After finding the Blade, when going to sleep for the next time, you will suddenly find yourself in a terrible nightmare! Totally naked (well, whether really totally naked or still wearing underwear depends on the body mods that your are using ;-)) and unarmed, you are stuck in this dream-world, haunted by a deadly demon (called “Dundellon’s Nightmare”), until that demon kills you, or you fall down into the abyss looming below! Then you’ll wake up.
From this time on, the nightmare will haunt you again and again, each time you lie down to rest. You won’t be able to sleep, nor to level up, nor to do anything against it.
Quickly you’ll realize that you have attracted upon yourself the ancient curse of Dundellon, and so you’re stuck in it, with no way to escape. History repeats itself; at least so it seems.
If you want to know how to break the curse, proceed to chapter 9.
Many players get stuck in this part of the quest, because they don’t know what to do next after finding the Blade, and as nothing seems to happen, they think it’s a bug.
In fact, the next chapter starts when you go to sleep after holding the Ghostly Blade in your sword hand at least once. If you have never done this, sleeping will continue as usual, and the quest won’t proceed.
Inside the dream, you’ll have to realize that none of the weapons/items that can be found there can harm the demon! However, there are some items and supplies available that might yet give you a bit of protection and restoration and thus help you gaining valuable time while fleeing from the demon (this will become very important in the next chapter).
As you’re stuck inside the dream anyway, you should take your time to explore it as good as you can with the demon at your heels. By the time you will have learned the clue for defeating the nightmare (see chapter 9), every bit of knowledge about the dream world will pay off.
To start the nightmare (and you must start it, otherwise the quest won’t proceed), you have to equip and draw the Blade at least once before going to sleep. As soon as you do so, a journal message will warn you of a strange, scary foreboding, without explaining more of it.
You will not be able to drop the Blade anymore after that (technically speaking, it’s a “quest item” then), though you can still unequip it and just leave it in your inventory. It makes no difference, because once the curse is upon you, it will persist (until finally you defeat it)!
Going to sleep afterwards will immediately start the first nightmare. You must receive a journal entry on entering the dream world for the first time, and another one on waking up from it for the first time.
If you still have problems starting the nightmare, check if there’s a conflict with some other mod that uses sleep mode for triggering certain actions. Some of the mods that are known to conflict are mentioned in the readme, such as:
- Lost Sword of the Ayleids
- Tears of the Fiend
- See You Sleep
- Vampirism
- (and probably various others still unknown)
Inside the dream world there are both useless and useful items to be found:
Any weapons found, no matter how powerful, can be considered useless, as they won’t have any effect on Dundellon’s Nightmare at all. They’re meant only to distract you (giving you the illusion that they might help, though they actually don’t). Don’t waste your time on them!
The following things, however, will turn out to be useful, because they provide valuable restoration or protection, thus gaining time while on the flight:
- any pieces of armor: Their protective effect is real, so they may grant some delay while being killed by the demon (dying slowly is the key ;)),
- several healing potions,
- 3 individual Ayleid wells (“springs”), each one giving a special benefit (protection, healing, and magica, respectively).
The Ayleid wells are most useful of all, because they will be recharged each time you enter the nightmare world again. In addition, using one of the wells will move your entry point for the next time you’re sleeping to the position of that specific well. Thus you can gain some head start by carefully choosing which well to activate last before waking up.
Note that none of the items above will follow you into the real world when waking up! In addition, some of those lying around in the open will be gone permanently after the first time you enter the nightmare. Others (those inside chests) will respawn each time you fall asleep.
Feel free to spend some time stumbling through this dream over and over again. Many people reported that they even enjoyed it! :) Never forget that Dundellon’s Nightmare usually can’t kill you for real! It’s just a dream. By usually, however, I mean that there's a little chance that taking too much damage from him in a single stroke, when your health is already low, might indeed really kill you. This is due to the technical limitations of "script-based death handling" in Oblivion and cannot be avoided. If you are in doubt, don't try to play around with the demon too much.
As soon as you feel prepared for defeating the demon, proceed to the next chapter, but having explored the dream world thoroughly will give you some advantages by then.
