1st of Granite, 125
The Enchanted Planes: 125 years old, so small you could walk the entire continent in a week-- and packed to the brim with elves. They've conquered and occupied a goblin fortress, bent the local goblin pits to their whims, and spread their forest retreats across the continent. Anyone who's ever challenged them has soon been swamped by endless tides of war elephants and grown-wood arrows.
The dwarves of the Quiet Gears have not fared well under this elven regime. Harried by both goblins and, at one point, elves, in the early days of the world, they have long since retired to relative safety in their mountain fortress of Paintpointed and its cluster of surrounding hillocks.
Somewhere in the bowels of this fortress, seven dwarves, extremely disgruntled and rather drunker than usual, decided to do something about the situation. And so they planned, in the alcoholic dark: they would set out, having packed a wagon with stuff nobody would miss, to found a mighty bastion under the shadow of elfkind that would grow strong under the elves’ noses and strike when least expected. Thoroughly pleased with this plan, the seven dwarves procured a map, marked a spot on it that looked suitable to them, and set out that very night.
Perhaps somebody should have reminded these seven would-be warmongers that the elves hadn’t attacked them in over a century, and were now both friends and allies of the dwarven people.
Perhaps somebody should have told these seven that the elven settlements they planned to attack, the elven settlements they thought belonged to their ancient “enemies”, the Courageous Twigs, in fact belonged to a completely different group of elves who had no knowledge of dwarves whatsoever.
Perhaps somebody should have told them that what they thought was a beer-stain on the map was actually a deliberate marking indicating “horrible undead abominations”, and that the spot they’d marked was right smack in the middle of one of the two most inhospitable, horrendous, generally bad-for-your-health woodlands on the continent.
(https://i.imgur.com/XbXo5BH.png)
But nobody did. And so one cold night in Granite, in the year 125 A.D. (Anno Dorfus), seven alcoholic hairy lunatics set off into the darkness with a wagon full of stolen junk.
---------------
Welcome to my community fortress!
This fortress was created with several purposes: in-character, to construct a mighty above-ground bastion of dwarfkind and kill elves for no reason; out-of-character, to help me learn to write and to teach me how to have !!fun!! with Dwarf Fortress again.
I’m open to dorfing requests. Currently only military positions are available, but if you have something else in mind I’ll see what I can do once more migrants arrive.
If you want a dorfing, I need to know your dorf's:
- Preferred name
- Preferred gender
- Preferred profession
- Other personality traits or characteristics, if anything
And please, please, do post a dorf-journal if you’re at all inclined to that sort of thing; the more I know about a given dwarf, the more I can write about that dwarf!
15th of Granite, 125
Somewhere in the dark woods of the Brazen Hills
Erush Kizestlikot, weaponsmith, miner, and impromptu leader of the drunken seven, was in a bad mood.
Sure, this had seemed like a great idea... two weeks ago.
Then the hangover hit.
Then a wagon wheel broke.
Then somebody dropped the map in a river.
The trip was supposed to take two days. Instead, it had taken two weeks-- two of the most unpleasant weeks Erush had experienced in his seventy years of life.
Well, too late to turn around now. Thanks to gritty determination, constant inebriation, and a healthy dose of bull-headed stupidity, there was now to be heard a sound of dwarfish grumbling in the Brazen Hills.
“This ain’t natural, I tell ye! We been wandering this continent for two stinkin’ weeks now, and the landscape is NOT improving!”
“Landscape? Who cares about the landscape? What about the squealing? It’s downright abnormal, it is!”
Erush waved a hand. “Arrrahh, you guys worry too much. We’ll take the wagon down, dig ourselves a nice hidey-hole, stow the stuff inside, and figger it out from there.”
And so the dwarves dragged their wagon a few more urists, stopped, smelled the earth, and deemed it good.
(https://i.imgur.com/5uof7Bf.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/lzqyfge.png)
Inod Leromerith, woodworker, grunted something and began taking apart the wagon. One plank at a time.
---------------
Resigned to a several-hour wait as Inod sorted through kindling, Erush decided to take a better look at their surroundings.
The place was eerie. Most of the trees in the area were long dead, ashen grey but intact to the last shriveled twig. Only a few scraggly fruit and nut trees survived in this wooded wasteland, together with a smattering of willow, maple-- and two that looked truly bizarre. Twisted, leafless, purple... Erush shook his head. Maybe Inod could tell him what those were.
Erush looked deeper into the woods. Everything was dead here. Even the grass was dead. Even those piggy things over there were dead-- wait.
(https://i.imgur.com/060FDWB.png)
Erush’s eyebrows went up.
---------------
“Äs! Äs!”
Äs Shinlitast was the party militia commander. He had obtained this position by brandishing his war hammer imposingly and glaring at anybody who objected.
“...so this elephant seal’s about halfway up the tree, then suddenly he-- eh? Wot?”
Erush beckoned him over.
“Huh. Weird sort of critters. Want I should smash ‘em for yuh?”
“...No. No I do not. We need to get a hole dug and get ourselves and our stuff underground, now.”
Inod was enjoying herself. The wagon hadn’t been in the best shape when they’d... er... borrowed it, but its construction was intriguing. Inod worked slowly, noting each joint as she came to it and determining how best to unhitch it before doing anything rash. Wouldn’t do to break the material.
Erush came running. "Inod! Hurry up with that wagon, we need to move!"
"Whadayathink I'm doing? I’ve gotta be careful here, or I’ll damage the wood! What do you expect me to do-- kick it?"
Erush kicked the wagon. The wagon collapsed.
(https://i.imgur.com/3y7Wken.png)
"...Oh."
With the wagon down, Erush stepped forward to begin excavation.
---------------
Ordinarily the striking of earth is a joyous occasion, a time of celebration. Here it was a thing of deadly urgency. Porcine abominations stalked the woods, and slow though the piggy creatures were, sooner or later they'd notice something amiss.
For four days the dwarves labored in fear, but at last an underground shelter was dug, a carpenter's workshop constructed
(https://i.imgur.com/RZXjdhC.png)
and a hatch cover set into the ground.
(https://i.imgur.com/p9qca6D.png)
They were safe-- for now.
---------------
19th of Granite, 125
Locked in a dirt hole under the Brazen Hills
With little else to do, the two miners attacked the wall of their shelter, hacking at it with their picks.
They spent three days doing this.
The clay gave easily under the cold copper; the shelter was soon carved wide enough to hold the stocks of food and other supplies the dwarves had brought with them.
(https://i.imgur.com/EpiMeBX.png)
Wide enough-- but how to haul everything in without attracting the attention of the porcine menace outside?
22nd of Granite, 125
Locked in a dirt hole under the Brazen Hills
Erush set down his pick. “Right... this is about big enough. Äs, what’s the pig situation up there?”
Äs clambered up to the hatch cover and unlocked it, raising it just enough to peek outside. “Eh, seems safe... well, for a given definition of “safe”. The pig thingies are still there, but they’re a fair bit off and I don’t think they know we’re here. ...Want I should smash ‘em for yuh?”
“No. You’d be eviscerated. We cannot beat those things in a straight fight; we’ll have to avoid them.” Erush turned to the others. “We need our food, but we don’t necessarily need all of it-- if we grab the plump helmets quickly, before anything notices, we can mash ‘em for juice and ferment the juice into something alcoholic. Then we hang onto the leftover spawn and plant it in this clay here. Not exactly fine cuisine, but we’ll survive.”
(https://i.imgur.com/WiahgfC.png)
Right now survival seemed like a pretty good proposition. The hatch was thrown open, and the dwarves scurried out to grab mushrooms.
(https://i.imgur.com/HBR3xzW.png)
As it turns out, reanimated boars with half-rotten eyeballs have really terrible vision. Over a period of three straight days, the dwarves were able to bring in not only the plump helmets, but the extra spawn bags and much of the alcohol.
(https://i.imgur.com/Jqfzy5y.png)
The boars began wandering worryingly close before anybody could nab the meat, but... well, perhaps that wasn’t such a great loss.
(https://i.imgur.com/OwmNpxN.png)
---------------
25th of Granite, 125
Locked under the Brazen Hills-- with food!
Things were almost peaceful down under this earth, Erush decided, now that there was food and drink to be had.
Erush looked over to the expedition planter. “Oi, Atis! How’s it going with the ground preparation?”
