It's been a long time again. I just couldn't get in the mood for writing, and when I finally did, my laptop's charger got busted. My life in a nutshell.
I know how the cave roaches keep getting out of their terrariums! SQ keeps releasing them for some reason! The previous three were either killed with doors or eaten by spiders, I don't know why my drow thinks keeping the fourth cockroach outside of the terrarium would be a good idea. Well, RIP SQ5, victim of her owner's good will.
Strange about the slave beasts though - in my experience I haven't had issues with semi-sentient wagon pullers (though I give them innate discipline which may or may not have something to do with it)
Slave creatures handle fear really strangely. While regular citizens just take a hit to mood and continue going their way, trolls keep cancelling jobs and run around scared. Would removing [WAGON_PULLER] work in an existing world?
Five years old Asithi Liegills got bored of playing in the bedroom level's corridors all day, and as a resourceful drowling she was, she quickly found a solution to this problem. She needed to find out what she wanted to do when she grows up. After five minutes of walking back and forth completely lost in thought, she looked at the toy she was holding in her hand the whole time - a bronze toy sword. She knew.
---
Imic was having a hard day. The last day of Moonstone was the last day of training before a month long break for Blackguards, and nobody seemed to be eager to do any training.
"Miss Litheme, we'll be having a lunch break in about an hour, you won't starve until then! Mister Fecawi, I won't believe you have this so-called narcolepsy unless you bring me mistress Asithi's opinion on paper! Mistress Freshcannon, where are you going? Don't leave me with seventeen people to take care of!" Imic couldn't handle the situation, but he remembered what the city guard instructor in Murknightmare used to do in moments like this.
The weapon master went outside, believing that his soldiers would be too lazy to kill each other, and trusting that ZM5 would manage to keep Biretha and Melici from taking their antics too far. Before he could even wipe sweat from his forehead, he noticed a tiny person rushing straight at him.
"Mis'ser, mis'ser, what do you do, mis'ser? Mis'ser, what do you do?" Asithi inquired, pointing at Imic with her toy sword.
"Huh? Oh... hello, little miss, I'm, uh... a weapon master, why do you ask?" Imic answered, trying to sound friendly despite having spent the whole morning with an unmotivated pack of unskilled, undisciplined soldiers.
"I wanna be a weapon mas'ser when I grow up! What does a weapon mas'ser do? Mis'ser, what does he do?" The child looked at Imic with awe. She didn't expect to run into the weapon master himself, but becoming a weapon master would be even better than being just a regular soldier.
"You can't be a..." Imic stopped. Obviously as a girl Asithi would never become a weapon master, but crushing a child's dreams isn't what a champion of justice would do. "I'm tasked with protecting the overseer, but I'm not working alone, I have a squad of... elite warriors under my command,"
"That's what a cap'n does! What do you do mis'ser? What? What, Mis'ser?" Asithi demanded a full answer, not some half-hearted beating around the bush.
"I... what do I do? I guess I make demands, but... Yeah, I make suggestions to the overseer about making things that the town needs the most." The weapon master tried to make his 'privilege' sound impressive, but Asithi didn't look impressed. "I'll demonstrate!"
"Go and tell overseer SQ that we can safely export floodgates now, and also we need a crown. This is your first mission, don't disappoint me." Imic didn't seriously expect Asithi to follow the order, but the girl saluted, turned around on her heel, and ran underground. The weapon master thought to himself: "I'll have to make it up to miss SQ after that."
---
SQ and Darkening Kaos were having a pleasant conversation in SQ's office. Tea and strawberry cake were involved.
"...It's not like I hate her, just the opposite in fact. I admire her, but she's the kind of person you'd rather admire from far away." Kaos explained her relations with Yetine Tamelies, the legendary wound healer. "Unrelated, but do you have any plans for the caverns? You had me making those serrated discs for a new safe entrance, and suddenly you tell the masons to block the doors completely."
"Well, I really want to put some cage traps in there, but look what's been happening in there: most soldiers cough blood from touching a forgotten beast's blood, the trolls are shaken because of all those cave pygmy chunks lying around, Scourge still complains that her arm feels stiff after her meeting with a reason stealer." SQ explained. "It's just a matter of time until something even worse comes out of there, like mind flayers or aboleths."
