The Promise of the Hydra, Story Trailer/Teaser Options

[Uleni Athram]

.. in cinematic format. I found this particular work when I dared to peruse my dusty archives of unfinished works and when I read through it, I decided to follow up on it and actually challenge myself to finish it. Because of several reasons:

The plot is CRAZY and EPIC in scale, and it seems a waste to just let it wither and die.
Even though I call myself a writer, I haven't actually finished any stories whatsoever.
This would be good practice for my increasingly rusty English and Writing skills.

Let me warn you now that this story, in addition to being crazy and epic in scale, is KINDA AU. The Tamriel you know will not appear in this; rather, a 'mutated' version of it is in its place. I will of course try to stick close to the depiction given to us by the games and other media, but if I find something not to my liking (and I do already have several), I will destroy them and add my own. *shrugs*

So without further ado, here's a teaser of an upcoming fic of mine...
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THE PROMISE OF THE HYDRA






The scene starts with an ebon tower, with a backdrop of an evil looking mountain. The tower is a spindly, wicked looking thing with spikes that ridged all over its sides; it was less of a structure and more like a wrathful finger pointing up to curse the heavens. The weather is wild and unnatural. It is heavily raining green, dancing water that, exploding into violet and yellow lights when hitting any surface, surreally light ups the surroundings. Magnus is silent. No illumination from the afflicted skies. Save for the wind that is shrieking like a banshee, there are no noises.

The camera zooms on a figure atop the tower. It is a male, dressed in regal robes of black felt, and he is playing a strangely-shaped lyre in his gloved hands. There are no sounds, but the acoustic vibration generated by the lyre is somehow visible, and those vibrations piroutte to an unseen point in the skies. Everything suddenly freezes. The dancing, colorful lights, the visible vibrations, the eldritch raindrops from the darkened skies... Everything.

Save for the man in robes. He keeps playing whatever soundless tune he is playing.

A haunting celtic-style song begins as a sharp, accented, EVIL VOICE begins talking;



EVIL VOICE: "The Razor-God has had his way, and your broken Empire now lies in ruins. Alessia's bloodline is mute, and the Sundered Seat is now without command. O, unhappy Cyrod. O, sweet, sweet Cyrod. You call upon old treaties and forgotten friendships to see you through the days after His Crisis, certain that the subjects would heel to the demands of the overlord.."



The scene suddenly cuts to the Imperial City, during the height of the Oblivion Crisis. The Imperial City is burning, the smoke rising to copulate with the fiery skies, and the combat between the mortals and the Daedra is frenetic. Daedric catapults are raining liquid fire outside the white walls, and Lake Rumare glows red from both fire and blood as Imperial War Galleys skirmishes against daedric sea leviathans. The camera zooms on and follows one particular catapult barrage as it smashes against the side of the White-Gold-Tower. The Tower stands resolute, ignoring the kinetic force of the barrage, and the camera follows the debris of the barrage falling down into the chaotic, bloodied streets of the Palace District.




We see Ten Heroes fighting against the seething ranks of the daedra. A brief but bloody combat montage of the Ten against the daedra begins.




There is a particularly tall Wood Elf with distinct hair and tattoos (SWEET DARLING YLENNO) doing absolute havoc in close-quarters melee. He is speedy and cunning, striking with his dual knives and his own body, using dirty tactics to survive. A half-naked Dremora bristling with arrows charges him from behind. The Bosmer quickly steps to side, allowing the demon to rush past him. Like a snake, the elf springs onto the gigantic Dremora's back and begins biting on the daedra's ear while stabbing its eyes and throat relentlessly. They fade away from view as the Dremora runs wildly in an effort to shake the elf off of him.



EVIL VOICE: "But you are weak now. So... so... Weak."