(https://i.imgur.com/82mqiE7.png)
“As it always goes. I am furrowing the earth, as did my father before me, as did his father before him, as did--”
“I get it, I get it. Inod?”
A beaming face popped up from the heap of wood that had been the temporary carpenter’s shop. “Almost done breaking this thing!”
“Ex-cel-lent. I’m gonna start digging down, see what kind of rock I can find.” The dwarves grinned. Now everyone was safe underground, they could start striking the earth in earnest.
---------------
Perhaps three days later, Erush emerged from his hole, dusty but beaming. The others gathered around.
“It’s beautiful down there, guys. It’s chalk-- all chalk-- it’s like carving warm yak cheese, and there’s bound to be iron down there somewhere. And look--” Erush pulled a grimy chunk of rock out of his pocket, polished it on his shirt, and held it up to the light near the hatch cover.
(https://i.imgur.com/aHA3rz1.png)
Seven voices spoke at once, reverent. “Platinum.”
---------------
Erush was halfway through a perfectly good drink when he felt a tap on the shoulder. “Mlphh-- eh? Kel?”
It was indeed Kel Lalasmel. “Yeah. I wanted to show you something."
Kel grabbed a stick from the wreckage of the carpenter’s shop and plopped himself onto the ground. “So. I been thinking about the diggings down there, thinking about what we want it to look like down there when we’re ready to expand, and now you’re back from your little expedition I thought I’d show you..." And Kel began to sketch designs into the soft clay floor.
(https://i.imgur.com/IilwOit.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/hyzcvz5.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/kOr9HsT.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/5LCa9aJ.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/5bjtqbj.png)
“...Huh. Sort of a weird setup. Nothing like anything in the mountainhome.”
“Sure, but the mountainhome was built for two hundred dwarves now weren’t it? I figger we’re not gonna get more than five score here, tops. We can afford to think small-- and this way the hauling’ll be easier a couple years from now."
Erush shrugged. “Eh, I guess so. I’ll start digging some of this stuff out-- carve a couple workshop spots, then get to work on that food pile you have there; we could certainly use one. I’ll need help, though... oi, Lorbam, mind taking up a pick?"
“Sure, not much else to do around here.”
And Lorbam Risenisan grabbed a pick and followed Erush down the staircase.
---------------
5th of Slate, 125
With the new month came the beginning of true self-sustenance. Atis Ginonkadol had completed his furrowings, and was now setting into the earth great wet handfuls of the spawn from which plump helmets grow.
The miners were still hacking away down in the stone. Nobody had seen them in ten days.
---------------
9th of Slate, 125
Erush clambered up to the farms. “Anybody here dabble in masonry before? We’ve got a nice nook down there for a mason’s shop, and we could use some furniture for when we dig ourselves a dining room.”
(https://i.imgur.com/FWPlada.png)
Kel looked up, grinned, and followed Erush down the stairs.
---------------
10th of Slate, 125
Erush clambered up to the farms again. “Tun, a word?”
Tun Letmosstukon looked up. “Hm? What?”
“Two things. First: you used to carve rock, right?”
“I s’pose.”
“Great. We’ve got a nice little nook carved out for a craftsdwarf’s, and we need mugs. Second: how are you at paperwork?”
“...Beg pardon?”
“Paperwork. We need somebody who can keep track of the stocks around here, and we need somebody to keep track of the work orders that need doing. Think you could do it?
Tun’s forehead wrinkled. “...Sure. Why not.”
“Wonderful! Take the broker and chief medical dwarf positions too. It’ll save on office space.”
“What?”
(https://i.imgur.com/FM8BsaL.png)
But Erush was already heading back down to dig the food stockpile. Tun sighed and descended the stairs to build herself a workshop.
---------------
13th of Slate, 125
It had taken Tun three days to haul all the rock in and assemble it, but at last she had a crude workbench and stool set up. Smiling, Tun assigned herself a work order for 10 rock mugs, grabbed a nearby chunk of chalk, took a tiny chisel from her shirt pocket, and began carving.
---------------
14th of Slate, 125
Kel emerged from his workshop. “Hey Lorbam!”
“Hmm?”
“Would you find somewhere to put this thing?” And Kel dragged a gigantic weapon rack made of solid stone out of his shop. “It’s for Äs to practice at.”
Lorbam looked at the weapon rack, sighed, and stumped off to carve a place for it.
---------------
15th of Slate, 125
Äs was bored. A whole month he’d been here, and he hadn’t been allowed to kill so much as a pig. He’d taken to holding the hatch cover open a wee bit, watching the piggy things through the tiny gap and thinking about how he’d smash them if Erush would let him. Cave that one’s skull in, break that one’s legs and send it flying into a third, kick that one in the gut-- did zombies have guts?-- then break its spine with the rim of his shield...
Then, as Äs watched, they left.
Äs groaned.
But wait. What was that?
(https://i.imgur.com/fLXqC7i.png)
---------------
“Erush! Erush!”
Erush put his pick down. “Eh?”
“The pigs! The pig things are gone!”
“Wait. Wait wait. Gone?”
“Yeah! They just kinda wandered away! Now there’s a bunch of emus! Can I smash them?”
“...Emus. Are their eyes milky white and blazing with unholy hatred? Is the flesh rotting off their blackened bones?”
“...Yes.”
Erush sighed. “Äs. You’ve never killed anything tougher then a plump helmet in your life. These are unnatural monstrosities tainted by an evil from the dawn of time. Stay. Here. Lorbam’s carving a nice spot for you to practice your combat drills in; you’ll be able to train in peace.”
Äs stumped back up to the farms, grumbling all the way. The next day Lorbam finished his carving, and Inod dragged the weapon rack into its place.
(https://i.imgur.com/1zLB0x0.png)
---------------
28th of Slate, 125
The 28th of Slate marked a day of rest, the first day anyone had really felt safe enough to sleep. Half the fortress had settled down for an extended nap, dwarves plopping themselves down wherever they happened to be.
Tun had fallen asleep at her workbench after finishing the last mug and placing an order for 40 rock pots. She’d have to start carving those when she woke up.
Äs had passed out from sheer exhaustion after swinging his hammer around energetically for a week straight.
Inod and Kel had talked long into the night
(https://i.imgur.com/Sz4G2LE.png)
but had parted at last for sleep. Kel was snoozing in her shop, surrounded by rubble and stone furniture. The dining room, once Erush and Lorbam had gotten around to it, would have seating enough for all.
Meanwhile, Inod was asleep by the rubble of her old carpenter’s workshop.
(https://i.imgur.com/v1QpFAz.png)
Atis was awake still, determined to finish planting his plot. Nudging Inod out of the way with his foot, he triumphantly set the last measure of plump helmet spawn into its place.
The miners, too, labored still, carving deep under the earth.
Tonight, for the first time since they left the mountain, the seven dwarves under the Brazen Hills were safe.
(https://i.imgur.com/oOVf8SL.png)
With the new month came the harvest! Atis began carefully plucking plump helmets from the earth, quiet satisfaction on his face.
(https://i.imgur.com/fLngZAw.png)
---------------
Inod came walking down the stairs to where the miners were digging. “How’s the storage digging down here, Erush? Atis is yanking mushrooms out of the earth with nowhere to put ‘em...”
“Eh, good enough, I guess. We’re only like halfway done down here, but there’s space enough for whatever stuff we have.”
(https://i.imgur.com/621pQlw.png)
“Great. Another thing: the horses are getting hungry up on the farm level. They won’t eat plump helmets, and there’s no grass down here for them to munch on like they usually do...”
“Horses?”
(https://i.imgur.com/g7jx4ce.png)
Erush frowned. “We can’t very well pasture the horses aboveground with those emus up there-- they’d die anyway, and we’d risk losing a dwarf too. We could butcher them, but I dunno I trust things to stay dead around here... we’ll have to lock them in a room of their own, where they can die in peace without taking us with them. I’ll ask Lorbam to go carve a place; Kel can fashion a door for it.”
Inod nodded and headed back up to start hauling the food down.
---------------
6th of Felsite, 125
Atis was preparing the ground for a plump helmet when he heard scratching noises from the hatch cover. Something was trying to get in...
(https://i.imgur.com/FM8JvQH.png)
The hatch held, and Atis returned to his work with a shudder. It was safe down here yet-- but what if other dwarves from the mountainhome came here? How would they get in?
---------------
Lorbam clambered down to the half-finished food storeroom. “Hey Erush.”
