#1 The Waking Nightmare
The Waking Nightmare is a quest found in Dawnstar, started in the town’s tavern!
Upon speaking to Erandur about the nightmares everyone around here seems to be having, he will have you follow him to a Daedric cult’s tower.
Just outside of town, and reveals that the reason for the nightmares is the Daedric Prince Vaermina, who put a spell called “The Miasma” on the town to cause nightmares. Erandur begins to act somewhat strangely as you go deeper into the dark tower. It seems like he may know more than he lets off.
You eventually reach a barrier with no hope of passing. This is when Erandur shares he used to be one of the priests of Vaermina serving here and helps to lead you to a potion that allows you to pass the barrier in a very interesting way.
The potion places you in the mind of a person from the past, during an attack on this tower, and travel through their body. The memory has you running from dangerous attackers around the castle until you can make it to where the barrier was in the present.
Activating the barrier in the past places you on the other side of the barrier in the present allowing you to turn off the barrier and feel cool for time traveling.
After that hiccup, you travel to the bottom of the tower where it is revealed the memories you got to see were, in fact, Erandur’s and that the two people guarding the shrine are his closest friends from back in the day, two men named Veren and Thorek, who Vaermina’s influence has since corrupted.
After a flashy spell battle with the two assailants, you are left to guard Erandur while he purifies Vaermina’s shrine, though this is where you get a choice. The Daedric Prince Vaermina speaks to you directly in your mind. He tells you that Erandur will betray you once he is done purifying the tower and that you need to kill him first.
Should you kill Erandur, you are rewarded with the staff Skull of Corruption that lets you harvest dreams from sleeping people and use those as ammo to damage others. If you spare Erandur, he will not betray you and will instead be willing to join you as a companion at any time.
#2 The Cursed Tribe
This quest can be started by finding an Orcish stronghold that giants are attacking. Talking to the inhabitants, you learn that the tribe has been dealing with constant attacks and invasions from giants, so an orc named Atub sends you to gather ingredients so she can find out why the giants are attacking so frequently.
Upon retrieving the ingredients, they can summon the Daedric Prince Malakath, who angrily informs the chief, Yamarz, that their shrine of Malakath has been overrun by giants appease him. This leads you to a cave filled to the brim with giants while Yamarz follows you through.
Reaching the end, Yamarz will offer you a bag of gold to kill the giant by the shrine, or you can refuse and let him take the fight. Should you let him fight, he will die, and you must kill the giant, but if you take his offer, then he will betray you after you kill the giant, so everyone will think he killed the giants.
Whichever path you chose, once the giant and Yamarz are dead, returning to the tribe will have Malakath reward you with Volendrung, a legendary Daedric hammer, and declare an end to the giant attacks on the tribe.
#3 Blood on the Ice
This is a quest found in Windhelm and is started by finding a crime scene in the town’s graveyard. Immediately it’s apparent that a trail of blood leads away from the victim’s corpse, following that leads you to a locked abandoned house.
Once you get inside, the usual whimsey of Skyrim is replaced by an uneasy creepiness as you search for clues about the killer. Finding a false door near the back of the house gets you a unique looking amulet and the journal of the killer himself!
Next, you have to find out who these clues belong to, which leads to asking around town about the objects. Eventually, a man named Calixto will tell you the amulet symbolizes a place of power in Windham, and Viola Giordano will recognize the diary, both pointing you towards Wuunferth the Unliving, the court mage in Windham. At this point, you have two options, confront Wuunferth directly, or bring the evidence you gathered to the cities steward.
Should you take the evidence to the steward, Wuunferth will be arrested for murder on the spot, and the quest will complete for a few days before it is revealed that Wuunferth did not do it. Alternatively, taking the evidence to Wuunferth lets him explain himself and tasks you with watching the streets carefully when night falls.
While patrolling the streets at night, you will eventually come across a familiar face, Calixto, murdering someone in the dead of night.
Finally, finding the real killer, you can free Wuunferth from jail if you got him locked up there in the first place, and the house in town, which is one of the best houses in-game, becomes available to buy.
#4 To Kill an Empire
This quest takes place late in the Dark Brotherhood questline, tasking you to assassinate the emperor who is currently visiting Skyrim. The plan is to sneak into the palace pretending to be a famous chef the emperor had requested and poison him using a Jarrin root, so naturally, the first step is to find the chef and kill him.
You’ll find Balagog, or “The Gourmet,” sleeping in the Nightingale Inn, kill him and dispose of the body before heading to Solitude for the main event. Upon infiltrating the castle, you’ll meet another cook named Gianna, who has to be the worst in the land as she lets you put nearly anything you want into the stew she’s cooking.
After putting a few finishing touches and dropping in the Jarrin root, the stew is served. It instantly kills the emperor, leaving you to quickly escape out of the back entrance to run back to the Dark Brotherhood sanctuary. Upon exiting the building, you are stopped by the guard captain, who informs you that you were set up. Astrid had made a deal with the guards that you would be captured and locked up after the assassination.
It turns out the deal had back-fired, as they had switched the emperor with a fake body double, and returning to the sanctuary will show that the imperials have stormed the assassin’s dwellings and are killing everyone inside.
Despite your best efforts, you can only save Babette and Nazir before the building collapses, causing you to hide inside the coffin of the guild’s spectral leader, the Night Mother.
Nazir and Babette release you from the Night Mother’s coffin, and as you tour the destroyed remains of your home, you come across a nearly dead Astrid, who confesses to her crimes of betrayal and gifts you the blade of woe. Upon ending Astrid’s life, the quest ends as well.
#5 The Mind of Madness
The most famous quest in Skyrim, the Mind of Madness starts by talking to Dervenin, who is wandering the streets of Solitude near the Blue Palace. He sends you to retrieve his master from the Pelagius Wing of the blue palace, saying he hasn’t returned since going in.
Upon reaching the door to the Pelagius Wing, you learn that it’s locked and no one is allowed inside from here. You can either do a quest for Falk Firebeard, the steward of Solitude, or use your skill in a speech to get a key from one of the servants in the tower. However, you get the key. Once inside the Wing, it is abandoned and has been for quite some time.
Wandering around long enough sees you transported out of the palace and into the mind of Pelagius the Third himself! Inside his mind, you see Pelagius the Third having a tea party with Sheogorath, the Daedric Prince of Madness.
After a quick conversation between the two, Sheogorath notices you and denies your request to leave this place. You slowly convince him by mentioning his servant Dervenin wants him home, and he agrees that if you can fix the mind of Pelagius the Third, he will go home and let you leave.
To fix Pelagius’s mind, he gifts you the Wabbajack, one of the strongest weapons in the game, and tells you there are three trials to overcome before you can leave. The first shows a tiny, shrunken down Pelagius fighting a normal-sized Imperial soldier to represent Pelagius’s waning confidence.
Every shot on the soldier shrinks his worries, and every shot on Pelagius grows his confidence until the soldier is tiny and Pelagius is giant! The next trial involves Pelagius’s Night Terrors. Every shot of the staff on the sleeping Pelagius brings his nightmares into reality. Once they exist, simply shooting his nightmares turns them into visions and memories he enjoys, bringing him back to a peaceful sleep.
The final task is a fake arena battle between two elementals. While you can switch the elemental types to try and win, the fight continues until you shoot at the other group of people watching the fight, who turn into wolves and attack your true target.
Once all three tasks are done, Sheogorath informs you that you treated the mind of Pelagius well and that he will be returning home and letting you keep the Wabbajack forever. Finally, the quest ends with you back in the Pelagius Wing as if nothing ever happened.
