Chapter Text
“All… Might…?” Izuku passes out as his head hits the ground.
He feels something itchy on his body as he sits up, the floor is wet. ‘What the…?’
“Ah, you’re finally awake! About time.” A voice echoes around in his head. He looks over at the statue with a light shining down on it. “Approach, my child.”
Izuku puts a hand on his knee and pushes himself up, feeling something shift under his clothes, and having to adjust his balance a bit, he looks down.
‘… Ah, another one of these dreams.’ He thinks, poking the breast that shifts slightly under the beige rags he finds himself in. ‘Wait, when I’m dreaming… I don’t tend to notice anything’s wrong… Okay, Nope. Not dealing with that right now’ He sighs and checks the room over. ‘Okay, so… Damp prison cell. Lovely.’
It smells of mold. She looks at the statue again and sighs before walking over.
The statue glows slightly as the echoey voice speaks again. “Welcome to Nirn, stranger.”
“Stranger? Nirn?”
“Yes. Stranger. You are not from this world. I know not what world you came from, but you are here now, and some rather strange destinies await you.” The voice says. “You are on Nirn. A large planet full of chaotic creatures, people, and energies.”
“I am one of the deities of the main pantheon of this world. Known by the races of Men as ‘Mara.’ Goddess of love, compassion, and marriage. The reason I am talking with you is due to a strange… presence, about you. In this world, there are not many that can keep hold of their compassion, but I have this feeling that no matter what we throw at you, you will not falter in your path. Which is good, you will need that when you set on your path.”
“My path?” Izuku asks, sitting on the ground.
“Yes, you… When you came to this world, you were originally just a human soul. A body was somehow made here, but not in your current image. For whatever reason it wasn’t in your soul’s image. So we shaped the body like so, as part of an apology for our… blunder.”
At Izuku’s raised brow, the statue continues. “When you were sent here, you flew in between the two hands of Akatosh, the Dragon God of Time, while he was making the Dragonborn. You absorbed and combined with the Dragon Soul, before Akatosh could combine it with the prepared body. We have… no idea what this will do, but, sadly, due to Akatosh not having the power to perform such a feat for a long time, you are now the only one who can stop the doom to come.”
Izuku sighs, pressing his hands to his brow, ignoring the niggling thought of ‘oh, I can feel my hands.’ “Alright, what’s this impending doom?”
“There is a dragon. A destruction god by some measure, since he is said to eat the world upon his return, which generally isn’t what he’s supposed to do. But either way. The dragonborn is meant to fight him and defeat him upon his revival, which, since the soul meant for the dragonborn was merged with you, is the destiny now falling to you.”
“… Okay. How long do I have to prepare?”
“There’s not much time you can spend inside this cell without the roof collapsing, but the longer you delay Alduin’s death, the more people die.”
Izuku feels something growl in the back of his mind at that idea. “What was that?” He asks, looking around.
“That was your inner Dragon flaring up. I have no idea what it was about though. Your eyes just went slitted and glowed slightly.”
Izuku cups his chin with a hand, ignoring the softness his elbow rests on. “Well, if it’s a dragon, are dragons possessive? Like, they hoard things?”
“Yes, but what does that have to do with-”
“When I was back on my original world, I was planning on becoming a protector of the people. The dragon sounded… Displeased, about people dying from Alduin.” A small, strange note of pride enters his voice as he thinks about that.
“Interesting… Akatosh gets lucky once again.” Mara sighs. “Putting that aside, look within my basin.”
Izuku’s brow furrows and he does so, spotting a small ring, he reaches in and grabs it.
“That is a Ring of Mara. It is normally used as a marriage symbol for Bretons and Imperials, for you it is a communication tool with me, as well as a deterrent against those willing to try and proposition you. There are a few other functions, but those are for later. The rest of the nine have also decided to help you, so you will likely be stronger than normal. Left middle finger.” She adds that last bit as Izuku holds it to one of his fingers.
