-7- [Ironchapel] (3) Well, it was going well at first.
Yikes! This should read -9-! This is actually Fort 9. Sorry about that.
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1St Granite - I've had a vision. Well, it was more like a really long dream. I dreamt that I was a mountainhome animal keeper turned fortress overseer in a strange land where tigermen, flaming skulls, and honey rains abounded. My dream showed what a truely selfish and negligent leader looks like. And it inspired me to make sure I never become that dwarf. I knocked on Zener's room. "Enough with the nomabod bees, Zen. I'm taking over," I said. "Oh thank Armok for that," he said, and promptly walked straight through me and out the door. What an odd character.
10th Granite - I've taken stock of what we have in this fortress. We seem to have a decent store of everything that's needed, so I've decided to work on the outer defenses first. I think we may need some work getting a more extensive trap network. I've also ordered the filling of the bathtubs that were made by the former leaders. At least I think that's what they are. Hopefully none of these levers are "kill everyone" switches, cause I'm going to try them.
17th Granite - Well, there is a near death baby crawling around. This kid's got what it takes do be a true dwarf! Well, if he lives.
22nd Granite - He died.
28th Granite - A bureaucrat went crazy today after I accidentally ignored his request of something or the other. Stay tuned. We may have to send in SS1.
30th Granite - Well, he climbed a flight of stairs then swung at a couple of farmers. He was actually a pretty decent fighter, but some of our military folk are quite efficient at killing. Made a mental note not to ignore any mandates of SS1.
Posted May 7, 2012, 5:56 AM UTC · edited
CONTINUED. .....
12th Slate - I tried to make some coffins to cull the ghosts, but the masons insisted that we had no stone. I asked them, "Do you remember cutting up all that stone and storing it in bins?" The head mason scratched his head and agreed that he did remember. I motioned for him to follow me. We stared at the stockpile. "What about those bins full of hundreds of tons of stone?" He replied, "Well, those are gabbro BLOCKS. We need just stone." Aren't the blocks just really big pieces of stone? "We don't need blocks. We need STONE!" Whatever. I just ordered some new hallways built. Its time do delve to see if we can find some magma so I can quit setting fire to every tree we cut down. We are starting to get low on beds, and metal production needs to take a sharp rise if my weapon trap corridor is to be completed. Also the military has been bugging me about propper armor. Ugh. My vision did not involve so much whining. At least we're well fed and drunk.
14th Felsite - It has been a slow month of production and building. Our miners are concentrating on delving deep, while our masons and haulers are bolstering our defenses above ground, while laying down the foundations of a defensive strategy in case of the worst coming from below. We've found no coal, so we're going to either set up a camp at the first magma we find, construct a pump stack for bringing the magma to us, or burn a LOT of trees if we are to set up a proper metal, glass, pottery industry.
Speaking of burning trees, those hippies came with a caravan. I wish I could buy all their useless wooden armor and weapons and burn it for charcoal, but according to our head wood burner, they use some kind of weird finish or spell or elf spit that prevents it from becoming charcoal. I would like to flex our muscle and confiscate their goods for sale to the mountainhomes, but I think we'll save that for their next trip, as I have more pressing matters. They will merely be ignored for now.
3rd Hematite - Summer has begun and our mayor, Tun Anvilswelter, has graced us with our first bounty of the season. He made a WONDERFUL bucket made completely out of gems. He named it Punchcrest the Ink of Seals, and our resident number nerd questionquality has given it an appraisal value of 10,800 dwarfbucks or so. I actually pretty much complied with all of his requirements as mayor because of his immaculate work.
10th Hematite - Oops. I got so excited about the crazy bucket, that I forgot I pulled the lever to refill the well. Luckily someone made it right in time before the water was untreadable. Also, there hasn't been much progress filling the other water troughs I guess.
15th Hematite - When inspecting the progress of our outer defenses, I noticed Narc just standing there. He was mumbling to himself how he was hungry and thirsty but he wouldn't move. He didn't even acknowledge my presence. I hope we won't have to kill him later, but I'm not hopeful.
