Chapter 10: The Path of Bloodied Ruin

Yang's Perspective

My breath blossomed out in front of me as we walked through a small gap in the glacier. I instantly noticed that the ice carried throughout the tunnel we entered. The crunching of footsteps upon ice filled the air as we dodged overturned carts laying in the middle of the path. After dodging the last cart, Ruby pointed out a couple of fur bedrolls and a pile of wood that looked like it would've been used for a campfire, but sat unscathed. Blake noticed a chest and opened it up. She came back holding a Ring of Minor Magicka, a Silver Ring and 35 Septims. I barely lifted my head, and I noticed a large amount of blood on the ice and on a camp, much like the one we stood at. It couldn't have been broken for very long because the blood still oozed on the ice and fell into our tracks as we walked past it.

"W-What happened h-here?" Ruby asked quietly, stuttering from shock. No one knew how to respond.

The trail of blood didn't stop there, so neither did we. We tip-toed down a steep slope, trying our best to not step too heavily in the blood that coats the ice. We reached a wooden platform, but the blood that was on it was different than the ones that led here, it seemed to have held a dead body recently. We were shocked to see all the blood, but with the opportunity to go home staring us in the face, we pushed on. Slowly, we began to recognize the type of ruin we went through in Remnant. As we reached a left turn, we saw a broken pipe hung on the ceiling. Water poured out of the large fissure in the pipe, causing a puddle to form on the flat part of the walkway. The water slid down the slope of the walkway, turning at the various pillars and stopping when it flattened out again. Blake led us down the slope, walking parallel to the water that slid down the slope. Once at the bottom, we noticed one of the Spider-Bots that attacked Jaune. Speaking of which, where is Team JNPR? I refocus on the Spider-Bot and see that it is recently broken because steam still unfurls off the sparking wires. I was pulled from staring by Ruby screaming and a loud smashing sound. Apparently, a different Spider-Bot snuck up on us and pulled on Ruby's cape.

By the time I saw what the loud smashing sound was, Crescent Rose was held in the air above a large broken part in the flooring, which I assume is where the noise came from. Ruby swung Crescent Rose , but at the same time the Spider-Bot leapt up and attacked her, deftly avoiding a most gruesome end from the force of a surprised Ruby. Ruby jumped out of her skin when the Spider-Bot dodged the attack, so the Spider-Bot missed Ruby. It was a Cat-and-Mouse between Ruby and the robot.

Weiss glyphed over and had a swipe at the bot, but it did no more than dent the armor. Blake ran over and tried to coax it towards Ruby to get smashed. It instead leapt at Weiss, who promptly screamed in surprise. Weiss tried to use her Dust abilities on her rapier, but was too shaky to hit the bot correctly. I'd like to say that I was helping in all of this, but I was really laughing so hard my stomach hurts only a few feet away.

Finally, after what seemed to be an eternity, Blake coaxed the Spider-Bot over to Ruby, who smashed it gratefully.

"On the bright side killing it didn't take three days!" I sarcastically say with a upbeat tone.

"Shut up." Blake responded.

"All this ice is m-making me cold." Weiss said, hugging herself to stop her from shivering.

"Two things. One, you're the Ice Queen, how could you get cold? Two, we were talking about your bullocks job taking care of the Spider-Bot." I tease her.

"She changed the conversation to make herself look stupid. I can get used to that!" Blake joked.

Even Ruby laughed at her.

"We have a ruin to get through." Weiss told us as her voice cracked from anger and embarrassment.

We walked single-file through the next area from lack of space. Blake led, Ruby took up second in-line, I followed Ruby (like a good sister should) and Weiss followed behind me, fuming from our comments. We reached an open room, which had a worktable and another bloody campsite. Was someone on their period or something?

We split up. Blake ran over to a gated area that seemed to hold something important which lay on the far side of the room. Weiss stood over the worktable, with dissected Spider-bots, and read some dude's journal that was on the table. I found a bedroll that wasn't covered in blood and layed down on it. I carried them up until here, I deserve a break. Ruby spotted a tunnel which went to God-knows-where and looked around to see what was inside. As soon as Ruby entered the tunnel, she ran back and ran to me.