“You look most like a Breton, so we gave your body their racial abilities, which allow you to learn magic slightly easier, absorb the Magicka of a spell fired at you, and have 2 standing stones watching over you. Normally you can’t select a birthsign, but you are not of our world, and thus not our stars. So, if you touch a standing stone, you gain abilities related to them.”
“…” Izuku sighs. “I have no idea what that means.” He stands up and stretches. “Magic? Standing Stones? Birthsigns?”
“I shall be able to explain things better on the road. Just clench your fist when you wish to speak with me. For now, however, there is a bed up those stairs behind you.” Izuku turns, spotting the edge of a rudamentary bed frame. “Lie in it and close your eyes, and you will find yourself in the woods, just outside a small town called Helgen.”
Izuku nods, noting the sense of urgency in the goddess’ voice. He walks over to the bed and lays down. Shoving the thought of ‘I can feel the fur stabbing at me’ as he closes his eyes.
—
Wind passes by his ears and he opens his eyes, finding himself inside a tent, laying inside a sleeping bag made of stiched furs.
He gets out of it and checks himself over again.
‘Arrows, Quiver, a bow…’ He feels his back as he looks down, seeing fur draped around his shoulders and leather coming up to hold his… breasts ‘Unpack later. Unpack. Later.’ He raises his hands to see them covered by warm brown gloves with fur wrapped around the forearm.
He jolts from his musings about leather pants actually being decently comfortable as a flying beast roars and flies overhead. ‘Fucking hell!’ He thinks, clenching a fist on instinct and dropping into a fighting stance.
“That was Alduin… Helgen is in danger. You should look for survivors.” Mara says. “First, however, tap the sack beside your tent and say ‘Store All’ in your mind.”
Izuku nods, determination overtaking curiosity, he taps the sack and says the words, feeling something shift and click in his mind as the thing deflates into a flattened piece of cloth. A mental catalogue shoving its way to the forefront of his mind, telling him of what he found inside.
“A gift from Akatosh, the only one he could give. It’s an ability that allows you to stow anything away in a space so long as it is no larger than a mammoth. There is a max amount of different items that can be stored at one time, but there is not an amount limit on similar or same items. Amount storable is dependent on the strength of your soul. And considering how dragons work and how strong your soul already is, you likely will not reach its max limit.”
‘Inventory, got it.’ Izuku thinks, taking off in a jog towards where he can feel Helgen is. Everything else becoming background as he starts to focus on saving people.
“Kynareth gave you the ability ‘Pathfinder’. You will always know where your quarry is. Even if it tries to hide itself.”
‘That’s a bit overpowered… Not complaining though.’ He thinks, dodging the bite of a wolf by jumping over and kicking it in the rear before continuing on his path.
“Threats like Alduin require abilities like this.” Mara huffs. “I wasn’t able to find anything for myself to give you other than various calm spells, which were already provided by Julianos if not Arkay or Stendarr. So I decided to help you as a guide.”
‘I’ll ask about what all those names mean after I get somewhere I can rest’ Izuku thinks, finding and pulling an iron sword from his inventory, sheathing it in a sword frog that appears on his waist.
The smell of burned wood, fire, and brimstone assaults his nose as he spots a stone wall. He kicks the gate open before dashing through, briefly checking over houses and making his steps echo through the town so any survivors might hear him. He feels the strange pull guide him to the big pair of stone buildings, so he walks nearby and spots a charred corpse lying in the underbrush.
He sighs and places a fist to his chest. “Best of luck in the next life.” He mutters before kneeling down and trying to inspect the body. As soon as one of his fingers brushes the body, however, it crumbles to ashes. The red of… something, being the only thing in the gray.
He picks up the red thing to find it a book. He flicks it open and reads through a few paragraphs.
“Looks like… whoever this was was wrongfully imprisoned, given the death sentence because of it…” He feels the same part that growled at Alduin grumble at this. “But luckily he saw some useful information before Alduin got to him… Dunno how the hell this book survived though.” He mutters all of this aloud and turns to the keep.
‘Should do a full sweep, make sure nobody gets left behind.’ He thinks, walking to the door to the shorter of the two buildings and kicking it open before walking in.
