In Which Faanshi Slays a Necromancer and a Cruel Guardian

Continued the quest to get Faanshi the final few Stones of Barenziah. Primary actions: clearing Ansilvund, and then going after Grelod the Kind on behalf of Aventus Aretino.

Highlights

• Play date: 9/6/2022
• Session number in this run: 56
• Started off outside of Ansilvund
• Threw storm atronachs at the exterior conjurer; that went well, and by well I mean explosively; the atronachs took her out inside the tower just across from the ansilvund entrance
• Then started running Ansilvund in earnest
• Lots of dremora and atronach summoning; got in potshots or sword swings when necessary, if opponents got close enough
• No particular real impediments to running the place, though a couple of odd bits, see below
• Wound up forgetting the Ghostblade at the end of the dungeon, but i got the Unusual Gem which was the important part 😉
• i think this may also have meant that i missed seeing the grateful ghosts of Holgeir and Fjori? i never saw them
• Boinged to Windhelm after that, because overloaded and needed to offload some loot
• Sold a bunch of things to Oengul, Niranye, and Nurelion
• Broke into the Aretino residence to talk to Aventus; got his contract to take out Grelod
• Boinged to Riften, sent Jordis home to Heljarchen for now
• Went into the Thieves Guild and sold more things to Tonilia and Flagon merchants
• Did a little alchemy but couldn’t quite make it up to level 60
• Went back topside and boinged to Honningbrew; sold a bunch of staves to Mallus
• Boinged into Whiterun and did a small amount of jewelry smithing at Warmaiden’s
• That finally boinged me up to 60; took Stamina bump and Poisoned perk in Pickpocket
• Nightingale’d up and infiltrated the orphanage
• Slipped weak poison into Grelod’s pocket to take her out
• Cue the kids rejoicing and poor Constance flipping out
• Got back out of the place and darted back to Honeyside
• Slept the night; did not get taken by the Brotherhood yet, because right, they actually have to send me the note first saying they know
• Saved for the night

Commentary

A couple of minor out of the ordinary bits, running Ansilvund this time.

First, while I did take out Holgeir and Fjori, I did not wind up seeing their grateful ghosts appear. This may or may not have been because Lu’ah al-Skaven actually ran off back into an earlier stretch of the dungeon, possibly because of being pursued by the rest of Team Dragonborn.

I wound up having to backtrack to actually find her and take her out. Which took a bit of doing, since she made it out past the part where the fire traps and the swinging spike trap were! And I think perhaps because I didn’t kill her in the boss chamber, this might have meant I missed seeing the ghosts?

I also totally forgot about the Ghostblade, though I kept thinking even as I was running the place that there was something at the end that had slipped my mind. But I didn’t go back to fetch it, even after I reminded myself what it was by looking up Ansilvund’s wiki page. Oops.

Didn’t really care enough about the Ghostblade to go back and fetch it, really. It’s not like I’ve used it in any prior run, or like I’d use it in this one! It can stay at rest with Holgeir and Fjori.

And after all, the real thing I was after was the Stone of Barenziah, which I did indeed secure. 😀

Latter half of the session was all about queuing up taking out the Dark Brotherhood.

Interesting to think about how exactly the narrative plays, this time through. I’m tempted by the idea that maybe Jordis actually prompts Faanshi to go check out what the kid is actually doing? Or that perhaps they talk about it together. Because they’ve kept hearing that the kid is trying to summon the Dark Brotherhood, and now that Faanshi’s adopted at least one child, perhaps she’s feeling a little bit of sympathy for the idea that a kid alone and frightened might need help.

I could easily see Jordis even suggesting that they try to go help get the kid to safety, or at least find out what’s going on with him. And when they get into the house and hear what the kid actually is trying to accomplish, they could have had quite the conversation about that.

Jordis: “My thane… you can’t be seriously considering doing what this boy is asking for?”

Me: “The Mother Cat does not look kindly upon a caretaker who is cruel to her charges. This one must see the truth with her own eyes. If this Grelod is as evil as the cub has said, then it would be my duty to attend to it. But Khajiit must be certain first.”

Jordis: “Why not tell the guards in Riften?”

Me: “You forget this one’s position in Riften–and that it would be unwise to come to the attention of the guards any more than absolutely required.”

Jordis, uncomfortably: “Oh… right. But you’re Guild. You aren’t Brotherhood. What if the Brotherhood hears of this?”

Me: “Khajiit will follow that path when she reaches it.”

Jordis: “You’ll at least let me follow it with you?”

Me: “Not for now, bold one. Return to Heljarchen. For your own safety you should not know what this one am doing.”

Jordis: “I don’t like the idea of leaving you unguarded, my thane.”

Me: “Khajiit will be fine. Wait for me in Heljarchen. This one will contact you when the deed is done, one way or the other.”

And just to shake things up a bit from previous playthroughs, I decided I’d take out Grelod this time by putting poison in her inventory. Which required me to level up first so I could take the relevant perk.

Getting in and out of the orphanage was trivial, though, what with an easily castable Invisibility spell! I actually got spotted by a guard close to Honeyside, when she crossed my path close enough that I could have pickpocketed her. LOL. Came out of Sneak just to be safe, and don’t even remember which random line she gave me. I figure Faanshi was rather miffed at how the guard actually saw her.

Heh. Just wait until the Dark Brotherhood nabs her.

Next time

I was still in Honeyside, so it’s going to be interesting to see if a courier will find me as soon as I emerge into Riften!

I’m thinking I’ll just need to boing to Heljarchen, to rendezvous with Jordis. And I can get kidnapped by the Dark Brotherhood from there!

Screenshots

No screenshots this time.