For those of you wondering, this is going to be a Taloslocke. I’ve never seen one of these done, so I think I’m somewhat creating my own thing. A Taloslocke is very much like a nuzlocke from the Pokemon fandom. A Taloslocke is a predetermined set of rules that I have to follow to make the base Oblivion game a lot more challenging. These are the rules I’m setting.
1. If my character dies at any point, he is done. I have to delete my save and start over.
2. I must chronicle all parts of my character’s journey, from cell to death, and all points inbetween.
3. I must purchase potions to heal myself; no using magic.
4. I can’t do any hacks or glitches. It has to be totally legit.
5. If I gain infamy, I cannot pray at an altar (besides the Knights of the Nine expansion) to restore my infamy.
6. I must play the game at the hardest setting possible. Changing the difficulty is not allowed.

7. I cannot use inns to store goods. I can only use houses I have purchased.
8. If I turn into a vampire, I must either A.) drink a potion before it’s too late or B.) stay as a vampire for the rest of the game.

These are the rules I have set for myself to make the game a tiny increment harder. So, without further ado, let’s begin this The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Taloslocke! If this gets a good enough reaction, I might do a Radlocke for Fallout 3 or New Vegas, or even a Doomlocke for Doom and Doom 2!




Chapter I
Jail

“Strotharr, are you done hefting that baggage?” A voice hissed right beside me. The night was illuminated by hundreds of fireflies, and the stench of mud and dew could be smelled from anywhere. Moonlight shone upon my band of Argonians, but only a time fraction. The moon shunned intruders like us, and tonight was no different. It dare not cast its full wrath upon us. Heavy drops of rain splattered all around us, wetting our clothes and staining our cargo. The coldness of that particular night was amplified by the wetness consuming us. The sky was not a forgiving neighbor.

“What do you mean?” Another voice growled, undoubtedly Strotharr’s. It was farther back than the first voice, which meant that he was getting weighed down considerably. He could tell exactly where he was, amid the rain and the fog, because his feet made an awful sloshing sound as it travelled through the mud. The trees gnarled at us, their limbs raking us and drawing petty amounts of red fluid from inside of us. Their contorted visage made us feel like an unearthly presence was all around us, laughing, scolding us from afar. Indeed, it seemed that the whole travel had suddenly pitched its way from the Black Marsh to the deepest pits of Oblivion, where light ceased to search and creatures haunted throughout.

“What I mean is that you are slowing us down.” The voice beside me clicked. A heavy thump could be heard from behind us, along with exasperated breathing and the sudden stop of the sloshing.
“Fine! You take it, tra’sacharr!” My companion cursed in his native tongue. After he himself cursed a few times, my second companion ordered me to stop and to wait for him to retrieve the carriage. I did as I was told. I did not want to unleash my companion’s fury.

“We are near, very near, to the border of Black Marsh and Cyrodiil,” Strotharr said behind us. He strode with long steps, eager to catch up with us. My other comrade, although hefting a relatively heavy bit of shipment, was still in step with me. It was painfully obvious that Strotharr wasn’t fit to be with our crew. He was, as he said, the anchor of our time. What he didn’t realize was an anchor is a dead weight which impedes progress. Although I despised him, I did not wish upon Strotharr my master’s wrath.

“Wow, when did you find that out? Daddy tell you that?” The voice beside me hissed. The strain of the weight was obvious in his voice, and, although he didn’t want to admit it, was a bit much for him to handle. After this remark, a snarl of frustration left Strotharr’s maw, and then silence resumed. For a long while, it seemed like all there was was silence. The night was silent, the critters and birds had stopped, and the only sound was the rain hitting the ground and the mud slopping all over us. Although we both admitted that Strotharr was an imbecile, he was correct in his reasoning; we were very near the border.

The next thing I remember happened in a dream-like state. I tripped over something—what I tripped over still eludes me—and landed on my stomach. I voiced a bit of frustration, but got up and resumed along my journey. I didn’t realize that something insidious had happened. Pure adrenaline, I suppose had taken over. My comrades were visibly shocked from what I could see in the waning moon’s light. They looked at me with horrified expressions, but they didn’t slow their pace. I wanted to ask them what had happened, but I was unable to. I couldn’t find my voice.

After a few more minutes of terrified stares, a sharp pain hit me from my stomach. I grunted from the impact of the sudden pain, and I hesitated to go on. My ribs, my stomach, and back hurt like nothing I had ever experienced before. There was a burning sensation throughout, so powerful it brought me to all fours, beating with a clenched fist on the muddy ground of the marsh. Strotharr and my master stopped after hearing this, then turned back to face me. Their faces were hideous. Their speech I could not make out. My vision and hearing became steadily more and more distorted, until everything felt like a dream. My mind raced to piece together what had happened to me, until it finally told me to look down. So I did.