"Th-There-were-two-d-dead-people-in-the-other-room." Ruby stuttered as she spoke extremely fast.

"Hold on. What was in the other room?" I asked her, holding my hands up to show her to slow down her words.

"Dead… cat-people." Ruby said, slowly.

I waved over Blake and Weiss.

"Let's go check this out." I told them, walking over to where Ruby just came from.

I lead them towards the tunnel tentatively. I peeked around the corner of the entrance and nearly vomited. The sight of two dead cat-people lying in pools of their own blood got to me, somehow. It was nauseating.

I turn to everyone. "Yup. There's two dead people." I calmly say, or as calmly as I could sound. Ruby nodded solemnly in response.

"I want to see." Weiss said, clearly not trusting Ruby's or I's words.

She went in and returned immediately.

"I don't see why you need to make a fuss about it." She told us, with her usual Holier-Than-Thou attitude.

"Well, if there's dead people-" Blake was cut off by Weiss.

"They're called "Khajiits". Weiss corrected Blake.

"The dead people are Khajiits?" Blake asked, leaning over to try and see in.

"Clearly." Weiss sasses Blake.

"Whatever, Weiss. Well, let's keep moving." Blake told us, walking into tunnel.

We follow after her. I tried to obscure Ruby's view of the corpses. I never once smelt decay, that means they weren't dead long.

We stepped over the bodies of the two dead Khajiits and continued on down the tunnel. I heard Ruby apologize to the both of them for their being dead. Only a few feet from the dead people lay a table with a broken Spider-Bot and a journal. We walked past it, but Weiss snatched up the journal and tucked it in her purse, or wherever she holds her stuff. We saw a set of stairs leading up to a circular platform and had a light in the center. Once we walked up the stairs, I realized it had something else on it. It had two broken robots that had a sword attached to one hand and circular base. Huh. A robot that has a circle on a circular platform.

"Good thing we didn't have to fight those things." Blake comments as she crouched next to a robot.

"Yeah, no kidding. We'd have had a hard time fighting those." Ruby agrees.

"It just occured to me. Do you guys know why there are dead things everywhere?" I asked them, thoughts flaring in search of an answer.

"I would assume it's because the Dragonborn is ahead of us." Weiss replies, inspecting a nearby piston that releases a burst of steam with each thrust.

"That's convenient. Just follow the dead things." Ruby comments bitterly.

"Do you think the Dragonborn killed the two Khajiits?" Blake asked us all.

"Maybe. He's at least few hours ahead of us, and the bodies weren't decaying yet." I reply.

"Well, it is also cold. That could delay the decaying process." Ruby told us.

"One of them did seem to be fresher than the other." Weiss chimes in from the other side of the room.

"That could explain it. But for now we have to catch up to the Dragonborn." I tell everyone.

After reaching the other side of the platform, I noticed a large pile of rubble lying near an arched entranceway to my right. On the left, was a table with trinkets on it and pistons firing off behind it. In front of it was a single piston, which Weiss was inspecting. The piston rocketed out of the ground in a burst of steam and shot back down almost immediately after extending, and vice-versa. We went down the only path further in, and I noticed a carpet lining the path. It was red with gold accenting lines criss-crossing on the material. It was intact in some places, and decayed in others. We walk through without any problems and ended up in a room full of rubble.

"What's with all this stuff here?" I asked the room.

"Hey, there's some broken Dwarven Spiders." Blake called out, pointing towards a broken robot.

"There's a forge…" Ruby said from the corner of the room.

"Is it lit?" I ask her, turning and seeing a burning forge.

"Yes it is." Ruby replied, lighting small sticks on fire.

"Why would there be a forge in a place like this?" Weiss asked hotly.

"Well, people needed stuff to forge obviously." Ruby answered her.

"But how is it still burning?" Weiss asked as if she had Ruby in checkmate.

"The people who built this probably were far more advanced than Remnant, it only follows that they could have something burn indefinitely." Ruby explained.

