Dragonborn Saga

Chapter 725: Dear Miraak

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The Temple of Miraak was utterly vanquished against the might of a single Dragonborn and as Jon got a hold of one of Miraak's cultists, it was time for interrogation.

Who are you? What is the Cult of Miraak? Where did people like you come from? And what is your goal here?

Jon was asking nicely but after hearing the usual "Captain Piss-off" answer and the maternal insults, he retrieved a flask from his storage with a white liquid on it and a label that says "I hope I don't use this."

"See what this is?" Jon asked, "It is poison. What it does is that it kills living organisms."

"I know what a poison does, Deceiver!" The Cultist spoke with anger as he looked at Jon with one intact eye and one bruised eye, "When Lord Miraak emerges, the loyal shall be rewarded, the Nirn shall sing, and the world will kneel."

"You've totally drifted off topic here, mate. What does this have to do with Miraak returning?" Jon asked.

The Cultist heated up moment was faced with Jon's cold disdain, it left the former a bit puzzled and the latter grinning ear to ear.

"If Miraak were to show up on Nirn, I'd kick his ass through and through. I mean why would I want to fight him in a Daedric World where he is surrounded by a Daedric army?"

The Cultist was provoked right away and wanted to bite Jon but his bindings were strong and unyielding.

"You will die, Deceiver!" The Cultist shouted.

"Funny you should say, I was just talking about poison and death." Jon immediately held up the Cultist off his collar, "As I was saying poison kills people by messing up their biological functions."

"No shit!" The Cultist insisted on mocking Jon.

"Oh yeah, but that's a normal poison, something made of biological ingredients and crafted by an Alchemist like my dear second wife." Jon said and brought the flask closer to the face of the Cultist, "This, on the other hand, is a poison that was made by my brother, who is a blacksmith. It makes you wonder how good a blacksmith can be at making poisons."

Frea and Wulfur, who stood a few steps behind Jon, were watching him play the villain and as he brought up that flask, Frea turned to Wulfur.

"What is that?" Frea asked.

"Just something very twisted… Jon's idea." Wulfur said with an uneasy face.

"This, my dears, is a metal-based poison, not a plant or animal-based one. It means that it was made of metals instead of plants or venoms. It can't be healed by magic or detoxified by any known antidote. Also, all our Falmer test subjects have passed away with the most agonizing screams. Fun stuff, really. It is made of molten geode Soul Gems and sprinkles of Stalhrim. Funny story, Wulfur discovered it when he was researching a new way to create precious things. Anyway, after this poison is ingested, it starts to liquidate everything inside you. You'll literally be shitting your innards but lucky for me, this a very slow process. We estimate that it would take 5 minutes for you to die after ingesting it so… Bon Appetit!"

"No, wait!"

The Cultist was already shitting himself halfway through Jon's explanation of how he will die. As the Cultist wanted to say something, regardless of its nature, Jon punched him in the face hard enough for the man to lose his focus and become dizzy long enough for Jon to slip the liquid geode inside.

"Is this a noble way to kill someone?" Frea asked Jon, "Even if he is an enemy, treating life like that is fairly unreasonable. You could have tortured him normally if he wouldn't answer but to overdo it is unjust!"

"No, it is not noble." Jon replied with neutral expressions, "If anything it is quite gnarly and barbaric… but it's all according to plan."

As the poison kicked in, the Dunmer Cultist started to shake and his eyes were wide open.

"What…" He spoke while his body was overheating and sweating, "… did you… do to me?"

"Your insides are melting as we speak, you're bound from all your limbs and you can't kill yourself before the poison completely dissolves everything within.

"Please!" The Cultist shouted but his words weren't coming out right anymore as if his vocal chords were set on fire, "PL…EA…SE!"

"I know." Jon nodded and crouched near the man, "If you want me to kill you, you have to give me something in return. I don't get my hands bloody if not for a noble cause."

"We are… were… the Black Isle… Pirates!" The man spoke.

"From northern Morrowind or from the Eastmarch coast?" Jon asked, fully aware of the pirate clan.

"East…march! ARGH! PLEASE!"

"How did you become Miraak's lackeys?" Jon asked.

"Lord Miraak… invited us… gave us… magic, opened our eyes!"

"And?"

"He promises… a new world… he'd reward his followers… we become his disciples… his priests."

"Dragonborn Priests, huh?" Jon asked, "Now he's just copying me. Right, Potema?" Jon asked.

From Jon's shadow, a figure rose up and it floated like a Dragon Priest wearing black rags and holding a black staff. It looked like a mix between a Dragon Priest and a Hagraven but with an ornate skull covered with a ghastly layer of a face that belonged to a woman that looked like a wolf.

