Okay, so I'd thought I'd try something different. Obviously things looked different at the time, which was like, an hour ago, but after making a new world a few days ago, and working on a dwarf, as I'm usually going human and killing elves for fun, I thought I'd be a dwarf and try bringing the fight to the Green Menace. So I trained up a Dwarf as my first character this world.
After I was ready, and had gotten a nice party of Nine, including myself, I took on a raid on the Bastion of Cruelty. And...well, as it happens, I got inspired by the events.
_____________________________________________________________________
The year was 264, of the Sixth Age. Long ago, the mountains had shifted, and spat out the bearded ones. They had come out of nowhere, and had taken into hand, most of The White Spine. They were harsh, but not heartless. They were of the stone they worked, and died. In the time they had risen, the Mudmen, the tall, and brave, though not quite bright, and begun to rise in power. Soon, a mutual partnership had been forged. The Dwarven Nation, although paranoid, and not exactly trusting of their neighbors, took them in stride. But they were slow, and thus, when the elven people from across the Blueness of Savages had arrived, they had no idea what to make of them.
The humans, who had begun to encroach on the greens, and great forests of the west, were taken by surprise when yelping and crowing elves would swing out of trees, planting arrows at point blank range into thier foresters faces before they could raise a hand. The elves had brought a new thing to the land. A weapon, other then the club, or the crude spear. Long bloody war over resources, or for the elves, tradition in guarding the forests, had begun. But the elves would refuse to leave their forest, where they had the advantage. So when the humans set alight the greater forests, many of the elves burned to the trees they loved. It was known as the year of fire.
The dwarves, yet prone to the way of war, yet mighty they already were with a pickaxe, or a hammer pounding steel, learned to craft the sword, and the axe. Overwhelmed in their genious, they used their newfound weapons of war to great effect. Along with mighty armours, that could turn spears and break arrows.
Being the power over the two, they came down from their White Spine, and offered the humans their blades, in exchange for gold, as was the want of the dwarves. Though greedy, they were terror inspiring on the battlefield. In the blackend forests, they pushed the elves aside. And on the great frozen plains were the final battles fought. The elves were driven over the sea, only to return several hundred years later, weaker, because of the Great Enemy.
After the elves had been defeated, the humans prospered. They built great empires, and with their hardfought resources, forged great cities, and learned, though never as good as the mighty dwarves to the east, how to make the blade, and the shield. The humans, as was THEIR want, would fight amongst eachother. While the dwarves prospered off of their war.
They would hire themselves out, fighting for one side, or the other, always shifting loyalties. Some mudmen would be outraged, but they realised the value, in the metal craft, and their arms, that the dwarves would not make good enemies. And so it was for most of the ages.
Until the decline. Dwarves, expending most of the outter edges to the Spine, were forced to dig deeper into the mountains to extract the gold they hungered for so much. Which is when two equal great things had been discovered. The blue metal, unbreakable, and near unforgable, a gift from the gods! And the terror in the deeps! Demons, great and small, they were all powerful. The dwarves waged war with them, but were no match for their great hordes, for they kept coming, some, the same demons, slain perhaps days before, could be seen fighting in the mountains again. So the Bloody Passes were closed...but the dwarves, rubbing their hands and looking on at their prize. The blue metal, of which they had mined great amounts before being pushed back from the demons, was theirs to forge!
And so for hundreds of years, the dwarves had tried to make use of the metal. And their power grew, but still they had been on decline. Not long after, most of their great discovery had been lost, buried in long forgotten Fortresses, or stolen, back, it is said, by the demons that had made forays out of the mountains, though it is thought impossible, and indeed could be, as they have not been seen at large for hundreds of years.
Then the elves came. They were ragged, and unarmed, poor, and easy targets for humans, who harried them as they made their trip, west, avoiding The White Spine, and never returning. And behind them, came the Great Enemy.
