After we settled on the design, I had to unicate that we wanted a fg made to the weaving goblins. Which, after a few hours of bad forth, they had a good idea of what o be done. With that do to me to make the stone gift crates for the dwarven warlords who would be showing up. Since we have no idea just how many will arrive, I'm going to prepare plenty, and if I have extra, I always either bring them back, or, if there are enough, divide them up and give extras to all the dwarves.

  I decided that, given the importance of the first impression, I'd make the crates with lightstone, and make our emblem out of darkstone on the crates. Though that did mean I had to take a bit of time making lightstone again. Ultimately, I made 80 crates over the course of twelve days, which means I have enough crates for fourty different emissaries. Half the crates have paper, and the other half have salt. Unfortunately, that does cut into our trade supply for year quite deeply, but again, this is an iment iions with the other dwarf warlords in the dwarven try.

  Last time I had asked, which was many years ago now, the dwarven king had banned any demons ing to the dwarven mainnd. So, if we want to ge that, we'll o vinough of his military advisors that we should be allowed over. Thinking ouation, this reminds me a bit of when Europe arrived in Japan and wao trade there. There are quite a few differehough in the dwarveality and their iions with their neighbors. The dwarves seem much less isotionist than Japan was. I'm just hoping that it doesn't e to the same result, with the only way to properly open their borders being threat of military force, because I don't think I could do that. Perhaps after a few of the dwarves acquire rge crystals, I'll gift the king an even rger crystal to try to improve our retions...

  With the remaining twenty-three days until we went to the beach to await a ship to pick us up, I picked out the handful of hobgoblins that I wao apany me orip. I had already decided that I'd bring one of the two goblins that had learned how to speak, read, and write dwarvish to assist in the whole endeavor. I also talked with Zaka, Zeb, the human harbormaster, Elora, and a particurly money savvy hobgoblin to harade with the mert this year. I don't actually know if he stops on the dwarven isnd, or if I'll run into him this year, but I wao make sure we didn't miss out on what trade we could be doing.

  A mere five days into the first month of winter, and a ship bearing Kao's fg arrived to pick us up to take us to his isnd. We took a day to load in all the goods and the crystal, and the off for their isnd. Shasta was aboard the ship, so I was able to get filled in on what to expect at the au.

  First, I seem to have drastically overprepared for the meeting. There are six participating dwarven warlords. I prepared for up to forty. So, I decided that I'd triple the initial gift size to six total crates eabsp; That means we're still only giving away half of the prepared gifts. Havira on hand isn't a bad idea though, incase one or two more arrive unannounced.

  Sed, Kao didn't really appreciate the short notice of su event, and wao let me know that he won't do something like this again for me. That doesn't mean we don't keep doing the aus, just that I shouldn't go about asking him to coordihe other warlords for other events. As an apology, I've decided that aen crates of goods will be given to Kaanizing the event, in addition to the crystal that I'll give him year.

  Third, as for the au itself, given the small number of partits and the uuation, Kao is finishing up a special location on the isnd for the au to take pbsp; The crystal will be trally visible for the partits to see, though it will be behind gss. The au will be done in dwarven , though I'm allowed to ta certain other pre-requisites to participation if I want.

  I had initially thought I'd just have them each try to offer aiate with me foods in exge for the crystal, but when I asked Shasta about that, she said that would be a very bad idea. If we had it done via goods, some of the partits might feel slighted personally by me if I choose one partit's goods over another's. As long as it's done in a single currency, then all the other partits only bme the sele criteria, which is known in advance, and no one feel like a partial decision was made. This way, they'll also be able to leave with the crystal, rather than waiting a year to prepare their goods.

  That makes sense, but it unfortunately means I'll have to wait even loo properly trade for what I want, since I'll just be receiving dwarven instead of actual goods. Though I'm gd that I at least ta a few pre-requisites to participation. Like I request a defensive pact simir to what I have with Kao, which art of my initial pn. Part of this endeavoals is to make allies after all.

  Given what Shasta said about actally slighting the warlords though, I want to be cautious about adding other prerequisites to the au. Unless I think of something iweehe au happens and now, I don't think I'll add in anything other than a defensive pact.

  This is the first time I've travelled away from our isnd and actually seeher isnds up close. Our trip brought us along each of the other isnds in the isnd , so I was able to get a pretty det look at what is teically our territory. The total sailing time was three days, with about an equal distaween each of the isnds.

  The first isnd that we passed, which is also the ohat I could spot from the peak of our own isnd, was somewhat simir to our isnd, if a bit smaller and shorter. It seems like it has eroded and sunk pared to our isnd. Though after seeing it, it's probably actually better for living on than our isnd is. The valleys are wider and there are more of them, though the isnd seems to follow the same sort of biomes as ours does. The peak has a tiny bit of snow on it, the side fag our isnd seems to have rai like pnts simir to ours, and the far side is also dry.

  I brought along my telescope, sihought we might pass the isnds, and while I was looking at the isnd, I saw a giant lizard, though it did look a little different than what I remembered that the ones on our isnd looked like. This one has three bright blue stripes down it's back, and it seemed a little smaller than the ones on our isnd, thought that might just be an issue with my memiven my ge in size sihen. Iher case, I'm somewhat relieved that it doesn't seem like they've gone pletely extinct.

  The sed isnd was quite a bit shorter and more eroded. There wasn't any snow on the peak, if you could even call it a peak anymore. It was more of a generally raised se he ter, with a retively shallow slope and sharp valleys going out to the sea. In fact, the whole isnd looks like it's mostly craggy terrain. This isnd is easily only a third of our isnd's size, and it seems like very little of it would be easily inhabited, mostly around the beaches. To make use of the majority of the isnd, it'd take years of terraf to cut away at the crags. If we pnned on doing that, we'd just as well make our own crags useful on our isnd first.

  Then, we finally made it to Kao's isnd. Most of the terrain of this isnd seems usable, but the isnd itself is very small. It's probably about the same size as our isnd's valley that our city is in. There are beaches around a rge portion of the isnd, and fifty or so feet back from that are cliffs that are also about fifty feet tall. As we came around the isnd, I spotted their outpost. Along a portion of the shoreline, a small stream flows down to the sea, and the cliffs in that area are signifitly more sloped. led along the stream on the cliff is a stone fort. Along the beach, they have a few stone piers going out to the sea.

  We pulled up to one of the piers, but our boat was floating almost twenty feet too low to dobsp; Shasta informed me that you only use this dock at high tide, at which point you unload everything, so we'll have to wait some time before we actually unload. We could use the rowboats, simir to how we do it on our isnd, but it seems that it's signifitly easier to just wait, so that's what they do here. If there are important matters to rey, then a rowboat could be used to get important persoo shore quickly, but we aren't in a rush.