Chapter 2: Choices — Ver. 3.0

I'm about to play the highest stakes version of dodgeball ever, and if I get hit, I will die a horribly painful death.

'The power Alduin used just now, Dragon Storm Call, lasts for about a minute, so for that time, I'll need to either find some cover or—'

SHIT! I dive to my left. Where I was standing is a fairly large crater, flaming with the heat of Alduin's breath — that is, pretty fuckin' hot. I sprint from the meteorite to the tower closest to me, but the entrance is blocked off with stone rubble from the rest of the tower. A charred arm sticks out from the rubble.

The meteorites have been falling for what should be half a minute by now, meaning this area will become as dangerous as an erupting volcano. My eyes keep focusing on Alduin, but I glance up every few seconds to make sure there weren't any other meteorites aiming at my death.

I see Alduin landing at the far side of Helgen, on the roof of a building, where a dozen or so soldiers ran up to attempt to put up a defensive fight against Alduin.

Alduin, of course, simply breathes a golden red blaze into a cloud of arrows they shoot at him. The iron and steel arrows they've fired at him melt and burn to nothing as they disappear in a flash. This fazes the soldiers a little as they form a shield wall. They look like they're little more than Viking warriors in a C-rated movie.

Alduin opens his mouth and something I didn't think I'd hear comes out:

"Hin sil fen nahkip bahloki."

Having played Skyrim for a long time, I've heard those words a few times before. After all, I'd hear it over the course of far more than forty playthroughs, so I'd want to know what it meant, but it was so much more metal than I thought when I looked it up: "Your soul will feed my hunger."

My jaw drops because as Alduin finishes saying that, he torches them with his fire breath before crawling down from the building, and walking over their smoking remains to kill more people. That is one mighty display of power. One that from an objective point of view might even seem cool.

I'm nearly in awe. This slaughter is only getting worse. As far as I remember, there were supposed to be a rough number of 40 or so people that die here at Helgen, based on the number of bodies that were scattered around after returning. From my view on the way here, there were dozens to hundreds of houses. The way this already looking, Alduin is going to destroy this entire town. Or rather, kill all the people inside. Unfortunate, but as long as I survive…

My legs freeze up as I realize that I don't really care about these people. Whatever it was, some innate switch had flipped inside me earlier. I'm not even sympathetic. I used to think that I'd become pretty desensitized to death having had family members die as the years passed, but this… This is completely different.

I feel absolutely nothing for these people. I can't place why. If this were the real world of my home, I'd probably be puking, retching, or even paralyzed still, at the thought of this slaughter. The amount of gore, violence, and death I'm currently seeing is making this far beyond "just a game".

Another squad of soldiers run forward and try to distract Alduin from killing more villagers by shooting arrows at Alduin. They scream at him, and they finally take his attention.

'Idiots. He's a goddamn dragon! All of you will die, and for people with whom you have no connection!' My thoughts once again took hold of my body. My body's no longer frozen, but since Alduin is far enough away that I won't need to worry about him attacking me, I focus my attention back to the meteors with great willpower. It's lucky I do so, because another was hurtling towards me.

I almost get hit by it, only managing to dodge it by diving into a really rough roll. Rocks pierce my back and arms as I roll away. I get to my feet, shaking the pain off and picking out some pebbles that are poking into my skin.

General Tullius is screaming stuff at his soldiers when I was dragon-watching, but it hits me that Ralof is yelling at me, suddenly in my face and shocking me back to reality.

He grabs my shoulders, and shakes me yelling, "Hey, man! Get moving! The gods won't give us another chance!"

The (mostly) scripted scenes are in action again, in my favor this time. If I'm with Hadvar, I won't die. Probably.

We run over to the tower to the right of the tavern, where a couple guards were horribly injured. They had third-degree burns, looking like overcooked meat, their armor or weapons melted directly to their flesh. Hadvar says something to them, but we continue on. We run up and around the inside of the tower to the second floor.

Ralof almost continues up the third, but I pull him back, next to the center brick frame for cover.

Just then, Alduin busts through the tower, shoves his head inside but doesn't see us, and proceeds to breathe fire on the injured soldiers from downstairs, and leaves, pushing off the tower. 'F for those guys. They didn't deserve that.'

The hole he left in the tower is just as I remember, albeit the dust from the rubble is somewhat difficult to breathe in.

"See that building down there? Jump down, and I'll make it down over there, after you!" Ralof yells at me. He then points to Helgen's keep.

I see the tavern with the broken roof right where it used to be in the game, and back up a few steps. I'm going to actually try and land this jump.

I run forward, jumping off the tower, using a large ruined brick as a ledge to push off of, and glide into the building.