Made of bile and slime, the Green Skinned bastard children of the Dark Gods ravaged the Mudmen, as they had the elves. War flared, and the Humans were forced to retreat, to their citadels and castles, to which the elves could not best. So the green menace set their eyes, on a new target.
The bearded dwarves, who though hungered for more, still had plenty of their gold, and their crafts were great. Bloody war was soon waged, the goblins inferior in arms and skill, but in great swarms they came. No side gave in, and their were locked in a terrible stalemate, skirmishing around the mountain homes. The goblins, taking in example of the dwarves, their great enemy, had forged fortresses just as they did, out of dark rock, and their raised their gods, who sometimes lead them in attack, though always were driven back.
In many years, the greater council of demons, the ones who called themselves gods in the eyes of the Green Skins, ended the war, so they might find a way to crack open the human castles back to the east, to which they still had little luck.
And so it was, for near a thousand years, when the great wars fought and lost in these times were forgotten, and the three sides had grown to make peace.
And in these times, were hungry gods ask for blood, they sometimes, pick a mortal, to start the bath.
In these times, Greed has come and past.
In these times, there is only Battle.
...
In these times...there is only War.
_____________________________________________________________________
"Sh. Quiet." Sibrek Mortalroads hunched over. Behind him, all of his best friends gathered around him. Kor, the Macedwarf, hunched beside him, looking at the entrance of the darkstoned fort. "Why are we here Sibrek?" Whined Urist, the Marks Dwarf. The eight of them, Sibrek included, shushed him, though the other eight had to supress their own questions as to why they were here as well. "I shall show you." Sibrek gazed on.
Kor had known his best friend for atleast twenty years, and all of them were still young and wild, taking 'quests' and adventures into the wilds around The White Spine. He felt something was wrong with Sibrek, like something was wrong with the way he gazed at the darkstoned walls of the fortress, where they shouldn't even be. The goblins didn't like trespassers. Though they usually didn't do anything about them, it was still rude to invade their privacy...and rumour had it their priests were starting to take offence to them being so close.
Sibrek had made them all dress in their arms and armour, the things they had earned after joining the army. They had little time for adventures now, but they were all dispatched to an outpost to wait watch, and they had left the second shift to duty. So they had time.
But it was still strange. Sure, a blade or a hammer would be wise to bring along. After all, the jaguars and the wolves were hungry around here. But easily beaten off. Armour wouldn't be needed, unless the humans were around causing trouble.
But they had gone off east. Or most of them anyway. Kor supposed they were trying to make the best of whatever the...what were they called? Ulfs? No...Elves? Kor couldn't remember. There were stories of them, but they hadn't been seen...ever perhaps. Kor didn't think they were real anyway. "Sibrek, we should leave." Kor was about to finish when his friend got up. "Marksdwarfs, cover the entrance from the foot cliffs. Axes, take the gate. Secondaries, take the flanks. I shall lead. The eight other dwarves stood stunned, mouths agape. Kor was one of them indeed.
Attack the goblins? They had never fought the goblins! Or maybe they had...long ago, but not now! They wern't at war! They would be killed by the goblins perhaps if they attacked...or maybe their own clanskin if they discovered they had attacked. What was Kor thinking! This was madness! And he was worrying about trivial things when he needed to stop his friend! "Sibrek-"
The dwarf gazed dark eyed back at Kor. "Either your with me. Or your dead." Kor stood their dumb struck. Sibrek had gone out ahead, leaving them all there. He strode up to a waiting greenskined priest, who was tending to flowers outside the darkwalls, and the gate. "A dwarf? Here? Say there! Ho! What are you doing wander-" The steel battleaxe in Sibreks hands met the goblins neck. Sibrek took up the fallen head that had been cleaved in one strike from his the goblins shoulders, and helt it up for all of his stunned clanskin to see. "THIS! THIS IS THE FUTURE! ATTACK!"
_____________________________________________________________________
In these times, Greed has come and past.
In these times, there is Battle.
...
In these times...there is only War.
Author
Topic: Marks of War; Histories of Greed and Battle (Read 948 times)