Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Sphalerite]

Cilob's Journal, 19th of Galena

I have asked Cain to examine the corpse of the minotaur, or at least what our militia commander left of it.  He has concluded that the creature was likely young and inexperienced, and after consulting the historical records declared that it did not match the description of any of the minotaurs known to have attacked the mountainhomes.  It it likely that the creature had never fought a dwarf before today.

Cain also reported that the creature died slowly, from many small blunt impacts, none of which were enough to kill it alone.  While I can't say that the suffering of such a monster bothers me much, it does seem to me that hammers alone are not an efficient way of killing a creature of that size.  As several of our recent immigrants have skill with swords, I will be creating a secondary squad of soldiers armed with swords.

It has also been mentioned to me that steel is not the best material for warhammers.  It is however the only metal (along with iron, which is no better) we can produce in large quantity at the moment.

Now that the minotaur is dealt with, I must deal with the humans.  I am not surprised to see them here, as Brightwater is only a short distance from a major human civilization.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The humans are here to trade.  Their advance scouts must have told them of our location.  Fortunately, they are friendly.  I am hoping that they will eventually be willing to give us some more information on local threats and monsters, creatures like the minotaur that attacked us they might know of.  For now, we can trade some of our crafts for supplies.

I have ordered brought to the trade depot some of Rachel's cut gems and polished stones, some masterfully prepared food by Will_Tuna, and even a few strange totems that Geb carved from spare animal skulls.  We traded them for some metal bars, lumber, some of the foreign booze the humans drink, and a selection of cloth and leather.

I have also received a suggestion recently, in the form of a note written in a child's handwriting, though quote neat and polite for that.  The suggestion is for a mechanism to drop goblins to cripple them before letting our soldiers attack them.  This appeals to me greatly.  I will have to study the geological survey notes to find a location where the aquifers will let us dig a pit deep enough.

[Sphalerite]

"So, why can't we tame these ones?"

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"Well, they're giraffes.  Everyone knows giraffes can't eat fast enough to keep themselves fed.  Silly notion anyway, giraffes grazing.  They can barely get their head low enough to reach the grass."

"Wait, if they can't keep from starving, how are these ones alive at all?"

"Cause these are wild giraffes.  Only tame animals need to eat.  Everyone knows that.  Tame them, and they'll just starve."


Cilob's Journal, 16th of Sandstone

Six more immigrants arrived today - much to my surprise, as the Trader had advised me that we would get no more.  Of the six, only one is related to the great inbred family slowly taking over the fortress.  The other five are unrelated, though two are married to each other.

None of them have any skills of use.  I have assigned them all to masonry duties.

Our ongoing animal trapping project had some great luck today, after those useless giraffes we've caught something that we can actually use.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Of course, after these three were caught in the traps, we had the usual hilarity as the rest of the flock crowded around the cage traps and refused to let any dwarves close enough to retrieve the cages.  I decided to take this opportunity to send the new squad in and see how well sword-armed dwarves fared against them.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Our soldier sliced the first one in half with a single blow, and didn't take much longer to kill the others. I'd call that decisive.  Against unarmored targets, the cutting weapons are far more deadly than hammers.

[Geb]

This is a serious moral dilemma!

Giraffes are cute, but also, giraffes can be made into crossbows. Cuteness. Crossbows. How is anybody expected to make that sort of decision?

Maybe if there are some nice enough cages, they could be added to a zoo exhibit...

... or they could be torn apart and made into weapons of war.

Gah!

[Corai]

I have the same thing with cutebolds



Cutebold zoo, or let them free, zoo, free, GAH.

[zomara0292]

Cutebold zooo!!!!!! We can have them all in one cage, and goblins in another, and trolls in a third!!!!

[Corai]

Cutebold zooo!!!!!! We can have them all in one cage, and goblins in another, and trolls in a third!!!!

I prefer open-cave habitats.

[Jarod Cain]

What, "behold the cutebold in its natural state?"

