There was no time to think. In the second that Onmund saw the club coming down on them, he dove to his left, grabbing Danielle by the waist, practically tackling her and they both came down hard on the ground just beside where the Giant's club hit. They both then scrambled to their feet and took off running into the trees. Onmund could hear the footsteps of the Giant running after them, a rhythmic thunder-like boom as its feet pounded the ground. They came upon the foothills of the Velothi Mountains and Onmund shouted, "Get to higher ground!" He then stopped briefly to turn around and shoot his Chain Lightning in front of him. Even though he couldn't see where the Giant was amidst the thick trees and shrubs, he knew that the lightning would find its way to its target and stun it momentarily, giving both him and Danielle enough time to get far enough ahead. He then continued running on up the hill. Danielle was ahead of him, scrambling her way up the steep rocks. He began climbing the rocks, himself, and they climbed onto a large boulder and looked back down. The Giant tore through the trees and when it emerged, he and Danielle immediately unleashed their attack spells at it. It dropped its club and threw its hands up in front of its face, wailing in pain as the fire and lightning burned it.
Just then, Danielle screamed, "I'm all out of magicka!" She looked at her hands. "I must've used it all on the healing spell!"
Onmund stood there, not sure what to do. "Head on up the mountain!" he finally cried. "Find a place to hide!"
"What about you?" she questioned fearfully.
"I'll hold him back," he declared, now casting Sparks continuously towards the giant, which seemed to stun it. "Get yourself to safety!"
She hesitated for a bit, and it pained Onmund to see the look of worry in her eyes as she gave him one last look before obeying his command and getting out of there. Now alone with the Giant, he took a step back as it ran towards him. He unleashed another Lightning Bolt and watched as the Giant flailed its arms and lost its balance, falling backwards onto its butt.
Onmund hesitated, charging up his next spell should he need it. Is it dead yet? he wondered as he saw the Giant waver. Its head was hung-over, as if it were done. Onmund cautiously looked on as the Giant slowly got up to its feet, and then without warning, the Giant lunged forward with its arm to reach out and grab him. Onmund was swept off his feet as the Giant took a hold of his foot. He nearly let forth another Shock spell but stopped himself just in time because he realized that with the Giant touching him, any lightning that struck the Giant would also travel to his body, as well. In a panic, he dug his fingers into the ground and tried to kick his foot free, but the Giant had a strong grip on him. He then tried to see if he could perhaps wiggle his foot out of his boot when all of a sudden, a blast of fire flew over Onmund's head and hit the Giant in the face, burning it. Letting go of Onmund's foot, the Giant screamed and slapped at its own face, trying to put the fire out. Onmund took this opportunity to get back on his feet and shoot another Lightning Bolt at the creature. The Giant faltered, lost its footing, and fell facedown onto the ground. It didn't move after that. Onmund heaved a big sigh of relief and turned around to see where the fireball had come from. He lit up when he saw Danielle standing on a giant boulder just above him. She lifted up a hand and waved. Onmund smiled and waved back. Danielle…what would I do without her? He then saw her turn around and start making her way down to him. He dusted his robes off and watched her run down to him. Words couldn't describe what he felt then. She ran up to him, carrying a blue potion bottle in her hand. Onmund recognized it as a magicka-replenishing potion. "You might need this," she said to him with a smile.
He took it from her. "Thank you. Thank you for…everything." He gazed at her for a moment before removing the cork from the bottle and tilting his head back to drink. Immediately, he felt the power of magicka flow within him. She took the empty bottle from him and put it back into her satchel. "Did I…hurt you when I pushed you out of the way?" he decided to ask her.
Danielle shook her head. "No. And even if you did, I'm glad for it." She laughed, which made Onmund laugh, as well. "Thank you for saving me."
"Thank you for saving me!" he spoke back.
"So…we'd better find our way back onto the trail towards that Dwemer ruin," she said, changing her tone.
"Actually, we should be close to it from here," Onmund explained. "It's in the foothills just east of the Steamcrag Giant Camp. And I'm assuming that's where that Giant had come from, so we can't be too far off track."
