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[LordBucket]

Episode 53, part 1: Info dump with Yagrum Bagarn

tell him that we come from a Universe without Magicka; or at least if it has magic, it remains largely undetected and works completely differently.

: "I come from a universe without magicka."

Yagrum facepalms.

: "Ok, look...lad, this is one I've heard before. I can tell you're not a caster, so I'm sure magic must seem like some oogedy boogedy creepy unexplainable thing to you."

: "Actually, I can see it. I just haven't learned any spellschools yet."

Yagrum frowns, then raises one finger a shoots a stream of...it's one of those colors you don't have a name for.

: "Can you see that?"

: "The magic coming from your finger? Yes."

: "Then what in blazes are you standing there telling me there's no magicka where you come from?"

: "Well, if we have magicka, it remains largely undetected and works completely differently."

: "And what, you think that now that you can see it, if you find a way back home you'll suddenly go blind?"

Huh. That's actually a good question. If you learn to cast spells then go home, would you be able to cast spells there too? Your cellphone works here. Why not the other way? What reason do you have to think that magicka doesn't exist back home?

ask him if he knows anything about atomic/nuclear power.

: "Do you know anything about atomic/nuclear power?"

: "I don't recognize the expression. What is it?"

: "It's one of the ways we generate electricity back home. Also, bombs and stuff. The idea is that all matter is composed of atoms, and energy is used to...well, hold them together, sort of. So if you split an atom you can release the energy."

: "Oh, you're talking about the Bohr model? "

: "Neils Bohr?"

: "Could be. I'm a genius not a historian. That model's only usefully descriptive at a very specific scale. If you go bigger or smaller, it doesn't make sense. 'All matter composed of atoms...' nuclear power as in nucleus? I take it you mean extracting power from atoms?"

: "Yes."

: "It can be done. I've done it myself, actually. But it's not a scale anyone I've ever known likes to work at. Too big to make much sense magically, too small to be practical for most things you wouldn't use a simpler solution for instead. It's like washing your front porch with marbles. Yes you can do it. But why would you, when you can use water or a broom instead? "

ask Yagrum whether he's ever heard of Euclid, Planck, Pythagoras, Newton, or any other historical figures essential to our understanding of physics and mathematics.

: "Speaking of Bohr, have you ever heard of Euclid, Planck, Pythagoras or Newton?"

: "No. Do you have any idea how old I am? You should be asking those people if they've heard of me. My species vanished probably centuries before most of them were born."

: "Well, I ask because they're all significant names in physics and math."

: "Oh, wait. Planck as in the Planck length? Euclid as in Euclidean? Able to be described via a coordinate system where you go forward and back by the same amount you always end up where you started?"

: "Yes. Euclid was a Greek mathematician. "

: "Greek?"

: "It's a country where I'm from."

: "Never heard of...oh, where YOU'RE from? So what you're saying is that words in Cyrodiil appear to have common roots with...wait, did you have to learn the language when you got here?"

: "No. So far as I can tell I'm speaking english, but everyone calls it Cyrodiil."

: "Ok. Yeah, I've seen that before. Just means your universe and ours are close on the cultural axes. There are bound to be other similarities too. Like your body. I'd think the fact that you look like an Imperial should be far more surprising to you than whatever trivial etymological quirks you're asking about. That is your original body isn't it?"

: "Umm...so far as I know. What do you mean when you say our universes are close on cultural axes?"

: "Oblivion is basically infinite, and takes up infinitely many dimensions. Well, maybe not literally infinite, but close enough as to not matter. Anything that's possible, exists. Imagine your entire universe where you come from, except one bit of...we'll use your model, one atom in your nose is different. That universe with a single different atom exists and is just as valid as the universe you're from. Now imagine that universe except the atom to the left of that other atom is different instead. And so on for every atom in the entire universe. All of those universes exist."

"Obviously, that means a lot of universes are very similar. In fact, every universe is similar to an effectively infinite number of other universes, because every universe that exists has a universe that's just like it except one atom is different, a universe that's just like it except two atoms are different, all the way up to every atom in the universe. Again, maybe not literally infinite...but close enough for all practical purposes. Especially since the number of atoms in each universe isn't fixed. So after you've counted up all those other universes, start in with universes that are identical to each of them except they have one extra atom somewhere, then two extra, etc. "

"So, not only are a lot of universes similar to other universes, the ways in which universes can be similar is effectively infinite, too. If you imagine all possible universes existing at 90 degrees to each other, any possible pair of universes could be described as existing at a particular 90 degree angle and at a certain distance from one another. And other universes at different positions along that axis will also be similar. When I say 'cultural axes' I'm simply referring to axis sets of universes that are similar in terms of culture."

: "Are the rules of physics the same in all universes, or can they vary too?"

: "With as many as there are, who's to say? It's not like we can check them all and compare. And if you were to start scouting out in strange directions where basic fundamental forces stop working, that might make it difficult to stay alive long enough to do any checking."

: "What do you think?"

: "I think local laws can vary, but there are probably a set of rules that sit above them that are consistent. If you think of all those universes as existing in a single infinitely-dimensional space, it makes sense that the rules for that space be consistent. But hving visited fewer than a 100 universes in my lifetime, it's difficult to speculate which physical laws are truly omniversal. "

: "So with that many universes, is it possible there are universes where there isn't any magic? Wouldn't there be an 'effectively infinite' number of them?"

He shrugs.

