7 dwarves, 9 units of dwarven rum, and a haunted glacier within spitting distance of two goblin settlements. 18 points total on the embark. This is the story of Urninch, the foolhardy venture of a doomed band of dwarves. This is the only way that I could think of to survive on so little. If there's interest, I'll write more as the game progresses.
----
By all that is right, it should have been someone else writing this.
Lokum, our leader, claimed to know what he was doing. He lured us all with tales of an oasis in the wilds of the frozen North. We believed him, fools that we were. None of us had any prospects to speak of but a life of toil in the mines, working for a pittance, making the damned King richer every day.
"For the honor of our ancestors!" he cried. "For the glory of ourselves, and the honor of our courageous ambition! A rich land, lost to the eyes of men and elves, the rock rich with ores and gems! With our hands and the iron in our souls, we will craft a settlement where no dwarf is beholden to another!" The glitter of gold in our eyes, we listened, enraptured. Fool. And greater fools, we six, for listening. By my mother's beard, we deserve what we've gotten, and I the most of all.
I have no wish to remember, or to recount, the trials our inexperienced band withstood to get to this Armok-forsaken wasteland. Suffice it to say that we were unprepared, and when we reached the ice... Our poorly-built, poorly-driven wagon was never meant for this terrain. We broke a wheel, and the legs of our animals.
We had nothing but two barrels of rum that had remained miraculously unbroken and the flesh of our animals. It would never sustain the group until the supply caravan from our homeland could find us.
We made a pact. We would sit, and die, without touching the remaining supplies. The last survivor, the dwarf that was proven strongest, would claim the lot, and hole up as well as possible until the caravan arrived.
We waited, and slowly froze. They slept. I didn't. I drank. It wasn't much, so help me, it wasn't much, but it was enough. One by one they died, and the snow has claimed their bodies, and with them, all traces of my betrayal - save the empty hole where my soul once was. I have paid a price for my life, and am paying it still.
And now I wait. By day I see twin plumes of smoke, one from the southeast, one from the southwest, carrying foul smells on the wind. By night I hear screams - they are faint but they haunt my nightmares. I believe it is the Twisted Ones - the Goblins. It won't be long before they realize I'm here. If they're lucky, there will be something left for them.
I have fashioned myself crude armor and a crossbow from the butchered remains of our animals. Though I've seen nothing moving since we arrived, I have seen tracks that... I would swear I was seeing the footprints of a polar bear, except that only the bones have left any sign in the snow.
I would rather not think about this any more. I have lost my body and soul to this accursed ice, and everything in me that was good and Dwarven. What more can any horror take from me now? I fight now at the gates of Hell. Survival is all that is left.
Author
Topic: Survivor's Guilt - A story (Read 3490 times)