A most interesting encounter, High Rock, 4th Era

I have spent my life in search of knowledge. Selfish knowledge, learnedness unto itself. And I have always taken pride in investigating the mysteries of Nirn alone, relying on the simple strength of my wit and tenacity of my spirit. But the most important piece of wisdom was gifted to me by a stranger, apparently by chance.

I was in High Rock, resting from my travels in the West in a tavern; its main hall was spacious, with long beams of oak, turned black by years of smoke, half hidden in the darkness unexplored by the hearth-light, which shone from an alcove in the red brick wall. My table was oak also, shiny where many hands, mugs and flagons had rubbed at its surface. But the thing that struck me most was a man, dare I say a man? for such he obviously was not, with his ever-changing eyes, from green to red to purple to white, and his feral grin, more alike to a Khajiit than any civilized race of Tamriel, who stared at me from a table, far along the hall.

He had been looking at me for quite a while, and I couldn't help staring back, for his glance pulled me in, hypnotized me, like a cat with a mouse. I did not know why, of course, but I was extremely curious; being the man of study I am, an academic, if you will, though enamored with the field, I did not dare make the first move.

In fact, not too long after sundown, he came to me, still wearing his beastlike smile. We had evidently never met before - I would have remembered such an individual - but he asked, with an almost rhetorical tone, if I was Sundaril Hlaalu, the scholar of the Imperial Library. I, amused, my curiosity ever rising, nodded. Still displaying his crooked smirk, he sat at the squeaky chair in front of me, then crossed his legs and clasped his chin, his right elbow on the table, his other hand on his lap. Still smiling. And he stayed, looking me in the eye, for what seemed hours.

Then, suddenly, his smile fell, and his eyes became of the deepest black. I could now see his face for what it truly was: haughty, with a small mouth and long nose; he was an almost perfect median between Man and Mer. Not a cross-breed like the Bretons, no, nor a sculpted Altmer eccentric. He was eerily un-placeable, a creature beyond time, borders and memory.

He spoke.

"I have seen things you mortals have not even dreamed of. I've seen flowers grow in Atmora, rivers flow upwards in Aldmeris. I have coasted the shores of Lyg, and I have bathed amongst the reeds of Pyandonea. I have watched Perfection age, and Eternity dwindle. I know the secrets of Mundus, its birth, its death, its people. This is why I am here. You beings of passing often ask yourselves how everything started. Why you are here. I'll have you know you are all a mistake: Man and Elf were not to be apart from Beast and Dragon, Tree or Lizard. But such it is not.

At first the Gods came to being from All and Nothing. Such is the way of things. All is Nothing, and Nothing is All, when they are apart. But together they are Disparity. They are Possibility, and Variation. Many gods came to life, first of all Time, or Akatosh, for you. And the first thing that time did was to stop himself, for he did not want to become Nothing again. From Possibility infinite forms came into being, though you remember only a few: Mara, the Kind; Magnus, the Crafty; Dibella, the Fair; Kynareth, the Ever Mobile; Stendarr, who Thought Himself Wisest; Julianos, the Thorough; Arkay, the Feared Second-Come; Zenithar, the Diligent. These are for you the Eight Divines, the Aedra, the 'protectors of the sentient races of Tamriel', and they have now but a shimmer of their past radiance. Then, there was also Lorkhan, the Brave. He thought being an infinity encased in Infinity was rather dull, and conversed with the other gods, suggesting they make something grand and Endfull, so different to their Endlessness, together. Some agreed, some didn't, for they reveled in their infinity. Dibella created the frame of Mundus, a perfect sfere, so beautiful and clear. Julianos made sure there were no edges. Meanwhile Akatosh and Magnus deviced the workings of their great creation, the Wheels of Lull; more specifically, the latter created the whole mechanism, while Akatosh made the Centrepiece, the largest of the wheels, its axis running through the poles, which imprinted a rotation to all the other cogs. When they came to covering the frame, Kynareth formed a shell of water, then of air, to keep the liquid from escaping; she then breathed part of her strength into water and air, letting them move freely within their Endfull bounds.

So was Kynareth the first to lose some power in the Creation.

Lorkhan the brave suggested the gods create something solid, on which mortals could rest. Zenithar forged therefore a cap of rock, which rested on the World-frame. But the Wheels were unstable, and time was unstable: most gods - all except Time, in fact - experienced age, and did not like it. They tried to balance Mundus by extending the land down towards the equator, the line which divided the World-sphere in half, but only made matters worse. Stendarr suggested destroying the whole creation, thinking all was lost; Mara reassured Magnus, saying it wasn't too bad; but Julianos the Thorough took the Land and copied it, identical, on the opposite pole.

And finally Mundus was sound.

Akatosh, though, thought more measures were need: so the first Being was created. His name is lost in shame, and he is simply referred to as the Bearer. He was stationed on the northern pole, and was tasked with holding the Axis pf the Wheels. A mighty creature he was, of stalwart strength.

