From the personal diaries of Sogan Quickcloisters, Interior Designer
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Spring 1003~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1st Granite:
After a year of travel and waiting, I'm here! Time to get decorating! And wow, does this place ever need decorating. And bedrooms. Okay first project: New bedroom suites!
Oh, and I requested that all of our military forces wrestle for the time being. I don't want our curb appeal taken down by random bloodstains or arrow debris. And speaking of curb appeal, our fortress has none at all.
I mean, sure, there's a road leading up to the fortress, but what's greeting you at the end? A stone wall. That's it. No windows, no doors, not even a roof over your head, and there's trees growing all over the floor inside. There's a moat outside the fortress, but no one has tried to fill it. Well, all of this is changing today. Big changes. First thing we're going to do is build some magma glass furnaces and some sand collection areas.
2nd Granite
A planter has created what he calls a masterful cinnibar door. He encrusted it with more cinnibar and named it "The Cut of Auras." I didn't want to let him down hard (I appraised it for about 2400), so I told him to put it in his room.
12th Granite
The elves arrived today, bringing boxes and boxes of cloth. That's it.
I told them that their gifts were. . . appreciated, but we wish they had a bit more diversity in their trading patterns.
16th Granite
Construction on the fortress roof was halted today when I found out we don't have enough stone to complete even one quarter of what I planned. Mining operations will have to pick up to meet demands.
11th Slate
Basic mining operations have been completed, and now the bedrooming shall begin. 400 BEDROOMS!
15th Slate
A cat has given birth to a kitten, and a planter has given birth to a boy. Coincidence?
21st Slate
20 migrants arrived today, and not a glassmaker among them (OOC: Seriously, what the hell, I always get like 3 when they're not useful). Oh, why did they have to arrive today? The whole place is a mess, and I've barely started to carve out rooms for our current residents, let alone smooth and engrave them! This is a disaster! At least I can tell them all to start stoneworking so that we might just have a roof on this place soon.
I've also commissioned a series of statues to be placed on the road leading up to our fortress, so as to improve our chances of attracting buyers passing by.
18th Felsite:
Construction of the artifact storage room was completed today, with room for 84 artifacts total.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Summer 1003~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
15th Hematite
The humans arrived today. Admittedly, my room construction plans seem to have hindered our rock crafting abilities, but we should still have plenty of things to trade.
18th Hematite
Upon their arrival, the merchants informed me that there's a goblin thief just waiting outside the fortress. Staring intently, as though he plans on trying to steal something, but isn't sure if he wants to. I told the wrestlers to go and persuade him a bit.
19th Hematite
The goblin thief got away, but not before the wrestlers roughed him up a bit. They then proceeded to kill all the slugmen surrounding the fortress.
Movie here7th Malachite
The miners' progress on the new bedroom suites has been slow at best, so I have taken them off all other active duties
17th Malachite
I knew we needed more curb appeal! No migrants arrived this season.
24th Malachite
It appears my beautification process is working, since our fort keeps attracting endless numbers of goblin child snatchers. I keep telling the workers that the thieves are just as afraid of you as you are of them, but they just keep getting scared away.
11th Galena
More statues! MORE STATUES! MORE CURB APPEAL!
21st Galena
Well, it only took 9 months, but I today I finally got my suite! I'm gonna start smoothing it out now!
24th Galena
The workers started complaining about mudmen again today. I Kel, head of our elite wrestling squad to take care of them. Apparently the fight went down something like this:
Kel: "Mudmen! Your reign of terror is at an end! Trouble these workers no more!"
Mudmen: "And who are you to try and stop us?"
Kel: "We are The Grasping Abbeys! Remember that name and remember it well."
Mudmen: "You fools! You are powerless to stop us!"
Kel: "You underestimate the power of justice! Abbeys, transform!"
"Abbey White: Crushing evil in my grasp!"
"Abbey Blue: Felling depravity like a pine forest!"
"Abbey Purple: Smashing in the skulls of corruption!"
"Abbey Red: Bringing down the mace of justice!"
"Abbey Yellow: Skewering the damned where they stand!"
"Abbey Turquoise: Slicing atrocities from this world!"
"Abbey Green: Sniping Wickedness!"
"Onul Oddomudar, Marksdwarf."
"Why don't you have a title?"
"We ran out of colors."
Kel: "And together, we are-" *dramatic poses* "THE GRASPING ABBEYS!"
Apparently, what followed was a most epic battle with a lot of special effects and posing, ending with a grand explosion as the Grasping Abbeys posed for the camera. They then proceeded to deal with the snailmen in a similar fashion. I wish I could have seen it.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Autumn 1003~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
12th Limestone:
A human caravan arrived today, and I was most disappointed to see that we still did not have a ready supply of crafts. This continues to concern me a bit more every day. We did manage to trade for a few barrels of booze, some weapons, and a bunch of seeds to keep our food supply going.
