[h1][color=orange][b]Orr'gavol: The Hammersworn - Turn 0[/b][/color][/h1]

Nothing. There really was nothing left. Osman Slag, foreman of the Worker Council and leader of the Hammersworn Dwarves, could not seem to stand up. Around him were men, women and children, some howling in agony, others in despair, some not howling at all - merely staring. The dust had not yet settled; the air was still ripe with the stink of industry - now complemented by the stench of death. Some dwarves grabbed whatever tools they had managed to evacuate and began beating and hacking at the boulders that now covered what had been their home about an hour ago. Others used their rocks, sticks or their fists, screaming at the cruel gods and hateful ancestors who had allowed this to happen. Some dwarves of the Bronze union sat down at began to debate whether this loss would upset the balance of the world, to which a gang of Steel unionists reacted with outrage and violence, quickly followed by Mithril unionists looking to vent some emotions. Gold Union dwarves and Silver union dwarves lamented their colossal monetary losses, and what few remained of the Unions of Phosphorus and Glass stood there like statues of stone. All the knowledge that they had gathered - every scroll, every carving, every log - all lost in the matter of minutes. A few of them collapsed to the ground in horror.

The foreman did not mind the chaos breaking out between the survivors. Currently, he thought of little more beyond his people, trapped within what yesterday had been their home. It was autumn now, he thought. Come winter, we will all be like those within. The thought sent a shards of ice through him. The Hammersworn civilisation, a people with almost a millennia of history - wiped out in less than a single year? He tried to dismiss the thought, but its roots dug deep into his mind, whispering wicked words of doom for his people.

"Foreman!" Osman snapped back into reality. He looked at the source of the voice. He recognised the elder woman, her hair like rusty strands of iron, her face overripe with wrinkles and now flaming red with tears. She looked to be mustering all her will to not keep shedding them. Her left eye was surrounded by a tattoo shaped like a golden plate with hints of green - a mark of the Copper Union. She gestured to fighting that had broken out between the hapless survivors - many of whom were now on the ground in pools of their own blood or clutching their wounds. Osman, having not completely broken out of the shock, merely glanced over, just in time to see a Bronze unionist be blinded by a rabid Steel unionist. The blind dwarf clutched his bloody, empty socked and his screams momentarily deafened all others'. He fell to the ground, and then his groans were all the sound that was heard through the valley - the wind was gone; the water, silent; not even the stone rubble in front of the dwarves groaned anymore. Osman held his breath. The hacking breath of the brawlers grew quieter as they looked at each other, then the results of their recklessness. Many of them once again felled tears, and the blind dwarf's kinsmen stormed over to help him.

"We are all dead," an Earth unionist said. "All our crops-... All our crops were inside. There is nothing left out here!" His words blew through the crowd like a disease. Families began to flock together, then into their respective unions, forming phalanxes with whatever tools they had, pointed at the others. 

"That cannot be true! You soilers certainly have a hidden storage somewhere! You will dig it out while the rest of us starve to death!" a Steel unionist spat back. Her kinsmen backed her up with a barrage of shouts and threats, to which the Earth Union responsed with their own defensive cacophony. The Glass Union and the Phosperous Union both backed the Earth unionists with arguments about the quality of the local soil in terms of food storage and how it would be impossible for them to store so much food in the hard ground without anyone else knowing about it. A Silver unionist, in a fit of stress, caved in and joined the debate by saying that his union had several thousand coffers of gold hidden away in caches around the valley. His kinsmen, appalled that one of their own would spill their secrets, immediately subjected the lad to severe beatings, until he was within an inch of his life.

Osman could not seem to muster the courage to break through the ever-thickening wall of words between him and his people. The councilmen who hadn't joined their own stood around him, begging him to say something and end the chaos. However, he had not prepared for this - not a single day in his fifty year long lifespan had he thought he might have been forced to lead his people through a crisis. Herim Ore, his closest companion and apprentice to the now late Elder Calendarmaster of the Glass Union, fell to his knees before Osman and grabbed him by the leg, shaking it in a futile attempt to break through to the stunned foreman.

"... We... We cannot remain," Osman finally managed to say. His councilmen heard him, and in mere seconds they all spread out to the various Unions, breaking up the chaos through any means necessary. Upon hearing orders, the people quickly quieted down and turned to the foreman. Osman swallowed.

"We cannot stay," he said again. "Our cities are no more. Our way of life is-... Is at the mercy of the gods once more." His words were met with a defeaning silence and empty glances.

"Winter is on our heels, Unions. We have no choice but to move south to the very edge of the Ancestor Woods. Perhaps there, we can gather what the season can offer and wait out the winter, so we may one day return to dig our home out." Osman's breath was ragged. Many of the dwarves looked at each other in uncertainity.

"Leave the valley? No one has ever done that before save the soilers!" claimed a Stone unionist who was clutching his head after a previous brawl. His words were met by disapproving hollering from the Earth Union. Osman bit his lip and looked down the river Darr, and into the horizon far beyond, where nothing but vast plains stretched for miles.

"As I said, it is only temporary. We will one day return to Gol'kharumm and rebuild. However, for now, we have no choice. By the power of my mandate as foreman of the Worker Council and leader of the Hammersworn, I declare that we are to migrate further south and wait out the winter before we come home. Does the council agree with my decision?" The counsilmen, with the exception of a few, nodded and grunted in agreement.

"Then may the gods be good," Osman said.