What Can SV Teach an Sorcerer in the Mesolithic?

Now that we've identified the hawktail plant one of us definitely needs to tell Bianca all of its modern and ancient uses especially in cooking after all it has been proven that food someone thinks tastes good provides twice as much fuel for the body as the same food turned into a paste. Food tasting good is your bodies way of telling you it is good for you while bad taste usually means something poisonous to you with the best tasting things indicating something rare and vital for a hunter. Farming can be one of the best ways to have an abundance of vital foods though this comes with risks that won't be relevant for many Great Grosses worth of years

With that out of the way, Greetings Bianca you may call this one Lucid or Clear as I hope to make my explanations easy to understand.

You have asked how a tree's roots can eat things from the earth without destroying that earth but the core of the answer is already known to you. Just as animals draw fuel from the air to power there bodies without noticeably affecting the air they breath out, when a tree or other thing with roots consumes something from the earth the signs of them doing so are very hard to notice.

I believe you also questioned where the fuel for animal's inner fire comes from and how it hasn't been used up and in this case trees and there relatives act as a mirror, for while fires and animals take in something to use as fuel and breath out an invisible waste that floats through the air trees and other green growing things take in that waste from the air to use as fuel while breathing out the same thing that is in turn used as fuel when animals breath in. Just as green things are fueled by animal waste and corpses to create things that animals in turn eat the delicate balance of all things eating all other things is at its simplest a circle.

if you are wondering how this circle formed we must go back to the origin of the Ancestor of Green.

Once there was a small Green thing in a wild age of abundance. The thing had found a means of turning something within the air into something to fuel its growth beyond anything that had been seen before. Unfortunately for the things that lived in the time of the Ancestor of Green the waste made after the Ancestor had consumed this fuel was deadly poison for everything else living at the time. Less than one in every Gross of other things living at the time would survive the poisonous nightmare world made by the waste produced by the Ancestor of Green in the greatest time of mass death in the world of substance's history, but some small creature found a way of using that fatal waste as vital fuel.This Pale Ancestor would give rise to all other living things within the world of substance including the Ancestor of Red, responsible for the red blood of humans that swiftly carries the fuel we take from air to every part of a man's body thus allowing for his great size and vitality. Thus we come to one of the great truths of the world of substance, the Truth of Fatal Fuel, what is consumed by one living thing as vital fuel may in turn be fatal poison if consumed by another living thing.

Generally the more related one thing is to another thing the more there list of boons and banes aligns so what is good for one human is usually good for another. However I must warn you that animals other than humans have different lists of poisons, for example now that we know what the hawktail plant actually is you should know that wolves find every part of the hawktail to be a poison that damages there blood so that drawing breath cannot properly fuel the vital work of there bodies. in fact the thing that makes a hawktail delicious to humans is a poison intended for insects that only has any effect on humans if they eat more than two full bulbs raw. this is another aspect of the Truth of Fatal Fuel as anything is Fatal to the body if consumed in excess.

To help determine general boons and banes when eating I will tell you one of the means of sorting the animals of the world. the three most common categories of animal are meat eater, leaf eater and all eater, to give an example of each, Wolves are meat eaters, Horses are leaf eaters, and Humans are all eaters. These are of course broad generalizations, humans cannot eat literally anything but they can eat parts of green growing things and parts of other animals, wolves love to snack on certain berries but would grow weak if they could not eat meat, and horses will eat eggs fallen from nests but would not live if they could only eat animals. There are of course lesser categories, but we can save bone eaters, corpse eaters and bark eaters for another time.

To delve further into how bodies turn food into fuel, you had stated that there must be something within the stomach and intestines that helped the body process what it ate and you are correct. In truth every animal contains an Inner Forest within themselves full of Invisible Worms that help the body rather than harm it. These Invisible Worms are found in a creatures gut and eat the food that enters the gut before producing waste that is vital fuel for the body. Many things that harm the body when consumed do so by poisoning the Invisible Worms that make up your Inner Forest or contain Invisible Worms of there own that do battle with the invisible worms of a creatures own inner forest. While human bodies can't destroy the Invisible Worms of uncooked meat like wolves and other meat eaters can, the human body draws extra fuel from cooked food to provide more energy than could ever be offered by raw meat. The Mouth telling the rest of the body how good a meal is going to be excites ones inner forest and makes it work harder.

To clear up some possible misconceptions and further questions related to the Ancestor of Green, various poisons, and the Inner Forest.

The green fuel is called carbon dioxide and the pale fuel is called oxygen, as those words have no meaning to you feel free to come up with your own means of referring o them Bianca. As for why it is the Green and Pale Ancestor rather than the Green and Red Ancestor, know that the green of rooted things is vital for the making of carbon dioxide into power and the thing that makes blood red is only one of many substances that creatures can use to make blood work so well. Before you feel sorry for the countless beings that died as a result of the Ancestor of Green know that the living things of its age were unimaginably tiny and frail in comparison to the great and hearty descendants of the Pale Ancestor that populate the modern world.

to address Corpse Eaters for a moment there importance to the circle of eating can not be overstated. a forest without large Corpse Eaters like Bald Headed Birds will be overwhelmed by the dead and the Truth of Fatal Fuel allows one to use the white Corpse Eater maggots of flies for healing in an admittedly disgusting way though one must be careful to not use Meat Eater Maggots for healing. If many cleaned Corpse Eater Maggots are placed on a bloody or pus leaking wound that does not reach the vital organs and left there for a day the Maggots will only eat the part of the flesh that has rotted like a Corpse while leaving healthy flesh unharmed

Yes there are things that use the poisons made by producing Firmiron as fuel but such creatures can only be found in the darkest pits of the Ocean where the Cousins of Trees could find no purchase as the sun which fuels there inner forges could not reach these depths. Even if one were to reach them, these creatures would die in the belighted shallows of rivers and oceans as surely as a fish would drown on dry land, though in there case rather than drowning they tend to explode. Perhaps where the world of substance offers no useful answers the return of magic to the world may provide a solution.

In the end it's a matter of what your inner forest is best at turning into fuel as ultimately all animals need the same elements to fuel themselves but a wolf's Inner Forest cannot draw fuel from grass even if berries provide the occasional boon and what a horse gets from a fresh carcass cannot fuel all of there bodies functions. Even the Ancestor of Red shows the truth of Fatal Fuel as the substance that binds Oxygen to Human Blood is Iron which cannot be processed by animals in it's raw form and must first be invisibly eaten by green things before leaf eaters consume it and take it into there bodies with there inner forests before meat and all eaters use there inner forests to turn the leaf eaters into fuel.

In opposition to what you might be thinking regarding Inner Forests an animal eating its own kind is one of the worst things it can do despite sharing an almost identical Inner Forest. The gut processes it oddly risking the onset of Brain Rot which is as terrible a way to die as it sounds and can spread by consuming the flesh of any animal with Brain Rot even if that animal is something like a horse. so don't let your horses too close to the dead bodies of other horses. This is not a universal rule as Chickens and Wolves are immune to Brain Rot and Rabbits can only get it from eating an animal that already has Brain Rot. Still one act of prevention is worth a dozen cures so take caution when feeding an animal its own kind

While I know my words are not as directly useful as the Secret of Firmiron or fishing and my way of informing is winding rather than straightforward I hope that different fragments of what I have given you show there use throughout your quest for ultimate Power and Ruling the world.

OatmealOatmeal said:

[Blight] [X] Plunder the Tomb of the Blight

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

(Warding 7(magic, aligned) + Soul Magic 2 + Sneak Magic 2 + Stealthy 2 = 13 (reroll failures once); Ob 11)

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

liberty90 said:

Chances look pretty pessimistic to me?

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Subtracting the words in this notice and the votes, this post is exactly 1941 words.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

[X] [Solstice] Make a false stone on a nearby hill
[X] [Blight] Brick up the opening
[X] [Theroriparian] Send the Heroine to deal with it
[X] [Bog Iron] Give mortals half the iron from what they bring

Junction speaking. There are now limits on how much each voice can tell you each summoning. These limits are purely due to the connection nearly breaking from sheer quantity of words last time. Therefore, we cannot honor our promise about the mathematics.

First, to define four words: a state is a group that maintains sole right of coercive power within a specific territory. A government is the subgroup within a state making decisions of leadership. An institution is a group filling a specific purpose, on the direction of a government. Taxation is a coerced transfer of resources from the state's people to the government, used to keep the institutions working.

There are good reasons for you to found a state with a large territory under its control, with you playing an important role in its government. If all the people over a large stretch of land view you as the person to contact about magical matters, and there is an institution of messengers to get such news to you, then you will be alerted to many magical opportunities and problems that you may not have even known about before the time ran out. It will also make it vastly easier to get material things done, having so many people working under common leadership.

Now comes implementation, starting with loyalty. While it's true that each person has a limit to the people they can know and be loyal to, people can be loyal to ideas, which can be copied endlessly. Ideas can be things like the government providing stability, protection from bandits, and aid in hard times. If everyone is loyal to similar ideas, they can work together on truly massive scales.

