Winning Vote:
[X]Glumi: The old ranger walking over, his cowl covering everything save his beard in shadow. At your nod, the elder simply sits down on the log to your right and pulls out his own tankard before putting it underneath the spigot on your keg.
…
You watch the old dwarf curiously, the foaming mug lifted to his lips is emptied in a moment before he returns for a second helping.
Impressive how he goes through the ale, like clockwork really. Pour, lift, drink, repeated over seven times before at last, he turns to you with an air approaching contentment about him.
"Good enough," he mutters before eyeing you appraisingly.
"Elder," you greet him verbally.
"Been busy these last few years haven't you lad?" the elder says, taking another drink from his mug before continuing, "talk of you and your king clearing more fjords than any other throng assigned to the task. Not too terrible."
"My thanks, Elder," you respond, knowing that even this much was high praise indeed.
"Bah," Glumi says with no real heat.
You look at the old dwarf again, his size about matching yours even as he hunches over the keg to refill his mug for….actually you aren't sure how many times it's been. You're fairly certain he's done it a few times without you noticing though, given how the keg is noticeably lighter.
Old ranger distraction tactics.
"How have things been on your end Elder?" you ask conversationally.
"Feh, well enough beardling. Can't have ourselves dawdling in the face of Grimnir now can we?" the ranger chuckles.
"Nai, we certainly can't," you agree.
Glumi drinks once more, downing the contents of the impressively large mug in a single gulp then letting out a quiet burp.
"This takes me back," the dwarf says quietly.
At your questioning glance, he snorts in amusement before explaining.
"Back when it was just me and my closest companions. Quieter then, fewer beasties to kill, fewer things to worry about. Good days back then, the best days."
"Where are they now?" You ask.
"Around," the old ranger chortles cryptically.
You nod, realizing that's about as good as you'll get out of him.
(Roll, Glumi Hints: 51 +15[A shared story] +10[A shared brew] =76, DC: ??? -??? =70)
"But as much as I'd like to sit and think about those days, I have too much to do right now to spend wool gathering. Something I'm sure you're all too aware of," he says with a chuff.
"Aye," you say, your own mind going back to lighter, warmer days.
"Still, does one good to go back to the beginning now and again eh? A good reminder about how we got here, and maybe we even find a bit of help in the memories," Glumi finishes with a sagely nod.
You both pass the night quietly drinking from the keg, eventually, you get up and leave the old ranger with the now empty barrel. Bidding him a good night to which he simply waves before reaching your tent and falling asleep in your bed.
…
Your mind takes you back. Back through time to the day you duelled the Greedy One. It is an odd experience, relieving the memory but with none of the associated pain or accompanying concussion. You are a passenger as your dream body repeats itself, goring the beast through the abdomen, then slowly, inexorably pushing it off the edge of the cliff.
You can't do much, but you do control your eyes.
So with nothing better to do, you take a look around. Taking in the sights of that day from your bent over position. You finally notice the glint of steel and cloud of dust as the throng marches down the hill towards you, desperately trying to get to you in time. You see the oddly bent shape of your leg and the limp position of your arm as you move, the phantom feeling of a broken limb pulsing in your mind.
Eventually, you look at the dream recreation of the Greedy One in all its putrid glory. Your eyes make out the slowly bloating form of its body, the twitching fur and currents of energy that course through it. Oddly enough you realize the cracks and eruptions of leaking energy grow denser around its torso, their trajectory pointing towards its heart from what you can tell. Which isn't much, considering your head is facing downwards on account of impaling the bastard with the horns on your helm, but still.
You watch with a quiet fascination as the creature topples over the edge. Your mind feeling the rustle of a warm summer's wind pass your face even as you stare transfixed at the great balloon of a Troll plummet to its doom. The cracks and bulging energy leaking out clear as day despite the growing distance.
The explosion pushes your dream body and by extension your trapped conscious, up and away. For a moment time slows, allowing you to take in the scene around you as the dream you flies through the air. From the brightly lit and cloudless sky to the clumps of earth and rock flying past you-
-there!
Out of the corner of your eye, you see it. Flying away from the crater in chunks the size of your hand. Mesmerizing you and drawing your eye without your control you gaze and see-
-shards of the
void.
You wake up with a snort, your sleep and by extension the dream you were having ended by the loud call of a particularly ornery goat.
