The Diary of Salmeuk, Spring of Year 181The Battle with the RocA bloody springtime, indeed!Work commenced on the new bedroom complexes. A last-minute redesign includes an entrance chamber with dual waterfalls providing a refreshing mist to all who pass. The waterfalls would run off a self-contained reservoir, pumped from the cavern lakes.
However, the pumps would need power, and there was no stream to turn a waterwheel.
Windmills would work fine, as we had tested earlier, but there was the issue of the Roc.
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"The Roc has landed! It's killed a traveler and is feasting on the corpse!" shouted our sentry, rushing from above to alert the guard.
Indeed, now was the time to strike. The gates dropped and all soliders were ordered to ascend to the surface, and catch the oversized eagle at it's moment of greatest weakness.
However, we did not account for the speed of the goblin recruits, who sprinted far ahead of the rest of our troops. Too far ahead. Utes Shockedscorpion was the first to arrive. Utes, who up until recently had been enjoying the Dionysian life of a traveling poet, was perhaps the
least qualified individual in the entire fortress to engage the bloodlusted Roc.
The Roc was out for blood, of any kind, and as the tiny Utes approached with his drawn sword, quaking in fear, the bird
caw cawed in the most horrifying way and struck Utes dead in a swift strike of the talons. The next two recruits were killed similarly, and the bird took the skies.
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Zon, our commander, heard the screams first and sprinted into the trees. The Roc had descended onto one of our woodcutters (our only woodcutter actually!) and, with great cruelty, severed his foot from his leg. Zon vaulted from a nearby tree limb onto the monster, and began delivering a series of seep stabs to the awful creature. Zon was far more agile than the massive bird, and soon the Roc shuddered and collapsed to the forest floor. Zon's final blow was merciless.
Our woodcutter survived, though he is severely maimed and will never walk the same way again. Three recruits died.
Zon felt that the battle was great, and coined his iron spear with a title.
Zegilral was a legendary weapon indeed, having killed both a Minotaur and a Roc.
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The Disaster in the CavernsOur previous overseer greatly assisted us in preparing for the great harvest. What would we be harvesting, you ask?
A harvest of silk!The door was unlocked and a great many dwarves rushed into the damp darkness, searching for undisturbed silk. It took a careful eye to spot the fine strands, and our dwarves went about the passageways unassumingly. They did their best to ignore the egregious bloodstains.
A troll was spotted, to the south, and two squads were dispatched. However, they arrived piecemeal from above, and while the troll was quickly dispatched the squad was spread out and isolated.
That was when we saw the legs. Two giant cave spiders, either sneaking around or having simply migrated unexpectedly, engaged our soldiers. Webs exploded from the darkness and everyone was stuck to the floors, the walls, each other. Like guerilla fighters the spiders fought with only one or two at a time, and if their jaws did not crush a dwarfs skull, their venom suffocated the rest.
No dwarf who engaged a spider survived, but their screams told us everything we needed to know. The military order was called off and the web-gatherers were shut inside the door.
Spiders can't open doors, right?Four more dwarves died to the spider ambush, bringing our total dead to 7. In the first 21 days. I cannot say what the future holds for the rest of us.
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OOC:
Slow going for now. I believe I can finish my turn by mid-weekend, but these large forts are slow going!
This is a DF-hack list of happiness values, sorted of course. It shows that things could get very bad very quickly, but luckily most of our named dwarves are staying fairly content.
Also, please enjoy this .gif of the macro-designation of the new rooms.
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Topic: Smithsoldier, Year 12: Clothes, Madness, and Beasts (And Candy) [47.04] (Read 63714 times)