Tag Archives: dwarves

J.R.R. Tolkien: The Hobbit

Back in October I spent a weekend with Anice in Berlin. As I knew she’d be sleeping in and I would wake up early I had brought two books with me: A Graveyard for Lunatics that I was close to finishing and Earthsea for when I finished. But Anice had a book with her as well: The Hobbit, so when we showed each other what the other had brought we decided to switch books. I got the Hobbit and she the Earthsea book. So thus I was able to read one of the fantasy classics for the first time.

What is it about?

4 of 5 stars


The Hobbit Bilbo Beutlin leads a quiet life in his Hobbit hole until twelve dwarves knock at his door one after the other and occupy his living room, eat all his food and drink all his beverages.
The sorcerer Gandalf has let them there to turn Bilbo into the thieve they needed to reclaim the Lonely Mountain as home of the dwarves and crown Thorin Oakenshield as King under the Mountain.
But before they even reach their destination they have to travel through Middle Earth and face foes and friends alike, not to mention Smaug the dragon who is guarding the dwarven gold and cast out the dwarves in the first place.

The reading experience

Before I started reading I expected the writing style to be completely different. It was a translated version, but I still didn’t think it would have been written like a children’s tale, as the narrator explained things quite easily. It was a nice surprise though.
Besides the Fairytale-like narration the book was also filled with sketches. You could see the dwarves, Gollum, trolls and of course Smaug, who looks a bit different than in the movie adaptation. 😀 Additionally, some of the books characters also fell into song on one or the other occasion.
It was a nice and fluent read and even in German you could see Tolkiens love for language.

The characters

Bilbo was a quite interesting character. A no-one that grows with his tasks and experiences, who is smart enough to know what is the right thing to do.
The dwarves on the other hand were kind of walking on the thin line between like and dislike, while swaying from one direction to the other. Whenever Bilbo did something good they praised him and called him their best friend, but if he, however, had a strange idea or did something that seemed wrong at first they talked him down and even insulted him. I have no idea how Bilbo managed to stay as calm as he did when they were like that and even how he could stay.
Most prominent with this behaviour was Thorin, whom I didn’t like for most parts of the story. His opinion and moods were ever changing and he was basically just an ass. Still, the finale caught me off guard and I didn’t like what happened to him.
The dwarves I sympathised most with were incidentally also the once that treated the Hobbit best: Balin, Bombur, Kili and Fili. Balin the eldest and most reasonable, Bombur, with his good nature and a heart that seemed to be about the same size as his appetite and the youngest brothers that were still less stubborn than the other dwarves. Needless to say I again questioned my luck with character-choices at the end of the book…
The side character were also quite interesting even though they had very little screen time. Still, an enjoyable contrast to the stubborn dwarves. Though „you-thought-I’d-be-accompanying-you-all-the-way?“-Gandalf,  didn’t really earn many sympathy points from me either.

General Opinion

I liked reading this book. There are some things that didn’t go well with me (annoying Thorin, some conclusions and characterizations,..), but they don’t really matter as the bigger picture leaves you quite content in the end.
The story was fun, exciting, interesting, sad and all those things that I can’t name. The end could have been a bit longer, as it felt a bit rushed, but every journey comes to an end at some point.
It’s really a story I wouldn’t mind reading again one day and I’m not sure if I’m disappointed in myself that I haven’t read it sooner or if it is all right that I can now appreciate it more.

Stuff I’d like to add

As I said before is the spelling dwarves based on Tolkiens writing and I still think that is pretty cool.
By now I’ve also seen the movies, which I didn’t want to see before reading the books, but I don’t know if and when I’ll be writing a review about them.
PoiSonPaiNter
© For the cover belongs to its rightful owner

