Balgruuf Was Lying to You

Hey how's it going guys it's Nate Hira and Skyrim and really all of the Elder Scrolls games have had a habit for attracting quite a few fan theories over the years on this channel we pored over literally hundreds of different Ted's five mysteries and community ideas however one concept that I've always felt deserved way more time and exploration that I was able to give it is the theory that yarrow balgruuf the grader secretly cheated on and likely murdered his own wife in cold blood at face value such a proposition doesn't seem to make a lot of sense yarrow balgruuf of Whiterun is quite literally defined by his honor honesty and concern for the people he rules over heck he's so helpful and charismatic when we meet him in the main questline I think it's safe to say no Roby is one of the community's favorite characters so much so that despite being a strong backer of the Empire even Stormcloak supporters find it hard not to love him anyway alas there is quite a bit of evidence both in-game and buried away in Skyrim's files that suggest to this model leader might have committed a horrible atrocity as mentioned this is a concept we've briefly touched on before but this entire video offers a much better opportunity to assess all of the information and some of the associated deviating theories I never got to touch on and after dozens of hours exploring again both the game itself and the creation kit some additional discoveries have been made that I'm very excited to dive into so anyway without any further ado let's ask the question is yaro balgruuf evil before we accused this man of matricide and cheating we should probably familiarize ourselves with the history of both ball growth and his family which is surprisingly vague we know barely anything about bowl drops past heck we don't even know if Bowl graph is the guy who's first or last name his dialogue suggests that he did indeed fighting the Empire's great war against the old amuri Dominion decades ago and he very likely inherited the throne from his father though we also know literally nothing about said father ministers in the royal court claim that mr. B is a genuine direct descendent of Olaf one I a famous ancient yarol of Whiterun who ruled all the way back in the first era thousands of years ago which would suggest that Whiterun has a royal family that's possibly among the oldest and longest reigning dynasties in all of Tamriel existing longer than even the Empire itself but I digress Baal groves house carl and chief protector is a dunmer woman named arrow lath who evidently fought alongside him before in previous battles and Wars oddly enough while Skyrim affords us little information on her backstory like everyone else in Dragon's reach Skyrim's official game guide which was written by bethesda claims that ear Olaf was actually trained as a morag tong assassin before leaving the guild service and joining vulgar off' for those of you who don't know the more I tongue much like the dark brotherhood are a faction of assassins though they operate exclusively out of the province of more wind and don't conduct much business outside of that region notably the morag tong are active worshippers of mephala Daedric goddess of lies murders and secrets but more on that later the guy doesn't elaborate on how much warped ear lift did with the tongue nor how she left and why she ended up in Whiterun it only states that she trained as a member but just to keep all of this information in mind finally the Yael has three children his oldest son fro Dhara his middle daughter named Agni and his youngest son nel Kira something that is very strange though is despite his rather large amount of offspring there are absolutely no references to these kids mother up or ball grips pose it wife whom he would have had these kids with and this is where things start to get a bit weird because while it's easy to assume that the woman who mothered all of these gremlins may have just passed away or had a falling-out with their father the sidequest the whispering door seems to imply that there's more at play here for those of you who don't know the whispering door is a very short Daedra quest that begins when the dovahkiin hears rumors that the kids in Dragon's breach have recently been acting up and misbehaving and you're encouraged to investigate eventually we discover that they've fallen under the influence of a strange evil spirit that's been speaking to them from behind an old locked door in the palaces basement the kids call this voice the whispering lady no Kira the youngest child seems to be the most impacted by the strange beam and when asked about what the lady is telling him he'll say this my father doesn't know anything about me but I know about him and about the war more than he might think I know that he still worships Talos that he hates the foamer almost as much as a storm code states that he worries about being chased from white man that he that I'm that I don't have the same mother as my brother and sister whoa what no Kyra claims he doesn't have the same mother as his other siblings and seems to imply that that information was supposed to be a secret his father was keeping now admittedly we do have to consider that maybe this weird whispering lady was lying to him I mean random voices behind doors may not be the best source of