He looks around, fists clenched in case someone mistakes him for an enemy.
“Are you versed in unarmed combat?” Mara asks.
‘Better than I am with anything else, yes. My granddad taught me. Said it’d help with the nightmares I get if I knew how to defend myself. It did, I think. I never remember them, but I always wake up in a cold sweat and screaming. But after a while they stopped being so bad.’ He replies, reaching his arm around his back to feel something that kept hitting him while he ran. It turns out to be a hood, which he pulls up to cover his hair and a decent portion of his face.
“Plagued by Nightmares, yet still so resolute in your path. You truly are a strong one, my child.”
Izuku shrugs. ‘Not anything special. I just don’t know when to give up.’ He decides to ignore her calling him her child. It was kinda nice, anyhow.
He walks into what definitely looks like the inside of the tower portion, a man’s corpse laying next to a table.
‘Take weapons and other items, leave the armor.’ His mind automatically relays, which causes him to tense slightly.
“A gift from Arkay. Grants you knowledge of the burial practices associated with each race. There’s more to it, but speaking in broad strokes, that’s how it is.” Mara says.
“May you find your place in Sovngarde.” Izuku says, keeling slightly as he picks up the items his mind tells him are okay to grab. Storing them away before moving on and through the opened gate.
The stench of blood reaches his nose as he walks into what appears to be a storeroom. Dead…
‘Who are these people anyways?’ Izuku asks.
“The ones with more refined armor, who don’t have a specific uniform, are Imperials. The ones with the blue armor are called Stormcloaks. There’s currently a civil war going on in Skyrim, if you wish to know more you may ask a local.” Mara’s speech becomes clipped, and angry sounding.
‘Not a big fan of war anyways…’ Izuku thinks, nose scrunching as he repeats the same process of grabbing what Arkay’s guidance deems acceptable and sending them off with a quick and short prayer. Then he drags their bodies over to the corner and lines them up so they’re out of the way while he searches the room.
He picks up a red bottle from a shelf. ‘Health Potion. Not too potent, but decent enough to mend some basic cuts and gashes.’
He then sighs. ‘Lemme guess, another blessing?’
“Yep. This time from Julianos. Basic knowledge of the Magic Crafts, as well as some strategy understanding.”
Izuku sighs again and shakes his head, looking around, he taps the side of the bookshelf while thinking ‘Store All.’ All of the items on the shelves disappear in a flash of blue light. ‘Nice. I can work with that.’
He walks around and taps all of the storage mediums he can find, storing everything inside. He then looks at the ingredients hanging in front of the fire. A dead pheasant and a rabbit. He taps both and they disappear, his mental list informing him due to his curiosity that they’re listed as various parts, ‘Rabbit Meat, Guts, Skin, and Bones’ all get added. It is the same with the pheasant, just changing out the skin for ‘Feathers’
‘So, the Inventory automatically separates the different parts of corpses… that has disturbing implications if I accidentally put a human corpse inside…’
“Luckily we made it so if you do it doesn’t do the process animals get.”
‘Yep, thanks for that.’ Izuku thinks, moving on from the room after checking it over once again.
The smell of blood, where it was just a slightly gross annoyance, becomes putrid when he gets near the bottom of the stairs.
“Torture and Holding room. Awful place.” Mara says, disgust seeping into her voice.
Izuku nods in agreement and looks around at everything. “Hm, seems they fought to a stalemate.” He repeats the process he did in the previous rooms, moving all the bodies to a corner once again so he can look around.
“A looter, here already?” He jolts as someone asks from behind him, curling a fist to potentially fight, when he realizes that the person in the cage just spoke. He stands from where he’d been squatting and smiles slightly.
“Not a looter, just someone checking for survivors. Though the weapons are nice. What’s your name?” He asks, walking over and testing the lock to find it still working.
“Odvasic, Odvasic Natoit.” He says, shuddering as he seems to try and sit up. “Was put in this stupid cage due to false accusations of being a Stormcloak that tortured people for fun. Ironic, considering the person who put me here was an Imperial more suited to that kind of story. ‘Was headed to Cyrodiil to study magic in a way I couldn’t at the college of Winterhold.”
