Winning Vote:
[X] Plan It's A Start.
-[X] Teach your apprentices. [Cost: 1 Action] Locked in for 7 turns.
-[X] [Simple] Defence. In. Depth Pt1: [Cost: (2-1) =1 actions] Productivity Like No Other Will proc. 1 Action
-[X] [Simple] Runic Warmachines: [Cost: 2 actions] Productivity Like No Other will proc. Apprentice Action.
-[X] [Difficult] Trollslayer Pt. 1: [Cost: 1 actions] If a rune you want requires special ingredients that you don't have access to I will alert you. If I am given the choice you won't have to worry about that. Good rule of thumb on if it will likely need ingredients is if it's a Master Rune or it's a rune you've developed and know it will need ingredients you don't have. 1 Action
--[X] Choose: Master Rune of Conduction, Rune of Might, Rune of Impact.
-[X] The Rune Metal Pt. 2: You've found a connection between Runes and Gromril, but it feels like just the beginning of something greater. You've found that in a moment of clarity, that Pure Gromril is especially important for the Master Rune of Gromril because of that inherent purity. With a recent look at actual Pure Gromril, you can say for certain there's more to it than simple physical purity. [Cost: (6-4) =2 Actions] Student of the Odd will proc. 2 Actions
…
You spend the first few years of this decade in your workshop, determined to crack the secret that lies
just out of reach. A tantalizing prize you must strain your mind to reach.
Of course, while you're busy learning you leave your apprentices the unenviable task of working on a treatise describing the most efficient way of inscribing the correct Rune array on a hypothetical backlog of five and three dozen Bolt and Grudge Throwers respectively.
Of course, you knew the answer, having planned out everything with the Guildmaster weeks prior, but you wanted to see how badly they bungled things up to know just how much remedial learning the two of them needed
You further explain to your young charges that both you and the Guildmaster had also planned out a bit of collaborative teaching, your apprentices chanting the right of Forging as apprentice engineers hammered away on some machines that didn't pass muster and were destined for deconstruction. No actual runes still of course, but the experience of having to coordinate with others would be invaluable in the future. Runesmiths had to coordinate with a bevy of guilds and craftsmen to get their duties seen to, and dealing with a bunch of beardlings their age would do them some good.
You slam the door on Dolgi's eager grin and Fjolla's look of distaste. The former clearly happy to be working on the type of runes he failed the least in and the latter clearly because she feared gaining yet another would-be suitor.
That bit of humour done and the next two or so years of teaching squared away, you look back at your work table. The geode glinting in the light of your runes and samples of Raw, Refined and Purified Gromril you forged yourself.
By Grungni's beard, you were getting to the bottom of this!
…
The sound of yet another explosion rattles the workshop, both apprentices, long since used to the noise, wait patiently in the main hosting area of the workshop. The final drafts of their papers waiting on a table for their master to pick apart.
"He's been in there a year longer than expected," Dolgi says for the umpteenth time.
"Aye, and he'll leave when he's good and ready," Fjolla says, voice full of conviction.
"Think we'll ever be like that one day?" he mutters, still staring at the door.
"How so?"
"Just… just like that you know?" Dolgi says floundering to find the right words.
"Obsessive over something to the degree that we hole ourselves up in our workshops for years on end? Or so proficient at Runecraft that we can do the work of two masters in half the time? Or maybe- "
"Yes!" Dolgi exclaims, "It all seems...so far you know? One day who knows how far away we'll be sent off as journeymen, then come back with some profound insight that I'm sure Master Snorri will have known since he was a beardling. How do we live up to that?"
"Don't rightly know. Seems exciting to try though, innit?" Fjolla says, a small smile gracing her lips, "Always learning, never stopping to find a new way to get better and better at what we do, knowing there are places we'll always be reaching for til the day we go back to the Underearth"
"Yeah...yeah, I think I could live with a life like that," Dolgi agrees, a similar smile on his lips.
"Course you'll have a lot of catching up to do, with Klorah and a family to take care of," she jokes.
"You make it sound like her father said yes," Dolgi stutters.
She needs only to look at him, eyebrow raised.
"I'm not marrying her till I become a master," he says, voice adamant.
She looks harder.
"I swear on my honour!"
She keeps looking.
"I Dolgi Embermane, swear on my
beard that I won't marry Klorah Silvereyes until I attain the rank of master," he says with finality and sincerity in equal measure.
"Good motivation to be a master at least," Fjolla half laughs, acquiescing to the sacrosanct nature of an oath made on a dwarf's beard.
"Yeah, I gue- " whatever the other is about to say is cut off by a final thundering boom. Though the workshop doesn't so much as shake at the force, being made to withstand such stresses, the echoing sound reverberates throughout the building regardless.
Followed immediately after by the sight of the door sliding open, smoke billowing out ina heady torrent before the Runes of Filtration dutifully siphon and clean it.
Standing there, in an outfit that looks as immaculate as the day they last saw him in it, is Snorri Gift Giver, Runelord of Kraka Drakk.
He scoffs, adjusting his coat then turns to face them.
"Those your papers?" he says, acting as if he hasn't spent three years in his workshop completely isolated from the hold.
"Yes Master!"
"Hmmph, I'll read them on the way, come along now you two. We're just in time for you to get about that training exercise with the apprentice engineers while I go and apologize to the Guildmaster," he says, nodding to himself and moving to the door.
They follow him dutifully.
…
Funny just how much the words "Runelord Business" can excuse.
It was well known how obsessive a Runelord with a lead to a new Rune or avenue of research could get, you were no exception. Examples of your contemporaries holing themselves up for decades after squaring away their affairs, to emerge only after they'd finished their research were common enough to be a recognizable pattern. Others were more moderate, setting aside a set time for research and another for going about their duties and adhering to that schedule stringently.
But inspiration, for all that dwarfs wish it wasn't the case, struck at the oddest times. And many a Runelord and Runesmith ended up getting caught up in their work to the detriment of their other commitments.
You remember a Runelord who forgot his wedding, becoming so engrossed in his work that he didn't realize until a month later.
He found his would-be bride waiting for him at the altar, in the same dress, the lass having prepared it every day then waiting at the altar for hours on end before going home to eat and sleep, for an entire month waiting for his return.
You don't envy his fate.
Still, it didn't do for a dwarf to be late to their meetings, or miss deadlines, Runelord Business wasn't a get off scot-free excuse after all. As that Runelord likely learned.
That's why any decent Runelord or Runesmith had a clause that absolved them of guilt in the event of an "epiphany or some other discovery of such import that it would delay their ability to complete an order, by so and so amount of time."
Of course, this also stipulated you paying the client back for invoking this clause and for taking up their time in such a manner. Something many a Runesmith and Runelord was fine with doing and something some of the greatest members of the Burudin were known for doing rather often actually. So much so that they usually added a decade on to the completion date as standard practice. Even then, it sometimes still ended up having the clause needing to be invoked.
You, of course, hadn't needed to invoke the clause more than 6 times this past century, all but the last for a reason that led to a bounty of knowledge.
You still think there's an argument to be had about sentry goats, but that was for another day.
But a few hundred pounds of gold and a missed deadline were well worth your discovery.
Pure Gromril
wasn't pure. Or well, it was just
physically pure.
It came to you one night, deep into the frigid cold, your rune torch burning bright as you poured over notes. You remember knocking the torch and a vial over as you reached to refill your tankard with more ale. Looking over at your mess, you slowly set the ale down, instead you watched with almost childlike fascination as the light of the torch bounced off the scintillating crystals of the geode and through the coloured glass.
The light was impure.
Yet you could see not a speck of impurity in the crystal, perfectly formed in the geode.
What was there was pure, but the light was dimmed, distorted by an outside source. The green glass of the vial muddying the otherwise perfectly clear light.
It struck you like a hammer blow.
Pure Gromril was
only physically pure. The essence itself though was tainted by the nature of its environment and existence. The decay of Warpstone as it broke apart in the face of reality and dispersed back into the raw stuff of the Realm of Chaos tainting the Gromril that was right next to it so thoroughly that the whole seam was infected.
So now you knew, you think, but it left a burning question.
How did you purify it?
You spend that last year making ever more destructive attempts to purify the Gromril, but make not a speck of progress. Even still, the thought will take up the corner of your mind for the rest of the decade as you go about your delayed schedule.
…
Thane Ironarm is as imposing as you recall. An elderly dwarf almost into his 5th century of life, with a beard only a shade darker than yours. In one arm was a richly decorated helm, the winged decorations noticeably absent and in their place a great set of curling horns.
The man was wearing his customary outfit of solid Gromril plates overtop a chainmail shirt of what was no doubt the strongest steel available to him. Beneath which, richly decorated leather and equally comfortable padding no doubt stopping any chaffing. The armour bearing Runes blazing on its surface.
Okay work, you suppose.
One of the contenders for the future king of the hold, not that he knew of course, as well as the commander of the army that fought back
The Greedy One's horde while you duelled its master. The man came to you decades ago, requesting a weapon worthy of commemorating that titanic battle and only now have you come to him with a design you feel worthy.