There are other factors in loyalty to a government, and with it the state. First is that people directly benefit from the state's institutions; things like bridges, disaster response, fair conflict resolution, and dealing with troublemakers. Second is the threat of the state's coercive power if they start causing problems. Third is having some say in who gets to be part of the government.

Aside from loyalty, seizing all of the government's power for yourself is a trap. Even without your intention, those working under you will eventually start saying what they think you want to hear, instead of what is true. This can be avoided if much of the top levels of government are decided by votes of the state's people, instead of being directly chosen by you. To avoid problems of coerced voting getting scumbags into power, votes should be conducted secretly, with only the voter knowing who they voted for. Each voter marking a card that they then put into a box for later counting is a workable example.

It's also good that those voted only hold their position for a set number of years, needing to be voted again in order to keep their position of power.

We will also introduce a related concept: federalism. The farther away from the center of government, the harder it is for the government to govern a given place. This problem can be mitigated by having local governments that only govern specific regions within the state as a whole, having their own officials while remaining answerable to the central government. These places with local government can then also send representatives to the central government every few years, participating in its affairs.

For a state to persist, it needs to enforce its sole claim to coercive power. This will require people who are armed and permitted to employ violence against troublemakers. To minimize problems, enforcers should be drawn from those loyal to the state's ideas, rather than those inclined to violence. Inclination to violence doesn't mean being best at violence; those who are not particularly inclined can be motivated to train by a desire to protect those they care about, which can include the state itself with sufficient idea-loyalty. Practice-fighting with blunted training weapons is very helpful in this.

These enforcers should try to capture rather than kill in most cases, with those captured being brought to an appointed or voted judge to figure out two matters: first, did the captured individual actually do whatever they are accused of? Second, what punishment is appropriate. This is called due process, and again does a lot to minimize resentment. Advocates for the accused and accuser are helpful, presenting the available evidence in the way most favorable to their appointed side. Judges can also be called to decide disputes that don't require the enforcers, if these disputes are sufficiently troublesome.

Two related notes: First, memory's fallibility means that the precise details of witness testimony should require multiple people with similar accounts. Generalities are somewhat more reliable. Second, torture is useless for extracting information; the victim simply says whatever makes it stop, rather than what's true. As such, the use of torture for such purposes should be banned.

Anyway, all these enforcers and judges and other institutions require resources to keep running, which is where taxation comes in. Taxes very obviously shouldn't take all of what people produce, instead only taking a small portion that they can afford to exchange for the services of the government. Tax rates should also increase with the wealth of those being taxed; not only can they afford the higher taxes, but those who are extremely wealthy generally get that way by exploiting others, and a counter for their greed is required. If anyone is exempted from taxes, it should be those poorest.

Tax collectors should be drawn from those of similar loyalty to the enforcers, but need different skills. Specifically, they need mathematics skills and writing in order to keep track of resource levels, notice if someone hasn't been paying their required allotment of taxes, and similar. These people can also get involved in planning of large projects to make sure they can actually be afforded, and to minimize waste. This includes ensuring that planting and harvests happen at proper times of year. Tax collectors providing useful services aside from tax collection reduces resentment; give them a fancy title with the job.

If someone refuses to pay, or tries to cheat on their taxes, the tax collectors should get enforcers, a judge, or both involved.

To start, we would recommend that aside from judges, enforcers, and tax collectors, the most important institution would be official messengers with some kind of verification - perhaps use encryption? If their cipher-word doesn't decrypt to the correct secret word when put through the correct one-time pad, they're fake.

Another important institution would be official sorcerers, taking orders only from you, and providing some assistance with magical matters, perhaps entirely handling ones you can't be bothered to. To ensure their loyalty, a peculiar trick of the mind is quite useful: if getting into a group requires some kind of personal sacrifice or hardship, those who do get in will be quite reluctant to betray that group or spread its secrets.

Additional institutions that would be useful, but lower priority: teachers to ensure everyone learns things like reading and the ideas of the state, trained builders who study what makes certain structures stay up and others fall, government-sponsored ironworkers, and a standing army for directed violence against outsiders. Again, soldiers for the army should be recruited for loyalty to the state's ideas, rather than for an inclination to violence; it lets them better cooperate on a much larger scale, which is very useful for battles and war.

Do Not allow lineage or heredity or skin color to get conflated with loyalty. It causes problematic attitudes among those favored, and squanders the potential of those discriminated against.

Now for beekeeping.

There are three sub-types of honeybee: Mothers, Fathers, and Workers. Each colony has only a single mother, a few fathers, and a great many workers. Most decisions are not made by the mother or fathers, but instead through votes of the workers. In spring, the mother will leave the colony with half the workers to found a new colony, with the new mothers left behind fighting to the death to be the only one remaining.

These traveling bee mothers and workers look for specific things in a colony site: the most important being an enclosed space to keep the rain off, notable elevation off the ground, and a small entrance that they can easily guard. A box fitting all these criteria is simple to make.

The inside of the box should have slots for wooden frames that can be taken out and put back in; these are where the bees will make their honeycomb, and this allows the frame to be removed and harvested for honey without killing the bees or destroying the comb. The distance from the middle of one frame to the middle of the next should be about as wide as both your thumbs side-by-side, in order to give the bees space to move. The center of each frame should have a taut net to facilitate the bees making their combs.

The bees can be stunned using smoke, reducing the risk of being stung. Protective suits for the beekeepers are still advised, with thick fabric, gloves, and a brimmed hat with mesh to keep the bees away from the face.

Certain regions have large hornets that invade and murder bee colonies. Steel edges to the entrance will deny these hornets access, especially if the entrance is only barely tall enough to allow bees through, though it can be wide to make up for this. These hornets can also be lured to their death by injuring one hornet, then sticking it to something covered in glue; the hornets will try to rescue their comrade, get stuck to the glue, and exhaust themselves to death.

As an important detail: always leave some honey for the bees. They need it to stay healthy, especially over the winter. This is not an onerous requirement; the bees produce more honey than they need, most years. The comb is also where the bees keep their babies, so it's important not to try collecting honey from cells containing baby bees; that just reduces the worker population. Cells used for babies become dark over time, cells used for honey stay light colored.

It takes bees eight times as much honey to produce any amount of beeswax, so return the wax to the bees if you don't have any particular use for it. Honey can be extracted from frames by spinning them around at speed; the spinning force drains the honey into a vessel spinning with the frame.

To answer some questions:

Glass needs to be annealed. The rate of cooling can cause or reduce stress in the material, and glass handles these stresses much less gracefully than iron. So it needs to cool slowly.

Iron can also be magnetized with lightning, or vigorous rubbing against another magnet. It just doesn't hold it as long as magnetite. Remember, bluing produces artificial magnetite; if scraped off and melted together, you should be able to make a solid chunk of it. Use a sealed crucible to avoid chemical changes.

The poison from smelting can be contained and kept away from the river. The most important part is making sure that water running through the smelting waste cannot return to the river without first evaporating and falling again as rain. Keeping the smelting waste dry would also serve this purpose.

Writing is easiest for mortals to learn when young.

If the heroine fails to kill the dolphin, temporarily poisoning the river could work. A fast poison, rather than a slow one.

Also, ChatGPT has been banished. Good riddance.

This is Black Cat, welcome again. I still exist. I now think that we Voices may be from many places, not one. Perhaps we are different types of creatures, even, not one. And that time may pass differently for us. I mean, for me it feels like a dozen days, and for you sometimes centuries passed. Humph. That's not too important. But it may explain something to you about some of our mad-sounding words, and make you less confused about our weirdness, perhaps. Humph.

We forgot about poisons from smelting. Yes. Truth. The Bay should be able to heal with time, I think, but poisoned water would need to be directed into some deep useless holes, perhaps, instead of the river. Humph. It would still somewhat poison ground-water downhill anyway, but certainly less. Already present poisons should be slowly washed away by new water.

Regardless. You and your mortals had issues with roofs falling on them. This can be solved, even so well that thin bricks will become viable as parts of these roofs. How to explain... Lay long, strong wooden poles - across the tops of support pillars, made previously from wood or bricks. Make sure they're tied tightly to the pillars. Next, put smaller poles across these big ones. Finally, cover this with dried grass or wooden planks. Layer them like fish scales, starting at the bottom and working up. This keeps rain out. Or, indeed, use even water-proofed thin bricks, firmly on these long wooden supports.

Remember to make the main pole or poles in the middle taller than the ones on the sides. If you have four poles, the two in the middle should be taller. Now, when you lay the long branches across, they won't be flat. They'll be higher in the middle and lower at the edges. This makes the slope. This helps water run off instead of pooling. If the house is big, put more support pillars inside to hold up the roof, or internal walls. Obviously bricks also work instead of wooden poles as pillars to the ground, but across the top it's much easier to place wooden supports.

It's like, that's just an imperfect comparision... Like a skeleton and bones for a living creature. With the main wooden pole at the center of the roof serving like a spine, like a main bone.

Somebody already suggested to use such skeleton-like structure also to make ships greater than any one tree. Only then wooden pole-spine is down, not up like a roof. Obviously waterproofing is harder and more important.

It's even possible to make roofs sturdy enough to sustain weight of people and things on them! And then make something like two homes and one on top of another roof. It maybe sounds mad, but.... Perfectly possible with this craft perfected. This way family could store food or tools safely up-stairs, and sleep downstairs.