“Hm?”
“I’m done diggin’ up where the horses are supposed to die. We can shove ‘em in whenever.”
Erush nodded. “I’ll let the dwarves up there know they can start doing that. Does Kel have a door ready?"
“Yeah.”
“Perfect. I’ll tell the guys up top to fit that over the entrance once the horses are in. Then we lock it and forget about the whole thing until Äs decides he wants to smash some horse skulls.”
(https://i.imgur.com/wcAUy1A.png)
---------------
11th Felsite, 125
“Erush?”
Erush turned. “Hmm? Tun?”
“Sorry to be disrupting your work down here and all, but-- well, you told me to count everything in the fortress.”
“I... so I did. What of it?”
“We-e-ll... is there somewhere down here I could put one of Kel’s chairs? As a workspace for myself?”
“Uh. Not at the moment, no. I guess I could go widen that hallway over by Kel’s workshop; you could put a chair there. Nice and close to your space, too.
Tun smiled. “That’d be perfect. Thanks.”
---------------
12th of Felsite, 125
Atis climbed down into the storeroom. “Erush, thought you’d like to know: those foul bird creatures that were scratching at the hatch cover are gone.”
“Wait. Gone gone?”
“They have left the area, yes.”
“Is there... anything else nearby? Evil bears? Evil gorillas? Evil moose?”
”Nothing of which I am aware.”
“But that’s wonderful news! This is a chance for us to bring in more of our supplies! We have wood up there! Wood! Inod can make us proper beds to sleep in!”
Atis frowned. “Are you sure that’s safe? This place has never been truly empty before... there has always been something lurking in those shadows, be it swine or fowl.”
“We’ll send Äs up there to stand guard while we drag the wood in-- and if anything does show up, we can just pop back down and lock the hatch before it gets close. Zombies are slow, remember?”
“...I suppose. We had best make it quick, though.”
---------------
Erush ran down to the workshop floor. “Guys, we’re going up to grab wood.”
Kel stumbled out of his workshop. “We’re what?”
“You heard me! The emus are gone and nobody’s seen anything else around; we’ve got a window. If we move quick, we can grab the logs we brought and drag them down here. We’re gonna have beds!”
Kel ran for the stairs. “Great. You do that, I’m getting a drink. We left some of our best brew up there!”
“What?" But Kel was already gone.
Äs came runnning from his training room. “You’re letting me up there? I get to kill things?”
“With any luck-- no. The idea is to get the wood in before anything actually notices us.” Erush sighed. “On the other hand, if something does notice, well... yes, I guess you’d have to kill it. Or at least try to.”
That was enough for Äs; he charged up the staircase with hammer in hand.
---------------
15th of Felsite, 125
Äs was bored again. Sure, there had been the promise of potential destruction-- but it had been three days, and not so much as a marmot had turned up. And now everyone was heading back inside... Äs sighed and turned to leave. Back down into the dark, performing and re-performing old combat drills under the weapon rack.
Then Äs heard the screech.
(https://i.imgur.com/TFTajyC.png)
It was on him before he could react, a hurtling little tangle of bone and claw and tattered flesh. Terrified, Äs lashed out with blind instinct-- once-- twice-- thrice--
(https://i.imgur.com/Q3h3apX.png)
And it stopped moving.
Shaking, Äs stumbled back under the earth, locking the hatch behind him. Rotting eyes in the darkness watched him go.
---------------
18th of Felsite, 125
(https://i.imgur.com/wARE89l.png)
Erush entered the farm level grinning, followed by Lorbam. “The food storeroom’s complete-- all squared out-- we’re going to go start carving bedrooms! Inod, could you go start making us some beds?”
Inod smiled. “Yess. It’s been too long since I last touched proper wood-- oh, I’ll need another workshop. This one’s... a bit the worse for wear.”
“Oh. Oh yeah. Lorbam, would you mind?”
“Nah. There’s a nice spot over by Kel’s shop I can carve out; I’ll go get on that. Should be ready by around this time tomorrow.”
And the next day, it was. Inod finished her workbench and began fashioning beds the day after--
(https://i.imgur.com/IjW2Eu4.png)
--and four days after that the miners finished excavations on a bedroom wing.
(https://i.imgur.com/10puTno.png)
---------------
1st Hematite, 125
(https://i.imgur.com/g7oII5O.png)
Summer! The warm weather didn’t make much of a difference down under the earth, but the dwarves of the Brazen Hills had nevertheless survived a full season and that was something to celebrate. Erush and Lorbam labored to finish carving out a rough dining hall, and eight days later it was ready and stocked with tables and chairs from Kel’s workshop. On the 9th of Hematite in the year 125, the citizens of the Brazen Hills feasted.
(https://i.imgur.com/GJhOu2V.png)
Well, most of them.
(https://i.imgur.com/1R71GHF.png)
Erush took a moment from his diggings to pay the farms a visit. “Hey Atis, anything nasty hanging around up on the surface?”
Atis lifted the hatch cover a bit. “Mm... nothing unduly large. Just a few rodent things.”
(https://i.imgur.com/DMZ8Dtv.png)
“Ex-cel-lent. Let’s pay the woods a little visit, shall we? Oi, Äs! Inod!”
The two dwarves came running up, Inod in the lead. “What’s up?”
“Us. We’re making another wood trip.”
Inod frowned. “That-- that sounds dangerous.”
“‘S not as bad as all that; all that’s up there is a couple weird rodents. They’re dead, of course, rotting corpses twisted into unholy mockeries of life, but... they’re smaller than the pig things. I figure we can take ‘em.”
“...All right. I’ll have to cut down some of the local stuff, though; we already brought in most of what was in the wagon.”
And the dwarves clambered up into the pale light of day once again. Äs seemed much less excited about the excursion this time.
(https://i.imgur.com/HoGFn4j.png)
---------------
11th of Hematite, 125
Erush was working on widening one of the hallways when Kel came marching down with a great bundle of wood in his arms. Erush looked up from his digging and-- “What is that?”
(https://i.imgur.com/Hicsu2o.png)
Kel grinned from behind his load. “Glumprong! ‘Ccording to Inod it’s just as tough as any other wood, and looks nice too. ‘Pparently it’s a devil to work, though. All twisty on the inside, doncha know.”
“I... she cut that stuff?”
“Sure! The glumprong trees were closest to the hatch cover, we figgered, why not? It’ll make some fine beds, it will!”
Erush, at a loss for words, turned back to his digging.
---------------
13th of Hematite, 125
The groundhogs had been wandering the Brazen Hills for a long time. Half-blind and half-deaf as they were, they took little notice of the wood around them in their shamblings.
Today was different.
Today they heard voices.
Today they saw the light of the new clearing.
Today they smelled the warm blood of the living.
(https://i.imgur.com/EEn2qoC.png)
---------------
Äs had been watching the reanimated rodents for some time. They’d moved slowly for the past few days, shambling across the map at random. Blind, deaf, they’d not noticed the dwarves’ labors, not heard the sounds of the axe nor the crashing of the wood.
Nevertheless, Äs watched and waited for the groundhogs to make their move. And today, he saw what he was watching for.
They’d scented him.
The groundhogs shuffled towards Äs, slow on their rotting feet but determined to taste of his blood. Äs Brighttorch, defender of the Brazen Hills, hefted his warhammer and charged to meet his diminutive enemies.
---------------
“Is it over?” asked Inod.
Kel lifted the hatch. “I... think so. Äs is comin’ back. Seems OK, too.” Throwing the hatch open, Kel climbed out. “Äs! Oi, Äs! What happened out there?”
Äs stumbled into the clearing, moustache and beard stained with... something. “I-- crushed them. All four of them. The first one came, and I was just-- swinging at it, sending little rodent bits all over the place-- and then it jumped at my face, and-- Äs’s face twisted into a rabid grin. “I bit it, Kel.”
(https://i.imgur.com/ND5zTDs.png)
Kel’s eyes widened. “You--”
“Yeah. Bit it. Got my teeth around it somehow, and I just bit down as hard as I could. And then I smashed its stinkin’ face in with the butt end of me hammer.”
“And then another showed up, and I smashed it until it stopped movin’--”
(https://i.imgur.com/ThtzvAR.png)
“And then one tackled me somehow, and I smashed it some, and it tackled me again, and I smashed it for good--”
(https://i.imgur.com/AEj65cG.png)
“And the last one-- well.” Äs started chuckling. “I flattened it.” And Äs laughed.
