AMIA ARCHIVE • View topic

By the Fires of the Forge

This is a mountain of a drow. Not a mountain whose peak would ever tickle the clouds, but certainly one that would take a long time to walk around. The huge pack on his back seems like an extension of his hulking figure: it holds an impossible horde that distorts the old leather just as Victyr’s muscles distort his black skin. He wears a thick leather apron to protect from heat and grubby pants to hide his shame. A scimitar and fire-blackened hammer hang from the belt at his waist.

He had wanted to develop a mechanical golem that was inexpensive and quick to produce. Most importantly, it had needed to be more efficient than the magical alternative he despised. After many cycles of grafting, however, Victyr concluded that his task must be impossible. If it were possible, he reasoned, he would have accomplished it by now. But he hadn’t. So it wasn’t. He glared at the forest of parchment, ink blots, and scribbles that littered the table before brushing them into the furnace with one unceremonious sweep of his arm. The greedy flames swallow his blueprints in seconds and, satisfied, belch a cloud of smoke and ash over the frustrated drow.

As the ash settles, Victyr smudges it in to the rest of the grime on his face. He returns his attention to the work bench and rests one ham-sized fist on it, pinching the bridge of his nose with the other as he closes his crimson eyes and exhales slowly. New plan… New plan…

With a lick of his lips and a flicker of his eyelids, he turns to the duergar armoursmith that co-inhabits the forge with him. They have known each other for a long time. At the very least they have known of each other for a long time. In the beginning there had been bickering: each too stubborn to allow the other the use of a tool they both needed. In the end, because neither were getting much work done, whenever the duergar needed to use the furnace, Victyr would simply not be there. Not because he had consented to the duergar, of course, but because he just so happened to need the refinery at that very moment. Similarly, the duergar would find himself in need of a bathroom break when Victyr happened to require the use of the anvil. This silent dance suited them well enough that they were actually able to share only half insulting words with each other from time to time. This was one of those times.

"Ever built a golem, Runt?"

The duergar looks up from his work with a filthy expression.

"Nay, but ah’ve lain wi’ one before when yer mother came ter see me. Like a machine, she were."

"You mean she floored you with a single punch?"

"Nah, ah mean ah stuck my-"

"Yes, I get it."

"Har har!" 'Runt' cackles in delight and makes a rude gesture.

Victyr opens his mouth as though to say more, then closes it again and shows the duergar his back instead.

"Keep it simple, ye mutated chunk o' turd. Keep it simple!" The duergar calls over his shoulder.

"Simple advice from a simple mind, you fetid pustule." He mumbles absently.

The duergar issues a rebuttal but Victyr doesn't listen. His brow furrows in thought. Simple… Simple…

Victyr opens a drawer in his work bench cluttered with blueprints, old correspondences, tools and spare machine parts. He looks at the mess for a moment before driving a hand in to its depths, rummaging around until he finds what he's looking for: Ulviir'aufein's latest golem project report. He takes a quill and makes a few corrections.

Muspelkvist wrote:

http://img818.imageshack.us/img818/4113/ihjj.png

Quote:

Project Update; Machines of war - Establishing export

Extending span of idea. Proposing smaller model of iron golem soldiers made out of metal armours enchanted with elemental core. Idea sprung from ravaging the electric castle and combating sentient warriors defending said location. The benefit is that only Victyr is needed to assemble the suits of armour and arm the Golem appropriately before activating it by high magic. While the Golem suffers in some aspects, it excels in others and the possibility of mass-production yet again opens up.

Pros:
- Agility
- Versatility
- Lower cost
- Production time lowered
- Speed
- Easily enchantable

Cons:
- Weaker
- Less durable
- Reliant on weapons

Required;
- 500 Pounds of pure adamantine (267 kg) roughly.
- An item or object out of pure adamantine to hold the captive earth elemental (A symbol of Lolth, A chunk of non-molten iron, a wrench?)
- The spell "Craft Construct" to awaken the object.
- The spell "Cloudkill" to enable it's gas attack.
- The spell "Geast/Quest" to give it purpose. (otherwise it merely lives without doing nothing)
- The spell "Limited wish" to entrap the elemental spirit. (The battery / power of the golem)

Ulviir'aufein

He scans the page and sighs before casting it back in to the chaos of the drawer, all the while unbuckling the three thick straps around his torso that hold his pack in place. Opening it up, he takes out a black adamantine ingot that glitters green where the light of the dancing fire strikes it. He places the pack on the floor and turns toward the furnace where 'Runt' was working. The duergar suddenly realises that he hadn't trimmed his nose hairs in a long time and scuttles away to do just that, leaving Victyr to his task.

