The story of Ann Thraxx, a survivor of Kvatch Options

[Lady Saga]

Good day fellow Chorrolmates. I am Lady Saga, and today I'd like to talk about the saga of Ann Thraxx.

I originally posted all of the text of posts 1 and 2 over at Bethsoft's Oblivion: general area. Forgive the crudeness of some of the early text, for I was not originally writing Ann's tale as a true story yet. In Post #2, this starts to change. Post 1's text was originally in the Where are you Now #7 thread, and Post 2's text came from my own thread in OB: General.

This character is probably my deepest Oblivion roleplay to date. Originally I wanted her to be "Renee Gade III", which means she'd be some sort of heroic figure. But as Ann Thraxx evolved, it was apparent she's going to have a story much different from what I had originally conceived.

Although I'm on PS3, I performed a couple little tricks which I like to call pretend-mods. I used another character's game save, so that Ann never had to go thru the Tutorial part, then I fast-traveled her to just outside the Imperial City...Chestnut Handy Stables, to be exact. I had no idea why her game started here, though. That was not made known to me, yet. I also didn't know who Ann was, exactly. All of this becomes apparent during the massive text below.





Name: Ann Thraxx

Race: Imperial

Sex: female.

Class: peasant (custom).

Starsign: Atronach

D&D alignment: Chaotic Neutral


Ann Thraxx the wayward peasant has just arrived at Chestnut Handy Stables outside the Imperial City. She arrived here by carriage, and it is nighttime...dark and rainy. She's wearing nothing but one of those horrible Cyrodiilic bras and some sack cloth pants. No shoes, no shirt.

Ann has heard there's a place to stay in "some house on the Waterfront" * so she's walking there now.

* I think there's a free bed in one of the houses on the Waterfront. if there is, no problem. A "friend" told Ann there's a place she can stay. But if there is no free bed, Ann will have no place to stay.

Her family is no more, and she is sad. I'm thinking she was a farmer of some sort, perhaps, and lost her farm. Her husband got killed perhaps, and Ann is right now in serious depression, serious culture shock. She's been to the I.C. before, but never actually lived here. She's used to the wide open plains of the West Weald.

She is poor, but she is also fortunate to have 58 gold in her pocket, along with a soul gem and a few minor things which can be sold. How she got all this stuff? We shall find out, won't we?

Ann Thraxx arrived at the Abandoned Shack, which is anything but abandoned! It was about 6am Cyrodiilic time, and Hillod the Outlaw and a dark elf male (forget his name) immediately rose as Ann walked in the door. Oops...

"Please, I didn't mean to startle you" she said to the dark elf. "I am Ann Thraxx. I have been sent here and was told I could spend the night. I've lost my home and my family..."

What was interesting was the dark elf's greeting had something to do with losing his job or being out of work or something. This fit right in, so that Ann and the dark elf had a short conversation about finding work.

The situation in the Abandoned Shack was awkward as the 2 males stood around staring at Ann. This isn't what she expected! Ann "got to know" Hillod and dark elf, and gave them more than half of her 58 gold (she basically bribed him so she can stay in the Shack). But the guys wouldn't leave!

Ann took a short walk outside, deprived of sleep and getting dizzy. She found a couple beggar beds which were open, but there's no way she's gonna stoop that low.

Finally she made her way back to the Abandoned Shack. It's now 8 am and Hillod + the dark elf are both gone. Finally.

Ann sets off to sleep. When she wakes, she's going to see about looking for work in the Imperial City.

.

This post has been edited by Lady Saga: Apr 12 2012, 07:45 PM

[Lady Saga]

Hello to all, hale, healthy and whole. I am Lady Saga, and today I'd like to further continue the Saga of Ann Thraxx.

Recap: Ann is in the Imperial City. She's a refugee from Kvatch and has been staying with a couple of commoners on the Waterfront District. She's decided to try and look for something to do, but has had no luck at Chestnut Handy Stables. Upon arriving in the Market District, Ann managed to sell dozens of goods for what seems to her to be a lot of gold.

She's also managed to hear about a couple of things she can possibly do to keep herself busy, and not think about what happened at her previous home. One of these is the Unfriendly Competition quest, the other is something I've roleplayed up: a sort of "sewer patrol", which has been created to try to eliminate any sort of riffraff down in the sewers.

What will Ann's choice(s) be?


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CHAPTER V

Heartfire 4, 3E Year 433 11:47 pm

Eight flowers lay in a neat row upon the ground. With deep red bulbs and bright green stems, these eight creations of flora rested here, until our wayward peasant clumped towards them in her deer skin shoes and discovered their location.

It's a pleasant day, the sunshine marvelously warm with a slight breeze in the air. The atmosphere above filled with mostly blue sky. Ann had been walking along at a fast clip on her way towards the south wall of Kvatch, but as she sees these eight flowers, she slows her pace, and finally stops. She stares down at the flowers, which are not standing like flowers usually do, but have obviously been picked and then placed here on the grass in a row.

There's something about these flowers that piques her attention. After a moment, she realizes what it is. She realizes she's never seen flowers like these before, with bulbs such a brilliant red. They're not flaxseed flowers, not columbines, not lilacs or lavender. Their bulbs are full and large, almost completely round. There's something which seems almost....alarming about them and their placement on the ground. Who placed them here? she senses herself thinking. And why?

