It's bloody hard to be a carpenter.
Sure, we mock the cheesemakers, the milkers, the lye makers. They're useless, and we all know it. But us carpenters work with the foulest and undwarfiest substance of all: wood. By all rights we probably would have been cast out of the mountainhomes long ago if not for one thing.
You need us.
I can count on one finger the number of stone and steel beds I've seen. It was made in the depths of a dark mood by a maddwarf who has never quite recovered. These days he still only eats cheese and only drinks water. But other than his creation, no one has been able to make a proper bed out of anything but elf-shit, as you call it. So you torment us with one hand, and yet with the other you beg us for beds, for barrels, for bins. Bastards.
And the worst part is that you still don't understand us! You call us elf-humpers, tree-lovers, but that is exactly the opposite of what drives us in our terrible craft. We do not work for the love of the material or the craft. We work to subjugate it. To make the wood understand that it will bow to the stone and steel. To make the elves understand that their precious forests mean nothing to the children of the earth. We are soldiers, and our war against wood will go on, and on, and on.
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I came to Ardentdikes to find my mentor, a brave man named Akaros who had come to see the glorious fortress rebuilt, and to bring its forests to heel. But when I arrived, no one could tell me what had happened to him. Some of them spat at me once they heard what trade I had learned and refused to say anything to help my quest. It was only after I dug into the archives that I found any mention at all.
Armok-be-damned.
There was no explanation, no accounts of his death. I could not even find where or if he had been entombed. But he was dead. I was stunned. Shocked. And then a girl in a leotard and mask came over, threw a bunch of ribbons at me, pronounced me overseer of the place, and disappeared.
I already hate this damned land.
But, apparently the assignment was real. So, first thing I ordered was the war on trees to begin.
I drafted three lazy shiftless dwarves to begin the slaughter to fuel my craft. I had a special plan for all of the wood I would reap.
Meanwhile, just learning the layout of Ardentdikes was confusing to all bloody hell. For example, what the heck was this meant to be?
I also ordered the first of my rooms to be built. Naturally, everything in them will be make out of wood.
Unfortunately I found out something else about Ardentdikes. People here are f***ing busy. There's about 50 of us, but of those the soldiers don't work, McDuck is only spoken of in hushed tones if at all, and dwarves are still wandering off to drink and eat when they feel like it. I hate to say it, but my plans requires more. I need... migrants.
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OOC: So, those are the opening moves, I should have another update tonight once things really get rolling. Promise.
Edit: Oh crap, now I really want to try and pull this:
But what it might unleash terrifies me. Honestly, being in a fortress with so many levers that could just wipe the whole place out scares the shit out of me.