He's starting to remember more – the fresh air clears his head and revives his lungs. He slashes through a bandit camp outside the Imperial Sewer exit and swims to the Waterfront. The people straggle across the lake bank shore, and a pirate crew eye him distrustfully as he passes by their ship.

He's in the Market district now, and he dully remembers the Imperial Box Office Committee, where the little voice where his memories should be are telling him that he can buy a home here. He definitely knows that he cannot pay for much more than a stay at an inn for a night, but he supposes that he will go to see how much a home may cost.

Walking through the door, he sees a sour looking Imperial woman at the desk in front of him. Vinicia Mellisaeia, the voice in his head whispers. He asks her about buying a house in the Imperial City, and she eyes him distrustfully, like a thief she knew and resolutely tells him that she doesn't trust him enough to tell him about houses for sale.

He sighs and tosses her some gold.

At the sight of the money she sweetens up to him and tell him there's a shack for sale at the Waterfront, for two thousand septims and he thinks he may as well fall down and die because that'll take the whole day to save up that much with Arena winnings if he even makes it to the Arena, by iAzura/i that is a lot of money for a Waterfront shack.

But he supposes he'll manage, as he goes down into the Bloodworks under the Arena to sign up as a combatant. The man, Owyn, looks distastefully at him and seems to be stifling some laughter as the ex-prisoner puts on the rather skimpy Arena Light Rainment and strides into the Arena, slashing apart the upstart from the Yellow team with two clean strokes from his steel short sword. Hah. Suck on that, Owyn.

Funny, he has barely a scratch on him. Either his opponent was extremely stupid and charged in without training, or he has had much more experience in the field of battle than he remembers. Though it's all a blur (a whirlwind of a boy, slashing his way this and that and laughing joyfully, this is what it meant to be free, this is what it meant to be alive).

Eleven hours of blood and gore and a quick run to the Slash n' Smash to sell a few longswords and hammers he got from the Bloodworks later and he has just over two thousand septims.

He manages to get to the Office Committee just before closing time and buys the shack. She tells him that if he wants furnishings of sorts, he should head to the Three Brothers Trade Goods. He doesn't really care.

It's ten at night on a Morndas and as he arranges his new (rather familiar looking, did he own a house like this one before?) one-room home to his liking, he cannot really recall any day remotely like the one.

Of course, if it was any other day, he would probably never have dreamed of joining the Arena, he would never think to purchase a home on the Waterfront, would definitely not be saddled with an amulet that perhaps could change the fate of the world…

He decides he is overthinking things. He is tired and amnesiac and the darkness is an inviting void. He rubs the ashen skin of his face, closes his eyes.

In his slumber, he dreams of butterflies.

The next morning he goes back to the Arena.

After about seven battles or so with what feels like half of Tamriel, he's up to the rank of Champion and is sidling up to Agronak gro-Malog to challenge him for the rank of Grand Champion. For someone who kills others on a daily basis for money (hah, isn't he also doing this for the gold?), gro-Malog is very amiable, very polite. He's going to challenge the Orc. But it isn't quite that easy: Agronak is much too nice, talks too much, and before he knows it he's on his way to the Gold Coast to a fort called Crowhaven to find out about Agronak's heritage, of his father, a nobleman. How noble of him (heh, noble…). How selfless, how kind, how stupid.

As he walks up to the fort, it clearly has seen better days. He unlocks the door and pushes it open, walks in and is rather unimpressed when he is greeted with members of the undead. More specifically, vampires. They see him and instantly start attacking. He thinks he wants to throw something.

He ends up "throwing" his sword into vampiric faces, collecting vampire dust and looking around the fort. He looks around the inner chamber and finds a diary. He's always wanted to read someone else's diary. Flipping through, he grimaces as he realises that Agronak may not appreciate being a half-vampire, according the diary. His father – the man named Lord Lovidicus, an Imperial, no doubt – seemed likable enough throughout inspection of the diary, not a man to be ashamed of. The diary isn't so much a recount of daily life as a tragic tale.

He finds Luktuv gro-Malog's actions rather drastic, and quite sad. Didn't she love Lovidicus? It shouldn't of mattered that he was a vampire – she'd loved him when she didn't know, when he already was one. He honestly does not mind vampires; he thinks that he'd like them if they weren't always trying to kill him. The sad truth is, though, that the vast majority of Tamriel would much rather see all the vampires dead. Permanently. Preferably with fire. And lots of silver arrows stuck in them. Seems like '"the maiden gro-Malog" would've agreed to these methods.

He looks at the remains of the vampire that he now knows as the sad writer of the diary.

Poor Lord Lovidicus. Poor, lonely, heartbroken, starved Lord Lovidicus.

He makes his way back to the Arena Bloodworks and hands the diary to gro-Malog, casts his eyes down at the obvious horror and disappointment washing over the half-Orcs' face. Agronak believes he is a monster. The ex-prisoner believes he is far from it.

"So… can I challenge you for the rank of Grand Champion?" he asks, shrugging a little with a strained, guilty smile on his face.

Agronak accepts and returns to hacking at the practice target, albeit much more violently.

He thinks later that day, as he stands over the miserable corpse of Grand Champion Agronak gro-Malog, that some things are best left unknown.