16th of Obsidian, 512
Another Forgotten Beast has been spotted way down on cavern level 34. As is tradition, the one who spots it gets to name it. This one has been called Lene Tholathoefano Efeye Thaci, presumably because its discoverer figured he'd never live long enough to name another one and decided to give it every name he could think of all at once. This one is a gigantic, skinless, ravening alligator with three tails, glowing eyes, and deadly spit. I've instructed everyone to go absolutely nowhere near the damn thing.
17th of Obsidian, 512
I love goblins. More specifically, I love how stupid they are. So after the last siege, a few of them managed to get away - badly wounded from our traps and the rain of shit, but alive. I can only imagine that they returned to their goblin tower and told their leaders about us, and about the horrible, crushing defeat they suffered at our hands. And did they say, "hm, maybe we should leave them alone"? No! They said, "Let's try again!"
Anyway, long story short, we're under siege again. I'm not terribly concerned about the outcome, which I see as being fairly inevitable. On the other hand, I did just watch three different undead creatures get absolutely murdered by about a million crossbow bolts at once, so we'll see how it goes. If nothing else, it'll be an interesting test of my latest addition to the fortress...
18th of Obsidian, 512
Oh. They brought about a dozen ogres, too. This will be fun.
19th of Obsidian, 512
And if that weren't bad enough, a magma crab just started spitting lava at someone's kid down in the magma forges. I've sent the military to deal with THAT, because it's less likely to die horribly just from walking around outside.
21st of Obsidian, 512
Several goblin hammerers just met with a rather grisly end in our trap corridor, but the ogres and archers have not yet been deterred. Nor has the magma crab, whom the Rags of Breath never got around to killing and has since killed Foo Quuxman and whoever's kid that was who was playing in the forges before slinking back into the magma below.
27th of Obsidian, 512
Ashsaber just beat two ogresses to death with her bare hands. She'd almost beaten a third one, too, until Ledi arrived and, doing what she does best, hit it in the face with her axe. A fourth ogress died to a combination of my sword, Ledi's axe, and El Presidente tearing out its throat with his teeth.
Note to self: Watch El Presidente carefully. He may be a werewolf, vampire, or other sort of supernatural monster. Either that, or he's just gone feral. Armok knows I wouldn't blame him if he has.
28th of Obsidian, 512
A fifth ogress died after Deathsword put her sword through its eye (and El Presidente smashed in its head with his warhammer for good measure). In other news, Sabertache had a baby boy today.
4th of Granite, 513
A sixth and final ogress was slain today. Deathsword hacked at it for awhile, Balnash punched it in the head repeatedly, and finally Ledi embedded her axe into its neck, then twisted it around until its head popped off. I made Deathsword an Axelord and made a note to never get on Ledi's bad side because frankly, she scares me.
The goblin archers, meanwhile, are standing around a long distance back from our entry hall, culling the herds of wilddeath and presumably arguing about whether it was really a good idea to come back here or not.
16th of Granite, 513
On the advice of Deathsword, I constructed a series of pumps to temporarily remove the water from a section of the aquifer in order to dig the channel required to complete my project. "Aquifers absorb water," he said. "There is little problem," he said. Turns out there was actually a big problem, as the pumps are now flooded (hopefully not permanently) and Echostatic very nearly drowned.
19th of Granite, 513
That damn magma crab, Asgan, showed up again, killing an herbalist and seriously wounding Sensei_shade and one of our armorers - I do not expect them to survive. Fortunately, the militia was much more punctual this time; Spishiban proved the hero of the day, sinking several crossbow bolts into it before I arrived with Deathsword and El Presidente to finish it off.
25th of Granite, 513
I've been watching the goblins carefully the past few days. They're still here, surprisingly enough. Still killing wilddeath, too. Some of the lookouts have even given taken to naming them. The most hilarious part, though, is that by and large they're just killing the same things over and over and over again; they just keep getting back up.
We also spotted another forgotten beast, Aco Amsirsedast Nomarkulur, down in the caverns. It's another skinless crocodile, but this one has glowing eyes, a horn, and webs. This one, at least, should be easier to kill should it ever come to that.
