Tales of History - A Civ-Builder Quest

When the great warband had returned from the lowlands not defeated, but neither victorious by any sensible measure of the word, voices had grown among the Valley People that questioned. Why go into the low-lands at all? What did they have that the valley lacked? Why bleed good warriors for the spats of treasonous farmers? The High Council spoke against them, cautioning against hiding in the valley and mountains and letting the world pass by. For was not that how they had been fooled? Too long they had ignored the low-landers and now paid the price for it.

But in the end, nobody wanted to listen. The hunters only spoke of great and bloody revenge visited upon Brushcrest at some point, but most people did not care overly much for that. The serfs were content with a full stomach and a mild winter, the artisans concerned about good lumber and stone, not far away people they would never meet, and the fishers barely cared about the events in the valley, let alone beyond. And so the High Council quieted, the years seeing ever more of their number and that of their aides replaced by those who shared this sentiment. Their home provided almost everything the Valley People wanted, and what little else they desired could be found among their distant kin wandering the mountains.

So the Valley People turned their gaze inward again, away from the ever shifting fortunes and the bloodshed of the low-lands. It was not their concern after all. Instead, there was renewed vigor to get closer to the clansmen, the apparently only other people in the world that could be depended on. The hunters used the summers to range into the mountains, seeking out the more martially inclined clans to join their parties traveling further east. Old tales spoke of goatmen living there, driving their vast flocks from peak to peak. The artisans began to make pretty baubles for the pilgrims coming from the mountains, offering them for free as keepsakes of their visit to the White Halls, hoping to draw ever more pilgrims towards Greenvalley.

And lastly, Speaker continued his journeys. He was an ancient man, allegedly having already spoken to the Valley People in the days when the White Halls were erected. While the Bone Tenders knew neither rank, nor superiors within their group, they all deferred to his wisdom. Alas, he was also frail and weak. It took no charcoal and chalk to make his face look like a skull and his hair needed no shaving for it never grew at all. His teeth were long gone, but his voice, that remained. As long as he lived, so he had said, the strength of his words would stay with him and so would the strength of his legs to carry them forth.

---

The three men worked mostly in silence, their brows slick with sweat despite the chilly winds falling down the mountain flanks. Only a single torch shed some light on their doings and soon it would not be enough. The sun had dipped beyond the mountains quite a while ago and the sky was nearly dark, yet they kept working without a complaint. Beside them sat a wizened man, silently watching their efforts. He too would have joined them, his age never having been an argument for him to shirk from his duties, but the three Bone Tenders were adamant. If the Speaker wanted this shrine finished before they set out for Greenvalley, then so would it be, though he would not break his bones trying to help them.

This was not their home and while the clansmen were enthusiastic about their work, they hardly had time to help them. So it was no great resting places for the ancestors that the Bone Tenders were making. It was better than the haphazard resting places some of the clans had made, piling bones beneath a rock outcropping or into a small cave, though with the number of hands so starkly limited there was only so much they could achieve. Whenever they found one of those simple shrines they would build a new one, a small yet earnest imitation of the White Halls.

First, a round pit was dug into the soil, the size depending mostly on how much help they had. With the clan that was currently their host being so small and preparing to flee the chilly autumn air for the low-lands, they had none at all. Any of the other groups traveling with the clans might not have bothered to start this shrine at all under these circumstances, but the Speaker never passed by a burial site without making it proper. So the pit was only slightly wider than a man was tall, and so shallow that one could easily step in and out, but it would do.

Now they were adding the stones for the walls, a basket of pretty dry clay and two water skins resting beside the pile. Once the walls were done, they would place the bones within and cover the pit with woven branches to prepare it for the winter. Their efforts were a far cry from the grander shrines, which sometimes had entire huts dug into the ground and covered with sturdy wooden roofs and soil, yet there was no haste or sloppiness in their work. This work was done to honor the ancestors after all and even the humblest offering to them would be kindly received as long as it was earnest.

"That will be enough. You can make the cover in the morning. The clan departs at sunrise, but you won't have to go until mid-day. Still plenty of time to reach the meeting spot." With these words Speaker planted his staff firmly into the ground and rose from the large stone that had been his perch.

The three Bone Tenders stopped their work and looked at their leader. "Don't you mean 'we', honored Speaker?"

Picking up the torch, the flickering light casting his sunken eyes in deep shadow, the Speaker shook his head. "No, you will go alone. There are not many winters left for me and I would rather spend them teaching rather than to sit in a hut and waiting for them to pass. I'll travel with the clan. I'm sure I will see some of you come summer."

As though frozen the Bone Tenders simply stood there, not a single word uttered between them. They had many objections to this, from worries about his safety all alone among the clansmen with no one to watch out for him to the feeling of wrongness at the though of him not being present for the winter solstice in the White Halls, yet no one found the courage to speak. The Speaker just nodded and turned around. "Come. We need some sleep before tomorrow."

---

When the Speaker did not return one winter, many in the valley assumed the worst, even when the Bone Tenders explained that it was his own wish and that he was merely preaching to the clansmen during the snows as he had done a few times before. So many were worried that the High Council even sent some hunters alongside the Bone Tenders in the next spring, tasked to find him and to make sure he was well. However, when they did, they were only rudely told by the Speaker that he needed no minders. He had switched to follow another clan by then, teaching and advising a young chieftain who had the burden of leading his clans after his father's death at the hands of a bear.

This pattern continued for the coming years, the Speaker switching from one group of clansmen to the next, traveling ever further from Greenvalley with each turn of the seasons until only the tales of pilgrims and traders coming to the Valley People told of him. Yet these tales were always well received, telling of how the Speaker wandered the mountains, offering help and wisdom to those in need of it.