: "Sure. Maybe. Why not? But I don't think you really understand what magicka is. You're comfortable thinking in terms of atoms, right? The whole point of the atomic model is that atoms are supposed to be the smallest possible thing, right? The 'fundamental particles' of the universe, right?"

: "Yes."

: "But obviously that's not true, since you can break them apart. You said yourself you do that on your world."

: "Umm...well, atoms are made of protons and neutrons and things."

: "Ok, fine. What are protons and neutrons made of?"

: "Quarks?"

: "Ok, that's nice. What are quarks made of?"

: "I don't know."

: "Good, because I didn't want to sit here for five minutes asking you what each of a bunch of smaller and smaller particles were made of while you gave me increasingly silly made up names to describe them as if doing so actually explained anything. If you keep going down and down though, eventually you'd think you'd get to what actually is the smallest possible particle, right?"

: "Sure, that makes sense."

: "The problem is that once you get there, you're not talking about particles anymore. You're talking about magicka, and the concept of 'particle' just doesn't describe it very well."

: "What does?"

Yagrum thinks for a moment, then shrugs.

: "Flow. Presence. Awareness. Existence. Energy. Potential. God. Purple puppies. Assigning names to things names doesn't always do them justice, and what we're talking about is so far removed from common experience that it's difficult to describe in words. Look, think of of it this way: do you have showers for bathing where you come from?"

: "Yes."

: "I really miss those. Not too popular in this era. Anyway, imagine a nice warm shower spraying you with a stream of water. If you replaced the water in the stream with beer, would it suddenly be a different shower?"

: "No."

: "Ok, now imagine if you replaced the beer with a really good ale. Would that make it a different shower?"

: "No."

: "So it doesn't matter what is being streamed. The 'stream' is independant of what the stream is streaming. Magicka is the stream."

: "But what happens if you take out the beer and the ale, and don't put anything else in its place?"

: "And that's the thing you need to get over. The idea that there are 'things' to put in its place. There are no fundamental particles. If you're looking at a single atom, there's no such thing as beer. 'Beer' doesn't make sense because you need things bigger than atoms to make it. Everything is made of magicka. Even things. But at the scale of magicka, the idea of a 'thing' doesn't make any more sense than 'beer' makes sense if you're looking at an atom."

ask whether he has seen an outer plane where events in Mundus are a game

: "Have you ever seen an outer plane where events in Mundus are a game?"

: "What? Like on your phone?"

: "Sort of, yeah."

: "Can't say I have, no. But with effectively infinite universes, stuff like that is bound to happen."

Come to think of it, didn't Divayth say basically the same thing about Mundus being a game or a dream?

Ask Yagrum what he knows about Clover

What's up with Clover

: "Ok, maybe a change of topic is in order. I actually came here looking for a dunmer girl-"

: "I completely understand. Hot, aren't they?"

: "...umm, yes. But I meant a specific girl. Clover the Clever. Do you know her?"

: "Can't say I do. Is she hot?"

: "I'm probably not the best judge of that. White hair, caster, likes books, has corprus? Might have come through here asking about a set of dwemer flying boots?"

: "Oh, you mean Sexy - and I do mean Sexy...Withers?"

: "Wait, what?"

: "SexyWithersXOXOXO. Dark hair like midnight, not white at all. No corprus. No idea if she likes books. She was here a couple weeks ago with a set of boots Divayth wanted me to fix. Couldn't do anything with them. They were in bad shape. Did you know the XOXOXO stands for 'hugs and kisses?'"

SexyWithers spoke with Yagrum? How does that fit? You remember Divayth mentioning that there was 'another guest' that he'd asked to take the boots to Yagrum, not Clover like you expected. If you recall correctly, SexyWithers is the one Edwinna Elbert said was the owner of the pile of stuff in the hallway of the Ald'rhun mage guild. But now that you think about it, that dunmer you saw butchering guards in Balmora also had dark hair. And so did the dunmer you saw brandishing a knife back in Seyda Neen shortly after you arrived. Is it possible they're the all same person?

: "I wouldn't exactly call her hot, though. She was more of a cool, dangerous kind of sexy. 'Hot' is a word I'd use to describe a tall girl with big boobs and wide hips. I like the voluptuous look. Did I mention I like big? It's a dwemer thing. Whoever made that phone of yours had it all wrong. I just don't understand the miniaturization aesthetic. If you saw a floodgate that was two inches by two inches, and a floodgate that was two miles by two miles, and they both did exactly the same thing, which would you be more impressed by?"

This isn't helping.

: "Anything else you can tell me about her?"

: "Well, I suppose you might say she wasn't the most refined lady I've ever met. Maybe even a bit socially awkward. And kind of loud. No indoor voice."

Didn't Edwinna say something about Sexy being loud?

: "Kind of got the impression she'd spent too much time alone as a little girl. Never learned proper social graces, never learned to connect to anyone on a personal level. And I'm being generous because I'm a gentleman. The girl was a borderline lunatic, really. Definite anger issues. Kind of flat chested, too. Definitely not the biggest breasts I've ever seen, and trust me, I've seen some huge breasts. Have you ever seen a female ogrim? Can't say I recommend it, actually, but they're definitely above average in the breast department. Though ogrim men tend to have big boobs too, which is kind of creepy, if you ask me. Especially with those piercings."

Lunatic describes the Balmora Butcher well enough, so that's probably her. Didn't someone in the Wolverine Hall mage guild say she was rumored to be in the mage guild, but also a member of House Telvanni?

