Skyrim: The Faces of Death

by Blackdrag-rose

Wanderings: Embershard Mine

After departing from Helgen, without the alarm being raised since no one seemed to be up at this time, Amaryllis quickly darted behind a large stone that was along the path that she was following and paused for a few seconds, which was when she glanced back at the fort and studied it for the next couple of minutes, just to be absolutely sure that no one had seen her leave the keep with the gear she had stolen, or had seen her get over the wall in a way that likely wasn't normal for this world, before letting out a sigh of relief when her earlier thoughts were proven right. Once she was positive she was alone right now, with no guards coming out of the fort, she resumed moving and headed down the road that she was currently on, which would allow her to disappear in due time if luck was on her side, as the last thing she needed right now was the Imperial Legion chasing after her in an attempt to capture her and execute her for deceiving them and stealing some gear from them, especially since she was in a totally new world and everything was unfamiliar to her. There was another reason behind why she was thankful that she was leaving Helgen with no one noticing her, as it allowed her to get out of the area before the Imperial Legion clashed with the Stormcloaks, as she had the feeling that Ulfric's followers would come here in the near future to free their lord and return him to the front lines, allowing their army to return to its full power, and she'd rather not get involved with the battle that would likely unfold when morning arrived, hence why she was eager to get out of here and put Helgen far behind her. Part of her still couldn't believe the fact that she had landed in a land that was in the middle of a war, something that was almost unheard of back in Equestria, but for the most part it appeared that the conflict might be over soon and the land of Skyrim could go back to what it had been like before this started, given the fact that the leader of the rebellion was going to be executed tomorrow morning, based on what she overheard during dinner, though her feelings told her otherwise and made her want to steer clear of both the Imperials and the Stormcloaks, just so she didn't get dragged into the ongoing conflict.

It didn't take her long before she had to pause for a moment, as there happened to be another fork in the path that was in front of her, where her only choices right now were to head to the right or to head to the left, and from what she could see there wasn't much difference between the two, as both of them looked like they headed down towards a river, or so she hoped based on what the map side, so she shrugged and decided to head down the path that was on her left, figuring that this decision wasn't all that important. Fortunately the light from the moons meant that it wasn't totally dark out, because if it had been totally dark out Amaryllis knew she would have been better served to stay inside the fort until the first hours of the morning arrived, but she knew that finding a place to rest for a couple of hours, to wait for the sun to come up, was the best move she could make, which was why she started looking for any small clearings that would allow her to hide for a time. What surprised her was that it only took her a couple of few moments to spot some smoke that was rising from an area in front of her, which meant there were people out here and a clearing that she could camp in for the night, if those who had set up the camp were kind enough to let a stranger join them, which caused her to summon her power for a few seconds as she shifted back into the form she had used to get into Helgen, figuring that creating a new disguise wasn't all that necessary and that whoever saw her outside the fort wouldn't think to report her to the Legion that was on the other side of the walls, before she resumed moving towards her current destination. As she got close to the camp, however, she found that three people were in the clearing that the smoke was coming from, where Amaryllis discovered that all three of them seemed to be wearing animal fur over their chests and their lower bodies, though while one of them had a bow the other two seemed to have axes, making her wonder if they were hunters that were camping for the night, especially since there were three tents around the campfire.

"Hello there." Amaryllis said, letting the group know that she was there and that she was talking to them, even though that was easy to tell at a glance since there was no one else in this area, but she did notice that the trio glanced in her direction not even a second later, showing her that they were alert and were looking for any threats before they went to sleep and started whatever shift system they had created for themselves, before she focused on why she was bothering them at this point in time, "Do you have room for one more by the campfire?"

"Look at what we have here boys, a lost Imperial soldier." one of the campers said, which was the instant that he and his friends, who were both male as well, got up from where they were sitting and turned to face her, all while each of them pulled out their weapons, almost like they were getting ready for a fight, but his words told Amaryllis that something was up and it made her wonder if she had messed up, "You picked a really bad time to get lost, friend, and I'm afraid that it's going to cost you more than a few coins."

