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19th Granite, 12~With the imps wandering around the valley, I’d sort of hoped the elves would be ‘greeted’ on their way in. Alas.
They breezed in in an airy manner, practically floating up the bridge and into the fort. Their mules, less so. The beasts bore cloth and berries, mostly. Some thread. I passed Irwin as I went to greet them.
“Listen, Irwin. Remember the bonecrafts I asked you to make a while ago? Grab a binful and meet me over by the elves.”
“No time for bonehappenings! The stables must go higher…
higher…”
“Well, couldn’t you go make some right… now?” But it was too late – he’d run off wielding a hunk of stone. I was in the same dratted situation I was back when our own merchants had showed up.
Well, if we didn’t have bonecrafts, what
did we have?
I stopped through some of the makeshift stockpiles and picked up some random stuff, finally meeting the elves at the depot.
“Ah, fair dwarf! Your kind are so small, yet full of so many surprises, are you not? I greet you, on behalf of our people: I am Nili—”
“Right, you’re an elf, I get the picture. Let’s skip the fancy tongue stuff, why don’t we?” The blonde creatures furrowed their brows at me. I continued. “All that stuff you’ve got there? We don’t want it. Your cloth, your stupid berries… I mean, come on, guys. You brought a
caged blue jay. Who made the decision to bring a
bird to trade with? Hell, the cage is probably worth more than the animal is.”
This was a dangerous game. If I didn’t come off as confident, even intimidating, they would see this as an insult. Of course, it
was an insult, but hopefully they’d just generalize it away as some odd form of respect in dwarf culture.
The elves regarded me at great length. Time wasn’t a factor to them, I suppose. One of them, not the one who had first spoken, piped up. “So… you don’t want to trade, then?”
“Not this time. Instead, let… in fact, allow me to make an offering to your kind.”
I held up one of the raccoon skulls. We didn’t have bonecrafts, but we still had some bones. The elves were still, and rather confused. I stepped forwards melodramatically, holding the skull out in both hands, as if it had some sort of hidden mystic power. Then I placed it on their leader’s head.
“We understand that your people respect nature and live in harmony. We, too, now try to follow your ways of nature. This hat is symbolic of our efforts to find a use for everything so as to make no death meaningless."
I was met with stares. Then the one with the skull on its head pointed out that we’d built our entire outpost out of wood. I told them to sod off and come back with some better trade goods next time. They left, the leader still wearing the hat.
Jyrvus, now a miner of legend, leaned on his pick next to me as we watched them go.
“They’re leaving in a mighty hurry. What do you suppose that was about?” he asked me.
“Oh, I don’t know, Jyr… Elves are just so...
‘bone’-headed sometimes.” I laughed. Jyrvus didn’t seem to catch the pun. “Uh… or, rather… they’ve really got a
‘bone’ to pick with us, eh? …Eh?”
“Oh, I get it. It’s funny because you used the word ‘pick’.” He didn’t laugh, but seemed to be mulling the pun over internally.
Good enough. I headed inside to continue work on our castle designs.
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Yeah, I forgot to disable masonry and carpentry on Irwin and he ended up continuing to build walls without me noticing. I really did give the elves the loose bones lying around and nothing else. Hopefully it counts as a profit even though skulls are worth nothing (doubtful).
ed- Jarod, tell me if you want to chage your dwarf's name since she's a she. 'Cain' is pretty masculine. I tried Ms Cain in the nickname menu but it looks kind of funny.
Hmm... Sam is fine.
Done.
The most important part of any imposing death fortress/dark tower/crazy castle is the entrance. I’m thinking something that opens gradually, and dramatically. HUGE doors that slowly edge open, or slam close.
You're living up to your name and it is beautiful. Just make sure that each gatehouse is a strong one with towers. We will have no weak and undefended gatehouses in our castle.
-J-
...Yeah, seriously. Yeesh. That massive floodgate thing sounds awesome, though, and it's a good opportunity for me to toy around with fluid logic.
Getting a second update ready, concerning our pair of new migrants... eh, actually, I got kinda distracted and now it's late. Tomorrow, then. Also, yaaay Jyrvus for becoming Mightygrips' second legendary! Perhaps I'll keep a list.
Author
Topic: The Castle Mightygrips: Cancelled. [community] (Read 48032 times)