"If there were aboleths in our caverns, they wouldn't have left us be for this long. Come on, we have thirty competent warriors armed by yours truly, so if you keep people from wandering around looking for webs, everything should be just fine." Kaos said enthusiastically, but then she felt the need to explain her excitement: "I just really want this trap corridor built, okay? I haven't been making giant sawblades to sell to those freaky fish people or the scumbags from Murknightmare."
"I'll think about it, but first I want to..."
"Mis'ress oh-ver-sire! Mis'ress!" A squeaky voice interrupted the conversation. Nobody saw or heard Asithi come in, making her sudden appearance startling to say the least. "Mis'ser weapon mas'ser said we can ex-port flooding gates! An' he wants a crown!"
"Don't sneak up on us like that, Asithi!" SQ scolded the child, then waited for her to leave. She was getting nervous when the girl continued to stand in place, looking at her. "I'll tell Imic to make his crown himself, you can go now. I think your mom is in the menagerie, why don't you go to her?"
"Mis'ress, what does an oh-ver-sire do? I wanna be an oh-ver-sire too! Mis'ress!" Asithi inquired.
"Over my dead body." SQ muttered under her breath.
"SQ, what was that? She's five at most!" Kaos whispered.
"Being an overseer is not that pleasant at all. I have to listen to people's complaining, my orders are often ignored, I sometimes drown in paperwork, I get all the blame if something happens to merchants." SQ was obviously trying to discourage Asithi from pursuing her career. It was so painfully obvious that Kaos couldn't help but roll her eyes. "I think you'd make a great rothegirl though, just like your mother. I'm a little busy right now, so talk to Scourge about this, she's the second in command in the menagerie."
Asithi saluted like a little soldier, then ran off without saying a word.
---
Asithi, a drowling on a mission, was running up the staircase to the menagerie. When she was on the right level, she heard noises coming from upstairs, as if someone dropped a pile of heavy items on the ground. As a future overseer and weapon mistress, Asithi had to investigate.
"THE MATERIALS HAVE BEEN GATHERED, NOW IF ONLY I HAD A WITNESS TO BEHOLD MY CREATION..." A spirit shouted through Tharumi Squashhates the jeweler. Then he noticed Asithi looking at him from across the corridor. "YOU, CHILD SKULKING THERE! YOU ARE ABOUT TO WITNESS THE IMPOSSIBLE! THE CREATION OF AN ARTIFACT SO MAGNIFICENT THAT... HEY, COME BACK HERE!" The girl had no interest in such distractions. She was carrying crucial orders, so she couldn't risk falling into an enemy's trap. Tharumi started working reluctantly, disappointed that nobody will see the effects of his work.
---
Scourge was standing by the rothe enclosure, overseeing their marking for slaughter. Lerine Doombranded was inside the enclosure, marking the animals with silver moon dye. As much as it pained Scourge, there were just too many rothe, and culling the smaller, weaker ones would do good for both the animals and the food and textile industry.
"Lerine, I don't wanna kill rothe! We could just geld some bulls to slow down the growth of the herd." Scourge felt bad for the rothe. She knew that no amount of begging would postpone the order any further, but she felt a strong need to express her displeasure.
"Scourge, you know how hard it was to convince SQ to let us mark eight rothe instead of ten?" Lerine asked, sprinkling another rothe with silver powder. "She's always so timid, I didn't expect her to get so... assertive. Does she always get like this on her 'time of the month'?"
"Hah, nice, I gotta use that one one day. But no, it's not that. SQ's been in a foul mood since her meeting with the outpost liaison, and honestly, I think I should have a word with her before she gets some silly idea." Scourge said. Suddenly she felt someone pulling her robe's sleeve. She looked down to see Asithi looking at her with fierce determination. "Oh, Asithi! Glad you decided to drop in, adorable little things like you are always welcome here. I think your mom is taking care of the abrians right now, so why don't you wait here with me and Lerine?"
"Mis'ress, I wanna be a rothegirl! I wanna ride a lizard an' throw lasso an' shoot rothe stealers an'... an'..." The girl was so excited she forgot she had no idea what else rothe herders did, but that wasn't enough to curb her enthusiasm.
