The following is a journal of one of my fortress playthroughs started in march of 2024. While feeling very competent at the game, my fortresses only ever last 5 years until I become bored, or update the game. I only ever seem to play through the establishment of the fortress and never after. I have a lot of fun designing layouts and systems to triumph over the harsh environment and invading hordes. That being said, I have never really explored or conquered the hidden fun stuff at the true bottom of the map, where the true competition of the game really is.
In 2022, Tarn Adams released a new paid version with graphics, a new soundtrack and an overhauled user interface to help crowdfund his own health insurance. While I paid, I never adjusted to the new version, and prefer the way it used to be. Opting to play legacy is a blessing however, removing one temptation to constantly restart my fortresses. I also have in my posession an always on PC that basically just runs servers, and I have figured out how to plop an instance of DF on it that i could potentially run for weeks at a time AFK.
The goal of this playthrough is to push my own limits, and run a playthrough for as long as possible.I have always admired the stories from the bay12 forums of long fortress playthroughs, like this one in Archcrystal, where the game was run for over a century to grow some tame cave dragons to fighting age.

The Ageless Dimensions

It is the sixth century of recorded history. We are still in the age of myth, where significant populations of great timeless beasts still roam the world. Many of the original beasts have died in the second and third centuries, but it seems enough have had offspring or been killed and reanimated by necromancers to still provide dominance and terror over the world. This was a feature of Dwarf Fortress I did not really know existed until very recently
The northwest of the continent was largely unsettled. Any humanoid civilisations that populated here would have been wiped out by the great beasts of time, though it appears some few souls still wanderthe abandoned mountainhalls of the Dented Diamonds, a derelict civilisation on the mountain Anzishlurit. The southwest sees a peninsula with most of our human population. This area is largely conquered and vassalised by the goblin hordes from the river valleys separating the peninsula from the mainland. In the south is the haunted Forests of Blanching containing the goblin civilization the Devil of Locks, but this has largely been conquered by an elven and dwarven coalition of the Cavernous Orb and the Drink of Clenching. This Coalition comes from a large valley cutting into the central highlands. Well fortified and separated from the outside world and with the goblins at the valley mouth conquored, the mountain walls have afforded sage isolation for both civilisations, who have enjoyed a great early prosperity of peace art and religion. This would be true, at least if religion, worship, dark experimentation and a quest for immorality had not gone too far, and sprouted necromancer towers of obsidian from both races and tormented the coalition for hundreds of years. A unique and curious feature of this world, is that not long before our beginnings in the sixth century, these towers actually appear conquered or at least abandoned, and peace seems restored.
In the southeast is a large region of cultural diversity. The rivers have been populated by human hamlets and monasteries, goblin pits and a great rainforest housing what at one point was the greatest elven forest retreat in history. With too many cultures occupying the land, this region has collapsed sometime inthe fourth century and much of the elvish forest is in ruins, and the various towns indescriminate to their owners or without political unity entirely. Necromancy has also flourished here, and unlike the valley westwards continues to thrive into our modern era. No doubt the wars and countless dead of the region have created a formidable force of undead on this coast.
The northeast has another dwarvern civilisation, The Coal of Empires. This land also has the ruins of an elven civilisation and various goblin pits, and has also seen great wars over the past centuries, though the dwarves here have emerged as a significantly powerful nation in world history.

Year 1

The first year went by very quickly. Designating the fortress, and beginning the escavations. This included a planned flooding of the caves to set up mud for farms and gardens. Alcohol briefly ran dry but now we have a full farm area for the indefinite future. We only had a half dozen unskilled migrants arrive, some of whom had interesting traits but many seemed to be about to succumb from old age at any moment.

