Into the Depths: My First Journey Through the Dwarven Mines

 

I finally built up the skills to go down not a rabbit hole, but through the insides of a certain shaft that may be found in Copperhead. The experience was quite intense and adrenaline-packed, finding jewels and loot, solving puzzles and fighting creatures in the dark.

A couple of notes for future expeditions: I need to carry more hearts, candles and eyes. They get spent rather quickly under the mountain, and only the eyes are (partially) replaceable with what you find.

This is the top of a tall vertical shaft, dimly illuminated by light from some distance above.  A wide ladder is bolted onto the wall to allow miners to get up and down, and an opening leads to the southwest.  The shaft walls are striated with layers of rock, shading from light brown above to orange here and further down.  From somewhere above, a slow trickle of water winds across them.

There are three obvious exits: up, southwest and down.

A skeleton warrior arrives from above.

The skeleton warrior grabs onto the ladder and starts climbing.

Down we went, the skeleton and I, and among the first spaces we found where glinting walls, which got me to mining with pickaxe and claw hammer. My skills need honing, as more often than not, I got some trolls to wake up and come after me. Still, some patience resulted in my first gems and some better skills at finding them:

chip wall with hammer

You start carefully chipping at the wall with your claw hammer.

> Saving...

You feel better at excavating gems from underground mines.

Your claw hammer breaks through perfectly into a vein of ankhstones with a satisfying crunch.  You pry a white gem fragment and a white gem chip free from the rock.

Soon after I found some dwarven berserkers (quite tough to kill!), bats, more gems, giant cave spiders (which were a little bit less intimidating than I expected) and my first crates. I proved to be quite clumsy (and or unlucky) with most of them, though:

You pry open crate B2.  It's full of little baby giant spiders, about the size of tarantulas.  They rush out like a tide, gnawing on everything in sight in a desperate search for food.  All of the closed crates get gnawed open in seconds, with A2, A3 and C5 releasing their own deluges of spiders into the swarm.  B5 seems to have contained a number of copper bars, which are also borne away by the tide.  (Giant spiders love shiny things.)  Once it's clear there's nothing for them to eat, the swarm turns on itself, spider devouring spider, until only a few survive to scuttle away into the tunnels. 

As mentioned, I kept going until I couldn't go further down, exploring every nook and cranny. As I got to the bottom, though, I found myself running out of eyes and candles, meaning I was no longer very able to kill the critters that attacked me. I didn't explore in depth the lower levels, but did find an interesting pair of abandoned rooms, with quaint objects to be found therein:

These quarters look like their owners left in a hurry, or possibly died in a terrible accident of some sort.  The pleasant grain of the smoothed orange walls is interrupted by the occasional bloodstain.  Three beds stand against the north wall, each with a little side-table beside them; the fourth lies broken in pieces across the room.  A weapon rack stands empty against the north wall.  Next to it is an armour stand, its contents undisturbed.

There is one obvious exit: northwest.

Almost forgot to mention that some of the rooms I encountered were full with stinkbomb gas! Fortunately, I had come prepared with an elemental magical shield, which I also renewed once below the mountain, so the only effect was the occasional appearance of a frightful message:

> The yellow energy around you pulses briefly.

The air here is just as choking as before.

Overall, the loot was quite interesting: four small pewter bars, four white gem chips, three white gem fragments (these are all ankhstone, I think), a rusty music box, a secure sandstone lockbox, five very small tin bars, two yellow gem shards, three yellow gem chips, a yellow gem fragment (these are jasper), three pink gem chips and three pink gem fragments (these are rose beryl). I now have to find something to do with the bars and someone to open the music box and the lockbox...

Addendum: since the time of writing the previous post, I've had the change to visit the mines about 3 or 4 more times, and become moderately savvy at navigating them. The loot has been expanded with some rather quaint mineral jewellery (what the lockboxes contain), a greater variety of gems (tiger's eye, zircons, jade, topazes...). I've also sold off the lower quality ones and kept the good stuff for future gemsmithing) and some more bars in different sizes (pewter, copper and tin).

I also found this quaint little mug, carved from dolomite, which I feel is a rather nice souvenir and memento of the caves, which I probably won't visit as much in the following weeks:

This is a large mug, of the sort used by dwarfs for quaffing beer.  It's carved out of solid dolomite, but isn't as heavy as it looks.

It is in excellent condition.