As we passed through the cave system, we began to hear Imperial voices: "Orders are to wait until General Tullius arrives."
"Imperials!" Harald gripped his warhammer and charged forward. Ralof drew his axes and followed with a grimace. Fuck! I thought to myself; This damned NPC will get us killed; we're outnumbered in this room!
As Harald headed through the door, he was immediately detected. "Stormcloaks!" Called out the Imperials.
The room was developed but was mostly a cave with a stream of water running through it. It would have been beautiful if arrows weren't flying.
Harald met an Imperial on the stone bridge over the stream and quickly smacked him away with his warhammer. As Ralof and I arrived, an Imperial Soldier in heavy armor and another in light armor came up the stairs to meet us. I let Flames greet them, and Ralof quickly took care of the rest. Two arrows flew from the two Imperials on the other side of the room, one missing all of us and the second dropping Harald like a sack of potatoes as it penetrated his head. Ralof rushed forward, moving between cover. Thinking quickly, I gave us some cover with spurts of Flames. It was far out of range but was meant to obscure vision. As we went up the stairs to get to the vantage point on the other side of the room, arrows flew over the ledge behind us. We reached the top and turned the corner, and Ralof charged toward the archer on the far right, which threw me off because I would have thought we would take out the closer one first. I paused, and for my pause, earned an arrow in the chest.
"OOOOOOOOOF," the arrow knocked the wind out of me and nearly knocked me over. My health bar reappeared with a severe dent in it. I looked down and was horrified to see an arrow shaft sticking out of my chest. I started to panic and thought of the vital organs it had hit and fell into a sitting position.
I would have likely earned a couple more arrows if not for the timely intervention of Ralof. Ralof had charged the Soldier on the right to throw him off, then threw an axe into his face. He then pivoted and sunk his other axe into the final Imperial Soldier. He pulled it out and let him collapse to the ground and turned back. Upon seeing me on the floor with an arrow in my chest, he hurried back over.
"Guy, you need to pull the arrow out and have a potion to speed the healing process," he started fumbling through his pouch. "Either that or some healing spell, do you know any?" Ralof produced a Potion of Minor Healing from the storeroom, and I weakly grasped the arrow shaft and tried to pull. It hurt like a bitch, so I stopped and started breathing heavily. I watched in horror as my health bar was steadily dropping from the bleeding.
Ralof gripped the shaft and pulled it out quickly, hurting a fuckton and making me scream in pain. He then put pressure on my chest and put the potion on my lips. It tasted worse than cough syrup, but I had no choice but to drink up.
My health bar filled a bit and stabilized. I still felt like shit, but at least the bleeding stopped, and I didn't have an arrow sticking out of my chest. Ralof pulled me to my feet, "How's that? Need any more?"
I stretched and winced at a still lingering pain in my chest. "I'll be fine; this was the hardest part," I said as I started walking toward the doorway to the next area. No longer in shock, I remembered I had the Healing spell and activated it with my hand on my chest. It felt warm and was soothing. My health bar filled slowly, and I let my magica fall as I healed up to full. I felt very refreshed, more than ever before. The discomfort from the rickety cart definitely felt like it should have taken some health points, I thought to myself.
Ralof passed me on the left and headed up the doorway steps leading to a tunnel with a raised drawbridge and a lever to activate it. There was a lit torch on the ground, and he took it, saying, "Well, let's see where this goes."
I stretched and pulled the lever, dropping the drawbridge. Light from outside flooded through from a small hole in the ceiling. We headed across just in the nick of time, as just as we passed by, Alduin flew overhead, the force of his flight shaking the ground and the keep again. It dislodged some stones from above the bridge, which fell behind us, destroying the bridge and blocking the way we came. We both braced and hoped it wouldn't affect the cave ceiling above us.
"No going back that way now, eh Ralof?" I mused, given I was pretty sure that was his line.
"I hope what you say about Ulfric finding another way out is true," Ralof scowled at the rubble. He turned and headed down the steps into the cave.
Feeling spry after healing up, I vaulted over the ledge into the cave. The drop was a bit more than expected, but not enough to do any damage. It was dark inside, with small pockets of sunlight coming in. There was another underground stream coming from a set of bars on the left. As we were about to leave, I remembered that there were some hidden goodies beyond those bars.
"Hold up, Ralof," I said as I headed to the bars.
"Where are you going?" he said, confused. "I'm pretty sure this is the way out."
"There should be some goodies over-" I stopped from the stench in the air. It was a bit dark, and the water was flowing past me. I lit up a flame in my hand and noticed the water wasn't exactly clean.
Continuing forward, I saw a pile of rotting bodies, likely of prisoners to this keep, and what definitely appeared to be poop. I covered my nose and mouth and hurried to grab the pouch of Septims and potion hidden there and rushed back out, trying even harder not to touch the water.
"What 'goodies' did you find?" Ralof chuckled. I scowled at him and shook the pouch in his face and passed him by, and headed into a tunnel where some much cleaner water flowed down.
We followed the water until the space was too small to continue and found a bend with a skeleton and another coin pouch. Ralof remarked the path ahead while I grabbed the Septims. "Well, let's try this way."
Not many steps past the corner, we quickly noticed spider webbing on the walls and ceiling, increasing density as we continued down the tunnel. I ignite my Flames in anticipation. I hate spiders.
"S-spiders," I stammered out to Ralof. He drew his axes, and we entered what appeared to be their lair. It was disgusting. Webs. Egg pouches. Creepy. Ew.
There were three small (but still way too giant) spiders crawling on the ground. As Ralof and I approached, three bigger ones almost as tall as us came down from holes in the ceiling. I nearly shit myself and did what any rational person would do.
I screamed, shut my eyes, and spewed out Flames at them until I ran out of magica.
After a while, I got a chuckle from Ralof, and I opened my eyes. The spiders were very crispy.
"I get it; I hate those damned things too. Too many eyes, you know?" Ralof put away his axes.
"And the legs...and the hair...and the mouths...and the size-WHY THE FUCK ARE THEY SO BIG?" I put my hands on my knees, breathing heavily.
Ralof chuckled in agreement and headed down the path leading away from the spider's lair. Not wanting to be left in there, I hurried after him.
We met back up with the water stream from before and headed across a landbridge that went over the little ravine it made. As soon as we turned the corner, Ralof stopped suddenly and pulled me to a crouching position.
"What the hell -?" I got out before he silenced me with his smelly, sweaty hand.
"Quiet!" he whispered. "There's a bear up ahead, see her? She's sleeping, so we don't have to tangle with her, and I'd rather not. Let's sneak on by."
I nodded in agreement. Compared to the nothing I was used to, this was far more fighting than I was comfortable with. The humans were hard enough to fight; that bear could easily slap the shit out of me. He removed his hand finally, and I tried in vain to spit out the still lingering stench and taste.
"I'll be right behind you," I said.
We began to sneak towards the source of light on the left. It was dark and hard to see. I stepped on something that crunched and stopped and slowly turned my head toward the bear.
Luckily it only stirred in its sleep. I really hope it's in a food coma right now, I thought. Full and sleepy.
We managed to get away from the bear and passed what appeared to be some skeletons of its victims.
We turned the corner and were met by the sun's light piercing into the exit of the cave. As a shut-in, I have never been happier to see the light of the Sun in my life.
Ralof ran to the exit, seemingly more excited than me. "That looks like the way out; I knew we'd make it!"
I let out a sigh and smiled as I raced into the warm beam of light. I actually made it out of Helgen.
I had completed UNBOUND.