Year 2

Thirty migrants arrived at once. Our long allegience with the elves seems to have softened our labor pool, with our migrants bringing no skills but herbalism and animal care. Our folks have been living an agrarian existence, and it seems will need to learn new skills to live life underground, and forge a fortress the way armok intended us to live.
We have recruited enough workers for every desireable profession, although we need medical skills to acquiesce somehow. We have modified the D_init file to prevent new migrants from this point, though there is a high birthcap still. we will only grow the fortress population cap slowly as we test for lag. The stress for our fortress here is if we can set up our farm and drinks industry to provide for the incredible surge in population and demand, hopefully we can start constructing the incredible volumes of furniture we need in the fortress also.
We traded our earliest crafts for a cat from the dwarves, and a cougar from the elves; which basically also a cat but probably twice as formidable for the wandering mice.
Our small militia made the adventure to a seemingly abandoned and derilict tower of the necromancer, to inspect what had caused its destruction. There is nobody present, but remarkably the library has remained largely unlooted. Among the texts that are recovered are accounts of reanimation, documents about life in the tower, and a necronomicon,- a book recounting the secret arts of life and death. The former are relatively safe to read, and are released into the library. The necronomicon however, has been immediately sealed on a pedestal behind a locked door, fearing the power that would be released if it were read or transcribed. I have read stories of the powerful implications that a necronomicon in the public library can have on other fortresses, though I have never played with this mechanic myself. Instead, it waits as a potential doomsday contingent, should our dwarves as a collective all wish to turn to lichdom. Still, it is comforting enough to know that this doomsday device is in our posession, and not left unattended in a disused necromancer tower to be unleashed on our homeworld.
The first artifact we created, a cherry wood ring, was stolen form its display place. While nobody witnessed the theft, the human sunless hunter (a type of cursed ghoul) visiting the tavern pretending to blend in as a normal guy and clearly not an agent of a nearby necromancer's cabal, was an obviuous subject to interrogate. They confessed to a plot of espionage, naming their overlord.
The tavern was closed to outsiders, and the goblin poets went above ground to mill about at the wagon while they pondered their next adventures having now been banned from inside the fortress. These poets were notably quite skilled at lying, so were also interrogated being suspected of also bearing false identities. One confessed to a string of espionage across the last three centuries, including plots against our fortress.
The goblin Feb Alathnakuth was cagey and refused to give any evidence in their interrogation. Their next actions make them a hero of our fortress, but ultimately revealed their identity to be a spy. The werelizard bandit cheif Nguslu Umakutsob rampaged to the fortress, charging at a group of dwarves outside hauling logs and gems. Moments before it could bite our broker in the face, it swung left and charged 'Feb', who fought off the werebeast with his spear. Ultimately, both died in the encounter though the corpse of 'Feb' now reads Amxu Slonanamxu who we could bury for his sacrifice, if we had carved out a museum at all yet.

Year 3

We have felled the entire forest, before the elves come an declare it a nature preserve. Trees generate lag anyhow. This fortress is my first exploration in quantum stockpiles. We have decided to work on pulling all the logs indoors before anyone is dangerously cave adapted, and so they wont get sick and traumatised from the labour outdoors. We need a considerable supply of wood and charcoal to have the metal and furniture production to get to the stage that we can pump magma and run magma forges.
A mother just dropped her baby in a pond. Chances they both fell in together as it thawed from an ice sheet, as I had forgotten to designate restricted traffic restriction. It will be an effort to recover the corpse and entomb it properly, to end the beginning of out fortresses first trauma.
There is a second werebeast in our corpse stockpile, though its attack I was completely unaware of. I may have unnoticedly unpaused the game once it arrived, but a travelling speardwarf from one of the merchant caravans was reported to have taken the kill.