: "Golden Saints are pretty big chested too. They do it on purpose, you know. To distract you. Conjuration school daedra are all extradimensional shapeshifters. They take on bipedal forms just to mess with us. Not that I'd mind messing with a Golden Saint, mind you."

If SexyWithers is the Balmora Buthcher, and if she's in House Telvanni, that kind of connects to her presence here. Even if Divayth isn't involved with the council, this is definitely Telvanni territory, and Divayth is the senior-most magelord on all of Vvardenfell. The only reason Gothren's the Archmagister is that Divayth doesn't want to be. And both Cinia and that boat captain back in Sadrith Mora mentioned that access to the island was restricted without council permission.

: "Still, she had that forbbiden fruit kind of appeal I just can't resist. Imagine if the big-boobed hot girl had a younger sister. You know you're not supposed to touch her or else she'll beat you up, but you still want to. That was SexyWithers all over."

But on the other hand, Clover was here too. So maybe it has nothing to do with House Telvanni at all? How does it makes sense that SexyWithers was the one who spoke with Divayth first, was the one who was given the dwemer boots quest, was the one who spoke with Yagrum, but Clover is the one who Caius thinks is the Nerevarine, is the one who contracted corprus-

Wait. Is SexyWithers in the Blades too? Caius did say that the only reason he sent Clover to Ilunibi was because of the advice you'd given him about the sixth house base there. Did you totally mess up the main quest?

: "Kind of reminded me of an altmer girl I used to date. Name was Selene. Turned out she was a werewolf. Do you have any idea how awkward that was when I found out? Complete monster in bed, but there we were on a quiet moonlit walk one night and it turned out she was a complete monster out of bed too."

He's just going to keep going, isn't he?

: "Ok, thanks Yagrum. I get the picture."

Ask him what the local alternative is for computation, if not electricity - could he make steam machines that can be reconfigured in a matter of moments to solve a wide variety of extremely complex math problems? Electricity seems particularly good for logic gates, but I'd certainly be interested in knowing if there's an alternative here.

: "Getting back to math for a moment, how do you handle complex calculations here?"

: "How complex?"

: "...well, let's say you wanted to compute the surface area of a sphere. I guess that's not really complicated, but just as an example. Do you have a way to to automate that kind of thing?"

Yagrum raises a hand and conjures a magical sphere. It looks just like the cube Divayth conjured.

: "What's the diameter of the sphere?"

Let's say two feet.

He adjusts the sphere to two feet in diamater. Then, as you watch, the sphere is pulled apart and flattened into a square in front of you.

: "That's the surface area of a two foot diameter sphere."

: "Ok, but how much is that?"

Yagrum gives you a strange look, then divides the square into small pieces and looks at the result.

: "It's a little over twelve and a half square feet, but why does that matter? What are you going to do with a number? Isn't what I just showed you far more useful? "

: "How so? I'd think-"

: "Here, let's work with a different problem."

He dismisses his spell and conjures a triangle.

: "Let's say you're building a wooden frame house. The width of the house is however big it is. Let's say 20 feet. You decide you want the roof to angle at 23 degrees. How long does the diagonal support beam need to be?"

Ok. You know this one. That's basic trig, right? But is it sine, cosine or tangent you need for this problem? You'd usually consult a-

: "It needs to be that long."

You look. He's adjusted the dimensions of the triangle, and he's pointing to the hypotenuse side.

: "But while you're cutting you change your mind and decide you don't care what the angle is, you want the height from inside roof to the top of the house to be eight and a quarter feet instead because you have a bunch of pre-cut boards of that length. No, better yet...you don't even know how long they are because somebody else cut them at some arbitrary length and gave them to you. And you don't have a measuring stick. But you're a mage."

With a flick of a finger he adjust the triangle.

: "There you go. Done. In fact, here...watch as I do infinitely many computations."

You watch as he slides the angle of the triangle from where it is all the way down until it becomes a simple flat line, then slides it back back up,  then instead shrinks the width of the base gradually until it becomes a vertical line. You're reminded of Divayth's demonstration with the cube. He mentioned that it would take a piece of paper the size of Vvardenfell to do even a very tiny portion of the problem he was describing.

: "What if you're doing something that uses very big or very small units? Millionths of an inch, or billions of miles. You either wouldn't be able to see it, or it wouldn't fit in this cavern."

: "Change scales. The proportions are the same whether the base of your triangle is ten millionths feet or ten billion miles. or ten stick snakes dancing in skirts."

: "What if you have unknown quantities?"

: "We just solved for all possible dimensions of a triangle. Whichever angles or lengths you don't know are made apparent simply by constructing the shape with the information you do have."

: "No, I mean what if you have a problem with variables?"

: "Give me an example."

: "...umm, what if...let's say you have a quadratic polynomial that-"

Yagrum lazily flicks a finger to dismiss the triangle and conjures up cube with x, y and z axes extending from the middle. As you watch, he quickly cycles through over a dozen various two and three dimensional lines, planes and complex shapes. You recognize a couple of them. Most you don't.

: "I'll give you credit for even knowing what a quadratic polynomial is. Most people use math to solve real life problems, and very few real life problems require that sort of formalism. Really, algebra isn't even necessary. It's simply one means of describing relationships. But it's not the only means. For every algebraic expression, there's a spatial geometric equivalent. Sometimes you have to use more than three dimensions to describe a particular relationship, but with practice manipulating n-dimensional spaces isn't particularly more difficult than manipulating page-long formulas."