"Stairs" are steps that go up. Like climbing a hill, but inside. Make flat pieces of wood or stone. Put one on the ground. Put the next one a bit higher and back. Keep doing this. When done, you can walk up these steps easily.

Underground is often moist and in some places trying to dig underground home would cause hole to fill with water, but there are also other places where underground water level is low enough, that the same principle could be used to make storage space below home, under it. Underground is often cool in summer.

Huh. Underground water level... Dig a hole deep enough... Then make the hole stronger with bricks, to avoid dirt filling it again... And... Down the hole there may be water after some days. Not from rain. Fresh water not from rain, not from river, from underground moisture. It would need to go below local underground water level. Water well. At the bottom, put clean rocks or sand: this helps clean the water. Put a wall also around the top to stop people from falling in. Perhaps place wooden something on top when not in use, to avoid leaves or rats falling in. There is no need for going down to use: use a bucket on a rope to pull up water. The deeper you dig, the more water you'll find. Obviously: keep in mind to keep it uphill from waste.

I recently discovered a secret. There's a way to make dark soil that makes plants grow very well. This soil is better than the mud left by rivers or rotted plants we put on fields. To make it mix together charred wood, the same as used for ironmaking, with... Old animal and plant parts, broken pottery, and the waste from people and animals. Let this mix sit for a year or sometimes two, but sometimes mix the layers of this foul stuff. Add moisure if needed. Black soil when ready becomes safe, but when making it keep in mind dangers of waste. If done well, finished it should look like black soil. Plants should grow very well on it. And once created, black soil can remain for centuries and while it can be ovedrained by plants, it usually retains ability to regenerate faster than regular soil. With time, it could make lands around the Black Hook Bay better yet safer for farming than the river floodplain with unreliable floods.

There is another thing making mining and moving stones and bricks and soil easier... The wheel. Find a tree with a wide trunk. Cut a thin slice from it. Make it as round as you can, shape of a circle, round like a sun. Now, make a small hole in the center of this round piece. Not too big, just enough to fit a strong stick through.

Take a strong, straight stick that's longer than the round piece is wide. Put it through the hole in the round piece. The round piece should turn around this stick easily. To help it turn smoothly, put some animal fat or oil where the stick touches the hole. On both sides of the round piece, put something on the stick to keep the round piece from sliding off.

Carts... Make four of these rolling things, wheels, of the same size. Connect them with long sticks as was explained, make a platform above. You can pile heavy things on this platform and push or pull it. This is good for moving lots of heavy things at once, like logs for your fire or rocks with iron inside.

Second, wheelbarrow. Make just one of these rolling things. Attach a stick into center of this wooden circle as was before explained. Attach two other long sticks to this main stick, one from each side, but this time going up. Between these sticks, make a deep basket from woven vines or wood. When you lift the ends of the sticks, the basket will be between them. You can put heavy loads in this basket and push it around easily. This is very good for moving dirt, rocks, or anything else you need to carry. These work best on flat, hard ground. You might need to make smooth paths where you use them most.

Making people peaceful... Select 5 well-respected people, perhaps the most important in biggest families, to be "Five Judges" over the Black Hook Bay. Afterwards, when one dies, remaining Four Judges shall select replacement. When there is disagreement that cannot be resolved inside of families, the Five Judges will hear both sides, then talk, then decide. When in doubt, the eldest one proposes solution and if at least 2 others agree, then it becomes decision, and dissenting Judges must remain calm. Tell them that it must be so, and that if you ever return to see no Five Judges then you shall punish the Bay. There would be Five, so they are less likely to be too harsh like one person could be when given power. They would also already, ideally, have some respect and authority over their families. If done well this could make guidance of existing leaders stronger and more durable, instead of trying to create leaders from nothing.

I'm not saying that this is a perfect solution. But I'm reasonably sure that it's worth your time to try it and return later to observe if effects decreased discord and increased useful work.

I would advise also to build a special house where the Five Judges would meet to talk, and where riches too great to be under control of one mortal should be, to be used by all in true need. These riches that you don't want for yourself, obviously. Perhaps the unicorn horn could be stored in this special house.

This is not something that is just my imagination. I had seen such, and more complicated, hierarchies of people working for a very long time and surprisingly well. Not perfectly, no, but surprisingly well and usefully well. I guess that the first twenty years is the hardest - after children are raised to adults in a settlement with firm rules about leaders and disputes, they start to consider such rules as normal and needed for peace.

In a more complicated system there are also Guards. Judges are often elders, but Guards are younger. Their role is to protect Judges from harm and help them when needed, and to break up fights with use of sticks. There is a small danger here of Guards taking power for themselves, but surprisingly small if people who respect and obey elders are wisely selected. Disciplined and obedient to elders Guards, with solid wooden sticks, can stop fight between two stronger but undisciplined and chaotic folk.

I think that, for now, expecting all leaders to be able to read and write would be impossible, but... If possible, leaders should know how to read and write numbers. Counting and writing how many hides, food or tools there is, for example. Even if with only number and a crude picture, not words. Numbers are certainly exeption to the rules of writing, and deserve separate symbols.

I know a writing system for numbers, I use counting by 10 for it, but similar one could use 12...

They had separate sign that mean 1, then sign with meaning 2, then 3, then 4, then 5, then 6, then 7, then 8, then 9. They used also another sign that means "nothing", 0

Then when I want to make sign for 10 according to their ways, I write signs 1 and 0. 1 tens and "nothing" else.

Then to write 11, I use signs 1 and 1. Just adding 1 to 1 would make 2 obviously, but for these signs it means instead 1 tens and also 1.

Ten there is 1 and 2. 1 tens and also 2.

And this way with only 10 different signs I can paint or carve on wood or clay any number. Do you understand? 1 then 5 then 2, written closely one afrer another means 1 hundred, 5 tens, and also 2.

But sometimes you may instead want to write "55 should be added to 11", how to write it? Just use separate sign for "added" and "results in". 5 tens and also 5, when added to 1 tens and also 1, gives us 6 tens and also 6, 66.

200 is preserved with signs like this. Sign 2, sign 0, another sign 0.

208 like this. Sign 2, sign 0, sign 8.
2 hundreds and nothing tens and also 8. 208.

1000 like this. Sign 1, sign 0, sign 0, sign 0.

1270 like this. Sign 1, sign 2, sign 7, sign 0.

By knowing how to make only 10 signs, preserve in signs on fired clay any number that is hard to remember, even 7851. Much easier to learn.



I shall mention another tool, to hopefully make you more pleased after hearing confusing things. A monjolo is a wooden tool used to hammer iron ore with no magic but also with no human work after the tool is build! Sounds weird? Probably, but listen.

It's a small log or heavy stick with two ends. One end has a heavy wooden hammer. The other end has a scoop. Small amount of water, for example redirected with a channel from a stream, flows from above and fills the scoop, making it heavy. This makes the hammer end lift up. When the scoop tips over and empties, the hammer falls down, hitting the iron ore below. The water keeps filling the scoop, making the hammer go up and down over and over again. This way, the tool thing hammers the iron ore without using much effort after it's made.

The tool stays in place instead of falling away because it's attached attached in place with a sturdy axle stick placed in hole across the middle of monjolo tool. This lets the tool to move up and down without sliding out of place. The base is firmly set into the ground or secured with heavy stones to keep it stable. This way, the monjolo can move without falling out of place.

An axle is a strong, straight stick or rod. It goes through the hole in middle of the tool, keeping it in place but allowing to move up and down. This stick lets the heavy hammer end and the scoop end move up and down. The axle stays in one place, keeping the monjolo steady while it moves. To make rubbing between axle stick and rest of the tool more gentle, animal or fish fat need to be rubbed on axle stick.

More things...It may be worth time to create special paths from iron smelters to homes, or from fields to homes. Not only remove plants and trees from the path, but also place some stones or bricks on it, and wooden structures over streams, to make moving things easier.

To make a bridge over a stream find two strong, long logs to reach across the stream. Place these logs across the stream, ensuring they are stable on both sides. Then, lay smaller logs or thick branches across the main logs, close together to create the surface. Use strong rope or vines to tie these cross beams to the main logs, keeping them in place. Finally, cover the surface with flat stones, planks, or thick branches to make it smooth and easy to walk on. Check the bridge to make sure it is sturdy and safe before using it. Also, while you cannot avoid bridge destruction from great flooding, you can try to to avoid damage from minor flooding: place both sides slightly raised on ramps, not at the ground level, try to give stream more place below to rise before bridge damage happens.

It's even possible but harder to build such paths over bigger streams. You would need a pillar placed deep into the stream sand or mud, deeply into rocks below the stream. Big enough pillar so that logs could be on top from both sides, creating bigger structure. Probably slightly hard work even for you, but good to know what is possible.

Do you managed to make concrete, liquid that hardens into rock? You asked once: "I might know that rock. Is the stone itself sticky or is it just that you make sticky from it?". The stone is not, no. You need to make a powder. "Break it into small pieces and burn it in a hot fire until it turns into a white powder called lime. Next, mix the lime with sand and small stones. Add water to make a thick paste." I must add that it's not like glue, you cannot use it to join pieces of wood. But it should work to join two bricks, or many pebbles, or just to make a rock with weird desired shape.