"That's cute, but we don't do free-range anymore, so there's no need for lassos and revolvers. I could use a lasso and a revolver though... Never mind that! If you wanna become a modern rothegirl like me, SQ or your mother, you have to adhere to three simple rules." Scourge cracked her knuckles, overjoyed that she could once again recite the rules she made up over a hundred years ago. "First, you need to respect all animals, not only rothe. That means you should learn about their behavior, be diligent in taking care of them, and not take their docility for granted. Can you do that?"
"Yes mis'ress! Mommy already taught me how to milk a spider!"
"Excellent! Now rule number two: be cute as a button. If your mom can do that, you shouldn't have any trouble."
Lerine's muffled voice suddenly came from under the tightly packed mass of rothe. "I'm not cute, I'm ruggedly hadsome!"
"Keep telling yourself that, sweet cheeks!" Scourge smirked at where she assumed Lerine was, then went back to explaining rules to Asithi: "The third rule: you need to be twelve or older. I lowered it to seven once, but that was an exception. Come back in seven years and I'll make you my personal assistant."
For most drows seven years wasn't long at all, but for Asithi it was literally more than she could imagine. She couldn't be a weapon mistress, she couldn't be a house overseer, she couldn't even be a rothegirl, so what was left for her to do? She looked at her toy sword and everything became obvious - she could still pretend to be a knight slaying vile unicorns and foul pixies.
---
"IT'S DONE! IT'S... I GUESS I'LL JUST GO, HMPH!" The spirit grumbled before leaving Tharumi's body." Wait, what am I doing here? I was... Woah!"
Tharumi couldn't believe his own eyes. Before him stood a cage of pure pyrope, intricately decorated with masterfully worked metal, stone, wool and bone. The decorations included architectural and animal motifs, foundation of Dungeonevened twice, and a priestess of an eldritch entity becoming an outpost matriarch in Murknightmare.
The jeweler wouldn't have believed he was the author of this work if not for the fact that he was still holding tools in his hands and there was nobody around.
---
"We've got cage traps and giant sawblades, what next? You know there's no such thing like overkill when dealing with monsters." Darkening Kaos was extatic knowing that her idea for a trap corridor has been approved.
The young mechanic's excitement quickly spread to SQ. "How about huge retracting spikes?" The overseer suggested. "All best dungeons have spike traps. And swinging axe blades! And monsters! Let's pitch monsters against monsters!"
"Monster on monster action? Great idea! The spikes are too simple though, I don't like taking the easy route. Maybe giant corkscrews instead? Or, imagine, enchanted metal snake heads like those in scourges of fangs!"
"Yeah, sounds fantastic, let's finish the tea and get making this entrance! If Fred isn't busy we can heve it done by the evening!"
Knocking on the door interrupted the conversation. Without waiting to be let in, Fred the Mitey entered the office as if he hed been waiting outside for his name to be mentioned. In fact, that was exactly what he was doing.
"Not so fast, overseer!" The administrator exclaimed dramatically. "Are you aware how much work the miners have in their hands?"
"We're done with the new dining hall, which was a big job, and now we're expanding the menagerie as you ordered, then we'll be making room for carpenter's and mason's workshops..." Fred listed. "There was also the dungeon mistress and her... unorthodox request."
Fred was already a bit flustered after mentioning Yetine's order, but he became even more so and admitted: "That, and I must have also sold all trap components you made at some point, Kaos, because I couldn't find any when checking the stocks..."
"You were eavesdropping, waiting for a chance to make a dramatic entrance?" SQ asked in disbelief, ignoring everything Fred said. "What's next? You're going to create an alter-ego and start narrating everything you do?"
"Let me take this one, SQ." Kaos suggested. The overseer wanted to protest, but she realized she had nothing constructive to say. Kaos continued: "That's a lot of metal wasted. How much of what do we have left?"
"I've got a list somewhere... just a second... here!" The administrator pulled a piece of parchment from his pocket.
"We've got loads of gleaming chitin, a good amount of silver, some refined and hardened chitin... huh, looks like we're low on diamondium again. At least the Blackguards are fully equipped now. The wagon that crashed carried some ore, but I don't think there was a lot of that." Fred analyzed the list closely.
"Gleaming chitin is too brittle for... for anything, really. Okay, I'll keep making chitin sawblades, but I want someone assigned to making silver hammers down in the forges." Kaos requested.
""Hey, I'm the overseer here!" SQ reminded, putting down her teacup. "Kaos, you keep making chitin sawblades. Fred, get someone making silver hammers in the forges. If your miners weren't so busy, I'd have you send them to the mines to get some more chitin. I'm going to the menagerie to make sure Scourge isn't trying to rescue any rothe."
