Honor's Hubris

Honor's Hubris was a virtual representation of one of Eivor Varinsdottir's genetic memories, relived by Layla Hassan in 2020 through the Portable Animus HR-8.5.

Description

Eivor met with Faravid at Stenwege Camp to start an assault on the Picts at Magnis Fortress.

Dialogue

With the preparations for the assault on Magnis Fortress complete, Eivor made her way back into the wilds of Eurvicscire.

• Eivor: Faravid should be waiting at Stenwege.

After arriving in Stenwege Camp, Eivor overheard the inquiries of Faravid's men.

• Norse Warrior 1: Where's Halfdan Jarl? Will he be here?

Eivor caught sight of Faravid.

Eivor talks to Faravid

• Faravid: Eivor! Good to see you.

Eivor spoke with Faravid atop the camp's inner gate.

• Eivor: Where are the Saxons? We need them to take that fortress.
• Faravid: Patience. Ricsige promised an army.
• Eivor: What about Hjorr and Ljufvina?
• Faravid: Ljufvina is ahead with a dozen of Jorvik's swords. Come. Our Saxon allies have reached Magnis. We should march.

Faravid's men readied for battle as Eivor meditated, then she rose to begin the march to the Magnis Fortress. She rode out from Stenwege alongside Faravid, initially, before they split up.

• Faravid: Meet us on the field near the fortress. We'll make our plans there.

Eivor rode alone, reflecting on her own decisions, truths told, and secrets withheld.

Told Halfdan the truthWithheld the truth

• Eivor: Will Halfdan join us? Or stay home, out of spite.

• Eivor: Halfdan doesn't know our plan. But he'll hear the aftermath soon enough.

Halfway through her ride, Eivor felt wary of the upcoming battle.

• Eivor: This plan... I feel uneasy.

Eivor overheard Faravid's men talking while she was riding.

The road to Magnis Fortress

• Norse Warrior 2: It'll be a good fight, I've faith in it.

Eivor reflected on the optimism of the common soldiers, ignorant of the machinations that brought forth this battle.

• Eivor: Faravid's plan had better be sound.

Nearing the end of her ride, Eivor hoped for the best.

• Eivor: Let us hope this goes well.

On arriving at the staging grounds, Eivor noticed Ljufvina and the men who had gathered.

• Eivor: Faravid's army.

Upon seeing Eivor, Faravid called out to her.

Eivor confers with Faravid and Ljufvina

• Faravid: Eivor, over here!

If Eivor asked mercy for Ulf's men, they sat ready minus their dead commander. She spoke to them.

• Eivor: Today you may regain your glory. Think on that.
• Norse Warrior 3: We did wrong to follow Ulf and would make things right by following you this day.

Further up, she noticed Ljufvina with her assembled swords from Jorvik.

• Ljufvina: Are the shields ready? The battle is near.

Eivor went to Ljufvina as Faravid drew closer. Before they could speak to one another, Halfdan arrived with some of his own men-at-arms.

• Halfdan: On the battlefield once more, old friend.
• Faravid: Yes, my jarl. As in days of old.
• Halfdan: Who are you to speak of the old days? The days where my word was bond. The days where the light of my glory lit the world. How dare you speak of those days! As if they meant anything to a traitor like you!
• Faravid: Who told you of this?

Told Halfdan the truthWithheld the truth

• Halfdan: My new ally is more loyal than my old friend.

Faravid turned to Eivor and spat in disgust.

• Faravid: Eivor Two-Faced. That's your name.

Eivor responded to Faravid's insult.

How dare you, Faravid?Calm down, everyone

• Eivor: I came for Halfdan. To prove my worth and loyalty to him. You brought this down upon yourself.

• Eivor: Gently, friend. I told Halfdan because it was my duty.

• Halfdan: My Saxon vassal is more loyal than any man in my army!
• Eivor: Ricsige. That silk-tongued devil!
• Halfdan: Silk-tongued and loyal to the end, you backstabbing curs! Both of you! Traitorous schemers!