Amaryllis recalled what she had told Provis and Wulfir at the gate, about a bandit stealing her stuff, and realized that this wasn't a camp for hunters, who could have been resting after a long journey to this place and would have started hunting in the morning, rather this was a bandit camp and they intended on taking everything she owned to make themselves a bit of coin, no doubt after taking from her corpse, even if she didn't have that much on her right now. She mentally cursed herself for forgetting about these guys, as she was sure that one of the soldiers back in Helgen had made a comment or two about the bandits of Skyrim being bolder than they had been in the past, but as the speaker took a step forward she focused on what was happening right now and pulled her sword out of the sheath it was in, because she had the feeling a fight was about to break out between them and wanted to be ready for it. The bandit that had spoken to her drew his own weapon and charged at her, where he brought down the head of his axe in an attempt to kill her before she had a chance to do anything, which was why Amaryllis surprised him by raising the edge of her sword and stopped the attack, causing the bandit to struggle with her as he attempted to push her weapon out of the way and cut her down, even though it was easy for her to see that he had a bit of strength behind his swing. One thing she noticed was that the other axe wielding enemy had his weapon drawn and that he was coming at her from the right, which was when Amaryllis was glad that she had kept her dagger on her belt, the steel one she had been practicing with earlier, as she pulled it out and parried the incoming attack, which surprised her second foe, as it looked like he felt that the attack would have been successful, but she wasn't out of the woods yet. The reason behind that thought was due to what else she was seeing, as the archer of the group seemed to be waiting on his companions, to see if he needed to step in or not, though she knew that such an action was going to cost them dearly, as she redirected both of her weapons and swung them at her foes, cutting into the arms of both her foes, causing them to yelp as they backed up and gathered near each other, doing nothing to stop the wounds from bleeding as they focused on her.

From what she could tell that they were regrouping and determining how to deal with her, as the two warrior type bandits were focused on her while the archer refused to pull his bow out, but she suspected that the moment she really hurt one of his friends, more than the light cuts on their arms, his passive nature would be thrown out the window in seconds and he would attack her as well, meaning she had to work fast before such a thing happened. A few seconds later the leader of the group, or who she assumed was the leader since he had spoken to her while the others remained silent, charged at her again while his friend came at her from the side, where Amaryllis jumped backwards a bit and wobbled a little as she landed, a sign that she still wasn't used to this form and how it walked, but she pushed that out of her mind and focused on what was happening in front of her, because one wrong move or step could bring about her end, which she wanted to avoid at all costs. The leader caught up with her and swung his axe at her side, where she quickly blocked with her sword and pushed the attack back with all her might, though she failed to account for the other bandit for a moment, who swung low and cut into the upper part of her right leg, causing her to curse herself for not paying attention, despite the fact that it was only a shallow cut, like they wanted to toy with her for a few minutes before they ended the fight. Unfortunately for them she wasn't going to give them the chance, as she focused her mind on her foes and lashed out with her longer blade, burying it in the chest of the bandit that had cut her leg, surprising him once more, before taking her dagger and driving it into the head of the leader, since he was still close to where she was standing, where she let go of the weapons and let her foes fall to the ground... though as the archer pulled out an arrow she channeled her magic for a moment and loosed a fireball at the third bandit, which struck him in the chest and knocked him off his feet, before he collided with a tree that was behind him and collapsed on the ground.

Amaryllis huffed for a few moments as she took in the fact that she actually killed someone, which wasn't something she did as an infiltrator, in fact all changelings preferred to capture and hide their targets in certain areas, instead of killing the one they wanted to replace for a time, something that causing her to sit near the fire as she thought about what she had just done as she stared at her new hands. She didn't feel guilty about killing the bandits, due to the fact that she had been defending herself from people that wanted her dead, but that didn't change the fact that she had ended the lives of three people that were living in the wild, even though she was sure the other residents of this land would be happy to be rid of those three, to clean up some of the roads and make things safer for the citizens of Helgen, but it still felt strange for her to take someone's life. In the end she decided not to dwell on the fact for too long, as from what she had been told while she was in Helgen there would be more people like this on the road and that she needed to be more careful as she started her search for someone who might be able to help her get back home, to put this behind her and focus on her search for the rest of her Hive, not to mention her missing Queen. With that thought in mind she pulled herself up from where she had been sitting and walked over to the three bandits that were now laying on the ground, who were definitely dead since she couldn't hear them breathing anymore, before she pulled out her sword and dagger out of the bodies they had been left in and cleaned them to the best of her ability, to ready them for whatever the future held for her. Once that was done she put them away and checked out the bodies for a few moments, finding a full quiver on the archer, at least twenty gold coins, or Septims as one of the soldiers had called them during her time in Helgen, which came from all three bandits, two small red potions with the word 'healing' engraved in the glass, and a piece of paper that looked like a map to a hidden treasure, located near someplace called Riverwood.

