-From the journal of Azguuruk, Axe Lord of Blackhold-
14th Lead
The badgermen lay dead at our feet. They attacked with all their ferocity, especially the honey badgers among them, and were killed to the last. They may be our foes, but let none speak ill of them, as in this battle none of them were wanting of courage and none attempted to retreat.
The orcs celebrated their victory, and the warchief raised a mug to the slain badgermen in honor of their bravery in the face of orcish might. The following morning, amid the ample hangovers, a snaga atop a tree on lookout duty blew the merchant horn, assembling those not too debilitated to move from their hovels to bring the remains of the battle to the depot – The clanorcs from the south had come to trade in the wake of the siege's defeat.
However close behind came a small horde of stranglers and bears, which had the decidedly irate warriors called up to fight. Unsurprisingly, the stranglers were not but fodder for their blades and spears, and the bears fled the field without their screeching chimp-like handlers. To the surprise of many, the liaison arrived bearing aged parchment bearing the council seal: Blackhold was to be made an official clanhold!
After conferring with the rest of the clan, Morbai returned with their consensus and stated that the clan agreed by vote that she should assume the position, if for no other purpose than her having always been the young hold's leader. The miners and builders insisted upon a solid and defensible abode, as was fitting for an orcish leader. In the meantime, crude accommodation was established underground, making use of the spaciousness to provide a mask of proper value.
A “study” was also built, a thinker of sorts building it so that the many old chests discovered below the hold. Some of the goods uncovered were placed around the new “rooms” for Morbai, to allow it to be considered valuable. The remaining dreamwalkers were also finally given homes below the temple.
And in reprisal of the past assault by the dwarves, Bolugd commissioned the Freelancers to raid a dwarven hillock. That particular group of raiders were not heard from again. Following this, the design plans for the clean leader's manor were laid out, and a mason building the needed tables for the dining room began behaving oddly.
The mason was quick to seize silk, yarn, shale, and elf bone and set to work. Possessions such as this usually herald things of terror or fortune (sometimes simultaneously,) and sure enough the enemy came: Beak wolves.
Two groups from the south, one from the east, this group lead by the “general” of the beak wolf hordes. Bolugd mustered the warriors and lead his squad for the enemy leader, while sending the rest of the warband after the foes to the south.
The general escapes in the ensuing slaughter, resulting in Bolugd loosing a roar most horrific in his rage at the coward's escape. The roar seems to trigger a completion of the great work, and a bed of sublime make is the result of the possession, a frame of spiked shale with a mattress of finest silk.
And in celebration of the crushing and bloody victory (that left only two orcs with minor bite injuries,) Senshuken grants a name to his mighty kite shield: “Swamppaged, The Shorn Cosmos.” Winter passes after this, the Morbai Estate rising up in the months that go by. As the drow come to trade and orcs drag up bins of goods, Lugbok sounds the alarm from atop the mead hall: Gnomes!
This batch come baring real weapons even, sabers alongside mallets and they're lead by both a master Speargnome and master Axegnome. The Orange Plagues march on the swordgnomes to the south, while the Demonic Glens face the northern hammergnomes.
The north group is driven off, but an over-eager snaga without his bow charges into the fray and pays for his recklessness: His arms are horrendously gnawed by the many bobcats the gnomes rode into battle, and his body covered is bruises that made his skin appear brown rather than the normal dark olive of his skin. To the south however, the battle goes much worse.
The gnome ran the orc through with his saber, shattering ribs. The orc lashed out, crushing the head of the gnome's bobcat but this does little to deter the small fellow. He leaps from the dying cat's back screaming bloody murder and sends the warrior on his back with sharp pain in their ribs as the gnome collided with him. The orc tries to stand, but suddenly darkness overtakes him, the gnome having scrambled to his feet and striking while the orc was low to the ground, a copper saber punching through the bottom of his head.
Beirus goes into a frenzy at the death, and quickly slices a gnome in half and bites down on the neck of a another, shaking her violently until she was a limp husk, head barely clinging to her tiny shoulders. He spat the dead gnome out and glared menacingly at the gnome who killed one of his warriors.
The gnome started running, dropping his saber into the mud with a splop.
He didn't get far.