Eivor responded to Halfdan's accusation.

I am no traitorEnough treason talk

• Eivor: You're a sick man, Halfdan. You see traitors under every cobble, behind every tree.
• Halfdan: A sick man? You deny you went behind my back?

• Eivor: Enough, Halfdan. Name your traitors when the fighting's done.
• Halfdan: Easy for you. Nobody's poisoning your damn wine.

Ljufvina stepped in to break up the argument.

• Ljufvina: Enough bickering, all of you! We are at the edge of war. Preserve your rage for the enemy!
• Halfdan: Ljufvina talks sense. We fight this battle and we end this war. At this moment, nothing else matters.

A war horn sounded. Ljufvina turned to see a Pict in the distance waving a flaming torch.

• Ljufvina: Look there. The Picts send a message.
• Halfdan: Raven-Tamer, with me. You'll talk them into a surrender with your sword-sharp tongue.

Ljufvina shook her head in annoyance as Eivor followed Halfdan to the fortress' gates. Halfdan cautioned them as they charged into the snowblind.

• Halfdan: Stay back, men.
• Eivor: These Picts came in great numbers. They came to fight.

Faravid, Ljuvfina, and the army await Halfdan's orders

• Halfdan: If this is a trick, do what you must. Draw steel and cut them down like harvest corn.

As Faravid and Ljufvina stayed with their army, Halfdan and Eivor met with three Pict warriors.

• Eivor: Turn tail and run, back beyond the wall.
• Pict Warrior 1: The Romans built that wall to keep us out. But they are gone and we remain. Someday you too will disappear.
• Halfdan: Wall or no wall, we have more gods than you.
• Pict Warrior 1: We may have but one God, heathen, but we have many more friends.

The Pict warrior revealed King Ricsige atop their fortress' walls and revealing his true allegiance.

Ricsige declares himself king

• Ricsige: Who now is the rightful king of Northumbria?

Ricsige's fyrd cheered for him.

• Ricsige: The kingdom has spoken!

Angered, Halfdan threw a battleaxe and started the assault on the fortress. As Eivor and the army started to fight, Halfdan screamed out a war cry.

• Halfdan: Glory for Halfdan! I'll have your head, Ricsige!
• Faravid: Die you bastard dogs!

Eivor headed towards the fortress to reach the inner compound, where a number of fires had started.

Halfdan's army enters the fort's courtyard

• Ljufvina: Careful. They mean to burn us!
• Eivor: Extend the ladders!

Eivor shot the locks holding up the ladders, allowing them to extend to the ground. She climbed them to the battlements above

• Faravid: Charge! And may the skalds remember us!

Eivor circumvented the gate and destroyed its reinforcement bar, allowing her to open the gate from the inside. With the Northumbrians gaining ground, she advanced and breached the palisades. Eivor then got into position to take aim at the drawbridge chain links.

• Eivor: I need to get that drawbridge down.

Eivor destroyed the drawbridge's links, dropping the drawbridge and securing entry to the inner keep.

• Faravid: Press on! Let the Picts remember this in their Hell.
• Eivor: Eyes open for the coward, King Ricsige.
• Halfdan: Attack! Attack for Halfdan! This is the last of them!

After defeating the last of the Picts inside, Halfdan's army clamed the fortress. Halfdan yelled out a victory cry from atop the battlements.

Eivor talks to Halfdan after the siege

• Halfdan: For Thor! For Ragnar! For Halfdan! The sweet taste of victory. And Ricsige defeated. Was he the thorn at my back? The traitor I suspected all this time?
• Eivor: Save your praise, Halfdan. Ricsige may yet live.
• Halfdan: That coward will be dead in a snowdrift somewhere. It matters not.
• Eivor: This day is not done until we've seen his corpse. Do not relent, not yet.
• Halfdan: Eivor. Rise like an eagle, or caw like a crow.