I tuned out as soon as Weiss stopped making sense in her arguments. I instead checked out the broken Spider-Bots that Blake pointed out. After I saw numerous dents and scratches, I concluded that it was broken by a sword and shield. I turned my attention to a locked gate on the other side of the room. On the inside it had a couple weird looking pipes that seemed to open and vent out steam on the top. On the right side of the room had a rack with cups and plates. I don't think that a vent and a dining set would fetch a decent amount of money at a shop. I left it there, intact, because I would lose money breaking in and taking everything.

I brought everyone together and talked to them about what we should so with the gated room.

"So, do we want to get into the gated room or keep going?" I asked them.

"Is there anything worth getting in the gated room?" Blake asked me.

"Not really." I reply.

"The amount of good stuff in that room is the same amount of chance that the people who built this place were smart." Weiss pompously said, glancing at Ruby to show it was pointed at her.

"Shut up, Weiss, I'm trying to get home." Ruby shot back.

I cleared my throat. "So any objection of continuing on?" I asked them.

Blake and Ruby shook their heads and Weiss just looked like she was thinking of a way to outwit Ruby about the forge.

We walked through the door and saw a large set of stairs with pillars that had faces carved in them. Once we reached the top, we noticed a large brass gate and a slightly raised platform with another one of the vents on it. It sat casually behind a pressure plate. This obviously isn't something we should mess with. I ignored the vent and ushered everyone down the path.

"Hey, check out the cool pistons over us!" Ruby exclaimed, pointing excitedly to the pistons moving back and forth.

"There's a gate on the sides that I can see down into." Blake says, leaning over and looking into the gates.

"This is one weird place." I comment.

At the end of the path was a set of stars which led to a fork. To the left was an open door and a pipe, to the right was a table with trinkets on it. In front of me was a step with a section of flooring at the same height. Two pillars stood at the two back corners. They had the same face carved into them as the last few had. Must either be their leader or their god. Or both. Next to the pillars were rack with more dining set materials and a few cogs. They weren't worth much either, so I ignored them. Blake walked over to the table on the right and stopped when she noticed a broken Spider-Bot. She stood by the table and I saw a plate, a gyro-thing, and a vent. Blake grabbed something on the table that I didn't noticed and walked away from the table. She walked over to Ruby and put it in her hands with a mocking "To add to your collection".

"Alright, let's head through the only door." I told everyone, motioning to the left.

We went over to the door and turned right. I looked down to the left and noticed the room that we went through with the Circle-Bots. We walked along and dodged pistons pumping across the pathway. At the end of the side of the room, there was a broken Spider-Bot. Thank Talos for the Dragonborn; he's doing all the hard work for us! We turned left at the end and dodged the pistons much like we did the first ones. We found another dead Spider-Bot. This isn't clearing, this is slaughter. We turned left and walked down the path that was, happily, piston free. It ended with a pipe blocking the edge. There was a door on the wall that had been written on in an odd language. Blake and I tried to read what it said. We must've been reading longer than we thought we were.

"Oh come on. This isn't some extremely complex thing! I'm bored! Let's keep going." Weiss complained.

"We are trying our best!" I snap at her.

"I have an idea. Weiss, how about you try to read it?" Blake says, anger dripping from her voice.

Weiss walked up to the door, looked at it briefly and opened it. She walked through right after it was open.

"Well, come on then." Weiss said from the other side of the threshold.

