chapter.0: never trust a merchant or Businessperson....or drugs dealers
Deep in the earth, toiled packs of Diamond dogs each seeking their own riches, or looking to pick a fight with those that were weaker than they were. Down here in the Underland as the dogs like to call it, only the biggest and the meanest survived and if your weren't one of the two then well they call it a dog eat dog world for a reason. The world above had always founded the Diamond Dog race to be 'unwanted' at best and something to erase completely at worse, that's how the dogs liked it. They adored the thrill that came with butting heads of the surface races, and it was really their only mark on history, of course there was a time where the packs were legion and they had a great civilization. The long dead kingdom Mar-ken-howl, but such times were very long since past especially with the dogs being the only ones that bother to remember the old nation because the surface races just forgot it even existed in the first place.
The chains of captured ponies rattled as the equines were put to work, pulling carts of jewels and metal ore, while some of the ponies were indeed captured slaves from various raids on Equestria and among other pony nation's, most of the small ponies were born and breed Underlanders. While most dogs could care less for their pony counterparts, there have been times where certain Underlander ponies were chosen from the ranks of the slave and servant class to become members of the packs or even rarer a member of the Alphas' courts. The one place in all of Underland everyone desired to be.
But in order to get there you must the meanest and the biggest, friends and pack are just tools to one trying to join one of the Alpha's courts.
But in order to get there you must the meanest and the biggest, friends and pack are just tools to one trying to join one of the Alpha's courts. Rover, Fido and Spot are just three of theses dogs trying to join their local Alpha court, the Gem-Stealers, the main Alpha court in the southern Underland. The three brothers worked tirelessly to ensure that the other dogs in their pack failed, in order to reap the desired spoils of wealth and the favor of the local Alpha which often lead to hilarious results. Such as throwing bananas in the tunneler of a rival dog's tail pipe and watch it go haywire to stealing a dog's favorite pony and place it in the bed of an underlander pony, laughing wildly as the dog chased down the poor pony before making him/her into a new one.
But of course despite their many attempts to gain favor through any means necessary, they still had to do their jobs, over seeing the mines, and making sure that every dog dig till their paws bleed or rusted pick axes broke.
“Oi Spot!” grunted one of the three brothers, the one that spoke was Fido, out the three brothers he had the biggest and strongest arms but unfortunately for the workers he was the stupid one.
“Who's working in tunnel number five again?”
“Er...me check the list!” said Spot the runt of the three brothers, while he was much smarter then Fido, he at a young age took a shovel to the throat no thanks to a prissy captured stallion from Pance forever ruining his voice box so to avoid pain he spoke broken English, ''Me sees pony thing work.”
“Then if the ponies working the tunnel then who's overseeing them?” asked the leader of the three brothers Rover, the smartest and the meanest of the lot. It had been said that Rover was once the kindest dog to ever work in the Underland mines while most believed this to be only a myth and nothing more, there had been whispers of him sneaking away to the surface world to visit a lady love whom was eaten by a three headed bull…
“Not dog.” Spot replied glancing that the list in his claws, the list wasn't only a list of names as some had been told it held the locations of the richest veins of golds and other metals in all of southern Underland, then again nobody knows that to be true since Spot was the only one that was allowed to read it by Rover's orders.
Rover facepalms and slowly drags his paw downwards before glaring at his smallest brother “ you have a pony watching them don't ya.”
Spot's ear flatten themselves against his eyes, which told Rover everything he wanted to know with a swift movement that was almost completely unheard of thanks to the dogs ungainly arms, he uppercuts the runt sending him flying to the stone walls of the housing tunnel. Fido started laughing maniacally at the misfortune of the poor runt before he too found himself flying into the wall unlike his little brother Fido hits the wall face first.
“OWW what did I do?” whined Fido
“Cause yer stupid.” huffed Rover crossing his arms, “git yer filthy hides off my floor, we got work to do.”
“What work we do?” Spot painfully asked rising from spot shaped dent in the stone wall, it was thanks to years of abuse and diamond dog nature itself that he was left relatively unharmed. Though that did not meant he escaped the pain from hitting a stone wall, with a small limp and sore bones the runt scamper over to his biggest brother.
“Fixing your mistake Spot,” growled Rover jabbing a jagged claw at the runt, “and then we pick on some underlander ponies that been eyeing our positions, I've gots good intel that those ponies been holding out on us...something about the mother load of ge-”
“Rover?” interrupted Fido.