16th Hematite - We broke through the roof of a large cave around z54. Although the first cave nearest to the surface usually does not contain magma, it would be a wonderful occurrence if this was the exception. I will seal off the puncture while our safety bridges and traps are being constucted.
12th Malachite - Some migrants have arrived. I will take better stock of our numbers once they all arrive. I think I need to rethink the job distribution. Production is steady. Mining is slow. I wish to remake the bedrooms to a smoothable and engravable location at some point. There is a nice marble layer of stone that I may take advantage of soon if I can bolster our miner numbers.
28th Malachite - While I had our military out training on some camels that had been pestering our woodcutters, a Minotaur came! She was pretty boring looking. I thought forgotten beasts were supposed to be weird. Her name (which I somehow knew the instant she arrived in the area) is pretty weird at least.
1st Galena - The fight was tough and, alas, one of our own warriors fell, but we downed the beast. Tirist will be missed.
12th Galena - The humans have arrived. Hopefully they bring wood, metals, and picks. I sent the workers to gather the spare crafts we made out of the shells of fish and spare bones. Hopefully they will fetch a decent price as a whole.
24th Galena - Oops. There's a new mayor? Why doesn't anyone tell me these things? Tun is out of the nice room, and in goes the new guy, before he tantrums the fort to death.
CONTINUED .......
1st Granite - The winter was a blur. We finished a beautiful hospital, had a bedroom for every citizen, explored to z25, and I flashed back to my dream. So many dead dwarves everywhere I went in that damnedable dream. A shudder went down my spine. I went to check on SS1, and our champion was in top shape without a barracks set up yet. I went to the surface, and the bridge across the river was completed. Then I saw them. In the distance, the ones that were in my dreams. The dead. I swear that the faces of these dwarves and even the undead gobbos were the faces from my dream. Four dozen as far as I could tell. And the upper wall wasn't complete, nor the trap maze or last bridge.
Our militia 20 was up to the challenge. Just as the last few zombies were getting smashed to bits, I glanced over at our champion. He was smiling bigger than I ever saw a dwarf smile before. Then I looked behind him.
More. So many more. A hundred strong at the least.
I thought he saw my expression change and reacted, but in retrospect, the horror on his face was actually a reaction to what was behind ME. I felt a sharp pain in my neck. I turned to fight back but the undead goblin's claws ripped at my arms. I knew I had little time because of the infection. I took my knife and sliced the zombie's head enough to slow him to a halt, then turned to position myself beside the bridge. I would not let myself become another enemy of this fortress. It would have to end before that happened. I looked at the bridge so close to me, then out to the walled in pastures. I saw a cow and a ewe both horrified. I knew that they knew my pain in that moment, and they knew my fear. Such a strong connection to such simple beasts that maybe they aren't as simple as they seem. Maybe in another life I would be able to explore that idea. But for now, it's time to lower the bridge.
I pulled the lever, and saw the bridge come flying toward me. Maybe in another life.
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Here's the save file. You have your hands full.
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I have some pictures to upload and link to the text with numbers in front of them, but I am tired. I'll do it tomorrow.
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EDIT: The pictures are up. Full Album
Fuck yeah, it's about time things started to attack us. Here's hoping we survive.
Yeah it was pretty intense. That one epic guy (I think named Mesthuth or something) was literally going around the battlefield like: sprint, kill, sprint to the next zomb, kill, sprint, kill. I didn't see his kill list but it had to have been at least 30.
Yay, he was my adopted dwarf for my opening of the fortress. Been training with that hammer since the first few months. Too bad you didn't get a screenshot of the battlefield though
I thought that the battle that you've given everyone at the beginning of the save warrants at least one write-up, so I figured I'd give it a shot. The First Necromancer Invasion
Record Keeper's notes
Hundreds of undead? Tragic irony? Screaming bowines sent by a dark lord? All there.
A reference to me. Almost flattered, I am.
Generally, this seems to be a well-thought-through year. No fuck-ups, as the fortress number 7 would have suggested. Needs more metal and magma, though. I have my hopes up for next year.
We have such a quality Record Keeper.