Welcome to Suran (Day 13)

Upon arrival in Suran I visit the "House of Earthly Delights". Ya, must be a church! Nope, nudy bar. I find Helviane Desele and ask her to pay up already but she refuses. Something about the Commona Tong and protection money. I'm not the Commona Tong, and I didn't think fighter's guild was either, so what's she talking about?

So I do more exploring of Suran. I meet a slave trader/hunter while in the nudy bar. Seems he's been looking for the same escaped slave for weeks with the help of a guide. The rest of the town doesn't seem to think highly of the slave trader and doesn't seem to know much about the escaped slave. Eventually I learn of a secret base in the nearby hills and some kind of crazy man also in the mountains.

Then I find the guide in the local trader. He's not of much more help, just says he's been search for that slave for a long time. Then I speak to the local slave trader who, after some "greasing of the wheels", tells me the guide for the slave hunter is actually the escaped slave. I confront the slave with this and he asks me to not tell the slave hunter.

So now I told the slave hunter I would help him find the slave but that means turning in this former slave. So I tell the slave I won't tell on him. Guess that'll be a quest I never solve.

I go back to Balmora and decide to explore some of the caves I passed in between the city I arrived in and Balmora. Clearly these caves are likely involved with some quests I could have. I find one with some kind of outlaw, at least I assume so since he starts wailing on me with a war hammer and kills me in 3 blows. I use the "slink belt" I found to summon a "slink" as well as one of the "summon skeleton" scrolls to help me out. Between the three of us we finally kill the guy off. Too bad I'm too overloaded to carry the hammer back to town for sale. Or I could keep it, I need blunt skill levels anyway.

Eventually I leave that cave and keep going down the path away from Balmora. I then see a split in the path including a split with no sign pointing in that directly. Well I can't very well let that go unchallenged so I start down it, knowing all the while this isn't helping any quests and it could be a waist of time. Eventually I find yet another cave. This one I don't like however as it seems too advanced to I quickly leave.

A little furhter down this path I find an elf standing on the side of the road. Looks like she's a pilgrum trying to find a holy shrine. She marks it on the map for me. I take a look and it appears to be off some distance to the east. Instead of trying to find the road to take me there I just jet off straight in that direction through the wilderness. Encounter very little creatures on the way: just a couple mud crabs. Then we come to a water way. Not very far to the other shore but there are some killer fishing about. They're not much of problem and the Pilgrim seems to be doing ok. Finally we arrive at her shrine. She's happy sure, but now I'm pretty much lost.

So I continue down a path I now find myself on until I find another happless traveler. Seems his traveling companion heard a noise off in the woods and hasn't been heard from since. Being the brave imperial I am I start off down the trail but soon run into a monster that looks something like a tri-ceratops dinosuar. This manages to kill me in about two blows. So I load my save game and try again, this time summoning the skamp for support. We do manage to kill it as well as another but it soon becomes clear I'm not match for these creatures. So I use my Rune of Recall to jet back to the guild in Balmora.

Finally I cave in and look on the internet for how to get the money from Helviane Desele in Suran. I need these quests for the fighter's guild after all. Looks like I just didn't greese her proverbial wheels nearly enough. Eventually I will solve this quest, but the fund raising will have to wait for next time.