Two, currently. That update wasn't quite up-to-date. Maybe I'll pull my head together to catch up before continuing
Alright, here's part two.
Part two
The morning after his arrival in the new lands, the adventurer walked into the keep of the town to find accomplices. He located an axewoman, and an elven archer, who would travel with him for a time, in return for a share of the glory of their accomplishments. The women were strong, and attractive, which meant they could become popular heroes with the locals if they played their cards right. The next 12 hours to sunset were spent hunting for an animal man in the sewers. No such luck was to be had, however, as the villain was well-hidden. Finding little else to occupy their time, the trio left for a village to the east that night. Whilst on the road, the women, being mortal, became drowsy, and they decided to stop for the night. Bora took first watch, of course. Once they were asleep, he could feed, and make them his thralls.
At daybreak, the trio continued. The women, Riloth and Lam, found their master irresistible, and his assaulting them forgivable, so long as he never assaulted their people, which he did not. His other minions would handle things here, even a century from now, after their conquests were complete in the icy south. The town to the east, Hairyally, and the town to the north, Rainknits, had nothing suitably intriguing for the vampire lord, except a returning merchant caravan, who spread tales of great beasts and strange people far to the east, where the land divided the sea, and connected the Occult Continents together as one, East and West. This was the nexus of the world, through which all great things and ideas must travel, if they dare not brave the waters, which few ever would. To Bora, travelling the world, and returning with myriad trophies and tales of adventure would make the perfect excuse for him to be a hero in the eyes of the people, and convert them quickly, with little resistance. If he could form a new religious movement revolving around himself as some sort of messiah, the sheep would follow with little err. They immediately bought a map, with coin Bora had taken from some muggers along the way, and set out for this land bridge, where glory must surely await them.
The trek was hard; Riloth had lost her entire left hand, leaving her without a shield, and Lam had burned through her quiver of crossbow bolts, leaving her with only a simple bludgeon. The trio walked the circumference of the Water of Meditation, and the southern edge of the Tooth of Trickery, before they came upon the great Dune of Whims. The trip was two days of endless sands, burning gravel, and torturous vegetation, without a drop of water for miles all around. They narrowly avoided the venom of enormous scorpions and cunning reptiles, until finally they were ambushed by a squad of goblins. Six in all, the trio was surrounded by 3 hammermen, a lasher, a spearman, and a crossbowman. The fight was brutal, and long. Bora abandoned his first opponent and fought to protect Lam, who had been encircled by three of the fiends, whilst Riloth held her own, all one-handed, against a single hammerman, whilst dodging bolts from the archer. Soon, though, the fiends fled from the badly wounded Lam, and Bora took his anger out on the archer while he could. After mopping them up, the wounded heroes restocked and rearmed for the journey ahead.
Just kidding. Riloth ran off to beat up a camel, and took her sweet damn time.
Blasted giant desert scorpions got us the first time I tried to sleep through the night, and Lam was stung, and envenomed. Her brain would have rotted eventually, but then the game crashed.
Here's part three. It's a long one.
Part Three
The trio marched onward, to the foothills of the Prim Mountains. There, they rested again for a mere four hours, before another squad of goblins came by. Bora, standing watch, did not see them coming in time, and although he yelled at the top of his lungs, the girls did not wake quickly enough. In seconds, both their throats were slit, and Bora was left to fight off the horde on his own. He did so valiantly, without serious harm to himself, and soon the goblins were all dead. Without empathy, he left the girls to lay where they bled. They would go down in history as heroes, but only because that would benefit Bora’s image. Within an hour, Bora stumbled upon the nest of a mighty Roc, who defended her eggs. Poorly, as the case may be, for she was taken down with little effort. Bora kept an egg as a trophy, and marched onward, through the pass where the Dune of Whims met The Brash Profane Steppe and The Hills of Wealth. There, he slew a giant peregrine falcon, and took it’s head as another trophy.
For a week Bora marched through the wilderness, unencumbered by his mortal companions. He was harassed again and again by beast mortal and ethereal. Bogeymen roamed all the world, under cover of darkness. He travelled through the Lacy Jungles and meandered the shores of the Ashen Ocean where it met the world’s nexus. On the seventh day, Bora reached a castle outside a village. There, he recruited another pair of soldiers. Men, this time, but nonetheless important in convincing the populace that he was on their side. He told them of his fight with the roc and all else that plagued him, and he was immediately a renowned hero in these lands. The world would know, Bora Ragedance the Allied Flesh of Nourishing was a hero, and that the fools in the south were wrong to send him away.