Alftand Animonculory

Upon walking in, I noticed that above the walkway, with the stone in the center and gates on either side, a piston pumped back and forth, like in the rooms prior to this one. Three gears turned above the door and another set of three rotating not too far from the door on the left side of the hallway. Steam hung quietly over the gates that lined the pathway, giving an already mechanized room seem more like a workshop. Only twenty or so feet from the door are two hallways that cut off from the center one. The one on the right was collapsed, so we couldn't go through it. The left room, however, was a bedroom. A bed with a pelt blanket and a stone base sat on the left side of the room. On the right a large section of rubble claimed numerous feet of space. In the central section of the far wall were two stone tables. Man, these dwarves love stone. A vent sat in between the two tables, making the room seem very carefully planned out, save the pile of rubble in the right corner. The tables were covered in a conglomeration of items. On the left table sat a large section of metal, brass colored, the seemed to be like those in the robots and architecture in these ruins, and in others; there was also a brass gear, with a fair number of teeth on them, much like the gears we saw in the foyer of this section of the ruins; the last item, and the most confusing of them all, was a shield, center-grip, that seemed to be made of the shell of a crustacean, under the handle was a bunch of ribs that looked like the gills of a fish. I quickly looked over to the other table to survey what was on it. A helm laid on the table. It looked similar to the shield on the other, but the shield was like a claw, and the helm was the face. Very weird. The dwarves loves stone and crustacean-esque armor. Ignoring the extremely odd armor on the table, I checked out the three other items on the table. Behind the helm, sat a section of rounded metal, brass in color, that held an uncanny resemblance to the rounded sections of metal on the Circle-Bots. Maybe they are the same kind of part. Near the helm were another rounded section of metal, but it was smaller and dented. There was also a lever made of brass. Not too impressive, but it looked like it could get the job done.

"So… Any ideas on what the shell armor is?" Ruby asked, scrutinizing the shield.

"Maybe it's the types of armor that the Dwemer used." Blake speculated.

"I don't know. All the dwarven stuff that we've seen thus far have been made of brass." I commented in response to Blake.

"Maybe they liked brass for their architecture and mechanisms, but didn't like it for armor." Blake put forth.

"You're all wrong. Dwarven armor is made of brass. This is from some kind of creature that inhabits this ruin." Weiss scoffed from the doorway.

"Whatever, Weiss." I reply to Weiss with an undertone of anger, seeing as she ended a constructive conversation.

We headed down the path in silence, mainly because we didn't want to be insulted by Weiss again. The doors at the end of the hallway sat open and inviting to the room behind them. We all walked in and looked around. There was nothing special in the room, in my opinion. When Ruby walked in, she froze like a deer in headlights. I looked at her to see what she was staring at, but before I could fixate on what it was she saw, she dragged me over to it. The gates on this side of the room had an opening in them that would allow someone to walk through them. Ruby pulled me through the gap and I instantly saw what she was staring at before. A puddle of blood clung to the floor and ran slowly in the small gaps. The blood led to the left, so that's where I was dragged. Ruby's face of fear never left for one second as I was pulled through puddles of blood and knocked into pipes that ran vertically. Once we reached the far end of the tunnel, for lack of better words, we turned left and saw a man in a rugged and dirty tunic lying next to a vent. Near his right hand was a journal, probably his, a piece of charcoal and two lockpicks. I walked over and crouched next to him and grabbed the lockpicks and brushed off the charcoal to read the contents of his journal. I glanced back at Ruby and saw a face of pure horror. I looked closer at Ruby and saw that her hands grabbed the opposite arm like one would hold themselves when they are cold, but I knew that this wasn't the case here. I looked back at the journal to see how he died and maybe bring comfort to Ruby.

"The eyeless creatures took us in our sleep. I don't know what happened to the Khajiit brothers, we never saw them in the cell. I managed to pick the lock and we made a break for it, but got split up. Sulla yelled something about not leaving without finding what he came here for and Umana chased after him.

Yag and I tried for the top of the cave shaft, but one of the ramps was broken. Without a hesitation, she grabbed me by the scruff of my tunic, threw me atop the ledge and told me to run.

And I did.

I didn't even look back.

I just ran like a coward.

I could hear her fighting them and I just had to get away. I didn't even notice the arrow in my shoulder till I hid here.

Those metal creatures are still all around me and I'm too terrified to even move.

Eight Divines, please just take me now."

I felt myself shaking as I put the journal down. I slowly turned my head to his dead body and, sure enough, there was an arrow with something other than blood dripping off of it. I stood up and walked over to Ruby pulling her into a hug.

"It's alright. He's in a better place now." I murmured to her.

"Now come on, let's head back to the group." I told her, breaking the hug.

As we walked back, I mentioned to Ruby the fact that there was going to be a dead orc girl somewhere beyond this point. She nodded and looked like she was preparing herself for the coming dead person.