She bends to pick one up, to try and smell its perfume, only to feel a small amount of pain. YOUCH! she cries out. Selecting more carefully now, Ann realizes the stem of this flower, which is such brilliant green it almost seems painted, has pricked her fingertip. This stem is covered with tiny sticking-devices of some sort which Ann has never seen on any flower she's ever picked before.

"By the Gods! Wait till I show this to Marcus!" thinks she.

Now, she attempts to smell whatever perfume these odd red petals might emit. As she does so, there's suddenly a loud CRACK across the lands. It's a sound that is louder, much louder, than anything she's ever heard before, except maybe thunder. Yet the sky had been clear all day, and no thunder could possibly be nearby. Looking up to the sky now, Ann starts to see it color, to a shade of red, a sort of deep crimson, as if the blood of every Tamriellic man, woman, and child has been painted above the lands...With horror, Ann realizes the flower she's holding is now bending over towards her, almost leering in a way. It seems to possess a certain sort of evil, and Ann now senses this evil, although she can't exactly describe how.

Alarmed, she drops the flower! and rushes to the city gate. AS she does so, a massive gleaming line somehow sizzles its way across the air, electrifying it to a degree, and then...there it is...the GIANT GATE, larger than any portal, dwarfing the actual gates of Kvatch by far....it rises up above the town, and Ann can hardly believe what happens next....

NOOO NO NOOOO!!!! MARA! HELLP!!! MARRRAAAA......


Ann comes SCREAMING to her senses as she falls out of bed and cracks her shoulder upon the hard, ceramic floor, she rolls across the room and then cowers next to something hard and woooden! "NOOOO! MARA PROTECT ME! MARA PROTECT ME! MARA--"

Looking around spastically, she realizes she is safe. There is no flower, she's not in Kvatch, and there is no giant gate nearby. She's in some sort of room. The air is warm but the floor is cold. She shivers for at least a minute and tries to remember how to breathe. After awhile, Miss Thraxx finally relaxes, walks over to her bed, and takes a deep breath.

The place is so silent! It's so silent she can hear her heartbeat punctuating from her chest ...

...hu hu hu hu hu....

....Hard ceramic floor? A wooden desk? An actual bed I can fall out of? Wait, where am I?



It takes Ann a moment to remember. With the small fortune of gold she sussed out earlier, she decided to treat herself to what seemed to her to be a luxury, renting an actual room for 10 gold a night at some sort of "boarding house". It was the cheapest location she could find in this Imperial City. After a couple days spent in the "Abandoned Shack" with Dralas and Hillod, Ann wasn't sure if she was imposing upon them or not. Sure, they seemed nice enough, but it was their place, and there were only two bedrolls available: one for Hillod, the other for Dralas. Maybe she should get her own place, and with all this gold in her pocket, she could stay here safely for several days if need be.

Plus, after all she had been through, the idea of a nice, cozy room with firm stone walls, an ever-burning fire-lamp on its wall, and a solid door seemed like a good one. But now that she starts thinking about it, maybe it's not such a good idea after all.

Earlier, after renting the room, Ann quickly collapsed upon its bed and slept for an unknown period of time. She needed this sort of sleep, badly. But now that she thinks of it, she can't help but feel a bit critical of her own decision. There are no windows in this room, and although it's warm and cozy, what sort of exit strategy could such a place provide? If the "daedra" attacked and swarmed this "boarding house", what exactly were her options for escape?

As Ann ponders all of this carefully, she reaches into her pocket and spills the coins out upon the room's desk. Hold on. There aren't 77 gold here. Nor are there 67! What's going on? Where is all my coin?!

Ann carefully counts out her coins, and comes up with a total of 17. "WHAT? have I been robbed?" she asks the walls.

It takes a moment to remember what happened. After speaking to Jensine and selling her wares, Ann realized she now had enough money to afford Edgar Vautrine's "Fire Touch" spell. So she went back to his shop, and after just one hour, he taught Ann all the basics.

Ann could hardly believe it when after Edgar's lesson, she pointed her right hand towards a wall, concentrated her mind's eye upon a magical symbol, and felt an awesome hotness emiting from her palm!

"By the Gods! she cried....I can DO THIS! I can perform my own Fire Touch! And at will!" her face gleamed with satisfaction.

She then starts casting this spell over and over at the wall, until she can't do it any more. The entire time, Edgar had been standing behind his counter, watching with a curious eye.

"Wait! I can't do it anymore! Why won't it work?"

"Ah. You've run out of magicka!" said the Breton shopkeeper. "Happens to the best of us."

"Magicka?"

"As you've gained the ability to perform magics, you've now also become aware of one of the inate essences within us all. As you cast your spell over and over, you'll start to lose this unseen pool of magicka. But no worry! Magicka regenerates within the mage natrually, and soon you should be able to cast your Fire Touch again."

'What do I owe thee, sir? Other than coin' Ann asked, feeling sheepish and low again.

"Take care". Edgar dismisses with a wave. Apparently Ann owed him nothing more.


Despite her earlier criticisms about the room's lack of windows and exits, Ann can't help but lie down again, and falls fast asleep. But before she does so, she once again attempted her ability to cause fire from the palm of her hand, only to find it still didn't work. She tried again and again, focusing on the mind-symbol Edgar had shown her.

It didn't work.

.

This post has been edited by Lady Saga: May 30 2012, 07:38 PM