Year 4

We have elevated Stinthad Dakostsherik to the baron of our lands. He is young, only 17, but has a wife and child to extend his noble reign through. He values the law, decorum and leisure time, and does not have any particular fascination with furniture to feel the need to dictate our production and exports.
We briefly opened up the library to outside visitors, though few in attendance appear to be scholars and many are partial ghoul demons with highly suspect identities. Interrogating everyone has more or less revealed all guests to be involved in plots in some way. They are likely all coming from a nearby necromancer tower, that we must wipe out in the future.
That being said, having not decided to go out and conquer the small isolated goblin pits that would be easy targets for us, has kept us off the radar of the goblin hordes. Though, they are much more interested in attacking our homeland, and we often get news each year that the noble positions have been replaced in other governments, which usually signifies the old government was slaughtered in a seige.
Otherwise, our efforts are focused on slowly carving fluid pipes for the grand drowning chambers and a magma elevator. We are crafting lots of high value furniture items with all the tetrahedrite and billon we can forge, and have set up stations to decorate said furniture with gems or freshwater musselshells. The labour of doing so has often been unnatractive to complete, though with quantum stockpiles we have been able to produce incredibly ornate furniture, that we will soon furnish the fortress proper. Despite being active and working with little leisure time, the craftsdwarves and labourers are incredibly happy working with and living around such ornate furniture and decorations. Once complete, every dwarf will be housed in a personal palace like a king. There has been few trauma to happen in the first years, and most dwarves are comfortable and happy.
A human bard who had become a resident of our fortress went missing, although his body is already in the corpse stockpile. His last thoughts were complaint about having slept in the mud. For some reason, his corpse is mutilated. What happened to end his life is hard to ordain.

Year 5

there is little to write of year 5, though we have begun decorating some areas and our furniture is truly decadent. The megaprojects for the entrance hall are nearing completion, and should be tested once the ice thaws.

Year 6

Halfway through year 6, and our first big megaproject is complete. First, allow me to show you the dwarvern reactor.

Our understanding of nuclear fission and perpetual energy, is that the energy released from water moving horizontally along a body of water, or downwards, is less than the energy we need to operate an archimedes screw to lift said water upwards. By connecting a battery of pumps and waterwheels in succession, we can generate enormous amounts of free power (800). The brown lever allows us to disengage the pumping of new water, although it appears that we have a runaway reaction in some of the waterwheels on the right, and are generating 400u of free power. Fortunately, the amount of torque in the pump stack is greater than 400u, so by engaging the gears we can shut down the reactor fully.
Speaking of, we also have a stack of archimedes screw pumps ascending all the way up from a magma pool in the caverns, and can power it by the reactor. Lets turn it on and see what it can do

Very nice. We have a reservouir of magma ready to drop onto forces wandering our entrance labyrinth.

Year 7

The fortress is decorated, and the defences are ready. We are now mining the marble from the bottom layers of the map to begin constructing steel, so our army can be fully equipped. We opened up or tavern and library to guests, but it seems like there are next to no scholars travelling the wilds these days. The wars at home might be having an effect on that. We have almost a dozen poets join us, who are honestly far more useful than the herbalists and animal trainers we could have migrate from home.
Some of the tavern guests are quite suspect, and have been interrogated on arrival. We have discovered some plots to incite violence and theft in our fortress. The agents have been imprisoned or beaten, and here are the ringleaders we have discovered: Dostngosp 'Skyhorrors', Snodub 'Witchhandle', Stozu 'Elbowevils'. A peek at their history in legends reveals the following; Dostngosp lives in a goblin tower in far southwest with a population of 10000. We will not be able to sack that tower anytime soon. Stozu is from menaceage, a tower in the north with a horde of only a formidable 2000. Stozu has had an incredible amount of marriages and divorces across his four centuries of life. Snodub witchhandle had the most interesting backstory, currently having infiltrated a carpenters guild in bridgesmith, a dwarvern fortress in the northwest possibly the once mountainhome of the lost dented diamonds civilisation, now currently under a goblin government. Snodub has a role of treasurer/bookkeeper in the organisation, and appears to be using that position to funnel funds into a gambling hobby, of which each bet and a measure of winnings has been logged in detail in the world history. Menaceage has a population of 2000, but as a mountaihome probably deserves to be conquored and restored to its dwarfivish purity.
We have drafted some reservists into the military, who can train for a month a year to double our military forces. Admittedly, our fortress is only 65 citizens, now 20 of home have military background. With the poets that have joined us, we will draft them into an extra foreign legion to give us 30. 30 dwarves might seem like nothing in comparison to the giant goblin hordes, but we have the greatest metals and forges for our weapons and armour, and with enough time before we put ourselves on the map of global warfare, we can become skilled enough to fight gods.
We already are, actually, with two forgotten beasts already in our corpse gallery.
Meanwhile, our llama and dog population has been getting out of control, and we've had to butcher many. Though our food stockpile has thousands of serves of meat and offal, and our dwarves are quite busy carting refuse and bones outside, and the first jobs outside in the last 5 years are nauseating us and causing a minor amount of stress. Generally the population is ecstatic, though some dwarves are having significant negative changes in their personalties over the years