Looking for more beasts to slay and fame to steal, Bora asked a villager what troubles them. He replied, “Ah, I wouldn’t know where to point you. There are plenty of villains around, yes, but I couldn’t say where to start. I think, though, that the Lord of Castle Rushedraked, Genam Tulipwashes, would certainly know all that troubles us, and where to find it. We report all our problems to his officials, you see. Centralized Monster Massacre Department, it is.”
“And where is he?”
“The castle is far to the south-east. It may take more than two days to reach it, but as far as I know, there’s only one possible monster lair between here and there. And some bandits.”
Bora thanked him and turned to walk away. He soon met a young woman near a cabin, and stopped to speak with her. “Ma’am, I’ve been directed to Castle Rushedraked, do you, perhaps, have specific directions on how to get there? There’s a lot of wilderness to cover, you know.”
“Oh, I can do you one better! Name’s Riñih. I been fixing to get out of here, so I can guide you right to it, if you’d just let me have a bit of the fun on the way. I’m a butcher, you see. I can defend myself fairly well against angry animals and fool boys! It’ll be fun.”
“Ah… Alright, I suppose. Stick close to us, though.” With that, the woman chirped with joy and grabbed a sack of coin and a boning knife from her cabin, and began leading the group out of the village, towards the south-east. After a long day of hiking, they stopped to rest for the night, and soon Bora heard the approach of a group of brigands. He rallied his companions, luckily with just enough time to wake them before the bandits did them in. The fight was quick, and brutal, and soon the troop was dispatched. Both soldiers had taken injuries, and lost their shields, but the strange girl was unharmed, and had done quite a bit of damage. “Nobody ever takes me seriously,” she scoffed as she helped the men dress their wounds.
The next morning, they continued on their journey, and the mad butcher led them to the lair of a night creature, who Bora slew in one unseen stroke. By sunset, they had reached the castle Rushedraked, and let themselves in. The courtyard was empty, the walls unmanned, and the keep silent. When they came inside, they were immediately overpowered by the stench of rotting flesh, and soon discovered the remains of the late Lord Genam Tulipwashes and many others, strewn about the keep’s interior. Soon, the group left the castle, and wandered into one of the villages north of it, where they reported their findings, and accomplishments, to the townsfolk. They had, in fact, known of the slaughter at the keep; some whack-job something-or-other adventurer, or something like that, went berserk and killed many people. Or so the rumors had it. Nexus of the world, and it’s thus the worst place to live short of the haunted Land of Amethysts. Typical. The adventurers wandered north once more, to Castle Calmecru, where they found a similar scene. This time, however, there had been survivors; a swordsman and swordswoman, and two villagers, family of the now-deceased lady. The swordsmen joined the group of adventurers, and the six of them headed north again.
As they neared the next castle, Riñih pointed out a minotaur’s labyrinth, and, looking for a challenge, Bora entered the lair. Sure enough, the minotaur was alive, and very noisy. In minutes, it charged out of the shadows and slammed Bora in the torso with it’s shoulder, knocking him prone. The battle had begun! In the shouting, Bora could hear Riñih scream in pain, her chest sliced open by the monster’s blade. Next, it was Ñabsiz the axeman’s turn to scream, as the minotaur stomped on his toe, and lopped off his right arm. The rest of the group parried or blocked it’s blows, and successfully brought it to it’s knees, where Bora cleaved it’s skull open, killing it. Trudging back outside, the adventurers assessed their wounded comrades, who had both lost quite a bit of blood in the exchange. Riñih’s wound healed well, but Ñabsiz’ arm was of course not going to be sewn back on, nor would his toe heal. In fact, it would soon become infected.
The gang of adventurers were soon hailed as legendary throughout the realm, and they reported directly to the lord of Castle Crystalround for an assignment.
“My liege, I have come to your kingdom seeking to aid you, for the betterment of your people, and the world. What would you have me do?”
“Hmm… I know what you’ve been up to, indeed. All I can think to ask of you, though, is to slay the titan Thaci Rocksjungles the Stream of Straps, in his shrine to the east of here. There are others, of course, but until I see Genam’s writings, I have nothing worthy of a hero’s time.”
The heroes left within the hour, cheered on by the castle’s guards. But within the hour, the mortals took a nap in the wilderness, during which Bora ensured they were all properly enthralled. It was not a peaceful night, however, and a gang of kobolds attacked. All of the warriors were wounded, besides Bora. The mad girl took the least damage, while the swordsmen were left crippled.
