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In the cleverly constructed airlock chamber, the forgotten beast Remzu Zospuror (An enormous quadruped of clear glass, beware its deadly spittle!) clawed futilely at the indestructible artifact floodgate. Across the chamber, behind a channel and wall of fortifications, the fortress's only marksdwarf fired bolt after bolt at the beast. The bolts had little effect on it, despite a dozen sticking in it and more shattered around the chamber, the beast felt no pain and had no blood to spill or organs to pierce. It had been good archery practice, but the decision had been made to finally kill the beast. At least half a dozen more forgotten beasts waited in the caverns, gathered around the entrance to the airlock where they have been attracted by kittens dropped from above as bait.
By the fortress-side airlock gate, Urdim Dikefeast the Armored Plank of Distracting had gathered her soldiers. Ten strong, four with hammers, four with axes, one with a mace, and one with an artifact spear, all clad in high-quality metal armor. They had killed countless goblins and elves, along with the riding beasts they brought, and had even killed two forgotten beasts after an unfortunate mining incident had opened the fortress to the caverns. They were not concerned about the monster waiting for them in the airlock, expecting this to be an easy fight.
At her signal, a dwarf pulled the lever to open the fortress-side gate. The militia swarmed into the airlock. Remzu Zospuror, who had ignored dozens of bolts, fell quickly to the axes and hammers of the soldiers.
The calendar passed from spring to summer. Elsewhere in the fortress, the elven ambassador patiently waited for Duke Sibrek to finish drinking. Down in the magma forges, a furnace operator finished smelting a batch of wolfram ore, went for the next, and found that there was no more. In the caverns, a forgotten beast easily slaughtered two of the bait kittens.
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By the fortress-side airlock gate, Urdim Dikefeast the Armored Plank of Distracting had gathered her soldiers. She paused for a moment in confusion. Hadn't she done this already? A glance told her that the door was locked, and the great glass quadruped was still waiting to be killed. She gave the signal to open the gate. The militia swarmed into the airlock. Remzu Zospuror, who had ignored dozens of bolts, fell quickly to the axes and hammers of the soldiers.
The calendar passed from spring to summer. Elsewhere in the fortress, the elven ambassador patiently waited for Duke Sibrek to finish drinking. Down in the magma forges, a furnace operator finished smelting a batch of wolfram ore, went for the next, and found that there was no more. In the caverns, a forgotten beast easily slaughtered two of the bait kittens.
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By the fortress-side airlock gate, Urdim Dikefeast the Armored Plank of Distracting had gathered her soldiers. She stopped, thought for a moment. Something wasn't right. She turned to the dwarf waiting by the levers. "Never mind for now. Let the marksdwarf get a bit more practice. We'll kill it later. Soldiers, dismissed!". At that, she and the rest of her squad headed back to their barracks.
The calendar passed from spring to summer. Elsewhere in the fortress, the elven ambassador patiently waited for Duke Sibrek to finish drinking. Down in the magma forges, a furnace operator finished smelting a batch of wolfram ore, went for the next, and found that there was no more. In the caverns, a forgotten beast easily slaughtered two of the bait kittens.
Dwarf Fortress has stopped working. A problem caused the program to stop working correctly. Windows will close the program and notify you if a solution is available.
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By the fortress-side airlock gate, Urdim Dikefeast the Armored Plank of Distracting had gathered her soldiers. A look told her that they shared her expression of puzzlement - several of them had also started to realize what was going on. "Doesn't seem to matter if we kill the beast or not" she said. "What else could be going on here?"
"Perhaps an elven trick?" one of them suggested.
She smiled grimly. "One way to find out."
The elven ambassador stood waiting as Duke Sibrek took his drink, in the disgusting manner such filthy, non-elven, mud-loving creatures did. Not using a mug or other utensil, the Duke was bent over the barrel, his head and beard fully immersed in the alcohol as he drank deeply. With the patience only an immortal tree-lover could muster, the elf stood without showing his utter disgust and loathing. Not long ago, the elves had sent wave upon wave of soldiers at this fortress, riding on unicorns and pegasii. After the last army was slaughtered, to the last elf and beast, the elven nation had finally agreed to send an ambassador to sue for peace.
Peace was not to be found today, as the axe-brandishing Urdim burst into the room, the rest of her squad just behind her. The Elven ambassador fled, staying just ahead of the soldiers, nearly making it to the fortress's main gates, but collided and became tangled up with the war dogs stationed there. Then the soldiers caught up and mercilessly slaughtered the elf.
Urdim spat at the sad mangled corpse. "Couldn't beat us in honest combat, so you tried using your elf magic, to do whatever the hell that was? Here's what we think of that!". Feeling satisfied, she and the rest of the soldiers headed back to the barracks.
