Post by Celephai on Sept 23, 2011 0:48:40 GMT -5
Cel shook her head. The concept of meta-cheese was just a bit much for her.
"...I wonder if madness took them long before they disappeared. Either way, I think we should keep looking for something valuable. As much as I enjoy it down here, it just feels like there's something... wrong. Very wrong."
She stepped down the hallway, quickly coming upon a door, ornate and stone. It was smaller than the doorway they had stepped into earlier, only about five feet in height. Cel bent down and opened it, stepping inside a small room.
Books filled shelves from wall to wall, the study was small, but it was packed in with many and varied materials for writing and recording. Thousands of ledgers and papers were scattered about, with a single bed in the corner and a massive obsidian desk being the largest objects in the room. A single journal lay closed on the desk. Cel picked it up and handed it to Alec.
"See if you can derive anything from this, scholar, let's see if we can find a map of some kind..."
Inside the journal read in finely scrawled dwarven, dated some years ago:
<My name is Urist Sebrek, and I am a work manager and accountant at the old mountainhome. A few days ago I began my journey with a few fellow settlers to find riches in the depths of a new settlement. There are seven of us, and we are well-armed: a hunter whom is quite skilled with a crossbow, and a former guardsman who appears quite fierce. Among us is a mason, a herbalist whom is quite the farmer as well, a craftsman, and a woodworker. They seem quite taken with the outdoors, but I will be glad when we get underground, lest I fall into the sky.>
{Dated roughly a month later}
<We have since struck the earth and begun digging our lodgings. The mason was quite skilled with a pick, and carved me a room out of stone, apart from the others. He said that as I was a 'noble' I should have my own secure room 'just in case'. I was not sure whether to take that as a threat or as a compliment... but it is good to know I won't have to share a bed. The rest of them have taken a room to thenorth GONE, and we have also set up several beds. I have begun taking stock of our supplies, so that nothing might go missing without our knowing.>
<I have spoken with the fortress hunter, Cerol. She seems nice enough, even if she is eerily cheerful about her work... I saw her snap a buck's neck with her bare hands. She is skilled with her crossbow, but she says she would like to conserve her ammo in case a real threat shows up. Mayhap I shall ask her out for a drink.>
{Dated several months later}
<Glory! We strike another deposit of platinum! Ah, but we will be quite wealthy in the months to come! A shame, then, that the trade caravan has left already. Hardly a year has passed and we have made a vast fortune in mineral wealth! Iron! Silver! Platinum! Coal! Even several gem deposits have been noted! Migrants stream in by the wagon load! We will yet be a mountainhome amid our grand halls! The entry hall, which is the only way into the fortress, is paved with obsidian, a true stone of stones, and has been engraved with many fine works! My wife, Cerol, needn't even work anymore, as my managing this growing township has led me to more than a fair amount of wages. I even hear she's with child...>
{Dated a few years later}
<...But this siege will be broken, like so many before it. Goblins cannot hold any kind of sustained invasion, even with their troll hordes, our militia is one of the best of it's kind. Rangers, axedwarves, and hammerers all set behind the walls above. Even if they did manage to get down here, the numerous traps in the maze-like halls will surely make short work of them once they are activated. Cerol and little Thenil are safe in the deeps. It's likely nothing has even changed down there, even if there is a siege above. We have long been entirely self-sustainable.>
{A few years later}
<-struck another rich platinum vein. Is there no end to the wealth of this place? I have almost become suspicious about the luck of this metropolis.>
<I have just been informed we have struck an adamantine vein. Praise the miners! There will be feasts for months among the nobles and working class alike! I hear the mountain king himself is on his way to investigate. Unfortunately, there has been some unsettling news among the miners down there. They say they are hearing voices in the darkness, near the vein of adamantine. I'm sure it's just their long hours getting to them, and I have scheduled them for some off-time.>
{A few months later}
<The walking dead! Ah, just as we had been following the adamantine vein, we struck a peculiar cavern. This cavern was made up of all completely smooth... slade. The miners called it slade. It cannot possibly be slade because slade is entirely fictional. The bodies of the walking dead, however, were not. We have explorers searching the eerie cavern now, and reports circulate in about an adamantine weapon so intricate it may well be an artifact...>
{date unknown}
<We were wrong. We were all wrong. We should never have mined out the adamantine, we should never have even come to this wretched place! They lurk there, in the deep, so that none may unleash them upon the world again. Now we know why that sacred mineral is so strong: It was forged by the gods to keep something IN not to keep us OUT. Perhaps they shall not find me amid the many myriad halls of the mountainhome, but I hear a faint, deep groaning coming from thewalls NONE, as if the earth itself sighs in despair. I too, would sigh if I did not think the noise would give me away. Cerol and my son disappeared into those depths. Maybe I... maybe I will give myself to it willingly.>
NOTHING LEFT - VOID - MUST GO
Cel pulled out a large map, with many winding hallways and landmarks, the writing exactly the same as the journal's, save for the colored words.
