A string of events which cause the Dragonborn to receive an inheritance letter immediately after the inexplicable death of an NPC manage to perfectly distill just how special the Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim experience can be. The incident has a lot to unpack from the get-go, and given that Skyrim is notorious for its bugs (harmless though they may be), it's almost a foolish endeavor to try and untangle the logic underneath.
The events occurred in the city of Whiterun, a major location in Skyrim, and one of the first settlements that players can come across during their adventure in the Nord province. Whereas Riverwood represents the idyllic village that functions as Skyrim's initial quest hub, Whiterun is Bethesda's attempt to showcase the advancements in Radiant AI by having a bustling city filled with interesting merchants, companions, and all sorts of NPCs. Among them, the four most important vendors are Eorlund Gray-Mane, Farengar Secret-Fire, Belethor, and Adrianne Avenicci.
A humble yet proud Imperial blacksmith, Adrianne offers players a solid stock of weapons and armor, as well as access to the smithy. Crafting in Skyrim often allows players to create powerful (if not outright broken) pieces of equipment, and attempting to craft an Iron Dagger is ultimately what caused the incident in JCNicholsLOL1's game. Upon exiting the crafting window, the player mysteriously found Adrianne collapsing on the ground, dropping her Steel Mace, and dying.
Bewilderment soon turned to comedy, as the infamous Courier of Skyrim appeared out of thin air to deliver an important letter to the Dragonborn – which, of course, ended up being their inheritance from the recently deceased Adrianne Avenicci. One might claim that the incident occurred due to a Skyrim mod interacting poorly with some of the NPCs, but according to JCNicholsLOL1, they were running a vanilla playthrough. Those with a sharper eye may have noticed that for a split second, kicking Adrianne off her forge caused her to respawn high in the air, ultimately resulting in her death via fall damage.
Though Skyrim is over eleven years old, bugs and glitches such as the aforementioned incident still happen in an unmodded playthrough, as the Unofficial Patch for Skyrim has become a mandatory plug-in for any player seeking a truly stable experience. Though fans are beyond excited about Starfield becoming the next great Bethesda title, many among them are fully prepared to endure a launch filled with all sorts of random bugs that have come to define the Creation Engine era. Ultimately, both developers and players alike hope that Starfield's release will resemble Skyrim rather than Fallout 76.
The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim is out now for PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.