{Master! You are the true Dragon! This right belongs to none other than you! You're the one they should have followed if they wanted to follow a Dragonborn. Let me have my way with the heretics!}

Potema of Envy came right to Jon's ears and started speaking like a devil insinuating some dark deeds.

"You heard that?" Jon looked at the dying cultist, "That's what a proper Dragonborn Priest should look like."

"Kill… me! I've told you… all." The man replied, unable to withstand the feeling of burning liquidation that was utterly messing him from the inside out.

"No." Jon shook his head, "I still have questions! Once we are done, and that's when I say we are done, Potema will take care of you."

Seeing this demonic scene from the side, Wulfur was already used to it but Frea was unaware of how cruel the outsider ally of the Skaal, Bloodskal, can truly be. Wulfur had a dismissive look in his eyes and she wasn't one to pity her enemies but she wasn't one to approve of this dark power.

As for Jon, he interrogated the dying Cultist even more. It wasn't as satisfying as he hoped but he was done with the man in a couple of minutes.

"Potema, he's yours."

And with this signal, Potema immediately rushed at the dying cultist and stabbed him with her bare bone hand in his abdomen and just like that, the molten geode poison in the cultist's body stopped raging and cooled down a bit. Potema, however, was far from over with him. She snared the Astral Body from the Physical Body and without cutting the bond of life between the two, she started doing something to the Astral Body using dark magic.

Her intentions were unholy and as she was done with the Astral Body, she put it back in the body. Once that happened, the molten geode poison was ignited again.

"What was that?" Wulfur asked.

"Technically, he's alive but his brain has been shut off so he is dead…ish. Anyway, the preparations are over on my end, what about you?" Jon asked.

"We found the last chamber. It is as you expected." Wulfur replied.

"Let's go then." Jon held the Cultist by the nape of his robes and dragged him along as he followed Wulfur and Frea.

As they arrived at the deepest part of the temple, Jon started to recognize some bits of the temple as his memory was being refreshed on things. As they entered the great hall that was part of the old raised temple, Frea pointed out to the Dragon Skeleton hung by its ceiling.

"I had heard Miraak had turned against the Dragon Cult, but to display the remains in such a manner as this… It is no wonder the dragons razed his temple to the ground. Seeing the remains hung up like trophies must have enraged them to no end."

"Jon does it way worse." Wulfur said, "He had me dismantle every dragon he kills and sort out their bones by type in crates. If Miraak treated his kills like trophies, this guy treats them like byproducts."

"Wow!" Frea looked at Jon and she couldn't help but have a brutal image of him in her head.

"It is something I learned from the Skaal, really. You don't let any part of your prey go to waste." Jon said.

"Yes… we don't normally hunt dragons though." Frea couldn't find anything illogical with Jon's argument but that.

As they reached some point in the temple, they came to a large oval chamber with a word wall on one side and some standing sarcophaguses on the other side. It was obvious that once they got near the sarcophaguses, a wave of Daedra would assault them and so Jon went to the word wall first.

"I haven't done that in a long time." Jon said.

"Done what?" Frea asked.

"I have visited all of the Word Walls on Skyrim with the exception of a handful of them. I collected all their knowledge long ago. Gaining new powers is always exciting."

Jon approached the word wall and could feel the whispers of the stone come from within. With his innate nature, he started reading the word wall.

"Pah WERID MOROKei MiraaK ZOK SULeyKaaR DO Pah SONaaK WEN MUL BOLaaV NaaL FahLUaaN DO JUL." (All praise glorious Miraak, Most powerful servant of all Dragon Priests, whose "STRENGTH" was granted by the gardener of mankind.)

As Jon finished shouting, he felt that the word "Mul" (Strength) was imprinted on his brain.

This was the first word in the Dragon Aspect shout. A few years back when Jon was on Solstheim, he managed to learn the first word "Qah" but the shout needed "Mul" to be learned first and now he has completed two of them.

The "Dragon Aspect" shout was one of the few shouts that Jon couldn't learn from his memories even though he knew the words required. This also applied to the "Dragonrend" and the "Bend Will" shouts, all of which are unnatural shouts not made by the Dragons and some of the most overpowered shouts in existence.

The "Dragon Aspect" is powerful and can only be used by a Dragonborn. With its first word, it increases the strength and the fortitude of its caster by leaps and bounds. With the second, it can summon the ancient spirits of the past Dragonborns. With the third, it makes the Dragonborn shouts with a similar power to that of Ancient Dragons.

"You're good?" Wulfur asked.