(https://i.imgur.com/DdY8ldE.png)
“Are you... okay, As? You look exhausted. And psychologically damaged.”
As nodded, still chuckling “I’m fine. Just... fine. Think I’ll take another shift. Saw a couple more hogs on the west side, gotta keep an eye on ‘em...”
(https://i.imgur.com/DIavujk.png)
And As disappeared into the woods.
“He is horrified after being attacked by the dead. He is satisfied after improving fighting.”
(https://i.imgur.com/w5VaFfy.png)
---------------
15th of Hematite, 125
Äs had been watching the groundhogs for a long time. A long... time. Perhaps... perhaps if he just... leaned against this tree a little...
“Kel?”
“Mm?”
“Is Äs... asleep over there?”
“Is he-- wait. What?”
Inod pointed.
(https://i.imgur.com/fS7nn9T.png)
“No. No no no no, he can’t be asleep now...” Kel sighed. “You know what? There’s nothing we can do about that. There’s no moving a sleeping dwarf. We’ll keep hauling wood, and if the groundhogs find him... well, we’ll have to defend him.” Kel smirked. “Y’know, you’d think that’d be the other way ‘round.”
---------------
17th of Hematite, 125
After two nerve-wracking days for the haulers, Äs picked himself back up and resumed his watch just as the two groundhogs started moving again.
(https://i.imgur.com/tmSqHK9.png)
Slow creatures, these groundhogs; Äs sighed and resigned himself to another long wait--
“Ho there!”
(https://i.imgur.com/vTs7YCJ.png)
Äs whipped ‘round. “Wha-- Who are you?”
“Sakzul Libashkikrost! I bring news from the mountainhome!”
(https://i.imgur.com/Vy2UirU.png)
---------------
Down in the new dining hall
“No, it’s wonderful that you made it here, we’re very happy indeed to have you-- I’m just shocked that the mountainhome bothered to send anyone at all!”
Sakzul smiled. “Well-- Erush, was it?-- I’m not exactly, as it were, formally sent by the mountainhome. I’m no messenger, I’m an artist-- a poet, in fact. I’m here more out of curiosity then anything else.”
“So wait. You left the nice, safe mountainhome-- you came marching over here through this trackless wood of deathly horrors-- you arrived here, despite the scores of undead monsters seeking your blood at every turn-- from sheer curiosity?”
“Exactly! Two of my colleagues should be here soon too. We poets travel in threes, you know.”
Erush buried his face in his hands. “I’ll never understand artists. You said you had news for us?”
“Ah, so I did. Where shall I begin... well, first of all, you seven fine dwarves have been put on the mountainhome justice rosters for counts of misconduct and petty theft!”
Erush spluttered. “We wha-- oh. Well, I guess that was inevitable. Are they going to come for us?
“Hm? Oh! I’m not sure. The guards have been very quiet about it. The citizens, though-- well, the citizens are all in a tizzy. Would you believe it, word of your little expedition has spread like wildfire back there! It’s all over the mountain! You’ve been reviled as drunken warmongers, hailed as heroes-- mind, some folks’ idea of a hero back there is a drunken warmonger-- but nobody, nobody, has been able to ignore you!”
“Is that a good thing?”
Sakzul suddenly became very solemn. “No idea... but some of the dwarves there have decided they’re going to come here. They don’t know how well you’ve done here-- they don’t even know if you’re still alive-- but they’re risking everything, and I mean everything, on the faith that seven drunken lunatics with a wagon full of junk could provide them a better life than the one they have back home... and bring glory back to the dwarfish people.”
Erush said nothing.
“Makes you think, doesn’t it?”
---------------
18th of Hematite, 125
(https://i.imgur.com/tWtnCBJ.png)
Erush ran into the food storeroom with a chunk of something in his hand. “Guys! Tetrahedrite! Copper! Silver! We’re gonna have weapons! Armor! Overpriced furniture!”
“...Guys?”
(https://i.imgur.com/aJPX6Ru.png)
It had been a long week.
19th of Hematite, 125
“Ho there!”
(https://i.imgur.com/W6UVKA7.png)
Another poet. As was once again forced to divert his attention from evil-groundhog watching.
“And just who,” said As, “might you be?”
The poet, a dwarf of long nose and longer facial hair, marched over and bowed. “Logem, good sir-- Logem Alathunal, wandering poet. I’d heard old Sakzul was seeking you seven out, and-- well! I couldn’t let him discover a spiffy new poetry hole without me, now could I?”
“Er. I suppose not? Look, I’ll just show yuh over to the dining hall before yuh get eaten by squirrels or somethin’.”
---------------
21st of Hematite, 125
Inod climbed up to the surface, where As was standing guard.
“Where’ve yuh been?” asked As. “I’ve been up here for days now, and nobody’s been hauling wood! I mean, I wouldn’t be here if you weren’t supposed to be hauling wood!”
Inod started. “Oh dear. We didn’t realize you were still up here-- we’ve been putting up beds in the bedrooms for the past three days!”
As sighed. “Well, now you folks are done, wouldjuh mind terribly bringin’ down those last logs? I’d rather like to go back inside and get a drink, y’know.
---------------
23rd of Hematite, 125
“Ho there!”
As didn’t even bother turning around this time.
The poet walked over anyway. “Hullo, good sir! I’m--”
“Don’t tell me-- yer another poet, like the last two poets that’ve showed up in the past week, and yer here because yer buddies are because poets are a buncha nosy lunatics.”
“I-- yes. Yes I am.”
“Won-der-ful. The hatch cover’s thataway. Now if ye’ll excuse me, it looks like the haulers are done--I’m gonna go submerge my head in a barrel of fermented mushroom juice.”
And As stumped back to the hatch. Lost for words, the poet followed suit.
---------------
24th of Hematite, 125
(https://i.imgur.com/AzxXSin.png)
With the wood-hauling expedition complete, the dwarves of the Brazen Hills treated themselves to a day of rest. The miners had passed out in the new bedrooms; sleep, blissful sleep, took them like it had not since they’d arrived here. Tun and As cracked open a new barrel of ale. Sakzul the poet regaled Inod, Kel, and Atis with an old historical tale while the other poets criticized.
On days like this, you could almost forget you were living in a hole in the ground under a haunted woodland.
---------------
26th of Hematite, 125
(https://i.imgur.com/8qUCXrq.png)
Erush stumped up to the food storeroom, wiping sleep out of his eyes. “Hey Tun?”
“What?”
“Did you ever start counting things around here?”
“Oh! I *hic* never did. There was so many pots to carve I sort of *hic* lost track...”
“Ah. Well, could you get started on that? Nobody seems to know how much food and drink we have left in here, and I suspect we’re running low...”
Tun nodded. “Yeah, sure. I’ll *hic* get on that.” And Tun made her way, slightly unsteadily, to the stairway.
(https://i.imgur.com/Yd0k2Qi.png)
---------------
27th of Hematite, 125
“Erush?”
Erush turned from his digging. “Yeah, wh-- oh, Lorbam! What’s going on?”
“I was just thinking-- we don’t really have anything left to dig up here. We’ve been widenin’ the hallways and such, but none of that’s really so important right now, yeah?”
Erush frowned. “I mean, I guess so. What are you getting at?”
“I want to dig down,” said Lorbam. “We’ve got a good settlement carved out up here-- it’s time we look at the stuff down there. We’ll find some new ores, maybe crack open a cavern or two, and eventually... magma.” Lorbam spread her arms wide. “Magma! Blood of the earth! Soul of the fortress! We’ll bring ores down there, forge weapons, armor... the things we came here to make!”
Erush nodded. “Yes. Yes, that sounds wonderful. Sink a shaft from the main stairway, we can widen it later. Let us know what you find.” Erush smiled. “Happy digging.”
(https://i.imgur.com/Xzdu4yW.png)
---------------
Twelve days after Lorbam disappeared under the earth, she returned. The dwarves gathered in the dining room to hear her findings.
(https://i.imgur.com/MwCb34R.png)
“It’s great down there,” said Lorbam. “Diorite and granite, layers and layers of the stuff, good solid building material-- and ores everywhere. Tin and copper for bronze, silver for warhammers and statues, and gold-- gold all over the place. I dug straight through a big vein of the stuff, gold all ‘round me. Fan-tas-tic.”