16th of Slate, 513
Another forgotten beast. Name: Alece. Great, gaunt, hairy toad, knobby antennae, unkempt gray hair, poisonous bite. Also, Megaman3321 gave birth in one of our stockpiles.
19th of Slate, 513
Finally managed to pump out enough water to dig a channel. Very nearly managed to drown six miners and a peacock in the process. Totally worth it. Inspiredsimji also gave birth today, making me seriously wonder what the hell kind of party we had nine months ago and why I wasn't invited.
28th of Slate, 513
The "siege" has finally ended. The goblins, having been worn down by two and a half months of fighting the undead, finally began to suffer significant injuries. All it took was a skeletal muxox tearing off one of the goblin's arms, and it was all over. The arm immediately animated in undeath and killed one of the goblins, which rose into undeath and began attacking its former comrades... Within a matter of hours, an entire squad of goblin archers had either been torn apart, transformed into zombies, or both. Personally, I'm looking forward to the excitement that's sure to come when the next siege is killed by the previous one.
12th of Felsite, 513
The elves arrived, took one look at the wilddeath, and promptly ran the hell away. Probably just as well for them; I was planning on taking all their goods by force anyway... Assuming, of course, that they weren't undeadified by the cloud of nefarious mist that's been floating around our entrance for the past week.
17th of Felsite, 513
Huh. Some of the elves survived long enough to get inside. Guess I might as well try and trade. If they've got the balls to get here alive, the least I can do is give them a bunch of bloodstained clothes in exchange for their sissy elf booze.
21st of Felsite, 513
A kobold thief stabbed Urist Imiknorris in the back today; he died shortly thereafter. Unfortunately, it stabbed him so close to the entrance that there was no chance of avenging his death before the skulking bastard slipped away into the horrible, horrible world outside.
5th of Hematite, 513
El Presidente finally got around to going to the depot to trade, only to find that the five elves who had made it safely inside were no longer willing to trade due to their two friends outside having been horribly murdered by undead. I ordered them killed for their insolence; El Presidente smashed in three of their skulls with his warhammer, while the other two ran. Ashsaber chased one down and severed her head with a mighty swing of her sword, while Deathsword ran after the other and jammed his axe into her skull.
21st of Hematite, 513
CloverMagic withdrew from society and claimed a jeweler's workshop. The fruits of his labor, unfortunately, turned out to be an incredibly boring tsavorite that's not even worth writing about further.
11th of Malachite, 513
I gave birth to a girl today, leaving me thoroughly confused.
12th of Malachite, 513
Saint has been missing for a week, now. I eventually found him at the bottom of my project's drainage shaft, having for some mad reason destroyed the ramp that was his only means of escape. Also, Aerie gave birth to a boy.
21st of Malachite, 513
Seven new migrants arrived today, and all of them managed to make it into the fortress alive! One of them introduced himself to me as SpaceCat, son of SpaceCat, and asked where his father was. I was tempted to have him open up the wall preventing the Forgotten Beast that incinerated him from getting into the fortress, but I figured it'd be more trouble than it was worth and just told him that his father had tripped and fallen into the magma. He shrugged, told me "shit happens," and headed off to spend the rest of his tragically short life hauling stuff around the fortress.
1st of Galena, 513
The final wall has been built. The last channels have been dug. The grates are all in place. The gems uncovered in the construction have been secured. It is time... I am giving the order to open the aquifer, and complete the grand project. Almost a year of planning has led to this, and what I do now can never be undone.
11th of Galena, 513
Kaamen breached the seal, then removed the stairs. So far, everything appears to be working as designed:
Should an enemy make it into the fortress, the bridge will retract, dropping them into the aquifer. They will drown, and their corpse and gear should be flushed down into a specialized containment room. Grates in the floor allow the water to continue flowing down, into the chamber below, where additional drainage tunnels will direct the runoff into the caverns. At last, my work is complete, and I can retire happily at the end of the year.