"...This can't be right. There was none of this when we came in. Must be for a different- no, there's the chasm. Strange. Alec, did you see any kind of massive statues when we came in? Maybe I missed them..."
"...I wonder if madness took them long before they disappeared. Either way, I think we should keep looking for something valuable. As much as I enjoy it down here, it just feels like there's something... wrong. Very wrong."
She stepped down the hallway, quickly coming upon a door, ornate and stone. It was smaller than the doorway they had stepped into earlier, only about five feet in height. Cel bent down and opened it, stepping inside a small room.
Books filled shelves from wall to wall, the study was small, but it was packed in with many and varied materials for writing and recording. Thousands of ledgers and papers were scattered about, with a single bed in the corner and a massive obsidian desk being the largest objects in the room. A single journal lay closed on the desk. Cel picked it up and handed it to Alec.
"See if you can derive anything from this, scholar, let's see if we can find a map of some kind..."
Inside the journal read in finely scrawled dwarven, dated some years ago:
<My name is Urist Sebrek, and I am a work manager and accountant at the old mountainhome. A few days ago I began my journey with a few fellow settlers to find riches in the depths of a new settlement. There are seven of us, and we are well-armed: a hunter whom is quite skilled with a crossbow, and a former guardsman who appears quite fierce. Among us is a mason, a herbalist whom is quite the farmer as well, a craftsman, and a woodworker. They seem quite taken with the outdoors, but I will be glad when we get underground, lest I fall into the sky.>
{Dated roughly a month later}
<We have since struck the earth and begun digging our lodgings. The mason was quite skilled with a pick, and carved me a room out of stone, apart from the others. He said that as I was a 'noble' I should have my own secure room 'just in case'. I was not sure whether to take that as a threat or as a compliment... but it is good to know I won't have to share a bed. The rest of them have taken a room to the
<I have spoken with the fortress hunter, Cerol. She seems nice enough, even if she is eerily cheerful about her work... I saw her snap a buck's neck with her bare hands. She is skilled with her crossbow, but she says she would like to conserve her ammo in case a real threat shows up. Mayhap I shall ask her out for a drink.>
{Dated several months later}
<Glory! We strike another deposit of platinum! Ah, but we will be quite wealthy in the months to come! A shame, then, that the trade caravan has left already. Hardly a year has passed and we have made a vast fortune in mineral wealth! Iron! Silver! Platinum! Coal! Even several gem deposits have been noted! Migrants stream in by the wagon load! We will yet be a mountainhome amid our grand halls! The entry hall, which is the only way into the fortress, is paved with obsidian, a true stone of stones, and has been engraved with many fine works! My wife, Cerol, needn't even work anymore, as my managing this growing township has led me to more than a fair amount of wages. I even hear she's with child...>
{Dated a few years later}
<...But this siege will be broken, like so many before it. Goblins cannot hold any kind of sustained invasion, even with their troll hordes, our militia is one of the best of it's kind. Rangers, axedwarves, and hammerers all set behind the walls above. Even if they did manage to get down here, the numerous traps in the maze-like halls will surely make short work of them once they are activated. Cerol and little Thenil are safe in the deeps. It's likely nothing has even changed down there, even if there is a siege above. We have long been entirely self-sustainable.>
{A few years later}
<-struck another rich platinum vein. Is there no end to the wealth of this place? I have almost become suspicious about the luck of this metropolis.>
<I have just been informed we have struck an adamantine vein. Praise the miners! There will be feasts for months among the nobles and working class alike! I hear the mountain king himself is on his way to investigate. Unfortunately, there has been some unsettling news among the miners down there. They say they are hearing voices in the darkness, near the vein of adamantine. I'm sure it's just their long hours getting to them, and I have scheduled them for some off-time.>
{A few months later}
<The walking dead! Ah, just as we had been following the adamantine vein, we struck a peculiar cavern. This cavern was made up of all completely smooth... slade. The miners called it slade. It cannot possibly be slade because slade is entirely fictional. The bodies of the walking dead, however, were not. We have explorers searching the eerie cavern now, and reports circulate in about an adamantine weapon so intricate it may well be an artifact...>
{date unknown}
<We were wrong. We were all wrong. We should never have mined out the adamantine, we should never have even come to this wretched place! They lurk there, in the deep, so that none may unleash them upon the world again. Now we know why that sacred mineral is so strong: It was forged by the gods to keep something IN not to keep us OUT. Perhaps they shall not find me amid the many myriad halls of the mountainhome, but I hear a faint, deep groaning coming from the
NOTHING LEFT - VOID - MUST GO
Cel pulled out a large map, with many winding hallways and landmarks, the writing exactly the same as the journal's, save for the colored words.
"...This can't be right. There was none of this when we came in. Must be for a different- no, there's the chasm. Strange. Alec, did you see any kind of massive statues when we came in? Maybe I missed them..."