They decided to wander south for a bit, and it turned out that that was where Mzulft was. Danielle was in absolute awe of the place. Onmund had never seen an actual Dwemer ruin in person but as he looked at the crumbling stone structures and massive golden piping coming out of them, the images in his books came to mind. But it was one thing to see it in a book and another to behold it in real life. They carefully made their way down from the rocky hill they were on into the flat area where the ruins stood. Onmund marveled at the architecture of this extinct race. The Dwemers were the most technologically advanced people in Tamriel and their disappearance was a great mystery. What they had left behind left so many more questions than answers.
"What's that hum?" Danielle asked.
"That must be all the machinery inside," Onmund responded. "The dwarves definitely had a fascination for mechanics." He then noticed the gilded door on the side of one of the great stone walls and lifted his finger to point. "There. There's the door that leads into the ruin. Let's look for those Synod mages."
They walked up to the door and pushed it open. They then stepped into the ruin and the hum grew much louder. There was also a constant clanking heard in the background. Danielle retracted in fear. "What's that?" she questioned.
"Again, just the sounds coming from these mechanical wonders," Onmund explained. "I'm amazed that all of this machinery is still…alive after all of these ages!"
Just then, they heard a cough, which made both of them jump. A voice spoke, "Crystal…gone..."
Danielle and Onmund saw the man at the same time. He was seated on the floor with his back up against the wall…and he did not look well. "Oh…sir!" Danielle exclaimed and ran up to him. Onmund followed. She crouched down in front of him, and he slowly brought his head up to meet her eyes. He was dressed in blue mage robes and was wearing a blue hood, as well. Onmund took it that he was one of the Synod mages.
"Find…Paratus…in Oculory…" the mage uttered.
"Wait! I can help you!" Danielle cried, and she began removing her gloves. But before she could begin another healing spell, the Synod mage lowered his head and his whole body fell limp.
"Sir! Sir!" Danielle cried, shaking him.
Onmund lowered his head. "He's dead."
Danielle stopped, looked down at the ground, and slowly put her gloves back on. She gave him a sad look as she stood up. "What could've happened to him?"
"I don't know," Onmund replied. "But we'd better keep our eyes peeled. There could be Falmer living in here."
Danielle's eyes widened in fear. In his rundown of Dwemer history to her, Onmund had also told her about the Falmer- the blind, subterranean race of elves that lived alongside the Dwemers in their time. The Dwemers, themselves, may have long since disappeared from their once-great cities but the Falmers still lived on, occupying these structures and becoming very hostile to outsiders. Onmund readied the spells in his hands and Danielle did the same.
"He said to find Paratus," Danielle said. "In the Oculory. What does that mean?"
"I don't know," Onmund responded. "Hopefully we'll soon find out. And hopefully this Paratus fellow has some information about the location of the Staff of Magnus."
They tried to go through another door, but it was locked. "Great," Onmund spoke wistfully. "I don't suppose this fellow has the key to get inside?"
Danielle went back and crouched down next to the dead mage. She reached behind his back and pulled out a brown satchel. She then opened it up and searched through it and pulled out a book.
"What's that?" Onmund asked, very curious.
"It looks like a…journal," she replied, opening it up. She then exclaimed, "A key!" and picked up the metal key that was on the inside of the cover. She handed it to Onmund, who then tried it on the door. The door opened.
"It works!" he exclaimed. He looked over at Danielle, who was flipping through the journal. "Find something interesting, there?"
Danielle shook her head. "It doesn't make any sense to me," she said. "Apparently, some man by the name of Gavros was supposed to deliver a crystal of some sort to the Oculory. This man here…" she gestured toward the body, "he mentioned something about a crystal, didn't he? He said it was gone or something."
"He did say something like that," Onmund agreed, putting a finger on his chin. "Who knows what it could be about? Let's take that with us. Come on."
Danielle put the journal into her satchel and followed Onmund through the now-opened door. The hum and clanking of the machinery were much louder in here. The whole building seemed to be noisy with life. Giant gears were turning and screeching. Steam shot out of some of the piping. "I've never seen anything like this before," she marveled.