Beirus barged through four other gnomes and their mounts, hurling his saber at the fleeing little creature, where it stuck hard, sending the gnome crashing to the ground with the steel blade buried in his lower back! Beirus kept advancing, whipping his shield at a gnome hard enough to knock her from her attacking bobcat, which found itself viciously smashed into a tree in one fluid motion.
The gnome tried to crawl away, but it was useless. He saw another gnome get sent flying past him by either a punch or kick, and then felt the large boot of the orc on him. He was seized by his left arm and head, thick green fingers forced into his mouth for a better hold, and after an agonizing thirty seconds, death followed, Beirus having pulled the gnome in half.
The few gnomes who hadn't gotten into the fight yet turned and ran at the sight, Beirus having taken on the appearance of a manifestation of the gnomes very nightmares: A towering abomination, strong enough to tear gnomes asunder with naught but its hatred for their kind!
The slain Dragon Warrior is buried with honor in wake of the battle, and the wounded snaga is treated quickly and a bow thrust into his hands for the future. Some two weeks later, the thaw comes and with it come the raiders looking for work. Bolugd sends them to raid merchant guild shipping, and within days a small mercenary taskforce from The Knotted Empire comes seeking retribution for the failed raid.
In the initial volley, to the horror of the warband, Lat's child had followed them into the field. The orc child didn't survive, being struck by a single arrow to the head.
The warriors crash into the Imperial mercenaries, and only their leader thanks to his horse, escapes the massacre.
Weeks pass, the child buried and both slain given proper headstones atop their graves. A new standard is made from the scalps of gnome and man, and a great orcish factory is build, with a cellar for storing of farmed trees.
In celebration of this, a warrior bestows the name of “Disappearing Peace” upon the toothed spear they bore into battle. Gradbul does the same, the olog naming his shield “The Join of Radiance.” The first thing done with the new factory, was the bulk production of clay bricks to build a great monument of some... Vagueness.
Goblins come as spring ends, and pursuing them come the pandashi warrior monks, spotted by a wandering condor that quickly flies away. The warriors set upon them quickly, the enemy's leader being the first to be felled. They are quickly slaughtered by the superior martial might of the orcs, and their bodies rapidly stripped of weapons, armor, and anything else that could be used to pry any needed gear from the goblin merchants.
As summer came, the monument rose, a pyramid of sorts, with plans for many spikes to sit patiently in the center for any rare captives taken in battle to be hurled upon, their deaths intended to honor the ancestors. But that would have to wait, as stranglers came hot on the heels of the summer caravan from the reservations.
The foul ape-things quickly set upon the caravan while the warband rushes to meet threats closer to the residencies of the clan, swarming over the wagons and smashing them with frenzied shrieking and driving the merchants away, though their guards exact a heavy toll on the apes in reprisal. The stress of the even proves too great for one merchant, and both they and their pack auruchs go mad, gibbering nonsense and mooing in bizarre patterns.
In wake of the stranglers, beak wolves make an appearance as well, and the warriors set out without rest into the fray. The Dragon Warriors under fight bravely, scoring many kills on their own while the Orange Plauges split up, two warriors facing one pack, two facing another. There were no survivors amongst the hated vermin.
Months go by, and a wall is raised using the factory's ability to turn out copious sums of earthenware bricks from the ample quantities of clay both on-site and imported. In honor of the many dead enemies slain, Senshuken names his saber “The Sickened Spark,” while Thrak dubs his “The Alchemical Recreation.” Days later, Gradbul follows suit, naming his maul “Cacklefuschia.”
Winter came in short order, and the clan used the chance to build a stockpile of shillings, cashing in the ever-present bounties for stranglers and beak wolves, among others. Celebrations for late winter were waylaid however.
The dwarves had come.
“Boss! We got a problem!” A snaga, Krat Jackleshins, yelled while barging into the barracks. The poor snaga was soaked through from the rain. Rain that had been going on for the better part of a week.
“How many?” the Warchief asked as the warriors sharpened their weapons and donned their helmets. They had heard Lugbok's horn.
“Lugbok sez two squads, 12 mudbeards each. All mounted, plus a pack a them elf dogs.” Krat said, looking over his shoulder. “Axes 'n' maces mostly, but they got somma dem legion boys mixed in and a real good marksdorf.”
“Won't make a difference.” Gorlshk said, pulling his great axe away from the grindstone. “They'll die all the same.”
“I dunno, lots of'em are ridin' bears.”
