyvoor's peeves), and the place is also too expensive. Some of its residents are also snooty, and racists.

So he returns to the Temple of Talos, back to the bedroll on its floor. That will suit him fine.

Nice spending time in Windhelm and really getting to know the place without rush here, kill that....

No toes being stepped on here.

So Sir V is out getting morning wood? And being paid for it?

Many of my characters prefer sleeping outside of inns in Skyrim, just like Vyvoor. Firstly because of the bards, though they can be silenced with mods or made to sing less frequently, and secondly, because scripted conversations in inns go on and on all night, since some NPCs never go to sleep. There's also a mod that makes conversations less frequent but they still happen. It were better if some rentable rooms were in separate cells so it'd be more quieter at nights.

Okay.

Lopov: Yes, I have that mod which makes conversations less frequent. I tend to turn it on and off, just so there's some variety. Because at least there isn't as much silence if that mod is on.

Acadian: None of mine so far have spent a significant amount of time in Windhelm, except Mycharonna did the quest with that weird boy, which kept her in town for awhile. That happened to work just perfectly, since Mych actually did look rather Night Mother-ish.

-------------------


Sundas, Last Seed 31, 4E 202

Days Passed: 16

Sundas is the day Sir Vyvoor decides to head into Palace of the Kings, to see about speaking to Ulfric. Vyvoor wants to join the Stormcloaks, he's finally decided firmly, but he also simply wants to speak to Skyrim's High King, since both men shared the same execution cart two weeks ago.

Their meeting is brief. Ulfric initially wondered why a stranger would approach such an important man as he, but once Vyvoor mentioned Helgen, all the sudden it all came back to him. Ulfirc warmed up just a notch, and then dismissed the man who would change the face of Skyrim.

Sir Vyvoor also spoke to a man who wore a huge bear pelt on his head (lol). And this bear-man wants Vyvoor to kill an ice wraith at a place called Serpentstone Island. If Vyvoor can prove he did this, he will then be able to join the Stormcloaks.

Vyvoor is able and willing. He knows what ice wraiths are, and how aggravating they can be. Because he knows this, he wonders if he has to go all the way to some remote island, just to kill some creature which can occasionally be found on the mainland?

Getting to know Ulfric and 'Bear-Man'.

Ugh, ice wraiths.

Sir V is going to join the Rebel Alliance StermClerks, and fight the Empire? I have done both sides, and usually felt better on the SC side. Though neither is has much in the way of moral high ground. TBH, the civil war just does not do much for me, and I think it would have been a better game without it. But I hope you have a better time with it than I did!

It is funny because I just finished watching The Hobbit, and Richard Armitage (Thorin Oakenshield) always reminds me of Ulfric. He has the look, a great voice, and a similar distaste for elves.

Don't underestimate the power of the old man with the bear's head. He knows everything and more.

Cool. Only three more back-updates to post, then I am caught up and can start gaming with Vyvoor again.

Yes, Vyvoor respects Sir Bear-Head so far, Lopov. NO spoilers!

Yes, ice wraiths aren't very fun, Acadian. Vyvoor was toying with the idea of just finding one on the mainland and killing it. This might actually work for the quest, problem is, where do we go to find an ice wraith? They don't show up very often. ... But as you'll see, instead I came up with a REALLY creative idea to go where the Stormies want him to go. Hahha!!!

Yes, SubModerator. I've heard about the Civil War, and its lack of luster. I don't mind how Beth wrote the politics of it all, but I did have a problem with the 'war' itself. It doesn't feel much like a war, does it? It feels more like a bunch of minor skirmishes.

I tried to put several mods into Claire Voyance's game (she did the Imperial side) a couple years ago. One of these added extra battles, which was great, but it put all these extra battles in very predictable places, like just outside of Whiterun, for instance. Fair enough. But when Claire returned to Whiterun several days after, and the exact same battle occurred. X-]

The most promising mod is called WARZONES. It is very ambitious, and adds random battles instead of predictable ones. I tried WARZONES and was immediately impressed. .... until the glitches started happening. X-\ And the CTDs. The worst glitch happened just outside of Robber's Gorge. All the sudden, Clare began swimming in mid-air. The river was about 50 feet away, yet she was moving in mid-air like she was swimming, while the battle began.

