Chapter Two: Kvatch, city of heroes
It is a bright day, lush and vibrant with color. The Sun shines over the rooftops so there is but little shade, but the heat is not enough that one would want shade. This is the city of Leyawin.
"Good day." A Nord man said to a passing Breton woman."
The citizens were happy, and they probably couldn't get much happier, unless maybe gold fell from the sky. They all walked their way, bustling and busy going about their business, the only sad few, were the few that had known what had happened overnight.
Now imagine a dank dark and moist place. I would only imagine the people in this place would be unhappy, the floor is cold stone and the beds are simple straw cots on the floor. Cockroaches and rats (the small kind) are practically crawling out from the gaping holes in the walls (these holes also make cold days a pain in the ass). The only light shines from the dim wall-mounted torches, and the windows in the cells. Yes, cells, this is the Leyawin city prison.
"Oi! Barteal!" One of the prisoners shouted to his cell-mate.
This noise caused his cell-mate, who was sleeping at the time, to awaken with a start, knocking his cup over and causing it to spill all over his torn pants.
"Oh shit! Look what you made me do Preston! It looks like I've gone and wet myself!" Barteal complained.
"Oh shut up you do that all the time! Anyway, didn't you hear what happened at Kvatch?" Preston said to him.
Barteal immediately sat up, now he was interested. "No what?" he asked, intrigued.
"Destroyed, done. Overnight, they say a gate to one of the realms of Oblivion itself opened up, and deadra swarmed the city, they killed everyone except for a few who were lucky enough to run." Preston explained.
"Holy shit, that's crazy." Barteal replied.
A guard walked up to the cells, he was a tall imperial with hair that ran down to his shoulders, and it was unkempt and fuzzy, as was his stubble. He was in his late twenties and had the looks that would make girls act like Orlando Bloom fangirls around him.
"Watch the gossip you two, there are some unhealthy people listening in on what you have to say." The guard said, looking around at some of the shady figures, cloaked in the shadows of the corners of their cells.
"Hey! Marcus!" Barteal shouted, happy to see this guard.
"We thought you got transferred to Kvatch yesterday, we were as scared as shit you were dead." Preston said.
"Yeah, but I stayed an extra night, good thing too, looks like I might have died if I left, unfortunately, I still have to go. It appears that they need as many men as possible to stop that damned Oblivion gate." Marcus said.
"Well, that must suck for you, when are you leaving?" Barteal asked.
"As soon as I get it."
"You know where it is, right?"
"Yeah."
Marcus walked to the end of the jail hallway and placed his hand on the cool stone wall. He stopped himself and took a deep breath, and then he reached up and pulled on the wall-torch. Unlike most wall hangings, this one actually came out, but did not separate itself from the wall. Instead it simply pulled out like a lever, and the wall slowly slid to the side.
Behind the wall, there was a case, not large enough for a body, yet large enough for a sword, and that is exactly what lay within. Marcus slowly lifted opened the case to reveal a magnificent sword, the blade was golden in color and the hilt was a sleek jet black. There was an inscription in ancient Aylied along the blade of the sword. It states, though a flame may be stagnant, it still burns on.
"It has been so long since I have used this." Marcus said.
Then, the Imperial sheathed the sword, and walked away.
It had taken them three days to get here, and when they got there, they did not enjoy what they saw, but still, they were there.
"I can't believe it's all gone." Renald said to Blink, or at least that's what they called him.
Blink's real name was Jacob, but no one ever called him that because of his heritage (ooh a flashback). Jacob was an Argonian. When he was born, his mother wanted to name him after the man who would raise him, because to be put as frank as possible, his mother was going to die. And this man just happened to be Jacob Valinus, the, would be hero, and would be leader of the Fighters Guild, unfortunately, before he could claim the title, he was murdered. At the murder scene, a blue rose was found lying in the pool of his ground next to him. Anyway, we will simply call him Blink. He was and average sized Argonian for his age, which was nineteen. His horns took on a magnificent shade of white with a tint of blue at the edges.
Renald was a Dunmer, he was fast and quiet, but could be strong and loud when the need arose. He had upswept flame-colored hair and an annoyingly bulbous nose, he was short for a Dunmer, and he was around nineteen. He and Blink had come to Kvatch on a mission from the Fighters Guild. However, when they arrived, they had come to witness the horrors of Oblivion firsthand.
The gate stood before them, towering over all of those who tried to stop it, as if saying "Ha ha, I'm better than you." Flames spouted from inside of it, and violent little grey lizards came out of it and tried to kill the guards who still remained defending the people from it.
As if on instinct, Renald pulled out his steel claymore and began to hack away at them, the poor little lizards (Though they were evil) never stood a chance, any who came his way, he would simply chop their head off and move on to the next one.
Blink soon after joined in and pulled out his elven bow. He was a little more elegant with his attacks. Rather than charging in and bloodying his armor, he simply pulled arrows out of their quiver, one, two, or even three at a time, fired, and listened to the shriek of the deadric creatures as they writhed in pain.
The guards tried equally as hard to fend off the creatures, swinging their swords left and right, but the deadra wouldn't stop coming. They swarmed over the guards and killed everything in their path.
"Push them back!" a guard screamed. "We may be able to at least block the gate."
Our heroes and the guards hacked, slashed, and shot their way to the gate, killing deadra after deadra.
"Look Out!" one of the guards screamed as he leapt to the side, attempting to avoid the tumbling fireball that had just come his way. The flaming rock exploded upon impact with the ground, sending dirt and bodies flying this way and that. The explosion lifted Blink and Renald from their feet, and sent them slamming into the nearby wall and sending them to their dreams.
"No… must save…. Must save… them." Blink managed to mumble before his vision became blurry, clouded with blood and dirt, and he slipped away into unconsciousness.
Renald awoke to hear a gentle female voice. "Hey, wake up." He opened his eyes to see an Imperial girl kneeling over him, she had long blonde hair tied in ponytail and bright blue eyes, and a smile that said "Things might suck but they'll work out in the end." She was about eighteen with soft features and good looks. She wore a green collared shirt and black loose pants, and had a sword-sized cylinder-shaped pouch strapped across her back. But the thing you most noticed was the scar on her left arm. Her entire left arm was covered in a bandage, and you could see the tips of a scar, a burn scar, coming out from underneath it.
"You took a pretty hard hit on the head there when you hit the wall." She said.
He swiftly looked around to see that, while the Oblivion gate was still up, the guards had blocked the entrance.
"I'm Sarah." She said cheerily, holding out her hand. Renald took it and she helped him up. "Some creepy guy with a blue rose and cloak showed up, and your Argonian friend got up and screamed something about his dad and chased the other guy into the gate. After that, some other cute guard guy showed up and he ran into the gate. Then the deadra started to break the blockade but this girl with violet hair used some sort of spell to freeze them all, and this other guy that was with her ran in with Elven daggers and cut them all up. It was pretty weird" She finished.
"How long was I out?" he asked her.
"About six hours."
"Oh shit!" At this exclamation he ran towards the gate and began to scream at the guards to unblock it. Reluctantly they did and he ran in. A few seconds after, Sarah ran after him shouting "Wait, you forgot your sword!"
Yeah Chapter Two! In this chapter most of the heroes were remotely introduced and in the next one you will know all of their names and at least a slight backstory. Marcus' sword does have its own little story there but that won't be described until later. Next Chapter: The group meets each other and actually enters the gate to Oblivion.