: "I think I might want to learn that spell. Which spellschool is that?"

: "It's not a circinate school. The locals probably have an equivalent, but this is dwemer magic. You have to understand, it took a long time for the study of magic to evolve to its modern state. Really, the common magic you'd learn from the telvanni or the mage guild is a very high level set of patterns that are simply memorized and energized. That makes it easy for anyone to learn, but it's inflexible. If you're a student of the destruction school and you want to cast a fireball, you go learn fireball. If you want to cast a bigger fireball, you go learn a bigger fireball. The spell trainer adjusts the relevant parameters, trains you using that basic pattern, and when you cast it you simply channel magicka through the pattern. It works, it's easy, it's functional. But what if you want to throw a ball of fish instead of fire? I doubt there's a pattern for that in any of the standard schools."

: "So what do you do if you want to throw a ball of fish with magic?"

: "You do it the old fashioned way. You research the spell pattern yourself."

: "Is that difficult?"

: "Master a couple circinate schools and then come back and ask me again."

(continued in part 2)

[LordBucket]

(continued from part 1)

Episode 53, part 2: Plot exposition with Yagrum Bagarn

Ask him if he knows of a way to somehow read another's thoughts, or to be able to think what they're thinking, or anything like that.

: "Is it possible to read thoughts?"
 
: "Depends on what exactly you mean that, but sure. Any competant caster can see the energy makeup of your brain if they take the time to look. With a little practice it's not difficult to recognize patterns. Emotions are especially easy to read. You have to be careful though, because different races sometimes have different brain structure layouts, and sometimes entirely different structures. More of the khajiit brain is devoted to smell, for example, and a portion of their olfactory bulb sits in roughly the same place as where a dunmer handles motor control. If you're used to dunmer, a khajiit smelling something they like can look a lot like a dunmer doing something like juggling or balancing. In any case, knowing when someone is happy, or sad, or really enjoying a meal they're eating is different from me thinking 'Yagram you are one sexy devil' and you being able to know I was thinking exactly that. I'll give you a hint, though. I'm always thinking that."

: "What about full on telepathy?"

Yagrum frowns, and doesn't answer right away.

: "It's been done. My people were working on it when they disappeared, but I was in another dimension at the time, so I can't tell you for certain how successful they were. The Psijic Order beat us to it by a couple centuries though. We actually got the idea from them. And I'm sure there are daedra who can do it. In fact, I'd just assume that anything you think within sight of a daedric prince, they probably know about. I wouldn't be surprised if some of them could even read your entire life's memory in a glance."

ask him about what he knows about the Nerevarine

: "What do you know about the Nerevarine?"

: "The who?"

: "Lord Indoril Nerevar? The-"

Yagrum suddenly goes pale.

: "Yes, I know that Nerevar. You mean the prophecy of his return? I know only the superstitious nonsense I've read of that, but I can tell you the truth about the original Nerevar. Because I was there."

: "Oh?"

Yagrum visibly cycles through several emotions. Pride, reverance, sadness. Then he speaks.

: "That volcano you know as Red Mountain was once our capital. Vvardenfell. 'City of the Strong Shield' in dwemeri. This whole island is named after it. Vvardenfell, the bright center of all dwemer civilization. Vvardenfell, eyd domseti uus vednornam."

His voice cracks and he shakes his head.

: "At that time there were two native races in Dwemereth, the land you call Morrowind. My people, the dwemer, and the chimer, a race of elves now extinct. We'd never particuarly got along, but rarely did our disagreements need to be settled through sword and flame. All that changed when the nords invaded from Skyrim. They were a brutal people, burning down villages, slaughtering man woman and child alike. Our King, his Majesty Dumalacath, united our people together. The dwemer, under his Majesty, and the chimer...under Ashkhan Nerevar."

Yagram laughs.

: "I grew up hating him. When I was a child, the chimer were nothing but tribal nomads, struggling for a living at the feet of our great civilization. Nerevar united them. He turned them into a dangerous enemy inside our borders. They dared to call Dwemerth by their own name, Resdayn, as if it was their land. If it hadn't been for the nords we'd have destroyed them, but when faced with a mutual enemy, it was enough to force us to set aside our differences."

"For all I hated him, he was no fool. 'Hortator' his people called him. General. King. Ashkhan Nerevar. If I'm to be honest with the benefit of hindsight, we all owe him a great deal. The nords had burned half of dwemerth to ashes and were at the gates of our capital when his army showed up. Most of us didn't know of the alliance and thought they were in league with the nords. But no, with their help, together we were able to push back the offensive and over the following months we slaughtered every last nord too stupid to leave dwemereth with their tails between their legs. Because of them, because of our hated enemy, we'd won."

: "What happened afterwards?"

: "After the war, we were divided. Some of us wanted to honor our agreements with the chimer and live in peace. Some wanted to betray and enslave them. Others wanted to press our advantage and invade skyrim and eventually turn all of Tamriel into a united dwemer/chimer empire. Many factions, each with their own ideas of how best to act. One of them..."

He pauses to sigh, the sadness clear in his eyes.

: "...decided that while the agreement with the chimer people was to be honored, all other people of Nirn were to be subjugated. Not through conquest, not through treachery...but through religion."

: "Religion?"

