Level 35 going on 36 and still no dragon in the sky . . .
We finished the Dawnguard quest line, so that's done, and Serana's back at Fort Dawnguard. At some point I will go back and talk to her again, and maybe see if I can get the option to have her heal herself of vampirism. Not sure if that will come up again, and in any case Isran seems to have accepted her as part of the gang. So that's all well and good.
I made the mistake of "introducing" Vilja to Serana, and boy is she mean in her comments to Serana! I wish I had never done that! Sure, Vilja hates vampires, but Lady Cora has my approach when it comes to vampires - it's a case by case basis, especially considering the first vampire never asked for that "gift"! So chill, Vilja!
Anyway, Lady Cora now has 12 adopted cats, divided between four homes, and she loves coming home to their purring. She makes sure to pet every one of them when she enters the house, just to remind them that they belong there (not required by the mod, but just something she does). There's still a few stray cats to find out there in the world, so Lady Cora is still on the lookout for more.
Right now we are working through the quest line for the mod
Helgen Reborn. This is one of my favorite mods from Oldrim and I was happy to find that it has been ported to SE. It cleans up the ruins of Helgen, and makes it easier to navigate through the town from any of the gates (the gate from Falkreath road is normally closed off in the vanilla game, so you can't use the shorter route from Falkreath unless your mount is a mountain climber). This happens fairly early on in the quest line, so that's a godsend. You also get a keep as your personal home, and that's nice to have, too, though not really a necessary one with Lakeside so close. With Frostfall it's nice to pop in the restored town and have a place to warm up!
I've left both Vilja and Inigo at the Bards College in Solitude, since Vilja's next quest takes us to a site added by Helgen Reborn. Until we pick up that book, I figured it was time for just Lady Cora and Argis to spend time together training up guards and progressing the reconstruction of the town.
Oh, and Lady Cora finally found the Frost Spear spell that Valdimar has, and man, is it powerful! She really likes it and will look for a nice "skin" to have for her left hand for armor. Currently she is wearing light armor, and I can't remember if that is less of a hit to her magic skills compared to heavy armor (which doesn't suit her at all), but she has a few clothing options in stock that she can go back to. The nice thing about Frostfall is that she can take a clothing outfit and configure it to have the same warmth and coverage rating as her current armor (
Ranger's Armor, another favorite that I converted to SE).
At this time, she is using the Mages Amulet and Circlet to boost her magicka, but it's now so high that we are thinking of finding jewelry to boost her health instead. And of course, she has the Bond of Matrimony on her left hand, thanks to
Left Hand Rings Modified. She might make and enchant something in the meantime, but her enchanting is still low so that might not be as useful as something she might find in loot.
We still have so many unexplored places yet to enter, but since many of them are quest related we are careful about that. And the Dragon aeries that have the exterior dragon walls, we are looking for those and picking up those dragon shouts too.
Forgotten Vale was cool, and COLD! Lady Cora had to rely on her companions to do all the offensive since she had both hands full with warming spells just to keep going!
TL:DR: Still enjoying a dragon free Skyrim!