White paint: crush limestone, the same grey stone used for creating powder used in concrete, that's fired at very high temperatures. Mix with water. You can use it to paint things white, I think that painted wood should survive for longer. It's not perfect but smallest worms and mold somewhat dislike this paint, so paint walls of homes even inside, and re-apply after some time.

Imagine you're building a statue of a cat. You start with a toy, small clay model that fits in your hand, as is good practice before making a new thing. Now, you want to make it bigger - say, as tall as a person. As you make it bigger, something strange happens. The outside of the cat - its skin and fur - grows much slower than its insides. If you make the cat twice as tall, its skin becomes four times bigger, but... its body becomes eight times bigger inside. More usefully, this is also true about buildings. This rule affects everything we build or grow.

As to glass. If it explodes it means that our explanation was imperfect, as sometimes happens. But there is one thing that you can create from glass that is not only pretty but also offers something more than pottery: transparent glass pots, transpatent like clear ice can be, with things inside visible from outside without any magic. To make glass with fewer explosions: heat the sand slowly, cool the hot glass slowly. Also mix the sand with ash from certain plants. Seaweed ash works well, or ash from plants that grow near salty water. Also try to add a small amount of limestone- this helps the sand melt better. Stir the melted mix to remove bubbles, using a long metal rod. When it's fully melted and smooth, shape it quickly before it cools. Cool it slowly to prevent cracking, or especially exploding.

So big well-made glass pot may be interesting even to you, I think. Shards from explosions, less so. Maybe Black Hook Bay could exchange glass to outsiders, in mostly peaceful exchange for needed things, and steal less? They won the fight nicely, yes. But they would again make enemies with this constant stealing and murdering. Perhaps they should mellow their ways and learn to deceive outsiders about value of useless baubles, instead.

As to better brush, you asked about it: do you tried just hair, a piece of wood and glue, instead of hair and clay? Get a wood for the handle. Find some animal hair or plant fibers for the brush part. Bunch these fibers together. Tie them tightly at one end. Now, attach this bunch to your wooden handle with glue. Or perhaps two small pieces of wood, and hair secured with glue in between these pieces.

Are people of Black Hook Bay increasing in numbers? I hope so. It would be good to count their adults once in a while, and write number, to have a better understanding how much our advice helps with increasing numbers of servants. Preferably they should be persuaded to do it themselves, to save on your valuable time, humph. Are they building homes with foundations under, bricks and arches and fire enclosures? Perhaps try to show it to them to test effects. Try to see effects on things, try to see effects on people... Something can be "tested" in Black Hook Bay before doing it elsewhere.

Overcrowded and dirty and wet and moldy homes: can be very harmful to health. More space, as long as it's well-heated in winter and dry, should help also with health and decreasing risks of sickness spreading. Many ideas about bigger structures were already provided.

Dry and clean skulls of enemies, for example with flesh removed by boiling, are nice decorations. You mentioned Black Hook Bay people to already store skulls of some enemies, very nice, but warn them to clean fresh ones from flesh, avoid rot. Also, don't eat people, that is sadly unhealthy, the most easy spread of diseases. It would be the safest to just burn most dead bodies, including dead people of the Black Hook Bay; with only some clean skulls of enemies as fun decor. Also, some groups people have wasteful burial practices that should be avoided, burying or destroying tools of the dead- it would be more useful to, instead, fairly divide items between living.

Do you know a simple tool known to me as lever? A long, strong stick used to move heavy things. Put one end under the heavy thing, rest the stick on a rock, and push down on the other end. It makes lifting easier. Obviously wooden one would break more easily and be less useful than iron lever.

An angle is like the corner where two lines meet. Imagine you're standing with your legs apart. The space between your legs is an angle. You can make it bigger by spreading your legs more, or smaller by bringing them closer together. Measuring angles help make sure things stand up straight and fit together right. If the angles in a building are wrong, it might lean or even fall down. If you assume that 360 degree angle is full circle, then 90 degrees helps us build strong corners. 180 degrees helps us make straight lines and level surfaces. So these numbers come from dividing a circle into parts. But the idea of these special angles is what's important, not the numbers themselves. Carve a shape from wood to measure 90 degrees and be more sure if walls stand straight up. Also, we Voices often mention angles, maybe you noticed.

A triangle is a shape with three straight sides that meet at three points. Think of three sticks laid out so their ends touch, forming a closed shape. A wedge is a tool shaped like a triangle, but solid. It's thick on one end and gets thinner to a sharp edge on the other end. To use a wedge: Push the thin, sharp end into a crack in wood or rock. Then hit the thick end with a hammer or rock. The wedge forces the crack to open wider. Wedges are useful for splitting logs for fire, or breaking apart big rocks, perhaps after weakening rocks with fire and water.

Rake is a tool good for mixing rotting plants or black soil, or just gathering leaves for use in black soil. It includes many long metal teeth at the end of wooden handle. When you pull the rake across the grass, its teeth pick up the leaves and bring them together in a pile.

Comb is a very small tool consisting of a shaft that holds a row of many small wooden or bone teeth for pulling through hair to clean or untangle them. Combs can be carved out of wood, bone.

Scissors are tools for cutting hair, rope, hide. This tool is made of two metal blades. These blades are joined in the middle, like two fingers crossing. This joining point lets the blades move. One end of each blade is sharp. The other end is shaped to fit your hand. To use scissors, put your fingers in the hand-shaped ends. Open the hand ends wide. Put what you want to cut between the sharp ends. Close your hand. This makes the sharp ends come together and cut.

Tooth that cause significant pain should be removed with forceps. A tool pretty similar to biters used in iron-making, but much smaller and thus able to properly grasp a tooth, at least in the most cases. Forceps should be clean and boiled for a while before use, like knives used to cut living body. Even though tooth extraction is usually simple, there are some risks from smallest worms. To stop bleeding, bite on something clean for a while, maybe on a very small piece of leather.

A mortar and pestle are simple tools used for grinding and mixing substances. The mortar is a sturdy bowl, usually made from stone. The pestle is a heavy, club-shaped but small tool that you hold in your hand. It's often made from the same material as the mortar. To use them, place the item you want to grind into the mortar. Then, press and grind the pestle against the item in the mortar. Use a circular motion, pushing down with some force, to crush and grind the item into a fine powder or paste. The rough interior of the mortar helps break down the materials. This tool is very useful for preparing ingredients. It's simple to use and requires no special skills.

Poppy flower has thin, tall stems that can grow as high as a person's waist or even chest. At the top of each stem is a single flower. The flower itself is quite large. It has four petals that are very soft and delicate. These petals can be different colors - bright red is common, but they can also be pink, white, or even purple. Inside the flower, at its center, is a round pod. This pod is green at first, but turns grayish-brown as it dries. This is where the seeds and the special sap come from. When the pod is cut, a white, milky sap comes out. This sap is what can be used to make the strong medicine against pain. Collect it carefully and let it dry into a sticky brown substance, it can be also mixed with alcohol for long storage and easier use. The seeds inside the pod are tiny and black. They can be eaten and don't have the same strong effects as the sap. While this plant can be very helpful for easing pain, for example before bonesetting or cutting into body, it's a strong medicine that should be used carefully. Too much can make a person very sick or even cause them to stop breathing.

More about giant boats... Great boats made with many wooden planks on wooden keel, like a skeleton but for a boat and without bones, with wooden planks like skin... instead of using only one log. Possible next way after hollowed logs... Such a boat made from parts could be great enough to fit few people at the same time and many, so many, so many fish... Possible. Planks are... Long, thin, flat pieces of wood. Would need labor and tools to produce from logs. Tree resins to seal the gaps between the planks... Making the boat watertight... Also try to carve a slot in one plank and a matching one on the other plank, fitting them together.

Maps. Pictures representating land, on a flat surface, clay tablet, or stone, or leather. For example, decide that there is a symbol for a settlement, lines symbolize rivers, and size of average human finger symbolize distance that you can cross during one day on a decent and level grassland. These are obviously only examples that need to be changed to better serve your needs. Now, you can make your map of some territory on a clay tablet, a picture that shows where thimgs are, and how much distance may be between these. You can also include hills or whatever you like; also some written words, names of places and numbers if pictures are not enough.

Oil lamp, light source much smaller and better than torches... Start with a small bowl. It can be made of pottery, stone, or metal. This holds the oil. In the middle of the bowl, you put a wick. The wick is like a piece of small rope. It can be made from plant fibers. You pour oil into the bowl. Close the bowl, with only some wick going out of it. Some oil should go up the wick. When you light the end of the wick, it should burn slowly. The fire eats the oil that's in the wick, without entering the whole bowl. As it slowly burns, more oil climbs up the wick, and the flame gives off light, letting you see in the dark. You can make the oil from plants, by pressing seeds, or from animal fat or whales.
Oil lamps are great because you can carry them around easily, unlike a big torch. They're safer too, as long as you're careful to not spill oil around.

Another thing. It's good for settlements keep track of time by marking and counting days and years. Each day, when the sun rises, they could make a mark on a big rock or piece of wood. By counting these marks, they could see how many days have passed.

