Traveling through The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim

I thought I should still pretend to be surprised, after all, this is the secret of the Companions. Most werewolves will become cruel and bloodthirsty like Sinding, so they are hated by everyone in the whole Tamriel continent. Even if the members of the Companions can remain rational after turning into werewolves, they will try their best to avoid exposing their beast blood in public to avoid causing panic. Seeing that I was silent, Eric thought that I must be frightened by this news, so he told me how he discovered this secret.

At first, he and Riya were sent to the east bank of the White River to look for the traces of the good man Haval. After a fruitless search, the two recruits were reluctant to return home. At this time, a Nord woman with funny patterns painted on her face and her tiger companion asked them for help. The woman called herself Esha Blackthorn and the tiger man was named Rajil. They confessed that they were bandits of the White River Gang. They defected because they were dissatisfied with the leader "Iron Hand" Haval's uneven distribution of spoils and were being hunted down. Isn't this a case of finding something without any effort? The four of them dealt with the pursuers and soon found the bandit camp of the White River Surveillance Camp and took back the property belonging to the Companions and the interest generated.

The woman named Aisha was very good at fighting. Eric had a feeling of mutual respect when he mentioned her, but she still declined the invitation to join the comrades, saying that she had made an appointment with the tiger brothers and was going to try their luck at the border of Yar together. After completing the task, Eric and Ria successfully became official members of the comrades. Poor Ria originally wanted to compete for the position of senior sister because she came a few days earlier, but after seeing Eric's skills, she obediently became a junior sister.

The Companions is a very strange organization. It is not like the Wizarding Corps or various guilds, which have a leader or a decision-making team. Instead, it allows its members to do their own thing, and the status each person can obtain is also based on their own ability. The prophet is more like a spokesperson, responsible for coordinating internal relations and foreign negotiations, and the high-level members called the Circle are just captains with outstanding combat capabilities. They are all long-established mercenaries with their own connections. They often receive tasks commissioned by major territories in Skyrim, and the Circle members then distribute these tasks to ordinary members.

There are currently five members in the circle. The prophet Krako Whitemane is the spiritual leader. He is not responsible for specific affairs, but as a respected elder, he provides guidance on faith, or as a speaker, he negotiates with the lords and other nobles on the interests of the Companions. Skoyue, the huntress Ayla, and the twin brothers Wilkas and Farkas are each in charge of a squad, but they sometimes choose to have other squad members perform the task according to the specific circumstances of the task. As a newcomer, Ria was assigned to Wilkas' squad, and Eric joined Farkas' squad where Torva was.

Eric owed a large sum of money to the Companions, so he was very diligent in accepting missions. He was not picky, and he could complete all the tasks on time, whether it was escorting a caravan, hunting wild animals, or even helping with moving. In addition, he was skilled in martial arts, so he quickly gained the unanimous recognition of the circle members. At this time, someone provided the Companions with information about the fragments of Uthrad.

The powerful Wuthrad, the slayer of elves, this legendary weapon was made by Inger for his father Ysgramor. According to legend, in the First Age, the Nords living in the far northern continent of Atmora crossed the Sea of ​​Ghosts under the leadership of Ysgramor and came to the continent of Tamriel, and established a city called Sattar. Unfortunately, the good times did not last long. The Nords accidentally discovered the Eye of Magnus under the city of Sattar. The wise Ysgramor knew that humans could not control such a powerful artifact, so he sealed the eye and buried it deep underground.

But the Snow Elves got the news that the Nords had found the artifact. In order to take this powerful power for themselves, the brutal covetous destroyed the city of Satar and slaughtered the Nords crazily. Only Ysgramor and his two sons barely escaped. Seeing the city he built with his own hands collapse in blood and fire, even the strongest man could not help but shed bitter tears. The tears filled with heroic sorrow turned into the purest ebony rock. Inger, the eldest son of Ysgramor and the greatest blacksmith known, collected these tears, tempered them with lightning, cooled them with waves, and his hammer sounded with the evening wind in the Night of Tears.

At dawn, the eldest son handed his father a huge battle axe as black as night. Ysgramor named it "Uthrad" - Atmoran: Tears of the Storm.

The three of them returned to their homeland and gathered the tribesmen who were later called the Five Hundred Heroes to make a comeback. Unfortunately, while crossing the Sea of ​​Ghosts, Inger's ship was attacked by a siren, and he became the first son of the sky to die in Tamriel. The grieving father wielded the mighty battle axe in the name of his eldest son, slaying countless snow elves until he drove them all into the dark abyss. He said that Inger's will had merged with Uthrad, his eldest son, his pride, and his greatest joy, and he had never and would never be separated from him.

However, even the most powerful weapons will eventually break down. In one year of the Second Era, the evil Worm Cult colluded with three Reachmen tribes to attack the Companions' base in the Rift Valley: the Hall of Faro Stone in order to revive the giant Sinmur. The Worm Cult used magic to decompose Uthrad into three pieces. Although all the pieces were eventually taken back by the Companions, no one could reforge the legendary battle axe. They were regarded as holy relics by the Companions and kept in Yuevaska and Faro Stone Hall respectively. In the long and turbulent years that followed, the base in the Rift Valley Territory was eventually abandoned, and the pieces stored there were lost. Only the piece that the prophet was responsible for keeping was still firmly in the hands of the Companions.