The awful moment when you can't properly write…

As I mentioned last time with my new instalment of The Weekend Guess I can’t really put my thoughts into proper posts right now.
And yes I don’t consider this rant to be a proper post either.
There is so much stuff I’d like to write or write about.
So many stories floating in my head fighting for attention.
So many ideas popping up, reminding me of unfinished drafts.
I think I just don’t know where to start…
I really like to complete or add to my stories, but I can’t seem to be able to find the proper motivation for sitting down, planning and actually typing it.
As you know I do dabble in Fanfiction.
I already have a story that awaits its completion since 2012 and I don’t really know why I don’t feel like finishing the next chapter. (Well, maybe it’s because the Manga it is based on are quite weird „lately“…)
I also have plenty of other ideas that I currently don’t feel like working on (see my profile on Fanfiction.net for a look at those).
Still, my mind seems to always wander back to The Return of Magic, a Merlin Fanfiction (season six-thingy) I started recently. I get all kind of ideas for stuff happening towards the end, but I only have a little bit of what should be going on in the next few chapters, where the characters actually meet each other again and stuff…it’s bugging me, but I can’t help it, my muse is weird that way…
I also have brought it upon myself that I want to re-do The Elevator story as Multi-Chapter Multi-Fandom Crossover story. Again, many thoughts on how to continue and little on how to start and finish…
Muse and Imagination thou art* unfair…
I also want to write some proper original stories again, like continuing with the stories of the dwarves that we last saw on their Quest for Ore.
I’d like to finish the missing reviews and reports from concerts and festivals I’ve been at last year and many more things I still have only drafted.
But as soon as I think „Yeah, I’d like to get that done.“ my mind wanders off to totally unrelated thoughts and the procrastination begins.
It’s enough to drive you up the wall (in frustration) or „Es ist zum Mäusemelken“ as we’d say in German (Mäusemelken roughly translates to „milking mice“, so the literal translation is something like: It’s like milking mice. Or something like that).
But on the bright side:
I get more and more comfortable with writing posts that have less than a thousand words…though on the other hand I annoy you with my ramblings instead of posting something proper.
I’m so sorry for that, but as I said: I don’t like it myself, but I can’t seem to help it right now.
Other than that there are a couple of nice things coming up for me, that are also kind of urging me to hurry up with my festival and concert reviews/reports.
Next weekend (after picking up my Bachelor’s degree certification in Elmshorn, a former fellow student in Hamburg and driving back) I/we’ll be having a look at the Jazz Frühling (jazz spring) in Neubrandenburg. Something entirely different to the music I usually listen to.
In early April I’ll be visiting Liathano again in Germany’s capital city and stay for a concert of Van Canto and possibly a medieval market as well.
Just a week after that Brüllmücke and I will return there to see Schandmaul live.
I’m quite looking forward to all of that and maybe it will spur my imagination enough for me to continue or write the stories that are still eagerly waiting to be typed.
See you around and sorry for the rant.
PoiSonPaiNter
* Sorry for possibly misused words.

Answering Questions from being Tagged

As I am a great fan of procrastination I thought I might as well use DarkFairy’s tagging to write something completely different…again….
But what’s this tagging about?
The tagging is used for small Blogs to enlarge their readership and Fairy tried to do this with her own and mine. It is quite like a chain letter, but this has better and more useful side effects. 😉
The rules for the tagging are:

  • You are asked 10 Questions by the tagger. Answer them in your post.
  • Think of 10 Questions you want to ask the Bloggers you are going to tag.
  • You tag 10 Blogs with below 200 followers.
  • You of course have to tell the people that you tagged them.
  • Tagging the person that tagged you isn’t allowed.

Now to Fairy’s questions (translated from her side, see link above):

