There weren't any trees.

There were rocks, huge boulders as well as vast jagged cliffs, rising up like shards of shattered daggers. The ground was hard and ashen, covered in web-like cracks, many of them oozing lava. A lake of the same scorching liquid was spread out not far from her. The Oblivion Gate itself looked just the same, a flaming tear in the fabric of the universe. There were slabs of stone forming segments of walls, pierced by twisted black spikes tipped with blood and a few obelisks with strange runes on them. Everything seemed to pulsate with a glaring red hue. The tall, bony towers in the distance were only just visible in the shroud of reddish dust. Combined with the sky, which took on a truly searing shade of crimson this side of the rift, all the red was painful to look at.

And no, there weren't any trees.

Taking slow, experimental breaths, Liallan observed that while she was definitely feeling a pair of lungs shorter, she didn't seem about to suffocate. Thank the gods for small favours, Liallan thought, resolving to add the unexplicable presence of air to her list of things to be appreciated and not questioned.

Of course, there was still the heat. Liallan was Dunmer by birth and as such was considerably insensitive to excesses of warmth in all its forms, but the air was still hot enough to make her want to crawl into a lake somewhere in Skyrim and stay there for the rest of her life. It was already making her skin sweat and her eyes water and she blinked furiously to clear them. It was bearable, but only just. She couldn't possibly imagine how it would feel for a non-Dunmer.

Standing out in the open amidst the reddish illumination, Liallan felt uncomfortably exposed. The feeling doubled when a daedroth stomped into view, the scaly muscled limbs, terrifying claws and huge teeth set in equally huge jaws all too recognisable. Before the creature could see her, Liallan edged away, hiding from its sight behind a slab of rock. She was about to unsling her bow when a glance back at the creature revealed a second daedroth join the first. Liallan swore silently, ducking back behind the rock. With one daedroth, she still had a chance of killing it without attracting much attention, but with two, it just wouldn't work. As much as she hated to leave the pair of monsters between her and the only way out - she assumed that the Gate would work both ways, simply because the implications were otherwise too terrifying to consider - she didn't have a choice.

Moving in quick dashes between outcroppings of rock and carefully staying out of sight of the daedra, Liallan made her way in the only available direction - all others were sealed off either by lava or cliffs too steep to climb. She passed several scamps digging around in the dirt, leaving them undisturbed.

Moving past another rock Liallan walked right into a clannfear.

Both Liallan and the creature recoiled in surprise. In the next instant, the lizard-like daedra sprang forward, jaws open wide and clawed forefeet outstretched, its tail lashing furiously. Trapped against the rock, Liallan kicked out, her boot landing on the creature's jaw. The daedra yowled and staggered. Liallan seized the opportunity to draw her blade and drive it deep into the clannfear's chest. It stiffened, then crumpled to the ground, the last few spasms of its tail beating up a cloud of dust.

Quickly wiping her sword on the creature's hide, Liallan was about to make a getaway before the daedra's cry could attract any more monsters, but stopped in her tracks. She saw the limp figure of a human on the ground - a man, she could tell by the wide chest and powerful shoulders. He was wearing a bloody and ruined suit of chainmail armour, complete with the crest of Kvatch - a black wolf head on a white background, the white slits of its eyes narrowed dangerously - one of the guards, then. There wasn't much to go by for further identification. His face had been partially eaten out - the clannfear's presence here suddenly seemed very logical - one of his legs was missing, and the rest of him was an assemblage of deep gashes, burn marks, claw, fang and blade wounds.

Liallan spent a moment staring, then hurried away, not daring to glance back. She felt her resolve weakening, but knew she had no choice but to move forward. If she didn't do this, she wouldn't be able to get to the Chapel and would need to turn back...

And then what? Liallan nearly hesitated as the thought struck her. Yes, the survivors at the Chapel might eventually die, unless things work out like Savlian hopes they do, but I'll be alive, won't I? Alive, hopefully whole, and planes away from this...