Year 9

We decided to release two of the goblin spy prisoners. They have been chained up for well over a year, and are both completely insane. Whatever becomes of them, they pose little threat to our fortress from now, and are possibly negatively affecting the visitor cap. The ‘scholar' known to us as Ezum Bavastgoden is now wandering around babbling and ‘Ustuth Cattenemet', is slowly pacing in a melancholy haze.
Meanwhile, the goblin scholar 'Nomal Erithtenshed' has arrived, and while quite reasonably a scholar, bringing a book with him, we also notice he brings Ustetosp “the National Seiges”, a copper gauntlet artefact menacing with spikes of galena and of the most legendary highest quality. Additionally, he is armed with Smundunguk Oruse, “Cobaltgates the Everlasting twig”, an artefact copper whip with bands of elk bird antler and giant cave spider silk, menacing spikes of Draltha tooth. If Nomal does not petition to join our fortress as a citizen, we could falsely imprison him and confiscate and claim these legendary items. Intrusive thoughts… if the goblins want to keep trying to steal our artefacts, whats wrong with us plotting to steal theirs. For all I know when I next check the legends screen, they possibly were ours..

ustetosp, "the national seiges" is a copper right gauntlet, made in 109 by the dwarf Kosoth Sizzledpulleys. It was offered to the goblins of the Past Fly. Stored in the Dead Towers, it was instantly coveted by twenty separate goblins, before being stolen by the dragon Zes Brandedjade during a raid, and brought to luredtrades. A dwarf snuck into luredtrades and stole the artifact from under the dragon, but the gauntlet traded hands 8 times after multiple assasinations, before being lost for 70 years in Archsound. The dwarf Ushrir Roadpage recovered it in the early fourth century, though a plot formed to steal it and trade it to Nako Sinfulquests the Clean Snail of Disloyalty, who seems to possess the rights to it to this day.
smundunguk Oruse, the copper whip, was made in 153 by the dwarf Ngebzo Drinkmenaces in Sinchannels, changed owners several times after multiple thefts and ended in the posession of Nako Sinfulquests the Clean Snail of Disloyalty
Nako Sinfulquests, the Clean snail of disloyalty is a goblin as old as recorded time. At the beginning of history, formed the National Evil, and became lord in sinchannels. In the third century, the National Evil began a period of religious persecution, expelling swaths of the populace, including one dwarf necromancer Stozu flaxencurses. Several campaigns began on Archsound where ustetosp would later be lost. Enraged by religious persecution, Stozu flaxencurses executed a plot to abduct the lord Nako Sinfulquests, successfully doing so and consequently looting Conflictrampled and cobaltgates the everlasting twig. Stozu flaxencurses sold Nako Sinfulquests into slavery to the torments of dung in pagedpolishes, where she took the role as a bard. A reciprocal grudge was formed. Four years later, in 339 Nako Sinfulquests had already formed a criminal gang and had agents steal back conflictrampled and cobaltgates. With her gang and artefacts in tow, Nako Sinfulquests became a member of the turquoise order and migrated to pagedpolishes. Nako lost a fortune gambling at the Orange of Immorality, and went into debt. Form this vulnerable position, old friends from the torments of dung began forming false friendships to exert power in pagedpolishes through Nako. Meanwhile, pleatlands the tangles of tin, a fourth artefact in our story, appears to be repeatedly stolen and gifted to Nako by accomplices every three years. The goblin Liyiyi Drinkmothers appears across multiple of these stories, as some sort of master thief.