"So, what did you guys see?" Blake asked jokingly.

"A lot of things, the most important of which is a journal that mentioned a blind race of creatures that are intelligent and accurate with a bow and arrow." I dodged the mention of the dead dude.

"So if we are going to fight these blind creatures, then we are going to have to come up with a plan for fighting them." Blake responds, moving past why there was a journal with this information in there.

"Maybe I can use my glyphs to distract them while one of you closes in and fights it." Weiss offers.

"That might work, but what if they hear us coming? They're blind, so obviously their other senses are going to be sharpened." I replied.

"We'll cross that bridge when we come to it. Plus, If it turns on whoever is attacking it, then I can glyph over and stab their back." Weiss explains.

"Alright, good plan. But we have to encounter them if these plans are to work, and that means that we have to move forward from here in order to do so." I told them. Everyone nodded.

We started to head out and I noticed a broken Spider-Bot, but it's dead, so we didn't need to worry about it. We headed up the stairs and a broken Circle-Bot was not too far from a pipe protruding from the wall. Again, it's dead so we didn't need to worry about it. On the left side of the room, there were gates which separated apparent work stations. On the tables in the work stations, there were parts and pieces of the robots on them. One thing that was out of the ordinary around this area were the black mounds of stuff with blue eggs on them. Blake walked over and crouched next to one of the piles.

"I don't think these are a plant, nor are they any kind of egg that I have ever seen." Blake said as she stared at them.

"I don't know either. But at this point, if it doesn't directly affect us, then it isn't any of my concern." I replied, trying to force us along.

"She's right. The Dragonborn could already have the Elder Scroll and if not then he is very close. We shouldn't waste time staring at the odd things that we find." Ruby agreed.

We walked past the eggs and in between the pipes and the gate. Once we cleared the gate, there was a ramp heading up to the next area with stairs on the parts next to the wall. The most notable thing about the ramps were the pressure plates that were on either side of a raised section of stone. Clearly, the pressure plates did something, I just didn't know what. We all hugged the wall to avoid finding out what the pressure plates did.

The next area was surrounded on either side by gate. On the bright side, it showed us where we were going.

"These gates are making me claustrophobic. I'm used to large rooms." Weiss complained.

"Yeah, the large rooms in the mansion, paid for from the money stolen from the Faunus." Blake shot at her. Weiss opened her mouth to argue, but I jumped in right before she said anything.

"Shut up, both of you."

We turned when the gates turned and we noticed that it opened up to fresh air. We walked out and looked all around. We were standing on a platform that was suspended over a large cylinder shaped hole in the ground. The only thing that we could do was follow the platform. It didn't go too far, just over to a doorway that was collapsed beyond the first few feet. I quickly glanced at the broken Spider-Bot lying amongst the rubble. The walkway spiraled and finally straightened out around a door and a ledge. Blake checked out the door and told us about broken lockpicks around it. I leaned over the ledge and saw the dead orc girl that was mentioned in the journal. I quickly told Ruby that this is where the orc girl is. She nodded and seemed to be in more control now that she knew about the dead person. We all glanced at each other and readied ourselves to jump down. There were no other options. It was jump down, or don't go home. I looked at everyone and then looked at the platform below us. I swallowed in nervousness, but it didn't calm me down at all. Now or never. My feet left the ledge and the platform came hurdling towards me.

My feet landed in a small puddle of blood, covering my legs in small blood droplets. I didn't even need to look up to know that it was the blood from the dead Orc girl. To my right, near a large pile of rubble, not the one I was standing on, the parts from a Spider-Bot were scattered with arrows, much like the one in the shoulder of Endrast, lodged in the upper part of the main section of it. Around the corner from the Spider-Bot was a dead thing. I had no idea what it was, but I didn't have time to look closely at it because everyone else had leapt down.

Weiss and Blake stared at the dead orc girl and were whispering questions about who she was and why she was there to each other. Ruby stood near the wall that had the ledge taking deep breaths to calm her down. She may have been warned about her, but she clearly was still affected by it.