Erush nodded. “Any caverns?”
“Nah, not yet. I think I musta bypassed one or two of ‘em, but haven’t cracked any open yet. Had to come back for a drink.”
“Mm. Well, great work down there-- now we know where the good building rock is, we can start thinking about quarrying some.”
“Ooh. I might have something for that,” said Kel, and he began to draw on the stone floor with a chunk of chalk. “See, we want to do three things down there: explore the level, dig out plenty of raw material, and dig it in such a way that we could convert the floor into something later. So we start by digging these tunnels out across the level, like this--”
(https://i.imgur.com/Ghn1d2r.png)
“And then we start digging a crisscross of these, leaving 5-by-5 chunks of rock between the tunnels. We want to explore the level? We dig more tunnels. We need more granite for building stuff? We widen the tunnels a bit, or knock out a few chunks, or just carve more tunnels. We need more living space? We knock a few chunks around until they’re the shape we want. Simple!” Kel brushed away the chalk markings and stood in triumph. “And once we’ve got ourselves a nice little pile of granite-- well. The things we can build...” Kel stepped back, chortling.
Erush shrugged. “...Looks as good as anything, I guess. I’ll go start the digging; Lorbam, could you come help once you’ve got something alcoholic down your throat?”
“Sure.”
---------------
All this talk of stonework and design had put Kel in a constructive sort of mood. He needed to tinker, fiddle, manipulate-- engineer. Yes, engineer. Kel needed to play around with mechanics; it'd been too long...
(https://i.imgur.com/WkRAJ2F.png)
---------------
10th of Malachite, 125
Inod was in the dining hall when a rather odd odour descended upon the room. “...Hey. Do you three smell that?”
The three poets were in some kind of heated argument about the proper structuring of acrostics. Inod sighed and set herself to investigating. The smell seemed to be coming from upstairs...
---------------
“Hey Atis. Is something... rotting up here?”
Atis turned. “Rotting?” he asked. “I suppose there is a bit of a stench up here, now that you mention it... well, it’s certainly not my plump helmets!”
“‘Course not. I think it’s coming from outside...” Inod lifted the hatch cover-- “Eeyugh!”-- and promptly slammed it shut. “Definitely coming from up there. I could swear I’ve smelled this before,but it seems somehow worse this time--” Inod pinched her nose, lifted the cover again, and scrutinized the forest. “...Oh.” And Inod began to laugh.
“What’s up there?” asked Atis.
“Skunk.”
(https://i.imgur.com/lCyk9Ee.png)
---------------
Tink-- tink-- tink-- down in the granite quarries. Slowly but surely, the stone gave way under the cold copper.
“We never did finish sinking that shaft to the magma sea,” said Erush.
Lorbam shrugged. “Eh, this quarry here seemed like a good thing to get started on. Kel’s itchin’ to do some real construction up on the surface, y’know.”
“I suppose,” said Erush, nodding slowly. “One of us could go finish what you started down there, though. For the magma.”
“Yeah. Just doesn’t seem like a proper fortress until there’s magma in it, know what I mean?”
“Mm.”
The two miners worked in silence. Tink. Tink. Tink. Copper on stone.
“I think I’ll go finish that shaft now,” said Erush after several minutes had passed. “For the magma. Unless you’d rather do it?”
“Nah, you deserve a turn at it. I’ll keep working here.”
Erush smiled and descended the staircase. Lorbam nodded and turned back to her tunnel.
(https://i.imgur.com/ITJHe0q.png)
Tink. Tink. Tink.
---------------
12th of Malachite, 125
“Inod?”
Inod, not having had much else to do, had been spending most of her time in the tavern, listening to the poets’ stories and telling a couple of her own. “So when we get here Erush goes “Right-- who want to be militia commander?” and As, he just grabs this big hammer out of the back of the wagon, and he-- oh. Tun?”
“Erush told me to count everything a couple weeks ago,” said Tun, “and I’ve just finished counting everything, and there’s something he needs to see, but he’s under a hundred urists of stone right now, and-- but maybe you could look?” And Tun led Inod over to where the drinks were kept. “Look. We’re running out.”
(https://i.imgur.com/GtruRjw.png)
Inod groaned. “That’s enough for us to take what, three good swigs apiece? That won’t do...” Inod wrinkled her forehead, then looked up. “Say. Remember what Erush said about mashing plump helmets into juice and fermenting them? Maybe we could do that.”
“I guess so,” said Tun. “Who’s going to do it, though?”
“Me! I’m bored out of my skull listening to the poets anyway. I’ll grab a few of those nice pots you’ve been making, nab a few plump helmets from down here, and try my hand at it. How hard can it be?”
Tun smiled. “Perfect! Just let me know when you’re done so I can count the wine!” And Tun scurried off to carve more pots.
---------------
14th of Malachite, 125
Atis was burying another fistful of plump helmet spawn when he heard the voices.
(https://i.imgur.com/NyCGRTu.png)
---------------
“Migrants! Migrants!” cried Atis, running down the stairs. “As! Migrants have come!”
“Migrants?” As stumbled from his training room. “Wot sort of daft folks would migrate here?” And As rushed upstairs to see the newcomers in.
---------------
(https://i.imgur.com/J5tMjDD.png)
Melbil Tadcatten, novice miller, beekeeper, and gelder, was beginning to have doubts. His group had been trudging through the woods for two days now, and the landscape had only gotten bleaker as they moved farther into it. Not to mention the eyes in the darkness... surely no dwarf could survive here? He’d only come because his older cousins did anyway.
Melbil’s doubts were soon dispelled by a dwarfish voice. The infamous dwarves of the Brazen Hills were alive! And had come in greeting! The wonderful voice boomed out, in true dwarfish welcoming fashion:
“Get over here, ya lunatics!”
(https://i.imgur.com/raUYgWa.png)
---------------
15th of Malachite, 125
Still the migrants came, a great string of dwarves eleven strong. Well, five if you didn’t count the kids. As shook his head as he watched, confounded by the utter stupidity it took to bring children to a place like this.
“Alright,” said As, “welcome to our little hidey-hole. Don’t mind the stench; there’s a dead skunk prowling around here somewhere.”
“A wha--”
“You’ll get used to it. Hatch cover’s thataway, there’s room and board down there. Well, board anyway; Inod’ll have to get t’work on the room part. Now then... anybody here got any skills worth mentioning?”
There issued from the five adult migrants a mumbled string of various novice farming trades.
“That’s about wot I thought. You people willing to work hard and fight harder, then?”
The migrants shrugged.
“Eh, good enough. Yer profession here is ‘Soldier’. You’ll probably be drafted into the army at some point, of which I’m the only member, but if you didn’t want to fight yuh should’ve stayed home. In the meantime, we’ve got a dining room downstairs where you can go rest up a bit, and plenty of food and drink above that. Make yerself at home.”
The migrants spent the rest of the day herding themselves and their six children down to safety, and on the 16th of Malachite As closed the hatch cover. The dwarves of the Brazen Hills were now 18 strong.
17th of Malachite, 125
Tink. Tink. Tink. Copper on stone. Slowly the granite crumbled.
Tink-- tink-- tink-- *CRACK*
And a great chunk of stone collapsed suddenly into darkness. Erush laid his pick down, awestruck.
(https://i.imgur.com/lrmcZzg.png)
To surface dwellers, the cavern world was considered gloomy, alien, unnatural. Humans and elves called it the Underdark.
The dwarves knew better.
The dwarves had begun in the deep places of the earth. The dwarves had since time before time drawn their sustenance from the life that sprouted among the twinkling mosses of the caves. The dwarves had in some forgotten age learned industry in the caverns, scraping metal from the walls and slowly shaping it in deep pools of liquid fire. The dwarves, since time immemorial, had called the caverns their home.
The humans called the caverns the Underdark. The dwarves called them Thunenmafol: The Living Chambers.
---------------
Erush returned to the quarry. “I found them,” he said. “The caverns.”
Lorbam smiled as she worked. “Nice... Will we be movin’ down there?”
Erush sighed. “Too dangerous,” he said. “It took the old founders many years to tame the caverns back home, and these ones are virgin and wild. We’re not ready.”
Lorbam nodded. “So we need to wall ‘em off, then.”
“Aye. Let’s dig out a space over there--” Erush pointed-- “where Kel can do some stonecutting. We’ll need him to make some blocks from this granite.”
