Ahem.
Perhaps I spoke too soon.
You see, while these demons are extremely fragile, they can do something my dwarves can't.
Fly.
I got cocky. I sent my nine dwarves to assault hell itself. Unfortunately, that presented somewhat of a logistical problem, being as the demons were coming out of a several z level high tube. I mustered as many miners as I could to make a way down, but the demons kept coming. As I got more excited by the prospect of making hell my new home, I neglected to carve out enough space for my warriors to fight in. At some point, they ended up fighting on areas no larger than two squares.
These soldiers were legendary dodgers.
And so, gravity slew five of my best. Not directly, but the fall was enough to stun them long enough for the damned creatures to punch them to death. While incredibly fragile, I learned that the aphids were terrifyingly strong. Every time they hit, something successfully "exploded into gore"
I retreated with the others and the miners, thinking I'd take time and regroup. Time I did not have. I had an unexpected guest
It flashed in from the caverns like a bolt of lightning. My strategy of closely packing my dwarves worked against me here. Within a heartbeat, my four remaining veterans had died. I'm still not entirely sure how. It also managed to kill four of the twenty strong spearmillitia I'd had as a reserve before one put him down in a single stab.
My spearmen were no where near as disciplined as my veterans had been. Most of them were horrified by the carnage, and those who weren't were murdering each other.
And the demons were STILL coming.
In the end, my fortress proved to be it's own downfall. Turns out that giving your civvies weapons is NOT a good idea. They laid into each other with gusto. In the aftermath of the chaos, all that remained were three of my original forty dwarves. The chief medical dwarf was lying unconscious in his own hospital, clutching a steel axe. His ribs had only been broken, which meant that it must have been another dwarf who harmed him. Two competent speardwarves, one of whom had been a member of the original seven.
And two demons. Just two. Seems oddly poetic. I almost felt as if the fortress had been given another chance.
I sent my dwarves to fight. They'd only need to hit once. But then, so would their infernal opponents.
The Gods are just, but not kind. They died, and I spent the last remaining minutes watching my last, unconcious dwarf dehydrate. There was nothing I could do to save him, nothing I could do to comfort his final moments.
When he grew dim, when the light left him, so did it leave the fortress.
"Your settlement has crumbled to its end" And so ends Washedbeards, one of the last, if not the last, dwarven strongholds within the Absolute Realm.
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Topic: Well, that was disappointing. (SPOILERS) (Read 1689 times)