The camera darts around, showing us other non-important combatants in their respective battles, before focusing on an Orc easily seven foot tall (LUGRUASH). He is batting away hordes of clannfear and scamps from a wounded and vulnerable High Elf (ASGAELORCIL) that is in the midst of doing something with Ayleid crystals. Although successful on keeping the little creatures from the High Elf, the Orc finds his match against a Daedroth that towers over him by at least three feet. With a roar, the Orc eagerly charges the creature and they begin dueling. Armored in ebony and wielding a large mace, the Orc puts up a good fight at first before succumbing to the superior might of the daedra.

He falls to a knee before it, bloodied and weaponless, awaiting the deathblow. The Elf sees this, and with a cry he uses a welkynd stone and surges forth a blast of sorcery at the Orc. The Orc glows blue for a second, before letting out another roar. With renewed vigour, he blocks the deathblow from the Daedroth, spins behind it, grabs it by the waist and executes a suplex that breaks the Daedroth's neck. The Elf smiles tiredly at seeing this and nonchalantly blasts three dremora with lightning behind him.




EVIL VOICE: "You were once the wolf that held the nations in check, the crown that every knee bowed to..."





The camera zooms past the charred remains of the three dremora to focus on tightly pitched battle between two mortals and a legion of scamps led by a Kynval. There is an Argonian standing proud atop a pillar, loosing bolt after bolt from his crossbow at the yowling horde with frightening accuracy (KEESMATHAI). Below his pillar is a Redguard in desert garb, dispatching foes left and right with a very calm expression on her exotic face and a saber made out of pure spiritual energy (SARTANKEL). She evades a swing from the Kynval and kicks it off balance, allowing the Argonian to pepper it with three bolts to the face. But the horde keeps coming, and depleted of his arrows, the Argonian draws three scimitars - one in both hands, and one held by his very long tail - and jumps to reinforce the Redguard's increasingly untenable position. Back to back, they slowly regarded the horde that circled them. A foolhardy scamp charges them, and the Argonian beheads it with a powerful swing from the sword held by his tail. The horde converges upon them as one.




EVIL VOICE: ".. But the wolf lies punished by the lash of Oblivion, bereft of his fangs and claws, and the crown.. is trampled underfoot."






The camera follows the slack-jawed head of the scamp as it flies in the air, before cutting off abruptly and focusing on two women atop the roof of a smashed insula. One is a Breton, pale and bitterly beautiful, decked in the outfit of an assassin (CYLAISE). The other is a Khajiit with salt and pepper fur, wearing the soft but supple leathers of a Thieves Guild operative (DAR'MADAL). Together they are providing ranged support from their position, the Breton with a long, gnarly wand that shot magical fire and the Khajiit with her short bow. There is a keening whisper, slowly increasing in volume, and it escalates to a shriek as the space behind them is audibly ripped by an Oblivion Gate. They turn towards the newly summoned portal and sees a duo of titanic Xivilai emerge. With inhuman speed, the Khajiit brings a Xivilai to its knees with three arrows while the Breton sprouts an elongated, burning fire from the tip of her wand. Using the newly summoned fire like a whip, she strikes the other one and wraps the fire around its throat, and smirks as it cauterizes the Xivilai's neck from the body.





EVIL VOICE: "Your light dims..."





The camera pans out towards the skies, allowing a brief panoramic view of the ongoing devastation, before zooming past everything to concentrate on a motley group of mortals slowly fighting their way out of the District towards the Temple of the One. There ware two contubernia of the elite Praetorians working alongside a squadron of Blades to protect the newly crowned Emperor Martin. The Emperor is bloodied, his majestic robes torn, and he is having an animated conversation with an Altmer dressed in red and gold. At the front of the group were three people serving as the vanguard. At the center of this vanguard is a Dark Elf bedecked in the shell armor of a dunmeri House (LAMAREN). At his side were two women; a large redheaded Nord hefting a large glaive (MNORNAS), and an Imperial that is armored in the style of a Legionary, only much more ornately (AURELIANA). The three smashes through a concentrated gathering of fifty demonic beasts barring a gate, simply outclassing them in terms of skill and tactics. With a grunt, they push open the gate, allowing the Emperor and his retinue to the Temple District.




