Gather 'round, little Urists, and let me tell the tale of a Moonstone day barely two thousand years ago. Winter had come to the little fortress of Bitecastles, and the first of the snowstorms were settling in to stay for the season. But the citizens weren't worried! After all, their booze stores were well-stocked, and if they ran out, well, they didn't mind brewing up their last few plump helmets and going hungry for a month or so. All was well in the fort, it seemed.
But then young Tobol Luridentrance made a terrible discovery while he was forging up =iron buckets= for the baron. Bitecastles was out of charcoal! The metamorphic stone held no coal or lignite, and the last of the wood had been wasted making beds for the latest wave of immigrants. In a panic, Tobol rushed to the manager to explain the situation, only to find out that the worst had come to pass.
The elves had come that spring and imposed a logging quota.
Feeling frustrated at being unable to practice a craft, Tobol trudged back to his forge. There was only one thing for it: He would have to use magma. But in the entire fortress, there was only a single minecart of magma! It would only last them a day. Nevertheless, he poured it into a pit beneath his magma forge and set to work.
And then, just as the magma was running out, Tobol canceled Make Iron Bucket. He was taken by a strange mood. Tobol cast aside his =buckets= and scoured the fortress for materials, gathering adamantium wafers, star sapphire, sheep wool, and chestnut wood logs. And then Tobol began a mysterious contruction. He worked not just into the night, not just into the next morning, but for a full eight days and eight nights, and for all that time, the magma never ran out! The forge kept burning until finally, Tobol had completed his creation: Strifehop the Safe Syrup of Bulwarks! An adamantine battle axe, encrusted with star sapphire, menacing with spikes sheep wool, and decorated with a stunning image in chestnut wood.
The citizens of Bitecastles gathered 'round to see the image, and one by one, they gasped. For on the item was an image of a dwarf, an elf and trees. The dwarf was striking down the trees. The elf was terrified.
That very moment, the citizens of Bitecastles decided they'd had enough of the elves' logging quotas. Every last one of them enabled their woodcutting labor and snatched up a +iron battle axe+ from the barracks stockpile and swept out into the forest. Tobol lead the charge himself, wielding Strifehop in the mad fury of a martial trance! On that day, every last tree in Bitecastles was felled, and the charcoal was used to forge a ☼steel statue☼ in Tobol's honor.
To this day, dwarves everywhere celebrate that fateful winter. We chop down trees and put them up in our living rooms just to show that we can, and we set out seven-branched lamps in memory of the magma that lasted for an entire week. And that, little Urists, is the story of the first Dwarfsday.