"Fascinating, isn't it?" Onmund remarked. "And to think, with all of this knowledge the Dwemers had, they couldn't prevent their own sudden extinction."
Suddenly, Danielle frowned and pointed to something at the other end of the hallway. "What's that?" she asked.
Onmund looked, and he gasped. At the other end of the room, he saw something moving across the floor. If his memories of his books were correct, it was some kind of automaton that the Dwemers had built- a living creature made of moving metal. "That's an automaton," he said. "Uhhh, we should be ready to defend ourselves if it sees us…"
As if on cue, the automaton stopped, as if sensing their presence. It then began crawling right towards them! "Attack!" Onmund cried, and he and Danielle began charging up their spells and firing them at it. It didn't react at first, and as it crawled closer, he saw that it resembled a spider. It moved very fast, and before they could react, it jumped on Onmund, causing him to lose his balance and fall on his back. He immediately threw his hands up to fend off the creature, but its mechanical arms were very strong. Danielle was hitting it with a steady stream of Flames now, and before long, the creature fell still.
"Onmund, are you all right?!" Danielle cried, running up to him.
"Yeah, I'm all right," he replied, tossing the spider off of him and getting up. "Wow, those things are aggressive!"
"I know a spell that can give us some extra protection," she said. "Maybe I should cast it now."
"I think that's a good idea," he agreed. "What is it, anyway?"
"Oakflesh," she answered. "I'll cast it on myself and then on you." She then proceeded to cast Oakflesh on herself and then on him, which created an extra invisible layer of light armor on their bodies. They then continued on through the ruins, where they encountered more spider-like automatons. One of them started chasing after Danielle, who was becoming increasingly backed into a corner, and just as the spider jumped towards her, Onmund zapped it to pieces in the nick of the time while it was in midair. In another instance, a spider nearly trapped Onmund and it was Danielle who saved him.
"We make a great team!" Danielle remarked as they took down a few more automatons together.
"We sure do!" Onmund agreed.
They eventually found themselves in a cave system, and it was here that Onmund warned Danielle of brand new dangers. "This is definitely Falmer territory. Let's be on our guard."
As they made their way through the dark caverns, a spray of some kind of black liquid came shooting out of the darkness and nearly hit them. "Whoa!" Onmund cried out and he pushed Danielle out of the way. He then shot out his Chain Lightning, which zapped something in the darkness and killed it. Upon closer inspection, it was a Chaurus- a large, poisonous insect that lived alongside the Falmer in their caves. Danielle was disgusted.
"Be careful," he warned her. "We don't want to be bitten by one of these or come in contact with their black venom. It's very poisonous."
As they fought more Chaurus in the caves, they came upon two other Synod mages. They looked as if they had been dead for a while, and they were both covered in blood. As Danielle looked away frightfully, Onmund commented, "Those mages didn't come in here very prepared, did they?" They moved on. There was some old food in some crates nearby but the only objects of interest were a few healing potions and a scroll, which Danielle took with her.
As they continued on through a narrow cavern, all of a sudden, they heard and felt rumbling. As they glanced wildly about them, Onmund's eyes fell upon a wall that started collapsing. "Look out!" he shouted and grabbed Danielle by the shoulders before she could step into the path of the collapsing wall.
The wall ahead of them came crumbling down and very large pieces of rock fell everywhere. After it settled and everything grew quiet again, Onmund breathed a sigh of relief. "Whew! That was close."
"Thank you…again," Danielle said. "I must watch where I'm going next time."
"Good thing you have me, then, right?" he said, smiling.
Danielle rolled her eyes. "Iii suppose," she sighed.
Onmund gave her a surprised look at first, and then she laughed. "I'm just kidding. Of course I'm glad you're watching out for me." She then gave him a warm smile.
Onmund laughed, as well. Danielle can be such a tease, he knew. I need to be quicker on my feet when I'm with her. But she isn't mean about it. It's actually cute.