“Fido I thought that I told you never interrupt me when-”
“But it's important.” interrupted fido again.
“Oh? what is it.” asked Rover raising a brow in curosity.
“I'm hungry.”
The cravens echoing with a mighty slap, one that every dog and underlander pony felt, the two races glared at the other before they shook their heads while clicking their tongues knowing that it was probably somebody's wife hitting them for doing something very stupid or Rover and Fido were at it again.. most would bet their left leg that it was the two brothers.
Tunnel Number Five
An group of underlander ponies dug into the earth greedily, with each strike of the pick axes and shovels, they saw a bit's of emerald green shining in the gloom that was tunnel number five or was the workers called it The Pathway to Tartarus. According to old stories from the time of the old kingdom there was a road deep below even deeper then Underland where the kingdom's greatest enemy slept sealed away by the first of the Alpha King Rex Ruby-eyes, 'the demon of the four heads' they called it. The demon supposedly dragged any who seen it down to Tartarus where it would eat them unless you somehow paid it off with a flawless gem or many colors and gave it the name of someone else to be it's victim.. the thing is there were no such gems or at least nowadays.
To this day there have been no records of what the demon looked like or anyone who survived from being dragged down, except for the old King Ruby-Eyes of course. Yet the old legend of 'the demon of the four heads' did not scared off the underlanders or their hunger for gems, the Alphas' themselves believed it to be only an old wives tale about the dangers of mining that and they thought somebody has been holding out on them in taxes.
The underlander ponies knew that they would need to dig quickly if that was indeed the case, no one dared to cheat the Alphas' out of gems unless your were smart enough to get rid of the evidence of cheating them or wet some paws with the odd jewel here and there. As they dug they failed to notice the tips of ears in the biggest of the visible parts of the emerald or that the three brothers were standing in the gloom of the tunnel watching the ponies work with furious look about them...more in Rover's case while Fido rubbed his hurt ear and Spot rubbing his poor little head.
"Oi, Ponies!" snarled Rover, the sound of the snarl evilly echoed throughout the whole of the tunnel causing the ponies to drop their equipment in order to shield their sensitive ears, it was thanks to their lives down here in the tunnels that their hearing grew to an level of sensitivity way beyond the ponies on the surface yet due the ringing pain none of them noticed that by dropping their equipment so suddenly had cracked the emerald "Ya'll trying to cheat ME!"
"No!" said the pony overseer cradling his ears in his hooves "we we-"
The pony never finish his sentence because he was sent flying into the tunnel's wall on the count of Rover's fist, the eldest of the three brothers then took his frustrations out on the other ponies, bashing them over the head with his massive fists and others shaved in the same fate as their overseer yet the vibrations of their slamming into the tunnel's wall only cracked the emerald further. Some of the ponies tried to fight back using their tools as weapons, but the other two brothers quickly joined Rover in the little rumble knowing that they have to end the fight quickly least one of the Alpha's dogs find out and 'steal' of their gems in 'terms of payment' for damages.
As quickly as the fight had started it ended when a very peculiar sound reached the group, Rover still had a couple of ponies by the throat as he strained his ears listening to the sound. Then the sound grew louder, echoing deeply in the tunnel again the ponies had their ears assaulted. Letting go of the ponies in his paw and following the sound itself, Rover found himself stared down at an heavily damaged emerald of a size he had never before seen.
His two lesser brothers quickly scampered to his side and together they listen to the emerald, at times the sounds coming from the massive jewel held a likeness to words other times it seem to be something...they just couldn't just place their paws on it. But as to why it was being so noisy, they jointly had no idea.
It couldn't be an dragon's egg for they were way too far south and too deep for dragon to laid their eggs. It wasn't one of the alpha's traps for...less loyal dogs and ponies because if it was then where were the soldiers to drag them all way to The Pits of Woe where such dogs and ponies were throw down to fight to the death for the right to live and the Alphas' forgiveness. It certainly no emerald for the sheer size of it was all wrong.
"Spot, what in Ruby-eyes's name am I looking at?"
"Me no know..." said the runt tapping at the crumbling gem with an jagged nail, "me need book."
"Umm which book" said Fido who also tapped at the gem, to him it sound hollow only big enough to hold something small. He loves small things for they were to puny to hurt him and very fun to chase.
"Magic rocks" replied the runt with an very good idea of what happen to his book.