The next morning, the trek to the shrine was completed. The titan was certainly immense and imposing. It was, luckily, not especially threatening, despite being difficult to actually put down.
After reporting their victory, Bora came to a decision; He would leave some of his comrades here, to spread his “holy word” whilst he went on to became equally famous throughout the rest of the world. All throughout the land, they should speak the praises of this divine savior; that he is unstoppable, untouchable, and soon, to join the gods as an immortal, that he can offer his people eternity of pleasure in this world, to forgive their aggressions, defend them form the gods’ wrath, if they worship Ume, god of fishing, patience, and eternity and his chosen savior.
The mad butcher, Riñih, was chosen to stay. Mostly because she overslept the night before. She would remain in a nearby village, “LuckyQuests,” from which she would gather followers and spread his word. It would be tricky, in the end, to reveal to them that they must sacrifice themselves in order to join him for all eternity in endless “life,” so he neglected to mention that part to her.
The night after was the full moon, heralding the outpouring of all the night creatures of the world. The warriors were “lucky” enough to find the lair of a weremoose, who put up a good fight, killing the axeman, and leaving a nasty bite mark on the spearman. The morning after, the group killed an amphibian woman, probably also a werebeast, and then the spearman was killed when Bora’s trophy collection popped out of the bag and bit his throat out. The end.
[edit]
Oh noes! I forgot the pretty picture!
[double-triple-mega-edit]
Well, my adventures have been concluded, for now, and Bora has retired to a life of politics and duping people into thinking he's totally not a vampire/necromancer overlord of death.
Here's the last three parts of his journey;
From the city of Tradedclams, the remaining trio of warriors learned of the exploits of dwarves in the east; their many fine fortresses of maddwarves and corrupt nobles, their desperate attempts to preserve their race from the plague of sterility and madness consuming the land. It had worked, to a degree; dwarves who survived the tortures of these foul fortresses did give birth, and the children had an infinitesimally small chance of actually surviving to be considered adults. The important thing to note, however, was the legends of horrible monsters, vengeful spirits, and immense hoards of treasure to be had from these places. Many brave heroes went in, but few came out. Bora, though, could be one of those few among the horde of peasantry.
The nearest such place was called Northevil, not more than three days travel east-south-east of the city. None had ever visited it, as it was sworn to be haunted, having been built by mad dwarves, goblins, or both, and most certainly under the direction of some eldritch horror, if the citadel rising from the landscape was to attest to its own architect. The group set out immediately, and miraculously suffered little hardship along their trek into the Systemic Desert.
They approached the site at dawn of their fourth day from the north. The grounds near the edges of the fortress’ domain were littered with bone crossbow bolts and cheap trinkets. Into a nearby slope dwarves had carved out a temporary living and work area, with assorted butchery and tannery workshops. Further south, nearer the citadel were workshops for dealing with stone and wood. Connecting this work area to the citadel was a causeway just wide enough for a wagon to traverse. They crossed the causeway, and entered through the undecorative hole-in-the-wall entrance, where they found a trade depot, a pile of trinkets and logs, various disorganized workshops, the corpse of some animals and two possible options for where to go next; up a stairway along the east wall of the citadel, no doubt connecting to the other floors of the structure, or down a tunnel, leading to gods-know-where.
They chose the stairway, to explore the citadel, first. On the first floor above, they encountered rows of statues, a dining area, bedrooms, coffins, and an ugly old woman of a dwarf by the name of Atir Uristsarek, a miner who swore to know nothing particularly useful of the location. She did, however, opt to join the group as opposed to remaining here, and admitted to having heard of Bora’s exploits, despite his having just now arrived. These dwarves were still getting news of the outside world, and news of him was spreading rapidly. He was now a legendary hero in the eyes of these far-eastern people. There were corpses of animals and one dwarf near the stairwell.
The level above was open stockpiles, and the rest of the citadel’s floorplans were fairly open. Corpses were scattered here and there, and the only living things to be found were some dwarves of a strange persuasion with nothing much to say of the state of affairs, despite apparently having been living here for some time. They even demanded that they be allowed to return home before speaking to him further.
On the seventh story of the structure, they discovered a wondrous treasure: raw adamantine! Lots of it! Bora, of course took this as a chance to increase his fame and fortune to even greater heights, and took a single stone of the wondrous material. Only three floors up from there, they did encounter a goblin. A goblin cook, who assaulted the heroes and was quickly put down. Nothing else bolted after them from that point on up, as only dwarves survived up there. On the “roof” of the structure, they stood, overlooking the landscape. The stairs clearly indicated the dwarves’ intention to continue building ever higher, while no work appeared to be getting done.