A set of curved spikes several times her own height suddenly rose from the ground, nearly skewering her. Shaking her head at the strangeness and hostility of this realm, Liallan pondered the idea and dismissed it. Even if the high and mighty Grandmaster of the Blades doesn't kill me for abandoning the Emperor's son - and while I doubt he could make it much worse than this I wouldn't put it quite past him... Even if he spares me and merely makes my life a living hell... I have a hunch that leaving the heir to die simply isn't a very smart thing to do...

No, no matter if I like it or not - and I'm pretty sure where I stand in that regard - I still have to do this. I just need to be extra careful and make sure I don't find myself cornered, outnumbered, or any other things that will inevitably lead me to share the same fate as that guard back there.

Of course, I could get captured, and that would be even worse...

Now that Liallan had made up her mind about things to avoid, she took care to keep out of sight as she approached an immense gate. The doors were massive slabs of red and black stone looming high above her. She couldn't even begin to fathom the mechanism that manipulated the hinges...

Quite a distance behind the gate, she could make out a monolithic tower, an intense yellow light glaring down at her from the top. This monster of architecture, all spikes and sharp, unforgiving edges, was many times vaster than the smaller towers surrounding it like ants clustered around their queen. Precariously thin bridges hung like lifelines between the queen and her servants, dozens of feet above the ground, unforgiving of any too clumsy to cross it.

If the smaller towers didn't have the look of being completely uninhabitable, Liallan would've guessed it to be a city.

And if size was in any way related to importance, as it tended to be, this was where she needed to go.

Which left her with the problem of dealing with the closed gate. It felt a bit anti-climactic.

Seeing as the entire body of architecture was surrounded by lava, the gate providing the only entrance, it was clear Liallan wouldn't be finding a detour any time soon. Studying the gates again, she noted the towers that stood on either side of them, with the gates stretched between them. If there was any way to open the gates, this would be it.

There were also stakes holding heads, bodies and separate body parts spread around the gate. An unnecessary reminder.

Liallan crept closer, hugging the rocks, ready to dart into cover any moment. She wasn't quite sure what she would do once inside the tower, but she hardly had the means to compose a reasonable plan...

The gate was now close enough to blot out a fair part of the sky. Suddenly the flat slab of rock at the base of one of the towers parted, allowing a figure to pass through. Liallan had dealt with conjurers often enough to recognise the armour in an instant's notice. Before the Dremora could spot her - luckily it wasn't looking in her direction - she backed away, pressing herself against a stone pillar.

This was it - Dremora were immeasurably more intelligent than the regular monsters and would be much more difficult to avoid. It occurred to her that they could easily be more intelligent than the races of Nirn, but that idea wasn't helping...

Her eyes not leaving the threatening figure, she reached for her bow and was completely unprepared for the sudden pressure that encircled her arm and the sharp jerk that followed.

Whirling around and failing to pull away, Liallan saw spiky, leafless vines the colour of burned meat strengthen their hold on her arm in an attempt to penetrate the armour, with more clawing at the rest of her body. She cried out in pain as the spikes slipped past the folds of her glove and bit into her wrist. Drawing a dagger, her free hand lashed at the vines, severing their grasp. The tendrils stretched longingly towards her as she staggered away, yanking the remains of them out of her arm.

Liallan suddenly felt very light-headed and flailed wildly in an attempt to catch herself as she toppled over but her limbs felt heavy and reluctant to move. She knew what was happening... She had spent countless hours of frustration and headache learning and honing to perfection the spell suited specifically to situations like these, the spell that would quickly drive almost any poison out of her system, but mouthing the incantation was like trying to sing while having cotton forced down her throat...

She thought she heard the clank of armoured boots and an alarm bell went off somewhere deep in the blocked part of her consciousness.

Then, there was just darkness and more cotton.

Dark cotton?

A lot of cotton.