So yeah, anybody have any Civil War mods you've heard of, I'll check 'em out at least.

---------------------


Tirdas, early morning, 9th of Heartfire, 4th Era 202

Sir Vyvoor awakes after sleeping outside, next to a campfire. He has no bedroll, and spent the night before in the small mining hostel known as Darkwater Crossing.

In the days before arriving here, he realized (back in Windhelm) that there's no way he'll be able to swim to the island where Ulfric wanted him to kill that ice wraith. The place is too far away, and there are dozens of islands located up north of Windhelm. How will he find the correct one, freezing to death while swimming?

He tried paying one of the ship captains who'd moored their boats onto Windhelm's docks, but nobody was willing to go to some strange, remote island...they only would take him to safe & known destinations, like Solitude or Solstheim.

Finally, Vyvoor managed to find a man who'd sell him a boat, but this man wants 500 gold. Vyvoor has no objection to buying a boat; problem is, if he has more than 100 on his person, that's a rare day for this Nord. So he decided to do some dungeoneering.

Turns out, he does have some dungeon experience, from his days down in Cyrodiil, and this is now part of his backstory. Problem is, even after taking down the evil mages of Morunskar, some bandits at Traitor's Post, and a variety of random enemies along the roads, Vyvoor still only has 93 gold. Whatever he earns, he spends fast on weapon & armor upkeep, food, and an occasional bed.

So right now, he's headed toward another place called Stony Creek Cave. The innkeeper of Mixwater Mill gave Sir Vyvoor a bounty letter, and Jarl Ulfric wants the bandit leader of this cave dead. Hopefully the job will pay really well!


By the glory of Talos!

Ah yes, gold-induced dungeoneering! Nice screenshot with the lavender swirly bits.

Sir Vyvoor without his helmet - I think that's for the first time that he doesn't wear one in the screenie. Now all we want is a Lopov shot of the guy.

Good idea of buying a boat to reach the hard-to-reach island. Though he's still quite poor after looting three dungeons, it makes sense if you're using some mods that increase prices of beds.

I never understood why they would want you to go to an island in the middle of an arctic sea, that you can only get to by swimming! Bethesda seems to expect everyone to just swim around in the frozen ocean. I guess the idea of roleplaying never occurred to them.

In my current play through I have decided to investigate every part of Skyrim (and Boston)- via the water. Lo and behold Beem-Ja appears, the first Argonian I have used in, like, 6 or 7 years. It is a blast. He jumped off the bridge at Dragonsreach and just drifted around underwater beside the skeleton there.

Rather than pause the game I just got up and headed into the kitchen while my Argonian friend was left there under the water. A few minutes later he still seemed quite happy. It is great fun.

I look forward to exploring the northern coastline and those islands very soon.

It is fun exploring underwater in Skyrim. You will see all kinds of crazy things, like Elk swimming across Lake Ilinalta, and Necromancers chasing them! I don't think the NPCs can drown in this game, so the animals and them treat it just like it was dry land.

I can't help but look upwards whenever my character even walks underwater. I'll pan the camera down so that it's below his or her feet, just to see that cool visual effect.

Lopov & Acadian: Surprisingly, I didn't take very many pics when I was gaming with Vyvoor last spring, but I'll definitely include more.



Exactly. It's like what the heck?

-------------------------------------

Turdas, late afternoon, Heartfire 11

Days Passed: 25

Locations Discovered: 32
Dungeons Cleared: 6
Chests Looted: 40

Sir Vyvoor finds the town of Vernim Wood* the day before, finds the cave he's supposed to explore, but decides to rest in town before dealing with this cave. On Turdas, he spends the first half of the day re-finding Stony Creek Cave, kills all the bandits in there, and then returns to Vernim Wood, where he does some buying & selling. Hmm. Money is still really short. He's got about 156 gold on him, nowhere near his goal of 500.

He begins heading back to Windhelm anyway. Maybe the two contracts he's fulfilled (one for Stony Creek, and another for Traitor's Post) will earn him lots of gold.

But on the way back, he can't help but notice some worn stone steps leading up a steep hill. Really hungry for a place to loot, he follows these steps and discovers Mzulft, his first Dwemer ruin. Yeah, Windhelm can wait. Let's see what's in Mzulft.

