9 Powerful Video Game Side Stories You Probably Missed

8. Frostflow Abyss - The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

You may have come across this story before if you’re a Skyrim completionist or if you caught my hidden Skyrim quests list from earlier this year. If not, you’re in for a treat. A really sad treat.

This quest will activate once you enter the central room of Frostflow Lighthouse, a building on the coast of Winterhold. It’s fairly off the beaten path so there’s a good chance you may not have stopped in, and once you do you might wish you hadn’t. You’ll enter a room in disarray complete with blood, a corpse, and a dead Chaurus. Exploring the location further reveals that this is the site of several brutal murders. Journals discovered in the lighthouse, the cellar beneath, and the abyss beyond reveal a particularly sad tale of a family that moved from Hammerfell to Skyrim.

They bought the lighthouse as their new home and soon began hearing strange noises.

The father left the house to buy traps only to return to see his wife had been killed. His son was also killed while he and his daughter became trapped beneath the house. When he was taken away by the monsters to be fed to the Chaurus Reaper, he left a dagger with his daughter which she used to take her own life.

Perhaps the saddest part of all this is the quest represents one of the few times where you can’t swoop in and save the day. The horrors have already happened and all you can do is take in the tragedy and honor their remains.