Gorlshk shrugged. “Bears, boars, dwarves. Makes no difference to me what I kill. Let them come.” Several orcs grunted in agreement.
Bolugd threw on his helmet and fastened the chin strap. “What direction?”
“Lugbok sez the macedorfs is west, axedorfs is north, and the dogs is northeast.”
“Hmm. Should be able to take them down one group at a time then.” Bolugd turned to the warriors. “Senshuken.”
The old Uruk snapped to attention. “Chieftain?”
“Get Beirus and his orcs, and gather the boworcs as well. We'll need the back up.”
“Yes sir.” Senshuken made for the door, stepping out into the downpour outside.
===
The warriors moved low and quietly, aiming to get as close as possible before taking the enemy by surprise. They could hear the dwarves talking soon enough, their leader waiting for a runner or scout to return. Many questioned if they were attacking a forest retreat, due to the immense foliage-laden wood temple they could see just over an unfinished palisade.
“They think us elves.” An orc said with a snarl.
“Then let's prove'em wrong!” Gorlshk shouted, rising from his hiding place as Bolugd yelled “Now!”
The battle was a brutal display of savagery, limbs and heads flying about. The enemy began to flee after only four of their number fell, but to the credit of their leader, he stood and fought on, trying his best to rally his dwarves even as Senshuken cut the mace lord's bear out from under him. He ducked and dodged numerous blows from many directions, lashing out twice: first scoring a crushing blow on a boworc, shattering his left leg and again striking the Dragon Warrior Thrakugga in the head, sending him down with a wet thud in the muck; mercifully the swordorc hadn't been killed, but he had been hit very hard, as he didn't rise.
Dodging two arrows and three sword slashes was as far as the mace lord's luck would continue after this, as a warrior sliced away his shield arm. The dwarf struck out, managing to knock the orc back and turned north, following his comrades who weren't killed. But it was too late. Thrak ran around a now blood smeared pine and smashed the dwarf's head, helmet and all, with his morningstar into the trunk.
And just like that, the clash was over.
“How is everyone?” The warchief asked his assembled warriors.
“Talata's gonna need attention for his leg, and Thrakugga got his bell rung pretty good. We'll need someone to drag them back in.” Gorlshk said, helping the bruise-covered Beirus to his feet. Behind them, Senshuken and Gradbul worked to get two dead bears off of Lat.
“Don't relax everyone, we've still got work to do.”[/i]
The battle ended just before sundown. A trio of brave snaga took up whatever weapons were at hand to drive off the pack of faedogs that tried to tear into the hold's unprotected eastern side. While they and the dire wolves that aided them suffered many bites and bruises, they came through unhurt in any manner of consequence.
As winter fast approached, a baby common orc was born, and in honor of this, a shield is named (rather paradoxically,) “The Lustrous Bow.” The clan busies itself with various labors as always though, successfully walling off the temple, mining more shale to build the Morbai tomb, and preparation to hire freelancers to raid imperial shipping are made.
Beak wolves come in a horde as the final weeks of obsidian come, and once more the warriors take to the field, the skulls of beak wolves (and others,) fastened to belts draped across their bodies. Senshuken leads the charge this time, slicing a hunter in half with little effort.
The warriors tear into the first group, cleaving bodies and smashing bones. Gradbul scores the kill of their Predator, smashing the pack leader's head into the ground with a mighty overhead swing of his crimson maul. As the warband approaches the next two however, the other two predators make frantic chirps and barks and the horde backs down, fleeing north into the deepwoods.
That evening, a New Year's celebration is held, beak wolves sitting over great great fires on roasting spits while the warriors drink their spirits from mugs made from the skulls of the recently slain enemy, and the axe lord Azguuruk names an axe “The Joyous Flight” for the victory, and Spearmaster Lat does the same for a shield, dubbing it “Roartaxes.”
Months go by, the highlight initially being only the meeting Clanmother Morbai had with a drowish diplomat. But then...
Finally, the freelancers return successful! They arrive battered but victorious, and gleefully offload the clan's share of the plunder before continuing up river with theirs. In celebration, one of the warriors bestows the name of The Amethyst of Adoration” on their shield.
The crate is quickly broken open, and piles of shimmering gold and silver coin greet them, as do two handfuls of uncut emeralds and a handful of sapphires, and a half dozen silver ingots! An idea soon strikes some, due to the generous amount of cotton available, and soon sailcloth is sold in bulk to fund yet more raids.