Returning the the first story, Bora took another look around, and realized they were standing in a volcanic caldera! A dim glow could be seen through the cracks in the floor. He was a fool not to realize it. The entire structure was built to mimic the outline of the caldera’s rim, high into the air above. The group next headed down the hallway to the west, to see what were, apparently, the mines. They walked down many stories, until they reached a vast cavernous expanse; a strip mine, used by the dwarves to feed the production of the diorite blocks from which their citadel was built. Having lost his sense of direction, Bora wandered the dark room for a while, until he stumbled upon rough surfaces amongst the smooth stone floor. Carved intentionally, with detail; they were engraved.
“Atir, I cannot see these images properly, what is this we’re standing by?”
“Oh! Dat is a luvly engravin’ of ghostly gobbo’s! See, one of dem is scarin’ the other to death! An den he became a ghost, like da scary won!”
“You mean, this place is actually haunted? By goblins!? But, ghostly spirits only arise in the locations of their residence!”
“Dey was livin’ here idjiot!”
“And what’s that one beside it, hmm?”
“Is an engraving of goblins laboring. It depicts the foundation of the place, Nordevil, by De Bane of Angels of De Hellish Hate in the early spring of 1069.”
“So the rumors are true? To the letter? What the hell are you doing here, then?”
“I live here too, duh. The Distant Anvil took over a few years later. Some of de goblins was still around, like dat wacko dat punched me.”
“And that one over there?”
“Oh, that’s a real masterpiece! “De Peak of Beaching” dey call it. It’s an image of two tapered baguette cut gems. Our engraver, Imush Oslanlek, made it for us. Wonder what happened to de guy, hmm…”
The trio followed Atir around the cavern as she pointed out more of the artwork of the dwarven engravers. Eventually, though, it came to an end, as the room was only partially engraved. Bora followed a wall eastward, until he came to the other end of the room. It curved oddly, as if mimicking the slopes of the hills he’d seen outside. Yes, there was no way they’d climbed down below the valley… Soon, they found a hole in the wall, leading to bright red sands and the burning sun overhead. Heading back inside, Bora scouted the remaining perimeter of the room. It was truly vast. In the center was a great pillar of rock; the neck of the volcano.
Further down the stairwell, they encountered more and more troglodyte skeletons, until finally they arrived at the caverns. Bora easily spotted cage traps around the stairwell. Atir, though, recognized many of the troglodytes as having names; they were killers, dwarf-eaters, whom the dwarves fought off again and again over the history of the fortress. Finally, at the bottom of these caverns, they found the dwarves’ farm plots. Further down they went, to find the next level of caverns. And with it, the grand prize; a raw adamantine vein! Down and down the stairways plummeted, into the abyss and out of sight. The dwarves had mined much of the legendary metal, but made nothing of it. Nowhere throughout the compound was there evidence of the raw adamantine being processed into strands, nor smelters to convert the strands into wafers, or forges to convert said wafers into blades or armor. These dwarves… Were lazy!
Immediately, the group set off to the north, to search for the next great wonder of the world. It was noon, but he’d heard of a fortress only a few days travel to the north; Lakelancers
The journey, although short, resulted in the deaths of all three of Bora’s companions when they came upon a horde of undead boars. Their corpses quickly rose form the grave, but they were no minions of Bora’s now. Bora also had trouble keeping his trophy collection in the bag. Especially the sasquatch head and river otter corpse. And the playpus corpse gained a name when it murdered Atir. Beyond the Muddled Plain, though, Bora came upon a camp of kobold bandits, whom he drained of blood and butchered mercilessly. The remaining trip to Lakelancers was uneventful, which made his arrival there all the more impressive; The fortress was situated in the midst of an artificial lake, supplied by water from the rivers it connected to. Bora arrived from the south-east, and quickly found a bridge crossing to the first artificial island, where a large archway stood guard. The path to the fortress consisted of bridges spanning the distances between these artificial islands. Each bridge housed a lever that, when pulled, cut off that island from any islands closer to the perimeter of the lake. It was a truly marvelous way to keep invaders out. Soon Bora met a hammerdwarf by the name of Nil, who agreed to accompany him for a time. There were two pathways into the fortress, and Bora first took the North Path. Across the bridges, he entered a hillock, guarded by a façade of smooth pillars, well-made doors, and statues. Inside was a long, winding pathway leading to the caverns. Along the way, Bora adopted another thrall, a dwarven maiden by the name of Ushat. Far below his perch in the caverns, Bora could make out the glow of magma.