”Yeah, sure. And maybe the migrants can help seal the wall.”
Erush dropped his pick. “Migrants? What migrants?”
“Migrants,” said Lorbam. “They showed up a couple days ago; there was shoutin’ about it upstairs. You didn’t hear?”
“No I didn’t hear!” And Erush ran for the stairs. “Keep digging-- I’ve got to know what this is about!”
---------------
Erush burst into the dining hall, collapsing onto a bench. “I... heard... we had... company?”
“That’s us!” said a scrawny dwarf with a chipper voice. “I’m Litast. That’s my husband Unib over there, and these--” Litast smiled and swept her arm-- “are our children.”
Erush nodded. “Welcome aboard. And who might you three be?”
The three other adults introduced themselves as Atir, Litast’s elder sister, Melbil, a cousin, and Doren, who was unrelated to any of the others and had decided to come separately.
“Matter of fact,” added Doren, “I’d never met this fine family until we bumped into each other on the road! We’ve been getting to know each other over the past day or so.”
Erush smiled. “Well, I’m delighted to have you all, of course... Surprised, though. Of all the places you could come-- why here? Why migrate to a tiny little fortress you’re not even sure exists, in this forest of all places?”
Litast became suddenly solemn. “Because,” she said, “you’ve stirred hope in the mountainhome. We were told a bunch of drunken hooligans had stolen some stuff and set off to found a fortress somewhere-- the guards dismissed it, said it wasn’t important. But who, in the last century, has founded a fortress?” Litast spread her hands in the air. “It’s unheard of!”
“We dwarves reclaim a site now and then, a smashed-up hillock or something, but not since the beginning of recorded history has anybody even tried to found a new site. We wanted the rumors to be true. We wanted them to be true, because if they were it meant a new chapter in our history-- and perhaps a change in the fortune of our race.”
Doren nodded and said: “We were willing to risk this trip, because if the rumors were true-- and seven drunks really had made a Founding-- we wanted to be a part of it. If the dwarven people were truly coming back into their own, we were willing to risk anything to make that happen.”
Erush was silent for a long moment. “...Well. Welcome to our fortress, such as it is. Thank you."
"Arrahh, think nuffin' of it," said Doren. "Wait'll you see the lot that's coming with the merchant caravan!"
Erush's eyes widened. "Merchants?"
"Merchants! I dunno why they're coming, but they're coming-- should be here in the fall."
---------------
18th of Malachite, 125
Eager to begin contributing to the life of the fortress, the five migrants of age began the slow work of walling off the caverns while Erush set himself to square out some of the hallways near the workshops and bedrooms.
It was while Erush was carving out a spare worskshop space (or maybe it was a stockpile?) that he found something that made his eyes gleam bright.
(https://i.imgur.com/UlejqLm.png)
---------------
19th of Malachite, 125
Äs rested his hammer against the weapon rack, leaning against a wall for a breather. Four days straight he’d been practicing his combat drills, and still he did not understand them-- how would these help when the blind fury descended on him?
Suddenly a tremendous commotion erupted from behind the horses’ door.
(https://i.imgur.com/FXhAD5x.png)
Äs ran for the staircase, the shrieks of the horses ringing in his ears.
---------------
“Erush!” Äs burst into the bedroom floor, gasping.
“Hm?” Erush turned from the bedroom slot he'd been carving.
“Screaming... screaming behind the lockroom for the horses,” said Äs. “I think one finally starved, and something... set it moving again. It’s turned on the other one...”
Erush sighed. “Well,” he said, “at least now we know how this place works. Anything that dies here, something in the land gets into it somehow and forces its body back up again.”
“...Maybe. The varmints I killed outside didn’t get up, tho?”
“I don’t know,” said Erush. “Maybe they don’t reanimate if they already were once. Maybe if you hit them hard enough they stay down. We don’t know enough about this place to say!”
“Mm. Well, I’m gonna go swing my hammer around some more. Mebbe make sure the migrants know what’s going on; it’s a pretty awful noise up there. You can hear it in half the fortress.”
---------------
After four days, the screams from the horses ceased, replaced by a hideous nickering as the zombie exulted in its kill. Shuddering, Äs returned to his drills.
(https://i.imgur.com/D9DfqGD.png)
---------------
23rd of Malachite, 125
Tink. Tink. Tink. Copper on stone.
“So did you ever find magma down under the caverns?” asked Lorbam.
“I think... I think I might have found something,” said Erush. “A little patch of semi-molten rock, at the very bottom of the staircase. The caverns were so wonderful, I was hardly paying attention...”
(https://i.imgur.com/IbGpieD.png)
Lorbam started. “Semi-molten-- that’s the magma layer! Why didn’t you say?”
And Lorbam ran for the staircase.
---------------
28th of Malachite
The past few days had been quiet ones, disturbed only by the foul nickerings of the reanimated horses. While Erush labored in the quarry, Lorbam continued her hunt for magma:
(https://i.imgur.com/sz1WOcb.png)
She'd find it. Eventually.
---------------
Erush poked his head into the mechanic’s workshop. “Hey, you busy?”
“Mm? Not really,” said Kel. “Just catching up on some old projects. What’s up?"
“We need some stonework done down below,” said Erush. “We cracked open the caverns a few days ago-- the migrants have been working day and night to wall off the staircase, but they’ve not been able to make progress because of the weight of the stone they’re using. We need blocks. For this, and for our future projects... don’t you have some construction plans in mind yourself?”
Kel grinned. “That I do. I’ll get to it-- I’ll need to put a temporary workshop up down there, though, so I don’t have to haul the granite all the way up the stairs to carve it...”
“Already thought of that,” said Erush. “I finished digging out a spot for you to work earlier today.”
“Nicee. I’m off, then!” And Kel, ducking out of his workshop, ran for the stairs.
(https://i.imgur.com/5KfuuZH.png)
---------------
8th of Galena
Tink. Tink. Tink. Copper on stone. Carefully Lorbam laboured under the stench of sulphur.
Tink-- tink-- tink-- *CRACK*
And a great chunk of stone glowed suddenly with lines of red fire. Lorbam wrenched her pick free, exultant.
The lines widened, spread, oozed-- and just as Lorbam began to back away, the rock gave way completely.
(https://i.imgur.com/OvrPVkp.png)
Lorbam ran.
Lorbam ran, fast as ever she could, as the wave of sulphuric heat rushed in behind her. Blood of the earth, soul of the fortress-- the magma rushed madly through the hole, a glorious torrent of liquid flame.
Somehow Lorbam escaped incineration, dashing up the stairs before the heat could consume her. Cackling, she made her escape. Cackling, the red light of the magma still in her eyes, Lorbam ran to tell the others of her earthshaking discovery.
(https://i.imgur.com/4NnKShz.png)
---------------
9th of Galena
Lorbam staggered into the quarries. “Heh.. heh heh... heh-heh-heh...”
“Whuh? You’re back!” said Erush. “...Why is your hair smoking?”
“I... heh heh... I hit magma,” said Lorbam. “A whole ocean of the stuff.”
“Oh! Excellent! ...Are you alright?”
“Never... better.”
“Your pupils are constricted.”
“Hm? Oh. It was... really bright down there,” said Lorbam, waving a hand over her eyes. “I’m okay. Really.”
Erush frowned. “Alright then? ...Change of subject,” he said. “Magma forges! How do we want to set ‘em up?”
“Hrm. Want I should get Kel?”
Erush shook his head and said, “Not for this. Magma-- metalwork-- this is our place to design.” Erush pulled a couple chunks of chalk from his pocket, tossing one to Lorbam. “Kel can have his bedroom complexes and his workshops-- we have this.”
Lorbam grinned, and the two dwarves began scribing designs on the granite floor.
(https://i.imgur.com/JCxVqA8.png)
---------------
(https://i.imgur.com/D5DuwLI.png)
Unib grunted as he set the last block of a wall-section into place. Sealing the caverns wasn’t particularly interesting work, but it was something to do-- more interesting than listening to those poets and their highfalutin historical sagas, anyway.
(https://i.imgur.com/XxJBIc9.png)
---------------
13th of Galena
Inod walked into the dining room, towards where some of the migrants were listening to one of Sakzul’s poems. “Hey guys-- I just finished some beds for y’all! Care to help me set them up?"
---------------
(https://i.imgur.com/ZvriTjt.png)
“Why are these... purple?”