Izuku nods, pulling a bit of food from his inventory while hiding his hands behind his back, handing it over through the bars. “Sorry if it’s not to your tastes, but we should hurry, while there’s still a chance there’s more survivors.”
Odvasic nods and starts quickly chewing through the bread and jerky without much complaint besides a grossed out look. “Thanks.” He says after finishing. “The Torturer decided I’d confess if I was starved, since he couldn’t get me to ‘admit it’ otherwise. Then whatever made those noises attacked and they passed me by. I’ll owe you a lot if we get out of here alive.”
“What attacked was a dragon.” Izuku says, earning a look of surprise. “Hardly believe it myself, but we need every soul we can salvage from this to try and convince others of the danger.” He passes one of each potion he managed to pick up from the previous room, as well as a bottle of water. “I’m gonna see if I don’t have the know-how to unlock this. You try and recover enough to walk.”
The exhausted man nods, chugging back the health potion, then the stamina potion, before taking a potion out of his own pocket and downing it. “I have magicka potions of my own, you can have yours back.” He starts drinking the water.
Izuku nods and pulls the Lockpicking set from his inventory, finding the lock strangely easy to open.
‘Another blessing?’ He asks, and this time Mara takes a second to respond.
“… No, actually. How did you…?”
‘No idea.’ Izuku shrugs in his head as he pulls the lock off and swings the gate open, allowing Odvasic to try, and subsequently fail to stand.
Stabilizing himself on the bars of the cage, he reaches down and lets the injured man use his forearm as leverage to stand. “Good?” He asks as Odvasic lets go.
The wizard nods, taking a deep breath then a few steps, stretching his legs.
After leaving the cage, he stretches his arms to the sky. “Yep, good.” He nods.
Izuku reaches down and picks up the Magicka potion the wizard denied. “Alright. Only way I see through is down that hall. Take a bit of time, get your bearings. We both have no idea if the torturer survived.”
“Oh, I do, he was among the corpses you dragged to that corner.” He gestures to the mentioned corner. “But given the prayers you sent, I’ll assume you’d take offense if I kicked his body.”
“Lil bit.” Izuku nods, cringing slightly. “No lost love between myself and torturers, but I’d rather you show respect for the dead bodies.”
“Priestess of Arkay?” He asks.
“Nah. Mara, actually. Compassion, while more often associated with Stendarr, is a part of her worship, after all.”
‘Seriously, more esoteric knowledge?’
“Yes.” Mara replies, sighing slightly. “To keep you from sounding too out of the loop. People will understand if you don’t know about the war, since you might be from another province, but some things are a bit harder to try and hide as ‘from a different place’.”
‘… Alright then.’ Izuku thinks in return.
“Why not be a Stendarr priestess then?”
Izuku shrugs. “I’m not even really a priestess, but I am a devoted follower.”
Odvasic nods after his brow furrows for a moment. “Well, to each their own.”
“Indeed.” Izuku also nods. “Now, ready to go?”
Odvasic flicks his fingers and a few electric sparks come off them. “Yes. It seems my lockup has not turned my skills to rust.”
Izuku hums. “I’d prefer you leave any fighting up to me still, since you are, in all likelihood, still recovering.”
Odvasic nods, so they continue down the hallway, coming across a large room with a hole in the far wall, several cages line the two sides of the room, some still having people inside, others with Skeletons, the stench of rot and decay had become so putrid that Izuku doesn’t even notice it anymore. It having permeated the air so much that there isn’t anything else to smell.
Izuku sighs and grabs those still with flesh on their bones, moving them to his inventory and immediately depositing them once again, in a corner. He leaves the skeletons be, and nods to himself. “May you all find peace in your next lives.”
They leave through the hole in the wall, and come out to a room with four platforms. Bodies, both Imperial and Stormcloak, litter the ground. Izuku sighs and goes about the same process once again, finding there to be 12 bodies in total, he lines them up in a corner far away from the water after taking their weapons and other such items.