information so what could be going on here well as we continue the quest and continue speaking with the lady she will eventually reveal herself to be mephala Daedric princess of lies secrets and murder and after stealing a key to open the door off of the inventories of either balgruuf or his court wizard we'll discover that it leads to a room containing my fellows Daedric artifact the ebony blade which the goddess will encourage us to take and use against our foes and friends for all intents and purposes this is where the quest sort of ends asthma follows fear revolves around deceiving and betraying people if we use the ebony blade to kill people who have a friendly disposition towards the Dragonborn it will get some cool benefits and buffs but beyond that there's little more of narrative significance worth mentioning honestly this is one of the shortest side quests in the game regardless clearly the biggest point here is that mephala told milkier that he has a different mother than his siblings something that the boy wasn't supposed to know and suggesting that maybe his father cheated or more innocently maybe some adoption is at play here whatever the case given the fact that Nell Keira wasn't supposed to know though clearly something is up admittedly mephala is a god of lying so at first it seems very reasonable to suspect that maybe she was just straight up spouting nonsense in an effort to get the kid to turn against his father and be angry well this is a very valid possibility I personally highly doubt it and here's why for one the Daedric goddess also tells dohere secrets ball growth is keeping that we know to be true we know he still does a secretly worshipped Talos despite Talos worship being illegal we know what he is genuinely concerned about being overthrown by the Stormcloaks furthermore and this is where things get really creepy of looking Skyrim's gang files reveals that Nell Kira isn't actually flagged as Baal gruffs child like his other two kids no instead the Creation Kit says no Kira is your old B's brother huh okay so before we start speculating let's summarize the information we have so far because things are out to get very complicated no Kira claims that mephala Daedric goddess of secrets lies and murders reveal to him that he doesn't have the same mother as his other two siblings and now Skyrim zone game data is telling us that Nell Kira is technically bull gruffs brother ax as you can imagine this information has caused a lot of controversy and confusion in the elderscrolls communities that discuss it and sparked many many theories and possible explanations let's run through a few of the most likely one possibility and perhaps the most disturbing is that perhaps darl beebowen well got it on with his own mother a few years back and conceived Nell Kira hence the boy is both his son and brother basically he pulled an Oedipus though quite frankly this is so gross I would be path filled if Bethesda tried something like this another much more reasonable proposition built upon the same logic is that okay maybe mr. grader didn't do anything with his mother but instead very late in life his mom had a child with another man heck maybe her own husband and due to her mature age balgruuf opted to take the child in and raise it as his own to avoid controversy again nelq here very much hints that balgruuf is his biological dad but we could be just miss hearing or mephala may not have told him everything yet this is undeniably the proposition that makes the yarol appear the most innocent nonetheless despite what the Creation Kit tells us many players myself included don't really believe that Nell Kira's Bowl grips brother at all there's absolutely no references to this possibility beyond what the game files hint at this leads me to suspect that the brother designation was more than likely an error by the developers at Bethesda remember we're not really supposed to consider anything the ck tells us to be Canon it only offers us some insight and it's perfectly possible that a dev just hit the wrong button or something besides there's a lot more evidence to suggest that bola gruff was just a totally normal run-of-the-mill cheater take a listen to this conversation he may have with ear Olaf ba Grove did you slip out again last night for a drink at the Bennett Mayer heard about that did you yes I went out for a pint or two what of it and I'm an assassin slips past the Night Watch we won't have a y'all at all without ball gross leadership Whiterun will descend into chaos dammit woman I'm the yarol of Whiterun I won't apologize for talking to my people you can't protect me every moment of the day that might be so but it will never stop me from trying this man has a clear habit for sneaking out to the town's taverns late at night perhaps during one of those excursions a few years back when he was still married he could have gone too far one night and got a girl he wasn't married to pregnant in shame and in an effort to avoid controversy bold roof could have decided to take in the illegitimate child upon its birth and attempt to play the boy off as his own son to his actual life this seems very possible there are numerous nord bachelorettes are potentially devious boy in robes could have skoodilypooping respess enrolls in the city proper heck one very popular candidate is Carlotta Valencia