They carefully climbed over the boulders that fell from the wall and finally reached the other end of the caves and found themselves in another section of the dwarven ruins. In one of the rooms they walked into, they saw some strange-looking machinery lining one wall. Suddenly, one of these machines opened up and a boulder-sized golden sphere popped out of it, dropping to the ground. Onmund and Danielle were about to move closer to inspect it when it started transforming, causing both of them to jump back. It morphed into a taller and skinnier shape that then took the form of an upright creature carrying a sword of some kind and it began rolling towards them. "Automaton!" Onmund cried and started hurling Lightning Bolts at it. Danielle helped him take it down by throwing her fireballs at it. With that danger taken care of, they moved through more hallways where they encountered more of those spherical automatons. Onmund and Danielle were becoming very skilled at looking out for each other and attacking the automatons in a coordinated manner. Danielle would fire off a Firebolt while running backwards and then Onmund would hit their assailant with a Lightning Bolt, keeping a set distance between them. Danielle and Onmund would back off in opposite directions, so sometimes this would confuse their enemy as it tried to decide who to go after full force.
Between fending off the automatons and marveling at the Dwemer architecture and machinery, Onmund felt a strong sense of camaraderie with his mage partner, Danielle. He depended on her and she depended on him, and they were becoming an unstoppable duo. In spite of the danger involved, he began to actually have fun. He sensed that she was beginning to enjoy herself, as well, as they disabled another automaton. "Whew!" she uttered breathlessly. "I never thought the life of a mage would be this action-packed!"
Onmund smiled, beads of sweat forming on his brow. "This is fun, isn't it?" he asked.
"Oh, yes," she agreed enthusiastically.
"You're getting pretty good at those Firebolts," he complimented. He then added in a teasing tone, "Almost as good as me!"
Danielle opened her eyes wide at him, having never taken a jab like that from him before. She then bared her teeth viciously and gave him a playful shove. "You watch yourself, mage!" she threatened.
Onmund laughed and threw his hands up in defense. "I'm just joking! Just joking! You really are getting good with that spell, though."
"Well, thank you," she replied modestly. "You are becoming quite the skilled storm mage, as well."
"Really?" he asked humbly.
"Really."
"Aw, thank you."
They went on even deeper into the ruins, where they found another Synod mage's body. Onmund began getting worried. "I hope there are some survivors in here! Or else we're going to have great difficulty in finding that staff!"
As they entered another chamber, they came face to face with the dreaded underground elves. "Falmer!" Onmund cried, and he and Danielle took their positions.
Three Falmer nearly ambushed them and it took all of the mages' strength and wit to overcome them. Not only were the Falmer skilled in melee battle with their long, irregularly-shaped swords, but they also knew magic, casting frost spells on the two mages. Onmund and Danielle tried to keep the Falmer from surrounding them and succeeded, albeit barely. One of them tried to engage each mage individually in close combat, while the third shot them with arrows from afar. Thankfully, Danielle's Oakflesh spell was still active on him so when the Falmer's sword struck him, it didn't penetrate his robes. Once the two Falmer were exterminated, Danielle and Onmund made quick work of the third, as they were more comfortable with long-ranged attacks and it was easy since the Falmer was still in the far corner stupidly trying to take them down with arrows.
Onmund watched in amazement as Danielle took out a dagger and used it to slice one of the Falmer's ears off. She wrapped it in a cloth and put it in her satchel and she explained to him, "Falmer ears are a very valuable alchemy ingredient."
"You didn't tell me you were knowledgeable in Alchemy," he said.
"Not very," she replied. "But Dinya taught me a little bit."
"Oh," Onmund responded, remembering the name of one of her mentors in Riften. I learn something new about her everyday, it seems. "What is a Falmer ear used for?"
"It can be used to make a Resist Poison potion," she explained. "If you mix it with Garlic and…I think if I remember right, Mudcrab Chitin."
"Huh," he responded, his interest piqued. "That would come in handy against those Chaurus."
She nodded. "And many other creatures." She then approached another Falmer body, getting ready to cut its ear off, as well, when she gasped.
"What is it?" Onmund asked, concerned. He hurried over to her.
"Look!" she pointed to the floor next to the Falmer. "There's something here."
