Duke of Mania Quest: Addiction

Speak to the Duke of Mania, Thadon, and he’ll tell you all about a little tryst he apparently had with a member of a member of Syl’s court, Syl being the Duchess of Dementia. Apparently, the Chalice of Reversal, which Thadon adores, was lost during the affair and locked away someplace. He’ll ask you to find it for him, but won’t tell you where it is.

Find an Argonian woman named Wide-Eye who wanders around the House of Mania. She’ll tell you of a place called Dunroot Burrow, which is apparently guarded by Elytras. If you get her up to a high relationship, she’ll tell you about a Felldew poison which the Elytras drop. Apparently, eating it will cause you to experience drug-like effects, but is the only way to enter Dunroot Burrow, which is where the Chalice is hidden away.

If you head to the Burrow, you’ll find an Elytra Hatchling outside. Kill it, then imbibe the Felldew it carries (find it amongst your alchemical ingredients and press A to eat it). That will let you enter the Burrow.

Into The Burrow!

You never know what's going to be lurking in one of these random treasure chests…

Now, as the Felldew effects wear off, and they’ll do so quickly, you’ll begin to feel the effects of withdrawal from the drug. That’ll hit you for a five point drain to your luck, intelligence, strength, and agility. After a bit more withdrawal, the effects will spread to your willpower, speed, and endurance, and then they’ll start increasing in severity. The last stage will knock off 15 of your hit points to boot. You need to get more Felldew to get back to your normal self, at least until you can find the Chalice. Other elytras here will drop it, so pick it up as you go along and eat it. If you’re a burly character that can survive the drawbacks, it’s not really necessary to worry about them. Eating a single Felldew will remove the effects entirely and start you back at full strength, at the beginning of withdrawal.

Fight your way through the elytras until you reach the Kelp Fen and head through it. If you’re an alchemist, you may want to collect the Flame Stalks that you see; they’re a 0.1 pound Restore Health potion if you can make potions with one ingredient, and they can be combined with some other ingredients to add Flame Damage to some of your Damage Health poisons. Keep heading through the dungeon until you reach the Sanctum of Decadence. Inside you’ll find a few Felldew addicts, as well as the Chalice of Reversal. It’s possible that grabbing the Chalice first will reverse these guys’ addiction and make them not hostile to you, but we simply killed them, grabbed the Chalice, and exited the area.

Return to Thadon

There’s an Obelisk of Order outside the exit here, and a new Priest of Order who’s watching over it. You can’t kill the Priest while the Obelisk is activated, so if you wish, you can shut it down. Do so by killing three Knights of Order and looting the Hearts of Order off their bodies. Place three of them into the Obelisk by walking up to it and activating it, then quickly kill the Priest of Order while the Obelisk is shut down, or he’ll simply open it up again.

Bring the Chalice back to Thadon to end the quest.

Duchess of Dementia Quest: The Lady of Paranoia

I'm not touching you. Does this bother you? I'm not touching you.

Although Sheogorath intimates the Syl can be difficult to speak to, you should be able to find her on her throne in the morning of most days, around 11:00, and perhaps throughout the rest of the day. She wants you to help expose a plot against her, and tells you to speak to Herdir, in the dungeons below. He’ll tell you what she wants: you need to speak to people in Crucible, and discover who conspires against Syl.

Basically, your goal here is to speak to someone — anyone — about the conspiracy. If the topic Conspiracy stays gold after speaking to them, then you can have Herdir torture them to find out what they really know.

You can start with Kithlan, although numerous people will probably point you in the same direction. If you have Herdir torture Kithlan, he’ll point you towards Anna, the young woman who roams the ground of the House of Dementia. Her position will also appear on your compass. She’ll point you Ma’zaddha, a catman who lives in Crucible. Unfortunately, when you torture him, he’ll refuse to offer up any info.

Torturous Intervention

If you wander around torturing people, you’ll find that many of them won’t respond to torture, because they don’t know anything. One person who does, however, is Bhisha, another cat-man who wanders the city streets. He will tell you that Ma’zaddha meets with an enforcer named Nelrene at night behind the shops in Crucible.

Find a place to wait until after midnight and do so, then sneak up on the green marks on your compass to overhear their conversation. That’ll give you your own proof of a conspiracy. You’ll have to talk to Ma’zaddha again when the two are done talking; he’ll cave in, and tell you to meet him the next day at midnight for more information. Torturing Nelrene won’t help you at all.

We Barely Knew Ye…

Poor Ma'zaddha. He knew too much.

Wait a day and head to Ma’zaddha’s house at midnight. He’ll be dead, but you’ll find some keys on his body. Head upstairs and open his cabinet to find a swor of Nelrene’s and a note explaining the plot. Bring that to Nelrene, who’ll likely be standing guard in the House of Dementia, and you’ll have enough evidence to confront Muurine, the mastermind behind the plot. Speak to her, and she’ll confess without much difficulty. Speak to Syl in the morning, and she’ll warp Muurine into the torture chambers and ask you to join her down there. Syl will kill Muurine, and give you a new bow, the Ruin’s Edge, which casts a random spell effect on the target. You can also loot Muurine’s body for some keys.