If your world works like I think it works, there should be 365 days in most years, but 366 once after every 4 years. So after 365 marks for days, mark Year 2 and count days again from 1. Unless it's a Year 4 or Year 8 or similar, then after 366 marks.

Anyway. Counting days and number of years is useful because it helps to know when the seasons and events change, so they could better prepare for different weather, and it will be crucial for planting plants well. It also helps to plan for important activities, like hunting or gathering food, and allows to remember when things happened, like the last big rain. Using this way helps to stay ready for changes. Some fish movements also may happen every year around similar number of days.

Perhaps you could in fact declare that this Year is Year 600, not 1. So that people count years from around your first visit in the Bay. Then people always when counting years would think how great and eternal you are, as for mortals even 600 sounds like forever.

liberty90 said:

But I must think about this, any suggestions and opinions?

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

---

Hello you-who-are-mighty, for this is one-who-is-many.

I failed to introduce myself last time, but we shall once again talk about some obvious points that might have been misses. Less deep, but hopefully just as useful.

LoserThree said:

Why didn't you describe these before, Junction?

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

I'd garner a guess as to why the voices ignored to talk about bog iron is a combination of simply forgetting about it and once again thinking at the wrong scale of things. Bogs produce low quality iron at a low rate, which is perfectly fine for now but won't be sustainable once people grow to larger numbers.

LoserThree said:

Ergh.

So… The wind pushes the webbing… But the boat is facing the wind… Wouldn't the boat just go backwards?

Junction, are you speaking madness again?

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Sailing against the wind works because of a very weird combination of things. See, the wind basically pushes the boat mostly to the side and slightly backwards because of the angle of the sail. However, because the full length of the boat is pretty hard to move sideways, the movement instead turns into a sliding motion which, because the boat itself is also angled against the wind, moves the boat forward.

Very weird.

LoserThree said:

Ah. Here is the 'hard work' that is your planting-and-staying-in-one-place life. Truly, tearing all the life out of land to replace it with whichever seeds come from the plant which has done its work best, year after year, possibly several times a year will be difficult.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Something to note for the constant weeding and maintaining of your fields is that once a field has been in use for a few year it usually becomes a bit easier to grow more things on. Not a lot, but enough to make starting new fields even more of a hassle than farming already is.

LoserThree said:

I have never observed a mushroom causing a dead creeping thing to stumble about. Is there some special consequence of tiny tragedies like that?

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

There is a mushroom that grows in the brains of ants and spiders, directing them to stand around in the open to be eaten, so that the mushroom can then spread even further through the poop of whatever ate the infected animal. Thats probably what other voices were talking about.

LoserThree said:

Iron grows?

Huh.

If iron tightens around a wooden rod then why the spike driven into the wood of the rod? Why the sticky stuff?

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

It is very important to note that iron doesn't grow, it expands. This is probably already known to you, but I'd rather clarify something you already know than have you operating under false knowledge. As to why you should add the glue and the spikes is to keep the head from slipping off the shaft even with the friction of the shrunken head holding it shut. A tool of good iron can be handed down through generations and when you swing it with the full force of your arms the sheer power you put behind it will loosen the head sooner or later.

LoserThree said:

Tell me how other food is stored as well, Junction, especially fish.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

How to store foods can be done one of two ways: Cold or Dry.

If kept below the point of coldness that water becomes ice, food won't rot no matter how long it remains like that, and keeping it near that point is already enough to slow down any rot. This is slightly useful during the winter, but one can gather ice and snow during it into great heaps that can take well into the months of summer to melt, or even not at all and last until the next snow to store food. You usually make a big pit in which to keep the snow and ice and build a roof above it to keep the sun out, allowing the ice to last longer.

If food is kept for very long times in ice it will slowly start to become less nutritious, with the speed and severity of that process being very varied depending on what is being stored.

This will likely be of less use to you and the fisher people, unless you can conjure ice in large enough quantities that is, and so I will move on to dryness.

Things being wet is the biggest source of them rotting, be that wetness on the surface or wetness inside, and so removing wetness is very useful in making food last longer. This is usually achieved through drying them with a fire or in the sun, curing them with salts or smoking them - or a combination of the above.

Combared to the ice method, dry methods will usually change the taste of the food quite severly.

LoserThree said:

Why would the shape matter? It's a log, mostly. It will float.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

The Shape of the boat is very important once the boats being made stop being logs. If you draw your hand through the water, you will feel different levels of resistance depending on if you do it with the edge of your hand or your palm and the same applies here. A good shape for the parts of the boat that are underwater make it more stable and quicker than one with a bad form.

LoserThree said:

Can you voices tell me how to make plants bloom and produce fruit in seasons they usually don't?

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

The blooming of plants is guided by one thing, temperature, and influenced by three others - the availability of water, the availability of nutrients in the soil and the availability of sunlight.

To make plants bloom in the winter, one must as such make it warm like spring while providing the three other things I listed.

The answer to this riddle is to make a house with roofs and walls of glass that allow sunlight to enter while keeping the cold out. Water will likely have to be brought by hand and nutrients through the pots of rot other people have talked about, but the house of glass, very creatively called either a glasshouse or a greenhouse, provides heat and sunlight.

This whole thing is very expensive to make and the harvest will likely be less than if grown normally because there is simply less warmth and sunlight during winter to go around, and some plants are not really suitable to be grown this way, but fresh apples during winter are a luxury eagerly seen by most anyone.

If you deny water to plants just before they would fully ripen you can sometimes delay when they would have to be harvested. By doing this for half the harvest one can have more time to actually do the gathering. But thats more a convenience than what you asked for.

LoserThree said:

This is expected to work?

The leader does not say, "This will be good for you," or, "If you do not do this, terrible things will happen to you and people you care about?" The leader only says, "I have been a good leader, so you should die when I lead you to die?"

You may correctly know this to be so, Voice. But it is… Strange? Worrying, I think.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

The important thing to note for our advice on legitimacy and leadership and the example i brought up here is that very few of the people addressed in the example would have known the king personally or even seen him before this moment.

While for those one knows personally one can call upon friendship, brotherhood or bonds of family to make them march to battle with you, or for others promises of loot and riches might suffice, these things can not be scaled to bring an army of twenty thousand armed men - or multiples times that! - upon a battlefield. It is how the king would have likely gathered his most powerful of followers, those worthy of his attention, who then brought along some of their followers and so on, but to then make this gathering of men face their foes there has to be an obligation for them to do so and a reason for them to actually follow the obligation.

Again, self interest, greed and close bonds might work to a certain degree, but no one can be friends with everyone and while a few more can be forced to fall in line, not everyone can - especially if there aren't also ones following on their own accord - and so the person leading must have a reason to compel them to do as he asks.

Legitimacy is complicated to explain, with other voices trying to bring up organized violence or states or other concepts that are king of related but also kind of not, but if I can parse it down to its absolute basic, it is the believe that the person in charge has the right to be in charge.

In the example i brought up, the king says "I did a good job in all the tasks I have as a king and so now you should follow me to battle because leading those is also one of my tasks." Bidding upon his legitimacy to get them to follow him. There is of course also a degree of punishment involved if they were to not do as he asks and rewards for instead doing as asked, but again, those to not scale if you want to get people to do what you want at a certain scale.

It's a very complicated and cyclical thing that, as we said before, is not yet all that important because tribes are small and people are few so that it is actually possible for a chief to be friends with everyone and to call up a warband simply by asking all his cousins and brothers and friends to come to battle and to also ask their cousins and friends and brothers to do the same.

BUT. It is also something that a lot of voices seem very eager to talk about and so I really feel the need to explain it from a more basic level than their advice.

LoserThree said:

Is there a reason to do this in the ground and not in burners made of bricks?

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

The pitch burner I explained is in the ground because it is easier to make than a tall tower of bricks, if slightly less convenient as far as we understand its operation.

LoserThree said:

So make a boat of pieces of wood fitted together and then coat the gaps with pitch or perhaps with something soak in pitch? That sounds like it would work.

But I think it would be better to make a boat from a larger tree. When the boat moves on the water, won't the places where it is fit together will wear at each other until the boat comes apart?

Can the boat parts be so tightly fit together that they hold fast in waves?

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Making boats out of larger trees only works until you want a boat that is larger than any tree available to you. There are also some things about how the tree itself restricts the shape of the boat, but thats really it. However, even relatively simple boats can get very, very large.

And to make boat parts fit together better requires nails, so let me explain those:

Take a length of iron the length of your index finger and no thicker than the same. I don't know what smithing tools are available to you, but the easiest way to do this is to drawn very hot iron through a thick plate of steel with a hole the width a bit smaller than the desired width. You do this in steps, slowly pulling the the iron through smaller and smaller holes until it is the width you desire. This is also how you make lightning rods. Now hammer one side until it is tapering to a fine point and a flat top on the other and you have a decent enough nail that can be driven into two pieces of wood. If the nail is thin enough, the taper light enough and the tip sharp enough, it will cleanly punch into the wood if hammered and sit securely, connecting the two pieces.