Year 10

We have convicted Nako Sinfulquests the Clean Snail of Disloyalty for espionage, including various cold cases just tomake sure thecharges stick. They will be in prison for two years, to the thrill of us. We need them to ultimately become caged, to confiscate their artefacts for our fortress, or we simply murder them. It will bring us great appeasement for the former, so that nako may stay alive as a prisoner and hostage for the indefinite future.
Our carpenter has become severely stressed, with enough negative personaliy change that they struggle to get through the working day. We also have a furnace operator who will become highly stressed if they are assigned any work, as they feel very little positive reward from most activities except prayer, and have to live inside the temple.
This year we refused the elves request to curb tree felling. We intend to level the forest, and torch the ground with our new flamethrower, so that it does not grow back. These trees are infuriating, and they make the overworld chug to a lowly 21 frames per second. We still enjoy a pleasant 50 indoors.
The carpenter became stuck with the desire to create an artefact weapon rack, though the joy of doing so does not seem to bring him back from being haggard and drawn. We may have to train a new tree feller for our outoor operation.. 'Solon Rithartosid', our carpenter punched the mayor while the mayor attempted to console him. Solon avoided a prison sentence, which would have at least brought him away from the general populace from a while, instead getting hammerstrikes. In year 503, a falling log struck soon rithartosid while he was out cutting trees. The injury healed despite very rudimentary medical practice, but this along with other stressess has had consequences for his long term wellbeing. As one of our founding dwarves and having no family, we could easily exile him to another of our holdings which would probably be less stressful for our populace than his death due to insanity or violence.
With the surgery complete, Solon Rithartosid was sent away to live in the fort to our south, pagedpolishes. May he have a prosperous life and find joy there that he did not find here. I pray his friends here are least distressed by this action.
The goblin known to us as Ezum Bavastgoden, has been wandering the halls insane and babbling. It is likely he is funcitonally immortal, as he is still technically a visitor and doesn't need to eat. At some point, he wandered into the drain of the mist generator, and cant wander out unless we flush the pipes. At some point however, another goblin, Nako Gozruzosto fell in, and has drowned.

If I recall correctly, Nako Gozruzosto was a humble beast hunter, who was not involved in any conspiracy that we know. We were already aware that Ezum had become trapped there, and they must have seen the whole thing though they are too incoherent to tell us the details now. Thankfully Nako's corpse is deep enough that the miasma from their decomposition does not flow back out the mist generator entrance, which would be horrific.
All the trees are felled. Next year, we prepare the flamethrower to ensure all saplings are exterminated. We get an extra 5-8fps on the surface now.

Year 11

The hammerer, who is in charge of what should normally be nonlethal beatings, has killed a goblin conspirator because he is probably becoming quite proficient in his hammer use all this time, and also the hammers we have on offer are legendary crafted with significant attack bonuses. As long as nobody is distressed by the corpse, this is fine.
Kadol Sodelstinthad, a dwarf ghoul who previously was convicted of espionage in our fortress, received a beating and left, has returned. His false name is already in parentheses, and it is fascinating that he has chosen to return. It is clear that anything less than death for spies will not pertube them. Currently, his homeworld, the nearby necromancers tower is being raided, and hopefully he experiences a similar fatal beating when we punish him this time. Destroying the nearby tower should hopefully end most of these spies that visit us.
We found nelouzong, a shale and troglodyte scepter, an artefact crafted of the highest quality when raiding budlucky, the necromancers tower. No necronomicons returned however, not that we needed more. Our raid of budlucky also saw us kill five ghouls, a vampire and two necromancers, the latter of whom were responsible for most of the authored texts recovered

vomit is inflammable. I dont know why id didnt expect that. But know I know.

Year 12

Began sealing the second cavern. It will require lava channeling to cast obsidian through the laval lakes. There is a giant rat trapped on a small island in the centre, so little has spawned here in the last years anyway.
The elves traded us a breeding pair of giant grizzly bears, of which we shall breed our own ursine legion to fight alongside our lions. Bear cubs are far quicker at becoming adults than lions