I scrunch up my body, trying to center my mass, and roll when I land, but that doesn't work. Not perfectly, anyways. Let me rephrase, it doesn't work at all. I land on my arms and legs at the same time. Slamming into the ground at the speed I did hurt, much more than it probably looked. It seems I didn't invest enough time into parkour when I was on Earth.

At least, I shouldn't have to fear the meteors while I'm in here. Alduin's meteor shower should have ended by now. The lack of the sound of meteorites falling to the ground confirms my suspicions. I hear Alduin flying around and killing helpless soldiers, but I couldn't do anything for a solid minute. I pick myself up, and check my body.

Nothing's broken or sprained, luckily, but I will definitely be sore tomorrow. Bruises are already starting to form when I get up.

I look around and see a wheel of cheese on a barrel, next to a table with other foods on it. Food! A small loaf of bread and grilled leeks, and a baked potato, along with a bowl of soup!

Knowing the healing factors of food in literally any game, I limp over to the barrel, and grab the loaf of bread. I take a bite of it, and realize I'm not actually that hungry. Besides the fact that it's stale and dry, I'm not going to be able to eat very much of it, nor should I. I'm going to be running, fighting, and more from this point on, so I should be prepared for anything. Eating a lot will not help me right now. Eating some on the other hand, will.

As I eat the bread, it turns out the healing factors of the food does not work immediately, unlike in the games. Realizing this, my hopes for recovery via food were ruined. This 'reality' gets closer and closer to reality the more I experience.

This was important information. Food here holds what appears to be the same effects as in real life. I rip into the grilled leeks and the rest of the bread.

The grilled leeks tasted about as well as you might imagine. If you've never eaten grilled leeks before, then you're not really missing out. The bread on the other hand, was crap. It was cooked for too long and tasted more like ash than it did bread.

I check what else was on the table. A small iron dagger, and a quiver of iron arrows. Only five arrows were in it though, kind of defeating the point of having a quiver. I ignore the arrows, and grab the iron dagger. I stretch out my neck, arms, and legs. I take a couple deep breaths, calm my mind, and get focused.

As soon as I ran outside of here, I would just be a target for Alduin, so I have to find everyone else quickly. I take one more deep breath, and ready myself.

I sprint outside, and look around.

In front of me are the burning ruins of several buildings. A group of townspeople are taking cover inside, one of them being Hadvar.

"Haming, you need to get over here. Now!" He whisper-yells to a boy talking to his injured father, burned by Alduin's flames. It's obvious from his condition that he's not going to live.

"Come on, papa, get up. Please!" Haming cries. Tears stream from his face and drip onto his father's burns, and steam rises from them. It's the father and son from before.

"I'm finished, little cub. Run for it." Haming's father says, and Haming crawls over to Hadvar. "That's it, son… make me proud." He manages to breathe out, before dying.

"Torolf…" Hadvar chokes out, his jaw shifting. He swallows, and sighs, lowering his head to meet Haming's. "That a boy. You're doing great. We're gonna get out of here, 'kay, lad?"

Haming nods, and Hadvar smiles grimly.

"You'll be fine. You got to make Torolf proud, alright? You're well on your way to doing that."

I approach the group, crouching low to the ground, and moving quickly. Once I make it there, Hadvar glances at me, and nods.

"Still alive, prisoner? Keep close to me if you want to stay that way." He turns his attention to an old armored Nord nearby, probably in his 60s. "Gunnar, take care of the boy. I have to find General Tullius and join their defense."

Gunnar grabs Haming's hand, and pulls him close. "Gods guide you, Hadvar." He nods, eyeing me, before pushing Haming ahead of him and saying, "C'mon, lad. We've got to move."

They head their own way and disappear.

Hadvar unsheathes his sword and I follow him as we move behind the houses. A shadow looms over us.

"Stay close to the wall!" Hadvar cries out, right as Alduin lands on a guard wall to our left, blinding us with dirt his wings kick up, while I'm knocked to the ground entirely. An archer attempting to put up a defense is promptly wrapped in a blanket of flames, torching the house.

Alduin flaps off from the wall, and Hadvar pulls me to my feet. Once I'm up, we run through the burning remains of the house, to a large open area directly in front of the keep of Helgen.

On the west side of the ruins once known as Helgen, General Tullius, the Captain, Gunnar, Haming, along with a few guards, running towards a stable outside of Helgen. It's clear they're going to make it out, with Alduin on the far southern side of Helgen. On the north end, Hadvar, three Imperial legionnaires, a couple Stormcloaks and Ralof are just reaching the keep, and I follow, jogging up behind the two.

"Ralof! You damned traitor! Out of my way!" Hadvar shouts, meeting Ralof at the keep.

"We're escaping, Hadvar." Ralof spits. "You're not stopping us this time!"

"Fine. I hope that dragon takes all of you to Sovngarde." Hadvar turns to face me, nodding towards the keep. "With me, prisoner! Let's go!"