There was also a book resting nearby, Night Falls on Sentinel according to the title, to which she sighed for a moment and opened one of the healing potions, something that had the power to heal small wounds in seconds, which she learned from some of the Imperials while they were talking about things, and quickly downed it's contents, where she watched as the cut on her leg healed in a matter of seconds, almost as if it had never happened in the first place, though she did have a bloody cut in her pants leg that showed where she had been hit.

"Impressive. It takes a few seconds for the effects of the potion to hit, but its still impressive." Amaryllis said, though while she said that she had the feeling that if she had been injured on a different level, like halfway to death or something, the potion would have done little to her body, since this seemed to be a minor potion, the lowest kind according to what she knew, but she shrugged and stashed the other potion in her sack, before adding the book to her collection, as she figured she could sell it when she got to whatever town was along her path.

Instead of setting out again, and looking for a village or a town to spend the night in, which would have been safer for her in case there were more bandits that were part of the group she had fought, who would be furious with her the moment they noticed their friends had been slain, Amaryllis decided to use one of the three tents that were resting around the campfire and spend the night here, so when morning arrived she could meet it, get something to eat, and then be on her way before the escort arrived at Helgen, which was why she closed her eyes and drifted off to sleep.

---

Amaryllis woke up the moment the sun hit her face, signaling the start of a new day, and part of her hoped that she would awaken inside the cave that she had found the odd crystal tree in, as that would mean that everything she had seen was a dream and nothing else, but when she opened her eyes and looked at her surroundings she discovered that she was still in the strange world she had been teleported to, with the strange body that was now hers, and that she was resting in the tent she had used earlier. One thing that was interesting, at least to her, was that the disguise she had been wearing for her visit to the camp had fallen, revealing her true form once again, which meant that she had to be careful when she went to sleep, as she had no idea how the residents of this land would react to her true form and really didn't want to find out what would happen if they discovered she was capable of changing her shape. She sighed for a moment, as she couldn't believe that she was stuck in this strange land for real and that her body had been altered in such a way, but the only good thing that had come of this was that she didn't need to feed on love anymore, rather she just had to eat the various food items everyone else ate, which reminded her that she didn't actually take anything from the keep while she left, meaning she had no food, which was a mistake that she knew she was going to endeavor not to make again. Fortunately for her the few sacks that the bandits had brought with them actually contained some cheese, a few pieces of bread, and a couple of apples, where she sighed once more and sat on one of the tree stumps the bandits had been sitting before her arrival and their fight, allowing her to eat something before she determined which path she wanted to take once she was done with eating her simple breakfast, as she could continue down the path that was to her left or she could backtrack for a couple of seconds and head down the other path she had ignored yesterday.

A few moments later, once she was done with her light breakfast, Amaryllis got up from where she was sitting and stared at the road that was near the camp, where she found that neither really seemed to head towards any major city or village, or at least it sure looked that way right now, and while she wanted to get away from Helgen she decided that she might as well retrace her steps back to the last fork in the road and head down the other path she could have chosen, just to see what might be resting along it and what it might bring her to.