Turns out, the place is locked, and "Needs a Key." But there is also a storeroom located nearby, and though this storeroom is also locked, its mechanisms are nowhere near as secure. Vyvoor manages to find an iron mace nearby (on a dead body, yuck) and bashes his way into the storeroom. And it's a good thing too. There's no real treasure or gold in there, but there are 17 dwarven ingots. Vyvoor lugs all these back to Vernim Wood, and sells each ingot for 10 gold.

So now he's up to 346 gp.


* TES 1 Arena Townships adds various towns and villages found in the first Bethesda Elder Scrolls game.

That always looks like Vermin Wood to me. Not a place I would care to visit...

I think Mzulft is part of the College of Winterhold questline. The main ruin is locked out. But there is a little storehouse nearby that is packed with Dwemer stuff. If you have a high enough lockpicking to get past the doors.

Hecate just did the Season Unending quest - the part of the Main Quest where you have to broker a ceasefire between the Empire and the Rebellion Stormcloaks. Wow, this is just bad. Really bad. Trading holds around is how you make people stop fighting for a few days? What donkey wrote that?

For that matter, Jarl Baalgruuf is afraid someone is going to attack him when he has a dragon in his hold? Really? Who is going to be dumb enough to attack a place with a dragon in it!!! Did they all forget how things worked out for the humans at Helgen? Having a dragon around is the best way to keep attackers at bay.

I see SV is earning his gold the old fashioned way - smashing locks and lugging dwarven ingots out of dark places.

I B38T the MQ like a red-haired stepchild last night. It was... well... probably the least enjoyable of the TES games I have played. Only the Fallout 4 one was less fun over all (because of how that one forces the faction quests into its main quest).

It had its good points. The dragon fights were exciting, at first. But eventually they devolve into the same tedium that fighting cliffracers did in Morrowind. And I used the console to turn off the random dragon spawns after the first or second one of those. Once I realized I was getting random dragons and was not seeing the ones from the opened dragon tombs/word walls. I still have far more dragon souls absorbed than shouts I can spend them on. Not that I really found much use for the shouts at all. Except for a few that are required for certain quests, I almost never used them. Spells are much better. They contribute to you leveling up, and don't have a long cool-down time in between uses.

Sovngarde was really cool, for the five minutes I got to look around.

OTOH there is a lot of weak writing. I think much of it is simply an excuse to get the player to visit different corners of Skyrim, like Solitude and Riften and The Reach. The way the civil war questline is tied into the mq (and vice-versa) also strikes me as the same. It is Todd Howard's ham-fisted way of trying to force you to do every single quest in the game with a single character. The way Delphine and the Blades try to give you - the Dragonborn they are sworn to serve - orders really sticks in my craw. Especially since the game does not allow you to simply kill the lippy punks (well Delphine, Esbern is still mostly cool, and was actually useful at a few points).

I don't think I will ever do it again. All in all I prefer the game without constant cliffracer dragon fights, upstart servants, and a civil war that is as murky as it is pointless.

The farthest I got with Skyrim's MQ was with Lucius and that was to the Season Unending quest. Then I simply lost interest in pursuing the quest any further. I spoiled myself by reading on the UESP what happens afterwards and I think I didn't miss out much.

Hecate has been in Solstheim for the past few days. The first time she tried to sleep, she woke up at one of the All-Maker Stones as usual. I forgot that it did that every time you slept until the main quest was done. So there was no sleeping for quite a while.

She finally learned the Bend Will shout and started cleansing the All-Maker stones. She got the one by the Skaal Village, and another one with some Reiklings to the south (near the Temple of Miraak). Then she got the two on the west coast, including the one outside of Raven Rock.

Hecate tried sleeping after that, and worked fine! So that is good news. Maybe you just need to cleanse the stone near where you are sleeping in order to sleep normally?

Also interesting, in order to get the Bend Will shout Hecate had to kill a dragon at the word wall at Saering's Watch. Miraak appeared and stole the soul before Hecate could absorb it. I understand this is normal until you kill him. But while cleansing the All-Maker Stone north of Bloodskaal Barrow a dragon turned up. Hecate killed it, and absorbed its soul.

So perhaps Miraak can only steal dragon souls when near the All-Maker Stones that are corrupted, but not the cleansed ones?