During the conversation, war cries were heard as Eivor and Halfdan saw more Picts coming to attempt to regain the fortress.

• Eivor: Hold the wall!

Eivor and Halfdan spot the Pict reinforcements

After going down to the gate, Eivor fought the reinforcements below.

• Eivor: Block that gate!

Eivor battles the remaining Pict champion

Holding off the assault, Eivor heard and saw the upcoming Pict champion alongside Halfdan.

• Halfdan: Thor sends more Pict skulls to my hammer.

After killing the Pict champion and his team, Eivor regrouped with Halfdan. After the assault, Halfdan noticed a fleeing Ricsige.

Eivor and Halfdan spot Ricsige fleeing

• Halfdan: Ricsige! There!
• Faravid: He's fleeing to the north!

Seeing Ricsige, Eivor chased him down.

• Ricsige: Leave me be, you devil!
• Eivor: You meet the spirits this day, traitor.

If Eivor chased him down to the edge of the cliff, Ricsige turned and drew his sword. Eivor fought him one-on-one in his last stand.

Eivor eliminates Ricsige

Eivor caught up with King Ricsige and fatally wounded him. On the snowy ground, Ricsige pleaded to Eivor.

• Ricsige: Faithful counselor. Please, help me back to Jorvik. Let my heart expire at home.
• Eivor: I have no favors left to offer you, Ricsige. Soon you will walk beside your god.
• Ricsige: But I... I see no light. I feel no warmth. Only... an icy darkness, a cave.
• Eivor: Hel's frozen door, welcoming you.
• Ricsige: Wh-what waits for me there, Eivor? What waits for me?

With his dying breath, Ricsige held his hand towards the sky before passing, just as Halfdan arrived.

Eivor and Halfdan witness Ricsige's death

• Halfdan: A traitor's death for a treasonous fool.
• Eivor: He was a hero in tales he told himself. A Saxon who loved his homeland. You cannot begrudge him that.
• Halfdan: Hmph. There is something in that. No more Saxon kings, Eivor. I am through playing the puppeteer. The fate of this shire rests on my shoulders alone.
• Eivor: You'll take the crown yourself? And the extra burden it brings?
• Halfdan: I will. But I won't rule alone. My friends... and my allies... will keep me standing upright.

Halfdan stepped forward to clasp his hand on Eivor's shoulder as he spoke. Eivor nodded in agreement.

• Halfdan: Let's talk of our alliance in Jorvik. Leave this king to his winter kingdom.

Halfdan left as Eivor followed, leaving Ricsige's body behind to be buried by the blizzard.

Outcome

Eivor, Faravid, and Halfdan assaulted Magnis Fortress with their combined armies, only to find themselves ambushed by the treachery of King Ricsige, who had allied with the Picts. After seizing the fortress and routing the assembled Pict army, Eivor pursued King Ricsige beyond Hadrian's Wall into Pict territory and killed him for his betrayal.

Behind the scenes

While Faravid will initially attempt to ride for the staging grounds below Magnis Fortress, his pathfinding will take him and his horse into the lake west of Stenwege. Afterwards, he will be thrown from his horse, swim to shore, and continue on foot. Like all NPCs, however, he will simply unload and teleport to the staging grounds when the player gets far enough away (roughly 100-120 in-game meters), and as he has no dialogue during the ride beyond his initial comment to meet there, the player has no obligation to follow him the slow way.

Gallery

• 
  Halfdan arrives at Magnis Fortress
• 
  The army rendezvous with the Pict envoys
• 
  Halfdan throws an axe in rage
• 
  The battle outside Magnis Fortress
• 
  Halfdan's army crosses the drawbridge
• 
  Eivor and Halfdan survey the claimed fortress
• 
  Eivor and Halfdan fight off Pict reinforcements
• 
  Eivor pursuing Ricsige in the heavy snow

References

• Assassin's Creed: Valhalla