After getting all the terrace work figured out with Zeb, I found myself w what I should personally work o. While I could have just assisted with the existing projects for a while, instead, I could also get a head start on some of the things that need done in the few years. For instance, while we just had the au a few months ago, I could grow the crystal early, and we could use it ourselves for a bit.

  I could, holy, grow the wo crystals even, just to have it done. By then, we should have the new artificial tide pool pleted, and I'd expect that the tunnel will have made it far enough that I could spend a few days using maximum power teise to see if I find any deposits or other points of i. This winter, I have quite a rge list of import requests I'd like to make. After those start getting delivered, I'll have a lot of projects I want to work on, so it's probably for the best if I pn oing the crystals finished now, rather than ter.

  Given that I had focused my efforts before on growing the rger crystals, I ended up spending just over four months growing the wo au crystals. In the downtime on the mountain, I also pletely depleted the deposits of mana crystals from the surrounding area I'd mapped out with teise. Which, after doing some calcutions, and excluding the moderately rge natural crystals, it seems like these two crystals are the extent of what this deposit grow.

  I could dip into the medium sized crystals, and have enough material to grow twe artificial crystals, so it's not like we're doomed, but the medium and rger natural crystals are actually pretty useful in their current state, sihey're portable, and don't hurt to use directly. Though I'll o sider how useful they'll actually be if they're just left up here on the mountain, rather than turned inter crystals. If the tunnel finds a deposit, I could always attempt to move some of the crystals down using stations of the mana abs poison during an eclipse. I'm sure that'd also speed up tunnel stru over time as well, so it's something I'll sider doing iure.

  Right now though, we're very close to winter, so I'm going to haul one of these two crystals down, and install it near one of our many ongoing worksites that could use the extra mana sourbsp; After that, I'll get our trade goods anized for the year, and head over to the far side of isnd. I pn on requesting the mert make a double trip this year, so I'll probably spend the whole winter on that side of the isnd. They've been hauling stone from the terrace project to that side of the isnd, so I'll start w oing those jetties I discussed made.

  Once all the salt and paper was ready for trade, I brought a bunch of goblins along with me to the other side of the isnd to help haul everything. Unlike previous trips, where we were the only ones on the road, the inns along the way were quite busy, as carts full of stone were parked ht full of literal tons of stone making the journey every day from one side of the isnd to the other.

  Once we arrived oher side of the isnd, it arent that I had a lot of work ahead of me, as did the goblins that I brought with me. Months of stone being cut and piled over here has resulted in a few very rge piles having formed. I'm gd that they're at least somewhat anized. One pile is prised er, oddly-shaped stones, another of smaller oddly-shaped stones, and the final pile is made of smooth cut stone, which would be easy to stoneshape together.

  What's a little more iing is that the stone arrives only sorted in two types, smooth cut, and oddly-shaped, and the goblins unloading sort their load before returning home. I asked one goblin why they did that, and he just shrugged and said, "It's what everyone else is doing, so I'm doing it too." After I asked a few moblins, it seemed like none of them kly who had started the anization this way. It will make my job easier though, sihe rger stones are the ones we want to use for the jetty base, and the smaller stones simply be poured iween the rger stones before the outer yers are attached.

  Before that though, there was actually a det k of work that we had to do first. Both fnks of the bay on this side of the isnd were still rown, and had no roads reag the edges. The bay is fnked by small ridges that reach further out into the water during high tide, though at low tide, it's less pronounced. So, I wao extend our roads along the sides reag to where I want the jetties to be. Part of achieving that goal required me to cut down a few dozen trees, which barely moved the pass on my level. By the time all the trees were cut, I'd gained a single level, and based on when I st gained one, I was already pretty close before cutting them down.

  I was interrupted while I was w by the trader arriving. He had quite the haul of goods that were requested st year. Some roofing supplies, a bunch of iron, some more bargas, various human and dwarven goods, and some tools that were requested by our craftsman. Initially, I just assumed the tools were for the dwarves and humans, but as it turns out, a few were for our carpenter goblins and our weaver. When I get back to the city, I'll have to ask them about how they came about requesting these goods, though I suspect it was versation with some of our tial residents that informed them of certain tool's existences. I'm all for it, we have the money for the tools, and I've basically moved on from building tools for most of our craftsgoblins, so it's a good alternative.

  I then pced our orders for the year. I pced a rge order for quartz sand for making gss, though we'd also take recycled gss to use instead. I used up quite a lot of our avaible quartz supply while making the greenhouse, though most of it had been used up irofitting old buildings, so it hasn't been a huge detriment that we're nearly out, but it could bee one in a year's time. , I pced an order for some seeds that would be grown at higher altitudes.

  Given the dwarven ti is fairly mountainous, I expect they also have a rge diversity of pnts that they've learo grow in different climates. We don't have that mud at higher altitudes, but it'd be o start taking advantage of that space, especially if they have some good pnts for it. I expined our different altitudinal climates to our mert friend, and he said he knew of a few pnts that he'd bring arou year.

  Unfortunately, I didn't get any news back from Konkur on any of my questions. I hope that he's doing fine, and just uo respond for some reason or another. Despite that, I did have another note made for him, discussing the questions I had about fluorite abundand uses. The mert didn't have any neles of fluorite for me either, nor did he have much of an idea of it, si's usually not traded. Him and Shasta both had a vague idea that it's sometimes used in dwarven deep fes, which peaked my i.

  I asked them about what a deep fe was, given the name, I had a det idea, and my guess ended up pretty close. They're fes structed deep under mountains, where very little mao. When a new mountain is designated for mining out, they first dig a tral deep fe, where all the ore will be transported and smelted. Large fans keep air flowing through the tral tunnel, ensuring there is enough oxygen for smelting, while the sistent temperature that deep underground makes precision processes easier.

  We had our brief rise in fame temporarily thanks to our mangalloy, but ultimately, dwarven steel is sidered the best on the market, and master smiths hoheir craft in the stant climate trolled enviro of a deep fe. Most deep fes are operated by a regional warlord or the emperor who afford to pay the rge workforce to support them. Outside of that, they still have plenty of normal bcksmiths, like Karsh.

  So, I also ended up paying for a few ingots of dwarven steel, just to see it for myself. All that was in addition to the other metals I ordered, and more of the various humanoid's goods that they requested for this year. After getting the trade settled, I paid a premium to have a load of the quartz sand and some of the metals brought over this winter again, the back t oties while I waited for the mert to return.