Miraak stealing souls is just random, and he can even do it when you return to the mainland.

Cripes, Rosa, you're already done? That was quick. And now here comes slow me, who will probably not even get halfway through the MQ until 2022 and ES 6 on the shelves.

--------------------------

Sundas, 1:20 AM, Heartfire 14

Days Passed: 28

Gold Found: 2536 (damn... he really has little to show for this, lol).

Most Gold Carried: 762 (yeah that must be a glitch).

Back in Windhelm, Sir Vyvoor gets paid twice: first time was 50 gold, from one of the ship captains for killing the bandits at Traitor's Post. But that was nothing compared to the 100 gold Vyvoor got paid from the Jarl's steward, for taking down the bandits of Stony Creek Cave. Vyvoor was up to 412!

Unfortunately, he decided to gorge himself over at Candlehearth Hall. He had a big, well-deserved dinner, but then he splurged, and wasted 63 gold on a bottle of alto wine. Soon as he did it, I sort of facepalmed. The guy has a taste for booze? ... He does though. And I feel like he's got some reason for this in his backstory.

Later on as he was leaving Candlehearth, Vyvoor noticed Suzanna the Wicked (Candlehearth's bar-wench) was also leaving. .... Now, I happen to know that Suzanna is one of the people who get murdered in Windhelm, she is part of that quest. But beside this, Vyvoor began walking Suzanna home, because he's heard about these murders, and simply wanted to walk her home, because he's a man, and that's what men do.

Suzanna does not go home though, I'm not sure she even has a home. Vyvoor spoke with her for awhile; but eventually he began getting ultra-tired. He'd been up since 7 that morning, and now it was way past midnight. He returned to the Temple of Talos for several hours' rest.

SubRosa, enjoy Solstheim with Hecate! Buffy could never get through the main questline there. Faced with betraying the Skall and working with Hermie Skumlord, she just couldn't stomach it.

Renee, I see SV has a taste for wine and a streak of chivalry! And more gold than he did at the beginning of the day. Nice.

I think that's correct.

I kinda enjoyed the MQ on Solstheim (did it in Lucius' game) though as Acadian pointed out, it requires you to do some nasty things here and there. I liked Solstheim in general, they did good job with it, the island was interesting to explore, and overall I found its quests better than in Skyrim, namely the one where you have to prevent the assassination of the Counciloor and the one where you venture into an abandoned ebony mine are among my favorite quests.

@Renee - if you feel like Sir Vyvoor doesn't earn enough septims for clearing out bandit lairs, you can increase bounties with Increased Bounty Rewards mod though rewards are static but there's another mod where you manually decide how much you want to be paid for bounties plus you get a minor level-dependent bonus.

Nice that she accompanied Susanna home, I don't like seeing her getting killed, she's a far too interesting NPC to be removed so early in the game.

I figured out the sleeping situation in Solstheim. It is tied to the Cleansing The Stones quest. If you try to sleep before you start the quest you always end up working on one of the stones. Once you start actually cleansing the stones, there is a percentage chance of you working on the stones. That goes down as you cleanse more stones. Once you complete the quest, the chance is none. This does include the Tree Stone in Miraak's Temple.

Renee, I think Sir V needs to find a better paying gig! "You want to buy or sell, the City is great. You want free? Go down the holes, kill some monsters. Sell your loot back in the city!"

SubRosa: OH yeah, he'll be going down plenty of holes to kill some monsters. Makes me happy too, because some of mine aren't interested in dungeoneering much.

Acadian: Wow, you're right! Yes, what a perfect word: chivalry.



Huh? Thou must perish thine thought upon this matter, me lad!

Kidding. I added a quest to Cho's game so he can make some caps, but that was only because the Brotherhood really sucks at paying him. I don't know what Beth was thinking with the Citadel and their lack of funding during Broken Steel. ES games do fund the player for his/her efforts here and there, thankfully.

Well cool, I am caught up on back-updates for his Vyvoor's game. Anything after the update below will be more current.

--------------------------------------


Sundas, 1:20 AM, Heartfire 14

Days Passed: 29

Sir Vyvoor takes the plunge, and spends 500 gold on a brand-new longboat. And wow, it is really fun having a boat! ?


