[OOC: Sorry for the extremely late update, life was chaotic with College and Thanksgiving, but here's Spring and the first half of Summer]
Journal of Ryukan, 11 of Felsite, 253
Well Henry, this venture started rather weirdly, as I was preparing for my first day of fortress overseer, I felt a strange presence take ahold of my mind, and it was like a euphoric dream. I remember watching great beings of power fight in titanic clashes that made the very ground tear apart. I saw the destruction of many cities and the uprooting of the mountains themselves. I saw things that I can not bring to even write on paper, the horrors of which will haunt my mind until I draw my last breath.
I do not know what I did in the waking world except for what these dwarves tell me, but I know that when the horrors of that vision faded, I stood holding the most beautiful gem I had ever seen. The gem seemed to glow with a faint light and vague images can be glimpsed at if one focuses hard, but they disappear as soon as you can see them. I'll have to study this in my off time.
On the topic of study, I inquired a passing dwarf if this fortress possessed a Library of any sorts, and to my delight, he said they did.
I asked where and he showed me into the most dismal excuse of a Library I have ever seen. This... cubby, was nothing more than a hole where these fat dwarves could sit around talking about "Sexual Reproduction". I plan on fixing this immediately.
I take it upon myself to draw up plans for a modestly sized library.
Another thing I need to rectify is the amount of corpses that are in the entry hall and Depot. I do not even want to know what fell things these dwarves have done in the name of profit and greed, but I am determined to improve whatever trade relations these dwarves have ruined.
I set aside a zone for hauling the corpses outside as far from the entrance as we can.
Just in time did we clear up the depot when I was greeted by with the news of a Human Caravan approaching with a Lord consort at their lead.
Five wagons in total with several Guards slowly rumbled into our depot.
Before we began, I met with the Lord Consort who seemed like a very decent guy.
He then proceeded to pull out a small novel of reports on the goings on in the world, I tried to listen, but I think I nodded off once or twice
[OOC: Yeah, I got bombarded by like 120+ pages of text about the happenings of the world... it hurt]
After he wrapped up and I got a few minutes of sleep, we proceed to iron out a trade agreement... well, it was mostly him telling me what to do and what we should give him and stuff, I may have agreed to a lousy trade deal on our behalf, but I wasn't hired as a Minister of Finances was I?
I do remember ordering booze and food and some sheets of paper, then he gave me the final document of what the humans wanted next year.
With that, he said his farewell and went off to get drunk.
I let the broker do his thing and traded for some booze and food and whatever books the Humans had. We traded some silver crafts I had ordered made last month. I also picked up this fancy figurine of a human made of coral, never seen the stuff before so I thought it would look nice on my dresser.
The Library is pretty much done, just need to furnish it some more and add the books we bought into it, then maybe write some of our own.
While the humans were still here, I received reports of visitors from above and below. Some migrants had arrived on the surface and an unspeakable horror made of vomit decided to wander into our area of the caverns.
I have written this down as I prepare our marksdwarves to shoot the beast from our side of the lake and hopefully take it down. Who knows, maybe we might actually live through it.
Before I head down, I have to exclaim great displeasure in being near that blasted Gem. Every time I study it, I hear quiet voices that are always so close, yet when I focus on them, they retreat and I am left in silence until I focus back on the gem. I get a great sense of dread thinking on this, I do hope that I am just under the effects of the strong booze here, but only time and more studying will tell. I have made it my goal to bring in the great minds of this world to study and bring in more texts through which I may yet uncover the secrets of this Gem.