Spring seems peaceful for the hold, with the goblins managing to arrive to peddle rusty iron bars and arrows. A child begins speaking in the dark language of the long-gone sorcerer-kings, and before long a bagpipe set comes from it.
Pandashi however soon follow, discovered by a dire wolf that was chasing a giant weasel, and the warriors deploy to the two most likely places to be passed. Sure enough, the Orange Plagues walk into the pandashi, and slaughter them all mercilessly.
A second group walks into an ambush prepared by the Demonic Glens. Talata leads the attack, quickly decapitating one and severing the mace-arm of another. The results mirror the first quite well.
Summer passes quietly, the clan building, transforming the area inside their slowly closing walls into masonwork, farm, and pasture. The clan caravan arrives on schedule (more or less,) and the reservation orcs marvel at the great brick walls and wooden towers, the stone clanmother's manor, the great vale temple and growing herds of mumak and auruchs.
Racoons are spotted and torn asunder by dire wolves, trolls move amongst the greenskins freely and treated like kin, arriving with the goblins the season before, and sabre cats lazily wander the grounds of the hold. Blackhold orcs descend upon the spring battle sites, dumping mangled and wolf-gnawed pandashi bones from empty suits of armor to sell off: Proof of many enemies dead at the hands of the proud orcish warriors!
However badgermen come, likely having intended to severe the artery of trade. Lashers and berserkers, lead by a swordmaster and hammer lord. In response to the chance to prove the might of the hold, Spearmaster Lat names her spear “The Shrieking Joy,” and gleefully leads the run for the wall's opening to strike down the clanbadgers!
They return in short order, garnering applause form the reservation orcs for the many severed badger heads they bring back, the rest of their corpses being left indiscernible from the dead pandashi soon enough.
The humans however come soon after, horseback archers supported by hammer-wielding cavaliers and a pack of armored hounds. They begin setting up camps around the hold rather than outright assault, so their presence is tolerated. Mostly.
The olog child wanders out to wear the armored dogs wait for foolish orcs, and a single dog gives chase! The young orc runs as fast as his legs will carry him when the dog lunges, biting down on his hand when he turns to see where the attack dog is! While it fails to cause overly significant harm, the child is sent into a frenzied rage and he lashes out, getting the dog to let go with a strong blow to the side, and after several punishing blows, finally kills the mutt.
Infuriated by the bleeding child when he returned, proudly wearing the dog's helm as a trophy, Bolugd leads the Orange Plagues out to kill the dogs, and it is dealt with in fairly short order. When they return, they find the Demonic Glens rushing out, as a group of the archers was spotted trying to maneuver in the walls!
The warriors advance on them, sending the humans packing but not before Gradbul is put out of the fight with thankfully non-crippling injuries. However the dwarves arrive in short order right behind the humans to support them (!!!!) lead by the feared general Shulmik Rockedropes.
The veteran warriors charge out to slay her, and the warrior Azguub claimed the dwarf general's head for her belt. At Shulmik's death, the honor guards break and flee. However the warriors are forced to keep battling axedwarves, who fall on them from the north. But fate smiles on them, and their mace lord commander is the first to die.
To the south, bear-mounted dwarves begin filing into the hold, while Morbai orders all to find shelter and lock their doors, leaving four who seek shelter in the food stockpile and the merchants (now mocking them,) to fend for themselves.
“We don't survive by being stupid.” She says to them, and locks the door to the mead hall.
Bolugd rushes away before the axedwarves even really leave the area, fearful for his wife and child. He rushes through the pyramid, ordering the merchant guard to position themselves between the hall and the enemy. They obey the local warcheif, and a lone dwarf soon enough runs into them. Bolugd marches alone against the enemy on the other side of the pyramid. Two warriors of the caravan decided to take to the field as well, unwilling to let their fellow warrior face so many enemies alone.
His warriors took time getting their, having to navigate panicked auruchs and mumak calves, trees, and the brook. When told of his friend possibly being in peril however, the wounded Gradbul got to his feet, fighting through the pain and followed his fellow orcs. His friend would not die if he could help it!