12th Sandstone:
Kel and the Grasping Abbeys rejoiced today on the announcement that we have struck hematite. Production of iron armor to start immediately.
14th Sandstone:
While mining today, Edzul Ilfikod (Former Leader and miner extraordinare) suddenly dropped his pickaxe and started prancing off towards a mason's workshop, where he shoved out the potash maker and all of his stone thrones and proceeded to go and grab two obsidian blocks and start working furiously on something. A few hours later, he ran out of the workshop, yelling that he had created "The Greater Erasure," an Obsidian Coffer. I estimate it's worth about 12000.
21st Sandstone:
A guard has suffocated today, from what I'm assuming to be extremely damaged lungs. Upon inspection of the barracks, it appears another guard has broken his spine.
2nd Timber:
My husband and I received the gift of another child today. We decided to name him Cog, as a name for being merely part of a machine will make him want to strive for excellence.
(OOC: I didn't even realize my character was married until I gave her a room. I figured I could keep it out of the story, but then this went and happened, so whatever. Also, I passed up on the drunk baby jokes because Boatmurdered did it best)
6th Timber:
Aha! Our curb appeal is working! 12 Migrants arrived today, and none of them have skills I can really utilize. A few were recruited to the town guard, and the rest were given food preparation duties.
20th Timber:
Cog Ingishkatak the guard starved to death today. I assume the cause is the 10-foot-high wall built around his bed. I am commissioning the deconstruction of said wall so that he may be buried.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Winter 1003~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
6th Moonstone:
The cause of the constant fly invasion has been established: The hatch covers I ordered were never installed on top of the stairs, and so flies have just been coming in all day every day.
8th Moonstone:
I had a meeting with the villiage liason today. I requested that the merchants next year bring us wood, food, booze, charcoal, and steel.
17th Moonstone:
While removing the miscolored sections of the ceiling, there were several cave-ins that thankfully did not kill anyone.
20th Opal:
Oh no! The evil witch Bandora has sent her mudmen to attack the fortress! We need to call the Grasping Abbeys!
Kel: "Mudmen! We told you to leave this place!"
Mudmen: "Ha, we are not as easily defeated as you would believe! This season, we started at your weakest link!"
Kel: "You don't mean. . ."
Mudmen: "Yes, your dogs! We know that your champion status doesn't permit you to get more war dogs, so we began eliminating those as soon as possible, and soon the entire fortress shall be dogless! HAHAHA!"
Kel: "You fiend!" *pose* "You shall pay for your crimes! Abbeys, transform!"
"Abbey White: Throwing evil back to the depths of hell!"
"Abbey Blue: Shaping justice like a well crafted bonsai!"
"Abbey Purple: Banging the steel gavel!"
"Abbey Red: Crushing the hopes of all wrongdoers!"
"Abbey Yellow: Running the damned clean through!"
"Abbey Turquoise: Beheading atroicites!"
"Abbey Green: On the firing squad of freedom!"
"Onul Oddomudar, still just a Marksdwarf."
"Are you going to do this every time?"
Kel: "Silence! Together, we are-" *dramatic poses* "THE GRASPING ABBEYS!" *smoke and pyrotechnics* "Have at you!"
After mopping up the weaklings, Kel (Abbey White) charges the lead mudman, punching off its left hand and arm in that order, and locking his torso.
Mudman: "You have not seen the last of us, Grasping Abbeys. . . We'll be back again next season. . ."
Kel: "I know, and we'll still be here, delivering justice." Kel pushes the mudman back.
"FINAL ATTACK: BISECTION!"
Kel's left arm begins to glow, and projects a beam of special effects budget at the mudman, freeing his torso from his legs. As the monster's corpse approaches the ground, Kel turns to the camera and poses just before it explodes at the perfect spot on screen.
Excellent work, Grasping Abbeys! You have foiled the plans of Bandora yet again, and learned to work as a team!
Kel: "But we all fought alone-"
WORKED AS A TEAM.
Will the Grasping Abbeys actually learn to work as a team? Will the dreaded witch Bandora actually send a few goblins? Find out on the next exciting episode of "GRASPING ABBEYS"
Man, I started so many projects this year and got really close to finishing all of them. Haika, you're going to have probably about a month of not being able to use miners as they finish up my 400 bedrooms project (which really doesn't have more than 100, but still). Also, there were some guards that I wasn't able to bury, but there's tons of guys working on coffins for them.