I ordered Childerik to retreat back to the gallows, where he has soulless to reinforce his longdead. From that position, he can keep an eye on the enemy cultist and possibly strike him down if opportunity presents itself.
I myself ignored the deer that are ravaging my crops, I have better things to do. Come to think of it, why by all the spirits of darkness am I worrying about crops and farming?! I have more important things to do, but the problem with trying to build a power base is that competent minions are hard to come by and so I need to take care of even trivial tasks myself. It's going to be venison on the menu again at some point, though...
Instead of indulging my craving for fresh venison, I set out to examine the great colossus on the plain. It was standing on an equally massive pedestal and though worn, it was covered in runic inscriptions.
A better part of mid-autumn was spent studying the inscriptions, for they offered tantalizing hints of possibilities that could solve all of my problems at a stroke! If the implications were, after all, fact... If the statue could be brought to life... Bound to service...
At the last I had managed to glean enough from the inscriptions that I could proceed. All the preparation, the painstaking assembly of an incantation, checking and checking again that here was no mistake, was brought to a culmination!
I recited the calling ... and nothing happened!
Then...
With a rumbling and groaning of stone, the great head turned, the massive limbs flexed and the colossus stepped from its pedestal! My troops scrambled back to avoid being crushed as the giant kneeled before me, its weathered face rugged and ravaged by time, but there was a gleam of...not awareness...but something, in the eyes that had been blank stone before.
It spoke not, but there was an understanding that passed between us, that it had in me found a master and that it would serve me, its liberator, from henceforth.
It would be a trivial task now to conquer the nearby mines and defeat the immediate threats, with this giant of stone towering over my army and fighting as my vanguard!
I ordered the colossus to proceed north, but to my shock, it was as if speaking to a deaf-mute. No answer, no response. It ignored me, as if I and my troops did not exist! And then it began to move, not where I directed, but somewhere else entirely.
The magical bond was still there, is there even now, so I know this creation, this golem, serves me, but I have neither control nor direction over it. It will do as it wills in my service, though never will it turn against me.
I had expected so much more, but alas, such is the hand of fate.
It was already well into the late autumn when we were able to depart the site of the colossal base where the stone giant once stood. I led my troops north to slaughter the herd of deer that had done so much damage and to intercept the enemy cultist who had moved south of Childerik's position.
The last I saw of the colossus was as it entered the forest into the southwest, crushing and splintering thick trees in its wake as if they were kindling.
It was at this time that a scruffy creature calling itself Aun presented itself at the gates of my citadel and offered my steward its services for hire, in return for 37 gold coins. This goblin chieftain further offered the services of his followers, a contingent of goblin archers, for 50 more coins.
Just the goblin chieftain alone would have bankrupted my treasury and the creatures are notoriously unreliable, even if they can be surprisingly effective sometimes. His services were declined. I intend to buy troops of higher quality when I get the opportunity.
A quick review of the disposition of my troops tells me that I am spread frightfully thin. The main force accompanies myself, a light guard of longdead defends the citadel and the rest of my meager undead follow the command of Childerik at the gallows while the Colossus works under its own unfathomable direction.
(F1 opens Unit Overview. Childerik has not used any AP in late autumn yet, so the remaining AP are shown as diamonds)
(The reason that the Colossus cannot be placed under anyone's command is that it is a Stupid
unit and will move under its own direction)
Re: CoE3 AAR: A Chronicle of the Interregnum
Hybrid Mode