To improve the nail and make the hammering easier, the flat end gets reheated and the nail secured in such a way that there is a flat surface a bit underneath the flat end - this will likely involve holding it in place and something similar to the drawing plate. Now the nail just needs to be hammered from directly above until the heated part squashes up and turns into a flat circle of metal that is wider than the main body of metal below it.

LoserThree said:

How can I encourage the trees I cut down to do this. Is there something to be done other than leaving the stump in the ground?

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

You can encourage trees to grow faster by burying organs or bones or other inedible animal parts near their roots, but thats about it.

Check the stump for any infections by mould or insects to keep it healthy and cut it down near winter when the tree has already lost its leaves and can grow new shoots in spring, would be all that comes to my mind.

LoserThree said:

But they take so much work. And they're rough on the teeth. Or is this another case for pots and boiling? I think it is.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Making grain easier to eat is a matter of either boiling them or grinding them up. Mix the ground up grain, called flour, with water and knead it until it has become a singular mass of dough. Spread the dough on a hot surface - like a stone sitting on a fire - until the result, called bread, is ready to eat.

Adding milk, salt or eggs to the mixture before heating it changes the texture and taste.

LoserThree said:

And now I am fairly certain it is the rock-burning. It's got to be something I'm doing in those hills, anyway.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Ah, damn, we didn't tell bianca about all the dangerous as fuck stuff coming out of a furnace. Uh, throw all that stuff into pits lined with glazed ceramic and seal it up tight. Best way to deal with it and stop it from leaching into the water for now.

Oh and before I forget it: Rabbit meat is so lean of nutrients and fat that if you eat nothing but rabbit you will starve with a full stomach.

[X] Write-in: Appoint "Five Judges" above the Black Hook Bay, according to Liberty90 advice

[X] [Solstice] Make a false stone on a nearby hill
[X] [Blight] Brick up the opening
[X] [Theropirapian] Send the Heroine to deal with it
[X] [Bog Iron] Give mortals half the iron from what they bring

liberty90 said:

Making people peaceful... Select 5 well-respected people, perhaps the most important in biggest families, to be "Five Judges" over the Black Hook Bay. Afterwards, when one dies, remaining Four Judges shall select replacement. When there is disagreement that cannot be resolved inside of families, the Five Judges will hear both sides, then talk, then decide. When in doubt, the eldest one proposes solution and if at least 2 others agree, then it becomes decision, and dissenting Judges must remain calm. Tell them that it must be so, and that if you ever return to see no Five Judges then you shall punish the Bay. There would be Five, so they are less likely to be too harsh like one person could be when given power. They would also already, ideally, have some respect and authority over their families. If done well this could make guidance of existing leaders stronger and more durable, instead of trying to create leaders from nothing.

I would advise also to build a special house where the Five Judges would meet to talk, and where riches too great to be under control of one mortal should be, to be used by all in true need. These riches that you don't want for yourself, obviously. Perhaps the unicorn horn could be stored in this special house, and be guarded all day and night by three strong people, let's call them Guards, selected by and well-trusted by the Five Judges.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

[X] [Solstice] Dig up the stone, guide the rite, steal the power (Community Management 4 + Distiller 1 + Empathy 1 = 6; Ob 4)
At this time this seems the surest route to further power for Bianca.

[X] [Blight] Brick up the opening (Mason 3 + Warding Magic 2 + Architect 1 = 6; Ob 2)
This will keep. Low priority for now.

[X] [Theropirapian] Send the Heroine to deal with it (Fishing 6 (aligned) + Spear 1 + Hunting 1 + Bianca's magic gaff 1 = 9, Ob 6)
It did probably kill her parents. Seems most appropriate for a story. Do warn the Heroine that dolphins are evil tricksters and rapists.

[X] [Bog Iron] Give mortals half the iron from what they bring
Sounds like a good way to sidle sideways into taxation!

A good way to make the mortals remember the making of language glyphs is to give them a practical use. And the use which most directly plucks at the human soul is the recording of debts. Although your memory is certainly without peer, I would suggest that whenever a mortal owes you something, or is owed something by you, you record it on a fired clay tablet. People love their rituals. Their traditions.
If you do this thing, then people watching will want to copy you, and swiftly among them it shall be that none will remember a time when debt were not recorded upon clay. It need not be the system of sound symbols which you worked out already. It could be a simpler system. Numbers could simply be a number of lines. And you could draw a cute little picture of whatever is owed.

My other suggestion would be that you designate some area of forest near the village which you enforce that none may hunt or gather within. On pain of death if need be. This way, when the population of animals in the surroundings is depleted, there will still be a source nearby for them to repopulate from.

LoserThree said:

Yes, I know bees and honey, as do any people who live around them.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Oh, you know about bees, wax and honey. Good, are you aware that honey can be used to treat wounds? It can act as what's known as an antiseptic, applying it to a wound treated with alcohol can prevent the invisible warms from getting into it again, giving improved chance of recovery.

also, it is also possible to a limited degree to tame bees, known as beekeeping.
To do so first you'll need bee-proof clothing. For that, take thick leather, and cover the entire body below the neck, leaving no gaps. Then create a large hat from reeds, with a grass mesh over it that goes down to your neck, with holes big enough that you can still see through it, but small enough that a bee is unlikely to get in.

A mesh is like a much smaller form of the web used to catch fish. also Just in case hats, gloves, and boots aren't things you have yet, I'll explain those to you. Hats are a covering on top of the head and are used for various things such as keeping the sun off your face and shoulders. In this case, it's to keep bees from landing on you're head and stinging you there. Gloves are clothing that goes over the hands, with each finger being enclosed individually to maintain better hand movement and grip. they are often made of leather and cloth. With cloth, it is for keeping hands warm during times of great cold, with leather it is to protect the hands from dangerous substances, such as heated metal or clay. Boots are made by cutting a piece of leather in the vague shape of your foot, leaving some room around the sides to attach more leather that is sewn on. leave a gap in the side or top with even spread holes running up each side of the, so you can run a sting through and use it to pull the boot closed.

with the clothing done, I will now tell you how bees and their hives work. A group of bees is what is called a colony, and the colony can be made up of up to 60,000 to as little as 10,000, and function almost like they are one singular entity, the most important member of the hive is the queen bee, who is around twice the size of a worker bee, the queen is constantly producing children which make up the rest of the hive, wherever she goes the hive will follow.

The worker bees are the members of the hive who do all the work, from gathering nectar from flowers to make into honey, to building the hive caring for the queen and her spawn. then there are the drones, about half again as large as the workers, who are the only males. Their purpose is to go out and find young queens to mate with.

Finally, there are winter bees, who replace workers and kick out the drones during winter, their job is to feed the queen and keep her warm, by clumping up on her and shaking their bodies so much that the center is like a warm summer day.

As you know, beehives are made from wax which is made into the wall of six-sided holes in which they store either honey, a substance known as bee bread made of pollen, or baby bees. the baby bees appear as small worms and start really small, they are then fed honey and bee bread until they form a shell, in which they will develop into a full-grown bee, unless it a female and is fed exclusively royal jelly, another substance produced by worker bees, then they will turn into a queen. Then they will either replace a dead or dying queen or leave to form a new nest.

Now to construct an artificial hive for your bees to live in. For this, you'll need to carve and cut wood, take a log that is wide around as the tip of your fingers to your elbow and as tall as your waist. cut it in half from the top down, with each half becoming a hive, then hollow them out. You want to carve a hole big enough in one of the ends for a few bees to enter and leave at the same time. Then carve two large flat pieces of wood(These are called boards) big enough to be the lid of the logs, as well as some smaller boards, with two sides the size of the top part of you're thumb and two sides the same size as the shorter end of the log.

There should be enough of these smaller boards that if you lay them over the opening it will cover it from one end to the other. The smaller boards are for the bees to build their honeycombs and make it easy for you to remove them without destroying the hive. Then make some wooden legs to keep from rolling around, and put them on a flat spot of ground within.

Now, you could just stop here and hope a queen decides to make this its home, but you should instead capture a swarm to put in it. Swarms are the result of a young queen leaving with half the colony. They can often be found clumped up in a living mass of bees on trees and in various areas. As you might know, you can make small fire to create smoke under the bees to calm them and do this in the morning when they are at their least active, then just scoop them into a big tightly woven basket, once you get most of them, listen for some time to see if the noise quiets down. If it does, then you got the queen, if not, you probably failed, and the swarm is doomed.

If you succeeded, then move the basket to you're hive and dump them in. Now, the bees aren't guaranteed to stay in their new hive. but this is still a good chance. once you have a successful hive you can transfer some of the honeycomb from that one to a new hive to increase the new hive's chances of staying.

As for caring for your hives, this involves checking them regularly for insects that don't belong, smash those when you can they will harm the hive if allowed to live.
a good sign that things are going well in your hive is if there are a lot of drones, as their the first to go when things go wrong. Make sure to leave honey in the hive for winter, or the hive will die out.

Notably, if you can figure out how to make a mesh from metal wire, it will not only serve a much better job as a head covering, it is key in making a better beehive. But I'm not sure how such can be accomplished yet.