After the intruders were repulsed, the remaining dwarves followed their leaders orders and fled the field with the surviving human soldiers, after seeing three speardwarves fleeing for their lives from the breach they'd used, screaming about a “masked demon horde.”
In celebration of managing such a victory, Talata named his weapon, primarily for the death of the dwarven general. And as if on queue, a raider's boat arrived at the drydocks, offloading a crate of goods for the clan and marveling at the sheet of gore decorating the docks. Morbai is quick to commission them for yet another raid as a result.
[NOTE: Bolugd had run off after the dwarf general died to get food and was the only one close enough to engage as a result. Everyone else is hauling ass to help. I also slayraced the humans' mounts, because the fucking things kept running away which was making killing them tedious. They fucked off after the dogs and one squad had been killed, a little after the dwarves showed up to party.
Gradbul also, in the face of logic, got up after his leg stopped bleeding from getting shot twice, and was the first one to reach the battle after Bolugd.]
What's more, the clan was given the highest recognition: the Great Clanmother south, had sent a document naming Clan Blackhold, to be among the great clans of the orcs!
Autumn came upon the orcs with beards and boars, as the dwarves attacked again, likely seeking revenge for their slain general. Their packs of mastiffs fell first, naught but fodder for the warriors' bloodthirsty blades, spears, and maces. Next a group of macedwarves, lead by a swordmaster, met the warriors. This first group fell like wheat to the scythe, and a second group, lead by an axe lord, surged forward just as the stragglers of the first fled.
With this second group's fall, the last's spirit broke, and they fled without engaging the warriors. In response to this, kobold workers were rounded up by raiders on commission from Morbai, while Bolugd hired private corsairs to launch a raid into the Knotted Empire to damage their outlaying farms.
Winter comes and goes, though not before the beak wolves make a move, cutting off trade with the drow in obsidian. However, long gone was the many open ways into the homes of the clan: Earthenware bricks produced en masse have built a solid wall and gate. Untold amounts of shale built a road leading into the only entrance, an entrance that would soon become anointed with the blood of the slain of many races, the first of which would be these foolish creatures. As the beak wolves fall or flee, a shrill horn is heard.
Gnomes. Lead by their general even.
The Warriors about face and unintentionally crash into a squad of bobcat-mounted hammergnomes, but unexpected or not, they smash this squad into paste. At the same time a force of speargnomes and faedogs charge Gorlshk, Swordmaster Talata, and Axe lord Azguuruk, who stand their ground despite being outnumbered many times. As the rest arrive with the speargnomes driven off, Gorlshk even leads the charge against the General and his Axe Lord aide to crush the large force of hammergnomes the two lead, with the speargnome commander's head (or at least the top half,) quickly lashed to his head for additional intimidation.
They tear into the gnomes, sending they and their mounts scattering in mangled limbs and bloody heaps. Gorlshk adds the general's skull to his belt.
As Spring arrives, time also finally catches up to one of the warriors. Axe Lord Azguuruk is found dead. He sat in his usual place when he was not sparring himself, and when Thrak's grandson shook him to wake him for dinner, he did not stir.
“'Ey Waaghboss, dere's somthin' wrong wit' mister Azguuruk.” The young Uruk said, poking the warchief with his crutch while he stowed his sword for the evening.
“What d'you means 'something wrong' with him?”
The orcling pointed at the seated warrior. “Coz he ain't wakin' up when I shake 'im fer dinner.”
“So hit him with a stick. That's what I do.”
“I already done that. He still ain't wakin' up. I don't think he's evin' breathin' anymore.”
Bolugd perked up from his armor stand and turned to the old orc. “Oh no...”
“He iddn't dead is he? He ain't in enough pieces t'be dead.”
Bolugd walked over and nudged him, expecting the crotchety old orc's eyes to snap open and him to yell some obscenity or another and then both he and the young uruk laugh at the warcheif for falling for their trick, but he he did not wake. No stench of death permeated from him, but there was no slight rise and fall in his lamellar either.
“... We'll leave him to rest for now.” The chief said. With that, he joined the others who were now leaving.
“Old guy's dead ain't he.” Gradbul asked, sparing a glance to the barracks as they crossed the way into the mead hall, already loud with new years drinking and games.
“'Fraid so. I'm glad he was with us for the last battle.” Bolugd said solemnly. “But that's no way for a warrior to go.”