: "Yes. We made a god. High Lord Kagrenac, Chief Tonal Architect, the greatest engineer of my time...my teacher. We'd discovered the heart of the world. A great magical stone buried in the depths of the mountain. Some said we'd dug too deep. That it wasn't meant for us. But, we dared. Together with Lord Kagrenac, he and I crafted tools, artifacts of great power...Sunder, Keening, Wraithguard. Artifacts so great that any one of them could make a man a king, but to us they were merely tools. Tools to build a new god. A god we called Numidium."

: "The Numidium was a golem, right?"

Yagrum bursts into laughter.

: "Yes, much like the ocean is a pool of water and the sun is warm, Numidium was a golem. A golem a thousand feet tall, intelligent, capable of vaporizing towns, and crafted of dwemer bronze, no less."

: "You built the Numidium?"

Yagrum looks at you wrly.

: "No. I assisted Lord Kagrenac in the construction of his tools, but Numidium was his own doing. When I realized his true intentions, I left. It hurt to do. I loved him like a father, but I was young and idealistic. I'd seen our greatest enemies, the chimer, become loyal and true friends willing to fight and die at our side. What could justify marching on the rest of Tamriel to subject them in the way the nords had tried with us? I tried to talk him out of it. But he wouldn't listen. So I left. Completely left. I fled from Mundus into Oblivion, traveled through dozens of realms. I saw things both great triumphs and great tragedy. Until one day I returned, and found both my people and our newfound friends, the chimer, gone. In their place were only the dunmer, and the land we once shared now called Morrowind."

ask him what he knows or suspects about their disappearance

: "What happened to them?"

: "Depends on whose version of history you read. What's generally agreed upon is that Nerevar discovered Lord Kagrenac's plans, and went to war against us. He and his generals Vivec, Sotha Sil, Almalexia and Dagoth Ur, laid siege to our capital, defeated our armies, and murdered his Majesty Dumalacath in his own throne room."

: "The same Vivec as the god Vivec? The same Dagoth Ur responsible for corprus"

: "I presume so. Though they were merely Ashkhan Nerevar's friends and generals back then."

: "What happened after your king's death?"

: "I only know what I've read, and what Divayth has told me. No two sources agree. By one account, the chimer had begged the aid of the daedric prince Azura, Queen of Dawn and Dusk. She, in her jealousy wanted the Numdium destroyed lest there be a new god to compete with. Nerevar promosed to destroy it in return for her aid against my people. But once he stood in the hallowed depths of our mountain he fell to temptation, took Lord Kagrenac's tools in order to steal Numidium for himself. Azura, in her rage, chose to honor her promise to Nerevar by destroying not only the dwemer, but also the chimer, fusing our two species into a single new, dunmer race."

"By another account, Lord Kagrenac tried to use Numidium in the battle, but failed to control it and it destroyed us instead. Nerevar then seized the tools, and he and his generals fell to disagreement over what to do with them. Vivec, Sotha Sil and Almalexia wanted to use their power to ascend to godhood. Nerevar wanted to destroy them lest his people share the same fate as mine. He trusted his youngest general but closest friend, Dagoth Ur to guard them within the mountain until an agreement could be reached. But, Dagoth Ur murdered him and sealed himself within the mountain to unlock their secrets for himself. The other three somewhow ascended to godhood on their own before Dagoth Ur could succeed, and Azura, in a jelaous rage of having traded one new god for three, cursed the dunmer people by darkening their skin and eyes, and giving them that horrible raspy voice."

"There are a few variations on the tale. Probably only Azura could tell you for sure what happened that day."

Does Yagrum have the mark of Azura?

: "Yagrum, do you know anything about the mark of Azura?"

He stares at the ground.

: "You saw? No, I don't know why I have it. For a time I thought it was a sign of forgiveness and exemption from the fate of my people. I abandoned everything I knew rather than forge Numidium. But I'm not alone in bearing her mark. Divayth Fyr has one as well."

: "So do I."

Yagrum frowns, then looks at you.

: "So you do. How did I not notice that?"

: "Well, you were sort of distracted by a pretty face when I came in."

He laughs. You briefly wonder whether the pretty face he was distracted by was Uupse's or his own.

: "Hahah, I suppose I was. Do you know what it means? Divayth says he's asked Azura many times, but she won't tell him."

: "I didn't even know about it until he told me I had it. He says it might not mean anything. That he's known lots of people to have it. The High Fane, Vivec, a good...oh. You must be the good friend he mentioned."

: "I'd like to think so."

: "I'm probably going to have to ask Azura, aren't I?"

: "If you do, and she tells you, come back to let me know."

ask him what he knows or suspects about their disappearance

: "Forget the official accounts. What do you personally believe happened to your people?"

: "Remember what I said about how we were working on telepathy? I think we succeeded. The Psijics were a secretive lot. They wanted telepathy to give them an advantage over everyone else. The people we had working on mind magic, they were more idealistic. They didn't want to exploit other dwemer, they wanted to raise all of our kind to a higher level. Rather than developing techniques to allow individuals to read the minds of other individuals, a few of us were trying to give all dwemer everywhere the same ability. So if you ask me, one day some dwemer figured it out and gave every one of us on Nirn at the time the ability to instantly share thoughts with every dwemer on the planet."

: "Then what?"

: "Then, I don't know. Either we all collectively turned to dust or we became a singular hive mind and ascended to a higher plane of existence."

: "What about you?"

: "Me? I came back to find my friend and family gone. All of them. All of us. No bodies, no answers...just empty cities full of animunculi doing whatever it was they were doing before it happened."

