Ok, I decided to play some more yesterday instead of like, sleeping. Enjoy!
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A poorly-situated fisherdwarf buys us some precious minutes. It's time to formulate a plan, and fast!
The milicia now has gear, and some form of training. They can take on a kobold, and gank a giant dingo. But can they take on a giant angry Quagminotaur? I'm not entirely sure. I ask Senshuken if they can deal with it. ''If we have to'' he replies. ''Can't say we'll win, but we'll try.'' We are sitting in the unfinished 2nd layer of the military tower. This is suposed to become a dinning hall for our soldiers, but so far only half of it is complete, and there are still pieces of flooring begging to collapse if they don't receive more stable foundations. Underneat is the armory, and under that is a thinner corridor, running from the depot to the outside world. If this minotaur wants to get in, he will have to go underneath the tower, regardless of his entry point. Front gate or the tower's unfinished walls both lead into the fortress the same way.
That's when I come up with a fucking genius plan. Even if we close the gate, the minotaur will charge at the hill, jump inside the tower, and rush downstairs. We'll let him take the gate. We won't close it. Let him dive inside all he wants. We cannot finish the tower's walls in time, nor make them unclimbable, but it's unfinished state means that its pretty fucking easy to crumble parts of it.
Oh, we won't need to destroy the whole thing. If I've learned anything being a dwarf, it's that floors are fucking easy to destroy to create domino effects. all we need is to disconect one of the central pieces that's above the corridor. It'll fall down, hit the first floor, break that, and both pieces will fall into the corridor.
''That's dumb, interjects the captain. You'll never be precise enough to hit a fucking minotaur.
-No, of course not. But as long as some flooring falls, it'll create a fucking huge cloud of concrete dust. As long as the minotaur is nearby once that procs, it,ll probably be incapacitated in some manner. You guys will be on the standby, far away. As soon as the cloud disperses, you'll rush the monster before it can recover. Some mason in the tower might get knocked over as well, but who cares. Let's see how that minotaur fights with his lungs filled with sand and dust.
-That... sounds actually like a decent plan. Let' do this.''
We order the masons around. We have a general idea of how fast they can deconstruct a tile, but this is still a tricky shot. the beast charges the main gate. The workers ready their picks and hammers. This is a very tense moment....
...Aaaaaan nevermind, the minotaur stepped into a cage trap.
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The residents of Astville are now fully organised. Darzoth is spending most of his time aquiring then dismantling a smelter, then a forge, then back to a smelter. After an axe, a pick is the next objective. Once a copper pickaxe is aquired, Ast get to work and mine out some hematite, which Darzoth turns into bars, then transforms the smelter into a forge, which he uses to make a second anvil. ast mines a rock, and soon Astvile has both a smelter and a magma forge, no back and forth required anymore.
During those time, tho, some accident happen. fikod climbs all the way back to the entrance of the cavern (which he finds sealed) and on his way back, he falls into the pit. ast is the nearest, so she goes and mine him out, but the blood moon is near!
''Go back to base, and fast! screams Ast. i will run into the upper caverns. There is no time to seal me!''
Ast starts mooing to the moon, and her hands turn into hooves. she is now a wereantelope, stalking the caverns. She drops all her gear to the floor, including a silver battle-axe she found while freeing Fikod. What an ironic weapon for a werebeast to carry around.
The blood moon is over! she vaguely remembers slaying a crundle that wandered too close. Apart from that, she spent most of her time there, doing basic wereantelope things like mooing, growling, and being very angry for some reason
She returns to Astville, where Atir has drawn a very beautiful set of blueprints for the living quarter. Everyone shall have it's own spacious bedroom (Ast and Nil will share one, being married and all) they will have plenty of room for furniture and personal belongings, and the rooms are spaced enough that they will have engravings on each side of the walls, increasing the value and beauty of the place. Atir even included some alcoves to place statues, totems, or whatever else they happen to craft that's worth putting on display.
''I also have ideas for a dinning hall right underneath this, explains atir. But let's start with the bedrooms, shall we?
-Actually, replies Ast, our priority should be using the pick and wood we gathered to climb up to the cavern's ceiling and seal it.
The former members of Astville are not eager to follow the lycanthrope's suggestion. They are weary of living on the dirt, and wish the early wood stocks would go toward barrels for booze, and some beds and table. Most of them believe that snustrok has been killed offscreen by crundles or mudman, or that it simply left the region. If it was alive, would it not have attacked when Ast and Fikod ventured higher in the caverns? Still, they decide to play it safe, and Nil the carpenter begins work on a scaffold for the seal.
Food is becoming sparse, however. Fikod is slowly building some plump helmet and cave wheat farms, but it'll be a season before they can harvest anything. Most of the plump helmets have been harvested already, and eaten. They cannot mill the cave wheat into something edible because no millstones have been produced yet. Their only reliable food source right now is fishing. Things take a turn for the worse when sodel the fisherdwarf shows up in the forge to announce something dire:
''There is nothing to catch in the western underground lake'', he declares.
People are getting pretty hungry in Astville. For many weeks, they had survived on trout, and the occasional plump helmet, but now both of these had been exhausted. The residents start to argue on the fastest way to get more food. Cook the cave wheat? Try to make a millstone instead? Can they survive on hunting, until the farms are ready to harvest?
''I got stuck upstairs, admits Fikod. I didn,t get to plant the seeds yet!
-Well, that's it, says Bomrek, I'm going to look for some small critters to eat.
-Me too, says Asob.
-Guys, guys, we need to stick together and work as a team! begs Sodel.
But it's too late. Two of them have already left, to fend for themselves, and soon most of the tasks in astville are neglected, as people decide to scatter and hunt for their own food. Olin, ex-milicia commander and Sheriff of Astville, decides to go back to doomforest, and starts climbing up the staircase. there is nobody to seal Ast in time, and no room either, since atir occupies the well and Sodel the workshop room. Ast decides to wander into the caverns once more. ''Maybe if i can find something nice to kill, I can bring it back and we can cook it. That would solve everything...'' The ranger desperately want to return Astville to it's former harmony. It has become her home. Doomforest had exiled her, sent her to die without a second thought, yet the dwarves of the magma forge had welcomed her with open arms, regardless of her curse.
Yes, finding food is the best way to help her new family. She can feel the change taking place slowly, but surely. Her scent magnifies with each step she takes. She can feel the grass and the spores around her, the smell of long-gone crundles, and magma crabs down in the depths. Her nose catches the trail of something fancy. ''Food!, I found food!'' Ast knows, instinctively. she starts to follow the trail. Her hooves are quick, her reflexes sharp, and soon enough she finds what she seek.
She has found food.
She has found Bomrek.
Yet in the depth of the cavern, something else has found them still...
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Topic: The Hastening of Doomforests (Read 452363 times)