Board Thread:Lore Discussion/@comment-71.8.119.95-20131130213851

Daedra are distinct from the Aedra in that they are incapable of creating, and instead they embody change. The planes of Oblivion belonging to Daedric Princes, which were shaped from the Aurbis without any acts of actual creation, are saturated with the essence of that particular Prince, so one might theorize this inability to create new might extend throughout the plane. However, we know that Daedra native to Oblivion, such as the Elytra and Grummites of the Shivering Isles, are capable of reproduction. Indeed, several in-game books document the life cycles of certain Daedric species. My question, however, is about mortal creatures, natives of Mundus who find themselves in a plane of Oblivion. Since the Madhouse (aka the Shivering Isles, the realm of Sheogorath) is one realm we know to have permanent populations of mortals, I'll use it as an example. The mortal inhabitants of the Shivering Isles do die, as evidenced by the many quests involving killing people and the existence of the Hill of Suicides, but obviously something is sustaining its non-Daedra population, as migration alone is not nearly enough. All of its inhabitants are worshippers of Sheogorath, of course, but traveling from Mundus to Oblivion is extremely difficult, and with the exception of a Daedric Prince bringing a mortal into its realm, the only way to enter is through extremely powerful magic. Such magic usually involves the mortal's physical body remaining on the surface of Nirn. Since voluntary migration to the Isles is nigh-impossible and those brought there by Sheogorath must wait in the Fringe until their madness fully matures, and since most of the inhabitants of the Isles proper are not insanely powerful mages, we must assume the population of the Isles is sustained through some other means.

This begs the question: Is it possible for creatures native to Mundus to reproduce in Oblivion?

As there are no children in TES:IV or the Shivering Isles expansion, we can't look to the games for a direct answer. However, we can use them to aid in speculation. For example, there is a married couple living in Bliss, and there isn't much of a reason they couldn't have children at some point (aside from Sheer Meedish's excessive drinking, but she doesn't seem to be an alcoholic and could simply stop drinking for a while), and if Wide-Eye is killed her gravestone will say, "May all her children prosper." (However, as she is a Felldew addict and, as far as I can tell, unmarried, these children may or may not be metaphorical.) There's also Ushnar gro-Shadborgob, who has owned at least two dogs since settling in Crucible. Granted, his first dog (Ushnar's Skinned Hound) almost certainly died before he got his new one (Ushnar's Dog), but at some point he may have had multiple dogs at once, and we all know what happens if you have two pets of the same species and opposite sexes, and they haven't been spayed/neutered. There's also the question of where he got his dogs—did he get them from a breeder somewhere in the Isles, or did he have to import them all the way from Nirn?

A related question is what happens to children of mortal races born in Oblivion. If Raven Biter and Sheer Meedish did have a child at some point, would s/he still be a purely mortal Argonian, or would the Daedric influence of the Madhouse affect him/her somehow? Would s/he have Sheogorath's blessing from the moment of its birth? If s/he managed to get to Mundus, would banishing magic work on him/her like it does on Daedra? If killed while outside Oblivion, would his/her soul return to the Shivering Isles to wander for years and years before s/he manifested another body, or would s/he be dead like any mortal? What if s/he died while in the Isles? At this point it's all speculation, although it would be a fascinating subject to look into if Bethesda ever decided to touch on mortals born in Oblivion rather than Mundus. I'm not even going to start on mortal/Daedra cross-breeds, of which there is no reliable information (even the stories of Molag Bal seducing Vivec and fathering the first vampires are questionable).

I personally think it could be possible for mortals to have children in Oblivion, but the thing about the "infertile" nature of Daedra spreading to their Oblivion planes and the residents thereof also makes sense to me, so I'm not sure what I think about the subject. What do you guys think? 