: "I'm sorry."

: "Me too. I didn't take it very well. And by 'didn't take it very well' I mean I went completely batshit insane. Don't really know how long. My memory of that time isn't good, but I have centuries of missing time. Best I can figure more time passed here than where I was, but I don't know by how much. It's possible I spent 500 years in a daze being kept alive by the corprus. Might have stayed that way forever, except that I started hearing voices in my head from some crazy god calling himself Dagoth Ur, asking me to come to Red Mountain to help him build a second Numidium and offering me the world if I did. By then I was in bad shape and it sounded like a good deal, so I went. The buoyant armigers found me trying to claw my way through the Ghostfence and they brought me here. Divayth and his companions nursed me back to sanity and here I am."

It occurs to you that you still don't know for certain that the voices you hear aren't Dagoth Ur too. Or a daedric prince. Or something similarly dangerous. You remember very clearly one of them telling you to sell your soul to Clavicus Vile a few weeks ago.

give him the dwemer toy

Don't forget to give him the dwemer puzzle before leaving.

: "Oh, I almost forgot. Divayth asked me to give you this."

You hand him the puzzle. He gleefully takes it turns it over in his hand, then suddenly frowns.

: "Something wrong?"

Instead of answering, he quickly turns and twists it a couple time and it pops open. He pulls out two small rolled up pieces of paper from the inside, and reads them. In the middle of reading one, you notice his eyes dart up to look at you for a moment before looking back at the paper. After finishing, he nods to himself, pulls out a quill and writes a response on one of the papers, rolls them both back up and puts them back in. Then a couple twists to the cube and he hands it back to you.

: "What was that about?"

: "It was about you. Nothing you need to worry about. When you next see Divayth, give him that."

: "I don't know when I'll next see him. I wasn't necessarily planning to go right back up to talk to him. It might be weeks."

: "That's fine. If you get eaten by a guar or something, then it won't matter if he never gets my response."

You're a little uncomfortable with that answer, but you get the impression he won't be explaining in more detail.

As you make your way through the area, one of the afflicted sees you staring and nods as if to say hello.

What's going on here? Ask what's going on here.

: "By the way, what's the deal with the mushroom city here and why are the inmates not attacking us?"

: "I thought I asked you to call them guests."

You turn around to see Uupse standing behind you.

: "How long have you been standing there?"

: "Only just now. Cinia's waiting for you upstairs, by the way. You know you shouldn't keep a lady waiting."

You glance at the sun. It's fully over the horizon now. You'd better hurry if you want to catch that boat.

: "To answer your question, corprus doesn't turn people into monsters. But the growths are unpredictable. As you can see, Yagrum lost his legs."

: "Might have to cut out my instestines pretty soon too. I've got a good 50 pounds extra in there by now."

: "Some aren't so fortunate. When growths occur inside the skull..."

: "It makes them go insane?"

: "The voices don't help either."

: "Dagoth Ur?"

: "Or so he claims."

: "So you care for your guests, give them a place to live, and some of them despite looking like zombies are actually totally normal?"

: "That's very kind of you to phrase it like that. Thank you."

Yagrum laughs and slaps you on the back, knocking you to the ground.

: "Hahaha...oops. Little weak there, aren't you? Well, I meant to say thanks. Always good to have someone to keep me company that doesn't think me a monster, even if they are an alien. But you've a date."

: "She's just giving me a ride."

: "Oh, second date then."

You laugh, say your goodbyes and make your way back to the exit. On your way out of the village you pass a couple corprus....guests. You wave and smile, they wave and smile back. Which makes it all the more terrifying when you 30 seconds later run into one of the insane ones who walks up and takes a bite out of your arm.

Health is now 43/61



When you finally arrive in the entry room, Beyte waves and Cinia glares at you.

: "Took your sweet time getting here."

: "I did say not to wait."

: "Right. Well, whatever. Let's go. Thanks for the meal, Beyte. It was delicious."

: "Oh, Michael. Father asked me to give you 600 gold for the device if you still wanted to sell it."

Guess we have to decide that now. It's probably the only device of its kind in all of Morrowind, but if Fast Eddie's offer is still open, 500 gold would get you training for any one spellschool of your choice. Choosing a school might be tricky, but that could potentially open up massive avenues. Maybe. Eddie's training was being bottleneced by his ability to restore magicka, and you'd have to deal with the same problem. Still, you have 122 gold now. Plus 600 for selling the phone is 722, minus maybe 40 for assorted transportation costs, minus another 500 for training, that's 180 or so. Restore magicka potions were what, 30 gold each? It's been a while since you last asked, but you think that's what they cost. But then you'll probably also have to buy a spell, possibly a custom spell to train with. Just guessing, another 80 gold for that? Meaning if you want to keep enough to pay mage guild transport when you're done, you can probably only afford about 3 restore magicka potions. But at lower skill levels, that might be enough to be very worth doing. You expect the voices will have some input here.

How often does Cinia visit the island?

ask her when she is coming back

: "Cinia, when you are next planning to come back this way?"

: "Didn't have any specific plans to. Why?"

The mod she is from places her at the dock here at Tel Fyr, so chances are she will be back often

: "I just thought this was a regular stop for you."

: "No, I explained this already. I occasionally do runs through Tel Fyr as part of my business with House Telvanni. I'm only here today at all because some construction foreman in Molag Amur messed up a tower he's building and needed replacement seed crystals. Did you think I was a ferry? I specifically said I wasn't a ferry."

