Poorly!
See, the annoying thing about this beast is that it flies, which means that, with it on the surface, we are what is technically known as "completely defenceless". So I wanted to attack it as quickly as possible, lest it take a mind to come inside. Read on to see how well that worked out.
TEKKUDASMEL
Bearskie Bronzeevens volunteered to lead the charge against the vile beast Rubal. In his haste, he reached the battlefield well before his squadmate, perhaps hoping to fell the foe alone and hoard the glory. It was not to be so. Bearskie was quickly overpowered and gruesomely beheaded.
His horrified companion fled back to the gates, then turned in fear of pursuit – but Rubal had been content to hang back and lord over its prey. It was clear that Bearskie's body would not be retrieved for burial, not that it made much difference when the corpses of the previous inhabitants already littered the halls to the exclusion of any free coffins. Maximum ordered that the gate was to be sealed if Rubal made any sign of moving closer, and that Pickmerchant would thenceforth turn its focus underground and leave the matter of the surface for another day.
On the lowest floor of the fortress, the dwarves had discovered a series of strange corpse-themed bedrooms that had apparently been used to save space by combining sleep and burial.
None were particularly keen to try sleeping there, but it was clear that the other purpose would have to be expanded dramatically if Pickmerchant was to be made habitable again. A small store of unused sarcophagi had been unearthed not far above, all of which would soon be placed in the dormimausolea for immediate use, but they would certainly not be enough.
Eager to produce more, and hoping soon to start less morbid industries as well, Maximum surveyed the fort's stocks of raw materials. Although some corridors still hadn't been explored, what had been found presented a clear theme, and Maximum soon came to a decision. In order to give Pickmerchant its own consistent design voice, he declared a policy program he called the Feat of Clay: from that moment on, anything that could be produced from clay,
must be. The old settlers had built the entire above-ground keep from clay collected on the site, and Maximum sought to maintain that policy and extend it to the depths as well. With that in mind, he ordered an exploratory shaft dug from the dormimausolea level down in the hope of finding the magma with which clay goods could be fired without needing fuel.
On the 21st of Sandstone, Pickmerchant's lone miner broke through into the great caverns while working on the exploratory shaft. Visible from the point of entry was a deep pit the dwarves hoped led to lower caverns that would bring them closer to the magma they desired. In the meantime, all the corridors of Old Pickmerchant had finally been mapped; the dwarves now knew their home completely.
Soon after, on the 25th of Timber, another cavern had been breached. At some point in the past few months, too, the remaining soldier developed a grudge against Maximum for sending his only friend to a cruel death, unmoved by Maximum's plea that Bearskie had chosen this sacrifice of his own free will. With the six citizens living in such close quarters, the grudge made things even tenser than the monster sitting outside.
Winter struck, and the river underneath Pickmerchant froze. Maximum ordered that ice be collected for inscrutable purposes. Twelve poults, eleven chicks, and eleven keets hatched in the new bird coops. Rubal continued to brood.
The miner broke into yet a third cavern layer, with a more interesting sight: a tell-tale blue glimmer in the distance, proving that the shaft now neared the bottom of the earth.
Finally, in the last month of the year, just as the exploratory shaft encountered warm stone betraying the magma running underneath — a new forgotten beast, Ases Lico Issha, a giant monster in the likeness of a bloated human with three stubby tails made entirely of green glass, was sighted in the caverns amid a cloud of presumably unholy vapors. Luckily, this one lacked the power of flight, and the path through the cavern level it occupied was already mostly enclosed.
Heedless of the threat trapped above, the dwarves opened a hole to the magma sea, paving the way for the Feat of Clay to begin. At almost the same time, as if feeling the heat from below, the surface thawed. Spring, it seemed, had arrived, and with it a new year dawned on Pickmerchant.
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Topic: [0.43.05]Tekkudasmel, Reclaim the Fort! (Read 2762 times)