"You doing alright, kiddo?" I asked her after I walked over to her.

"Much better than if I wasn't warned about it." She told me without looking up. "Thanks for doing that." She said quickly after a short pause.

"Hey, it's what I do." I told her enthusiastically, patting her on the back. She smiled in response. I walked back to Weiss and Blake and told them that we needed to keep moving. I motioned for Ruby to join us and she pushed off the wall and walked over to us.

Weiss was the first one on the platform and said in extreme confusion and distaste "What is that?!"

I jogged over to where she was so that I could see what she was looking at. She was standing over the creature from before with her mouth open in shock and her eyes glaring in disgust. The creature lay with its knees against its chest, its hands in awkward positions. The left hand clutched a bow which had green circles in the riser that made the upper and lower limbs look like small crustaceans. In the center of the upper limb was a section of string that was wrapped in such a fashion that the string crossed in the center of the wrap. The hand that grasped the bow was pale gray and had long, sharp nails. The skin was almost opaque due to its paleness. The pale gray color went throughout the creature, with the exception of where the eyes should be and the knees. The eyes, or the lack thereof, were red-pink on the skin. The wrinkles which were there made it seem like the eyes were removed at one point in its life. The ears were pointed, much like an elf, and went out from the head so that you would see the full shape of them if you looked it straightforward. The nose had nostrils that were long and thin. The nose was flat to the point that it looked like it didn't have a nose at all. The body wasn't overly muscular, but it looked like it could get the job done. Green veins were visible through skin. It had green cloth over its genitalia. Thank Talos. It had bracers and a jockstrap made of the crustacean material. On the thighs had a string-like material wrapped around it that made it look similar to the bow that was clutched in its cold, dead hand. It had slashes across its chest in an X that were clearly what killed it. Upon further inspection, it also had smaller scratches on its shins, which probably came from the Spider-Bot. I was done with looking at a dead body, so I looked around at the scenery while everyone one else gawked at it.

"I think it's the 'eyeless creatures' that were mentioned in that one journal." Ruby commented from her position around the dead creature.

"Journal?" Weiss perked up at its mention.

"It was a journal written by a dead friend of the dead woman over there." I replied, pointing towards the orc girl.

Blake nodded.

"Do you still have it?" Weiss asked, almost happily.

"Nope." I told her, showing her my journal-less pack.

Weiss looked at me incredulously.

"You didn't save it for me?!" She asked, furious at my lack of the journal.

"I noticed your habit of taking journals, but no, Weiss, I didn't save it for you." I said, almost as cold as her reputation is.

"Well, you should've saved it for me." Weiss said loftily.

"Weiss, shut up." Ruby told her. Weiss opened her mouth to speak, but Ruby cut her off. "I said 'shut up'." Weiss just glared angrily at Ruby. I smiled at Ruby and gave her a thumbs up while Weiss' back was turned to me.

"Well, that Elder Scroll isn't just going to wait patiently for us." Blake said during the long pause after Ruby spoke.

We continued down that paths that hung in the air like morning fog as it spiraled around the central pillar. Not too far down the path was a piston which was extended across the path, leaving a small gap near the edge that was big enough for only one person to walk through. Blake and Ruby walked through the gap and by the time that Ruby passed through, the piston retracted. Weiss and I then rejoined our group on the path. We walked only a few feet down the path before it flattened out. Water fell from high above the platform from a broken pipe and crashed onto the path with, seemingly, tremendous force. Weiss walked through the downpour, as did I. Ruby dashed through it and shivered a little when she made it to the other side of the water. Blake however stood still, almost as if she was petrified on the spot.

"I-I'm n-not going th-through that." Blake stutters.

I laughed so hard I nearly fell off the platform. Blake stiffened even more when she heard me laugh.

Blake solved her problem by shimmying along the wall and trying to not get wet. It worked more than walking through the water. She meowed when the water started dripping on her shoulders and splashing up on her legs. She threw herself past the last section of water and looked slightly proud of herself for forcing herself through that ordeal.

