After the first time the DRC left the cavern, a lot of people stayed in the cavern. Since Victor Laxman protected the Lattice and severely limited the KI network, we couldn't reach each other by KI, so small groups formed of people who happened to run into each other or had some form of web contact. To name a few: "Cobbs", "H'uru", "AgeCrafters", "UO", "AgeBuilders". With the limited web access the DRC left behind we were able to keep some form of communication between Cavern and Surface going.
At first, most of them just focused on getting back into the main areas of the cavern. Ae'gura, Kirel, and so on. A few people worked hard trying to hack into the Lattice.
Of course, there were also a few who were just bent on exploring as much of D'ni as possible. It was in those days that a few people stumbled on an old Writers school. They uncovered a partially burned copy of the Rehevkor, but more importantly a few volumes of 'Writing for Dummies'. Well, that's what we called it anyway. In D'ni the title was a lot more solemn. It took like forever to translate it, I can tell you that!
A few years passed in this fashion, with new discoveries being made all the time. Granted they were small, but they were significant. One of the first milestones to be reached was the fabrication of small linking books that could be used to write links to our homes. Especially for the overseas explorers, the airplane fares to and from New Mexico were a killer. There was this one time a European explorer accidentally linked to Relto from home, while forgetting his passport ... nasty business.
Anyway, over time more milestones were reached, especially in the areas of Book and Ink making.
In those days everyone was just minding their own business right until the time the DRC got back to the cavern and shook things up. A lot of people had to ... well, let's just call it 'adjust to the new situation'.
When the DRC took the initiative for rebuilding the old guilds, they were well aware of the progress we made on reverse engineering the Art. So they included a 'Guild of Writers' in that list and redecorated one of the old Pubs for us.
At the same time a few of the old groups went through some rough times. One or two had leadership crises. So a few of the members of different groups joined together and started meeting in the new Guild Pub. They set up a central library on the Art, and started to supply empty books. Just that! Nothing more at first. But after a while more people flocked together, and in a few months we were almost a real Guild.
At the moment there are four main disciplines in the Guild of Writers:
- Writers of new Ages
Writing new Ages from scratch - Age Restorers
Restoring discovered books, either D'ni in origin or otherwise. - Cavern Restorers
Restoring existing parts of the D'ni Cavern, and providing links there. - Ink Makers
Research and production of Books and Ink. As well as research into the Art and writing of reference materials.
These disciplines are not mutually exclusive. Many Guild members have experience with two or more disciplines
) You might also want to check out families and friends. Not to mention that most people have jobs and responsabilities of all kinds on the Surface..
