Ok, here I go...
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Seasonal Development Progress Report, year 506, form BRT-325, in accordance to 3rd Directive of Bureau of Colonization
Fortress name: Battlefailed
Fortress status: Outpost
Bookmaster: Unib "Zathel" Ottanlimul
Due to illness I was suffering from for the past year, I was unable to establish proper Bookkeeping practices in the outpost of Battlefailed. For that reason, preparation of proper reports in accordance to established law concerning colonization efforts can only be begun now.
After recovering, I have immediately taken over the governance of the outpost after previous "Overseer" stepped down, in my opinion, due to melancholic mood caused by some tragic romantic entanglement. Most undwarfy. What I saw when finally free of delirious fever I have been afflicted with terrified me.
Battlefailed is a bundle of total and utter chaos. While piles of corpses littering the surrounding oceanside are understandable, considering the location of the outpost, what truly struck my dwarven soul is the sorry, for the lack of proper word describing the entropy reining here, state of the interior. The layout, or rather, complete lack of it, prevents any and all attempts to carry out any proper crafting or construction work. There are stockpiles EVERYWHERE. Refuse stockpiles, food stockpiles, goods stockpiles scattered all over the way too many floors of the outpost. Someone even piled dozens of units of furniture in a space left after mining out a hematite vein. A furniture stockpile in a hematite vein. A VEIN. Zombie muskoxen on the pier leading to fishing platform. Sorry excuse of militia running around with human-made weapons, dressed in tattered rags.
Another horrifying point is the absence of organized living space. There are few mined out bedrooms, lacking any coherent design, and communal dormitory.
This outpost has been established Five years ago. I expected something more than atrocious living conditions. However, previous rulers abused their position to establish opulent quarters for themselves.
I have immediately evicted the previous owner, wallowing in self-pity, seized the rooms and opened the statue garden to public.
Also, time has been wasted on carving out completely unnecessary... temple of some sort, because it can't be anything else. Waste of dwarfhours, if you ask me, even if it is supposedly dedicated to Lur.
I have deemed the current carved out spaced completely unfit for further usage. I have proceeded to plan a proper fortress deeper in the earth, around the third layer of underground caverns and the magma sea situated underneath it.
After hard, but deeply satisfying work I laid out plans for new, better Battlefailed - efficient, two-layered (with expansion prospect) workshop floor/warehouse, based on patented design by Urist Doledod and connected with farm-space that will be irrigated from cavern lake, following instructions in "Irrigation and I" by Olmul Kathilul, standardized living pods, variant 3c, proper hospital and water reservoir, connected to irrigation system pump stack for efficiency. And a practical dining hall. No silliness.
Not long after I sent out designs for mining, an artifact was completed by a member of militia.
End of Granite brought up another sign of wastefulness and incompetence of previous designated administrator - he ordered mass slaughter of animals without providing proper storage space for meat and fat. Butchers shops were flooded with miasma. I designated emergency stockpile in nearby corridor... the place is beyond hope anyway.
A group of 20 migrants arrived in the third week of Slate. Sadly, I must conclude that they will be mostly a burden, as current outpost profile predicts gainful employment of only a small number of them. Apart from the brewer, cook, glassmaker and two crafters, they are all pretty useless in current situation... especially the two hunters. I don't know what made them think that traveling to undead-infested plains was a good idea. This migration brings about one other problem - Battlefailed exceeded population levels of an outpost, and in accordance to proper regulations concerning municipal management of communities, elections will have to be held soon.
Elven caravan braved the cursed Blueness of Malodors to trade with our community, arriving in the third week of Felsite. It gave me the opportunity to replace the previous broker with someone more competent... even I know more about appraisal, and I only took a summer course loosely connected to the topic during my studies at Mountainhomes. I ordered purchase of as much wood, barrels, and alcohol as was possible with our pitiful stocks of trade goods. I need to order some more stone goods before the next caravan.
Remaining weeks of spring were uneventful. There was no trouble with undead denizens of the plains, and the work on fortress proper is progressing smoothly. I anticipate finishing the necessary mining by the end of autumn.
End of report
Signed,
Unib "Zathel" Ottanlimul, Bookmaster and temporary administrator of Battlefailed.
Edit: some typos