---
Athara Dieabyss left the abrian paddock visibly disturbed. Although it's logical to be disturbed by monsters from lower planes, abrians never bothered her to that day.
SQ, Scourge and Lerine were discussing the latest expansion of the menagerie and what enclosures needed to be built first, when suddenly they noticed their shocked colleague.
"Hey, Athara! We were just having a meeting, if you can call it that. We'd appreciate your input, so... did something happen?" Scourge asked upon noticing Athara's expression."
"Did... Did you know abrians are sentient?" The woman muttered.
"W-what? They don't talk, h-how do you know they can think?" SQ asked, hoping that Athara was wrong.
"I had one for lunch yesterday! We all ate abrian meat at some point!" Lerine started panicking, more because he found eating sentients disgusting than because it was immoral.
"E-everybody calm down! There's one simple solution for this!" Athara attempted to calm dow the menagerie staff. "Forget I told you about it, and under no circumstance let anyone know!"
---
The folowing month was seemingly very calm. Seemingly because mussel gatherers, corpse haulers and surface farmers were often voicing their concerns about sounds they described as 'savage howling' coming from the distance. Those complaints were dismissed by every drow in power, after all the woods were a home to many creatures that could make such noises.
One day the howling started getting louder and louder until finally:
A gigantic ape from distant frozen lands appeared on the horizon, falling trees on its way with its bare hands, crushing rocks under its feet, looking furiously at the walls of Dungeonevened. The town was on the Saumen Kar's way and it had to be destroyed.
Helmet Snakes and Steel Samurais gathered by the western gate. The monster could just vault over the wall, but even then it would have no choice but to face the drows.
Freshcannon was calm, even happy about the attack. Both major monster attacks were finished by her axe, this one was supposed to end the same way. That's what gods wanted.
The monster noticed a crowd of tiny black creatures in shiny shells from the distance. It walked slowly not to startle them, because stomping on them all at the same time would be much more satisfying than squishing them one after another. Once Baranue crossed the gate, the small creatures started waving their arms. The Saumen Kar thought it was their way of begging for mercy. It chuckled to itself in a deep guttoral voice. The situation stopped being funny when the monster's fur started glowing brightly.
Baranue was confused, but it was quickly forced to snap out by sharp pain in its right foot. Melici the Silver Samurai dealt the first blow, cutting deeply and forcing the monster to shift its whole weight to the left leg. Asin took advantage of that situation and slammed his fist into Baranue's left foot, cusing it to fall over.
Freshcannon made sure the monster wouldn't stand up by crushing its foot's bones, and later she did the same with its left hand. She had this kill in the bag. Or so she thought.
Baranue was unconscious, lying in the pool of its own blood, with twenty drows trying to pierce its thick skull. Finally a powerful stab turned the monster's fractured head into a rain of blood and bone shards.
Melici couldn't bring herself to pull the sword out of Baranue's brain, she wanted that moment to last forever. Killing a beast that huge would surely win her respect of other soldiers. Suddenly she felt someone putting a hand on her shoulder.
"Get inside or you'll get sunburnt again, freak." Freshcannon faked concern, but it was obvious she was upset over losing a major kill.
---
One of the soldiers wasn't in a festive mood after the fall of Baranue. Slevina Faintfolds, one of the Helmet Snakes, couldn't contol himself anymore. He was still dwelling upon being thirsty a year ago, Ombragon's masterful meals weren't good enough for him, a troglodyte bone he saw the other day was still creeping him out, he was sure SQ wasn't listening to him when he was complaining. All those horrible things caused Slevina to release his frustration on the nearest drow.
Lunardog was feeling second-hand embarrassment for Slevina. A trained warrior should be able to hurt him, not just give him a few bruises. Instead of fighting back, the farmer just backed away at which Slevina reacted by rolling on the ground and shouting obscenities.
---
First day of spring, SQ and Scourge were sitting outside watching the sunrise.
"Another year passed and we're still alive, can you believe it?" SQ muttered, deep in thought. "How long have we been here, four years? It feels so much shorter..."
"Not really, a lot of stuff has been going on. Although I get why you would say that." Scourge stood up and looked down at her friend with an exaggerated thinking expression. "I fell in love, got married, and I'm going to have a baby very soon. You haven't had much going on on the romantic front."