"O Lord!" He cries in the abyssal tongue.

"Grant me your blessings to craft the art of war,
so that I might prepare my kin for it!

With it, we shall neither give nor receive quarter,
but give ourselves to battle, till victory or death!"

As the guttural words bubbled forth, divine energies sizzled at his fingertips, jumping between them. As the ferocity of his chanting increased so did the intensity of the energy, and soon it was spiraling around his entire body, filling the air with an electric tang. His muscles bulge and his veins throb as his strength grows.

When the cacophony reaches its crescendo, he throws his arms towards the earth in front of him and the energy surges forward to burst it open. Out of the gaping hole climbs his demonic companion, here to aid him.

Victyr giggles and inhales deeply, feeling dizzy from the residue of power and adrenaline coursing through his veins. Taking some time to steady himself, he casts a critical eye over the demon and shifts his weight uncomfortably. He has absolute faith in his Lord, of course, but he still loaths the sight of the hideous thing. He flicks his wrist towards the refining pot behind him and turns away. Wordlessly, though with an air of resentment, the demon moves to comply and starts to unload adamant ore from Victyr's pack. It knew exactly what to do by now.

The demon loads the ore into the huge pot and stokes the furnace beneath it to incredible temperatures. Slowly but surely, the adamant melts and amalgamates with its elements to create the precious alloy Victyr was after. The unwanted impurities float to the top in the form of slag and are removed by the demon. Finally, the demon tips the contents of the pot into the molds below, where they will later be removed as ingots when cool. With his summon doing the dirty work, Victyr was free to forge the armour pieces.

Intermission

Victyr had climbed for what seemed like hours until he eventually found the veins of ore he was looking for on a narrow ledge, set barely a few feet back from a dizzying precipice. Now he had hard work to do, though it was work he found therapeutic: The steady sway of his body; the rush of oxygen after each heavy breath; the satisfaction of splitting rock. The sound was almost onomatopoeic, sometimes distorted with the clang of metal, sometimes with the click of rock.

PICK – PI – KICK – PANG - PICK!

Each sweet connection would create a tiny explosion of dust and fragments. Sometimes, if he were clumsy, shockingly large fragments of rock would shoot away and skid along the ground. Skipping towards the edge of the abyss. Slowing. Rolling gently, they’d pause. They’d teeter. Then drop.

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

A drow is running. Fast. His eyes are narrowed and focused. An arrow shoots past his head. He ducks just as another whistles through his hair, severing strands of silver. A figure leaps at him from the left. With a flash of steel its throat is cut and it collapses behind him as he speeds onwards. Ahead, a recent rock slide had almost blocked the path, leaving a narrow slit through at the bottom. He increases his pace and throws himself in to a slide, body arched backwards until it almost touches the floor. Rock flashes past his vision and then he was out on the other side. He takes a moment to catch his breath as he hears the sound of his pursuers scrabbling through the slit after him. He lashes backwards with his foot and dislodges a stone, causing the rest to cascade downwards, crushing whoever was underneath. He looks down to find a severed hand twitching by his foot.

'Feeling the pressure?' he comments to no one and grins.

'Go over the top! Over the top, you driderspawn!'

As the harsh male voice drifts over the rock slide, the drow takes off again. He steals a glance over his shoulder just in time to see a row of dark clad figures poised to take another shot at him. He veers left towards a rocky outcrop, sprinting erratically to avoid the volley of arrows that pepper the ground around him. Reaching it just as an arrow smashes into the formation by his head, he dives behind the corner with his eyes tight shut to avoid the splinters. He dusts himself off and opens them again to find two brown orbs staring at him. He recoils backwards to reveal the surprised face of a huge rothe. Silence prevails for long moments as both seem frozen to the spot, broken only when shuffling noises to his right force him tear his gaze away. An entire pack of rothe had decided to lumber over out of curiosity, grunting their bemused greetings at him. With the sound of many feet pounding the ground in the distance behind him, however, he shatters the calm by spontaneously throwin himself at the grey outcrop to his left, bunching his legs against its hard surface, then launching himself in the opposite direction mid-air. A gloved hand manages to latch on to thick hair and he pulls himself in to a sitting position upon the rothe's back. The rothe moos its distress and rears up on to its hind legs. The drow pricks its back side with his sword and screams incoherently at the top of his lungs, causing the beast to roll its ugly head and power forward. He and his steed burst from the rocky outcrop with the rest of the herd in tow, just as his pursuers carelessly sprint around the corner. The herd stampedes onwards unimpeded, and many of his foe are trampled beyond recognition by the time he glances back to make a rude gesture.