Unbidden, an idea springs up in your mind. Only for you to curse as you realize you can't really do anything about it right now. Well, you have time maybe, but not until after you get home. Glumi was right, perhaps your past
did have the answer you were searching for. You have a feeling in the roots of your beard hair, that something
important is at the site of the Greedy One's death. When you get home, you have a trip to a crater to plan for whenever you have the time.
…
(Roll, Snorri Y9: 71 +50[Cumulative Bonuses] =121)
(Roll, Throng Y9: 14 +45[Cumulative Bonuses] =59)
The year of campaigning is a mixed bag.
Grimnir pushes the Throng through the southern wastes, ones infested with trolls. Trolls that oddly enough seem to hone in on the Throng of Kraka Drakk specifically.
Many times over, your position is pressed more heavily than others whenever the Throng faces a group of trolls in those icy plains, the Greedy Trolls, seemingly attracted to you specifically, press their hordes of lesser kin upon your position without fail. But paradoxically your throng is also well equipped to deal with the creatures, their weapons instilling fear into the beasts that they're usually too dumb to feel. In fact it's perhaps due to this that so many dwarfs of Kraka Drakk survive the numbers bearing down on them. The phenomena becomes so noticeable that Grimnir uses the situation to your advantage. Placing the strongest segments of the Great Throng to your force's right and left. Bidding Otrek to draw his Throng back in a feigned retreat, letting the pursuing group of Trolls fall into an encirclement and be slaughtered wholesale.
There was a bit of trouble halfway through the year when Otrek and his Huskarls are accosted by a particularly large Greedy Troll that sweeps away the King's bodyguards with its makeshift club before going for the king himself. Thankfully, you manage to cast Wrath and Ruin on the creature, stopping its charge dead and chucking your hammer at its head. The weapon flies true, scoring a devastating blow that renders the Troll headless and the king thankful.
Thankfully the rest of the year goes by a bit more smoothly, though you can't help but notice that the number of Greedy Trolls you face is growing steadily more numerous.
It is slightly disconcerting, not that you ever show it.
…
(Roll, Snorri Y10: 3 +50[Cumulative Bonuses] =53)
(Roll, Throng Y10: 91 +45[Cumulative Bonuses] =136)
The troubles of the last year are just as apparent in the final year of the campaign.
You are in the final stages of clearing the last of the beasts out of the southern tundra. The last act of the campaign before the Great Throng marches back up North towards Kraka Drakk and through Trollbane Pass. The fighting is fierce, despite the Great Throng having passed through here as they marched north in the first place, the number of Trolls present doesn't seem at all affected.
In a fitting twist, during a battle in the final months of that year, you find yourself surrounded by a group of Greedy Trolls that, in a desperate and rage-filled act, used their horde of thralls as a meatshield to break through your line and attempt to kill you specifically. You found yourself fighting seven of the damn creatures for a good minute or two before the edge of
Trollslayer appeared out of one's back, followed shortly by the King and his bodyguards.
Yet despite their timely intervention, the fight is no walk in the market, two of the Trolls carry sacks laden with no doubt
stolen dwarf goods and who knows what else and use them as makeshift weapons to terrifying effect. The climax of the fight occurring after these two trolls literally swat away the King's remaining Huskarls with their loot bags. In recompense, you and Otrek both behead a troll each. At the battle's end, the Throng combs through the detritus of the Greedy Troll's hoards as has slowly become custom as the Great Throng cleared the wastes. They find many dead dwarfs' lost goods as per usual, but in this instance, they also find the corpses of the trolls' half-eaten
meals.
You remember clenching your fist at the sight of some of those
meals.
After everything is tallied and the goods prepared to be sent off and taken by the surviving relatives, you find yourself in the possession of the corpses of four incredibly large birds. Most of the bodies are half-eaten and rotted beyond useability, but you manage to salvage enough feathers for maybe 4 complete Runes.
Despite the shadow such a thing casts, the Throng of Kraka Drakk does incredibly well for itself the rest of the year. You, on the other hand, are not able to do much else save act as glorified troll bait, seeing as the Greedy Trolls are almost always looking to have a go at killing you. Not a glorious thing for a Runelord to be doing but no one can question your commitment to the cause. And though you keep it to yourself, you feel like
personally crushing a few Greedy Trolls after spending the past two years looking through, organizing and sometimes burying their ill-gotten spoils.