"I think i ate that one.." said the stupid brother before being hit in the back of the head by Rover who could only shake his head at the idiotic mulefaced mutt that was his brother.
"Well then spot you'll have to use what you can remember." said rover still shaking his head, "I want to know whether or not that rock is a danger to my mine, you remember what happen the last time we found something!"
"Cat is still hungry?" asked the runt visibly shaking remembering what happen last time.
"Yes the Manticore is still hungry, their always hungry, just hurry about this before you are its lunch!"
The runt gave a great squeak as he laid an ear upon the gem while his claws tapped away at the crumbling gem as counting the cracks in the stone. Then slowly he pulled away from the stone and picked up one of the dropped shovels before scraping at the top of the gem, seeing their chance the ponies thundered away yet the three brothers did nothing to stop them, the mystery of the emerald was too great for them to be concerned with frightened ponies, that and the greed of diamonds dogs was always great.
Handing the shovel to Fido, Spot then gathered the scrapings and breath them in, "Magic Strong," he says eyeing the great gem, "old very old."
"An old but powerful spell?" said Rover with now a bad feeling in his paws, he knew that there were many such items in world, mostly relics from bygone ages or things that intended to be forgotten yet the real trouble was which? There was nothing to make the designation between the two because of obvious, if something was intended to be forgotten then there would be no writing of warning and relics often were unknown until they were found, or rather when the relic caused a death, "Is it safe?"
"Me don't know?'' said the runt unevenly, "Safe? Not safe or both?"
"Well which is it?" asked Rover, while Rover and spot talked. Fido on the other hand was wondering where the shovel in his paws came from. He didn't recall picking one up but then he figured that his brothers wanted him to dig, so dig he did.
"what do you mean you don't know- Fido NOOOO- " shirked the two smarter brothers.
Bam went the shovel as it dug into the massive gem, biting into it for all it was worth. The whole chamber glowed green as what whatever magic the gem had was undone. When the three brothers could see again, four large rat like creatures danced top of Fido, the claws on their feet digging into the stupid one's flesh. Fido gave low moans of pain, the green blast fortunately shut down most of his nervous system, a fate that was perhaps to kind for one as stupid one's own good.
"holy shit we are out!! YES! YES! Finally I can get a decent cup of joe" went the first of the rats.
"Good thing too... if I had to spent another day with noting to listen to outside of meepo 4 bad puns, i will go fucking insane.. again" said the second of the four rats
"oh come on...some of the puns are good but Jesus Christ, I think they're older than we are." The third rat face palmed "we really need new material, gem based puns wasn't that whatshisface's stick?"
Rat4. "I know but I 'crystal' you guys." grinned the fourth rat before getting slap upside the head by the second rat.
"Fuck you." growled the second rat before slapping the the fourth again with his tail.
"Oi Lads looks like we have company!" Yells the first rat finally noticing that they been being watched, his voice then lowers into the deadly hiss "And they stole all of our gold!!! Thieves!!!"
Rat.2 "oh shit!" the second rat hissed as his glared daggers into the three dog brothers, his claws digging even deeper into Fido, "Do you know what I had to do get that mountain of gold! I ain't dive bombing down a dragon's throat again, I still have patches of fur missing and don't mention the teeth on those things!"
"Oh really Meepo 2? the third rat rolled his eyes at the second rat "how big were they again?"
"Fuck you Meepo 3" the newly named Meepo 2 hissed before slapping him with his tail.
"Looks like I'm gonna dig a grave or two before this is done" said the forth with an wicked smile " I wonder how much gold they have in their bellies? We ain't gonna leave emptied handed "
"GET THEM AND THEIR LITTLE MUTT TOO" Orders the first rat with his little paws glowing with an green aura.
"Oi who you call mutt!" yelled Spot indignantly " You Racists! ME HAVE YOU KNOW ME IS PRUE BRED"
The four rats stop in the tracks and look at each other. They have worked with diamond dogs before (rather more force labor on the diamond dog part of the deal), they were reasonably well knowledge in the different dogs breeds but the small one of the three dog brothers was really an mutt...
"wait what?..." went the four meepo.
"You heard me" yelled the runt with a raised fist.
"Hey we not racists, we're black market merchants yes and we had forcibly made others work for us under the the threat of death but we're not racists "went Meepo four before realizing that what he just said perhaps made them sound even worse. "Just merchants" he said wildly waving his paws.
''really....?'' went two of the three brothers, fido adding his own groan when one of the meepo toe claws went up his nose.
