Scarred ora Kazunel war hammer with a mithril-wrapped haft

This item was a prize from the Hunt for History.

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a scarred ora Kazunel war hammer with a mithril-wrapped haft

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Loresong

Damp warmth washes over you immediately, and your heavy breath echoes hollowly off the close stone walls. As you shift your feet, the feel of the sharp grit of a rocky floor is noticeable through your boot soles. You begin to notice the sensation of your visceral form; wide shoulders, stout limbs, and a thick low-slung belly. Smoothing your beard in a gesture that seems practiced, your fingers trail across intricate thick braids running down your chest, stopping a moment to finger a heavy Kazunel clan beard clip. Your eyes adjust with natural dwarven quickness to the pitch black, and a dim glow emanates from somewhere ahead. You pick your way slowly towards the weak light, surrounded by the sounds of dripping water and rough scraping alternately plinking and shuddering through your bones.

The dim light ahead swirls and fades as your heavy grip suddenly loosens and the hammer almost slides from your grasp.

With eyes shuddering from darkness to a bright bluish-green glow, your vision swims into clarity. Forms become distinguishable as you adjust to the change, and the hardy body you inhabit is comfortable. A rusty yet serviceable cart on sturdy tracking is half filled with shining chunks of mithril ore, and several well-used mining axes rest against a mined rock wall next to their stout companions. A deep grunt of satisfaction escapes your throat, as the sharp scent of the ore mixes in your nostrils with a soft yet salty smell of freshly-hewn rock. As you approach the methodically-cut wall, your strong calloused fist clenches around the smooth haft of your heavy forging hammer. Suddenly you feel like you are plunging forward and down, your eyes close and your stomach lurches.

Your hand tenses hard around the hammer and the vision passes, though the awareness of your belly clenching and roiling persists.

Blasted with brilliant light, your eyes close reflexively and you flinch away from pulsing waves of white-hot heat. Immediately you erupt into a heavy dripping sweat and your eyes slowly open. Squinting through a shimmering filmy haze, you can make out a stout smoke-vomiting forge humming with flame. Gripping the hammer's hilt protectively in your hand, you look down to see a fine-edged mithril dagger upon the anvil, and you grunt quietly to yourself in appreciation. The marriage of a near-perfect mithril double-edged blade with a simple yet elegant balanced gold hilt pleases you, and you scoop it up to examine your work. As you touch the edge of the blade with the tip of your tongue, a slight metallic tang rings through your mouth.

Your hallucinatory body turns, the brilliant light from the forge near-blinding your eyes to the darker recesses of the room. Suddenly a sweaty chill races up your spine and the vision ends.

A sturdy but not yet properly stout dwarven boy races into the room, a shred of panic washing over his features. "Orcs!" he cries in a still squeaky voice. Without thought you discard the dagger back to the anvil, your other hand deftly releasing a winged mithril helm from the wide belt around your girth. Striding to the door, you heft your hammer, turning to the boy grunting plainly for him to stay put. He nods at you with mingled fear and admiration as you stride out.

A scene that seems all too familiar plays out in front of your eyes, a good-sized contingent of vicious orcs versus your clan family in a passionate yet almost routine fray. Moving efficiently through the battle, you are surprised by a sharp thud hitting the back of your neck. Your head snaps forward with an uncontrollable jerk like the swing of a clumsy apprentice's hammer stroke. You fall face-first to the floor, a wheezing grunt escaping your lips, and the vision fades.

Blackness slides across your field of vision, your muscles go limp as you barely retain hold of the hammer. A wheeze blows past your lips as you feel brief warmth, a thudding pain and then a return to your true senses.

Your vision becomes brighter and slowly clears, while a different sensation of body and feeling envelopes you. Sadness mingled with resolve overcomes your emotions as you look into your now smaller hands. You feel as if you want to cry, but you know you cannot, and will not. Through the doorway, within the throng of your clan and the squealing orcs, your father's body has fallen and does not move. You wait, each moment telling yourself that he will rise, but his form remains still.

Breaking inside, knowing you are foolish, you rush through the doorway and out into the melee. As you reach your father, an orc in a mottled iron-spiked helmet raises its crude broadsword to strike at his motionless body. Taking up the forging hammer from the ground, the weight as comforting as a mother's yank on your beard, you swing it with all your might into the gibbering beastial warrior's skull.

Knuckles aching as they turn white on the hammer's haft, you suddenly gasp and your vision clears. The vibrations of striking the death blow still quaking through your arm, the poignancy of the historic illusion remain strong in your mind.

A flicker in the corner of your eye grabs your attention and forcibly intrudes into your sight, resolving again into the cavern-like room and the blazing forge. Placing the hammer on a sturdy glaes-topped mithril stand, beside others of its brethren, you grunt sadly and look away for a fleeting moment. Outside the open doorway you can see others from your clan, even some as young as you are, dragging away the corpses of orc and brother alike. Glancing back at the fine mithril dagger on the anvil, a sense of burgeoning pride swells within you, and deep purpose binds your soul to this moment. You realize that the work of your father will outlast even your own grandchildren's children, and you smile slightly, proud yet resigned, and walk quietly back towards the hammers and forge.

As the visions organize in your memory, a shroud of sorrow settles lightly across a steely admiration for the smith and his brave son. Softly, you run a thumb over the hammer's head a few times and your awareness begins to recover, the visions dissipating into a deeper part of your memories.