As they pass over the bridge leading further into the caves, Izuku starts up a bit of conversation. “I’m not exactly from Skyrim myself. Do you know much about the war?”
Odvasic shakes his head. “No, I’m afraid I pride myself a bit of a scholar, rather than a fighter. I do know the basics, however, if you wish to know that.” He says, fiddling with his robe.
Izuku nods. “Better than knowing nothing and getting misled by a non-neutral party.” He pulls his bow from his back and looks it over, feeling the string and checking the draw speed, then puts it back in a hurry when he realizes he has no idea how the hell he knows how to do that.
“Well, it starts with the white-gold concordat, you know how it outlawed Talos worship, correct?”
Izuku shrugs. “Yeah, I don’t really pay attention to that kind of stuff. Apologies if I sound a bit… well, like a bumpkin I guess.” He pulls his gloves, tightening some of the knots holding them together.
Odvasic shrugs as well. “It’s fine. After the great war was all done and dusted, the aldmeri dominion stood on top, somewhat. They were decimated at the Battle of the Red Ring, which is what led up to a deal being struck.”
“Titus II, the empire’s leader at the time, and likely currently, was wise, he knew it was a matter of time before the elves were able to decimate him, rather than what happened at Red Ring. So he agreed to a peace treaty, which heavily favored the Dominion, just so the Empire might be able to fight another day.”
Izuku hums and tightens various parts of the armor that had come slightly loose. Still shoving the thoughts of ‘Oh huh, I have boobs,’ in a hole.
“But, then the ‘Markarth Incident’ happened, nearing 200 years after the deal was struck. Among the concordat rules was the worship of Talos being outlawed. And Ulfric Stormcloak did not like this rule, despite it not really being enforced.”
Izuku pulls an arrow from his quiver, looking it over. ‘Steel arrow. Strong, but simple.’ He puts it back, nodding to himself.
“Markarth had been taken by Reachmen, and Ulfric near-singlehandedly took it back, then started making demands, first and foremost the dissolving of the ban on public Talos worship.” Odvasic rolls his eyes. “Anyways, that caused enforcement to get harsher, the elven supremacist government called ‘Thalmor’ were granted access into Skyrim, which they weren’t before. Not legally. But the concordat being broken of course meant that either they’d cause another great war, or to loosen the rules a bit.”
“And that’s when the war started.” He concludes. “Though there were a number of years of quiet before it truly started up with Ulfric killing High King Torryg and trying to take the throne, as per Ancient Nordic customs. The people of Hammerfell actually managed to fight off the high elves, making a treaty of their own, essentially saying ‘Pass through our waters or come on our land, and we will fight with tooth and nail.’ I may have gotten the timelines wrong, however… As stated, I’m not exactly a historian or a fighter. Just a scholar.”
Izuku nods and looks ahead. Jolting a little with surprise. “Well, at least they aren’t Humanoid corpses…” Izuku mutters, going to investigate the corpses of 4 massive spiders littering the ground. Hand on the hilt of his sword as he kicks one of them.
His foot nearly goes through, a crunch sound making him yank his foot back. “Eeew.” He says, continuing to investigate the bodies for anything harvestable.
Eventually he just shrugs and shoves all of them fully into the inventory. Continuing on.
“Okay, now I have to ask-” Odvasic starts.
“Sh!” Izuku shushes him, feeling slightly bad about interrupting, but listening intently to the clanging noises in the distance. “… Battle ahead. I’ll run forward, you follow after 3 seconds. Good?”
Odvasic nods, tensed slightly.
Izuku nods back, and starts running towards the sound of clanging metal. He spots two people, an Imperial and a Stormcloak, fighting. A dead bear next to them.
‘Disarm, knockout only if necessary. Try and convince to stop first.’ He thinks, quickly stepping between the two as they went for swings at eachother, grabbing both of their arms and twisting as hard as he can, resulting in hissed curses from both sides as he grabs their weapons and stows them before they can get them.