…
The return of the Great Throng is a momentous celebration for Kraka Drakk. Again the sight of dwarfs farther than the eye can see graces the horizon in front of the hold. The silvery gleam of Gromril and steel contrasting with the ever-darkening sky, defying the dark mood it brings. The Royal family stands at the gates where Otrek and you stood a decade ago, Prince Gloin standing at the fore with his mother and sister behind him, waiting to greet both Ancestor and their patriarch.
You'd give it to the boy, he managed to not snap shut like a rat trap at the imposing visage of Grimnir, merely a bit stilted in his delivery.
You're certain Otrek is proud of his performance, even if he might not show it until he's in the privacy of his own home.
Grimnir for his part ignores the beardling's bumbling and plays his role without fail.
Thankfully the ceremony is a short one, both for the sake of the Throng and the young Prince, and you once again come face to face with your, not quite as young, charge. Idly you realize you've missed the girl's 70th birthday because of your campaign.
"Snerra, I see you haven't bungled up the tasks I left you too badly," you grouse down at the young gi- -no, young woman.
"The material's been ordered, I've done the tablet exercise a further 4000 times and the work you wanted me to do is waiting in the workshop Master!" the dwarf says brightly.
"Bah," you mutter, "I'll be the judge of that apprentice!"
"Yes master!"
"Bah!"
Too damn cheerful.
…
The weeks after the Throng's arrival see much work being done. Despite the frequency and size of the celebration undertaken by Kraka Drakk, the work needed to haul the supplies of an army of this size down into the depths of the hold and into the Underway is completed exactly on schedule. Soon enough King Otrek is hosting a final feast to commemorate the Throng's departure and you are face to face with young prince Stonehammer once more.
"Rhunrikki," the dwarf says greeting you.
"Prince Stonehammer, I have your answer," you respond, cutting straight into the heart of the matter.
The young dwarf nods seriously, letting you continue.
"I-"
[ ] Accept: Take on [Difficult] Dowry Pt. 1:
The King of Ungor wants two cloaks? By Grungni you'll give him two cloaks! Damn finest cloaks anyone will ever see! Must be completed in four turns starting Turn 15.
- [ ] Accept Amulet, Combo: Add Amulet to items in [Difficult] Dowry Pt. 1:
Tell the king you'll take on the Amulet Request as well, what's one more task on the pile?
- [ ] Accept Amulet, Separate: Take on [Difficult] Takeaway Talisman Pt. 1:
You'll take on the amulet but it may take a while longer to do.
- [ ] Refuse Amulet: Do not take on [Difficult] Takeaway Talisman Pt. 1:
You won't be able to do the amulet and the cloaks together, only finding that you have enough time for both.
[ ] Refuse: Do not take on [Difficult] Dowry Pt. 1:
You don't see it possible with the schedule you have.
- [ ] Accept Amulet: Take on [Difficult]Takeaway Talisman Pt. 1:
You can't do two cloaks, but you can certainly fit in an amulet.
- [ ] Refuse Amulet: Do not take on [Difficult]Takeaway Talisman Pt. 1:
For the same reasons, you cannot take on this request either.
The prince nods, thanks you for your time and heads off.
…
Gain:
- An Epiphany from the Elderly! 1d2+ 1 =3 Progress to the Rune Metal Pt. 4, New Totals:
[Cost: 8 -3 =5 Actions]
- +1 Progress on Torques a Plenty, New Totals:
[Cost: 3 -1 =2 Actions]
- +4 Great Eagle's Feathers
- Oathgold Ordered,
[Cost: 1 Turn]
…
There will be a two-hour moratorium for discussion.
AN: We return to normal turns after this. Thankfully. As it is, I have a few flaws in this system I wanna solve before doing this again. IRL time commitment for what is in actuality very little time covered IC notwithstanding, the issue of format is one that comes to my mind as well. As an aside you probably wont see many to any more updates this week as its Finals for me. Sorry about that, but anywho thanks for reading and don't forget to C&C :^)
NOTE: Regarding the mechanical difference regarding the amulet as a combo vs the amulet on its own, itll mostly be narrative but also mean you have 3 different rune combos to make/theme to make/make me come up with instead of just two with a minor mechanical change regarding overflow and how much you can do before it becomes a waste. Not that I'll tell you what that limit is. :^V