Thus began the Creation of Beings, and from the start the gods convened on equality, that which they lacked so profoundly since the union of All and Nothing. They filled all the Land with creatures, created together by all the gods. Lorkhan gave them Bravery and Curiosity, the traits to be his downfall.

So fixed were the gods on filling each and every available space with beings, that they put some even close to the Bearer. And here the Imperfections of the Project began to transpire.

The Axis was connected directly to the Centrepiece, thus blocking it and not permitting time to flow. But, if the Great Wheel had been set free, the gods would have noticed that the closer one got to its rim, the faster time flew. All rested on the Bearer, who, although strong and proud, could almost bare his task no longer.

The gods were ready to relieve the Bearer of his job, when, all of a sudden, something stirred in the deepest recesses of one of the newly - although speaking of new in an era without time is paradoxical - created beings. In fact, Lorkhan's traits were strong in this one, and, coincidently, he was birthed next to the Bearer. And, seeing a creature of such magnitude, being full of Bravery and Curiosity, the First Man, for such he was, could find no reason not to touch the Bearer.

This made the Bearer lose his grip on the Axis.

The Centrepiece jerked into motion, ripping the Land into great craggy chunks, the Axis free to swivel like a maddened spinning top. The gods were also shattered, and flung back into Infinity, or Aetherius, as you know it; but they still had the time to blame Lorkhan for their losses, leaving him on Nirn and ripping his heart out, to be forever cursed. But were they truly entitled to blaming him? The First Man would not have awoken, were it not for Kynareth's breath, infusing him with life. Without Arkay, that breath would have ended instantly. Without Julianos the First Man would have not followed through with his Curiosity. All the gods had a part in creating the beings, but Lorkhan was the 'easy way out'.

Now, as I said before, the Axis shifted violently. But, for an instant, so small it was very close to nothing, time still behaved as it would have before, with it running infinitely faster toward the equator. In that moment a shard of land shot from the southern pole towards the Centrepiece's Rim; and by doing so, passed through ages and ages and ages of time as you, my mortal scholar, know it. It was an island of instability, of extreme Change, and for this reason the beings inhabiting it changed to counteract it: they lived long, and were highly developed and quick to adapt. And all the while this island was still in the first instant of Mundus. When it reached the equator, it sped into nothingness, for it was Everywhere and Nowhere.

Now, some beings decided to leave this shard by their own accord, whilst other were flung off of it, and not only once, but several times, in what were different eras of the island, but only different fractions of a moment to the rest of Mundus. The first of these were what you scholars like to call the Ehlnofey. They were the nearest to the first beings, and the closest to the original divine intention. The second were the inhabitants of Pyandonea, the Maormer, who further adapted to their isle. The third were the Bosmer, who settled in what you call Valenwood today. The fourth-comers, the Aldmer, consciously left the shard, for the climate at that time had become extraordinarily cold, and they were being overcome by the Falmer, the fifth people to come from the Vagrant Island. The second-to-last landed in Atmora, but their name is forgotten. The last were the Dwemer, who build underground to protect themselves from the scorching heat of the last days of Aldmeris. Yes, Aldmeris, though not the blissful place the Thalmor want to recreate. As a matter of fact, their Aldmeris never truly existed. The different Mer never lived together: they are simply the next step in the ladder to survival in the harsh setting of the Isle.

Aldmeris was not the only one to suffer the effects of Dawn Time - although other places didn't suffer at all, on the contrary! they benefitted from it: a cracked piece of land in the north moved southwards, but not so much as to be destroyed by time; this was Akavir, Land of the Dragons, of which I will not talk too much of here. Be it enough to you that that land has had hundreds of years'advantage on Tamriel, thanks to Dawn Time.

But you must be wondering how time became what it is now - constant and regular, an anchor for the common being - from the chaos of the Dawn Era! Well, you must know that very soon after the Bearer's Collapse the Axis began to rotate itself around the center of Nirn, assuming speeds unimaginable by the mortal mind. But, because it was a creation of Akatosh, it did not, like Aldmeris, become Everywhere and Nowhere: it Was, simply, and pervaded the fabric of Mundus to the very core. That is why time in Lilmoth is equal to that of Daggerfall.

And Men? Men were in a land of Stability, so they had no reason to develop a long life: they strive for change and dynamicity, opposites to Mer. Men are Change, Mer are Stasis".

The wondrous stranger sighed and shifted in his creaking wooden chair. The light of a nearby candle sputtered, while the embers of the hearth gave off only a faint glow.

"I will not enter the realms of Amaranthine Metaphysics, for that is a place where no mortal this age should go, lest all fall to ruin. I must go now, but we shall meet again if necessary".

He sat up, dragging the chair on the floor with a sonorous screech. He looked at the door, seemingly troubled, then instantly grinned his savage grin again, turning to me.

"Goodbye, scholar. Our chat was most entertaining".