For hundreds of years, the Companions had never given up searching for the lost fragments, but had never obtained any valuable clues, until recently, Sko Yue contacted a wise man through his informant. The wizard, who called himself Drela, sold his research results to Sko Yue. A series of internal files of the Worm Cult, the secret history of the Reachmen, and some fragmentary black market auction records all pointed out that a fragment of Wuthrad had been collected by a wealthy man in Whiterun and eventually taken to his own grave. This grave was the Dustman Cairn, located south of Labrinthian and north of the Gray Swamp Fortress.

The long-lost holy relic was actually buried nearby. The news was too explosive. Scoyue did not dare to act on his own, but submitted the evidence to the prophet Krako. The respected old man summoned the members of the circle and announced his conclusion: the reliability of the evidence was extremely high, and the Comrades must take back the holy relic.

Being able to retrieve the fragments of Uthrad for the Companions is a great honor, so who to assign to complete this task is a matter of wisdom. Grave robbing cannot be done too blatantly, but there are always some unruly skeletons or wights in the Nords' tombs, so too few people will not work. The final result of the discussion was to send three people. The prophet Krako nominated the Circle member Farkas to lead the team, and Sko Yue, who found the clue, nominated the senior member Madeline Lott. After discussion, the other three Circle members unanimously agreed that the newcomer Eric could do the job.

In this way, the three-man team entered the Dustman Cairn, only to find that someone had already explored the ancient tomb before them. In an empty hall, Eric was trapped by a mechanical iron door, while Farkas and Madeline were besieged by a group of uninvited guests. To Eric's shock, the two outnumbered people did not panic at all, but instead turned into terrifying wolf-shaped monsters in a roar, and killed all the ambushers in an instant.

Farkas then revealed the secret of the Companions to Eric. The Circle and a few high-ranking members can receive the blessing of the blood of the beast and transform into powerful werewolves, with greatly increased speed and strength. Unlike ordinary werewolves, the Companions can still maintain their sanity after transforming into werewolves, suppressing the cruel desires brought by the blood of the beast and transforming them into a desire for battle and honor. Eric was far from his best in the subsequent missions and seemed absent-minded. The scene of his two teammates transforming in front of him was too horrifying, especially since he had long heard of the atrocities committed by werewolves in Falkreath, so he was very uneasy.

The joy of gaining honor did not infect Eric. He found the prophet Krako and consulted about the werewolf bloodline. The old man tactfully complimented him, saying that as a newcomer, being able to get in touch with the secrets of the circle so quickly proved his diligence and strength. He then said that the blood of beasts was rare even among the comrades, and Eric only needed to focus on honor and fighting, and other things could be left to nature. Such an answer was not enough to appease Eric, but Krako changed the subject and asked Eric to find the blacksmith Erlund Graymane who was in charge of the Sky Forge to improve his weapons. The Sky Forge is an everlasting fire formed by the fall of a meteorite. The steel weapons forged by it are both sharp and tough. After discovering it, River Ik immediately decided to build a base here.

Eric continued to communicate with other members of the circle. As his status improved, he clearly felt that Skoyue and the huntress Ayla were trying to win him over. The two showed fanatical passion when talking about the blood of beasts, praising it as a blessing from the gods, while Wilkas and Farkas preferred to be evasive and used ambiguous answers to avoid making positive or negative comments. This made Eric feel even more torn. On the one hand, he liked the atmosphere of equality and freedom in the comrades, but on the other hand, he felt deeply uneasy about the beast blood of the high-ranking members.

He decided to interview me to seek objective third-party advice, but I was focused on another detail.

"You said that the woman you went with to Dustman Cairns was named Lotte?"

Eric was quite surprised by my sharp focus.

"Have you never heard of the Jade Axe Wolf Girl? She's the woman who competed with me in the playground today. She's as famous as any of the Circle members. Fortunately, it wasn't her who sent food to Loristed Town, otherwise I would have had to persuade my father to sell the Ice Fruit Inn."

"Then she and Torva teamed up and still lost to you. Isn't your worth higher?"

Eric smiled and shook his head. "No way. I just had the advantage in weapons. If she had taken out that magic axe, I'm afraid I wouldn't last more than twenty rounds."

"What did she take out?!"

"The artifact axe, why do you think she is called the Green Axe Wolf Girl? She has a green enchanted giant axe. Anyone who fights her will have their physical strength quickly drained. Don't even think about using the tactics I used today."

Eric stared at me again and again, as if he suddenly figured something out.

"Locke, you must not mess with Madeline. You can't control that woman, understand? Besides, she's already married. Her husband is Scoyue, the best fighter in the Companions. If you meet him like this, he'll break your neck."

A female werewolf named Lotte, holding a green axe...

Things are getting serious.