“Um,” said Inod. “We cut the wood ourselves, so there was a lot of, uh, glumprong lying in the storeroom...”
Litast shrugged. “Not too different from some of the mushroom-wood back home, I s’pose.”
---------------
24th of Galena
While the migrants set up their bedrooms, Inod had taken it upon herself to finish work on the wall sealing off the caverns. Smiling, she slid the last block of granite into its slot.
(https://i.imgur.com/0GALNJL.png)
---------------
(https://i.imgur.com/U53LhRC.png)
Wrinkling her nose at the sulphuric smell, Tun descended to where the miners were digging out a magma reservoir. “Anyone down here?”
Erush clambered up. “Yeah? What’s going on?”
“Well...” said Tun, “remember what the migrants said about a caravan coming this autumn?”
“Oh yes... I’d forgotten about that. What of it?”
“It’s almost autumn. They’ll be here in a few weeks, and we don’t have a place for them...”
“Hm. Didn’t think of that," said Erush, frowning. "Well, I s’pose we can put our little magma project on hold for a bit and carve something out upstairs... thanks.”
Smiling, Tun turned and started back up the long staircase to the surface.
---------------
Just as the miners reached the workshop floor, Atis came running down, panicked. “Enemy! Enemy in the farms!”
(https://i.imgur.com/B2sntAI.png)
“Enemy?” Äs came charging from the storeroom, beard dripping with plump helmet wine. “I’ll give it wot for!” Roaring, he lurched up the stairs.
(https://i.imgur.com/GvBMbdv.png)
Äs stumped back down, hammer sticky with blood and feathers.
“What was that?” asked Erush, incredulous.
“Kestrel,” growled Äs. “Dead one. I... took care of it.”
“But-- but how did it even get in here? I thought we locked the hatch?”
“Dunno... I need a drink,” said Äs.
“I thought you just had one?”
“Oh. Right.” Sighing, Äs stumbled back into his training room.
---------------
The two miners stood in the farm levels with Atis.
“It is locked,” said Erush, yanking on the hatch cover. “Nice and tight. Nothing short of a troll should be able to get in here.”
“Weird,” said Lorbam. “And even if the kestrel had broken through that thing, you’d expect it to be smashed up, yeah?”
“You would... unless...” Erush began prodding the ceiling with his back end of his pick. “Unless... ah! Here!” Erush jabbed the ceiling, and the pick handle poked right through.
(https://i.imgur.com/hw6HnKT.png)
“A hole-- right here, where Inod cut down that glumprong. Those twisty roots yanked a big
chunk of clay with them, right out of our roof! And look--” Erush pointed to a different part of the ceiling-- “same thing. There was a
tree there, and when Inod cut it down it took the ceiling with it.”
Atis stared at the ceiling, brow wrinkled. “Somehow I really feel we should have noticed that sooner.”
Erush shrugged. “Let’s just get these holes blocked up with some good granite.”
(https://i.imgur.com/yG3d9JA.png)
---------------
Äs clambered down to where the miners were digging out for the trade depot. “We got those holes plugged,” he said. “Nice and tight, a block of rock in each. Nothing’s getting in here again.”
Erush nodded. “Did you run into any... problems up there?”
“Nope," said Äs. "That skunk’s still prowling around, but didn’t come close-- smelly, but not too dangerous.”
Erush lowered his eyes a moment. “You know what? This’d be a good chance for us to do something on the surface... I need to go check something.”
---------------
With a final careful strike of the mason’s hammer, Kel finished squaring out another block of granite. It wasn’t the most interesting work-- didn’t take too much skill to square rock-- but Kel enjoyed it anyway, if only for the thought of what could be done with the blocks. So much to build, so little time!
Erush poked his head into the workshop. “Hey-- how’s the blockmaking going?”
“Eh, s’going alright!” said Kel. “I’ve got mebbe... what, thirty blocks carved out here?”
“Ex-cel-lent,” said Erush. “We’ll need them.”
“Eh? What’s up?”
“Us. There’s nothing up top but a dead skunk-- it’s a perfect time to do some construction work!”
Kel’s face lit up. “Construction work?” he said. “What sort of... construction work did you have in mind?”
“Walls,” answered Erush. “Defenses. Fortifications. Anything that keeps nasty stuff away from us.” Erush shrugged. “Got any ideas?”
“Ooh... do I ever,” said Kel, the chalk already in his hand. “I’ve had weeks to think about this stuff! Here, look--”
(https://i.imgur.com/f7iHwRE.png)
“Hm. Nice. Could we maybe put a couple watch towers in, though?” asked Erush, producing his own chalk and drawing a few quick marks of his own.
(https://i.imgur.com/pY1bWZW.png)
Kel grinned. “Now you’re learning to forget what the mountainhome taught you! What if we--”
The two dwarves scribbled designs into the floor of Kel’s workshop for a long time.
---------------
Erush and Kel threw open the hatch cover several hours later, followed by Äs, Inod and several of the migrants. As Kel marked a section of ground for construction, Erush explained the situation to the others:
“We’re not trying to build everything we have planned just yet-- just the central tower. We need a foothold in the surface, and that’s what you’ll focus on over the next few days. So... Äs? You’re on guard duty. Watch the woods, smash that skunk if it gets close, warn the others if something more dangerous comes along.”
Nodding, Äs turned his eye to the forest.
“Inod?” said Erush. “You’ll be cutting some of the trees around here. We need space to build, and more wood is always nice.”
With a quick grin, Inod turned her axe to the forest.
Erush nodded. “And Litast-- you and the others will be doing the masonwork. I’ll be downstairs helping Lorbam dig out a place for merchants; Kel will be cutting more granite for you. Thank you, everyone-- good luck up here!”
And the dwarves parted to their separate labours.
(https://i.imgur.com/F8UY2A3.png)
---------------
1st of Limestone, 125
(https://i.imgur.com/eWue6Mn.png)
When the first day of summer dawned, the dwarves were just beginning to find a foothold down under the earth. Now autumn had come, and the dwarves were moving to claim the surface-- and to prepare the way to greet the dwarves of the mountainhome.
It was good.
8th of Limestone, 125
Inod lifted the hatch cover. “Hey down there! Why’re you flooring over that stairway?”
“To make room for the trade depot!” yelled Erush. “We’ll get the stairways fixed in a moment!”
“How are we supposed to get in?”
“Just... keep working up there, okay? This won’t take long!”
Shrugging, Inod returned to her woodcutting.
(https://i.imgur.com/3WCFAcW.png)
---------------
9th of Limestone, 125
Erush had kept to his promise, at least. With a bit of careful deconstruction, the stairways were made again usable.
---------------
Erush poked his head into Kel’s workshop again. “Hey, could you take a break from blockcarving a moment? We need somebody to put together a trade depot real quick.”
“Sure thing!” said Kel, stumbling out from behind a pile of granite blocks. “What d’you want it built of?
“Eh, just use chalk,” said Erush. “There’s some right there, and we need that depot up now. No time to haul up big blocks of granite.”
Kel sighed. “Alright. Seems a shame, though...” And Kel, weaving his way through piles of his own masonry, made for the stairway.
---------------
11th of Limestone, 125
Äs came running into the clearing, new blood on his hammer. “Boys and gels, we need to move. Now.”
“What’s going on?” asked Litast.
“Remember that skunk?” said Äs. “It finally got close enough to the clearing to notice us. I killed it... but now there’s a bunch of zombie kangaroos wandering around. I can’t kill those, and they’re coming closer. So... yeah. We need to be going.”
(https://i.imgur.com/CfIPy3c.png)
---------------
Back in the dining hall
“Were you able to make some progress up there, at least?” asked Kel.
Äs shrugged. “Sort of,” he said. “The builders were able to get up one wall, and somebody’d gotten started on a second, and Inod managed to cut down every tree on the build site but two. It’s a good start, but we’ll need to go back out there to get much really done.”
“Well, it’s a start,” said Kel. “We’ll get another chance.”
---------------
13th of Limestone, 125
---------------
With a satisfied grunt Kel wrestled the last hunk of chalk into place. It had been nice to do something architectural for a change.
(https://i.imgur.com/FC2iMNy.png)
---------------
Äs clambered down into the dining hall. “You lot aren’t doing much of anything right now, yes?”
“I suppose not,” said Doren.
