Magic King Ranma: Of dobe dwarves and go-home gnomes. [Episode 110630]

Meanwhile, somewhere on the Pickaxe Mountains.

"Belay that!   Do be belaying all that hullabaloo!" growled Kindahkinki Longsword as he trudged up to the head of the mule train and glowered with practiced dourness.   "Best you do be saving this raucous caucus for the mead hall, me lads!   Be this any way for stoic and steadfast dwarven warriors to be acting on duty, I do be asking you?   Now, what do be the reason for all this undwarven behavior?"

"It do be the Sweetnote, Milord Longsword," a scout replied in a voice that was neither stoic nor steadfast. "It do be the water!"

Kindahkinki snorted, "what water?   That old dusty riverbed be dried up since before the Motherload…"   His dower gloom deepened and he cast a nervous glance at the surrounding mountainside, least anyone over hear how the source of his clan's wealth had been picked clean.   "I do be meaning that no more than a trickle of sludge at all do be passing over yon falls since the Failing befell the Lands Over and Under."

"Be that as may be, milord, but the Sweetnote, she do be dusty no more, nor all that dry," the scout replied excitedly.

"That do be impossible," Kindahkinki hurumphed flatly.   "Neither rain nor snow nor sleet do be touching these blighted mountains and you do be knowing as well as I that the mountain springs up here do be dry as a bone."

"With respect, Milord, please do be telling that to the river," the scout rebuked.   "She do be no mere trickle, but a good clean flow!   It be seeing it with my own two eyes, I do.   Do be seeing it for yourself if you do be doubting me."

"If you do be saying that you do be seeing it, then you do be seeing it," Kindahkinki snorted his dismissal.   "It do be no great matter.   We best be fording yon stream as quick as can be, or it be charging us for late delivery that the so called Lords will be doing.   We be having no time to be gawking over a little water."

"If it be down to the plains that we do be marching, milord," the scout pronounced and finally produced a suitably grim demeanour, "then it do be best that we be going some other way, for it be not fording across that bloody great river that we will be doing."

Kindahkinki stared at the scout agast and lost his dour in shock. "The Sweetnote, she do be flowing full for the very first time since the King do be leaving us high and dry?"

"Aye, that do be what I be telling you, Milord."

Kindahkinki Longsword pulled himself together and bellowed at his dwarves.   "Do not be standing around like a bunch of men doing nothing.   It be marching back to the Motherload Mines that we must be doing now."

A very grim Kindahkinki turned back to his scouts, "it be best that you do be showing me this river now so I can say I be seeing it with my own eyes.   If there do be no crossing through the only safe pass over these mountains, then telling the Clan elders the worst news of the century I will be doing.   For as much as we all do be detesting the Landlords and their restrictive, gourging edicts, we still do be needing the trade to survive.   Aye, so do be praying to the gods below that this do not be the undoing of us all."

Back in the Missenchanted Woods.

"Forward the gnomes!" an echoing voice boomed in response to Deekin's taunt.

"So, gnomes are giant metal men?" Genma observed, not at all impressed.   The steam driven monstrosity was big, but it moved slowly and uncertainly on ungainly feet.   The way it kept bumping into trees as it lumbered along did not lend any credance to it's threat rating either.   The chainsaw that popped out of its upper arm might have been worrisome, it it hadn't then sliced half way through another arm before being hastlily retracted.

"No, Mister Bosses Father," Deekin replied.   "The gohome gnomes are small, wee, men with big ideas but no brains.   They are cowards who hide inside their machines, which Deekin thinks is the least safe place to be in battle."

A hatch on the slowly advancing monstrosity's head popped open and an angry gnome peered out and its owner shook his fist angrily.   "That's gholem gnomes, you lowly reptile, and we're the best tinkers of war machines and clockwork constructs in the Lands.   Bah!   You're not one to talk about cowardice, you sneaky trapsetter, and we'll just show you how unsafe our latest creation is!"

And they promptly did so.   For that declaration appeared to be the cue for the infernal combustion engine to combust.   The lumbering battlemech began wildly windmilling its arms and lurched forward at alarming speed with flames gouting from its vents.   It soon wound up lying smoking and steaming in a nearby creek with gnomes crawling out to survey the wreckage and make notes on how to improve the next model.

Then, after the crew had relatively-safely disembarked, the ejection seats started ejecting.   They slammed into trees and bolders, and ploughed into the riverbank at litterally breakneck speeds.   It was perhaps fortunate no gnomes had been strapped into them at the time.

"Yous see now why nobody wants gohome gnomes around," Meepo remarked as the royal party rose up from their duck and cover maneuver.   "They is a danger to everyones, they is, yes sir."

"Damn you!" the gnome pilot cursed.   "I don't know how you managed to sabotage the Battleborg Mark Twelve this time, but: