Part 201: MortuusLupus: Update 2
mid-winter, 149
The Mayor's decided he's tired of waiting on his production request. Mother's demands for golden toys superceded bobthethurd's request for a battleaxe. He's decided that Anticheese bears responsibility for this. How can an animal caretaker possibly satisfy a metalsmithing demand? His punishment is a single hammerstrike, but I fear even this could kill him. The hammerer is contained, for now, but will need food and water lest he perish, and I fear his death would lead to retaliation against the people.
Already, I fear I may have angered the wrong people.
With the hammerer locked in his room, it seems the guard retaliated by throwing bobatron behind bars and forbidding anyone from bringing him food or drink. He died of exposure.
Something doesn't seem right, though. There are plenty of places they could have put him, why out on the roof in the bitter cold where none would go? Mother says it's what he deserved, for not knowing his place. But again, how would he be made an example of if
A member of the guard rushes in, breathless: Your grace! We are all in terrible danger!
Tarezax wrote :-
Wait, I'm the hammerer now? I thought I was a lowly thresher!
----------------------------------------------------------------
Locked in his room, the hammerer hums a mournful tune to himself, gently caressing the engraved surfaces of his hammer with his callused fingertips. As he sings, the flames of his -horse tallow candles(3)- flicker in response, as if answering his words.
In ages past, when the Great Miasma finally departed from the surface world, his ancestors were the first to climb from their crude tunnels to greet the Goddesses as they descended from the Heavens. Their clans became the first of the Order of the Song, shunned for embracing the surface world, yet valued for their gifts of music and knowledge from the Heavens. In time, the Order was called upon to defend the growing Mountainhomes against the many enemies that made their homes in the newly risen land. From these defenders came the third avatar of Armok, who was the first to use the Song in battle. Clad in the divine-metal and shouting in the tongue of the Goddesses, he entered a state of focused rage and determination, smashing goblin and troll alike into a bloody paste with his great maul. Ever since, the devotees of the Song of Blood have carried on his legacy, taking up the Hammer to strike down evil wherever it may be found.
The words engraved into his hammer shine in the candles' light.
Was yea ra chs hymmnos mea-
Was yea ra omness chs sacra sos yor-
I will gladly turn myself into a song.
I will gladly turn my life to blood for you.
The dwarves of Syrupleaf do not understand him. They fear his strange attire. They fear the words he sings in the Goddesses' alien tongue. Most of all, they fear his elaborately decorated +<<*Steel War Hammer*>>+.
This troubles him. He should be a symbol of valor and a paragon of justice. His songs should bring hope to the weary and comfort to the fearful. Yet time and again, he finds himself called upon to strike down the people he swore to protect.
This fortress has much to fear. His predecessor gave up the Rites of Blood in order to aid in Syrupleaf's defense. Perhaps he, too, heard the sounds echoing from the gaping maws of the abominations now surrounding the fortress. The Warped Ones, the demons spawned of the one called Holistic, sing a broken song. They sing the laments of the Earth, echoes of wounds from long ago, before even the Great Miasma.
The Spawn call out. And deep below, from the pits where the divine-metal was found, the wounded Earth answers.
The last of the candles flickers out, and the hammerer continues singing.
It's an LP crossover! 