Year 13

I accidentally let the chef go insane having forgotten to obtain the necessary ingredients for his desired artefact. He had made so many prepared meals we wont really need to replace him for some time
A speardwarf who joined the fortress as a monster slayer, but never petitioned for full residency and such we can't manage his mood properly, is also going insane in this moment. A craftsdwarf who arrived recently, on of our replacement woodcutters also went off the deep end, and died recently. He had spent most of his life cutting wood and didnt have enough time to pray to his god, that he had become enraptured by stress. Likewise, our wood burners (for steel production) and furnace operators have enough repeat tasks that they also find it a bit rough sometimes. Otherwise, every other dwarf is simply ecstatic in every moment of their living.
Everyone has been in the tavern long enough to have at least one friend, and so they shouldn't be so stressed by being away from friends and family as much now. Similarly, if they all became too close friends, they could really be in jeoporday of a snowball if someone dies.
There should hopefully be enough social interaction in our routine downtime that I shouldnt worry about needing to force relationships much more. We can now reactivate the library and temple permanently (we usually interrupt these partway through the year as dwarves spend too much time praying to meet their social needs). The armory is annoying, as some dwarves have so much discipline for their own military training that they neglect prayer or socialisation.

Year 23

Much time has passed since the last recording, though nothing particularly significant has happened. The is often left to run idle during other computer activities, with occasional attention to traders or invaders. The population cap is raised to 80, and this has fortunately had little significant affect on framerate. This also allows megabeasts, including a bronze collossus now carved into a statue and decorating our temple, as well as more than one breeding pair of Roc (We have also fought some in melee for fun). The first roc was a hilarious challenge, as it exploited the gap in our ceiling to fly inot the fortress, but became terrified at the sheer volume of dwarves in the temple and repeatedly flew out. We filled the interior of the fortress with cage traps and retreated from the main halls to successfully capture this one. Craftsdwarves have repeating jobs to create 2 or 3 commodities every season that they do not get bored, and are otherwise given free time for prayer or socialisation. This year however, a unique crime garnered our attention;
Whilst fortified with the front doors secured and awaiting the drowning of another army of goblins, two dwarven children were found in quick succession to have died in their beds, drained of all their blood. Without migrants arriving at the fortress, it is clear that our suspect vampire was a traveller that we had locked inside the fortress with us for long enough for them to achieve their thirst. A series of interrogations began to uncover the suspect before they truck again. A travelling kea woman, 'Mato Turhlesstoes' true name Atafo Chokeddepthsconfessed to both murders. The interviews were complicated by the fact that Atafo could fly above the guard captain and avoid capture, attempting to even exit the map through a gap in the cavern available only to flyers. Thankfully they were caught, convicted of both murders and several extra counts of treason to ensure a harsh penalty. Atafo Chokeddepths was bludgeoned to death as punishment, and justice for our children delivered.

Year 27

An interesting invasion occured this year. Usually, we burrow ourselves to remain inside the fortress proper, but keep the drawbridges open to bait invaders into the labyrinth. Though there are many tools in our arsenal to extinguish invaders from the entrance chamber, the ballista or shooting crossbows from the fortifications leaves dead bodies at a height unreached by the magma, and drowning or washing the chamber by flushing with water is painfully slow. Instead we have to wait a considerable time for the entire force to advance into the chamber before we secure the trap,- magma, drowning, ammunition or otherwise.
For some reason of yet unknown history, the diplomat visiting us form the elven civilisation these past decades has been a goblin this entire time. We will be interested to see if their replacement is also a goblin, as the former diplomat Pili Cocilebeyu (intriguingly, this is definitely an elvish name) met their death by trying to exit the beseiged fortress at the wrong time. If this comes with diplomatic consequences, bring them on; It might make the save more interesting, and the elven traders do not bring anything of consequences, especially since we now breed and train all the interesting war mounts they could bring.