As such Amaryllis headed down the short walkway that was in front of her and returned to the road, where she turned to her right and walked along the part of it that she didn't walk on last night, since she just walked straight through the hill to reach the camp she spent the night in, which might have been a bad idea now that she thought about it and felt that using the roads would be best for her. It didn't take her long to return to the split in the path, something that she recognized due to the signpost that rested nearby, and found that one of the planks pointed towards the other path, to a place called that was called Riverwood, just like the map she had found on one of the bandits, where she turned towards the path for a few seconds and started walking down it, as it looked like there had been a second plank near Riverwood's and it revealed that there was a place called Whiterun in this direction. She knew that she could have continued down the road that had been to her left earlier and just head to the west, which would have put more distance between her and Helgen, but she had the feeling that heading down this particular path would take her to a place where she could ask for directions, sooner rather than later to be exact, instead of wandering around for hours before achieving the same result, as she suspected it would have taken her longer to reach a settlement if he went to the west. It wasn't long before the road curved and descended towards a river, like it was forming some sort of serpent shape for a few moments, though there were two things that she discovered that interested her, the first being the large ruins that rested off in the distance, at the top of a mountain peak that was on the other side of the river that was in front of her. The other thing that caught her eye was a set of three odd stones that seemed to be resting on a stone platform, like they had been here for years, and she walked up to them so she could study them for a few seconds, because she was curious as to what they were and figured that this might be the only time she would see these particular stones, plus there were no Imperials nearby and it gave her a chance to walk over to the stones without having to worry about them chasing her down.

When she stepped onto the middle of the platform she discovered that the stones had some images on them and that the stone on her right had some markings that resembled a warrior of some kind, the stone in the middle appeared to have a wizard or mage on it, and the stone on her left had a cloaked individual that had a pair of daggers, which she guessed was a rogue of some kind, where she tapped the thief in the head for a second, not that she expected it to do anything, before turning around and heading down the path that was behind her, only to stop a few seconds later.

"What do we have here?" a voice said, where Amaryllis looked at the path that was to her right, that headed up to the side of the cliff she had avoided, and found a lady wearing the same sort of armor as the bandits she had killed last night, who had her sword out and seemed ready for a fight, making it pretty clear what her intentions were, especially with the look that was in her eyes, "A lost soldier, on her way to whatever post she's been assigned to? Or a pretender, who stole from the Imperials and is wandering around in their armor? Either way it doesn't matter to me, not when all of your valuables will belong to me and my friends, as we have taken over Embershard Mine and kill anyone that dares to get too close to our base of operations!"

Amaryllis knew what was coming and withdrew her sword to parry the incoming attack, even though the bandit did push her back a little in the process, but at the same time she prepared herself and pushed her foe backwards, who did seem a little surprised by what she had done and that opened her guard for a moment, giving her the chance to cut down the bandit before anything else could happen, slicing through the lady's chest and leaving a diagonal gash that showed how she had died.

"Another bandit attacking me for my belongings, not that I had much to begin with." Amaryllis commented, though from what little she heard from the Imperials, during her brief stay in Helgen, there were plenty of bandits scattered across the nine Holds of Skyrim and not enough guards to take care of them, especially with the war that was going on right now, an event that might be over soon if Ulfric met his end, before she glanced at the path the bandit had come from and thought about this for a few seconds, "Hm, she did say that there were more of them inside the mine, and it's only a matter of time until they realize she's dead and start looking for her killer... I guess I might as well clear out this group of bandits, just to make this area safer for whoever lives here."

As soon as she said that, and focused on the fact that she was going to attack the bandits this time around, she headed up the path that the bandit had come from and found a door that had to be the entrance of the mine, due to the few wooden beams which seemed to be holding up part of the rock wall the mine had been built into, though as she opened the door and headed inside she did something different, she switched her sword for her dagger. The reason was because one of the Imperials she had listened to during her training session had revealed how a scout would sneak through an enemy's base, trying not to make any sounds that would alert their foes, and even demonstrated how a scout could take down one of their foes by cutting their throat, as if they were sent to assassinate an important figure for the enemy's side, or maybe take control of a fort without being discovered, both of which were dangerous and had serious consequences if their foes found them. She figured that she could give this a try, which is why she also decided to do away with her disguise for now, because if she was going to be sneaking through the area, in an attempt to mimic what the instructor had shown them for a few moments, she could afford to be in her natural form again, given that most ponies had a hard time finding her and the rest of her kind when they sneaked around an area, though the first thing she made sure to do when she entered the mine was reach out with her magic for a second or two and snuffed out the torch that was near her, knowing that it didn't need to be lit anymore, before following the path that was in front of her. Of course she did have to avoid the tripwire that was in the middle of the tunnel, which she felt was odd, but then glanced at the ceiling and found a rock trap of some kind, meaning that if she was careless she could have walked right into the trap and taken some rocks to the head, though she focused on the task at hand as she lowered herself into a crouching position and carefully moved forward, at a speed that would ensure that no one should notice that she was there.