  1. Do you like mustard or do you prefer ketchup?
    Ketchup, definitely ketchup.
    But if the mustard is needed as ingredient for dishes like Rinderrouladen or in Hot Dogs I can live with it, otherwise I can’t stand the smell and taste of it.
    Funny side story: When I first watched the Doctor Who Episode „The Eleventh Hour“ I honestly mistook „custard“ for „mustard“ when Eleven ate his famous fishfingers and custard…
  2. The Zombie apocalypse is happening. What is now the most important thing and with what are you arming yourself?
    Well….the most important thing is of course my family and I’d do anything to protect them. What I’d arm myself with would however be quite difficult. We don’t really have anything here that would count as a useful weapon in a zombie apocalypse…though wait…Hyundai recently made it possible to build a Zombie Killing Machine maybe I’d just tune up my trusted car to become a weapon. 😀
  3. Are you pro Elves or pro Dwarf?
    I don’t really care about either of them, but from what I’ve learned so far dwarves hold my sympathy as I already mentioned in this post: Dwarves.
    Elves are just too arrogant and „perfect“ for my taste…except Fairy’s Odokè who sounds quite interesting. 😉
  4. What is your favourite dish?
    I’d say most dishes with potatoes or noodles. But if I had to pick one, I guess it would be potato in the skin (Pellkartoffeln). Grilled meat – or meat in any kind of variation – also belongs among my favourites.
  5. What is your favourite animal?
    It is always a tie between wolves, bats and owls. All of them are fascinating animals and I don’t want to decide for a winner here.
  6. In which sports would you like to be really good at?
    As I am horrible at sports in general, I really don’t know. The only one I irregularly play is volleyball and I’m not too dissatisfied with my abilities there.
  7. What can you not live without?
    Currently I think the answer would be my parents. But as I know that I will lose them one day, I’d say: Without someone I can confine in or simply be myself around.
    As someone who spends a high amount of time in front of a laptop I could also say that I couldn’t live without it, but I clearly can live without checking in on stuff and I have enough unread books to keep me entertained for a while. 😉
  8. Which fictional character (e.g. from a book or movie) would you like to meet?
    I honestly have no idea…There are so many great characters and meeting them would in my opinion only be possible in the regulations of the story, so talking to me would change the actions if I so much as let any information of future events slip and so on. But the fact that I am an author of one or the other fanfiction shows that I do think about changing or adding story lines and possibly being involved somehow at times. I also wrote about this in one of my (German) short stories about the unknown worlds that lie within books. (The story was first referred to in this post about libraries, btw.)
  9. Open the cabinet door or drawer nearest to you. What do you see at first?
    As I am too lazy to get up and actually do that, I will tell you what I see in the shelf next to me: A pile of books (some novels from the Anita Blake-series by Laurell K. Hamilton, Terry Pratchett’s The Colours of Magic and Cujo by Stephen King) that I most likely have not read yet…No, I actually did read most of them (The exception being Cujo)…Nice to know…
  10. If you would live in a fantasy world, would you be a mage or a warrior?
    In MMO’s and the like I mostly play warriors, because they simply have the better stats. But as magic always fascinated me and my physical form is far from it’s best (see question 6.) I think I’d actually be a mage/sorceress/witch. Also I prefer to keep my distance towards threats and enemies, so magic would come in quite handy with this. Besides I am currently finally watching the episodes of Merlin that I could not see before and I clearly do not wish to follow all those disposable knights…I’m certain they have a nest of those somewhere below Camelot…

Now for my questions:

  1. What is the first thing that springs to your mind when you hear the word „Eclipse“?
    (Unrelated Note in my defence: My first thought is related to what I wrote in this post: „Hello World„)
  2. When you write a story, what kind of Feedback would you like to get? (E.g. constructive, flattering, honest, etc.)
  3. What is your favourite TV show?
  4. The age old question: Werwolves or Vampires?
    (Fairy started it with the Elves and the Dwarves and I already mentioned Eclipse, it’s a totally reasonable question, right? >_<)
  5. Would you like to be immortal?
  6. Do you prefer the city side or the countryside?
  7. What song holds the most emotions for you and which emotion is it?
  8. What was the scariest thing that you ever experienced?
  9. If you met a Jinn or a Fairy that grants you 3 wishes, what would they be?
  10. What attribute would cause you to judge a person by its appearance?

Well…and now I have to think of who I am going to tag…
So far amoung the Blogs I follow and the ones in my Blogroll (and those that are not already tagged), only two fulfil the criteria:

  • Joaninja [Edit 07.01.16: The Blog no longer exists]
  • Icewolf

This post will be updated as soon as I find missing Blogs for the needed amount.
But if you want to tag yourself, feel free to send me a note and let me make it official. 🙂
PoiSonPaiNter

Once Upon A Time…

there were two writers of „Lost“ who decided to create a TV-series about Fairy Tale characters that ended up in our world.
When the series was far into its second season a random Blogger started watching it.

So here I am now waiting for the next episode and giving you my two cents on ABC’s “Once Upon A Time” by Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz.

The premise and where it leads

When the Evil Queen enacts a „horrible“ curse all Fairy Tale-characters one (possibly) knows are separated from their loved-ones and given new memories and lives in a town in our world: Storybrook, Maine. Breaking this curse is the destiny of the main character Emma Swan. And being the main character she has to face different trials throughout the season(s).

