Skald Sagas

20 Harpa (Women's Month / Spring)

Virfir introduced you to Hefti, who runs the mech factory.
Hefti showed you around the inactive workshop - they've stopped building mechs because of the challenges.
- She demonstrated a mech, then some of its misbehavior.
- She told you that she's checked everything mechanical and couldn't find any problems.
- She told you that there are runes that control behavior. She knows how to carve them but she doesn't completely understand them. She asked you to take a look.
Upon examination of the runes, you discovered that a rune on a misbehaving mech had changed.
You asked about references and she gave you a few - she can draw them from memory, she has a "book" that shows them, or you can look at a mech that she knows works correctly.
You chose to start with the book and discovered that, yes, the rune you identified as changed is, indeed, very subtly different. It's subtle - less like changing an F to a P and more like slightly changing a single angle or line.
You asked Hefti draw a rune and she did that on a piece of scrap - she drew it to match the book.
You learned that there's a maintenance bay where mechs returning from the field are repaired and Hefti took you there.

Hefty introduced you to Thrain who runs the repair bay.
Thrain shared some info:
- He confirmed that Hefti's runes are always right.
- He said his engineers don't change runes; they do mechanical repairs.
You inspected mechs in the bay and found some that had altered runes and some that didn't.
There was no pattern evident initially - age, number of times in the bay - nothing.
You asked about who worked on what and Thrain produced a log.
After examining the log, you focused on 2 dwarves who worked on the mechs with altered runes and had notes that they transferred in to the maintenance area.
You went back to Hefti to ask about them, then back to Thrain to ask about where to find them.

You found Skirfnir where Thrain suggested he would be and started a conversation with him.
He started out giving the typical dwarf answers but you eventually figured out he wasn't telling the whole truth.
Pushing him, you discovered more info:
- Skirfnir and some others had been modifying the runes because a contingent of dwarves wants to invade the fire giant stronghold to free Sif.
- Lots of dwarves will die when that happens. He and his allies would prefer that lots of dwarves don't die to maybe free Sif.
- There is a prophecy that heroes would arrive and that would be the tipping point that ensures that Sif gets freed.
- This prophetic voice speaks to some dwarves and not to others, and some believe and some do not.

You told Virfir that you have some information about the mechs but you need to go investigate this voice or echo or whatever it is before you can be sure what's happening.
That's something he wanted you to do anyway.

After a respite (congrats on Gold Rank), you set out for the caverns where Virfir told you that you might find the voice.
It isn't in a specific place; it's more of a pilgrimage or "walkabout" and the voice will come or it won't.
On your path, some gold rank monsters - cloakers - attacked. They had their auras hidden so you didn't realize they were there until they descended from the ceiling.