That was when she came upon an open area that had some water flowing into it, meaning the mine had to be larger than she originally thought, before noticing that there were two bandits standing near a fire, who hadn't noticed her yet, so she expanded her magic and snuffed out all of the torches, to make sure there was plenty of shadows for her to hide in while she was here, as she listened to the bandits for a few seconds, just in case they had anything interesting to say or if one of them might revealed the locations of other camps.

"Aren't you worried that someone might wander in here?" one of the bandits asked, though based on what she could tell Amaryllis could determine that the speaker was worried that an adventurer or some soldiers might locate their base of operations and decide to clear them out, even though it would have been more shocking if she told them that she only knew about them thanks to what the bandit outside had said, but Amaryllis remained silent as she listened to what else the pair had to say, "The entrance to this mine isn't exactly well hidden you know, not like some of the entrances the other bandits use for their hideouts."

"This nonsense again? I told you, like I told you a few days ago, that we have someone standing guard outside." the second bandit replied, though his voice revealed that this was a common question he had to answer every now and then, which meant the other bandit was either slow or he didn't understand what he was being told, something that seemed to anger all of his allies, before the second bandit seemed to think about something else, "Also, don't forget the fact that we rigged up a rock trap near the entrance, so that way anyone that's not part of our group will activate the trap and alert us if anything happens. So stop your bellyaching and get some rest, your shift is coming up soon and I don't want you dozing off again like you did a few days ago."

The first bandit nodded his head, to show that he understood what his partner in crime was saying, before the pair walked over to the wooden ramp that connected to the walkway that was in front of Amaryllis, where she silently watched as the two went their separate ways not a few seconds after reaching their destination, something that caused her to remain in her current position and watch them. What happened was that the first bandit that had spoken knelt for a moment as he climbed into one of the bedrolls that rested near the wooden ramp, allowing him to fall asleep like his friend wanted him to, while at the same time the second bandit headed down the tunnel that was on the opposite side of the chamber they were in, meaning that Amaryllis was safe for the time being and gave her a chance to figure out what she wanted to do to move deeper into the mine. Her best bet, if she wanted to get through this area without alerting either of them to the fact that there was an intruder, and likely give away her position at the same time, would be to kill one of them while the other was nowhere nearby, as she was sure that if she killed one of them while the other was close by, like one standing on top of the ramp and the other near the bedrolls, the sound of her target falling to the floor or letting out their last noise would tell the other that something was wrong. As such she waited for the bandit that was walking around to leave the area that she was interested in, patiently watching him as he headed down a side passage in the tunnel in question, though as soon as that happened Amaryllis moved forward as silently as she could, as she had no experience in sneaking with this body and was worried that the bandit she was after would wake up before she reached her destination, as she carefully headed down the ramp and focused on her target.

What surprised her was the fact that the sound of her hooves touching the wooden boards she had to walk on didn't alert the sleeping bandit at all, as if he was sound asleep or something, which meant that she was able to sneak her way over to where he was resting and carefully moved her dagger like she had seen earlier, at first going for the throat before thinking of another target, which was when she brought it down towards the bandit's head, figuring that if she struck there it would be instant death and allow her to move deeper into the mine. Not even a few seconds later she pierced his brain and both of his eyes popped open for a moment, not that she expected something different to happen, only for his body to go still a moment later, which allowed her to pull her dagger free and quickly clean it before the other bandit returned to this area and found out that one of his friends was dead, even though she was still surprised that he hadn't woken up while she was walking down the ramp, but decided not to complain about it. To make it seem like nothing was wrong she took a second to shift the bedroll and made it seem like the bandit was actually sleeping, before heading up the ramp and used a little more of her magic to douse the remaining torches that she could see at the moment, to decrease the chances of the other bandit spotting her before she was ready. She had enough time to see that there were two paths on the other side of the chamber, one to her left and one to her right, but the right one ended in a dead end, a collapsed tunnel by the looks of it, which meant that the other bandit had gone to the left, though as she hid near the small passage her target had wandered down she heard a voice coming from it, causing her to be as silent as she could possibly be.

