[ IP ] Lava Ruins

`` So you're saying that in the center, there is a city?'' The bard was hanging on their every word as they spoke. The Dwarf had arrived in the night, asking questions about the local legends. He claimed to be looking for a lost fortress of his people from long ago. 
 
 `` Aye, not sure how much of it could still be called a city though. It was abandoned long before the humans unified into the Illustrian Empire. The humans did have scattered cities of course, trading what they could for survival, and that is what brought the Dwarves to the area. Dwarven greed and the need to control the markets.'' There had long been talk of dwarf ruins all around the Silent Strand, some had even been found, but nobody knew anything of what was called the Magma Fields on the local maps. 
 
 `` But how did they survive, the lands are coated in Magma, anyone who gets too close tends not to come back alive.'' The dwarf took a sip of the ale he had brought. 
 
 `` It was n't always that way lad, when the Dwarves came, it was a fen. Live went on everywhere you could see it, and in the center of that fenn, there it was. Holduanthem, The Silver Reach in the dwarven tongue.'' He took another sip, pausing for effect. `` They called it that because they found silver inside, and I do n't mean just small amounts, I mean they found vast veins of it.'' 
 
 `` So if it was a fen, what happened?'' The bard had to know more, he had never heard of anyone willing to talk about the Magma Fields other than the people crazy enough to believe they could make it through. 
 `` Well, to understand that, you have to understand two things. One, this was not intended to just be a mining operation, this was to be a settlement. A new dutchy for the Dwarves, covering all the ruins you've found so far. So they pulled out all the stops, carved the whole mountain into a grand cathedral, stairs leading up, even structures for the traders to come while working the mine. The second thing you have to understand is this was done quickly, not efficiently.'' The bard did n't understand, and the Dwarf could tell it. `` When you rush something, it's just not as good. Sure it looked all pretty on the outside, but once you got to the inner workings, it all fell apart.'' 
 
 `` How so?'' 
 
 `` I'm getting there, hold your tongue for a moment and i'll answer your question.'' He finished off his mug of ale and signaled for another. `` Do you know what a magma pipe is?'' The bard shook his head. `` It's part of a giant pump, intended to bring Magma to a place we could work with it for forges and the like. Everything was going smoothly until one day when someone went to supply the forge with Magma and the lever to pump it broke off in the on position. Normally we could fix that if it had n't been right next to a weak section of pipe that began to pour Magma up and into the fortress. Many dwarves were killed when the mines flooded with Magma, but some escaped. The Silver Reach was forever lost to us, without a capitol, the dwarven cities dwindled to nothingness. That, good sir is the reason the Magma Fields exist.'' 
 
 `` And yet you're here asking about them, why? 
 
 `` Because my good man, I have something the others never did, which may help.'' The bard caught a flash of blue under the Dwarve's cloak...