The calendar passed from spring to summer. Elsewhere in the fortress, Duke Sibrek continues drinking, not even realizing that the elf was no longer waiting for him. Down in the magma forges, a furnace operator finished smelting a batch of wolfram ore, went for the next, and found that there was no more. In the caverns, a forgotten beast easily slaughtered two of the bait kittens.
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By the fortress-side airlock gate, Urdim Dikefeast the Armored Plank of Distracting had gathered her soldiers. They stared at each other in confusion and despair.
"Not the elves after all? What else could it be?"
"Perhaps the smelters?" one of the soldiers suggested. "It's unnatural, some of the metals the alchemists are making down there."
Urdim took off towards the main staircase. Running down it, past the dining room and hospital, she burst into the grand room housing the magma furnaces. "Shut down the arc furnace! Stop melting that wolfram! Drop the yellowcake! Get away from those hydrolysis cells! No more metal production till we figure out what's going on here!"
The alchemists and furnace operators backed away from their equipment, none of them wanting to disobey the crazy woman with the axe. She stared at them, waiting to see what would happen. The calendar passed from spring to summer. Elsewhere in the fortress, the elven ambassador patiently waited for Duke Sibrek to finish drinking. In the caverns, a forgotten beast easily slaughtered two of the bait kittens.
Dwarf Fortress has stopped working. A problem caused the program to stop working correctly. Windows will close the program and notify you if a solution is available.
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By the fortress-side airlock gate, Urdim Dikefeast the Armored Plank of Distracting had gathered her soldiers. She groaned. "Not the glass quadruped, not the elves, not the metals. What could be causing this? What haven't we tried changing?"
"What about the kittens? The bait kittens, that we dropped into the caverns?"
Urdim stared at him. "They get torn apart by the beasts there. To stop that, we'd have to go into the caverns and kill all the beasts at once."
They considered this for a moment, none of them liking the idea. The forgotten beast airlock had been constructed to isolate and deal with the beasts one at a time. Mighty though the soldiers were, fighting an army of poison-spewing monsters from before history would likely be the end of them all.
Urdim smiled. "If it doesn't work, we'll just be right back here anyway, right? Nothing lost in trying!" She turned to the dwarf waiting by the levers. "Open the inner airlock lever ... and the outer one."
"Ma'am, that will open the fortress to the caverns. All the monsters will come in at once!"
She stared at him, gripping her axe. He turned, and pulled the levers, one after the other. The militia swarmed into the airlock. Remzu Zospuror, who had ignored dozens of bolts, fell quickly to the axes and hammers of the soldiers. After that easy kill, the soldiers charged into the winding tunnel which lead into the untamed caverns. They ran head-on into an army of forgotten beasts coming the other way. Uthimi, An enormous serpent, beware its poisonous gas! Ino, A great one-eye spider, beware its poisonous bite! Oggez Rashmomuz, A great hairly slug, beware its webs! Others waited outside, spewing dust and leaving trails of poison as they converged on the now-open gate.
The soldiers fought well, dodging blows and striking down the monsters. But the beasts didn't fight fair, spreading poison gas and dust everywhere. Soon Urdim and her soldiers were reeling, dizzy and nauseous, their flesh starting to swell and putrefy. One soldier staggered out into the caverns and was blasted against a wall and killed by a dust-spraying blob. The others survived combat, killing all the monsters, but collapsing before they could return to the fortress, overcome by the poisons. Many of those who came to their rescue, to bear them back to the hospital, were also overcome after walking through the poison-caked corridor.
The calendar passed from spring to summer. Elsewhere in the fortress, the elven ambassador patiently waited for Duke Sibrek to finish drinking. Down in the magma forges, a furnace operator finished smelting a batch of wolfram ore, went for the next, and found that there was no more.
And the world kept running.
As the weeks and months went by, the hospital was the center of a grim fight to save the lives of all the dwarves affected by the poisons. The floors around the wells were torn up and replaced repeatedly after being contaminated with poison. Chief medical dwarf Solon Stelideral worked tirelessly to clean infected wounds and cut away infected tissue, till he himself fell victim to the poisons. Zas Rithmis, a recently immigrated doctor, stepped forward to continue the treatments. Duke Sibrek defied the common perception of nobles as useless, cleaning wounds and bringing water to the injured. He fell ill to the poisons three times, but in a display of amazing regenerative abilities managed to fight off the infection and return to work without needing medical attention each time.
In the end, only two more dwarves died. One of Urdim's soldiers returned to duty, but succumbed to infections raging in her bones. Another died in the hospital during surgery. The hospital itself was left a wreck, with two treatment rooms permanently walled off after being contaminated.
Later, the surviving soldiers gathered in the barracks. None of them had come through uninjured, all bearing scars from the ordeal. They knew, however, that they had not merely saved the fortress. Through some means they could not even begin to understand, they had somehow saved the world itself from becoming corrupted.
Saving fortress...
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Topic: Beware its segmentation faults! A bug report in story format. (Read 2623 times)