10 Felsite, 210, Late Spring
by Asob Momuzzokun
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The failure of the magma structure combined with other personal difficulties have taken a serious toll on Zon's emotional health. I fear for my friend's continued well-being, so I have taken the liberty of securing her diary. I doubt she's even noticed.... I'd wonder about the king's response to her complete disregard to his orders to keep an up-to-date record of affairs in the fortress, but that isn't a concern. I've seen Zon back the king into a corner many a time, both verbally and physically. It would appear our king is a craven... That should have been obvious, since he's never changed out of his peasant's garbs. So, Zon is in no danger from our wimpy majesty, and she's even survived a severe goblin ambush with no armor and only her axe.
The only threat to Zon is herself. And I haven't seen her lately.
It is currently late Galena - nearly four months have passed since Zon's last update to fortress affairs. So much has transpired! Unfortunately, Zon hid her diary after some very harsh words with me about snooping through it, and it's taken me this long to find it. It was where I've always suspected, but feared the most... inside the ≡Basalt coffin≡ containing the remains of her belated lover, Ast Numsazit the speardwarf.
So, now there are four months of fortress history missing... I will try to make up for that from memory!
Some time in early Felsite, Zon relinquished command of the fortress to me to mourn the failure of her magma structure. I tried to tell her that it wasn't a failure, but an obstacle... Quietust the Philosopher even tried to suggest ways she could fix it, but it didn't help. Over these four months, the structure has remained unchanged, and sometimes I would see her just staring at it from a distance.
The fires from the magma tower spread through the area where we were clearing trees, burning away several logs as well as two animal traps. The traps were empty... at least I THINK they were! Oh well. I kept a close eye on the area to make sure that nobody tried to run in gathering logs - a few had, but I ordered them away as soon as I spotted them. It's kind of fuzzy, but I'm pretty sure the fires started to burn pretty much exactly like this:
I attempted to cheer her up by commissioning 30 Iron Statues - they're not pretty or artful, and I would have liked to use gold, but I know that would have made Zon angry. Zon would have used iron since it's plentiful, we can get it from goblins, and it's the cheapest way to train our blacksmiths. I even designated some new furniture stockpiles to make room for them.
Meanwhile, the walls near the adamantine deposits continued to be fortified. Zon insisted that we take this careful measure if we insist on mining the precious blue ore... at first she allowed none of it, but when Derm the Metalsmith pointed out that adamantine could probably function as a mechanism in magma, and that we might be able to use it to build hatches for her tower, she reluctantly agreed to allow mining.
One of the new macedwarves who came with Rith Likotāst wouldn't give us his true name... he simply called himself "The Overlord" and started picking fights with Archibold. Apparently he wanted to be his rival or something? He's got a long way to go, though.
Olon Helmeddrills, a Stoneworker, withdrew from society. He started muttering to people near him and became peculiarly secretive as he claimed a craftshop. Meanwhile, Inod Glazednoses the first Duke's consort made a demand for a black bronze chest, while Kikrost Bustcrimson the Dungeonmaster requested a silver armor stand.
By 10th Felsite, the fires reached the majority of our standing trees. We would soon face a wood shortage... it was around this time that Zon began to withdraw from society, and not in the running-off-to-claim-a-workshop kind of way. Without trees to cut, she was spending her time almost exclusively fishing or carrying rocks... even talking to the rocks... and when the smoke got too bad around the ponds, soon she gave up fishing too.
Thīkut Eralzefon, a legendary fortress guard, gave birth to a boy she named Olon Mirrorchamber. Surely, this baby will learn a lot from her mother as he's carried into battle and wielded as a shield, just as he'll one day hope to hold himself!
I was paying so much attention to the fires that I totally forgot about this artifact, and allowed Olon to use poor materials. Ah well...
Fortunately, many trees were surviving the fires, so there was no wood shortage in our immediate future - lacking saplings, however, meant we may run into trouble later. The bigger problem was that the fires were encroaching on our front gate. I instructed our builders to get a wall between us and the flames, but the wall pretty much only served to attract dwarves closer to the fire... Why were you trying to walk THROUGH the flames to get to the rocks to build the wall with?? In the end, I ordered all workers inside, allowing only soldiers outside to spar in the barracks.
((DFMA)) ((Movie)) Yet despite my best efforts... there were two LEGENDARY dwarves who disobeyed. Even after recruiting them, after stationing them inside, after ordering ALL dwarves inside...((Still playing the same ol' 40d. We're going to give this another shot! I can't promise updates as frequently as I used to, but we'll see how things go.))
Author
Topic: Severedcoils - Consort Accumulation Challenge (Score: 5) (40d + DnD 5e) (Read 130385 times)