“Stop Fighting!” He shouts, anger radiating off in waves. They try and take swings at each other with their fists, but he grabs their wrists and twists again. “Whatever bullshit war is going on can surely fucking wait until you can inform the citizens, right? You’re both soldiers, and thus you both have a duty to the people. Right?” He asks, twisting further as both try and escape her grasp.
They both snarl and make to argue, but Izuku interrupts again. “I can, and will, knock one or both of you out if you don’t agree.” To prove his strength, he wraps his hand in the Imperial’s shirt armor, then lifts, holding him an inch above the ground with one hand steadily before lowering him. “So, I’d suggest we get to a nearby village, maybe… What was it, Riverwood? And make sure they know about the threat?”
Both soldiers seem to tense up for a while longer before nodding to each other. “Fine.” The Stormcloak says. The Imperial nodding in agreement, but Izuku twists his arm further.
“Say it.” He says, glaring at the man suspiciously.
The Imperial huffs after making a pained noise. “I agree to these terms.”
Izuku nods and lets go. “Good. Here’s your weapons. Let’s get out of here.” He summons both of their melee weapons and chucks them into the dirt at their feet. Odvasic catches up shortly after the two get their weapons sheathed.
He huffs as both look at him like they’d seen him grow a new head. “Neither of you bothered to check for a pulse. Luckily our friend here came right as I woke enough to speak. Odvasic Natoit.” He bows slightly
“Hadvar.” The Imperial greets.
“Ralof.” The Stormcloak follows.
Izuku blanches as the trio look to him expectantly. “Oh, right, I never introduced myself… I’m Midori.” He bows, hiding his cringing face slightly.
Ralof hums. “Strange name.”
“I’m not exactly a local.” He says, huffing slightly.
Ralof chuckles. “No, I don’t suppose you are. Not with that way of fighting.”
“Where did you learn to fight like that anyways?” Hadvar asks, and Izuku shrugs.
“My granddad taught me.” He taps the bear’s corpse and stores it before continuing on a path out of the cave. “C’mon, the exit’s this way.”
He hears Odvasic huff “Don’t look at me, follow her.”
—
Outside the cave, Izuku stretches his arms to the sky, letting out a small satisfied sigh. “The sky is a lovely sight to see after all of that… Mess.”
Odvasic snorts, approaching next to her. “Yes, well, I thought I was going to die in that cage, so you can imagine how it feels for me.”
Izuku nods with a small laugh.
Hadvar speaks up, seeming to scout the area with his eyes. “No sign of the dragon anymore, ‘sides the pillars of smoke coming from Helgen. Did you see what way it was flying before you went up?”
“…” Izuku rubs his face. “Maybe. We’d have to head back to my camp for me to truly point the direction…” He trails off as he feels the tug of Kynareth’s gift shift in direction to somewhere close by. “Luckily I think we’ve exited pretty close to my site.” He starts towards where the tug pulls him.
“I thought you said you weren’t local.” He hears Hadvar say.
“I’m not. I just woke up in these woods one day, and since I was a hunter previously, I set up a camp and started up my trade again. Made a decent amount trading with travelers.” He lies easily, shrugging off the feeling of discomfort. ‘They wouldn’t believe the true story.’
“A hermit then?” Ralof asks, and Izuku shrugs again.
“I don’t dislike the company of people. But I can survive alone just fine without them. Anyways, we’re here.” He stops near to the semi-familiar campsite. “The dragon flew off in the direction of the mountain with the stone structures on it.”
“… That would mean Whiterun is in danger. And possibly Riverwood too. We should hurry to Riverwood first, see if we can get food and supplies as well as rest before heading up to Whiterun.” Ralof says, Havar nodding his head.
“Alright, that’s a plan.” Izuku nods. “If we don’t get far enough before night falls, is there somewhere we can stop?”
“There’s a hunter’s camp near to the Guardian Stones. The ones who frequent it always seem alright with sharing their fire. So long as you don’t try and steal their sleeping spots.” Hadvar replies. “It’s about midday though, we should be able to make it.”
So, the group of unlikely allies starts the trek towards Riverwood.