Before I start to go into the topic I’d like to note that I consider it pretty hilarious that the Evil Queen claims our land to be „somewhere horrible„. For a magic user a land without any magic probably IS a horrible place. For everyone else probably just weird and foreign. 😀

That said: I don’t really know why I started watching it in the first place, but it might have to do with the fact that I simply like hearing/reading about or watching Fairy Tales. And with OUAT you don’t just have every Fairy Tale-character you (possibly) know, but also them in a different world. Besides I’ve already was curious about it thanks to the previews for the German version of it. So I gave it a shot and was admittedly quite easily won over.

Seriously: I only needed to watch a certain scene in the pilot and they had me.
The scene I’m referring to is the Evil Queens entry scene: The music, the atmosphere, the wonderfully bizarre animation of how she “walked” down the hall towards Snow White and Prince Charming. My mind really just went “BAM, you gotta watch this”. And when later they switched to a scene with a weird sounding and looking creature kept in a dungeon prison; guess that was the very final straw to destroy all my doubts (pun intended 😉 ).

Characters and Concept

I really think this series has a great concept and great writings. It is always fascinating how the different stories (Fairy Tales) connect and how the different characters interact. As well as seeing „history“ repeat itself when the „humanized“ versions live through a similar trial in each episode as their Fairy Tale-counterpart.
And the characters are great too, well most of them. There are some that are a bit easier for me to grasp than others. The worst for understanding and stuff are probably Charming (My spell-check is fascinating: If I only write Charming it tells me to write it with lower case, if I write Prince Charming it’s all right. XD) and Snow White…I just find them so disturbingly romantic and stuff that I just want to hide somewhere so I would not have to see that…I’m no good with too much romance, sorry.
Every time they do their little “I will always find you”- conversation my mind goes: – Yeah, I know…for crying out load…oh wait, no, they cry silently, whenever they find and/or lose each other…they cry so effing much…they must have an enormous supply of onions on set…or the actors are really good at crying without a reason…
Still, they do have some good scenes – where they are close to being pretty cool instead.
In those where Charming wore his pelted cape around his shoulders I somewhat thought: Now longer hair and beard and he might have just walked off of the set of „Thor“. 😀
Well, you see I’m not really a Snow White fan, but I’ve mentioned that before when I talked about dwarves.

Speaking of those: Grumpy. 😀
He’s one of my favourites and as I said: I really like his attitude and humour. It is always fun when he’s around. His comments cause some moments to become more enjoyable. Beside that did I really enjoy the episode that featured his back story. It was fun, interesting and kick-ass, because he is kick-ass. 😀
Little Red Riding Hood was also covered in a wonderful way. When I watched her episode I had a slight feeling of what might happen, but the revelation was still well done. Additionally, her actress is just amazing…she really manages to balance being seductive without appearing slutty.

But balancing stuff is kind of a theme in the series as each character has at least two sides to them. Their Fairy Tale- and their „Storybrooke“/Real World-personification. And some even have a third part to them: The personality before the big change. And I think it is obvious, for those who have seen the series, whom I’m talking about: The Evil Queen and Rumpelstiltskin. 😀

Their development from loving daughter/father to those badass characters that are cunning, witty and „evil“ is just brilliant. And the development is quite reasonable and well explored so far – we all know that there is even more to come and the majority of us are eagerly looking forward to that. 😀
But what I like most about those characters is that they are the ones you can relate to the most. Well, at least I can. Especially with the “imp”: Pessimism accompanied by cowardice, more or less antisocial behaviour and a way with words? Sounds familiar to me. 😉
Even though many characters have one or the other insecurity those two bring theirs to a different level. Yet, it still makes sense and that’s what’s fascinating about them. They have loved; they have lost something precious and secluded themselves behind their powers. Still they are willing to do anything to regain (a bit of) what they have lost.
And they are both brilliantly portrayed by their actors Lana Parilla and Robert Carlyle respectively.

They bring so much life into their roles, it’s incredible. If I didn’t knew it better, I’d say they are enchanting the audience with their performance. But who says I do (know it better)? 😉 Especially the interpretation of Rumpelstiltskin is most fascinating. The voice, the gestures, the combination of both. Carlyle created something unique there. Combined with the well written backstories and dialogues it makes for one incredible character.
It is always fun to see how Rumpel was involved with the other stories, manipulating people into doing what he needs them to do. A trait the Evil Queen has picked up from him.
While for most characters their Storybrook-personality is not as good as the one they had in the Enchanted Forest, those two manage to combine them. It is just always fun to see what is happening to and/or with them in each episode. 🙂 I wonder if it makes me a bad person if I prefer the supposed evil characters over the good ones? o.O