Returning to the surface, Bora reviewed the South path. It led through a similarly glorious pathway, that ended in a rather phallic-shaped passage headed by rounded rooms full of dead animals. Certainly not normal, and also not part of the living and work space of the fortress itself. As it turned out, the living space was only accessible from a bridge on the back of the island. Bora, of course, was too lazy to search and simply swam over to it. Compared to the decadence of the other two areas, the living space was more like a glorified hole in the ground; dwarves lived in squalor, in cramped tunnels with little in the way of industry. After speaking to the militia commander, Bora concluded that despite their incredibly decadent phallus-hall, pathway to the caverns, and artificial lake, the dwarves of Lakelancers had seen little in the way of excitement, were completely insane, and utterly boring. The worst thing he’d heard about here was the room full of dead animals, and the fact the militia commander’s son drowned in the lake.
After leaving Lakelancers, Bora walked east to the town of Mindfulring, where he spoke to merchants there in the markets. They spoke of the wonders of all the surrounding places, to which he listened intently. To the North-east was the fortress of Crystaltombs, in which only terrible beasts resided. The populace was slaughtered many times over by undead form the nearby necromancers’ tower. To the south-east of Crystaltombs was Islandpaddle, a fortress unknown, and built only recently.
But straight north of here was the palace at Dinnerwandered, where the late lords of the city opened the castle keep as a museum; a place for all the people of the realm to come and gawk at the treasures adventurers like him would bring. It was perfect. If he would go there, and deliver his trophies, all the realm of Omon Woge would soon be enthralled not by his bite, but by his heroic deeds. And then by undeath. Immediately he set out for necromancer towers to the north-east, where he would eliminate his competition in this region. He bypassed the fortress of Crystaltombs, for now, to save time.
That night, the trio were assaulted by bandits. They killed the dwarves, and ran off with Bora’s pack full of trophies. Four more times that night he was accosted by wild beasts, before dawn broke. He left, ignoring the fact he was without a bag and his trophies. Soon, he reached the necromancer’s tower, and took from them their own secrets of life and death. He left them alive, however, as he was short on time and needed to find his pack of trophies!
After two full days searching the deserts high and low, he was unable to find the site of the battle once again, and eventually was forced to visit Crystaltombs, in order to locate a replacement backpack. Crystaltombs was a place haunted by eldritch horrors and slowly flooding from the bottom up. Water trickled down the stairwell as he searched, and yet, he located a backpack, and a single exceptionally made silver goblet to take as a trophy. Unfortunately, he could not take the time to scout the ruined fortress, as his window for reaching the surface uninjured would soon close as water poured more rapidly down the stairwell. Bing washed down the many stories in that torrent of water would certainly be enough to injure him, and abandon him with the horde of beasts.
Reaching the surface, Bora travelled back the way he came, searching again for his lost pack, to no avail. He soon reached a nearby village, where he recruited a spearwoman as a replacement thrall, and continued his march northwards, to Dinnerwandered. Once there, he offered the single goblet he’d collected to the local keeper, a hammerman. His place to return treasures to would be the north-west corner of the third story of the keep. There was no table there, unfortunately. For now, though, the townspeople of dinnerwandered were suitably impressed with him, and he could afford to take the time to work his way into a position of power. His adventures were over, for the time being.
So, as a summary;
- I lost my goddamn backpack and all the cool stuff I'd collected!
- Explored Northevil. The rumors of it's founding by goblins are completely true, but somehow it was taken over by dwarves. Or something like that? Lucky enough not to meet any murderous goblin ghosts.
- Explored Lakelancers. It's pretty cool, and there's some neat trinkets to be found there, and plenty of living dwarves willing to march to their deaths at your side.
- Explored Crystaltombs (only because I needed a backpack) and found out that I'm a blathering idiot and should have though of a better way to drain my waterfall. There's at least half a dozen beasties there, all of which I avoided fighting. Have fun.
- Became a necromancer, neglected to raise an army of evil undead. Politics first, villainy later.
- Retired in Dinnerwandered with a single pitiful contribution to the museum. But I vow my revenge on the Systemic Desert and it's treacherous sands!
I will now run off to construct a fortress worthy of the glory of Bora Ragedance the Allied Flesh of Nourishing!
Author
Topic: The Museum: Adventure mode succession world (DF 34.11) (Read 782907 times)