EVIL VOICE: "Your future is dying.."





The scene highlights the bravery and utter power of the three as they annihilate foes from where they stood; the Dunmer was irresistible in his swordplay, the demons could find no fury to match the Nord's devastating swings, and the precise and controlled rage of the Imperial brooked no rival from the ranks of the enemies. Carving a bloody line towards the Temple, they come face to face with the nightmarish overlord of this whole Crisis; Mehrunes Dagon himself. The expression of complete despair and fear is utterly vivid on the three's faces as they look upon the infernal majesty of the Prince. The Emperor himself sinks to his knees, staring wholly traumatized at the big red monster in front of them.

Then there is sudden commotion of noise on a mansion to the Three Heroes' right and the camera focuses on one of the mansion's wooden doors. For a brief second there is the clashing of steel, an inhuman cry of strangled pain, then silence. Then the wall by the wooden door suddenly explodes outwards, gurgling out a dead Dremora and the seven foot Orc from earlier. The Orc grunts in approval on his handiwork, and rises to a ready position by the Three once he sees Dagon. The Orc was followed by the wounded Altmer, who steps over the corpse of the broken Dremora. The High Elf, too, readied himself and charged his fists with lightning when he saw Dagon.

One by one, the rest of the Ten makes their dynamic entrance. The Breton and the Khajiit by jumping from one roof to another until they almost stood eye to eye with the Daedra. The Khajiit's bow was nocked, and the Breton now had two wands aimed at the Prince. The Argonian and the Redguard by hacking their way through a troublesome group of clannfear mounted Valkynaz. The last one to appear was the Wood Elf, YLENNO, and the camera flies out of the showdown to focus on how exactly he made his appearance.

The camera transports the view to an aftermath of a battle in a different District. There is the Wood Elf Ylenno, covered in bruises and cuts, conversing with a panting Centurion about something. The Centurion points to a very massive ballista that is normally used for breaching iron walls. Ylenno smiles and approaches the huge contraption with its equally massive payload; a thick and long bolt that could easily skewer fifty men. The elf climbs and sits on the bolt with a natural grace, and he looks at the Centurion with a very serious look on his face as he begin saying something. The Centurion was looking at him with his mouth agape, but nonetheless complies as he walks towards Ylenno.



The scene suddently cuts to YLENNO hanging onto the bolt for dear life as it makes its trajectory through the air to one, big, massive target.... With a big, fleshy sound of explosion and an echoed grunt of pain from Dagon, the giant bolt embeds itself on the back of the Prince's head. Ylenno is cackling madly as he begins chopping the Prince's head with his axe, ignoring the harmful light that bled through the wound he helped create. The other Heroes, flabbergasted at Ylenno's entrance, roar into life as they began attacking the Prince with the ferocity they were known for.

Dagon, however, seems more annoyed than hurt and with a roar that echoed all around Nirn, he pounds the ground with his massive, four arms. Smoke and debris erupts, consuming everything, and all fades to black.



EVIL VOICE: "And what hope you have left shall be devoured by my coming darkness."




Blackness slowly gives way to unnatural and frozen lights, and the scene returns to the Tower amidst the supernatural rain. The Man in Robes is there, looking at the sky.


EVIL VOICE:"You have learned to hate and fear the fires of Oblivion..."



A very fast flash of several images - a stone dragon, Ten Heroes being honored atop a stage, a red-robed man running from a mob, several books being burned, a line of heavily beaten prisoners walking towards a hanging block- and the view returns to the Man in Robes. The strangely shaped lyre in his hands is now gone, and in its place is a Horn.



EVIL VOICE: "But there are other things out there that are much, much more worse."

He puts the Horn to his unseen lips, and blows. The sound is damning, mournful and evil at the same time. Everything that was frozen in time, begins moving again, but something has changed. The rain intensifies. The sound produced by the enraged wind is not from this world anymore; from the keening sounds it made earlier, it now turns to a chorus of screaming souls. From several murky puddles around the Man in Robes emerge a horde of misshapen creatures.