Also, shame they're not mini-giraffes.
-J-

[Sphalerite]

Rachel Itebopzkak, Jeweler and great-granddaughter of the legendary King Kivish Koningiz, was working quietly in the cubbyhole carved in the bauxite lodes just off the main hallway.  Just outside her doorless cubicle a constant stream of masons and miners ran back and forth carrying granite boulders from the granite mine/grand dining room below out to the mostly-completed curtain walls outside.  She didn't pay that much attention, other than being glad that as a skilled worked she was exempt from the orders to all idle dwarves to help with the project.

Her hands were occupied with the by-now routine task of carefully chiseling the chunk of rough turquoise into a more attractive shape.  One nice effect of the construction project, there were plenty of rough gems being mined out as a byproduct.  Her mind went back over the time she'd been living at Brightwater.  There had been some unkind things said about her and her family.  Whispers she'd overheard, things like inbred and lack of genetic diversity.  It wasn't nice.  They shouldn't say such things, she was a direct descendant of the first King the Imperial Picks ever had.  Of course, so was Geb, and so was most of the fortress population by now, but that wasn't the point.

There were a few who had been nice to her.  Corai for one was friendly to everyone.  And his girlfriend Fishybang semed nice too.  Rumor has it they were getting married sometime soon.

Inspiration crept into her brain.  I should make something nice for those two.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

She looked at the polished and cut turquoise gem in her hands. Start with this, add some of that bauxite in the corner there, and then a bit more bauxite.

Needs contrast.  Congomerate's a nice brown, it'll set off the red and purple.

I've got a bit of cut ruby I can add to it.  This one looks like a shiny fist.  Fishybang should like that.

Corai's always out gathering plants and talking about his giant birdy friends, right?  I can add some plants in bird leather.  Wait, what do plants look like outside?  Ah, I'll just make pig tails.  Nobody will know the difference.

And some diamonds.  Everyone likes diamonds!

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I will be away on vacation for the weekend, so there will probably not be any updates till sometime next week.  Coming up then:  Completion of the curtain wall, opening of the grand dining room, giant sparrow breeding, and the end of the second year report.

[Corai]

Okee-dokee, AND THAT ARTIFACT IS PURE WIN.

[Phenixmirage]

Enjoy your vacation!

Phenix approves of this masterfully crafted artifact; it is indeed made of Win and menaces with spikes of Awesome.

[Shinziril]

An image of silver fists?  Never seen that before, interesting. 

Your writing is delicious.  Keep doing it. 

[Sphalerite]

Enjoy your vacation!

Thanks!  On the free internet at the hotel now.

An image of silver fists?  Never seen that before, interesting. 

I think it's from Dig Deeper, my mods include the expanded art image files from that.

[Corai]

Enjoy your vacation!

[Sphalerite]

Cilob's Journal

No sooner had the humans left, that the caravan from the Mountainhomes arrived.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

As expected, those two spies from the General who had been lurking outside the curtain wall joined up with them.  I expect they gave the new Liaison an earful about the conditions and 'shockingly poor security' here.  I sent the soldiers out to escort them in, and made sure the caravan went past the stockpile where the corpse of that minotaur is still rotting.  Main entrance not ready for use yet, you see.  That at least should make an impression - it'll be hard for the spies to spin our military killing a cousin of the monster that killed King Kivish as anything other than what it is.

Two Kobolds tried to sneak it along with the caravans.  The first one got away with only a fractured leg.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Our Commander chased the other one a remarkable distance before taking it down.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I had some of Rachel's polished stones brought to the depot.  None of the really good gems, I have plans for those, just the last of the olivine.  Also, a few of Will_Tuna's more creative kitchen creations.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Finally, a cage containing a few of the animals we've caught here that I won't need for future research.  The giant insects are research dead-ends, and the other creatures seem to have little military application.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

We traded them for basic supplies - some metal we can't produce locally, some glass and wood, cloth and leather, and finally, a breeding population of war dogs.  They'll be useful for intrusion alarms on the main entrance, once it's completed.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"Say, Cilob?  These animals you traded us?  I'm not sure they're quite tame."

