Word from the author:
Challenges of character:
Writing a crossover between worlds of Elder Scrolls and Dragon age is an unbelievably difficult task and I faced a multitude of challenges coming up with scales and reasoning that would enable the story set in a fantasy world to be realistic (as much as possible). The greatest hurdle is the character of Dragonborn, the difficulty coming not from coming up with his personality, I knew from the start what I wanted him to be like, but rather the scale of his power. In lore, Dragonborn is the closest thing to walking, living God. Shout is the ability of creating reality by sheer will and willing things into existence. Tiber Septim used his power to re-write history and turn Cyrodiil from a Jungle into a temperate paradise. The clash between Mirak and Vahlok the Jailor made Solstheim separate landmass from the rest of Skyrim, a land unto itself. If you've visited Forelhost on one of your Skyrim adventures, you can see a 20 meter segment of wall and gatehouse, collapsed and crushed by the power of a "Young voice master", a rash lad without much training, who still wielded more power than in game Dragonborn, but realistically doesn't even come close to lore Dragonborn. Greybeards, when they speak - shake the whole of Skyrim with their voice, and that was barely more than a whisper. One can understand how placing a person with such power in a world without it's equivalents can be a challenge, without making everything broken and pointless, summarized by "And then he shouted and it was over".
Yet at the same time, people read Skyrim and Dragon age crossovers for that sense of awe and amazement when one witnesses the shouts for the first time, sees their power for themselves, and that makes them indispensable for a good crossover. As such I have decided to split Dragonborn from the main group of heroes. He will be a character occasionally seen or witnessed, sometimes with a chapter of his own, with an agenda of his own, pursuing a goal that brought him to this world. That will allow characters to face challenge and obstacles, while also allowing him to reshape the world to a reasonable degree, rather than break it outright.
To be different:
I've read all notable crossovers between these two universes, and by notable I mean anything longer than 10k characters. And over and over several tropes repeat, and Dragonborn comes off as predictable. The following irked me in particular:
Master of all trades. Not only is it unreasonable for one man to be the leader of honorable band of warriors valuing physical prowess and despising sneakiness and magic, while at the same time killing harmless grief-stricken beggars who just lost their sister, then proceeding to frame an innocent man for theft, placing him in jail for the rest of the game, and then get on a carriage to Winterhold and become an Arch-mage. For the sake of the game all of these positions are open, but realistically they are exclusive from one another, save perhaps Thieves guild and Dark brotherhood.
The backstory:
I've mulled over and spent many an hour trying to write in the backstory of Dragonborn as starting chapters. Every time it ended up scrapped and deleted, only to be restarted again, a task that repeated for 3 months. Ultimately I decided to skip out of it, the backstory is too long and convoluted to make it possible to explain it, without starting an entire 100 000 words fanfiction on it. A task I might undertake if this turns out to attract enough attention. As such I will explain the character's backstory here at the start, and will explain some parts of it in greater detail as the story unfolds, because it is impossible to understand various plots that will appear without the backstory. If you don't want spoilers feel free to skip this part.
The story takes place over 1000 years after the events of Skyrim. I've decided to use that because I needed an event that can connect the worlds of Tamriel and Thedas, something grand that happened at the same time. The event I've decided to connect to one another was entering of the Golden city by Magisters of Tevinter, and Nerevarine striking the heart of Lorkhan/Shor out of this world. Since the entering of Golden city happened 1300 years before Inquisition, and Morrowind happened 207 years before Skyrim, I've had to make a timeskip, which proved to be one of the greatest obstacles for writing the backstory chapters in reasonable length. But it also provided my Dragonborn with a reason to come trough dimensions and time, other than "accident" or "just because", it allowed him to have an agenda of his own to pursue.
Long story short is as follows; Skyrim became independent of the Empire, and the imperial council murdered the emperor, blaming him for failures in the great war against the dominion, the losing of Hammerfell, Skyrim and High Rock and the loss of countless lives that amounted to nothing. That resulted in a civil war in Cyrodiil, with numerous Warlords making a claim for the throne (We do have to remember that Titus Mede was also a Warlord that seized the Throne, he didn't inherit it). As one can expect the Thalmor reveled in the prospect, but at the same time it made them busy, avoiding the great war for a time and allowing the newly independent provinces to establish themselves. After decades of fighting a single Warlord rises to power with Thalmor aid, who provide him with funds, food and other aid to establish himself as a Client of the Dominion. The general populace simply welcomes the end to the fighting and doesn't offer much resistance to the established peace. While that was happening the Human states entered into an alliance to protect themselves from the Thalmor. The balance of power was precarious and the continent entered into a Cold war between these two factions.