For the past few hours, you have been explaining and consulting the technical details of the man's future weapon, from the weight of the Pure Gromril head, its shape and even the material of the axe shaft itself. You both have settled on a large two-handed greataxe. The single bearded blade will be an imposing butt spike to balance out the weight with a shaft of some of the finest Wutroth the thane will contribute himself.
"The head is decorated to visualize the effect the Runes will have," you explain, pointing to the final sketch of the design you envisioned.
"A meteor?" Thane Ironarm asks, more confused by the symbology than your ability to replicate the phenomenon you're sure.
"Aye. The Runes I'll put on it will mean the axe head grows bright as it heats up, then as you strike the enemy that energy is released in an expanding bubble of force, heat and air. The fact that your axe will have dug into its flesh beforehand will only make the resulting explosion more destructive. Of course, the bearer won't feel a bit of the knockback, be a waste of energy you see. I mean, not unless you've stuck your face right next to it, " you finish with a satisfied smile.
You see his eyes light up in understanding. The dwarf traces the intricate blueprint of the axe with a newfound appreciation.
"Clan Ironarm will honour this gift for as long as our bloodline endures Rhunrikki," the beardling says with a deep bow, his retainers following his example.
You snort.
"Better be beardling, I had to wait twenty years for the Magma Dragon Blood to get here so I could get to work."
You respectfully ignore the man's sputter.
He should be grateful your apprentices were currently out trying to work with those apprentice engineers.
…
You end the decade on a high note.
Finishing the first part of Kraka Drakk's defences.
Ahead of you the now cleared field is a perfect location for the dozens of runically enhanced artillery pieces and guard towers all along the walls to fire on, every last meter ranged and memorized by the crews for accurate firing.
A wall consisted of at least two meters thick and ten meters tall of stone reinforced by bars of steel and in some places Gromril. The walls themselves were inscribed with Runes of Warding and Preservation to make the granite even more difficult to break, built in such a way that the rubble would only provide further obstacles to climb through.
Of course, each wall had a gatehouse and accompanying moat and drawbridge. The structure of each gatehouse was such that it had two doors. A Gromril plated Portcullis and a larger thicker stone gate behind, with larger versions of your Alchemical flame throwers in between. All three mechanisms controlled from inside the gatehouse by a system of pulleys for the gates and Runes for your fiery death traps. The drawbridge was built from imported Wutroth reinforced with Gromril bars, and could be raised in fifteen secondsthanks to the Rune of Waking that would aid the dwarfs in charge of the pulley system behind it.
Then the moat, a ditch at least two meters wide and three meters deep. But It was no ordinary moat, no this moat was meant to be flooded, not with water, but with
lava. Lava sourced from pits built inside the guard towers, that bore Runes of Heat, Insulation and Warding that allowed any scrap stone from mining or construction to be melted down and then through clever rune enhanced pipework to be used to flood the ditch in a minute or less. The lava kept in a liquid state with yet more Runes on the stone side. Easily able to be simply shunted away or put back with a bit of clever fluid engineering… and Runes.
Now repeat this,
seven times.
Each time the wall grew larger and denser and the moat deeper and wider until you reached the final gatehouse, walls 5 meters thick and 20 meters high of Runed stone and metal. With titanic pools of lava ready to turn the depression in front of it into a river of molten death.
But, this was only the start.
The final plans called for a great network of tunnels, collapsible in the case of breach of course, that stretched from the hold into a series of barracks, watchtowers and artillery emplacements nestled and hidden in the nearby mountains. Turning the entire cleared area into a killing field with artillery now capable of raining down on them from all sides. Of course, artillery alone wasn't enough. Your plan called for the entire clearing to be made ruinous to march through. Using great underground pipes that were going to crisscross all throughout the plain, all meant to flood the earth with water and with the aid of Runes of Warmth turn the field into a quagmire of sticky, suffocating mud.
Defence. In. Depth.
…
Gain:
- Combo Unlocked:
Meteorfall: Strikes from this weapon hit like an object from the void striking the earth, an explosion of energy that expresses itself through heat, air and fire aimed solely at the enemy. [Blows from this weapon cause an expanding Bubble of energy that forces itself to expand despite whatever may be stopping it.]
[Master Rune of Conduction, Rune of Might, Rune of Impact.]
- Rune Metal Pt 3 Unlocked. Find a way to remove the metaphysical impurity from the Gromril.
- Defence in Depth Pt2. Unlocked.
Nowhere is safe.
- Trait: Mind for Metal: Every 3 research actions used for Gromril add 1 free action's worth of progress. Work with all Gromril tiers will be improved.
AN: wooh this one took longer than I thought. Anyway C&C and thanks for reading. :^)