A sabre had been jammed inside of me, right in the abdomen. The tool of malice was so long that it had jutted out of my back. Just below my ribcage, the evil instrument shining unnaturally at me. My blood dripped from its handle, and an odd green color was also present throughout. At first, I thought my blade had touched some boggy material in the swamp, and then when I tripped it sliced through me. However, when the sharpness became more and more evident, I realized that it had been set up. My blade had been coated with a poison so strong that it made my stomach churn, and it had been deliberately tampered with so I would fall right onto it. No doubt, although I had no evidence, my own colleagues tripped me.

Their voices hazy, I was unable to pick out anything my comrades said. I had heard laughter, of that I am sure, and the words ‘weight,’ ‘justice,’ and ‘evidence.’ Slowly my world began to fade around me. I gestured weakly for help, although they provided none. This information alone set in stone that they had organized that I be killed by my own blade. When the authorities find my body, they won’t think anyone killed me; they’ll just think another would-be adventurer fell on his blade and bled out to death. They would contact my family, and no mention would be made of foul play. A clever plot.

With my vision steadily turning worse and worse and my hearing practically void, my colleagues left me. My master was still carrying the loot, and Strotharr was in tow. I was going to die. I knew I was going to die. If my soul would leave this world, so be it. I remember… I remember a grave acceptance of my fate, that there was no hope in the world for me. And so, with the darkness finally setting in, I let go.

When I woke up, I was in an unfamiliar area. As soon as I rose, a piercing pain came from my abdomen, an undeniable pain so tough that it took away my breath. I couldn’t breathe for a split second, and when my lungs finally worked again, I felt an empty sort of solace. I looked down at myself, trying to figure out why I had felt such an intense discomfort. My mind tried to recollect itself, drunk on the poison it had received a short while ago. All I could piece together at the time was that I was stabbed.

A large vertical slit was in my abdomen, right below the ribcage. It reeked of copper, and it had been sealed up with a mixture of coagulated blood and pus. No bandages were located anywhere. My body had received no medical attention, and if it did it was obviously very miniscule. Dried splotches of blood mottled my scales on my stomach, turning it from an enviable purple to a disgusting black. I also noticed that I had no shirt or shoes on. My previous garb was nowhere to be seen, discarded and forgotten. I was dressed in a filthy pair of breeches and the only other thing I had on were some rusty shackles.

After assessing my situation a bit hastily, I decided I had better look around as to where I was before I started pissing myself and making any poor decisions. The first thing I noticed was the rock. There was stone all around me, bricks of stone in every direction. They all formed a sort of lopsided, awkward square in which I was contained. Light bounced off of them from a torch located high up on the wall behind me, and below the torch was a tiny window which gave me some flimsy amount of sunlight. The window was barred, and I couldn’t escape through it if I wanted to.

Decorations of bones and skulls littered the floor around me, yellow and rotten. Disintegrated piles of whiteish-yellow ash were spread throughout the square, from the place I was lying near to the aforementioned window. Shackles made of the same rusty metal found on my wrist were on the walls, and with this note my heart started beating frantically. I was in a jail. I was in a cell.

As I rose to a semi-sitting stance, my stomach screaming in agony, I heard a distant voice call to me; a Dunmer, I realized.

“Hey, lizard! It must break your heart, huh? Being so close to the water, knowing you’ll never get to swim again… You know, sometimes, when they let us in the yard, you can hear the sounds from the lake. The boats, the gulls. So close… No, you’ll never get to swim again, Argonian. But don’t worry, you’ll be dead soon enough. That’s right. You’re going to die in here! Hey, you hear that? The guards are coming… for you!” And with the last remark, he uttered a hideous laugh. As my eyes adjusted lazily, I saw that an arched doorway was close by, with a cell door separating me from the outside world. Directly across from me stood another cell, identical to mine, which housed a Dunmer.

His words enraged me. The way he spoke was cruel and villainous, with a strong hint of malice. He knew that what he was saying was frustrating me. At this a smile, disgusting and vile, spread across his face, and he performed a queer dance—if it can be called that—of joy. However, nothing I could do would let me at him. Instinctively, I reached for my waist, only to find that my trusty cutlass wasn’t there. Enraged further, I got up from my roost and walked to the cell door, pain rippling through my upper body. I gripped the bars of the cell door and looked directly into the Dunmer’s eyes.

