After w for awenty days, I fihe jail cell, and just in time too. Later in the day, the dwarven envoy arrived. I figured it would be just a handful of dwarves who arrived, but to my surprise, it was actually about thirty individuals, including the dwarf I iated with before and Shasta. They didn't just e to collect the crystal either. They arrived with various gifts of their own. Alcohol aal tools made up the majority of their gifts.

  I also learhat the dwarf I iated with was a big shot in the dwarf kingdom. When we were iating before, initial discussions had us ing uhe trol of Kao Ostark. Well, that dwarf is apparently him. He seemed to be in good spirits as he ehe vilge, and was seemingly impressed with the rate we've expahings in the vilge since he was here st.

  In the evening, we officially met with Kao and Shasta in Zaka's new house to discuss matters.

  "Kao is impressed with the improvements you've made in such a short time." Shasta said as we sat down.

  "Well, we've had a lot of iive to expand our popution." I replied, "Anyway, outside of the crystal what other matters are there to discuss?"

  "There are a few topics outside of just the crystal that we were hoping to establish in the ing days. First and foremost, we'll o draft up formal dotation and iional agreements to establish the exact retionship our two tries have, along with any stiputions that might o be included within those agreements. After those are discussed, we see what, if any, of the other topics are still valid." Shasta said, while reading from a piece of part.

  "I suppose formalizing everything is probably a good idea, especially before we have any further iions. Of course, I'll probably o be informed somewhat about the ws of the dwarven kingdom as we discuss matters..." I replied.

  After three grueling days, we've hammered out formal dotation for most of the important topics like trade, immigration, crimiradition, sn borders, and military agreements. Crimiradition and border discussions were easy and pretty straight forward. We both agreed to extradite any criminals from either try back to their homend when requested. Of course, things don't always work out that way, but that's a discussion for when a problem actually arises.

  As for border discussions, it was actually quite informative, in addition to being easy to discuss. It seems that, within the mainnd where the dwarves e from, maritime borders in the o aren't really sidered, because few people bother to travel in it due to the general risk of leviathans. Thankfully, the dwarves were willing to accept some maritime borders being drawn around the isnds as being our territory. The distance varies somewhat, but the water betweehree isnds that we own is sidered our territory, f a bit of a bubble around the outside of them.

  On topics of trade, the dwarves have a 15% tariff on all materials going into their try. The tariffs are generally handled by the merts themselves, but o be paid in dwarven currenbsp; As for ourselves, we've decided oing no tariffs on trade ing to us at this time. Without a formal monarch over, it's not like colleg a treasury is going to matter for us right now. We did however set a 5 year expiration on this trade treaty, and it'll o be reiated as that deadline arrives.

  Immigration was a tricky topibsp; While Kao doesn't seem to mind personally, the dwarven king was quite adamant about not allowing any goblins or other demons into their mainnd, but is alright with the singur isnd that is under Kao's direct trol having them if he wishes. So for the time being, their borders are practically closed, outside that one isnd. As for us, we're actually going to set up a pretty strict immigration policy ourselves.

  Those who wish to immigrate apply on the isnd trolled by Kao, fill out an application, and we'll review the applits before allowing them into our territory. First, I don't want this to turn into a y of dwarves. I don't have much against them, but I also would like to keep things within our own trol, and not be uhe influence from a fn power. Sed, we don't want t people in who wouldn't actually want to be here. ditions arely amazing here right now, and a lot of teology is g pared to a medieval society. As ht now, w and living here is somewhat harsh, and any immigrants o have good motivations for enduring that.

  When we arrived at military agreement discussions, I got even more of a glimpse into the ws of the dwarven kingdom. Their king doesn't actually make any military decisions. He's in charge of domestic policies, and has a retively small army that is statio their capitol. As suo try-wide military agreements are ever established. Instead, eadepe military leader makes their own agreements, whicludes their own armies. Internally, most of their armies all have defensive pacts with each other, but due to the difficult terrain in their homend, having indepe military deaking is important.

  Given that fact, we could only make military agreements with Ka iations. We settled on an agreemeed to the isnds. If an outside power threateher our isnds, or Kao's singur isnd in his territory, theher party would be expected to provide military assistanbsp; Holy, it seems to be a more than fair deal to us, since we won't get dragged into any mainnd fighting by happenstance.

  By the end of the agreements I had a question that had been burning in my head, but I didn't dare risk asking until after the agreements were all signed. However, after they were signed off I faced Kao and asked, "Alright, now that all the paperwork is done, why be this generous? I'm grateful, but from what I tell, demoo be seen generally as a sce."

  After Shasta transted, he let out a chuckle and replied in dwarvish, and I had to wait for Shasta to transte again, "There is something unique going on here. An eagle protected you, and you hold the secrets to crystals like ParTor. Many dwarves see the eagles as something akin to gods. I know they are mere beasts. They are fickle, but intelligent. If you keep them on your side, you show loyalty to others as well. As fenerosity, I'd be ined to be less generous personally, but Shasta thinks that big things are likely to e from here if it's given time to prosper. If it doesn't, then it's retively easy for me to merely abandon the isnd outpost we'll set up, ahe world decide for itself your fate."

  When his statement finished, I definitely uood his reasoning. It's likely to cost him nothing to actually give us these cessions, but if we end up being a problem, he just look the other way, and no one else would actually fault him for breaking any agreements he made with demons. Without making us a formal protectorate, he's still mao maneuver us into that role he-less. He's quite shrewd.

  The day, we sat down and discussed trade. The dwarves are going to set out tomorrow, and make the six day jourhrough the forests to the bay where they've docked, taking the crystal with them. They said that they could haul more items back if we wao trade for anything. This time around, they've brought a mert with them who do some appraisal, and give us rough estimates of what we could get in exge for things.

  First and foremost, I want crop seeds and domesticated animals. Diversifying food sources is always a good idea, si reduces the ces of total colpse of the food supply. Crop seeds wouldn't be too expensive, but enough domestiimals to start a food supply would actually be a bit difficult to transport to the isnds. It wasn't impossible, but it'd be expensive.

  Two potential exports we could provide weren't very valuable, namely, fish and s beets. However, since we always resto fish, it's worth trading some of it. Salt is actually worth a bit more pound for pound, so we'll also be trading some of that as well. The most valuable item though is some of the metal ingots that Katarko made. I'm willing to part with some of them, but metal is also non-renewable, and we have lots of things that we'll need metal for iure, so I don't want to ship away our eockpile.

  After iating with the mert for a few hours, I've decided to sent them off with about 20% of ots we have left, along with a det amount of salt and preserved fish. In exge, we'll be getting a barrel of seeds for three different crops that the mert suspects should be able to grow here, and 9 medium sized livestoimals, eight females and a breeding male in total. They're grazing animals, so they hopefully sustain themselves on general pnt life growing on the isnd. After he described the animals, they sound like a mix between a deer and a sheep, so I'm intrigued to see what they taste like.

  In the evening, I worked with some of the dwarves that were brought along to get the crystal properly packed away in lightstone for them to transport, ensuring that they could actually remove the lightstone as well using their own magibsp; Once everything was verified on that front, all the other trade goods were packed up so that the dwarves would be able to set out first thing in the m.