In Skyrim Ulfric married Elisif, joining their claims together, and ensuring that peace in Skyrim won't be disturbed by claimants to the High King's throne from Elisif's side, a risk that would always exist had she married another, and symbolically joining the formerly divided Skyrim together. Having secured the homefront Ulfric turned outwards, and although hate ran deep neither the Humans nor the Elves dared break the peace. As such he turned East, using the civil war in Cyrodiil and Thalmor involvement in it to push for conquest of Solstheim, citing ancient claims and rights over the land, while in fact wanting to gain control over the precious ebony discovered there. With Dragonborn on the side of Skyrim war was short and brutal, with incredible deeds on both sides. The greatest battle was the siege of Raven Rock, where the besieged Dunmer in their desperation summoned Boethiah to once again defend them against champions of another God, like he did with Trinimac. The grueling battle ended when Dragonborn with his last breath plunged his battleaxe into Boethiahs chests, slaying the Daedric prince and dying in process. (Please note that Daedra can't truly be killed, they will just respawn after an unknown period of time, yet this deed is equal to that or Martin in Oblivion)
For his deed Dragonborn became venerated and worshiped as 10th Divine of the Nordic pantheon, and his child with Aela the Huntress became Jarl of Solstheim. Grand temple was constructed for the Dragonborn where once Mirak's temple stood, Stormcloaks and Stormblades often intermarried and became staunchest of allies and that alliance ensured continued rule of Ulfric's and Elisifs descendants over Skyrim.
Following the defeat in the war Morrowind underwent another change, if that was possible after the Red Mountain's eruption and Baar Dau's crash into Vivec city. Dunmer became further isolated and xenophobic, but united internally. Centuries later they would restart the slavery and invade Northern Black Marsh and Southern Morrowind, reclaiming it from Argonians and placing many into chains, a practice neither side challenged since Dunmer became valued intermediaries between Human and Elves, transporting and trading goods between the two alliances without involving themselves.
For their part Argonians endured, with strength given by the Hist and inhospitable homeland proving more than enough of a deterrent for any would be invaders, save the occasional Dunmer slave raid.
And in the south the Thalmor plotted, a millennia meaning little to a long lived race like theirs.
My Dragonborn is called Arnlaugr Stormblade, an Old Norse name meaning Eagle that has sworn a holy oath, or oath sworn to the Eagle, whichever you prefer. I found it fitting as Kynareth, so often referenced is represented by a hawk or an eagle. And Stormblade of course a title that became a last name, just like today we have Smith's, Shoemakers and more. He has married Aela several years after becoming the Harbinger of the Companions and had several daughters and a son who later became Jarl of Solstheim. In life he was honor bound, and truly earned his place amongst the great Harbinger of the companions. Despite his best attempts to remove beastblood from the companions, Aela endured with it, and was the last of the companions to bear it. Despite not having interests in Magic, his pursuit of Elder Scrolls ensured his connection to the College, that would later be used to pressure College into coming under direct authority of Skyrim's High King, training battlemages for the Stormcloak army beside their regular students. He also created an agreement between Dragons and rulers of Skyrim that would ensure survival of the Dragons in Skyrim, an agreement that placed Dragons under Royal protection and prevented their hunting or harming, in return for service in battle when required and teaching of thuum to the "Tongues" that Ulfric decided to bring back.
In Riften he had destroyed the Thieves guild, and in Falkreath the Dark Brotherhood fell to his blade, he has never shown much tolerance to the sneaks, a sentiment that remained with him even after death.
Following his death on Solstheim he ascended into Sovngarde, his mighty deed granting him a place alongside Shor and Tsun, not as servant but as equal. He observed the developments on Nirn and mostly stayed uninvolved in the affairs of the Mortals.
That was not to be eternal however. In an effort to break the stalemate Thalmor dedicated all their efforts into recovering the pieces of Numidium and started the painstaking process of creating a Mertella, a super-powered soul gem to power it (When built by Men it was known as Mantella). They saw this as essential in not just wining the war against men, but undoing all of Creation, enabling them to once again achieve Godhood that they once possessed, before Lorkhan the betrayer tricked them out of it.
Shor, being the Nordic interpretation of Lorkhan and protector of Men couldn't allow that,and began searching for his heart so as to regain his power and stand once again as protector of men, trough great effort the Heart was discovered in another dimension, sent there when Nerevarine struck it with Keening and Sunder. In the final gambit Shor sacrifices last of his power to send Dragonborn into this strange new dimension to recover the heart alongside an Elder scrolls to guide him towards it.
And that is where our story begins. Perhaps you can understand the difficulties I was presented when trying to write this as starter chapters of reasonable length and why I decided to forgo it completely. Please, leave your thoughts on the story, suggestions, follow and stay close. I intend to update this story every Sunday save the next due to my trip to Italy. I already have few chapters close to completion awaiting final touches so there is still hope for me to change certain plot points if they prove rather unpopular. I will try my best to stick to the lore of both worlds, avoid cliche's present in other stories and will be available to answer any questions you might have about this fanfiction. See you in two weeks :)