: "...umm, right. I think you did."

Spoiler: Stats (click to show/hide)

Level 8
Health 43/61
Magick 69/69
Armor rating: 4

Spoiler: Attributes (click to show/hide)

27.3 Strength (20)
35.0 Speed (30)
37.3 Agility (30)
40.1 Endurance (30)
42.4 Intelligence (40)
40.0 Willpower (40)
44.6 Personality (40)
57.0 Luck (50)

Spoiler: skills (click to show/hide)

Numbers in parenthesis are starting values
33 Acrobatics (0)
22 Athletics (5)
 7 Armorer (0)

 6 Block (0)
 7 Heavy Armor (0)
 5 Medium Armor (0)
 22 Light armor (0)
 9 Unarmored (0)

 5 Blunt Weapon
 12 Hand to Hand
 5 Longblade
 6 Shortblade
 8 Spear

 7 Alchemy (0)
 5 Enchanting (0)

21 Speechcraft (10)
12 Mercantile (0)

Spoiler: Equipped (click to show/hide)

 * Cellphone
 * Cruel Viperblade
 * Chitin shield

 * Chitin left + right gauntlets
 * Chitin greaves
 * Chitin cuirass
 * Chitin left + right pauldrons
 * Chitin boots

 * Combat belt
 * Commoner's shirt
 * Commoner's pants
 * Interior coinpurse, containing:
   * lockpick
   * 1 standard invisibility potion
   * 1 potion of water walking
   * 1 empty bottle

Backpack (Worn) (damp)
Main compartment:
 * Dwemer Puzzle Box
 * Tennis shoes
 * 3 illegible water logged papers
 * 1 illegible water-logged scroll of divine intervention
 * Yellow water-damaged notepad with 54 pages left
 * 1 pen
 * "20% cooler" Rainbow Dash t-shirt (damp)
 * Denim pants (damp)
 * wallet with picture ID and $30 in cash
 * 2 lesser soulgems (empty)
 * 29 Whickwheat
Small compartment
 * 122 gold
 * 8 empty bottle
 * 2 Ampoule Pod
 * 1 Black Anther
 * 7 bungler's bane
 * 5 Chokeweed
 * 3 Corkbulb
 * 25 Heather
 * 3 hypha facia
 * 11 luminous russula
 * 4 Racer Plume
 * 8 saltrice
 * 2 Stoneflower petals
 * 5 spore pod
 * 6 violet coprinus

Spoiler: Faction standings (click to show/hide)

Bearer of Azura's Mark
Bearer of scholarly acquaintance of Divayth Fyr mark
Blades, Novice
Imperial Legion, Recruit
Fighter's Guild, Associate (1 quest completed)
Mage Guild, Associate
Registered Sadrith Mora business visa, with slave-handling endorsement

Spoiler: Equipment (currently at Nine-Toes house in Balmora) (click to show/hide)

 * Steel tanto, with scabbard and carrying straps
 * Imperial steel Cuirass
 * Apprentice mortar and pestle

Spoiler: Spells known (click to show/hide)

None, yet

Spoiler: Alchemy Knowledge (click to show/hide)

Alit Hide [1]Resist Poison
Ash yam [1]Restore personality
Ampoule Pod   [1]Restore speed
Black Anther   [1]Resist poison
Black lichen [1]Drain Health
Bread      [1]Restore Fatigue
Bungler's Bane   [1]Drain agility
Chokeweed   [1]Drain health
Coda Flower   [1]Restore luck
Comberry   [1]Drain health
Corkbulb Root   [1]Restore luck
Crab Meat   [1]Restore fatigue
Gravedust   [1]Burden
Green Lichen   [1]Night Eye
Heather      [1]Poison
Hound Meat [1]Poison
Hypha facia   [1]Drain speed
Kresh fiber [1]Cure common disease
Kwama cuttle   [1]Restore health
Large kwama egg [1]Restore fatigue
Luminous russ.   [1]Paralysis
Marshmerrow   [1]Resist common disease
Muck      [1]Poison
Racer plume [1]Levitate
Rat meat   [1]Poison
Roobrush   [1]Restore intelligence
Saltrice   [1]Restore endurance
Scale      [1]Swift swim
Scathecraw   [1]Paralyze
Spore pod   [1]Paralysis
Stoneflower petal [1]Fortify health
Sm. Kwama Egg   [1]Restore Fatigue
Violet coprinus   [1]Water Walking
Whickwheat [1]Cure paralysis
Willow Anther   [1]Water Breathing

Spoiler: Cellphone storage (click to show/hide)

 * One picture of you standing in Divayth Fyr's study
 * One, very jumpy 10 second video of you and Divayth waving the phone around inside his study

What do you do?

[birdy51]

I say it may be best to simply sell the cell while we are at it, we can also go ahead and ask her to deliver the message in our steed. It would be good to thank her for doing so.

Also Yagrum. 

[GlyphGryph]

Do NOT ask the message to be delivered (he said next time we see him, after all, and hey - we know someone in the mages guild who loves looking at Dwemer stuff), sell the cell, head on home. Mention that we didn't think she was a ferry - just that she might have regular business here, is all. Apologize for insulting her - we don't really know how often the House has a need for crystals.

Honestly, I think we might be done here. Make one last check to confirm Sexy or Clover aren't actually here, and then head out.

We've learned a lot - now it's time to learn an actual magical school.