Ralof snaps. "Through here! Come on!"

Decisions, decisions. Hadvar or Ralof.

This is one that's always made out to be more than it really is. The choice doesn't matter as much as it's usually made out to be. They both take you to Riverwood, anyways, the town north-northwest of Helgen.

I used to consider this question a lot. There are far more enemies if I take Ralof's side, and Hadvar's father will give me materials for smithing if I go about it right. Not only that, but if I take the Imperials' side throughout this civil war, I will be able to get a Daedric weapon.

The Daedric weapons are weapons of immense might, and are usually enchanted with some pretty good enchantments. They come from the planes of Oblivion, but that gets into multiplanar travel, which is a bit ahead of myself, I'd say.

I started jogging to Hadvar, calling out to Ralof, "No offense, man."

A vein on Ralof's head pops, and he growls, "Well, if that's going to be how it is," and storms inside through his entrance, luckily right before a part of the keep falls and blocks his door.

Hadvar smirks a little, nods for us to head inside, and speaks. "Good choice."

He and I run inside, but the guards stay out to fight the dragon. That being said, we take a minute to breathe.

The room we're in is the main barracks of the keep, but this room was twice the size of the ones I remember from the game. On the wall to the left of us were eight beds, with four chests. On the right side of us were a couple tables and chairs, and a bookcase, then the room had an extra 8x12 foot space on the opposite side of us. There was another chest in the far side of the wall. Based on my game experience, I knew that that chest was the Warden's chest.

"Looks like we're the only ones who made it. Was that really a dragon? The bringers of the End Times? Nevermind… We need to keep moving. Take a look around, there should be plenty of gear to choose from. I'm going to see if I can find something for these burns." Hadvar nods over to the chests to my left.

I was already opening the chests by the time he said that.

Inside the first chest I search, I find nothing. The second chest I search has an Imperial helm, and a purse of gold inside it. In the Warden's chest, I found a set of Imperial light armor; a leather cuirass, with pauldrons and light leather tassets attached that were made specifically for the legionnaires of the Empire. I also found a pair of boots in it, along with a sheathed iron sword.

I figure I should at least try activating the menus I'd normally have in the game. I whisper "status", "pause", "freeze", any words that could possibly activate the menus from the game, but nothing works. I thought that this would be the case… It looks like this is coming ever closer to real life.

I slide the cuirass on. It was like a very thick, rough shirt. However I had a little trouble with the straps. Hadvar ended up having to come and help me with it.

"Never put on armor before, have you?" He has a slight frown on his face.

"Oh, I have… Just not this kind. The armor I used to wear was a bit different." I answer, remembering my past. I used to have an interest in HEMA¹, drawn to it by the efforts of one of my friends. Of course, that started at least a decade ago, when I was 13.

Because of that, I've got the knowledge and the strength, but not exactly the experience. Combat experience with your life on the line is completely different to combat experience without it, and it's something I definitely don't have.

Hadvar pulls on a couple leather straps, and that tightens it to my body. I thank him, and put the helmet and boots on.

I also strap the sheath of the sword to my waist and hold the sword. The sword was both lighter and heavier than I imagined it would be in the past.

Having had my interest in HEMA for as long as I did, I eventually learned what a good sword is, and this ain't it. This sword is slightly too long, and the counterbalance created by the pommel was badly misplaced, being heavily weighted on one side. It also feels heavy in the handle, as if they used a completely different ore in the handle than the sword, and whatever they chose was objectively the wrong one.

I know from game experience and, you know, actual experience that the attacks in this game were pretty awful and were mostly chopping movements, as if the sword my character wielded was an axe. The openings were massive and anyone who's ever wielded a sword would be able to kill me in seconds if I tried to attack them like my character did in the game.

I try out a stance, the one I prefer the most, a stance close to something used in kendo. I hold the grip with both hands about a foot away from my head, with the blade parallel to the floor, and thrust. The only footwork needed with such a movement is a rotation of the heel, and stepping forward with the lead foot.

After that, I tried a stance used in old German longsword techniques, where the blade is pointed at the opponent from above the head, used to attack from a position where I could both easily defend myself and attack my opponent. I thrust, then switch to a cut, and tried switching to a knee with it, moving smoothly as I do it.

I went to the other side of the bookcase, where from my knowledge, the weapon racks were.

Just like the game, the weapon racks held two iron swords. Unfortunately, however, when I picked them up they weren't made much better. One of the blades was extremely dull along the entire blade and the other had a terrible grip. Both of the blades' points were practically blunted. I could only assume a novice smith forged them. I slide them under a leather strap on my back, to make sure they wouldn't fall off.

I nod to Hadvar that I'm ready now, taking my first step forward to face the future.

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¹Historical European Martial Arts. It's the practical and modern study of European martial arts, of the Medieval Ages and earlier.