The ride lasts for a minute or two until he suddenly notices the horizon speeding towards him. His eyes widen as he realises it drops away to nothing. Without a further thought he throws himself off the rothe, leaving them to stampede mindlessly onwards, piling over the edge of the cliff to their doom. He looks behind him as he untangles himself from a heap on the floor and spies his tormentors in the distance. He takes a quick survey of his situation. The edge seems quite unstable, a deep crack running from the edge, inland, and then back out again, encircling him. He approaches the crack, looks down at his sword, then up to face his enemy. Closer and closer they come. He could see their black faces, gaunt and severe, twisted in to wicked, grinning masks.

‘We’ve got you now, you bastard!’ they jeer at him, slowly moving to circle.

Without warning he throws his sword in to the crack where it jams, hilt protruding upwards. He holds his hands up very slowly. His tormentors' wolfish grins widen, their teeth lengthening as though they could sense their prey was done.

‘Want mercy now, do you?’ They laugh wickedly. ‘All you have to do is beg for it.’

He crouches down slowly, face sombre as he bows his head. The tormentors cannot believe their luck, they look to each other open mouthed, almost giddy at this result. He presses one knee and the opposite hand to the floor to steady him.

‘That’s it, be-‘

His muscles bulge and his legs snap straight, projecting him in to the air. His tormentors watch him in slack-jawed disbelief as he reaches his zenith, and starts to fall again, feet angled straight towards the hilt of his blade. His full force strikes the pommel and drives it into the crack, forcing it apart further ever so slightly. Dust settles about him as the tormentors watch on nervously, holding their breath. A few seconds pass and a collective sigh is heard as they relax again, regaining their leering confidence.

‘Yeah, really impressive. You fool!’ they call gloatingly.

He hadn’t moved a muscle, hands clutching the ground, head bowed.

‘Giving up?’

Suddenly, his head snaps upwards, pupils rapidly dilating with the sudden intake of light.

‘No.’ He hisses without batting an eyelid. ‘Going down.’

A terrible cracking sound is heard as the rock beneath him finally surrenders, encouraged by the sword's width. Their world starts to shake. The tormentors stumble and fall, terrified. Rock peels away from the cliff face in long shards. It is all anybody can do to hang on. Laying on a falling splinter, he rolls to one side as a boulder whistles past and smashes through it. He’s thrown wildly in to the fray of rock and bodies. A dark figure reaches for his leg but he kicks him away, propelling himself to another splintered surface. This one’s huge, long enough that the bottom of it would reach the ground a long time before he did. Someone tumbles past him, screaming. He watches the bottom of his shard intently, carefully timing its impact with the ground. Slowly, he stands up, arms held out to balance him. His long hair whips at his face as he waits. One second. Two seconds. Three seconds. He jumps. The shard hits the ground, splinters, then shudders to a halt. He hits it with his shoulder and bounces wildly up again. He slams into the shard once more, then breaks into a roll. Fast and uncontrollable at first, he almost slips off the edge. He slows as he reaches the ground and lands heavily on his front, head smashing against the rock. His world goes dark.

He opens his eyes. He tries to stand up and fails, pain gripping him as he discovered his shoulder and arm were shattered. A short, tormented scream escapes his lips. He takes some deeps breaths to steady himself and then tries again. He finds his ankle is broken too as pain sears up his leg. Gradually, shakily, through force of will alone, he picks himself up to his feet. He looks around at the carnage of rock and flesh, his vision blurry. He notices a figure stumbling towards him, crossbow raised. Click. The arrow bounces harmlessly off a rock. The figure’s in just as bad shape as he is. He turns to stumble away.