The method of making better hive is to attach the mesh to four pieces of wood, two sides longer and two sides shorter, then with the length being similar to the smaller boards from above. The point of this is to both stretch and straighten the mesh out, allowing the bees in this type of hive to use it as a preexisting structure to build their hove on, allowing them to use less wax and making it a lot easier to harvest it. You then build a box big enough to fit a few of these in standing on their side while allowing the bees to move around in it, then put a hole on the top and one side. The top hole is so you can easily expand the hive by making another hive with an additional hole on the bottom and just putting it on top.

[X] [Blight] Plunder the Tomb of the Blight
[X] [Theropirapian] Send the Heroine to deal with it

[X] [Solstice] Dig up the stone, guide the rite, steal the power
[X] [Blight] Plunder the Tomb of the Blight
[X] [Theropirapian]Send the Heroine to deal with it
[X] [Bog Iron] Give mortals half the iron from what they bring

We now have a hero how a̶͉͆m̵̨̻̋û̸̥̾s̸͂͜i̸̦̐n̵̳͗̏ǵ̸̮̉
We can get more power, or at least our new Overlady can do it. Also some things are best dealt with personally so the Blight should get Bianca's full attention. Also the hero can probably deal with the dolphin. As for the iron? Give the people a reason to come to you for it, maybe even teach them so after a while you don't need to do it.

Virian said:

[Solstice] [X] Dig up the stone, guide the rite, steal the power
[Blight] [X] Plunder the Tomb of the Blight
[Theropirapian] [X] Send the Heroine to deal with it
[Bog Iron] [X] Give mortals half the iron from what they bring

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

This is not even possible all at the same time, according to mechanics.

Hail Bianca!

Rafin here. One of the channels between us an you has torn, so you might hear less babbling overall this time. Smart voices will try to compensate by making their babbling more useful and condensed.

I wish to talk about another ability the mirror has. It informs us about some of your doings and consequences of some of our harder to follow advice, in the form of lists of influences and probabilities expressed in numbers. And so we knew before you told us of the following things:

1. Befriending the lions was made harder by the distraction of having to ruin the ritual. Given the circumstances, your skills and your divine heritage there was only a one in two chance that the lions would stick around. You shall never find this pride again.
2. Your guide in iron-making is only interesting and useful enough to inspire around five generations of Black Hook Bay people to be capable readers without your intervention. You were hampered by the lack of any skill in composing guides that captivate the attention or convey a skill usefully enough compared to other ways. And since the tribe has no true writers of their own, they will lose the skill of reading in time because of it. But even with just the skill you had at the time you had a three in four chance to embed reading in the tribe for as long as the tribe exists and a one in two chance to inspire them to write. I recommend writing more guides and also writing stories and to try and improve the skill of composing written works for others. Ask those who you teach to read to compare the ease of reading your works to one another. Also deliberately teach a few wise people to write, to write anything at all.
3. Making useful glass vessels is hard. Given your skill and knowledge at the time you only had a one in three chance to make anything truly useful in the time between our talks.
4. Your continued divine healing and soulwork upon many generations has permanently given inheritable traits to the souls of the people. Their progeny will now sometimes have innate poison resistance compared to other peoples and every once in a while they will produce a magically fast healer. But beware that what you did could also have had other consequences. Most of the time the consequences would have been positive, especially because healing is part of your divine heritage as your Maker intended for you, but negative consequences in the following forms were possible:
   1. The Black Hook Bay People hence on need a little poison to thrive.
   2. The Black Hook Bay People hence on need smelting waste in their water to thrive.
   3. The Black Hook Bay People hence on need smelting waste in their water to live.
5. In the battle the advantages of the attackers were numbers, fervent zeal, a unicorn, and a precocious and Heroic child. The advantages of the defenders were leadership, experience in similar situations, being warriors instead of hunters and having hafted steel weapons and pots of burning pitch. The heroic child only had its ability to remain conspicuous in battle, it's skill in convincing people and some unicorn magic to keep its side in the fight. Sheshlan, despite not being innately heroic, had his loud voice and trained skills in intimidation, raid lore and rowdy young people lore. And his warriors did not need inspiration in order to stick around and kill people while feeling threatened.
6. The people of Black Hook Bay are making steady process in figuring out glassmaking for themselves. But they had major setbacks in restoring old lore, likely due to preventable mistakes and mishaps. Maybe you should use your influence to protect and promote wise folk that gets captured or willingly joins the tribe, should such a thing happen again.

I shall return to answer questions you posed to me specifically and maybe to talk of more than that.

We need to talk more about bread, I think she just has grain and veggie stew so far, and also figure out what part of the world she's in to determine the likely resources and domesticable! So there's river dolphins, a temperate climate, horses, crocodiles, rabbits, rats, mountains that have icecaps, and wild onions. She's somewhere in Europe or Asia maybe??

If we want to know where we are, then we should teach Bianca about the making of maps. To draw a picture of the world as it would be seen by one one who has flown to the edge of the air and looked down.
Or if she wants to be very fancy, she could build a model of dyed clays. And carve some little statues of people to live in a little fake village.
Very fun!

Gavinfoxx said:

We need to talk more about bread, I think she just has grain and veggie stew so far, and also figure out what part of the world she's in to determine the likely resources and domesticable! So there's river dolphins, a temperate climate, horses, mountains that have icecaps, and onions. She's somewhere in Europe or Asia maybe??

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

O: Be the change you want to see in the thread, provide instructions.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

Shouldn't voting be in this form to actually work? Because some people voted, but in a way which is not registered by the system. Or author wanted format to be different and count things manually?

[ ][Solstice] Dig up the stone, guide the rite, steal the power (Community Management 4 + Distiller 1 + Empathy 1 = 6; Ob 4)

[X] We just write
Whatever Junction thinks is good idea

Anyway Bianca. Say to people: it's proper and good and pretty to carve on wood short stories about dead ancestors, to remember them better and longer. This way they wouldn't forget writing.

When you teach people reading explain to them: to write down the names and deeds of parents, grandparents, and those who came before, this is like keeping their memory alive. Family chronicle! Ask them: "you would want this for yourself, right?" Many would say yes. "So teach your children".

And write also something more fun not only guide to making iron. Guide to iron is useful but boring to read. Make a fun story about heroic defeat of evil unicorn and evil child done thanks to Bianca wisdom of iron weapons. Then children could want to learn to read a fun story.

This is to give people more reasons to retain reading and writing, but reaaon for you is that in the future their written countings will be useful to you.

Many many many winters ago these were your words: "How can the smartest be known?". Now I know. Tell to a person unknown to them long story. Then ask twenty questions about it. The better their answers and the more of answers are right, the better they are at thinking. Written story is better but is obviously more work and person needs to know reading.

You can raise children believing something then they will often still believe it when adults. Like raise children in belief that to disobey village council is very evil and then many would retain weird belief. You are confused how people can obey rules without fear maybe because your people were raised in different beliefs. It's harder to start new beliefs but possible.

Each family can choose one wise person. These wise ones meet to talk about big things that affect everyone. They sit in a circle so all are equal. Each gets a turn to speak. Others listen. When there's a big choice to make, these wise ones talk until most agree. This choice is then for all to follow. This group of wise ones is called a village council. They help solve problems without fighting. The council can choose some to watch for danger, some to settle small fights, some to lead hunts or building. This way, no one person has all the power.

There may be time when some people want to live away but retain peace with cousins. Both villages old one and new one should once per year send wise elder to speak under rules of council and settle disagreements in peace and prevent raiding.

You can use stories and messages to influence the thoughts and actions of the people.

You can create stories that praise unity and cooperation. You can write about heroes who help each other and work together for the good of the community. These stories can show how the heroes become stronger and more successful by working together instead of fighting each other.

You can also spread messages that highlight the dangers of constant fighting and raiding. You can write about the harm it brings to families and how it makes life harder for everyone. By sharing these stories, she can make people understand that peace and cooperation lead to a better and safer life.

To ensure these messages reach everyone, you can carve the stories onto wood and giant stones. These carvings can be placed in all settlements, so people see them every day. The carved wood and stones will serve as constant reminders of the benefits of unity and the dangers of conflict.

You can use symbols and signs to represent unity and strength. You can create a special symbol for your empire that everyone can recognize. This symbol can be carved on stones, painted on walls. Seeing this symbol everywhere will remind people of the benefits of being part of a strong, united empire.

You may also warn of other magic and gods that are very evil if they are not under you. You can tell stories of terrible things that happen when people follow these other powers. Say that only by staying loyal to Bianca and your magic can the people be safe from these dangers. You can teach that other magic brings chaos and harm, while your magic brings order and protection.

Additionally, you can warn of scary monsters and evil magic that threaten their land. You can teach that only by working together and staying united under you can they defend against these dangers. Remember evil unicorn and they overcome evil because of your iron not only their warriors.

By telling stories, spreading messages, carving symbols and stories onto wood and stones, and setting an example, you can influence the thoughts and actions of the people. This will help you build a strong and united empire where most works together for the common good, and for Bianca, under supreme leader Bianca.

You can also encourage the peaceful exchange and help of goods and resources among the people. By setting up gathering places where people can meet and share what they have, like food, tools, and materials, you can ensure that everyone has what they need. Improved ways of gathering food and using resources, through better techniques and tools, can increase production. These measures will lead to more stable and plentiful supplies. As a result, people will have better food, safer paths for travel, and increased wealth, improving their living conditions.