Gradbul scratched his chin. “I dunno, I think I'd rather go peaceful-like. Less mess t'clean up.”
Bolugd chuckled and shook his head. “That's true. Took us a week to find all the bits of Tulbuk back south after that dwarf raid before we set out for here.” He grabbed the door, closing it behind the group. “But enough of that. The old bastard wouldn't want us to be sad.”
The following morning, the warrior's death at the hands of father time coincided with Palu unveiling several katana, and Bolugd declaring his intent to have all warriors interred within a proper mausoleum. Senshuken was also quick to take two of Palu's new blades, and created for himself the Blademaster's Arms.
With katana on his hip and a standard covered in scalps of dwarves and gnomes, he returned to the barracks. Beirus likewise took the other, requested several more, and assembled his warriors' society kits. The Dragons of the South would begin training in earnest the day after.
Spring went by, with the slain warriors moved into bloodsteel coffins in a great slate mausoleum, adorned with statues made from the bones of their many felled foes. The goblins came, and with them battle, as the elves launched an assault upon the hold from the backs of unicorns. Two orcs, Thrakugga the Dragon Warrior and Krishump the brewer, were quickly slain. Thrakugga wouldn't go without a fight however, and managed to let fly two of the elves own silver arrows, one of which struck and elf and sent him tumbling from his steed while the other hit another bladedancer's mount before their leader's unicorn gored him.
The warriors rushed out to avenge their fellows and rescue the other salvagers. As they charged the mounted elves, Senshuken gave them pause with a declaration in perfect Elven as he drew both shimmering mithril blades.
“Eli Fathinu vafice cameda!” or “The blades of my [Ancestors] will drink your blood!”
And it was so. His daikatana saw the greater use, but two skulls were shattered with his off-hand katana.
The warriors split, the Plagues going north to protect further salvaging, running afoul of dire wolves of the northern variety (which fell easily,) and second squad of unicorn mounted pikedancers. The orcs were unimpressed, and they releshed in the chance to spill the blood of elves in honor of their Vale Temple.
“Didn't know you knew elven.” Talata said, yanking his saber free of the last unicorn to die in the battle.
“Corsairs can teach many things to their fellow orcs, if one has the coin to pay them.” Senshuken replied, casting a look on his blades. “I'd waited a very long time to say that phrase, and I'm glad the first blood these swords tasted was elven.”
Somewhere a wounded elf could be heard begging for mercy, only to be silenced by a helm-crumpling blow of wolfram club on skull.
Senshuken shook the blood from his swords and carefully sheathed them. “It's a shame Azguuruk couldn't be here to see it.”
“Shame about Thrakugga and Krishump too.” Talata added.
“Aye, but they went down fighting at least.”
“Well, Thrakugga did.”
As usual, the dead were sent off, with Thrakugga interred in the mausoleum and Krishump in the graveyard. Bolugd had a ruby coffin brought up in secret from the study below ground as well, for Senshuken in the event he passed similarly to their comrade. The graveyard was also expanded, and an additional coffin added to the mausoleum as a precaution.
The days and weeks moved along of their own accord, as they always do. Torgun dispensed a name for his skull-busting cudgel, “Cryptaxes,” and a prison, (long needed in the shaman's opinion even though both “criminals” had been dead for months now,) was finally built, a simple artificial cave barred with rusted iron and filled with simple cots and fabric restraints.
As Slate, or Commonrock as many orcs know it, came to pass, the firstborns of the hold reached the age they were expected to help in the pastures, fields, and battle grounds. They were swiftly assigned to help cut blocks, till the fields, and take up composite bows.
In Felsite, the decision was made to add hives of bees and others to the hold, and have the auruchs herd culled. The summer caravan sometime later was waylaid however: Badgermen arrived in force, lead by the general who had destroyed Gorlshk's original clan.
They tricked an interfering group of berserkers into passing by the gate, and the Orange Plagues set out, falling on the bladebiters the general lead with ferocity unequaled while the Demonic Glens took on the berserkers. Senshuken claimed the General's life, his daikatana cleaving the badger in half.
The Boworcs even took to the walltops, firing into a troop of macebadgers and several of the quicker berserkers, or took pot shots into the general's cadre before The Plagues struck, killing three bladebiters, a berserker, and wounding several macebadgers with expertly placed bodkin arrows; all the time spent on the range was proving invaluable.