Carlotta Valencia is a struggling single mother raising her daughter Mila alone to put food on the table she works as a merchant in the local markets selling fruits and vegetables yet it's never revealed who the father of Carlotta's daughter is or what happened to him was Miss Belen Tia married and maybe her husband passed away you're got a divorce the game doesn't specify any of this whatever the case despite these circumstances something very interesting about Miss Valencia is that she owns an incredibly nice home in the wind district not only is her house big and livable but it's well stocked with food excellent furnishings expensive silverware heck she even has a very large elegant bed in her bedroom the type you almost only see rich couples in the game use it seriously I can't stress how nice these accommodations are most people in the town live in taverns or really really small homes in the plains district servio Pelageya one of the richest men and Whiterun who owns a massive farm lives in a smaller house than Carlotta so the fact that this woman has been able to acquire such amazing accommodations while claiming to be a struggling merchant never made a lot of sense some have suggested that maybe she had an affair with the yarol and balgruuf decided to provide her with these incredible luxuries to keep her and her daughter comfortable and maybe Carlotta was never married at all maybe both Mila and milkier arbol gruffs but since Nell Kyra is the boy he decided to take in that one and leave Mila with the woman medieval cultures did typically place a premium on male children so this would make sense even if it's a little messed up though I'll admit it's also possible that Carlotta had a very wealthy husband who passed away and left her with such a nice house and a nice bed and all that stuff either way just consider that okay but with all of these possible theories one major variable we haven't emphasized yet is what about Baal Griff's wife and the mother of his other two children where does she fit in all of these pictures because whether her husband was cheating on her in a normal kind of affair or pulling an Oedipus with his own mom you would imagine she would have many things to say about this and remember because Nell Keira believes that she's his mother too she must have had very least been alive at the time the child was given birth to also where was this woman now why is she gone well this is where we begin to suspect foul play was possibly involved you see during that whispering Dora quest the only reason mephala is able to communicate and penetrate the minds of these children is because she's using the ebony blade which was already in that locked room as a conduit to reach out to the children and that blade was placed in that room seemingly by bowl gruff or at the very least someone in white runs royal court we know this because after we break into that room and find the ebony blade next to it will be a small journal titled admonition against a Bini and it was written by someone in the royal court as a warning to anyone who dare think about picking up the blade it's relatively short so I'll just read it all to you a quote to anyone reading this beware this blade it is hoped that the only people having access to this room should be the yarol of Whiterun and his trusted wizard if anyone else is reading this please understand the magnitude of your folly turn around and never speak of this room or this blade to anyone it has corrupted and perverted the desires of great men and women yet its power is without equal to kill while your victim smiles at UWE only a Daedra most foul could have concocted such a malevolent and twisted weapon but it appears all who wield it end up with the crazed eyes of wild men who roamed the hills with chattering rabbits it is not to be trifled with not even the hottest fires of the sky Forge could melt it indeed the coals themselves seemed to cool when it was placed within we cannot destroy it and we would not have it fall into the hands of our enemies so we keep it hidden dark deep within dragon's reach never to be used woe be to any who choose to take it end quote so it seems like the reason the ebony blade is in this room is it because mephala just spawned it in there or willingly placed it there but instead because the Royals and white runs somehow got ahold of it realized its horrifying potential and locked it up away the ebony blade does appear in the elderscrolls blades mobile game which takes place 20 years prior to the events of Skyrim so it would have had to shown up in dragon's reach within the last two decades at the absolute earliest likely during the reign of Baal gruff as we discussed earlier in this video and as this text refers to the great power of the ebony blade is that it's able to make people kill those they love and those who love them it turns them against their best of friends and greatest of lovers the journal entry never directly references the item being an artifact of mephala it does suggest it was probably made by a Daedra but mephala 's name is never brought up inherently this leads me to suspect that the way they found out so much about this artifact was it from reading a bunch of text books and learning what the ebony blade was at libraries or something no I think they had first-hand experience with it the people in white