"...mead, mead, mead... would it kill him to get some beer every now and then?" the bandit asked, even though it was clear that he was talking to himself, due to the fact that it was only him and his friend in this part of the mine and that he was all by himself as he patrolled the area, but this told Amaryllis that the leader of this group of bandits had to be male, and that he wasn't allowing his subordinates to drink until they got a good haul or something, or at least that was her thoughts on what the bandit was talking about right now, "Stupid bees and their stupid honey..."

Amaryllis had no idea what the bandit was talking about, or why he was even talking about it in the first place, but the fact that he seemed to be absently walking around the area, while stopping every now and then so he could mutter a couple of nonsense statements to himself, established a pattern for her to follow, one that allowed her to sneak up on him and slit his throat, causing him to drop to the ground and go still after a few seconds. All of this was still fairly new to her, since she never actually killed anyone during the time that she followed Queen Chrysalis' orders, so she was still bothered by what she was doing and did her best to feel nothing since it was bandits that were inside this mine, though another thing she was bothered by was the fact that neither of the bandits had noticed she was even there, even though one seemed to be ready to fall asleep and the other had been bored out of his mind. It felt really weird, taking the life of another creature like this, which was something that not even the ponies of Equestria did, though the Royal Sisters were another matter since it was hard to determine what was true about them and what was made up, but in the end she justified her actions based on the fact that these bandits seemed to kill whoever they robbed, so by ridding the land of them she was doing a good thing, and she hoped the people who called this land home agreed with her. A few seconds later, once she was done with her reflection on the matter, and that she had killed a few people since her arrival in this strange world, she walked away from where she had been standing and explored the tunnel that the other bandit had come from, where she found that it brought her to a small room that had some wooden rails to prevent someone from falling into the water below them, not to mention a lever that she decided to pull, which lowered the wooden bridge she had seen earlier, which connected with the main wooden walkway that the bandits used to patrol this part of the cavern.

"Why is the bridge moving?" a voice asked, where Amaryllis stepped backwards, away from the lever, and found two more bandits walking out from where the tunnel on the other side of the bridge was located, though one of them had a bow and the other had a sword at the ready, showing that they knew something was wrong and that they were ready to search for whoever had activated the bridge that lead to the deeper part of the mine, "Didn't we tell the guys out here not to lower the bridge until they robbed someone?"

"Yeah, and that they would be waiting on the other side of the bridge to show us that everything was alright," the second bandit replied, confirming that they knew someone had found their hideout and had killed at least two of their allies, or at least that was what Amaryllis assumed based on what they were saying, before he glanced at his ally, who was staring at the rest of the chamber they were in, "Check out the entrance and see if the guard outside is still alive, even though I'm sure she's dead at this point, and I'll check the room that the lever is in... though if you find out whose responsible for this, knock them out so we can present them to the boss... he'll want to personally kill whoever is attacking us, before seeing if they have anything on them."

Amaryllis watched as the first bandit nodded his head as the pair reached the wooden scaffold that she had used to get to the area that the lever was resting in, though as the pair started to separate from each other, so they could investigate the two locations they had talked about a few seconds ago, she retreated to the entrance of the small tunnel so she could wait for the second bandit to come her way. Fortunately the pair didn't seem to mind the fact that the torches were out, which was rather odd since she would have been worried in their place, meaning that they might have assumed that the torches had gone out on their own and didn't pay them any attention, to which she quickly extended her magic once more and put out the rest of the torches that were near her, allowing her to slip into the shadows as the bandits finally separated from each other. She readied her dagger as the second bandit, the one that would be checking out the area she was currently in right now, drew closer to where she was standing, where he didn't notice her lurking in the shadows at all, though as he over to the entrance of the small tunnel she sneaked up behind him and slit his throat the moment he came to a stop, an action that dropped him to the ground in seconds, before she slipped into the shadows once more. In that moment she had to wonder if the bandit had heard her and had paused to turn around and investigate whatever noise she had made, meaning that she would have to be more careful in the future, if she did this sort of thing, before she heard the sound of some rocks falling, meaning that the darkness had caused the other bandit to miss the rock trap they had set up and that he had accidentally sprung it, but to be absolutely sure she headed over to the area in question and found that he had, in fact, been crushed by the trap.

