“ One of the camels in the caravan trips over a dark rock protruding from the sandy dunes. The poor animal has broken its leg and cannot continue. A cacaphony ensues as the animal suffers and the caravan train overseers complain passionately as they redistribute the animal's load across the caravan. (Let's just hope none of the PC's was riding this camel, shall we?)
As the camel is put out of its misery and the camel is skewered over a campfire - waste nothing! - someone takes a minute to inspect the root cause of all the trouble. To their surprise, the upturned rock is worked stone. Some frantic digging may excavate the bottom half of a gorgeously worked1 obelisk, and maybe even the small square forum below; but a more rigorous exploration of the surrounding dunes reveals a buried tomb doorway on each side of the forum.”
“ Finally got the idea for an orcish currency:
A cold-hammered piece of raw iron, resembling some kind of a dagger. The Dagger is easy to carry, hard to forge, may be used as a crude weapon in case of emergency AND the iron being a valuable resource... may be used directly for weapon-making. May be carried openly on the belt of a mighty Orc. A new insult: 'to beat someone with someones money' . Self-explanatory.”
“ For a futuristic grim gory setting. Probably powered by some kind of dilithium battery or something similarly awesome. Anyways, basicly a big drill sticking up from a hilt that you primarily use for skewering enemies painfully and drilling through armor.”