[birdy51]

Indeed... And now I propose a theory.I'm good at theory crafting so, bear with me on this.  We don't know how we were dragged into Morrowind, but Yogrum stated that we are residing on a plane that is apparently rather close to our world. Now, I propose the theory that what ever brought us here took a large amount of energy. Following that theory, a large amount of expended energy could return us to our world and realign ourselves on the universe "axis" if you will... Provided we don't deteriorate from the amount of energy expelled.

*shrugs*

[WillowLuman]

Though, why return? Michael has said he wants to see how far he can go in this world. And who are we to kill his dreams? Certainly it wouldn't be very interesting to send him back to his old life. Unless magic worked for him back home, and he got some training here first, but still. Michael, would it change your mind about going home if magic still worked for you there? Not that I'd recommend it, but it's good to hear your opinion.

Oh, and that answer on nuclear science was very, very interesting. Better than I'd hoped, in fact. What Yagrum described sounds very much like either String or Membrane theory. This world, on the smallest scale, runs on a form of quantum mechanics.

And I agree we should sell the phone. We need to start on our magical career, and perhaps one day we could learn the secrets of Mathemagics. Or maybe even come up with some new magic of our own.

Michael, if we're Daedra, or Aedra, or whatever, we're not aware of it. We're definitely not Dagoth Ur. At this point I think we're some kind of inter-dimensional metaphysical tech support hotline for you.

But speaking of Dagoth, here's the updated list of people we should try to talk to at some point to figure out what the hell is going on:
Divayth Fyr
Yagrum
Vivec
Azura
Dagoth Ur
M'iaq the Liar
Sotha Sil

Some of these may die before we can reach them.

[Supercharazad]

Screw it. Sell the phone, go with Cinia, then let's see about paying a visit to the Sharmat.

[Mr. Strange]

Sell the phone and apologize to Cinia, say what Glyph suggested. Ask if Clover/any other guests like that are present, see if you can get help going up the shaft to meet Divayth Fyr and give him the message and thank him of his hospitality. If Cinia hasn't left already do with her.

[Spitfire]

Do NOT ask the message to be delivered [...], sell the cell, head on home.

+1

[gman8181]

It is interesting to see how the deep levels of math and physics are applied here compared to Michael's world and yet something as simple as biological repair processes are vastly different between worlds.

Keep in mind before Michael made the transition to this world, he quite likely could not have been walking around with huge chunks of his body missing, only to take a nap and wake up fully healed.

As convincing and interesting as the whole conversation with the Dwemer was, we shouldn't necessarily take it as 100% fact that all that still holds true across dimensions.


Yep, sell phone. Leave and get training?

[Xanmyral]

I would agree with training, thus the selling of our cell phone.

Destruction maybe, pick up a lightning spell, jury rig a makeshift-and-most-likely-dangerous rail gun, have some fun... Or perhaps a restoration spell to make us more effective and self-sufficient, and saving us a bit of cash.

[WillowLuman]

I'll have to go back and look up which school we wanted to learn first. Probably destruction.

[LordBucket]

hat answer on nuclear science was very, very interesting. Better than I'd hoped, in fact. What Yagrum described sounds
very much like either String or Membrane theory. This world, on the smallest scale, runs on a form of quantum mechanics.

Related, if anyone is concerned about the apparent logical inconsistency of Yagrum knowing words for things "named after" people not even born until after his civilization died, cyrodiilic is obviously not Yagrum's first language. He would have had words for the concepts in his native dwemeri, but when learning to speak cyrodiilic he wouldn't necessarily have taken the time to learn etymological roots for all the technical words.

For example, imagine you were a native speaker of russian, and you came to the US and learned english. You know what alcohol is, but you don't know the english word for it. Eventually you learn the word "booze." Wouldn't mean you'd have any idea who Edmund G. Booz was.

[joemoben]

I'll have to go back and look up which school we wanted to learn first. Probably destruction.

I would suggest destruction, if only so that we don't have to buy potion containers anymore.

[IronyOwl]

As Glyph says.

Destruction maybe, pick up a lightning spell, jury rig a makeshift-and-most-likely-dangerous rail gun, have some fun... Or perhaps a restoration spell to make us more effective and self-sufficient, and saving us a bit of cash.

I'll have to go back and look up which school we wanted to learn first. Probably destruction.

I would suggest destruction, if only so that we don't have to buy potion containers anymore.

Making our own potion bottles would be nice, but I'd firmly suggest Restoration. It's broadly useful, useful at almost any level of proficiency, and does things that can't be replicated in other ways.

Illusion, for instance, has some uses, but they're kind of scattered and specific. Charming and Chameleon effects, for instance. How often are we going to want to do that? Hard to say.
Conjuration is similarly handy, but only if you're good at it. Summoning a skeleton for three seconds every third try is not a useful spell.
Destruction is really useful, but a lot of its effects are basically just a different method of stabbing someone.

Restoration has none of these issues. Healing is always useful, and its augmenting effects have the potential to be handy later. Healing ourselves for a point of damage 15% of the time will still be marginally useful, and if it's not we'll likely need to sleep and recover both health and magicka anyway. Finally, healing can't be replicated by anything but enchanted items, which are expensive; potions, which are expensive; or sleeping, which can't always be done.

So especially when we're so weak, I would strongly recommend we go with Restoration. It'll let us grind mudcrabs or whatever we'll have to do more efficiently even at low levels by augmenting rather than replacing our other skills, and it'll remain useful as we get better at it and stronger in general.