"Yes. This word is really something!" Jon said and turned around to see that Wulfur has already taken care of the Dragur from the standing sarcophaguses.

"Was a bit bored here." Wulfur said while trying to look cool.

Jon laughed and shook his head.

"No salary is good enough for a guy like you."

"Haha! You never pay me though." Wulfur retorted.

"Says the shareholder." Jon replied and marched past the two companions of his.

They delved even deeper and passed a few eerie-looking statues of large green gooey monsters with pincers and tentacles, Frea started pointing them out.

"I do not recognize this statuary. We passed by a few of them earlier, but they are becoming more frequent as we get further in." She said.

"Relics from Apocrypha, Hermaeus Mora's realm." Jon replied.

"Herma Mora? Demon of Knowledge?" Frea looked at Jon and her feet froze on the ground.

"The one and only."

"What do the Knowledge Demon and Miraak have to do with each other?" She asked.

"Hermaeus Mora is the patron of Miraak. See where this is going?" He responded.

"All-Maker!" While completely baffled, she could do anything but tighten her grasp over her axe.

"We're here." Wulfur announced.

After passing many mechanical and trap barriers, the three looked around a chamber with a strange interior, stranger than the eerie ones from before.

"Here we are."

And at the center of the room, there was a pedestal of the same style as the room that had a book on it.

"A Black Book?" Wulfur asked, "That's what we're after?"

"What's that?" Frea asked.

"Skaal, all you have been doing all that time is asking what is this and what is that! No creativity to add to this group?" Jon asked.

"Hey! You already know all there is to know about this place. What kind of a man who is not even a native that would know all that?" She retorted.

"She raises a good point." Wulfur asked.

"Bros before hoes, man." Jon punched Wulfur's arm, "And I do know stuff like that because I do read books about things. This book in particular, I've read 4 of it before and guess what, they are gates to Oblivion."

"Oblivion!" Frea reacted.

"Indeed." Jon said, "That's why I know what I know. I'm an enemy of Herma Mora and by default, an enemy of his boy Miraak, who is also a Dragonborn and is trying to get rid of me. Satisfied?"

"Yes." Frea looked away apologetically.

"Alright. Now let's get to work. You two go back for a bit." Jon said as he pushed his two heavily armored companions away.

"Envy, let's do this." Jon summoned out Potema of Envy once again and she followed him to the Black Book.

Jon still had the captured Cultist from back then that he put on the floor. He then laid down on the ground and shut his eyes.

Potema of Envy hovered over the two of them and started making noises as she spoke some incompressible words.

"Dark Magic this time!" Frea exclaimed lightly.

"Jon uses all sorts of magic; Light, Dark, Holy, Daedric, Undeath. From what we learned, it's not Dark Magic that corrupts people, it is people who corrupt Magic." Wulfur said.

Jon didn't like his magic being criticized and Wulfur saw what Jon can do with magic light and dark. Jon had his moments where he used the most respected of magic, Restoration, to do the most horrible spells one can imagine.

As for Jon, he was simply lying and waiting as Potema of Envy finished her Conjuration spell. She then cast the magic on the Cultist and put her boney hand over Jon's head.

"It is yours, your highness." She said,

Jon's lips curved into a smile but by the next second, the Cultist rose from his slumber in the eeriest of ways.

He stood up, turned around, and walked to the Black Book on the pedestal. He opened the book and almost a dozen tentacles jumped off from its pages and devoured the man.

Instead of eating him whole, the Cultist just stood there while being covered by those green gooey tentacle things.

And then…

"Oh, Dear Miraak."

… Jon spoke.

"5000 years in Apocrypha and you're still an ass. Don't you recognize me? Did the realm of Hermaeus Mora make you forget me? I am your best pal from the old days, Sook-ma-Cok. Don't remember me? Ok, I have something for you to never forget me by… OUAGH!"

As Jon made that last sound, his body bent upwards and he seemed in pain for a second but then Potema of Envy removed her hand from his forehead and cut the connection.

"Hahahaha!"

Jon, who regained his consciousness right away, started laughing hysterically and stood up from the ground. He looked to his side and saw that the body of the Cultist had turned to ash and the Black Book had a hole in it that was made as if something burned it through.

"What was that?" Wulfur asked.

"Ahahaha! The molten geode. I made it… ahahaha… all over his face! Miraak won't forget his pal Sook-ma-Cok any time soon."

Historians recorded that this throw-up prank was considered the pettiest, most reckless in history since it involved delving for a few hours in one of the world's most ancient crypts.

The fight between Jon Dare and Miraak was purely about good and evil but Jon couldn't help but make it personal.

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