Since it appeared that her current enemies were dealt with, and it didn't appear that anymore were coming, she took a moment to see what was in the pockets of the bandit she had taken out, finding a few gold coins and a pick of some kind, no doubt a pickaxe given that her targets were in a mine, before heading over to the entrance of this mine, where it took her a few seconds to locate the crushed bandit and picked up a few more coins from his body, including his arrows in case she needed them, though once she had everything from the two bandits she returned to the bridge and headed deeper into the mine, while making sure to crouch in case there were more enemies nearby.

As she walked down the tunnel that was in front of her, and kept her ears open for the sounds of bandits, she paused for a moment as she found a room on her right that appeared to be locked, given that she was able to look through an opening in the planks that formed the small room in question and found an iron barred door that happened to have a bandit who was sitting down in a chair near the door. What caught her interest was the few golden coins that were resting on the table near the slightly broken wall she was looking through, along with a brown bag that seemed like a coin purse or pouch of some kind, a book resting near the coins, a weapon rack that had an iron greatsword and an iron warhammer on it, and a large brown chest that seemed slightly important, as it was definitely larger than the chests she had seen in the fort and it might mean there was treasure inside it, or at least the loot the bandits had collected so far. For a moment she considered using her magic to pick up the coins while the bandit was distracted, since she knew that having a decent amount of gold would help her while she explored this land, to pay for food and whatever else she might need, but before she could make up her mind she backed away from the opening as the bandit got up, inserted a key into the lock of the iron door she was guarding, and opened the door so she could check out the room for a few seconds, but, when she found that nothing was wrong, she walked back to where her chair was located and made sure to lock the door behind her. Amaryllis sighed for a moment as she switched her dagger for the imperial bow she was carrying and walked up to an area where she could see the bandit, though she had to extinguish the nearby torches to make sure the bandit didn't see her at all, and when she was in position she remembered what the soldiers at Helgen had shown her as she pulled an arrow out of her quiver and readied it, just like what she had done earlier.

With the arrow ready she raised the bow and carefully focused on the bandit that was sitting in the chair, since she knew that approaching her foe wasn't the best decision and from this angle she might notice her if she used her magic, before she loosed the arrow and watched as flew through the air, where it went right into the bandit's chest, something that did cause the bandit to let out her last gasp before her life left her body. Amaryllis was surprised by the fact that she had hit her target, since she had no experience in using this sort of weapon, save for her training in Helgen and her exercise with it had been against straw targets, but in the end she determined that the fact that the bandit appeared to be wearing leather armor didn't do much to protect her from taking an arrow like this, especially one that was lodged in her chest, before she shook her head and got up from where she was crouching, as the sound the bandit had made suggested she had died in seconds. She took a few seconds to retrieve her arrow, along with the coins that were in the bandit's pocket, before finding the key that had been used on the prison-like iron door, where she slipped the key into it and unlocked it once more, allowing her to enter the room without having to worry about bandits interrupting her, even though she made sure to keep her ears open in case the rest of the group just so happened to come looking for the rest of their group. She picked up the coins that were resting nearby, along with the coin purse and the book that was resting near them, and then opened the large chest that had interested her, where she found a number of coins scattered around the bottom area, a golden ring that had some sort of enchantment on it, due to a slight shimmer on the metal, a single amethyst, and a steel mace, to which she carefully picked up the coins, ring, and the gemstone, which she placed in her own pack, before closing the chest as she focused on the path that had to take her to the back entrance for this mine, if there was one.