By day's end, the badgermen all laid dead in mangled heaps, their general's head nailed to Senshuken's honor standard. However on the return, the Pandashi struck the returning warriors of the Plagues, they too lead by their general.
Senshuken added her skull to his standard as well.
As autumn came, raids into the outlying human hamlets yielded success, and one last raid was launched on merchant shipping before the winter freeze. The hamlet raid yielded several boxes of rifle ammo, brass bars, and even a suit of steel plate armor, albeit only the body armor. In honor of the latest successful raid, a shield received a name as well.
Two additional raids were launched soon after, using an unexpected window to send off the funds for more attacks. One returned in short order some two weeks later laden with loot, while the second returned battered and unsuccessful, with soldiers of the Union of Artifice close behind.
As was typical, they came astride various armored and unarmored horses, as well as a pack of leopards for support. The veteran warriors set out, with the brick drawbridge closing behind them. Victory or death, as always. And victory ruled the day in Blackhold, as leopard and horse alike were slain and riders were pulled from their skittish mounts and dispatched in bloody fashion. In retaliation, the freelancers were sent back out, and they returned much more successful with crates of goods from a Union trade vessel! And with ever fair weather even as winter continued, more raids were launched soon after, returning with still more plunder.
Not to be left out of the intense violence, stranglers attacked in the immediate wake of the human assault. With hungry and irate warriors prowling the woods, the ape-things were slaughtered by the dozen, their bodies ending up like many others, roasting over braziers in the mead hall.
Soon the Union stepped up their efforts against the hold, sending renowned General Nadmi, a member of the merchants guild of the Union to lead the attack in response to the numerous attacks on their territories by raiders bearing the coinage of Blackhold.
Spearmaster Lat took the human's head.
To honor the victory, the dreamwalkers raised an Alter of Storms, praising their old gods for granting the warriors the swiftness to run down the enemy in the forest.
While trade had been noticeably strangled, few in the hold minded. Life was good in the peaceful weeks to follow this last attack, and it was quite fitting that this was the case. They lived in a land not considered theirs by their enemies, and living well in this place was the greatest revenge against the “civilized” folk they could hope for.
BLACKHOLD! RIIIIIIISE!!!! AND BASK IN THE BLOOD OF YOUR ENEMIEEEEEES!
So, holy shit on the sheer amount of crap that happened.
Lots to summarize this time around! Some orcs were killed, we fought a SHITLOAD of invasions off (killing many enemy generals in the process,) the town is walled and gated, the temple itself is finished more or less, there's a jail, mausoleum, we've reached top-level land status, and built a bunch of pointless shit., built some flachette guns, and set Senshuken up with a blademaster kit and finally managed to outfit Beirus and his warriors with Dragon gear (or what's left of them at this point...)
We also got to launch a ton of raids, which provided much needed materials to build the mead hall, lots of bullets, partial suits of steel and bronze plate armor, and even a treasure map and an assault plan! Haven't used either one since I dunno what to target. We even have some captive humans, which means a Caravanserai will be opening soon! I do admit I've been largely targeting human villages, farms, and shipping nearly exclusively. For the Vale Temple's sake, I really need to start hitting the elves.
I've also prepared a space for an Orrey, raised an Altar of Storms, and even started a hive keeping industry, alongside with proper mass production, the beginning of refitting junk gear for snaga to use in battle into makeshift mail and helms, and got a solid handle on our once-huge numbers of auruchs and dire wolves (culling the former and selling the latter in bulk to home caravans,) and have the saber cats breeding in earnest! I just want to add, thank Smakemupagus for the factory.
I admit, I cheated for the codex cause Azguuruk dying of old age gave me a scare. Wanted Senshuken set up with his blademaster kit and to have a few kills under his belt before the Reaper of Time caught up with him. But aside from that and slayrace him-ing a single guy and his mount so Lat would kill the Union general like I'd ordered her to, all I've done is the odd bit of autodump and map cleaning.
I had originally intended to do a Riverrun update, but the orcs just kept beckoning me and beckoning me. Also below, I give you some unguided images. First, we have the whole of the hold, and after that, a close up of the Vale Temple.
This has been a long time coming boys and girls. Hope you enjoy it, such as it is.
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Topic: ☼"Blackhold," A Masterwork Orc Fortress☼ - Under new management! (Read 61963 times)