Weiss and I gave her a slow, sarcastic clap that made her look upset. Ruby on the other hand clapped genuinely paired with a face of awe and a smile. That only served to make her look more uncomfortable.

We noticed blue-grey panels lining the path as well as a three claw trap that was already sprung. The claws looks shockingly similar to the bow of the eyeless creature. Speak of the devil. In between the panels and the pipe on the wall, were two dead eyeless creatures, slashes sprinkled across their chests. We stepped over their bodies and continued down the path. Within a couple seconds walk, we found a doorway with a flame shooting down from the top of the doorway.

"So… How are we going to get around that?" Ruby asked.

As soon as Ruby asked, the fire stopped. We all looked at each other and decided to just walk through it while we could. I was the last one through and I felt the heat from the fire as it turned on right after I walked through. At the end of the room that we entered was a weird thing that was open at the top and made of the same material as the panels up on the platform we just passed. I decided to ignore it for now and kept walking. On the left were three workstations, separated by a gate, covered in miscellaneous tools and materials. We walked closer to the weird thing and saw that it was a hut. Blake and I quickly walked down the stairs to check it out, but were stopped by a dead body of an eyeless creature. We ignored it and peered into the hut. There was a single bag like thing in the hut. Ruby called out and told us about another dead eyeless creature by another hut.

"The other hut was weirder." Blake said as we walked over to the other one.

"As if." Weiss scoffed.

It had another weird bag on the outside of it but with hay on the inside. A dead eyeless creature lay outside the opening, cut down where it stood.

As we walked around the next room, a very large, very dead, rat sat in the threshold.

"So, are we just going to ignore this giant rat?" Ruby asked, slightly creeped out by it.

Blake was unphased, Weiss was skittish when she saw it. Me? I kicked it across the room and laughed as it bounced on the gate in front of us and landed in the room ahead.

"Aaaand there it goes." Ruby comments.

We continued down the antechamber, if you could call it that, and turned left to see a set of stairs. At the bottom of them were a couple eyeless creatures, who had some burn marks on them, and a hut in the corner of the opposite wall. How'd they get burnt? Almost as if in answer to my question, fire shot out of the pipe to the left of the stairs. As well as a second pipe at the center of the room. We found a small route, adorned by a couple bones on a string hanging down on it. Around the corner was a hut along with a large fire and an anvil. I quickly turned my head and glared at Weiss. We all didn't want another argument.

"Why are all of these sections of armor and mechanisms still in pristine condition?" Weiss asked, pointing to the rack full of miscellaneous things.

"Well, the Dwarves were, and are, known for superior craftsmanship." Blake comments.

"Ugh, why are we just standing around while we have to keep moving?" Weiss asked. We all tried to contain our laughter at her lousy excuse for a brush off of Blake's comment.

We walked into the next room, which was very cramped. A set of stairs on our left led to an isolated area above us, so we took the stairs in front of us down into the room beyond. The metallic smell of blood hit my nose. We all looked at each other with a grimace, showing our distaste towards the smell of blood which filled this room. At the bottom of the stairs was a room to the right which, in the center of a massive pool of blood, was a lever. We ignored the room and turned left. After seeing what was in it, my hand shot up to cover Ruby's eyes. It didn't work. She was the first one to turn. She has seen the blood, the dead woman in shackles, her skin and muscles piled next to her dead body, and the numerous dead eyeless creatures. Not to mention the spare torture device. What was this room even for?

"C'mon, guys, let's get out of this room." I say, my voice shattering the silence which hung over the room.

At the door out, there was a dead eyeless creature. Thank Talos for the ledge on the platform, or else these things would be everywhere on the upper levels.

We walked down the path, but noticed that in the courtyard below us were two dead eyeless creature and a very large Frostbite Spider. Once we got close to the stairs that led to the courtyard, we were greeted by the dead body of an eyeless creature.

"What's with all the dead stuff?" I asked everyone.

"I don't know and I don't like it." Ruby replied quietly.

"I agree with Ruby." Blake said, staring at the dead things in the courtyard.

