After a brief thought you've decided - you shall sate your needs accordingly, and ultimately rest for the night, but wake up sooner. A lot is at stake, and you don't want to give your enemy a bit of chance, by embarking early you might very well beat them to it, you feel.
You manage to carry yourself through to the forest, though. As you don't want to lose time with hunting or luring the wildlife, you decide to dine on the gifts of the earth that won't run away. You're close to the southern lands enough for some grass to be resting underneath its frosty sheets, but not much, still, you appreciate what you can get, before delving into the woods for moss, plentiful, but not as good.
None of it can compare to the prepared meals that formed your tastes, but it does keep the distracting hunger away, and that is what you seek. It seems the clouds are moving west, and brought a new wave of snow with them, hope you won't get caught in a storm...
The day is not quite over yet, and so you carry on. You traverse the rest of the woods quickly, and curiously, you hear no voices during this visit. From now on, it's just snow ahead, all the way to the ruins. The break was worthwhile - you feel strong again, and remain moving until the sun sets.
The ruins are in sight now, and behind them, the hilltops. Satisfied with your progress so far, you stop, eat some more, and go to bed, somewhat earlier, in case you wouldn't wake up as you've set out.
Despite all the rush, your dreams were less eventful. Kind of similar to the night before, but this time, you observed a dim room, shrouded in darkness until someone entered it with a candle.
And quite a lot of people did shuffle around, all familiar faces, especially the chairman of the assembly was a recurring figure.
At one point, he was there with another person, the wolf man, which you finally got to see up close.
You recognized the ashen paint smeared over his coat, a mark of a shaman. You further identified him by a pouch he held, from what you knew, it should contain teeth and bones of ancestors, but not as your people preserve it, instead milled to dust, sometimes even added to a foul concoction or spell powder. Even though you can't quite distinguish all the different wolf magic traditions, this one seems to you to be a master of shadows, one that conjures up the dead among other things. It is odd he would live amidst these humans, ritually unclean...
They discuss back and forth with the chief, but you can't hear anything, just distorted mumbling. The man orders his beast companion to bring some books, apparently, you can hardly see... And that is it.
You wake up, still under the light of stars, and your head feels heavy. The visions are without a doubt interesting, but what is the reason behind them? Is there a meaning? Are they even real? It is hard to disregard such occurrences. But no time to lose, you think to yourself. The sun will be rising soon for sure. A modest breakfast and you're off again.
Your intuition was right, as the darkness of night is lifting, and the sun is slowly climbing to reclaim its spot on the sky. And you haven't reached the ruins yet...
You do approach them eventually, when the sun has already risen, but it's still low. The site seems to be in the same state it was when you left, the rubble seems untouched. This is quite nice to see for you, but you're aware it doesn't prove anything yet. There still might be intruders by the hills, so you speed on to check.
Massive relief comes over you, when you see the carcass also unaltered. The exposed flesh has began to rot so its color is different, the snow around has thawed, and greens underneath has sprouted, but everything else checks out. There doesn't seem to be anyone around, even as you get closer. Now, it seems, the main objective is at hand. But how are you going to execute your plan?
What do you want to do?
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Topic: Dwarf Fortress -Drawings- : Tales of the Deer Wizard (Read 169948 times)