The boat in this mod is similar to the ones found in TES 1: Arena, which has boats that can be moved around in 1st person mode only. Anyway, Vyvoor set right off to sea, heading to the north. It will be a rather long journey.

early afternoon

Vyvoor passes by an island with a shipwreck on it, and encounters a group of bandits who've been living on this shipwrecked vessel a while, apparently. He approached these bandits in a friendly sort of manner at first, assuming they were victims of stranding. But this didn't last long.

He manages to find some food on the 'Wreck of the Winter War', and spends the night sleeping here. It took him three days to make it to the island with the ice wraith on it. He ran out of food on his first day, returned to the Winter War on the second day (and spent the night here), and finally managed to get to Serpent Stone Island on day 3. Now he heads back to Windhelm, hoping to get there by nightfall.



We're gonna need a smaller boat (ha).

Paddling along

Onshore action

Moored ashore (note how the boat gets half-full of sand as it clips onto the beach!

This guy's happy in cold water.

Row, row, row your boat!

That's a neat mod but with Frostfall it definitely adds a challenge to the rowing, you don't want to fall in that icy water.

Sir Vyvoor against the Thalmor Justiciar. Sooner or later everyone is against the Thalmor.

The boat looks great ashore.

At least 'someone' likes cold water.

Neat Rowboat. I am going to give it a try.

Ooops, Captain V's boat got buried!

Well I'll be a horker's uncle! SV has a boat. So did he bag his ice wraith?

Turdas, early morn, 19th of Heartfire, 4th Era Year 401

Location: Palace of the Kings

Level: 9
Days Passed: 32

Sir Vyvoor returned to Windhelm the day before, but felt too drained to face the Jarl. After selling a few things (including a magical necklace which netted him 147 gold) Vyvoor finally had some decent coin in his pocket.

But after a good night's sleep (still in the Chapel of Talos, he won't splurge 50 gold on a room) Vyvoor is ready for Ulfric. He marches right into the Palace of Kings, wearing his Stormcloak armor for best effect.

"I have returned."

At first, nobody is in attendance. He must wait just over an hour until Ulfric finally shows. And when he finally does, he saunters into court so slowly, Vyvoor must temper his enthusiasm.

"I have returned," he tries again.

"Why are you still here?" Jarl Ulfric asks with a frown that could slaughter weak men. "You're supposed to be in Korvanjund, to meet Galmar. Proving him right or proving him wrong."

Vyvoor stands embarassed. He cannot believe it. "I ... I've come all this way to..... I... but I just want to join the Stormcloaks. Must I go through all that trouble?"

"You fight for the men you've held in your arms, dying on foreign soil!" Ulfric's booming voice echoed all over the main palace hall. "You fight for their wives and children, whose names are heard whispered in their last breaths. You fight for we few who did come home, only to find our coun...."

But then, just at that moment, there was some sort of commotion going on in the court. All eyes turned toward the Palace's main entrance, where there was a sudden blur of fur.

"WHOT? What by Talos is that cat doing here?!"

Ulfric and Vyvoor's conversation was abruptly interrupted by a Khajiit in ragged robes that came running from the palace's barracks. The Khajiit jumped on the long dining table and was running in the direction of Ulfric, before he realized that the exit out of the palace was on the other side.

"Oops, wrong way."

The Khajiit turned around and ran down the table, nocking fine silver plates with delicacies cooked by Sifnar Ironkettle, the Jarl's cook, all over the hall. By then a dozen of Stormcloak soldiers stormed in the hall, all of them after the Khajiit who managed to escape from his cell.

"Someone stop him NOW!" Ulfric shouted, but the guards had already began to move, quickly vacating the place with haste. Once they were gone, Ulfric, Vyvoor, and Jarleif (Ulfric's trusty steward) stood looking dazed, their jaws slack, at the complete mess the Khajiit had left behind.

"I uh. Guess I'll be on my way then. To find Galmar outside of Korvanjund."

Ulfric nodded, slouching on his throne. Even after all that commotion, he hadn't broken his slouch.

---------------

Vyvoor approaches Ulfric

The mess that got left behind.

Dang. Couldn't find any pictures of your Khajiit there, Lopov.

Sheshko photo-bombed Sir V's big moment!

By Talos' hairy backsides! Nothing worse than a cat that isn't housebroken!

Hahaha, I didn't expect this reference to Sheshko!