Year 29

We conquered (site name forgotten ATOR), a ruined mountainhome in the northeast. It had a population of 400 and was controlled by an as-yet unmet goblin civlisation to the east. This expedition was an opportunity to send away some of our least sane dwarves offworld, to lead the new government of whoever natively resides there and incorporate it back into dwarvern holdings. This opens ourselves up to increased invasions from the goblins, however, with 3 separate civilisations at war. Meanwhile, the homeworld receives word of our new diploimacy, and marches it's own army on the newly met goblin spire (though does not conquer). Our armies are on several away missions to raze the surrounding goblin pits, as these have much smaller populations and are easy to sack.
Late in 529, possibly a retaliatory force, a vile force of darkness arrives the moments our armies are returning form one of their msisions. The soldiers are victorious, but must stumble the last few steps under the blinding sunlight to the refuge of home, only to find the seige between them. It takes the soldiers a few moments to prepare, and register the orders to attack. Usually, the soldiers are only for fighting indoors, and only typically face forgotten beasts and the like. This is the first time we take it to the goblins in hand to hand, dazed and convulsing from the sunlight. The first sodliers wandering past the horde have such high evasiveness skills they simply dodge every arrow, whatever strike rarely landing being deflected by skilled sheild use of legends, and if anything breaks their guard though such cases are practically theoretical, then that attack could only glance the masterwork crafted armour of mythical adamantine. Safe to say, once the army registers the order, the invaders are immediately peppered with bolts, minced or decapitated. Our military reservists were ordered to the surface as well; these are craftsdwarves who have received extra training in the off-seasons to become hammerlords, though they only carry steel (not as battle-hardened, it might be unsafe to have the militia carrying adamantine lest they go insane, beserk and need to be put down by the army) Despite our legendary combat abilities, Cerol Gidthurmebzuth is the first and only casualty of goblin seige. May they rest in peace.
It is also of interesting note that while this army was from the goblin hordes, these invaders were populated entirely by dwarves. A fortress of ours, likely the re-annexed mountainhome, had given the eastern goblin civilisation a population of dwarves raised or press-ganged into their military service. Hopefully, the sight of our brethren in the dead does not confront our soldiers. Perhaps the experience may turn positive, as it will battle harden our warriors. Should our civilians wander near this feild of death, this is certainly likely to have complications.
An artefact dagger, xuspstasoz, is discovered among the remains of the victims. Reviewing our artefact stockpiles, there is in fact a remarkable amount of artefacts that seem to have entered our fortress from unknown sources; invaders or executed spies. Xaddulresmi is another example, a polished artefact skull totem, as there has not been human skulls or a artisan with the macabre to craft such an object. Artefacts are supposed to be inflammable, though one thinks how many would possibly have been destroyed from the many invaders in the magma chambers
Another note, there is still one region of hte lower caverns that has not been magma cast and sealed, and a mushroom tree has provided a landing pad for forgotten beasts to enter over the last decade, excluding the confines of the draltha graveyard. Most forgotten beasts do not have the capacity to grasp, and cannot climb the rough cave walls to threaten our superiority over the sealed cabins. A fortified shooting gallery allows our marksdwarves to take shots when one appears, and the tree is littered with corpses of fantastical beasts of the before times. At time of recording, the lower cavern has had to be sealed, as a climbing humanoid of moss agate has appeared, emitting poisonous vapours. This monstrosity cannot be confined to the mushroom, cannot be fought in melee due to its gas and owing to it's material construction, possibly nearly indestructible (adamantine should shatter gemstones, but not something we are keen to test).