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"Don't worry about it.  She's just a bit upset at being caged.  Let her out when you get to the mountainhomes, she'll calm right down."

"You sure about that?  It just tried to bite Vucar."

"That's what he gets for poking at it!  Put a cloak over the cage, give the poor thing some peace."

"And that giant insect thing, I think it's trying to kick its cage open."

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"It'll be fine.  Just whack him on the nose if it gives you trouble.  Really quite timid once you show him who's boss.  Oh, and be sure to get these straight to General Reg when you get back, she'll want to examine them personally."


Now that the traders are gone, I can get back to my research.  We have had the fortune of capturing three females of the giant sparrow-like birds that frequent this area.  I have prepared nesting annexes off the animal training room.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The sparrows were quite happy to take to the offered nests and lay eggs.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

After verifying that eggs had been laid, I locked the doors to the nesting annexes to ensure that the brooding mothers would not be disturbed.  I hope that the training I gave the birds will hold long enough, as I suspect that removing the mothers to re-train them would render the eggs nonviable.  If my theories are correct the hatchlings will be far easier to train than the adults, having never known a wild experience.  Time will tell.

[Sphalerite]

It is the end of year 52, the second year of Brightwater's history.  Excavation of the new dining room has just been completed.  The walls are rough granite, interrupted in two places by a vein of gold nuggets.  Two cages containing wild live giraffes have been installed near the entrance.  A handful of chairs and tables have also been installed, but the size of the room makes it clear that many more are intended.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Into the new dining room walks fortress founder Cilob Amudaban.  He stands on a table, turns, and begins addressing the crowd of dwarves.  Mostly children, the bulk of the fortress's workers being busy elsewhere, but there are a few dwarves here on break, including the Bone Carver Geb Mozibducim.

"My Fellow Dwarves!  So glad to see that at least some of you read my notice on the anniversary address.  For it has been two years now since we seven founders first arrived here on the shores of the ocean to build this settlement."

"We may not have much wealth to show by the numbers yet, it is true."

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"But we have now, thanks to the work of so many of you, a completed curtain wall and entrance gate protecting our home."

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"So much tireless work has gone into that, and many of you have had to do without proper bedrooms and other accommodations.  That is changing, the completion of the curtain walls mean that Phenix and the other miners, masons, and architects can turn to bedrooms and living quarters, like this fine dining room."

"You there!  Put that plump helmet down and stop feeding that giraffe!  Can't you read the sign?  If you feed the giraffes, they'll get used to it and forget how not not need to eat anymore.  You don't want them to starve, do you?"

"As  I was saying.  Other than the giraffes, we have learned quite a few things about taming the wild creatures of this land, one of our primary missions here."

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"And we have quite a few talented artisans emerging from our population.  I'm sure you have all by now seen that amazing piece of work that Rachel produced, celebrating our own CoraiUnki?  "Pure win", I think I heard someone say."

"Of course, Geb here has also become quite skilled with her work.  I had a chance to examine some of the ammunition she's producing, though not as closely as I expect some goblins or kobolds will some day."

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"But now, we have to look forward to the next year.  The curtain wall is done, but the front gates still require a lot more work.  The goblins are only going to become more aggressive over time.  We will need to produce much more steel armor and weapons, more than the trees above can support.  I will call for miners willing to explore downwards in search of magma pools so that we can build a proper metalworking industry.  We will have a properly equipped military, in addition to the best traps that Dwarven ingenuity can devise."

"We also need to being working on fulfilling the Queen's orders for this fortress.  Now that the curtain wall is finished, a large area of shoreline is available for fishing.  We will begin a mass fishing industry, which in time will not only provide the bulk of the food we need, but fuel a healthy export back to the Mountainhomes.  And Phenix tells me she can build some type of trap-platforms out in the ocean to capture larger creatures.  We will harvest the very whales from the depths of the oceans!"

"Say, where did Geb run off to all of a sudden?"

Spoiler (click to show/hide)