Warring Room

"I mean, even with all this, we're still safe right? The Spire's defences render any invasion useless." Saya states, and a few people around the table nod.

"About that..." Michael speaks up, "They've got a Void Mage with them. An old enemy called Louise Valliere..."

"What's a Void Mage?" Ennura questions, never having heard of such a thing in either worlds.

"Essentially, it's a super mage or can bypass any barriers and unleash explosions larger than Megumin..." he states, getting an annoyed huff from the explosion-girl.

"Aye, that be the same girl who sent my tsunami back at us?" Kunkka asks.

Michael nods, "Yeah, the Spire won't do anything if she nukes it before the fight even starts. Don't forget they'll have thousands of mages with them, plus dragons and Surtr who's presumably been empowered by Miraak's soul."

"If she can bypass all barriers, how do we stop them from destroying the Spire? You said before that if it goes down Nirn's in big trouble..."

"Well, I kind of linked Akatosh's barrier with the Spire, they strengthen one another, but if one goes down so does the other... That'd allow just about every Daedric Prince to come on through and fuck everyone's day."

The listeners pale at that, "You mean you've risked all of Nirn to increase your own power?! We were fine before that blasted thing went up!"

Michael snorts, "No you weren't. Did none of you notice the Blood Moon and the Daedric Champions running around causing chaos? Or the Daedric Lords casually throwing Daedric Artifacts to random people? What about the vampires? Did all of you forget so easily? Stop blaming me for trying to fix things before they all fell apart and concentrate on keeping things functioning properly. Worst comes to worst, I abandon Nirn with all my buddies while hanging out drinking martinis and playing poker in my own realm."

Tiffania raises her hand as the Thane grumbles at his remark, "Erm, I could stop Louise from destroying the tower." she holds up Brimir's Prayerbook for show, "I know of a spell that nullifies any magic in an area. If I use it on the Spire she wouldn't be able to touch it."

A few people nod at the idea but Michael just shakes his head, "Nullifying magic means nullifying ALL magic. The tower will become inert and Akatosh's barrier will crumble all the same. I wouldn't be surprised if the Daedric Princes were waiting for a precise moment to invade."

Tiffania lets out a sigh at that ruined idea. "Then, I just need to cast it on Louise herself?" she offers.

"If we could get that chance, why wouldn't we just kill her there and then?" Michael retorts, "You stick to blowing up their armies, I'll try stop Louise if Anti-Mage and Silencer aren't able." he states.

"I thought Silencer was dead?" one man on the table asks.

Michael shrugs, "I can resurrect those I summon, while they're not technically undead, I do hold control of their souls instead of it inhabiting their bodies like usual. Before you ask, I'm not able to free them, even if I could I'd hold off on it until after the invasion, for insurance." he adds.

Ymir pokes him in the side and pats the table meaningfully, "Ah, right... Ymir and I have been playing with sand lately... In case I forget to mention it, she's a foreign god of Life and Creation or something like that-"

"Wha-at!?" Ennura exclaims, baffled, "You brought a god into the city without telling us!?"

"To be fair, none of you would have ever known if shit wasn't hitting the fan." he pokes Ymir in the cheek which has her pouting at him, "She's too cute to start causing trouble anyway."

"That's not what I mean-"

"ANYWAY. Ymir has the ability to bring to life any construction made of sand, we've been creating giant humanoids with it, but we need more hands to create something like, say, an army." he says, causing most people to lean forward in interest, "Not only that, we could construct a massive wall surrounding Winterhold out of these creatures, a wall strong enough to endure most spells and siege weapons they could throw. Even dragons would take a while to get through, without mentioning the living breathing giants waiting inside the walls."

"That sounds... Unbelievably convenient." Saya remarks, "Did you know this was coming?" she questions.

"Not really, I mean with Surtr I knew he'd come for me eventually, the self-righteous egotistically douchebag he is, but I didn't think he'd bring most of Tamriel with him." he shrugs.

Ennura looks down at the map and hums in thought, "Hmm, we could build the wall but that would still leave our port open to attack... The dragons too are an issue."

"The port'll be fine. What's left of our navy can take whatever that fake-dragon can cobble together." Kunkka states, "We all saw how stupid he is in matters concerning the sea, even if we start having trouble, the Spire'll be right there to take the pressure off."

"If I can't deal with Louise then I'll have Spectre do it for me, I think..." Michael offers.

"Spectre?"

"Ah, Mercurial, show yourself." he calls out, and behind him the purple shadowy figure manifests into existence behind him, her bright glowing blue eyes scanning the room. "This is Spectre, don't annoy her because she could probably take on a Daedric Prince for maybe a minute or two..."

...

"Were you just never going to reveal her existence? Or did you 'forget' again?"

"It'd be dumb to tell everyone about my bodyguard now, wouldn't it? Besides, I'm showing her now." he shakes his head, "Let's start working out the specific troop placements, and we should probably get started on titan construction immediately."