Alright, so a few things to get out of the way. First off, this is my first story on the site, so please tell me whether or not you guys actually like it and think it's worth continuing. Second, the grammar may very well suck ass, so please tell me if you find anything too bad. Thanks.

Chapter 1: The carriage full of gross, sweaty people

For what was probably the sixth time since this whole thing started, I tried to remember exactly how I'd managed to get myself in this predicament. One minute, I was going to bed getting ready to sleep, and the next moment I was woken up by the carriage I had found myself in going over a bump in the road.

"But hold on Mr Incrediblyhandsomenarratorprotagonist!" I hear you saying, "Why are you in a carriage? It's the 21st century!"

Usually, I would agree wholeheartedly. Unfortunately though, it would appear from the attire of everyone else in the carriage that it was not, in fact, the 21st century. But thankfully, my amazing skills of observation have allowed me to recognize said attire and make an educated guess on the time period.

It was some year I can't quite remember, maybe 200, in the fourth era.

For those of you who don't understand what I mean by that, this is the exact same time period that the fifth game in the Elder Scrolls series, Skyrim, is set.

That's right my dear audience. Somehow, I had become trapped in the game. Normally, I would be a bit more sceptical about this, but when you wake up only to find yourself tied up in the back of a carriage with a blonde man who introduces himself as Ralof, a man he keeps calling 'horse thief', and a dark haired man with his mouth gagged, you don't have too many options on what to believe.

There was something different though, in that there was a fifth person in the carriage with us, still unconscious and tied up beside Ralof. This was the most confusing thing so far, as the game only places you in the carriage with three people when you start. So why was this girl here?

"Honestly," Ralof spoke up, breaking me out of my thoughts. "There have been too many abominations showing up around Skyrim recently. If it weren't for them, we might've been able to get away…"

"If you're talking about the Dunmer, I'll have you know that they're kind of awesome. They make armour from the bones of their enemies!" I replied, surprising myself a bit over how casually that came out. After all, wit is generally a foreign concept to me.

"Not them," he said quickly, "I don't have a problem with the Dark Elves, even if some other Stormcloaks do. I mean the actual abominations."

This confused me a little, as I wasn't really sure what he was talking about. There were some strange enemies in Skyrim, but they all seemed to be treated fairly normally in the game, as if they weren't considered that strange in Tamriel.

"What do you mean by actual abominations?" I asked him.

"You mean you don't remember?" He asked me with a confused frown. "I mean, I know you were unconscious when we showed up, but I assumed it was those creatures that were responsible for that."

"The last thing I remember was going to sleep for the night." I answered. It was technically true as well. They don't need to know that it took place in a whole separate world though, or at least not yet.

"Oh, I see." He muttered, before scratching his head and taking a look of intense concentration, as if he was desperately trying to figure out what he was going to say. "They were… terrifying, I suppose. They looked human but… they were misshapen, like they had been stretched, and they had huge claws on their hands… It's hard to explain…"

Huh.

I see.

That was terrifying.

"Hey," I asked him after about a minute of silence. "Have there been any weird spells being made recently, or any recent developments in the creation of new spells, possibly to do with gold?"

"Maybe…" He said. "I don't know a whole lot about magic, but I'm fairly certain that some folks have mentioned something along those lines. They don't call it gold though, they use some strange word. What was it? Aulun? Aulum?"

"Aurum?" I asked in dread, cringing as his face lit up in a small smile.

"That's it." He said. "Do you know much about it?"

"Too much." I said, shuddering at the realisation of what had happened.

I wasn't just in Skyrim. I was in my copy of Skyrim.

My heavily modded copy of Skyrim.

Dear fucking lord, I was going to die here.

Before I could start truly panicking though, the girl stirred slightly, before going still again.

"Well!" Ralof said, "Looks like you're finally awake. Don't bother trying to hide it, I saw you when you tried to sneak a look just then."

I was about to tell him that he was imagining things when she let out a small grunt and opened her eyes.

"So, who exactly are you?" Ralof asked her. "You don't look much older than this kid, so I'm surprised you'd be trying to cross the border all alone."

"Why didn't you get confused over me?" I asked him.

"Well, you were lying in the middle of a snowy forest wearing nothing but your undergarments with three horrifying abominations standing around you. I just assumed that you were either insane or lost. Or stupid." Ralof said. "I did try to convince the Imperials that you weren't a Stormcloak, but apparently telling them that you were probably an insane daedra worshipper didn't help your chances."

"You're surprisingly honest towards someone who you thought was a highly insane and dangerous individual." I grumbled out. Even though that's technically how I played it when it was still a game, it still hurt to be accused of it.

"Ha!" He chuckled, "You'd probably be killed here if you tried something anyway, what with all these Imperial bastards here!"

"And why do you expect that to stop him? If he is insane, do you think he would care?"

At that interruption, everyone turned to look at the girl.

"Hah!" Ralof laughed again, louder this time. "That's true!"

He continued to laugh for a bit, before trailing off, and looking to the floor of the carriage.

"It's a damn shame though, that you two would get caught up in this." He said, a cynical looking grin on his face. "You're both so young, probably haven't even seen you're twentieth winter… And now you're here."

"And it's your own damn fault!" The last man apart from Ulfric said loudly. I think his name was Lokir? Yeah, that sounded right. "If it hadn't been for you messing everything up, the Empire wouldn't have even been there!"

"Shut up back there!" The man driving the carriage shrieked, his voice going about an octave hire than it did in the game. When I looked closer, he was also trembling slightly. I figured there could only be two reasons for this. Either he was feeling guilty thanks to Ralof's words, or we were slowly driving him insane.

Lokir, however, had not stopped ranting. "It's your fault that we were captured, and now we're all going to have to spend the rest of our days rotting in a prison somewhere!"

We were all silent for about half a minute, before Ralof spoke up again.

"A prison?" He asked, his voice sounding as if he couldn't quite believe what was Lokir had said. "You think we'll get to live out the rest of our lives in a prison? Who do you think you're sitting across from?!"

In response to this, Lokir jumped slightly, before beginning to examine the last person in the carriage. It took a while, but it wasn't hard to see when he finally realised who he was looking at.

"Oh… Oh gods…" he managed to choke out, before he began to tear up. "No… NO! This can't be happening! Please let this not be happening!" He continued to cry out in fear for a few minutes, until he finally began to mutter to the divines to save him.

"Who are you, horse-thief?" Ralof asked him.

"Wh-why do you care?"

"A Nord's last thoughts should be of their home, and their loved ones." Ralof replied simply.

It took a few more minutes, but eventually he managed to get his emotions under control enough to answer.

"My name is Lokir, Lokir of Rorikstead." He replied, his voice still shaking.

"My name is Ralof. I'm from Riverwood." Ralof said.

"My name is Leone Vallius, of Dragonbridge." The girl said, looking at everyone with mild suspicion.

"Mmmphmphmhm, mmmphmmphmhhmph." Ulfric said from behind the fabric covering his mouth.

Everyone looked to me, expecting me to continue. I might even have been able to hold it back if not for the fact that I'm terrible with pressure. Eventually, all I could do was sigh and say the only thing I could think of.

"My name is Joseph Moore, and I'm afraid I don't remember where I'm from."