SQ got up too, not very interested in continuing the conversation. Before she could disappear underground, voices from behind the walls grabbed her attention. "S-Scourge, can you hear it?"
"Yeah, and I don't like it..."
---
Uthimi Shockhell was slowly backing off along the wall. She had no idea who or what the people in front of her were, but she didn't like the way they spoke to her:
"Come to us, skinless elf, you will fit right in! Our family is always looking for new members! Ha ha ha!"
Uthimi was lucky she was blind, because creatures she was facing were some of the most grotesque. Suddenly she heard shouting from the other side of the wall. It was SQ calling for Freshcannon and Asin. Uthimi decided to trust the overseer's judgement and ran as fast as she could without tripping.
Unfortunately her fastest wasn't fast enough. A diminutive clown threw a hatchet that hit her in the back and lodged itself in her kidney. Uthimi was sure this was her end when suddenly...
"Hey, freaks, need a strong man in your circus? I've got plenty of mussels!" MottledPetrel shouted, flexing his feeble muscles, holding a mussel in his hand.
The monsters were not amused, but at least they helped Petrel discover a talent for dodging axes, BB gun pellets and fireballs.
This talent went unused, unfortunately, because once the large clown caught up with the fisherman it was all over. The horrible mechanical saw could tear through drow flesh with no resistance, and Petrel happened to be made entirely of drow flesh.
The fisherman's sacrifice was futile. A many-armed freak smashed Uthimi's head with a cane. Whatever the entertainers wanted to do with Petrel's and Uthimi's corpses was interrupted by the arrival of Snakes and Samurais. The soldiers had no time to be shocked by the monstrous appearance of their enemies or death of their friends, because it was time to kill.
Tharumi, an inexperienced swordsman, charged straight at the leader of the pack, a spearclown, and impaled him on his sword. Tharumi expected something more from a monster clown, but he didn't complain.
To the clown's dismay, Biretha the swordsnake appeared with a grin more sinister than any clown could have. He started slowly disassembling the evil entertainer, removing left foot, right leg, and right arm.
The hatchet-throwing dwarf clown charged at tharumi to protect its master, but due to its comical size he just bounced off. To add insult to injury, or rather injury to insult, Tharumi cut off the mini clown's leg.
Biretha got bored of playing with the clown, so he took a wide swing and lodged his scimitar halfway through the entertainer's head. Surprisingly it was enough to kill the monster, despite the widespread rumor that monster clowns are hard to dispatch.
The fire-breather attempted to cut the most fearsome enemy into tiny pieces, but Biretha managed to block even the fearsome chainsaw. Oquari the duelist took the chance and stabbed the dragon-like freak in the foot, causing incredibly complex injury. The monster was still standing, even if barely, but...
...Biretha slashed so hard that the fire-eater lost his balance and fell over.
The mini clown's misfortune wasn't over. The next person to stumble upon him was Melici who took great pleasure in tormenting the weak. She wondered how much of the clown's body could be turned into mush before the creature finally dies. Unfortunately Tharumi was nearby, and to get an easy kill to his name, he chopped off the clown's head.
The fire-eater met the same fate as his dwarf colleague, but the final blow was performed by Biretha.
The sword-swallower readied her BB gun, took aim and... was forcibly positioned by Freshcannon in a way that it was easy to chop her head off with a single swing. A split second before death she started to question her choice of weapons. Surely, a sword-swallower should use a sword, not a gun.
The juggler was unreasonably hard to kill. The whole military force of Dungeonevened was wailing on the many-armed creature, and it had the audacity to brag about its combat skills. Finally Biretha made a deep horizontal cut in the juggler's ribcage, slicing through lungs and heart.
The ambush took lives of two civilian drows, one of which was a founder of Dungeonevened, but seeing how one of the entertainers could breathe fire, the soldiers have agreed that the losses were acceptable.
A great fire from a stray fireball was started on the other side of the river, but it was unlikely to spread across.
---
"Okay everybody, you know the drill - you bring trash, I sell it to fishmen!" Fred the Mitey explained once again. It was finally time to get rid of some useless garbage littering the town. Hopefully the pelagics won't mind seeing dead clowns. "Wait, the western gate is closed? Who did that?"
