4.29

Whether it was because they were intimidated by my fight with Maarbrom, curious about my powers or genuinely interested in Sarah's talent, the College of Winterhold quickly made everything very convenient for us, giving us a private room as well as access to the entire faculty.

Not one to take advantage of others… well, I suppose I am, but facing such a warm welcome I felt like I had to give them something, which was why I was on my way to the Hall of the Elements. The fact that exchanging about magic was in my interests was purely coincidental, of course.

However, barely did I open the gates of the Hall of the Elements, where Arch-Mage Savos Aren, Master Wizard Tolfdir and Mirabelle Ervine were waiting for me, that I was greeted by a tall High Elf wearing different robes from everyone in the college.

"Are you the one named Alexander?"

Greetings maybe wasn't the best choice of words, seeing the antagonistic tone the haughty High Elf used to address me. Eyeing him through Shuten Doji's Mask, I mused, "You must be Ancano."

The High Elf, who was unmistakably Ancano, easily the most annoying individual in the College, and whom I personally rate as worst than even Nazeem, seemed pleased he was recognized, probably thinking his name had spread.

He remained haughty however as he proclaimed, "For breaking the levitation act on multiple occasions and causing substantial damage to the city of Winterhold, I act on behalf of the Thalmor, the Aldmeri Dominion and the Empire, and put you, Alexander of Skyrim, under arrest."

The nearby students of the College, as well as Savos Aren and the two Master Wizards, watched the haughty Ancano with wide eyes.

A little surprised myself, I asked, "Did you not see me kill a dragon?"

Ancano faltered a little as I raised my hand, but still said, "There are no excuses to break the Levitation Act. Of course, I am magnanimous, and would be willing to hear your plea."

So… corruption. I have to say, although I remembered him as arrogant, this was beyond my wildest imagination.

Raising a finger, Ancano was sent flying into the ceiling. Then, with another wave of my hand, I splattered him on the stone ground of the Hall of the Elements.

Savos looked on with wide eyes, before gulping, "That… that was an agent of the Thalmor."

I nodded, "It was. If they try to find trouble with you, tell them the truth. It had nothing to do with you and trying to attack me would have been a foolish way to add to the casualties."

Savos' mouth still hung open as he muttered, "But still…"

I knew that technically, I had fucked up a thing or two, especially since Ancano is such a large part of the College's quest line, but that was something the Dragonborn would have to figure out for himself since neither Sarah nor I would have anything to do with it.

Pinching two fingers together, I compressed Ancano's remains into a ball of flesh and blood, mixed with his Thalmor robes, "Sorry for the mess. I'll be right back."

I quickly stepped outside, and threw it as far as I could into the Sea of Ghosts, passing over the academy.

"So, about this exchange?"

---

Needless to say, people were on tenterhooks around me for the couple of days I passed in the College. I heard the Thalmor would be coming to investigate, as news of what I had done had inevitably spread. But by the time they arrived in Winterhold, I was already gone for my quest.

There are 43 Word Walls in Skyrim, spread all across the region of Skyrim. It took quite some effort, but I managed to visit all 43 of them in 85 days, which I considered to be quite good.

It wasn't really the travel time that took that long though, but my meditations on the stones.

In my first visit, not taking my second mission into account, I had traveled to the Bleak Falls Barrow and cleared it, and meditated upon the Word Wall there. But I was quite inexperienced back then, and only was able to scrap the surface, which was why I didn't have to spend much time in front of it.

But now that I was so much more skilled in the Force, I spent between 12 and 16 hours in front of each of the Word Walls, although this time I was able to absorb all the knowledge there was to be found.

Something I had feared about the Word Walls was that some of them would only give me useless knowledge, as it didn't look like some words could really be recreated through the Force, but I was pleasantly surprised to find that everything I learned was useful.

Of course, I couldn't replicate every shout, but everything I understood from those walls served a purpose, to allow me to better understand the world, and thus increase my connection to the Force.

Those Word Walls were always well protected however, and not only had me give some effort to reach them, but also allowed me to unleash my inner hoarder.

Equipped with the Expendable Bag, I no longer had to restrain myself as I grabbed every potion and enchanted item I found, resulting in quite the pile.

I also killed a few dragons, although I didn't take their corpses with me as I'm pretty sure they are pieces of time itself, so by extension of Akatosh the God of Time, and I didn't really want his attention on me either by stealing parts of him.

Besides, it's not like I did not earn anything from those dragons as I stole their lifeforces too, sealing them in Force Seeds that were still in my body.

I hadn't absorbed a single one of them because that would take a lot of time, but that had actually ended up benefiting my research as I found something peculiar about those Force Seeds while they were sealed in my body.

The first thing, which I already expected, was that the seals were slowly loosening up within me. That was easily solved by my strengthening the seals.

The other thing I discovered, and did not expect, was that even with the seal, the lifeforce sealed and my lifeforce could actually still somewhat influence themselves.

It wasn't by much, and I didn't know the reason yet, but as the days passed the dragons' lifeforce were slowly turning more and more similar to mine. But at the same time, my own lifeforce was being slightly influenced by the dragons, becoming more draconic as time passed. Actually, I'm pretty sure I can't be considered 100% human anymore.

A normal person would probably be horrified they were slowly losing their humanity, no matter how slight that change was, but I couldn't help but feel a little excited as I started feeling the effects of this transformation.

The more dragon I was, the easier it was to incorporate their powers. And as beings so closely related to the World, becoming more draconic actually allowed me to grow closer to the Force.

For now, it was mostly inconsequential, but that could lead to interesting opportunities in the future.

Sadly, however, even as I cleared all the crypts and dragon-guarded Word Walls, I did not complete any potential mission, like I had when I cleared Bleak Falls Barrow. I suppose that makes sense, considering Draugrs' did not really represent much of a threat to me, even the strongest ones, but that was still a little disappointing.

Yet, I did still complete one potential mission, and this one I had not even meant to.

[Congratulations for finishing a potential mission ahead of time by visiting all 13 Standing Stones. Rewarded with Double Blessing.]

Unexpectedly, I had been granted a perk rather than an artefact, and I must say, I quite liked it. And having visited all of them, I got to choose which ones I wanted this time.

[Blessing of the Lover Stone: All skills improve 15% faster.]

This one was an enhanced version of the Mage Stone in my opinion, as although it had 5% less speed, it covered everything, meaning my talent in everything had been improved by 15%, instead of 20% for Magic skills.

As for the second one, I hesitated between two.

[Blessing of the Lord Stone: Resist 25% of all incoming damage.]

[Blessing of the Atronach Stone: Absorb 50% of all incoming spells, Mental Capacity +50, Magic regenerates 50% slower.]

The Atronach Stone would truly turn me into an unkillable entity against mages, and since most energy attacks were considered magic, that would give me a great resistance to most enemies. However, I already Tutaminis from the Force, and the debuff was a little too steep for me. Just for training, this would make things much more complicated.

That's why I ended up taking the Lord Stone Blessing. Although the magic resistance was lower and didn't allow me to absorb the incoming spells, the resistance applied to all incoming damage.

Not only was the 'all' part important, but also the 'damage' part, as for example, healing spells should be considered spells too, so a part of me feared that taking the Atronach Stone Blessing would also weaken every buff and healing spell by half.