Down a dark and twisting valley the crippled chase continues. He could hear his shambling pusuer catching up with him. Arrows would whip past him sporadically, and it was only a matter of time before one hit. He didn’t have the energy to continue. He fell against a wall, turned to face his tormentor, then slid down in to the dust. The dark figure chuckled as he approached, the sound distorted by the bubbling of blood at his lips. He holds his unsteady crossbow aloft as he towers over the broken drow. He presses his face close to watch him die. The drow stares back stubbornly. His hand inches across the ground, searching.

‘I’ve been waiting for this for a long time.’ His foe gurgles with breath rancid.

The hand strikes something hard and heavy whilst his tormentor takes a tattered piece of paper out of his pocket and shoves it under his nose.

‘See this paper? This is a bounty with your name on it. Says I can bring you in alive… or dead.’

The towering drow grins and presses the crossbow to his forehead, his finger squeezing the trigger gently. The broken drow brings his hand up sharply and smashes a large rock in to the side of his head. The tormentor slumps in the opposite direction and the drow leaps up, smashing the rock down on his head until he stops moving. He drops the rock and leans backward, spitting on the corpse.

‘Looks like rock beats paper after al-‘

And then a shockingly large fragment of rock pierces his skull from above, almost as though the universe itself was screaming for an end to cheesey one-liners.

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Victyr, swearing he heard a scream, paused briefly in his work and turned to look at the cliff edge. He tilted his head to one side then shook it, dismissing it as the wind. He resumed his work.

Last edited by Travis on Sat, May 03 2014, 15:27 PM, edited 1 time in total.

Feet of Metal

"WORDS IN THE HEART CANNOT BE TAKEN" - Terry Pratchett, Feet of Clay.

After days of sweat and toil, Victyr holds aloft a huge suit of armour to inspect each detail by the light of the forge. By his side lay a pile of rejects, and upon his work station were the blueprints that birthed them. He had abandoned them all but one, and now he had his finished product.

Victyr sends the suit to the Vanguard and waits for either a rejection or an order for mass production.

Selvetarm's Art of War
Plans to mass produce metals and metal products for the service of Nec’perya, and for export.

The Blast Furnace – Smelting is performed here to extract the base materials from ores such as iron and copper. It can also be used to create cast iron.

A waterwheel is powered by the currents surrounding Nec’perya. The waterwheel turns the cogs, the cogs power the belt, the belt turns the cams, the cams operate the bellows. The bellows fuel the fire inside with oxygen, creating temperature enough to smelt any ore. Ores are placed into the furnace via the hatch, and the base materials melt to gather at the bottom of the furnace with a layer of slag above it. The upper pin is removed with tongs and the slag drains away into the waste bucket. The lower pin is then removed in a similar fashion, and the molten material gathers in the casts. The process is continuous and allows for large loads of ore to be smelted at once – favourable conditions for mass production.

The Crucible – Only prayers from Selvetarm’s faithful can operate this furnace to achieve the incredible temperatures required to create alloys such as steel and adamantine.

The crucible is a large container set on a raised dais, accessible by steps. The required material is placed inside via a hatch at the top where it will be met by divine heat. The material, once molten, will be released by removing the valve from the pipe at the bottom. Selvetarm’s faithful can pray whilst performing tasks, or simply pray to the shrine. As long as there is prayer, the crucible will function. The process is continuous and allows for large loads of ore to be smelted at once – favourable conditions for mass production.

The Hearth – This is a smaller, simple furnace used by all blacksmiths to heat metals for shaping and welding at an anvil. Products are then rapidly cooled in the slack tub.

Production methods:

Suggested Building Design – I’ve marked its location on the map. (I/J 10/11) I'd knock down two walls from the downstairs to create an open plan in which we can house the tools, the crucible, and the heath with plenty of ventilation. A load bearing column would be left to support the furthest corner. I'd have the blast furnace run up the load bearing column, the ore being deposited into it from the closed off second floor. The furnace itself would be shaped in the image of our Lord, visible to all, and the glow from the furnace along with the flue gasses would escape through his eyes and mouth. The second floor would house the shrine to our Lord, and be an incredibly hot place, so sweltering that only the hardiest warrior would be able to stand any prolonged duration in there.

Designs to follow soon.

Last edited by Very_Svensk on Sun, Apr 13 2014, 8:48 AM, edited 1 time in total.

A post is left within the project notes of the Selvetarm blacksmith.