People may learn to exchange peacefully, even with outsiders, and help each other instead of stealing, for several reasons. First, peaceful exchange builds trust and relationships. When people help each other instead of steal, they create bonds that make all stronger. Second, helping each other is safer than raiding. Raiding often leads to injuries and death, while helping each other allows people to get what they need without risking their lives. Third, peaceful exchange ensures a continuous and reliable supply of goods. If people steal, they may get what they need in the short term, but it creates enemies and instability. By helping each other, they can build stable and ongoing relationships that benefit everyone in the long term. Such peaceful relationship of exchange and help is hard for moving people but easiest for two settled people living permanently a walking day from each other.

When people expect to be around someone once it may be useful to steal. But when you expect to be around someone many times, even if not everyday and not living in the same village, it makes more and more sense to peacefully help instead of making enemies. It's harder the less contact there is, but families going away to another place can still retain peace and help with these remaining.

Purely OOC post: Would "Destroy the sacrifice stone" be an acceptable write-in for that mountaintop god cult thing? Particularly if someone took another crack at getting Bianca some explosives.

@LoserThree

There are more useful things for her to focus on.

Anyway, we-who-are-many brought up armour in the last cacophony, but nothing really came of it, so I'll try my best this time. Also a spear and sword.

Spears are simple, easy to use and easy to make, but a good spear design can save a lot of effort. As usual, we might as well cover the basics in case some parts are unclear, unknown or lost in translation.

We will be making a one-handed thrusting spear and so the haft of wood should be at most twice the height of the average man and at minimum one and a half men. The width should be two or three index fingers thick, maybe a bit more towards the middle. The wood should be somewhat springy so as to not shatter when bending but not too soft to withstand the rigours of being used as a weapon. The blade itself will be made of iron, of course and have a roughly teardrop or leaf-shaped head - trees have different leafs but in the area this spear design was very common and so was this kind of leaf - which means that it has a sharp tip slowly widening towards the base before flaring outward at roughly the bottom third of the blade, only to then gracefully curve inward again to the socket. The large flare is optional and usually left out to make the head cheaper, but that is not of consideration to you. It makes it so you can make a better cut on the swing. The length of the blade itself should at least be roughly two lengths of your hand, from wrist to the tip of the middle finger. The socket hereby is a round sleeve of metal in which we will put the haft before securing it with nails. It is important to note that the socket doesn't just end when it reaches the blade, but continues running through it as a central ridgeline slowly growing smaller as it nears the tip - though it should stop bring hollow once inside the main blade. This is very important to give the blade stability and keeps it from bending too much.

When using steel instead, the ridge can be very small, end just a bit above the socket or even be fully discarded, making the spear easier to craft.

The bottom of the spear can either be left as is, be covered with a small cap of metal to keep it from wearing out or if the owner is feeling fancy that cap can be a small spike to defend yourself with in case the spearhead is lost or not able to be brought to bear. It can also serve to counter out whatever weight you put in the spearhead until the whole thing is comfortable to use.

A good weapon to pair this spear with would be a sword, best described as a long knife. Only for you though, because swords require greatly more effort and skill than an axe or mace, with a modest gain in versatility at best. I will teach thou-who-art-mighty how to make a generally useful thrusting and cutting sword as while you will likely fight foes wearing no or only light armour against which slashes are better, thrusting blades are better against armoured foes until they are armoured to such a degree that you can't drive the tip of the blade through their defences on strength alone and I am sure that some of the creatures you will encounter will definitely fall into the armoured category.

The blade I am talking about should be the length of one and a half forearms - the space between your wrist and your elbow - 5 fingers at the widest and four fingers at the thinnest not counting the taper towards the tip. Starting from the hilt, the blade slightly curves together to its thinnest point until a third of the length before curving outwards to its widest two thirds of its length, from where it tapers in a straight line to the pointy tip. In the other direction we have the tang, the part where the handle will go, which should be a square-shaped spike decently longer than a good handle for your hand will go. Slide the handle of your choice onto the blade and try to balance it in such a way that while resting it on a finger that is roughly a third of the blade's length away from the hilt it doesn't tip in one direction. If it tips in direction of the tang, which is very, very unlikely, you have done something that is also very, very wrong. If it tips in the other direction you can either make a fuller, a small channel running the length of the blade, to take away excess weight, or you could weigh down the pommel of your weapon with extra ornamentations or by adding a large guard - stuff on the handle protecting your hand - until it is all balanced.

The last step is to then hammer down the excess of the tang until it has become a solid disk keeping your handle in place.

This design can be made out of iron or steel, but even if you teach people how to make it I frankly don't expect more than a single vanity peace to be made from how much skill and time good swords take to make.

Anyway, armour. I will list some designs for all the materials possibly known to you:

Wicker armour. The simplest and scratchiest armour there can be is to take square shapes of woven reeds like those used for baskets and hang them from your body with cords of leather. I am just listing these out of obligation to cover basic suggestions as that is what we do. They won't protect much beyond ocasionally preventing a cut, but that is still more than nothing for something reasonably quick to make.

Layers of clothing: Wearing multiple layers of clothing can catch arrows, turn away cuts and soften blows.

Cloth Armour: The above but improved to a much greater degree. They are made by taking up to thirty shirts made to the exact same cut, half of them with sleeves and half of them without, and sewing them together so that they are the same shirt. A useful trick hereby is to sew the shirts themselves in such a way that when sewn together that the seams don't overlap. The important thing here is that if properly sewn, the armour can still be moved in relatively easily while offering an incredible baseline of defense that can be combined with pretty much every other piece of armour I will list here, though there is no way to make wearing that much clothing not a sweat ridden mess.

You can do the same to make a padded hat to cover your head.

This style of armour is very good against blunt strikes because of the mass of fabric serving as padding and decent against slashes and piercing.

Leather Armour: When tanning hides there is a way for the resulting leather to be hard and inflexible instead of supple and flexible like normal. To my knowledge this is done by using tannins, the things that cause hides to tan, drawn from plants instead of animal brains or piss. When shaping them, one you can make very well-fitted pieces of armour - and as such easy to wear without chaffing or other problems - that can be worn above cloth armour, adding further to the protection and synergizing nicely as it is better for warding off thrusts or slashes than blunt strikes.

Metal Armour: Metal armour is an expensive but obvious way to protect yourself and the simplest design is to simple hammer sheets of iron and steel into the desired shape and thickness and then drilling holes into it to tie them to your body with cords or twine. This is very cumbersome however and so a more complicated version might be needed, the so called scalemail. It is called that way because it looks like the scales of a fish. You first have to create a bunch of small iron scales, roughly the same size with small holes at the flat end of the scale. You then take a leather chestplate or thick cloth, it has to be somewhat rigid for this purpose, to be used as backing and start attaching the scales from the bottom first. You use strips of cloth or leather to tie them to the backing pointed end of the scale pointing downward, or you use small metal nails to do the same, hammering the tip until it is a flat disk like the flat side. It's technically not actually a nail, but it's close enough in concept that I hope you can figure out the difference as I lack the words to explain them right now, and if not just use the cords. You will just have to replace scales more often. Anyway. For the next row, attack the scales in such a way that the 2nd row covers the attachment point of the 1st row. Repeat until the whole of the backing has been covered in scales.

You can also make these design out of leather, for those warriors too poor to afford the iron.

An alternative arrangement called Lamellar armour exists, where the metal is shaped into rectangles instead, with holes on all four sides. The metal pieces are tied to each other instead of the backing except for the outermost holes, those that have no other squares to connect to. Its mostly a matter of preference and flexibility between those two designs.

Lastly then a piece of armour that will likely be only worth making for yourself, but that is still something to bring up. Namely, chainmail. This type of armour consists of literally thousands of small rings maybe half the width of a finger, half of these already forged solid and half of them still open. They will now be woven together in such a way that four other rings goes through each ring - a four in one pattern. The still open rings are closed in this process, either through heating them up and hammering them shut or by using the not-nails we mentioned above, but again, that's just a matter of convenience and not too important for a one-off made for yourself. If properly woven and made, you will now hold a literal tunic of iron or steel that is as flexible as one made of cloth and more durable than anything else known to the people or yourself. Also more expensive, of course.

If you want to make it even fancier - and take even more time. You can make it longer until it falls down to your knees - not further than that and leave slits front, back and at the sides to make movement easier - or give it sleeves. You can also increase the number of intersecting rings to a six in one or even an eight in one patter and it is also possible to weave a second layer of chainmail in parts that might be worth reinforcing like a square directly over your chest to protect your organs or around the neck and shoulder areas where you are likely to be struck.

Further pieces of chainmail garments be be socks, glooves or a veil hanging from a metal helmet to protect your face and neck.

This is another 1.7k, while my first post was 2k, so this would be the struggle post to vote for if people want to give bianca some armour and weapons.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

liberty90 said:

This is not even possible all at the same time, according to mechanics.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

I don't see why not? The heroine gets an action, the people are told how to act with the bog iron, the Plunder is a single big action that might take a few days tops and the syphoning of power is the one that probably takes the longest.