Some of them might have been embellished somewhat, like the claims that he had averted a war between two clans merely by stepping in between their warriors and reciting the story of the Days of Blood. Others were clearly fabrication, such as the tale that had him travel to the gorges between the tallest peaks, where the sun never reached the ground and savage people lived in caves strewn by the bones of their kin. Some among the Bone Tenders questioned these tales, reminding people of the Speaker's age and frailty.

With each passing year, a few more doubted that he was still alive, but twice that rejected the idea of the beloved man dying in far off lands, preferring to believe that he was still out there somewhere. In the end, no one could say for sure what was the truth and all efforts made to find the Speaker or signs of his passing came back empty handed. The High Council refrained from getting involved in the matter, happy to leave this to the Bone Tenders to sort out while they took care of concerns closer to home.

One such concern was the new huts being erected all around the valley, modeled after the sturdy chambers of the High Council itself. It was normal for the settlements in the valley to grow, each and all of the older members of the tribe remembering a cluster of huts that hadn't been there in their youth and the many of them standing outside the great wall of Greenvalley a sure sign that the village was once smaller. Yet with so many craftsmen and serfs available and some of the council members encouraging the construction of sturdier homes, the face of the valley was changing rapidly.

Where once stood a few huts, one for each adult member of a family, now stood one large home for all of them. The walls were still made from wattle and daub, thatched in reed, though now framed by sturdy wooden beams. Plenty of space was within them, a great hearth spending warmth, and even a small granary and storage rooms beneath the roof. Some of the herders even took to building a few rooms to keep their sheep and goats in. Alas, for all the good, there was also some bad. Every now and then there would be complaints about one of these new longhouses being build partially on land claimed by another family. Other times, the families even began to feud among themselves if they should or should not rebuild their huts into a longhouse.

It was quite maddening for many in the councils, sometimes so much that some idly thought about forbidding the new houses all together to keep the peace within the tribe. Yet during the first harsh winter, the larger homes proved their worth. Their far more slanted roofs took even heavy snows in stride and even though needing far greater hearts to become warm, they also kept the warmth much better than the smaller huts. By the next spring, efforts to build new longhouses had redoubled, so much that the craftsmen could not build them fast enough. Greenvalley itself soon enough had not a single hut left, and while longhouses were still few in other settlements, there was little doubt that the huts there would soon disappear as well.

Not all was good however. After the many years of plenty, the larders of Greenvalley began to empty again. Half the hunters spent nearly every season save the winters somewhere in the mountains, chasing after the elusive goat people to little effect. Sometimes they saw great flocks driven by people in the dry and barren valleys deep in the mountains, but never did they come close even catching them. Quite a few of the Valley People saw it as little more then a waste of time to carry on these trips, though the hunters stubbornly insisted that just one more year of them would bring success, growing ever more frustrated when it didn't.

Meanwhile the valley itself wasn't faring much better. Game and fish there was enough, but hardly plenty. The sole exception being wolves, who ravaged the Valley People's flocks, yet too few hunter to drive them off for good. It were lean years, seeing most people scrape by somehow, and though no true hunger gripped Greenvalley, the High Council knew that something needed to be changed. If there were another few years like this, there would be true hunger and then the people would not be willing to ignore the hunter chasing after glories that they couldn't eat.



What should be done in the coming years?

General actions:
[] Reassign some of the workers to different tasks.
-[] Let the simple workers produce some other resource.
--[] Write-In
-[] Tell the artisans to focus on something else.
--[] Write-In

[] Send the hunters on a raid.
-[] Write-In target.
-[] Write-In what troops to take.

You have 1 Production to spend this turn:
[] Improve the village by construction sturdy longhouses for the people. (2 of 3 Production paid)
[] Erect menhirs to clearly mark the lands the Valley People claim for all to see. (Cost: 2 Production per map hex)

[] Train some of you workers in other trades. (Cost: 1 Production per Pop)
-[] Train Hunters
--[] Heavy Infantry
--[] Regular Infantry
--[] Light Infantry
--[] Archers
-[] Train Artisans
-[] Train Bone Tenders

[] Increase resource gathering slots.
-[] More orchards (Cost: 1 Production)
-[] More fishing boats (Cost: 1 Production)
-[] More cattle pens (Cost: 1 Production)
-[] Expand the clay pits (Cost: 1 Production)
-[] Expand the logging camps (Cost: 1 Production)
-[] Expand the obsidian mine (Cost: 2 Production)
-[] Expand the limestone quarry (Cost: 2 Production)
-[] Build a silver mine (Cost: 3 Production)
Note: This just increases the available slots. You still have to assign workers before something is produced.

[] Create a new village to claim more land for the Valley People. (Cost: 1 Production per Pop settled in the new village.)
-[] Write-In which Pops to settle there.
-[] Write-In where to build the village.
-[] Immediately build a palisade around the village. (Cost: 3 Production, new village must have at least 3 Pops)

You have 0 Culture to spend this turn:
[] Attempt to change a Pops culture to Valley People.
-[] Write-In which Pop
-[] Write-In how much Culture to spend.

[] Try to influence a faction.
-[] Write-In which faction.
-[] Write-In goal.
-[] Write-In how much Culture to spend.

Pick an action for the High Council:
[] Gain +1 Production to spend this turn.
[] Gain +1 Culture to spend this turn.
[] Send a diplomat to someone.
-[] Write-In target of the visit.
-[] Write-In goal of the visit.

Others:
[] (Optional) Change the focus of the Pilgrim Village.
-[] Encourage own culture. (+1 Valley People Culture in Greenvalley)
-[] Encourage White Clans culture. (+1 White Clans Culture in Greenvalley)
-[] Bring Valley People Culture to the White Clans. (+1 Valley People Culture in the White Clans) - Current focus


AN: Food rolls were only middling this turn. Plan voting only please.