Year 30

A new decade of industry. Our goals for the coming decade are less relaxed, and to be more involved in a new generation of industrial work rather than skills maintenance, and a revolution in structure, design and operation of the fortress. All non-masterwork metal objects have been scrupulously marked out and wil be melted down, forged again into new masterworks. Our clothes industry has bottlenecked at having only one loom, despite multiple weavers, and we wish to instead construct an incredible surplus of masterful clothes to cover the next generations (many instances of worn out clothes and stress points have been occuring despite the always-active clothier industry). Our happiest dwarves also appear to be those who are involved in the metalsmiths guild (all dedicated military take on metalsmith skills for peacetime, to drive their artistic visions towards artefact weapons). We shall endeavour to set up guilds for other professions as well, namely craftsdwarves and possibly also the farmers. Many of the childern are ageing up, and our fortress is consequently at its highest rate of employment. A new military squad has been created to independently train new recruits, proactively for veteran soldiers who are expecting old age or stress and insanity.
Meanwhile, the fortress is alerted that the dead walk, and a new seige begins. Normally, this notificaiton is for attack by necromancers, though we are not in proximity to any necromacer towers (though we are certainl somehow accosted by their apprentices and thralls as visitors). This army of the dead was remarkably living, combining approximately 40 completely unarmoured and untrained human recruits, a single beak dog, and a single zombified giant jaguar, 'Cacemerathi Univemini Yetine'. Sounds elvish, which is a plausible origin for such a beast into the civilised world. Thier collective army is either too intelligent to wander to our drowning trap or too dumb to figure out any advance. Some members of our militia are still stressed and agitated since the last melee, so are left in the backlines while the main army takes the engagement. Heads are cleaved at an alarming rate, and now this corner of the map is littered with the corpses of two seiges. Despite triggering a forest fire, it appears skeletons do not fully burn, and would have to be manually moved into the magma flow or a pulveriser to ever clear the remains. The list of souls that have died on our fortress grounds now exceeds 1100, 30 of whom were our own. A few of these were by accident, some from old age, some children playing make-beleive in the sun and failing to come inside during seiges, and a surpising amount of whom had strange moods and i did not pay attention to resupply the bone stockpiles as their artistic visions requested.
Our scholars have made their second advancement in the science of engineering, now discovering the windlass. One is about to go insane by next year, and the libary still fails to find wandering visitors.
A deciison was made to open the cavern and exterminate the emerald forgotten beast. It had to attempt a short maze, wherein our marksdwarves had to halt it's advance with volleyfire. Halfway in, it is crippled by bolts, but still crawls to the end before one dwarf is forced into melee, successfully destroying it. Adil Roderkadol was caught in clouds of the forgotten beast extract and began to soon show symptoms of all their organs and tissues bursting into rot. Despite the impending death, they race to the hospital and appear to have been so promptly cleaned with soap, that the inevitible is averted and after only a breif spewing of miasma, their body returns to normal.

Year 31

A project has begun to collect and atom-smash all unrotten corpses from the map. All corpses outside of the lava flows invariably have to be hauled manually, or will exist and cause stress indefinitely. Hopefully this task can have a net positive on stress in the long term. Hilariously, invadors are so shocked a thte death witnessed while wading the sea of corpses to approach our fortress, that reduced to an insane babbling mess in only a few steps. In another fortess, this would be an interesting strategy to commit to the spearing of invader's corpses at the map entrance, but for us it is a forboding inconvenience. Only the most sane dwarves are permitted to conduct corpse hauling, though most invariably bear witness to our mass-graves and six are now flashing red with stress, (though the animal trainer who has been stressed the last 5 years has finally had their mood brought under control, yay!). Thank goodness for the DFhack dwarvern therapist overview screen, otherwise I have to micromanage an incredibly laborious excel spreadsheet concurrent to my game.
A remarkable seige occurs this year in that only 13 invaders arrive, and are dispatched in melee given we are already confronting the corpse issue anyway. prompt response also saves a dwarven child due to another outdoors play mishap, vomiting and crawling on the floor in a poor attempt at retreat.
One scholar, haggard and drawn most particularly due to an accidental miasma exposure some years back snaps, toppling a statue and punching some townsfolk. A prison sentence is given, and confinement usually marks the tipping point of complete insanity. Delivering justice has its positives for the victims, and though pushing one dwarf beyond their ultimate threshhold feels regrettable, it replaces our weakest and most broken and let's us rebuild stronger.
Too much labour and hauling cuts into prayer and social time, and these dwarves need a lot of it. They almost spend too much time in prayer to ever get a good drink in, and periodic temple disabling is still necessary especially with increased hauiling and labouring tasks. The goblin and elven foreign legions have been very helpful soldiers in dispatching enemies outdoors, as they do not seem to become cave adapted and alarmed by the sun. However, these weal creatures cannot handle their drink, and would be killed by a tavernkeep serving them too much alcohol. Perhaps this is forcing our tavern to be far more dull. It is also true that our temple is valued at 10 million units of wealth (a lot), having multiple adamantine artefacts on display. A redesign of the tavern is ordered, into something far grander in the event this also increases relative patronage.

If you read all that and found it interesting, wow, thankyou. It really just is a diary of my gameplay, an archive and chronicle of one save. Maybe someday it will tell an interesting story. Eastvault the bastion of conquerors slowly continues, year by year. - August 2024

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