Part 3 - The Fall
In the Age of Myth, on the wind-swept plains of the Ghurish continent of Gallet, an espescially stubborn and hardy clan of wandering duardin, swarthy and black of beard, once founded a mighty stronghold whose name has since been lost to memory, known now for centuries only as the Lost Hold. Fighting off the voracious local megafauna as well as neighbouring greenskin and ogor tribes, they dug deep and made their home far beneath the earth, protected from the raging storms on the continent’s surface through hidden tunnels, cunning runic traps and high walls of granite and black marble. In the mineral-rich crust of Gallet, they mined for precious ores and gemstones, clearing out and fortifying a large network of surrounding natural tunnels and establishing underground trade routes with the nearest human settlements. Through this trade, they grew large and prosperous indeed, but it was their discovery of a large underground deposit of amberbone, the infamous realmstone of Ghur, that should cement their rise to power and considerable influence within the region they inhabited. More than that, their exploits had drawn the attention of the Pantheon, and soon contracts were made with the Collegiate Arcane, exchanging realmstone for ever greater profits and arcane secrets of metallurgy and smithing from the realms of Chamon and Azyr, allowing the duardin craftsmen to reach ever greater heights of skill.
In time, however, their industriousness turned to greed, and their lust for discovering new and more esoteric ways to hone their craft would begin to turn their initial allies against them. With each passing year, they began demanding higher prices for the amberbone they dug out of the ground as parting with the precious material became more and more difficult. Where once they had been skillfull hagglers and diplomats, they became ever more secretive, reclusive and distrustful of everyone not from their own hold. In truth, this was because in their pursuit of knowledge they had begun experimenting with the magical substance themselves, seeking ways to refine it and tame its unbridled, bestial energy through runecraft and technology. On the strong-willed, magically-resistant minds of the duardin the vast quantities of ghurish realmstone the were handling every day began to have a rather curious effects. Where other races might have been driven to sheer animalistic fury by these concentrated energies, the duardin became ever more vicious and territorial, ever more unyielding and stubborn in their pursuits, almost as if the stone had awakened something within them, a shred of an ancient past long forgotten and buried deep within their ancestral memory.
When the Pantheon fell, the Age of Myth ended and the armies of Chaos swept all over the realms, the greenskin tribes of Ghur briefly united into one big Waaagh!, led by Gorkamorka himself. The duardin of the Lost hold were engulfed by these raging armies, estranged from their former allies and too isolated for any hope of military aid. In their desperation, they locked themselves deep within their underground fortress, digging ever deeper for more and more amberbone. Their once peaceful industry was turned to war, creating ever more powerful runic weapons and warmachines infused with the power of refined realmstone. While this granted them an edge in their many battles against more primitive foes like orruks and corrupted human tribesmen, wielding these bestial powers began to work ever more apparent changes upon both their bodies and spirit. Some among their number began to grow horns from their foreheads where an amberbone gem had been placed inside their helmet. Hands wielding weapons infused with the power of Ghur itself would grow into elongated claws, and an ornate warmask, imbued with glowing amber runes, would often hide a snarling, tusked grimace underneath. In the minds of their most powerful runelords, the booming echoes of a distant yet powerful voice would resound, offering relief from their troubles in exchange for worship and subjugation. While they initially attempted to resist, their thoughts became ever more clouded by strange images of fire and smoke, warning them of a great and terrible doom that was to come if they were not to obey. Some went insane, scrawling pictograms of a great skull, horned and bearded, in their own blood and excrement on the walls of their sacred forges. Others began preaching of the cowardice of Grungni and Sigmar who had forsaken them, and the foolish and egoistical way in which Grimnir had sought his doom, leaving his people unprotected in times of war. These prophets were put down at first, imprisoned or outright executed for their blasphemous speeches in orders of their king in order to keep the peace. But when the miners, digging ever deeper and ever more desperately for realmstone accidentally hit a magma vein, these doomspeakers’ dire warnings appeared all too true. The lower tunnels and mineshafts of the hold were consumed in a tide of molten stone that could not be stopped, eventually flooding the workshops and foundries in liquid fire. As the magma reached one of the large underground vaults in which the duardin kept their precious refined realmstone, it ate right through their massive steel gates and runic wards of protection as if empowered by something greater than mere heat. The resulting explosion shook the entire hold, collapsing the ceiling in many parts and setting others ablaze with amber flames. Countless duardin were killed, families torn apart and priceless libraries of runic knowledge and treasures and works of great artifice buried under rubble. In the resulting chaos, the most venerable of the surviving runesmiths, Gurhan Iron Shaper, maddened by visions of a great flaming bull, led a frenzied mob into the king’s hall. There, they slaughtered both him, his family and his honorguard and offered up their hearts and entrails on a great pyre to appease the commanding voice of the Great Bull God in his head. It was guidance he sought from this voice, and guidance it was that he should receive amidst the clouds of swirling, black smoke that choked the throne room and filled it with the sickly sweet smell of burning offal.
A dark bargain was struck that day, and soon after, as a group of bloodstained and embittered survivors left their collapsing hold through one of the many secret escape tunnels, a huge storm of ash and cinders erupted from deep crevices in the ground, scattering the besieging armies on the surface and covering the escape of those duardin who had sworn allegiance to Gurhan and his new god.
To be continued…
Edit: This was growing larger than expected as I wrote it, so I decided to split this post up in order to make it more digestible. This should also give me some time to rework a couple of things on my warrior models that still bother me. They will then hopefully be featured in the next post, along with the more recent history of my dwarfs.
I hit puberty pretty late, though.
I used old Citadel Goblin chariots with Chaos hounds from Gamezone Miniatures. 