Sensing the hatred in them, he backed away, the smile gone. However, I had no further time to be frustrated. There were, indeed, steps echoing down the corridors. I could hear faint voices that got stronger as they went. From what I could hear, a minor argument was going on.

“Baurus! Lock that door behind us.” This voice belonged to a female, a Breton if I had to guess. It had an air of sophistication to it that only a Breton could produce. However, while it sounded feminine and superior, it also sounded possessive and commanding.

“Yessir.” This voice was fainter, but I knew immediately it belonged to a Redguard. He spoke with the same slight urgency as the last woman. This voice was obviously the one known as Baurus.

“My sons… they’re dead, aren’t they?” A feeble voice rang out. It was old and haggard, and belonged to an Imperial. You can never really forget the voice of an Imperial; there isn’t any way to describe an Imperial’s voice especially, but when you hear it, you’ll know it. This man was an Imperial.

“We don’t know that, Sire,” At this, I noticed a woman, clad in an odd sort of armour, rounding a staircase. I never noticed the staircase before; it blended into the background of the drab grey stone and didn’t do anything particular to stand out. My suspicions, however, became correct when I saw the speaker: a Breton woman, sword on her hip and the gait of a committed woman in her step. “The messenger only said they were attacked.”
“No, they’re dead. I know it.” At the same time as the feeble voice a guard came, dressed in the same queer armour the Breton woman was in. This one was the Redguard. This one was Baurus, dominating and brutish. He stood in front of my cell, looking at me with a mixture of confusion and disgust. I narrowed my eyes at him, unsure of what was going to happen. He had a menacing looking blade on his hip as well. I didn’t like the looks of this.

“My job right now is to get you to safety.” The Breton spoke once more. She appeared in front of my cell, animating as if out of thin air. Closely in tow behind her was the old man, and his appearance unnerved me. Rather than a haggard-looking beggar, who I thought they were escorting, was actually a refined fellow. His face was lined and creased with wrinkles of all sorts, and his robes, colorful in design and function, flowed behind him with flair. Of course, only an Imperial would wear robes this tacky. Mage’s robes aren’t this colorful, so this one was different.

“What’s this prisoner doing here? This cell is supposed to be off-limits.” The Breton woman stopped talking and looked at me, the same mixture of emotions present on her face as Baurus’. The Redguard looked at her a bit deflated. I bet he was hoping she knew why I was placed in here. At these words, my curiosity piqued. Maybe they were here to rescue me. Maybe this was all just a grave misunderstanding, and I was innocent, and they had come to take me out. Of course, I’m not sure why such ceremonious-looking armour was required. And that didn’t explain the man with the flowing robes.

“Usual mixup with the Watch, I…” Baurus spoke hesitantly. He didn’t get a word in edgewise before the Breton cut him off.
“Nevermind… get that gate open.” The Breton woman sounded a bit distressed, and obviously didn’t want any of this getting in her way. She was on a mission, of course. A rather important one, too. The Redguard complied with the Breton’s commands and produced a key, pressing it to my cell door. My heart leaped with joy and I could feel my pulse getting quicker. As he went to turn it, he stopped.
“Stand back, prisoner. We won’t hesitate to kill you if you get in our way.” The Breton said. I moved away a bit eagerly, and then the Redguard finished opening the cell. I had to stand under the window, my back against the wall, if they wanted to come in. They didn’t demand much. Seeing me in this state probably wouldn’t induce fear into anyone. Besides, being the bigots the Watch were, they probably thought that Argonians were weak anyways, having to rely on trickery and darkness to perform their deeds. Baurus and the Breton entered, and after a moment’s hesitation, the Imperial followed as well.
“No sign of pursuit, sir.” A different Redguard voice echoed. This startled me, as I thought only the three were there.
“Stay put, prisoner.” Baurus commanded, guarding me from leaving the cold embrace of the wall. He stood directly in front of me, his bulky figure blotting out what little light I had present.

“Good. Let’s go. We’re not out of this yet.” The Breton woman said as she proceeded towards me as well. My heart, originally joyful, was now full of fear. I had no clue what I had done to provoke these strangers. I didn’t remember much, but what I did remember had no details of a crime. My eyes were trained on their blades, never leaving them. I hoped they wouldn’t unsheathe them. Is that what they were here for? To cut me down and kill me? I felt queasy and nauseous all of a sudden.

The old man followed the Breton woman, and as he did so, said, “You!... I’ve seen you!” He paused, and came closer to me. His eyes, I noticed, were a magnificent shade of blue. “Let me see your face…You are the one from my dreams… Then the stars were right. Gods give me strength.”