Ghosts of Dunstad,
Another battle has come and gone, further determining the grisly fate of the Stormcloak Rebellion. A ferocious escapade, you fought valiantly to the end, your misplaced hearts fueling a dedicated service against an insurmountable force. Many of you lost your lives by my hand, chopped to pieces and shouted down staircases, sent to tumble like uncoordinated babies attempting to visit the second floor. I stand now before your bodies, your scattered husks, and hang my head in solitude.
It dawns on me at this late hour, that I know not your names. First name or family name, I know neither. I only know the name of that which you have given your last breath for, failing to even learn the area you have descended from. Farmer or city-dweller? Riften or Windhelm? Your bodies, clothed in blue and helmeted fully around the skull, I cannot see. But faceless soldiers you are, expendable creatures dispatched by a madman traitor with honeyed words and knack for blowing hot air.
And now the snow descends. It blankets your corpses and nestles around you, the cold embrace of mortality binding you back into the soils. You are Skyrim’s children, and she is bringing you home. Your blood spilled here, blemishing this isolated rock of frost and misery, will soon fade away. Covered by the sparkling snow of millions of falling flakes, all will be forgotten in time. Only the tales of the survivors will hold. Only the words of those who lived will remain, spreading far and wide, and then time, ultimately, shall seize them too, beckoning them forth back into the soil.
My brothers, someday I shall see you once more in Sovngarde. We shall meet, and we shall drink and talk of Fort Dunstad. We’ll laugh madly like poor Cicero while we barrage our bellies with pork and grilled leeks. Like old friends, you soldiers and I will speak of how I brained you, how I decapitated you, and how I impaled a poor maiden who wore the wrong uniform that day (she shouldn’t have been out earning a hard day’s pay milking cows). Chuckling in a drunken stupor, there shall be no hard feelings kept or tears shed, even as we speak of how I berated your corpses, disillusioned on Skooma, for lying about like useless logs.
Some of you may have had children and wives, brothers and sisters, who were cast out on the streets like homeless wretches because they couldn’t afford their bills, but that’s all gone now. In time, the snow shall blanket them too. Though they may suffer because of your blind loyalty, you have earned your keep. Dear brethren, you have earned your eternal reward of never-ending food and drink, all because you violently raised arms for another’s name. War is a gateway into an Oblivion gate for all who are affected and survive, but it reaps a bounty unmatched by any other form of death for those who feel the blade of defeat.
See you in Sovngarde,
Cornelius G. Thundercock
Posts Tagged With: Imperial Legion
Found in Fort Dunstad
Ghosts of Dunstad,
Another battle has come and gone, further determining the grisly fate of the Stormcloak Rebellion. A ferocious escapade, you fought valiantly to the end, your misplaced hearts fueling a dedicated service against an insurmountable force. Many of you lost your lives by my hand, chopped to pieces and shouted down staircases, sent to tumble like uncoordinated babies attempting to visit the second floor. I stand now before your bodies, your scattered husks, and hang my head in solitude.
It dawns on me at this late hour, that I know not your names. First name or family name, I know neither. I only know the name of that which you have given your last breath for, failing to even learn the area you have descended from. Farmer or city-dweller? Riften or Windhelm? Your bodies, clothed in blue and helmeted fully around the skull, I cannot see. But faceless soldiers you are, expendable creatures dispatched by a madman traitor with honeyed words and knack for blowing hot air.
And now the snow descends. It blankets your corpses and nestles around you, the cold embrace of mortality binding you back into the soils. You are Skyrim’s children, and she is bringing you home. Your blood spilled here, blemishing this isolated rock of frost and misery, will soon fade away. Covered by the sparkling snow of millions of falling flakes, all will be forgotten in time. Only the tales of the survivors will hold. Only the words of those who lived will remain, spreading far and wide, and then time, ultimately, shall seize them too, beckoning them forth back into the soil.
My brothers, someday I shall see you once more in Sovngarde. We shall meet, and we shall drink and talk of Fort Dunstad. We’ll laugh madly like poor Cicero while we barrage our bellies with pork and grilled leeks. Like old friends, you soldiers and I will speak of how I brained you, how I decapitated you, and how I impaled a poor maiden who wore the wrong uniform that day (she shouldn’t have been out earning a hard day’s pay milking cows). Chuckling in a drunken stupor, there shall be no hard feelings kept or tears shed, even as we speak of how I berated your corpses, disillusioned on Skooma, for lying about like useless logs.
Some of you may have had children and wives, brothers and sisters, who were cast out on the streets like homeless wretches because they couldn’t afford their bills, but that’s all gone now. In time, the snow shall blanket them too. Though they may suffer because of your blind loyalty, you have earned your keep. Dear brethren, you have earned your eternal reward of never-ending food and drink, all because you violently raised arms for another’s name. War is a gateway into an Oblivion gate for all who are affected and survive, but it reaps a bounty unmatched by any other form of death for those who feel the blade of defeat.
See you in Sovngarde,
Cornelius G. Thundercock
Found in Tullius’ Quarters
General Tullius,
I pity androgynous beasts like Ulfric Stormcloak and you. Two grown men with puffed up chests and elegant outfits fighting over a crown? While it has a more masculine-sounding name, ‘Jagged Crown’, and is wrought with a milieu of phallic horns jutting from the base to position itself as a manly dinner-wear item, it still is merely a crown – a piece of jewelry to daintily adorn the tender skull. Yet, you and Ulfric would both send men to die for this vanity piece?
Soldiers lay on the damp stone of a forgotten catacomb, shivering for hours as they bleed out slowly, their bodies oozing out every last drop of essence while their souls wisp slowly away through their breath. These men, waiting to pass on to Sovngarde, listen to the screams of their fellow brothers for seemingly an eternity, ears attuned to the clashing of metal and the shrieking of severance from this world. Growing cold. Oh so cold. Merely so you can look at yourself in a mirror. So you can place that jewelry atop your head like some sort of theatre dandy.
I’ve brought your crown, Tullius. You and Legate Rikke can play virginal princess and muscular stable boy now. While Rikke uses her strong farm hands in your silly games, just know, dear general, that there are men still coughing up their last gargling bursts of blood. As she unsheathes you from your slender, curve-hugging dress, her forehead beading with laborious man sweat, know that good soldiers still whimper in the dark, dripping frost of some forgotten hold, begging Arkay for mercy from an endless anguish. Arrows piercing their knees, they muster what little strength they have left and crawl toward the entryway. Nails clawing against stone, these men whittle their fingers down to bone as they seek the light of day, carrying on forward in futility.
There is no respite for the expendable soldier, not while you clink goblets with your betrothed commander. Should you desire another piece of apparel, I shall roundly refuse. No more brave warriors need die for you to make yourself glimmering and sparkling like Elisif the Fair. Feminine beauty comes from within, Tullius. Aye. Every half-wit knows that.
For the Empire,
Cornelius G. Thundercock
