Static and clouds filling his vision, Urist floated along with the void absentmindedly.

“What is this place? What is this stuff? Where am I?”

His voice resounded in the void echoing along with the clouds bouncing back and forth to him. This was the first time his mind wasn’t filled with scattered memories so he decided to explore this seemingly strange and endless place.

And so he floated along a direction to what seemed like an eternity before the clouds started to part for a single streak of blue lightning lit up the cloud world. The void trembled as the thunder’s mighty roar traveled forth blasting him away.

...

Waking up Urist rubbed his eyes and yawned, Well that was unexpected, I can actually remember that world. What kind of force was that? How powerful is that streak of lightning? Will I be visiting it again?

As his thoughts ran wild he felt a pressure on his chest again. With a sigh already knowing who it was he pinched Uria’s cheek causing her to yelp in surprise.

Urist felt a headache coming on, “Why do you keep doing this?”

Pouting Uria pushed Urist off the bed, “Because it’s comfortable you dummy! Why did you pinch me?” 

Deciding to dodge the question, Urist dug out the oxygen crystal and lit it up, the Pinky size stone had now become the size of two fingers. This made Urist raise an eyebrow, it seemed these crystals had some pretty good growth.

Urist got everyone up to work as they had a lot to do. Today Rat would be accompanying him to the civilization stone to greet the new dwarfs. Walking into the room Urist appraised the dwarfs standing before him.

They didn’t seem to be arguing with each other so that was a plus, the four noticed Urist presence and started walking up to him asking him questions. He replied to all of them and then started to ask them their names and jobs.

Emu the wind mage that looked like a girl, but was actually a boy. Regular brown hair, red eyes, and a charming smile. Urist couldn’t put his finger on why this mage made him feel like something was off about him. That is until the mage asked if there were any pretty girls around, it was at that moment he figured out what was wrong.

Ah, this one is a womanizer.

Moving along to the others there was an archer and warrior respectively called Uto and Indar. The anchor wore simple brown clothing, sort of matching his black hair and green eyes. His most eye-catching feature was the scar running down his neck, and his tall stature. His voice was very husky and raspy from the wound on his neck so he spoke a few words. Urist got the feeling that he a stoic type of fellow that spoke with action rather than words and welcomed him. 

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The warrior next to him was stocky and wielded a mace and shield. He wore cloth gambeson which made Urist eyes sparkle at the sight. Indar had dark orange hair, blue eyes a face that had some scars and a majestic beard to go with it that went down to his chest. 

When Indar was introducing himself he was kind of weirded out by Urist staring at him so intently. Urist felt a little awkward and explained how he loved the design of gambeson vs. leather armor for a few reasons.

Urist made a note of checking out the market pricing for such armor and talked with the last dwarf. Her name was Stonechild and a Stone Crafter she was quite the looker with her tan skin and defined muscles. She had a good face, sporting straight black hair tied in a ponytail, strong brown eyes and wore loosely fitting clothing.

She had a good set of assets that made Urist face turn to stone, showing not a hint of emotion. She seemed like a serious spirit asking if there was any good stone around and if there were any tools to use.

Urist liked her attitude of wanting to get to work, with a smile he welcomed them to their new home. He asked Rat to lead them along to their new jobs, as he wanted to get ready to lead the expedition to the mountains wanting to obtain some more metal.

It wouldn’t hurt to stock up on more in case he was right, the one thing he did though was to add a member to the team. He had Saera join them on the expedition for the reason of her skill that could identify objects.

He wanted to be the first to know if his prediction was true, it would take only a few more hours to know the effects. By the time they were finished, they’d be back to base and the event would most likely have begun. While he headed out he gathered another team to go out and set up various traps throughout the bamboo and marked their location with the cloth he bought at the market.

Most of the traps set were for killing rats, he asked for this for two reasons. To get an idea for the rat population, and two to reduce it. The stay at home dwarfs would get to making the foundation for the walkway as the earth mages covered the wooden wall with hardened stone.

Other then making some holes in the fence, for the spears and pushers, he had another idea. They would also dig a channel outside the wall and the earth twins would harden it. A little devilish idea he came up with to add another layer of defense.

It’ll be a little hard to pull off, but I think it will be a nice weapon to add to the wall. As he was thinking of such things a voice rang out in his ear.

“What do you think you are doing? You haven’t trained enough to go outside Urist!”

Turning around he knew that voice was Uria reprimanding him, “Mo said I have enough combat power to handle a boar by myself. So I’ve kept my promise and trained enough of the basics to learn how to fight with a spear.”

“But you just ca-”

“Uria I must do this, I need to set an example.”

“Why can’t you just lead from the back? Why must you put yourself in danger?”

Seeing Uria’s sad face Urist bitterly smiled and ruffled her hair.

“I just can’t change who I am. Don’t worry, I’ll always come back alive.”

Turning away from her Urist joined up with the waiting expedition. Leaving Uria by herself looking down at the ground clenching her fists frustrated.