Once she was done with the room, and had cleared it out as best she could, she followed the path that brought her to a larger chamber that had a waterfall of sorts near a tunnel that she assumed would let someone leave the mine without going through the main entrance, along with a bridge that connected the two sides of the chamber, but after taking all of that in she focused on her main targets for a few seconds. From what she could tell there were three more bandits in this area, where one was patrolling the area between the bridge and the exit tunnel, almost as if they were making sure no one used the back entrance to ambush them, the second was down in the area below her, working at what she assumed was a forge, and the third appeared to be sitting at a table, ignoring his companions. Since it appeared that none of the bandits were even paying attention to the area that she had walked out of, nor did they seem to care about their companions taking their time to check things in the first half of the mine out, this actually worked to her benefit, Amaryllis crouched in the shadows once more and readied another arrow, as this time she knew it would be best if she took all three of these enemies out in rapid succession without them seeing what was going on, or that was her plan right now. As such her first target was the archer bandit that was going from the bridge to the exit and back, given that she suspected that he had to be the most observant of the three that she could see, where she focused on her target for a couple of seconds, due to the fact that she was waiting to determine the pattern that the bandit was following, before shifting her stance as she let go of her arrow, which raced through the air and quickly struck her target near where she assumed the heart was located, and, due to the noise of the bandit at the forge, neither of the remaining bandits seemed to notice that one of their friends had fallen. In the following moment she pulled out a second arrow and loosed it not a few seconds later, where the bandit at the forge collapsed as she fell into heated area that the metal was being heated in, since the forges of this world appeared to be open, though Amaryllis remained silent as the final bandit shifted his head for a few seconds, as if he was curious by the lack of noise, before returning to whatever he had been doing, a meal or a drink most likely.

Amaryllis was thankful that the bandits in this chamber were so used to the noise of the forge, be it while it was in use or when the bandit who operated it took a break, otherwise she was sure that they would have noticed when their friends fell to the ground or failed to show up during their patrols, which would have alerted the others to the fact that she was here, before she moved away from where she had been crouching and got a better angle on the final bandit, who quickly fell once she loosed one last arrow.

She waited for a few moments, just to be absolutely sure that none of the bandits were still breathing, and that there were no more lurking in the rest of the chamber, before she got up from where she was crouching and moved up to gather all of the items that the bandits had on them, namely the arrows she had used, a number of gold coins that she would have to count later, a few picks, and an interesting book on a table, one that she could sell with the book she picked up from the previous room. Other than that she also found a side room that had a few coins laying on a table, with a coin purse, a few gems, as an amethyst, a garnet, and a ruby to be exact, before she discovered a chest near the wall, which had around fifty golden coins inside it, which she gathered and added to the collection of coins that she was gathering, all from killing the bandits of Skyrim and taking their loot. By her estimates she had about three hundred gold, maybe closer to two hundred and fifty, but, based on what she was told back in Helgen, this was nowhere near enough for her to do anything, meaning she was going to have to get a decent price for the gems she had acquired, since they had to fetch a good price, though, at the same time, she made sure to gather some of the food the bandits had scattered near where the third one had been sitting, finding that they had a variety of meat laying on the table and hanging off a rack. She really had no idea how long it would take for the meat to spoil, since this was her first time working with such a thing, but she wasn't about to let good food go to waste, which was why she grabbed the loafs of bread and cheese as well, figuring that she could use them to make sandwiches if she was desperate. A few moments later, when she was sure that she had everything that she could use in the near future, Amaryllis headed for the back exit and headed out into the land of Skyrim once more, to see if she could reach the village she had noticed the name of earlier, when she looked at the signpost, as it was time to get back to her main goal and figure out how to get back to her true home.

As soon as she stepped outside Amaryllis noticed that it was lighter out than when she went into the mine, which she was fine with since she knew she had been in the mine for less than an hour, before she paused as something massive roared, which was when she saw a large black dragon, a menacing beast that was different from the dragons she was used to seeing back when she was following her Queen's orders, who flew over the area she was in, plus the ruin she had spotted earlier, and quickly disappeared as it headed to the north... even though Amaryllis headed for the village to the east so she could get under cover, because there was no telling if such a creature would come back to this area and she wanted to be out of sight if it did come back this way.

Comments

[PrismStrike]

And theres that famous changeling logic at work eh. Have no need for love, these people are absolutely hostile, lets kill them all yay. Its downright scary how quickly a ling can logic something out when alone (look at thorax for example in canon)

[badninja]

I wonder how long until she starts to take everything that isn’t nailed down, and if it can be brought up by a crowbar it wasn’t nailed down. I hope she does inadvertently learn some of the words of power.