"One of your projects required it, or so we though." One of the miners said. "But apparently the bridge would collapse if we dug too close so we'll have to deconstruct it altogether."
"Could you please raise the bridge?"
"And risk squishing the merchants?"
"Good point."
"They went into the river! If they don't come out..." Fred crossed his fingers hoping there wouldn't be another diplomatic disaster.
"They are fish and their pack animals are crabs, calm down." The miner had his fingers crossed too, just in case.
"They're carrying food, booze and paper! I'm not eating river scum cheese!"
---
SQ and Athara were carrying a cage from the menagerie's storeroom to the trade depot, when suddenly something caught SQ's attention.
"Athara, look! The egg sac is broken! Giant spiders have hatched!"
"Could we take care of it later? Don't drop the..." Before Athara finished the sentence, SQ has dropped the cage and ran up to the enclosure. "Come on, I wanna get rid of those jammed cages!"
"And I don't want the spiderlings to escape. Three females, great! Now you stay here, little things, I'll be back in a minute." SQ said cheerfully, still ignorant of MottledPetrel's death. She locked the door tightly and went back to carrying the cage.
---
The drows of Dungeonevened exchanged crafts and tattered clothes for metal bars, animals, cages, bags and paper. Large amount of items were given to the pelagics as an offering. Fred couldn't guess what the fish people were feeling by their expressions or body language, but he assumed they were overjoyed.
---
"So... are we taking them straight to the store room or what?" Athara asked SQ.
"No, we examine what we got and share our knowledge. Normally Scourge says something dirty or hits on me at some point when we do this." SQ explained. "I... I don't expect you to do that, I'm just saying!"
"Another pig, well fed, really twitchy." SQ observed closely, but not too closely.
"Oversized tusks with no sign of wear. Reacts aggressively to even smallest movement. It was bred for battle, no doubt about that."
"You know what's weird? There are pig boars and pig sows, but also wild boars and wild boar sows. Shouldn't it be wild sows?" The overseer asked, hoping for a humorous answer.
"That was random... No, if it was supposed to be like that, it would be like that."
"Ugh, good enough."
"That's a huge lizard! It's like a better version of our riding lizards!" SQ exclaimed.
"It looks like a monitor lizard. The common ones hunt small animals, while the bigger ones can take down a fully grown buffalo. This one could swallow a buffalo whole."
"Can't wait to see it in action. I'm feeding carnivores today!"
"Suit yourself."
"Looks like a common kea but purple. Should we give it a wash? I think we might have got scammed." SQ looked suspiciously at one of the pelagics. The fish person inflated his throat for a few seconds, then continued staring blankly."
"Or maybe there happen to be multiple species of parrots that look alike?"
"Where's your imagination? Is Scourge going to be like you when she becomes a mother?"
"I just don't think that angering those guys is a good idea."
"A land octopus, not something you see everyday." SQ reached out to get some slime from the mollusk, but Athara stopped her.
"Were you going to get octopus slime on my clothes, young lady?"
"N-no..."
"Don't lie to me!"
"Yes, I'm sorry mom... I mean, Athara..."
---
A small crowd of drows gathered in front of the hospital.
"Oh, it's so frustrating! I can't shake the feeling I should be at Petrel's funeral! He was one of the founders of this town! He supplied the expedition with fish and fed us mussels!" SQ felt horrible. How would Petrel react to one of his friend ignoring his funeral if he was alive? He would probably be okay with that, but SQ wasn't. On the other hand Scourge and Imic were alive and they could actually get offended. Having multiple friends was so difficult for the overseer."
"How many time have you actually talked with that guy?" Lunardog asked. "I mean, there was always something fishy about him, but I don't eel he would be shellfish enough to demand people who barely knew him to mourn him."
"Gods, I know that's how you deal with difficult situations, but have some respect! For Petrel and for us!" Kaos couldn't help but cringe at Lunardog's inappropriate fish-related puns, but she did understand the need to lighten up the mood. "Anyway, anyone have any guesses what Scourge and Imic will neme the baby?"
"Either Asithi or Melici, statistically speaking." Fred the Mitey answered without a shadow of doubt in his voice. "Biretha and Weri are also likely, with Litheme and Tharumi closely behind."
"Scourge would never choose a common name like that." SQ said. "Maybe something rare like Zecalo, Meli, or something completely out there like Cacame or Yitana."
