Any last words, Dovahkiin?" the priest of the Dragon Cult mocks the last rebel.
"Even though my fight may have been in vain.
Even though my body even now is wracked with pain.
I still remain proud of that which I did.
I stood and fought where others knelt or hid.
Even though I will now finally be slain,
By a world gone fully insane.
I remain strong in one way still.
I am still the master of my will.
Even though I will die at the blade of my once-friend,
Even though I die at the hands of a world I tried to defend.
I will not waver, I will not regret.
With eyes still open will my fate be met.
Even though I regret what led to this fate.
Even though I wonder if perhaps I tried to fight too late.
I know that I tried, to do what was right.
To finally break the Dragon race's might.
But it is not to Dragons that I finally fall.
It is Man who betrayed man, after all.
But at least I can still walk with pride,
Even if it is only to Sovngarde I can stride.
For I saved that world, at the very least.
In Shor's Halls I will eternally feast,
Retelling the story of Alduin's death.
Though Men then bereft me of my final breath.
But it matters not how tragic my fate,
And tragic it certainly was of late.
For I am still the master of me.
And there is nothing else that ever will be." the doomed Dragonborn recites.
"How does it feel, Ralof?" he then asks the priest.
"How does it feel to be part of the generation that the Divines themselves gave up on?"
"How did you know it was me?" Ralof asks, "And what do you mean, that the Divines gave up on?"
"Of course I recognise you, Ralof. The first person I met in Skyrim. So kind, so gentle. How brave on your way to death you were... But I digress. I tried to save all of you. Even after you started to hunt me. I killed Alduin, I had hoped that you would turn away from the Dragons then." he begins his tale.
"But you all stayed. You all kept hunting me for your new 'Gods'. I killed dozens of Dragons, hoping you'd see your cause was hopeless and leave. But you all stayed.
Talos himself came before me. He spoke to me. He counselled me to abandon all of you. Called you all a lost cause. For Talos' sake, he offered to make me a Divine!
But I stayed. I thought I could save you." he laughs bitterly.
"They took my Voice from me. Hoped it would make me give up. And now... I've given all I had. All my friends are dead or have abandoned me. Abandoned the Divines." he spits. "For POWER."
"Talos was right. I was a fool. If the God of Mankind says mankind is lost... But I couldn't leave you, and see where it got me. But at least Sovngarde is safe. Though I suspect I will be the last to go there for a long time."
Ralof seems taken aback at this. The Dragons were almost the Divines weren't they? Children of Akatosh himself! Wouldn't the Divines want Dragons in charge? "Why would nobody else be welcome in Shor's Halls?"
"Because Tsun the Gateskeeper does not take kindly to traitors. And what Man has done is nothing if not a betrayal of themselves." speaks the last opposition the Dragons have.
"So go ahead. Kill me, obey your masters! At least I die with my mind my own, my soul free to go to Sovngarde and my honour intact! Kill the Hero of Nordic Legend! Bring an end to the evil of all the Dragons' foes!" he laughs, mocking the once-popular stories and songs of the Dragonborn.
"Perhaps one day I'll meet another Dragonborn, should Akatosh decide Man is worth saving! You have doomed yourself to centuries of slavery, for a few years of imagined powers! Now how will the Dragons act when all their foes are gone?" he wonders aloud as his head is chopped off by the executioner. His eyes never leaving Ralof's mask.
His eyes open, even in death.