Onmund followed her finger to some of kind of round device sitting on the floor. It was about as large as his head, adorned with greenish, glassy circles, and had a thick, metal ring wrapped around it. "Yeah…what is that? The Falmer must've dropped it." He picked it up and noticed that it was kind of heavy. The sphere rotated within the ring, and he noticed that the greenish-colored glass along the surface of it caught the meager light that percolated into the room. Not only that, it seemed to reflect the light, as well. As Onmund slowly spun the sphere around, the greenish circles reflected the light off of them, shooting small, dim beams of light towards the walls and ceiling. "It's some kind of…light-focusing device."
"Focusing device…" Danielle repeated to herself. She then suddenly lit up. "The focusing crystal! That's it!"
Onmund gave her a confused look as she went on, "That's what the journal had mentioned! This must be the focusing crystal that that man had lost! The one that needs to be delivered to Paratus in the Oculory!"
Onmund gave her a wide-eyed look. "What in the world are they using this thing for?" he questioned.
"I don't know," she replied. "But let's take this with us. Maybe…if Paratus is looking for this thing, he will be so happy to receive it and…"
"Help us find the Staff of Magnus!" Onmund slowly finished simultaneously with her. With his mouth set, he snapped his fingers and stood up immediately. "By the gods, you're on to something there!"
She smiled and took the crystal from him. "See, it's a good thing you have me."
As he watched her empty out her satchel of empty potion bottles to make room for the crystal, he grinned and admitted, "I guess it is."
She laughed at his casual tone which mimicked her sarcastic one earlier when he had made a similar statement and they journeyed on.
They soon found themselves in another cave. This one was also riddled with Chaurus. They took care to avoid their venom as they sprayed it and to keep their distance but Onmund's Chain Lightning and Danielle's Flames made them easy work. At one point, they came upon a nest of Chaurus Eggs and Danielle collected a few.
"Alchemy ingredients?" he asked her.
Danielle nodded. "These can be used for a Fortify Stamina potion."
Onmund thought carefully and then said, "Do you think you could maybe…show me sometime? I mean, how to make potions? I'd like to learn."
"Absolutely," she answered, smiling. "There's an Alchemy Table in the Hall of Countenance at the College. I haven't used it myself yet, but I think it's available to everyone."
"That would be great!"
The two apprentices fought on. They were becoming quite the skilled Destruction mages as they obliterated automatons, Chaurus, and Falmer left and right. They were quite banged up by the time they reached the very nexus of the ruins but they were still in good spirits. They eventually came to another door that was locked.
"Damnit!" Onmund cursed. "And I didn't see any Synod mages, alive or dead, nearby."
"There was a corridor we passed earlier that we haven't gone down," Danielle pointed out.
"Right," he replied, glad for her good memory. "You think we can find a key in there? Let's go!"
They went back the other way and found the corridor that she had spoken of. They followed it into a room full of dead Falmer and automatons, which they searched thoroughly.
"I don't see a key anywhere here," Danielle said worriedly.
"Me neither," Onmund replied. He then remembered something he had noticed earlier in the back of the room. It was some kind of large dome-like object with elaborate designs on it- like a…vault of some sort. He walked back over to it, and he saw that there was a circular button on the top of it. He pushed it. To his surprise, the button depressed and a door on the top of it opened! He looked inside and lo and behold, there was a key! He reached in and lifted it out. "I think I've found it!" he exclaimed to Danielle, who was still examining one of the automatons.
She looked up and saw him holding the key up. She lit up and said, "Great! Let's hope it works."
They took it back to the locked door and tried it. It worked! The door opened and they went on through. It was a long hallway with another door at the end. Onmund hoped that this one was unlocked or the same key would at least work on it, too. They went up to the door and tried to open it. This one was locked, as well. Onmund pulled out the key and said, "I sure hope this one works."
Just then, they heard a sound on the other side of the door, which made both of them jump back in surprise. Then, there was a voice. "G…Gavros? Is that you?"
Danielle and Onmund looked at each other, surprised, as the voice went on. "I'd almost given up hope. Let me get the door."
Onmund was about to say something to the effect of, "Be on your guard," but Danielle was already charging up a fire spell. He did the same. They heard some clicking on the other side of the door and finally, it opened. There, in front of them, stood a mage dressed in blue robes like all of the dead ones they saw earlier.