runs court in dragon's reach realized this objects horrible potential and just had to lock it away not knowing what else to do and maybe that intimate experience is why yarrow ball groves wife is dead after this item turned up in the Royal Court could your old bull growth have been lured to it and done something horrifyingly regrettable this would explain why no one dare speak of the man's wife why absolutely no one in the court would ever bring her up maybe shortly after Nell Kier was conceived she lashed out at the man and being lured and pressured by mephala he did the unthinkable or it's even possible that there was never any cheating at all theoretically no cure could have been conceived after balgruuf hypothetically killed his wife and he could have simply told the child no no you have the same mother as your brother and sister and hoped to explain something later on in the future because the story was just too much for him it wouldn't be a secret that he could realistically keep because you know his other two kids would know what's wrong but by Bethesda logic it could make sense regardless of the truth here's the point of video where everything gets really really frustrating because it looks like Bethesda did have a revelation and a sort of answer to this mystery an explanation behind why Bowl grifs wife is gone but they cut it from the game and we can't recover it remember how earlier in this video I expressed tremendous surprised at just how short the whispering door quest was I mean all we really did was talk to the kid get a key to the door and open it up well the reason it's so short is because Bethesda originally planned for it to be so much larger and so much darker but cut most of it numerous unused stage triggers and dialogue files imply that this quest wasn't just gonna end after we opened up the door and got the blade but instead there would have been a point in it where the urals children would have turned against him and murdered him yeah bull groves kids were supposed to kill him after he died his brother rongeur would have assumed the throne and there's actually a lot of dialogue for this there's so much rongeur dialogue that if the player kills bowl gruff with console commands krom'gar will automatically take up the role and have the dialogue to fulfill pretty much all the remaining quests he'll be able to help you with the Civil War he'll be able to help you fight the Dragons it's incredible in the whispering door requests there would have also been a point where the kids got together and killed a horse though were not too sure about that the problem is despite all of our own gardiah log and some other pieces of stuff the whispering door quest is genuinely super duper unfinished I mean unlike other cut quests that are actually basically done that we can add in with mods there's a lot missing from this there's so many missing triggers there even does appear to be some missing dialog related to it like there's character dialog we know should exist deep in the game's files but doesn't it's actually so unfinished despite our best efforts to put things back together we just can't for whatever reason sometime right in the middle of working on this mission of whether they ran out of enough time or they wanted to take another plot direction but des des just decided to stop working on this thing in the middle of it leaving us with all of these inconsistencies and I believe it's in this mission we probably would have learned the truth of what happened to mrs. Bolger off I personally believe she was killed by her husband after he was seduced by mephala after her murder he went out in the town had one of those drinking nights and conceived another child which would be Nell Kiera whom he decided to take in and raise as his own telling him that he had the same mother as the siblings of course this is one of those mysteries that has a whole ton of different possibilities when you consider Nell Kear's brother distinction in the creation kit like again the yarol could have performed in Oedipus and Nell Keira could be both his son and brother or he could be a product of adoption there's a lot of places this could go whatever really happened given that this video is now looking to be well over twenty minutes I think we can safely conclude one thing yarol bull growth is keeping something from us whatever that is well that's up for us and the riders at Bethesda to decide and with that we are going to wrap up thanks so much for watching everybody what do you think happened Bolg reformer Dirar on the follow worshipper and adopter leave a comment with your thoughts down below has always liked ratings are very much appreciated again thanks for stopping by and hope to catch you all in my next video peace out everyone

Channel: TheEpicNate315

Views: 1,058,698

Rating: 4.9165668 out of 5

Keywords: Skyrim, The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim, Skyrim Special Edition, The Elder Scrolls 5, Skyrim Top 5, Skyrim Rare Items, Skyrim Facts, Skyrim Secrets, Skyrim tiny Details, Skyrim Mysteries, Skyrim Theories, Things You Didn't Know You Could Do In Skyrim, Skyrim Top 10, Jarl Balgruuf, Skyrim Balgruuf, Jarl Balgruuf the Greater, Skyrim Lore, Elder Scrolls Lore, Skyrim Mods, Skyrim Mod, TheEpicNate315

Id: fZ6EuiX7ZM4

Length: 24min 43sec (1483 seconds)

Published: Tue May 19 2020