Recorded in the year 583 of the 2nd Era, by the hand of Moth-Priest Sidonius Gaius, Keeper of the Eighth Vault of Prophecies.
Though Molag Bal has been cast back into his fetid realm, the wounds he tore in the world have not yet healed. The Vestige’s sacrifice and Abnur Tharn’s ritual have restored the Liminal Barrier, but the repair is imperfect—functional, yet no longer dependent on the Dragonfires. The Covenant of Alessia is broken, its divine architecture sundered, and Nirn’s defense against Oblivion now stands apart from Akatosh’s ancient pledge.
Still, the Amulet of Kings remains metaphysically tied to the White-Gold Tower, its Red Diamond—the Chim-el-Adabal—still the Tower’s Stone. Though its divine charge has been expended for a generation, the power will return. Every scroll I unfurl insists the Stone must awaken again, for Towers do not slumber long.
Thus Tamriel stands on the edge of a new age.
And three alliances contend for who shall shape it.
The layfolk see Cyrodiil as fertile soil and easy conquest, but scholars know the deeper truth: to rule Cyrodiil is to sit in the shadow of the Tower that shapes the world.
White-Gold is no mere fortress. It is a Spoke within the Aurbic Wheel, a device of divine architecture built by the Ayleids to echo Ada-Mantia itself. Its Stone—the Chim-el-Adabal—has the power to shape reality within its sphere, whether that be for good, or catastrophe.
When the Stone’s charge replenishes, the one who wears the Amulet of Kings may again:
Bind their bloodline into Akatosh’s Covenant, granting legitimacy and divine authority.
Use the amulet's powers of divination to guide their people to prosperity.
Draw upon the oversoul of past emperors, a counsel of the Dragonblooded dead.
Thus the alliances do not merely seek the Ruby Throne; they seek the fulcrum of creation, and the right to shape what follows.
High King Emeric believes the calamities of the Interregnum stem from the failure of Men to uphold their ancient charge. To him, the Empire is not a relic but a duty.
The Covenant’s scholars assert:
Only Men may safely bear the Amulet of Kings.
Only Men may rekindle the Covenant of Akatosh.
Only under a unified human banner can Tamriel know peace.
Thus the Covenant’s aspiration is simple: restore the Empire in the image of the Second, enthrone a human dynasty, and relight the Dragonfires once the Amulet awakens again. Every fortress they seize in Cyrodiil is a step toward that divine mandate.
Their armies are disciplined and pragmatic, wielding the might of Redguard sword-singers, Breton knightly orders, and Orsimer siege-legions. But beneath Emeric’s polish lies deep fractures—distrust of sorcery in Hammerfell, Breton feudal disputes, and Orcish bitterness still unsated.
Still, they march under one belief:
The Empire must rise again, or Tamriel will fall forever.
Queen Ayrenn does not see the Empire as failing; she sees it as corrupted at its root. She has peered into the shadows beneath White-Gold, has tasted the treachery of Abnur Tharn firsthand, and knows the heart of Men is easily seduced by power.
To Ayrenn and the Thalmor:
Mer were the first to steward Mundus.
The Amulet of Kings is an Ayleid relic of divine investiture, misused by Men.
The White-Gold Tower belongs to Merkind by right of history and craft.
Thus the Dominion seeks not restoration but rectification.
They aim to crown a Mer as Emperor, purify the White-Gold Tower, and reshape governance according to ancient, ordered principles. With Maormer privateers augmenting their navy, Dominion power stretches towards Anvil harbor like a golden net.
Yet unity is strained. Bosmer chafe against Altmeri doctrine, bound to the Green Pact’s feral strictures. The Khajiit, guided by shifting lunar omens, support Ayrenn but fear Thalmor oversight.
The Dominion’s cry is clear:
Let Mer guide the world once more, before Men destroy it entirely.
Where the Covenant seeks restoration and the Dominion seeks reclamation, the Pact seeks independence above all.
The Dunmer remember centuries of Imperial pressure.
The Nords remember foreign kings and decrees.
The Argonians remember chains.
Jorunn the Skald-King commands the Pact’s armies, for Skyrim insists upon a soldier-king, not a merchant or magister. But the true engines of Pact ambition are found in the shadows of Vvardenfell:
The Telvanni, whose mastery of arcana has grown bolder since the Planemeld.
The Clockwork Canton, whose study of tonal forces has opened pathways none dared explore since the fall of the Dwemer.
The Pact does not seek to use the Amulet of Kings.
They seek to reshape Cyrodiil itself so that no empire may ever rise again.
For centuries, Cyrodiil’s fertile plains and perfect central geography have allowed human empires to dominate Tamriel. But if the land were no longer temperate farmland—if it became the vast, impenetrable Mythic Jungle of the Merethic Era, which ancient texts describe as a primeval and hostile place—then the heart of Tamriel would no longer support empire.
This is the Pact’s secret design:
Seize the Imperial City and maintain control over the White-Gold Tower.
Await the return of the Amulet’s divine power, predicted by Scrolls to reawaken in the decades following the Planemeld.
Use the Clockwork Canton’s Resonant Sphere—a crude but potent imitation of Dwemer tonal architecture—to activate the Chim-el-Adabal’s reality-shaping nature and revert Cyrodiil to its pre-Alessian biome.
Should they succeed, Cyrodiil would become a dense, living labyrinth of ancient jungle. Armies could not march through it; empires could not form around it; the heartland would no longer be a throne, but a wild place beyond dominion.
To the Pact, this is not destruction.
It is liberation.
Cyrodiil has become a revolving arena where no alliance holds supremacy for long. Keeps rise and fall weekly; supply lines collapse and reform; entire villages change allegiance by the hour.
The Covenant pushes from the northwest with heavy cavalry and disciplined legions.
The Dominion strikes with speed, using Bosmer Archers atop Senche Battlecats and precision destruction magic.
The Pact advances unpredictably, relying on sorcery, guerrilla tactics, and Telvanni stratagems.
Meanwhile, the Empire remains a shadow of itself.
Clivia Tharn has vanished.
The Elder Council is fractured.
The Worm Cult left scars in the Tower’s heart.
The Imperial City is now a battleground of alliances, mercenaries, Daedric remnants, and desperate citizens trying to outlast history.
My readings of the Scrolls, though veiled, allow me glimpses:
The Amulet of Kings will awaken again, for a Stone cannot remain dormant.
One alliance will eventually hold the Tower long enough to shape its destiny.
Whether the Tower enshrines a new Empire, restores Merethic dominion, or remakes Cyrodiil into an untamable wild remains uncarved.
The Scrolls do not speak with one voice.
Some whisper that Cyrodiil becomes green again, the jungle reclaiming stone.
Others show an unbroken line of human emperors.
Others still depict a radiant Mer on the tower’s peak, crowned in stars.
But one truth resounds across all prophecies:
The Three Banners War does not end with a treaty.
It ends when the Tower chooses.