A Fairy Tale background

Watching OUAT made me realize that I haven’t watched the old Disney versions of the Fairy Tales that often. Mostly only once or twice. And I probably haven’t seen every one of them (I know I haven’t watched Tangled so far). But I do have some memories of some of them: Grumpy and the witch from Snow White,  a little bid of the dragon in Sleeping Beauty, the scene where the beast fights with the wolves from The Beauty and the Beast, and probably some others if I would think some more about it.
It seems I wasn’t really into obsessively watching movies as kid, more a series kind of person. Like I still am today. 😉 Another thing is probably that my parents grew up with the German, Czech and/or Russian interpretations and Fairy Tales and taught/read/showed me those as well. I’ve seen the movies with Baba Yaga and her chicken-legged hut more often than I’ve seen any of the Disney movies. Though I don’t think that’s a bad thing, as they have a pretty fun and different tone to them. And less singing. 😀
Regardless of that I know all the stories OUAT is based on, some because they were read and/or told to me, some because I’ve seen a version or two of them and I really like the approach they made on them. (And I don’t see it as rip off of anything else, as the concepts of those other things sound different.)
It also made me realize that I didn’t know who Jiminy Cricket is (though I knew that there was a cricket in Pinocchio) and that I never really noticed that the Prince from Snow White was (nick)named „Charming“ or the witch from Sleeping Beauty „Maleficent“. Though I’ve heard those before I think…you always learn something new I guess…

The German version

As I said the show is on German television currently. They recently aired the finale of season one, which gave me a chance to shorten my wait for the new episode on Sunday (or Monday considering the time shift).
But don’t let me get started on the German voices…
Even though they made some good choices (Snow White is pretty well chosen), some are rather weird.
I mean: Couldn’t they have just let Sebastian Schulz voice Josh Dallas as he did in Thor? o.O No they chose the little boys voice instead…Aside from the fact, that Schulz sounds better, it would have been fun to have him alongside Claudia Urbschat-Mingues (Regina) like they had him alongside Oliver Siebeck ( as Volstagg ) in Thor, causing another family reunion. 😀 (Schulz voices Trunks in Dragonball Z, Urschat-Mingues is Bulma, while Siebeck is the second voice actor for Vegeta)
Also, why do voice actors always have to voice several actors? I mean as fitting as Thomas Nero Wolff might be for Robert Carlyle, my first association with his voice is and probably will be for a long time: Hugh Jackman and after that: Anthony Steward Head. Beside that is he not really able to come at least close to Carlyles Rumpelstiltskin voice…even though he is trying, but it just sounds so wrong….just like the characters German name by the way.
Even though I grew up with it, it sounds so weird when you’ve heard the English version, which has a different sound to it…though the suffix is basically the same…but in my ears Rumpelstiltskin sounds better (and even more threatening) than Rumpelstilzchen outside of the classical Fairy Tale context…no idea why…guess my ears are just weird like that…

Anyhow, the second season showed some quite interesting new turns and I am really looking forward to the next episodes. I think this format could really have a chance to last for quite a while as Fairy Tales are timeless and what Kitsis and Horowitz created is something special that contributes to that. Something you enjoy to indulge in when you’re day wasn’t the best one.
Just like a „real“ Fairy Tale would. 😉

PoiSonPaiNter

Dwarves

I don’t know why, but in general I don’t like dwarves or at least I don’t care about them.
Even though they are one of the classic fantasy creatures (alongside Elves, Fairies, Trolls, etc.) I never really payed attention to them …
All those novels about them, be they by the German novelist Markus Heitz or someone else, just didn’t sound interesting to me.
Only if they were part of a story it was ok for them to be there. They make good side characters and antagonists.
But before I want to give you some examples of dwarves I (dis)liked, I’d like to explain a fact I find rather interesting:
Grammatically there are two plurals of the word dwarf: dwarfs and dwarves. And even though I had dwarfs in mind when I started with this post, it seems I have to go with dwarves, according to this:

„Dwarfs is the standard plural of the noun dwarf. Dwarves is a newer variant popularized (though not invented) by English author J.R.R. Tolkien in his fantasy fiction works, including The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. The Tolkien spelling is appropriate when referring to little people in fantasy worlds. Dwarfs is better everywhere else.