"Knowing her it could as well be Urist or Tekkud, though I'm not sure Imic would be too happy with that. Heh... Urist, heh heh..." ZM5 couldn't stop giggling. He imagined a baby with a full beard and a horned helmet holding a bottle of ale. Those silly dwarves...
"What if it's an albino?" SQ suggested excitedly.
"You know that's a disorder, not some kind of blessing, right?" Kaos asked just to be sure. "The red stripe across Melici's face is sunburn, not some fancy warpaint..."
"Oh... I knew that!" SQ lied. "Anyway, how much longer can it take? Is she having triplets or something?"
"Gods, I hope not! I barely accepted the idea of two Scourges running around the town, I couldn't take four of them!" Lunardog said half-serously.
Finally the door opened and completely drained Nunore fell out. She didn't smell like wine, so this must have been Scourge's doing.
"Oww... Y-you should give me... give her a few minutes to rest after the whole ordeal." The barkeep-turned-midwife muttered. "Even if she manages to run up to the door and lets you in, you should just tell her to go back to bed... She's really good at forcing a smile... better than me, and I'm amazing at... Ugh, just let me go to bed already!"
---
Half an hour later SQ decided that waiting for Nunore's permission to visit Scourge was a stupid idea, and since she didn't like crowds, going to the hospital a little bit early would be good for everyone involved.
As soon as Scourge heard the door opening she put on her widest grin. She was surprised to see SQ alone, but by no mean upset.
"SQ! I was wondering when you'll drop by!" Scourge half-shouted half-whispered not to wake up the baby in her arms or Imic sleeping in the next bed. "If only you could see Imic's face, he was changing colors like... something that changes colors often! From black to grey to white to green to red! Nunore lasted longer, but she went straight to a weird shade of blue... Oh, where are my manners! SQ, meet Rithesa Nightscorched, my daughter!"
The baby was undoubtedly a healthy newborn drow, with black skin, a lock of white hair and pointy ears.
"I see she has your... ears." SQ remembered this was something people say to young mothers, but then she remembered Scourge didn't like when people commented on her short ears. "I mean, I can totally see your features in her. A-and Imic's of course!"
"You're not very good at this, you know?" Scourge chuckled. "I have to admit something: I wasn't sure if I'm a mother material at first. People tell me I'm too childish, too immature, too impulsive... What if they're right? But then I think about how much I went through with you, and I have no doubt little Rithesa will turn out just fine. Maybe just a little bit weird."
"Scourge... I'm really..." SQ wanted to say something, anything, but words got stuck in her throat. She felt tears appearing in her eyes.
"S-scourge... next time you give birth could you scream like all women do instead of..." Imic grumbled, getting up from bed. "Oh, miss SQ, hello! Scourge already told you everything you should know, I believe? I can't believe I became a father... Just a few years ago I was just a hopeless city guard reject beaten into pavement by a pack of rats. Not to sound ungrateful, but it's even better than being a house weapon master."
"Aren't you taking it too far, Imic? Even, let's say, Biretha could be a father, but weapon master is a prestigious title. Or maybe I just don't get all this pathos around parenthood? I was hoping I would once I become a mother, but..." Scourge stopped and looked at SQ. "Looks like you had too much strong emotions for such a short moment, SQ. Could you tell others they're good to come visit me here? I know Nunore said something about her supervision, but I don't care what she has to say. And, uh... I know how bad this sounds, but tell Five not to get close to Rithesa, will you? The last thing I want is my firstborn puking blood from birth. He'll understand."
SQ walked out still unable to say a word. Only then did she realized what a colossal change just happened in her life.
I intended this to be a peaceful update, but look, a named drow was killed by clowns. And here I was considering a subplot for Petrel...
Anyway, we've killed a semimegabeast and I feel really bad about this. Why? Because this semimegabeast's parents were both monsters of legends with dozens of kills while Baranue only became a historical character after she was killed by Melici. She never got to sow terror among vilagers.
And yeah, Scourge has given birth to a baby girl. I was really hoping she would get one of the super-common names.
Also I learned that abrians in D&D are sentient, just not very intelligent, and they don't talk much. Kinda like dwarves. Squamous made them non-sentient in one of his mods, so our drows will happily eat them.
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Topic: LCM - Dungeonevened - The End (Read 41254 times)