We entered the only open, and standing, door in the courtyard. We followed the path, which lead to a set of stairs, no traps Thank Talos, but there was a sprung trap in the room beyond the stairs. It was like the trap that was on the upper levels. But the door beyond was much more interesting. It was exactly like the door that led us to here, except the words on it were slightly different. I walked up to attempt to read it, but was cut off.

"I am not dealing with this again." Weiss said as she threw open the door, causing the rest of us to follow after her.

Alftand Cathedral

The room we entered was vastly different than the one before it. The last one was surrounded by stuff; cobwebs, pillars, gates, faces made of stone and mechanisms. This room just had a collapsed gate, which seemed to have closed off a room with two chairs in it, and a walkway with pressure plates on it. The one with the broken gate was closed off on all sides except the broken gate, so we walked around the pressure plates and into a very large area. Before reaching the large area I kicked a torch which was near a dead eyeless creature. I ignored it and continued on.

Dust fell from the roof lightly, almost like snow. There was a large building in the center of the cavern which had a church-like feel. It had a single tower that overlooked the entirety of the area before it, like a hawk perched on the top of the tallest tree in the forest. One story below the top of the building was a section of wall which had numerous buildings inside it, but they all stayed at the same height. To the right of the main tower was a tower, but it continued into the roof and had pipes along its side. It is probably a ventilation shaft. This was surrounded by a wall, stopping only for a gate, which was open, as it continued around the complex in silent defiance to all potential attackers on the building. But with the gate open wide, it was like the wall was missing a piece of armor. To the right of the wall were two smaller buildings, one collapsed and one standing, but with the inside collapsed. In front of the two building and closest to the wall was a hut like the ones that housed the eyeless creatures. Speak of the devil. Two dead eyeless creatures lay strewn on the ground around the wall, blood dripping from the wounds sustained by the person, or thing, that killed them. Not too far from the hut was a dead, normally sized Frostbite Spider I guess it's actually a baby, seeing as there are larger ones. To the left were two huts, one was fairly close to the gate and the other was tucked away next to a set of stairs which led to a raised platform above the walkway we entered from. Right in front of the gate was a small stone basin which probably held some kind of liquid at some point. Maybe since this was their church, this basin held their Holy Water. I couldn't be too certain, since the Dwarves were no longer around to answer my question.

We walked through the open entryway and saw the extravagant staircase that leads up to a courtyard that had two large robots standing at attention on each side. One still stood in place, the other was slashed and bent, it clearly was awake when the Dragonborn went through here because there were still sparks shooting out of it and oil still dripped out of the slashed parts.

"What is that thing?" Weiss asked, shocked by its size.

"A big robot." Blake replied. Ruby and I laughed.

"I know that, but what is it?" Weiss asked again.

"A big robot that was broken." Ruby replied. Blake winked at Ruby and I laughed again.

"Ugh! I just want to get through this place! Hurry it up!" Weiss shouted at us, storming off to the next room. We all laughed quietly as she stomped up the stairs

We caught up to Weiss once we reached the room at the top of the stairs and saw two dead people in front of a room with a lever, much like the one in the Torture Room from earlier. One of the dead was a male Nord with Imperial armor. Nothing ironic about that… The other was a Redguard woman who was dressed in regular clothes, but with an intimidating looking shield. They lay like they had fought against each other, but something was nagging in the back of my head that it said that maybe they didn't kill each other. We saw a spiraling set of stairs which led down into the ground. Because the other room probably was useless, we decided to go down. Once we reached the bottom, we saw a closed door with the weird language on it. Weiss didn't even think twice before shoving the doors open like she does it everyday.

"So we just have to find a large tower right?" I asked Blake while I stood at the door.

"Seems like it, yeah." She replied.

"Good, because I am getting a little tired of all this walking." I joke.

"Alright, let's go find Weiss." I tell them, heading through the door.


/AN: Hey guys! It's been quite the wait, but there's a reason behind that. My friends and I haven't had as much time recently to work on this, so therefor I haven't been able to upload anything to sate your appetites either. But, since today happens to be my birthday, I managed to get the day off of work and used this ti,me to bring you guys our longest chapter yet! Please enjoy and see you next time!