I think that is pretty cool. I consider origins of sayings or words to be quite interesting anyway. And having a plural for a fantasy version of something is, well, pretty cool. 🙂
But now onwards to some of the different dwarves that crossed my path so far.

The first dwarves every kid notices are probably the seven dwarves from Snow White. So did I. Probably. My favourite dwarf however in Disney’s Snow White was the grumpy one, but even as little kid I felt somewhat betrayed when he turned into one of her willing „slaves“ towards the end. Still I kind of vividly remember the scene where the dwarves chase the queen over the edge of the cliff. Pretty cool scene. Though, I kind of felt bad for the queen .. .and annoyed by Snow White … so not one of my favourite versions of it. But Once Upon a Time‘s Grumpy kind of makes up for his cartoon versions lack of personality(?). His rough attitude and his comments are just hilarious and fun. And I really liked the story of how his name changed. Yet, it is a creepy thought thinking about dwarves hatching from eggs … I’m not sure whether I’ve read/heard something akin to that before. I just don’t want to think about it …

Another Snow White adaptation with focus on the dwarves is from the German comedian/actor Otto Waalkes: 7 Zwerge – Männer allein im Wald (7 Dwarves – Men Alone in the Wood), where nearly every dwarf is portrayed by a German comedian (including Otto).
It is a pretty funny movie that gives a different view on the whole story. And of course the re-occurring joke – as none of the actors is that small – that it is a prejudice that dwarves are small.  🙂
Well, there are far to many versions of this fairytale to explore them all and I don’t really want to dwell on Snow White any longer (or even get into the latest versions with Snow White and the Huntsman or Mirror Mirror as I’ve seen neither of them so far.)

As you read in the quote earlier the word „dwarves“ was popularized by Tolkien and he has quite a bunch of dwarves in his stories – so I heard. I belong to those people that never read Lord of the Rings or The Hobbit. Though I watched the LOTR movies. Well, and didn’t understand them, but that is a different topic. Maybe one day I will read the novels …

Even older than both Snow White and LOTR are myths surrounding dwarves. They were mostly depicted as miners or other craftspeople, so they are more common in areas where those industries where widely spread. Unfortunately (or luckily?) I do not live in such areas, so I can’t tell you any local myths.

But I can however tell you about the dwarves in Norse myths. 🙂 The dwarves that have utterly complicated names, which I can’t remember. But I know that they forged things like Odins ring, an automatic boar, Thor’s hammer Mjölnir and one of them sewed Lokis lips when he had told one too many lies or rather mocked them one too many times. One does not mock a dwarf. 😀
Just as one does not make fun of a certain warlock, but this is about dwarves, so my focus will not be on Richard form the webcomic Looking for Group. The comic has its fair share of dwarves, with the bardic smith Pella being the most famous one. A kick-ass woman that knows how to swing her hammer for forging and her axes in battle. She has however a relationship of understanding for the warlock, but no I am not diverting to give him attention. He already gets that more than enough in the comics. 😀

Speaking of attention: I’d like to draw your attention to some other dwarves.
The dwarves I used in my own stories.
For once there is Bogie the tall dwarf from my „Weltenbaum“ (Worldtree) short stories. He is among the youngsters from the Underworld who find their way unto the Surface, into the world of humans. These stories are written in German, so it might not be understandable for some. Not sure if I’ll translate them one day, but after reading them again I might at least add some more to them or edit them a bit.

Nevertheless, I’d also like to introduce you to the newest addition to my blog: „The Quest for Ore“ – whose title is obviously not inspired by Van Canto’s „Quest for Roar„.
An English short story inspired by my first experiences with Minecraft – the more or less addictive game, where you have to build your own world through crafting blocks into whatever is possible.
As the guys I’m playing with are planing to create a dwarven city I started thinking about stories about dwarves. And the one above is the first product of that.

There probably will be more – one other is already half done even – stories within this world I created for it. I’m kind of curious what I will come up with next.
But what I write in this case might be inspired by running around in Minecraft, but it is not a tale from what I actually experienced. And I think you can’t call it a FanFiction either.
(Spoiler: E.g. did we run through the „mines“, but we did not encounter any spiders.)

And yes I know: You don’t really read that the characters are supposed to be dwarves. They could just as well be humans.

But I think they are (still nameless) dwarves that will get some screentime again

And I have to say: It was fun writing a normal fictional story again, instead of adding something to an existing world.

PoiSonPaiNter