NOVEL NEXT [Vol.5] Ch.52 Isolationism
In the following days, we held a brief memorial for the demons who died in the mana surge, and the aesthetic construction crew was told to make a memorial for them. Despite the fact that I can't actually trust anything that the elves say, I did follow up with Elora to try to get a better understanding of what exactly causes mana surges, so we can potentially prepare for them better in the future.
For an event of that level, I was surprised that very little was known about what causes mana surges. They're infrequent enough that, outside of the elves, it's unlikely that any other humanoid lives long enough to notice a pattern themselves, at least without consulting some form of written record. The only piece of real evidence I have to go off of is that they seem to occur on the sun-lit side of the planet. No information on whether eclipses interfere, or whether there is any discernable pattern to their occurrences.
The evidence would point to some sort of effect coming from our two suns, but that needn't be the case necessarily. It's enough evidence that I do want to do some research on the subject. There are some preliminary steps I'd need to make to properly research this subject though. We've made some basic telescopes, but I'd like to make a slightly larger one, and then also make some tinted glass to use as filters. Fortunately, our island is tall enough to reach above some of the cloud layers, so I might end up being able to build a facility on the summit eventually.
Before I do any of that though, I'll need to start preparations for moving some medium crystals down from the mountain. The lab can have one reinstalled relatively soon, since it already has an underground facility for housing one and the mine won't need much extra work to include a medium crystal, but the castle will need to have a deeper extension dug to house a crystal. I'm also concerned about us potentially overharvesting the mana poisoning plants that we use for the transport of these crystals. Winter is only a few months away, so I'm planning on only bringing one crystal down before then, and waiting until late spring to bring down the other two.
The first crystal will go in the mine, since I only need to spend a day or two adding in a chamber to hold the crystal and water for charging mana from. Since the mine will be the first location with one of these charging crystals, at least temporarily, Zeb has agreed to dedicate some more of the construction teams to working on expanding and digging the tunnel, since their labor will be significantly more effective there as compared to anywhere else.
With a little less than a month left before winter, we installed a 4 foot crystal in the mine for recharging. Things really have slowed down considerably on the island, at least as far as construction and mining goes. There has been a general sense of unease on the island after the crystals broke. We had all gotten used to the sensation, but it feels like the world is colder now, and it's not just because winter is coming. The air was heavily charged with mana from all the large crystals on the surface before, and now that its gone, it's really noticeable.
We aren't heavily reliant on farming, but I'm still worried about our crop yields. The goblins working in the original tidepool have noticed slightly less fish than previously, but the new tide pool hasn't had any noticeable changes. I'm assuming that it had to do with all our mana charged water outflowing into the ocean near the tide pool. Since we have significant excess with the second tide pool, it's not a threat, but it is somewhat concerning. The manavores in our population have also started to consume some amount of regular food again, as they aren't getting enough mana to fully sustain themselves anymore.
All these factors make me hope that the mine hits a layer flush with mana crystals. Ideally, I want to grow a new crystal comparable in size to ParTor, such that mana surges are unlikely to threaten the crystal. While it's not guaranteed that is the reason ParTor hasn't broken, I find it likely to be the case. If growing crystals to a certain size allows them to survive ambient mana, then growing them larger should increase that limit even further. If Konkur was here, I'd consult with him about the usual location of mana crystals. I suppose I can ask around among the dwarves we have to see if anyone knows anything. If they don't, I could try to ask Elora, and maybe I could get her to send out a message and ask around, though I imagine that won't come cheap.
None of our dwarves had any extra details as to what sort of environment that mana crystals are found in. As I thought about it myself, I did think of at least one thing though. They're unlikely to form below sea level. All of them grow in bubbles formed in the rock. If they're below sea level, it'd be reasonable that the magma would be less likely to form hollow chambers. I don't know if it'd be impossible for them to form, but I think it's at least reasonable to assume that we shouldn't dig down to find them.
I took a chance in asking Elora as well, but she didn't know, and trying to utilize the elves network would be expensive. In fact, the rate she gave me to have the elves gather that information was about a quarter of all our dwarven coin. If we get desperate in a few years, we could consider it.
After a bit of discussion, Zaka and I decided to halt the trips to the other island until we get a large crystal installed again. After we saw those two leviathans, I think it's reasonable to assume that there is a chance of something dangerous happening if we venture into deeper waters. As a consequence, we both talked with Zeb about prioritizing getting more jetties built. They're actually relatively inexpensive to build mana-wise, and catching larger fishes is a decent source of levels.
Ultimately, this didn't lead to much change in how construction was planned. Quite a bit of excess stone had started to build up from the terrace work, and expanding the tunnel forward is only going to increase that volume. One team will go work on the jetties on the far side's harbor, and another team will start on a jetty in the second valley. Terrace work is going to be put on hold, since it does require a bit more mana. Sometime in the summer though, we'll fully drain the reservoir and have one team dedicated to working alongside manual laborers there to provide us with a significant amount of stone for work. That does mean we'll have to halt our hematite processing during that time, but the facility can process more ore than the mine produces, so that isn't an issue realistically.
Considering it's only been a few months, I think we're actually adapting quite well to the new reality of our situation.