Construction of forge/Blacksmith
Responsible: Victyr Lolarox

X

✓

X

Quote:

Esteemed Victyr d'lolarox

How goes the progress with the forge? Have a location been decided yet? Have you calculated how much materials we need? When will the actual assembly of the refinery and anvil begin? When will be able to combine faezress with metal and create our own brand of weapons and armour?

Ulviir'Aufein d'Lolarox
http://img21.imageshack.us/img21/5527/ei0u.jpg

// Do we Move this to the vanguard forums or Leave this topic public, Travis?

//Leave this public, by all means.

Ulviir, the self appointed scribe of the Vanguard and house mage of Lolarox, goes over the ledger and it's documentation in search for updated entries or other additions.
He also makes sure the poster is placed on top of the boards as to get it some more attention again.

Last edited by Travis on Sat, May 03 2014, 15:26 PM, edited 2 times in total.

The light in the room is low and flickering, taking on the colour of the dribbly orange candle that stood on a desk. Victyr sits just behind it, alone and half-dressed as he reclines in a mountain of cushions. He is picking his sharp teeth with the shard of a bone, the rest of his meal left in pieces on a silver platter. His leather apron has been discarded on the floor after a hard cycle of work. He stared at it now for a while, knowing that it was making a mess of the carpet and that his matron would surely disapprove. Satisfied with the thought, he tosses the bone idly over his shoulder and turns to the desk, rummaging through the clutter until he finds his writing implements. The parchment was grubby already, and his soot stained hands do nothing to improve the matter as he settles down to write.

The gate will operate when a golem or two turns the crank. The movement is passed down to the lower mechanism through a series of cogs and shafts. As can be seen from the diagram, chain housing will be attached to the lower cogs, which are essentially a set of smaller cogs specifically designed to run the chain along them. Whilst the middle cog is immobile, the larger ones at either side are attached to the gate. The cogs will move along the run as the chain forces them to turn. There we have a functional gate.

The problem of friction arises in shifting something heavy across a surface - it’s hard work for the components, and it’s hard work for the crank operator. As it occurred to me that things roll better than they slide, I’ve devised a series of large rollers that will rotate with the thrust of the gate passing over them, though the rollers themselves will remain rooted within their individual sockets. They will bear heavy strain, as will the rest of the mechanism’s components, which is why they will be forged from adamantine and NOT, I repeat, NOT from wood. The gate itself can be made of stone, or perhaps a lighter substance, like mithril.

Victyr mutters something about the Spider Bearer as he dabs his quill in the ink, tickling his chin with the feather as he contemplates his idea further. Roused simultaneously by a thought and a sneeze, he adds to the paragraph whilst wiping his nose.

It won’t be necessary to install my pump cooling/lubricant system, as the seawater is a natural source for this.

Keep in mind that we will need a mechanism constructed on each gate, as there are two that join at the middle. This reduces the risk from difficulties or damage caused by the current. It also eases the burden on the mechanisms. If you need any more information or I haven't been clear enough, let me know. I will, as always, be here to forge components and oversee their implementation.

He takes the parchment and rolls it up with the usual napkins he'd pilfered from the bar, his 'blueprints', then throws them to one side. He'd take them to the vanguard headquarters soon, he thought, but first he needed a bath. He sniffs his armpits. A bath with lots of bubbles. And maybe some exotic dancers. Cheerful at the prospect, Victyr strolls out of the room and slams the door shut behind him. The candle is snuffed out with the draft. The room is left dark.

With construction on projects either completed, well underway or disregarded, Victyr writes down detailed instructions for the rest of the work and leaves them in the Vanguard Headquarters. He packs up his tools in the ludicrous pack on his back, stocks up on all his favourite beverages from the bar, then catches the next ride on Spider Bearer up the Dark Waterways.

He isn't seen in the city again.

A bit disappointed that Victyr seems to have left the city; for all she knew, upon hearing about his departure, Miz'ri commits her time and effort into making the gate exactly from the last schematic he offered.

It seemed out of all things, she never disputed that he was a capable engineer. She went ahead and commissioned material and estimates to build such a device.

Isendu't'tar approaches the forge construction site and looks for the slavemaster. Once located, Isen has a simple question

What is the progress on the forge and shrine?

and if is not completed yet..

can it be finished within two weeks.

He simply stands there, waiting for his answers.

[IC] By the Fires of the Forge

Who is online