Tigers with scales and glowing eyes, with three scorpion stingers for tails. Malevolent faced men with green hair, horns and the lower half of a stag. Goblins the size of houses, with the smiling countenance of gods for faces and octopus-like appendages for limbs. Cockroaches and centipedes that walked upright, brandishing hellish weapons and marching in orderly formation. Bark-skinned demons easily the height of three giants, shaking the world as they walked with purpose. Levitating creatures that had the shape of sea horses but had bat wings and bows. A horde of large, scuttling beetles ridden by man-sized, armored flies. Tall humanoids that had crustascean faces, wielding weaponry that would stump even the Dwemer.



EVIL VOICE: "Forbidden things..."



The camera pans away from the insane horde atop the tower, and focuses upon the dark and strange sky. Right above the tower is a massive, sickly-looking vortex that bled the unnatural rain. Now, however, it spat out flying creatures as well.

Beautiful humanoids that had butterfly wings and hair of inextinguishable, multi-colored fire. Laughing man-bats that joked and murdered each other as they flew lazily from the Vortex. Dragon-sized wasp things that spew out horrific gasses from their stingers and repeating a mad mantra about exulting a Dreaming Abyss. Imperious, screeching birds made out of metal, arrogant in the way they flew and contemptous of their unnatural fellows. Countless winged skeleton dogs ridden by mummy-knights without heads, their banners sputtering on their own accord.



EVIL VOICE: "Mutated things..."



The camera cuts back to the Man in Robes. He is surrounded by the monstrosities from all sides, and they are exulting his name with such intensity that the Tower shakes every time they praise him. He is unaffected by their reverence as he kneels and cuts his palm with a knife. A drop of his blood mingles with one of the murky puddles, and from there, emerges one giant dragon that had eighty-six heads. The writhing horde yells in jubilation and worship at the sight of the summoned Hydra, and the Hydra lets out a serpentine hiss as it takes the skies and begins circling the tower.



EVIL VOICE: "A skittering mass of exiled life that has been decreed by both the Sixteen Scepters and the Nine Thrones to be abominable. And they have become MINE."



The Man in Robes stands and shoots out a fist towards the heavens. At once everything falls silent. The horde of mixed insanities kneels as one and lowers their head to him. The Hydra, joined by the other aerial horrors, dip their wings in absolute respect and veneration as they circle around the tower. The Man In Robes begins walking towards the camera. One cockroach dipped its head on the ground and whispered the man's name with religious ecstasy: "Lord Celdryn." Immediately it burned with a rainbow-hued fire, and transforms into a mewling larvae that slowly melted into a white substance.

Celdryn pulls down his hood and reveals his aetherial, beautiful face. What mars this visage of absolute perfection was the fact that his eyes showed complete, alien, unknowable EVIL; they burn green and red. He smiles and keeps walking towards the camera, beginning to talk as he slowly takes up the whole view of the scene.


CELDRYN MINAN'KHERUS: "You have forgotten us. But I will make you remember. I will dry the seas, I will poison the air, I will break the earth, I will burn the sacredness off of this world. I am Celdryn Minan'Kherus, Left Hand of All That Is Unholy, the Fairy Fay Prince of Hell's Garden. And I will bring the dissolution of existence with a kiss."

Before he could completely dominate the whole view of the scene, he explodes into a locust of sickly-looking butterflies that scatter in all directions. The cosmic horde lets out one final roar before the whole scene instantly turns into black.


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The Age of Miasma
The Promise of the Hydra
Coming soon..
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[Acadian]

Uleni, nice to see you writing! Lots of mystery and action here as the Tenacious Ten (starring our famous Boy Bosmer Ylenno) battle the Daedric hordes.

[Grits]

Fantastic teaser! Epic, indeed. I enjoyed the cinematic format. Ylenno’s bolt ride was my favorite touch. I’m looking forward to this!