Hours 60 - 62: Suiting Up

After several unsuccessful attempts to surrender to the guards - they just absolutely hate my guts and all suicidally attack me, I decide to leave town for a while to see if it all blows over. I head back to the mainland and clear out an iron mine near Whiterun - this is just the same a goldmine for me, because with the Transmute spell I can turn all the iron ore into gold. The only catch is that it's pretty boring casting the Transmute spell about 60 times.

Gold ore transmuted, and with pockets overflowing with precious gems thanks to Prowlers Profit, I set about creating more jewelry. I sell a lot off for a good bit of gold (after enchanting, of course - putting my Enchanting level up to 94), but I decide that the time has finally come for Tharon-Zul to encase himself in armour.

I found a complete set of 'Nordic Carved Armour' at some point during a mission ages ago, and stashed it away in the main chest at Severin Manor. I enchant the helmet to increase my Magicka by 66 points, to take the place of the circlet I've been wearing this whole time. The gauntlets and torso armour don't have great options, so I just enchant them to boost my Heavy Armour skill. The boots are even worse, and the best I can stick on them is to fortify my Carry capacity by 40 points. Better than nothing I guess.

The end result - Tharon-Zul's first set of heavy armour. The enchantments aren't great, my Heavy Armour skill is quite low (although it's artificially boosted to something like 86), and it's not the most intimidating-looking armour I've ever seen, but it's a start.

Afterwards I take a stroll through Raven Rock, and fortunately I no longer seem to be a wanted man. I chance a visit back to Neloth and he's calmed down too, so I'm able to finish the quest by informing him that I slew his enemy - he rewards me by making me an honourary member of House Telvani. 

I next spend a while travelling round to all the major cities, buying up all the available iron ore from blacksmiths and transmuting it into gold ore. After several cycles round the whole of Skyrim, I'm able to craft a huge amount of expensive gold gemmed jewelry, which I enchant with more soul gems I acquired via the same method (cycling through as many vendors as possible). The end result is that I finally get my Enchanting up to level 100, and grab the Extra Effect perk. This will help me a lot when enchanting my next set of armour. I also get my Smithing up to 44, and I visit Isran at Fort Dawnguard a few times for Heavy Armour training too.

All the traipsing around, enchanting, selling, and training takes up a lot of time and gets quite monotonous. The only break from the grind is a trip to the exterior of Red Eagle Redoubt near Markarth. A large Forsworn encampment, led by a foul Hagraven, dwell within the ruins, and give fierce battle.

A mighty battle is fought upon these ancient ruins.

They prove to be remarkably tough opponents, with their archers taking out my Dremora Lords in a single shot, and one particularly aggressive Briarheart warrior taking out at least 4 or 5 of them in combat before they could finally best him. The Hagraven also rains down fiery meteors which explode cataclysmically and destroy all in their path. It's a difficult and bitter struggle, but I eventually prove victorious as I summon wave after wave of assailants to throw at them. To my annoyance, I find that I can still be taken out by one stray arrow. However, I haven't been able to grab many Perks yet, and I also hope to find a Fortify Health item to disenchant and use on my next set of armour, so I haven't given up hope yet.

One other thing I realise during these hours traveling round Skyrim is that I forgot how cool Solitude is:

This probably has to be the nicest and happiest-looking town, maybe on par with Whiterun. The whole place is kind of a like a castle, and indeed an actual castle and battlements form a large part of the town. It kind of reminds me of Skingrad from Oblivion, but with the castle actually incorporated into the town. It's pretty big, is clean and neat, and feels very secure. Raven Rock's still my favourite town, though.