“Great. Yer all drafted. The situation up top’s bad and only going to get worse; we need soldiers. Report to me at the weapon rack.”
Unib moaned. “Please, I can’t... I can’t stand fighting..."
(https://i.imgur.com/NjfSsq3.png)
Äs rolled his eyes. “Fine. Yer exempt. But only because you’d probably go insane at some point if I drafted yuh."
---------------
Äs had never been in charge of a squad before. Back home, he’d not even been part of an army-- what skill he had, he’d gotten by practicing alone half-remembered drills seen through a green glass window.
He’d learned a couple things here, though; the frenzied crushing of birds and rodents had taught him fighting and discipline. He wasn’t amazing with a hammer, perhaps, but he was at least adequate for this--
(https://i.imgur.com/v0ZTZjh.png)
and today, he was a commander for the first time.
“You have been divided into three groups of two! You will spend these coming weeks learning the basics of dodging and unarmed combat, moving into shieldwork as soon as Inod makes some shields for yuh! You will, whenever not leading or watching a demonstration, practice constantly the individual combat drills I show yuh! In this way you will prepare yerself to recieve weapons; in this way you will prepare yerself to defend the fortress and-- one day-- to wreak havoc on this world!”
(https://i.imgur.com/Zzmzx4P.png)
---------------
14th of Limestone, 125
“Are we sure this is the right place?”
“See the clearing over there? That’s the work of dwarves. This is it. I think I see a hatch cover, too!”
“The wagons won’t fit through that!” protested a merchant. “How’re we supposed to get the goods in?”
“Leave the wagons, bring the pack animals. It’s not like anything’s gonna steal our stuff-- this place doesn’t have anything with enough brain left to try.”
“I don’t like it,” said a hammerdwarf. “This place is dead. Dwarves don’t belong here!”
The outpost liaison shrugged. “Ours not to reason why. Come on.”
Unhitching their wagons from their pack animals, the merchants set out for the hatch cover with their lightened load. The hammerdwarf watched the forest behind them, muttering: “Ours not to reason why... ours but to horribly die.”
---------------
A merchant pointed into the forest, grinning. “Hey look, kangaroos!”
“Kanga-- wait.” The hammerdwarf in front stared hard into the forest. “Those... those are dead. And moving.”
(https://i.imgur.com/ghKwd6c.png)
A merchant’s head snapped up. “Panic!”
And they all ran around screaming for the rest of the day.
---------------
15th of Limestone, 125
The merchants, having regained their senses, began slowly creeping towards the hatch cover, pack animals in tow. Three days of terrified kangaroo-dodging later, they all made it inside.
---------------
18th of Limestone, 125
Atis came running down to the workshop floor. “Merchants! Merchants at the depot!”
Inod stumbled from her workshop. “Wha-- oh! Great! ...What are we supposed to sell them?”
Atis frowned. “I don’t know... we haven’t really been making trade goods,” he said. “Everything we’ve made, we need to survive.”
Inod groaned. “There’s gotta be something... wait! Wasn’t Kel working on something in the mechanic’s?”
---------------
“What are these things?”
Atis scrutinized the contents of the mechanic’s workshop closely. “Mechanisms,” he said. “They’re sets of components used in the construction of various devices requiring moving parts, such as levers, traps, and other more complex things.”
“Do we need them?”
“Mm... I don’t think so?”
“Are they valuable?”
“Perhaps?” said Atis. “I’m told a good mechanism is a fearsome device indeed, if used properly.”
Inod shrugged. “Good enough, I s’pose. We’ll see what Tun can get for ‘em.”
“Tun?”
“Tun,” said Inod. “Apparently Erush appointed her broker.”
(https://i.imgur.com/izPMV1p.png)
---------------
Tink. Tink. Tink. Copper on stone, down in the magma.
“Greetings from the mountainhome, Erush Kizestlikot.”
Erush whirled. “What the-- who are you?”
“Tun Deduknoton, outpost liaison,” said the liaison.
“...How did you even get down here?”
“I walked.”
“Oh.” Erush looked uncomfortable. “Well.”
The liaison leaned against a wall. “We have much to discuss,” she said.
“Is this about the stealing-a-wagon-full-of-junk thing? Because I’ll have you know...”
“This is not about the stealing-a-wagon-full-of-junk thing,” said the liaison. “Those charges have been lifted. I came here to discuss something else-- something perhaps a bit more serious.”
“...What’s going on?”
“Tell me,” said the liaison. “Of all the places you could have possibly settled... why here?”
“Er. Would you believe we were drunk at the time?”
The liaison raised her eyebrows. “No, I’m not sure I would. But nevermind that-- tell me, when was the last time you slept?”
“Uh. Why do you need to know?”
“When was the last time you slept?”
“...A week ago,” said Erush. “But look, I don’t see why you’re asking about--”
“Your stonecrafter. The dwarf up trading with the merchants right now. How good is she at stonecrafting?”
“Oh, pretty adept at her craft by now. She’s been turning out some really exceptional rock pots lately.”
(https://i.imgur.com/MgeVpNj.png)
“Adept, you say. How good was she at stonecrafting when she came here?”
“Eh... just a novice, really. Why do you ask?"
“Do you have any idea,” said the liaison, “how quickly she’s been learning? I saw those pots on the way down here. The quality of those things is nigh-unparalleled, anywhere. That dwarf’s only been here for half a year-- at the rate she’s going, she’ll be turning out masterworks by spring! It takes most dwarves a lifetime to learn to produce masterworks, and most never do!"
The outpost liaison paused, breathing deeply. “You came here to found a fortress, something that’s not been done since the beginning of recorded history, on a drunken bet. You chose for your fortress a location nobody in their right minds would set foot in. You only eat, drink, or sleep what-- every week or two?”
“Wait,” said Erush, “how did you know about the eating and drinki--”
“Your stonecrafter has learned to rival the old masters of her trade in six months, and she’s not the only one who’s learning fast. Your mason, your carpenter-- the furniture here is of unusual quality, and according to my records those two were rank novices at their crafts when you left the mountainhome. This isn’t normal.”
“Look, are you getting at something here?”
The liaison sighed. “There’s... old stories of this sort of thing happening. Folk tales. Nobody’s been able to connect those stories to reality, and a lot of people don’t really believe them to be true-- but those stories described exactly the same sort of thing as what seems to be happening here.”
“Wait. Do you mean that one with the elepha--”
“Yes, yes, that’s one of them,” said the liaison. “There’s a bunch of stories like that: stories about dwarven fortresses, fortresses founded in strange and inhospitable places, fortresses that didn’t follow the patterns of the mountainhomes. Sometimes the fortresses will be carefully designed, following some strange and exotic pattern. Sometimes the fortresses will be convoluted messes, seemingly without rhyme or reason, as if designed by madmen each with a deep hatred for the last ruler’s madness. But always-- always-- the stories tell of bloodshed. And always-- always-- one name appears in every story of this kind: Ar-mok.”
The magma bubbled.
Erush frowned. “Ar-mok?”
“Ar-mok,” said the liason, nodding. “Tell me, Erush Kizestlikot: do you know what lies hidden in the magma?”
This was an old drill; Erush had learned it as a child. “Adamantine,” said Erush. “This we have been taught since time began, and never have we touched it.”
“And why have we never touched it? Do you know, Erush Kizestlikot, what lies under the adamantine?”
“The underworld,” said Erush. “This we have learned from the goblins, spawn of the slade towers.”
The liaison nodded. “So we are told. But tell me, Erush Kizestlikot: do you know what is beneath the underworld?”
Erush frowned; this was not part of the drill. “...No.”
“Ar-mok. Ar-mok is beneath the underworld.”
---------------
“What?”
“So they say, anyway,” said the liaison, shrugging. “The stories. I never really believed it... but now I’m not so sure. They say Armok is a being with many faces; they say Armok created this world and many like it for its own amusement. And they say that sometimes-- after 5 years, or 125 years, or 250, or 550, or 1050-- Armok takes seven dwarves, and puts his bloodlust in them, and sends them to an unforgiving land, and takes a fortress for his own.”
“Wait,” said Erush. “Are you saying that we--”
“I don’t know. I’ve no idea. Maybe. But Erush?”
“...Yes?”
“Call off that war against the elves. It’d be the ruin of our civilization.”
“I’ll... consider it.”
“The fortresses of Ar-mok only ever export one thing in the stories, Erush: death. Remember that.”