The Forgotten Race

Gesi and her team make their way back from the mountain range with a few samples of the rock, hoping that one of their groups finds a mountain that will be good enough to turn into their home. She hears the sounds of picks and hammers working away as she spots her friend using his hammer and chisel to get a few good samples from the mountainside and says, "How's it going over there, miner, getting any good samples at all?"

Asulfur chuckles and says, "Yes, we have taken a few pieces of the outer layer of this mountainside. Now we are working on getting a few samples of what lies underneath of it, which shouldn't be too much longer than three more hours at the pace we are working."

The two spend the time talking and joining the others in deepening the tunnel to gather samples when they get enough samples of the layer further in as Gesi wipes the sweat off her brow and says, "That will be good enough for samples, let's head back to Dark Watch and show these to the commander."

He pulls his men from the hole and begins their journey back to Dark Watch, hoping that one of these two mountains will be good enough to serve as their new home. They get halfway through their journey home when a roar comes from the sky, causing the dwarves to look up nervously. After not seeing anything after several minutes, a strange creature emerges from the forest having six legs, a few half-stripes on its belly, a stinger for a tail, has black and white fur, and some yellow places on its body. The strangest of them all is that it can fly using a pair of yellow wings on its back. After noticing its strange appearance Asulfur says, "What, in the name of Durin is that!"

Gesi looks the creature over and replies, "It seems to be some sort of combination between an insect and a bear, so I guess it is some kind of a...bugbear?"

Asulfur watches the creature as it roars and flies towards them and says, "Looks like it wants a fight, avoid being stung by it!"

They move out of the way as it charges towards them with its stinger aimed towards them, flying right past them and makes a deepening furrow as it strikes the ground. They charge the beast and attack it with their axes, succeeding in chopping off one of the legs before it can recover.

The beast roars in anger and pain, shaking its head clear before lifting itself into the air to attack again. It turns itself around and swipes at the small creatures, too hungry to look for something easy to kill.

One of the dwarves gets slapped by a paw and is sent flying into a tree, dazed for a moment then shakes his head clear saying, "Now now, that is quite enough of that." Rising to his feet again, he begins to charge the beast. As he nears the beast, he shouts out in defiance to the creature before jumping into the air as he raises his ax above his head.

The beast looks around to the one making so much noise and starts to turn to face it when it feels a sharp pain in its back, roaring out in pain as it falls to the ground as its wings stop functioning.

The dwarf places his two feet onto the back of the beast and starts to pry his ax out when he hears the beast's roar stop. Finally pulling his ax out, he stands back up and chops off the beast's head saying, "I wonder if this beast's meat tastes like, let's find out."

After setting up camp, Gesi starts to cook the meat from the beast saying, "I'm not sure it is going to taste very good, it smells awful."

Usur sits beside the campfire and chuckles saying, "It could be you that you are smelling, you were putting up one hell of a fight against that beast."

Gesi scoffs and says, "It most certainly is not me that smells. Unlike you, who's content with smelling disgusting, we women actually do try to look and smell nice. You all could learn a thing from us, maybe you should give bathing a chance, perhaps you will find a wife."

All the other dwarves around them burst out laughing and a couple of others slap Usur on the back while saying, "Oh she sure got you there Usur, you truly do smell somewhat awful."

Several minutes pass by as she finishes the meat and calls them to get some, taking some for herself then sits upon a log near the fire. Taking one bite of the meat and chewing on it for a bit, she spits it out and says, "Well that is the most disgusting thing I have ever had the displeasure of tasting, I'm never cooking this creature ever again. Before we sleep tonight, four of you will keep watch over us. After three hours, wake someone to take over." She then tosses the food into the distance as the others do the same after tasting it for themselves.

At the campfire around mid-day

The night passes by uneventfully as the group moves on at daybreak, heading back to the base camp when two dragons land upon the ground.

One of the dragons sniffs around, smelling something tasty. Finding the source as some discarded meat and scarfs it down eagerly saying, "I wonder if there is any more of thisss tasssty food around Frosty Wrath?"

Frosty Wrath sniffs around the area and smells a corpse a distance away, but smells a new scent coming from the ground. Curious, she says, "There is a corpse some distance away from us to the west, but there is a scent here that I do not recognize. I have flown all around this land and know every scent, so this one is new to me Razor Wind."

Razor Wind sniffs around for the corpse and then says, "You're always trying to learn something new or testing your frost breath for different things, just ignore this smell and let's have lunch already."

She looks at the fire drake and rolls her eyes in annoyance saying, "Unlike you Fire Dragons who like to roast anything that is unfortunate enough to catch their eye, we Frost Dragons like to learn things to satisfy our curiosity. Eat your lunch, I'm going to check out this smell. Come find me when you're finished eating, I want to know what manner of creature this smell belongs to."

He huffs in amusement and heads towards the corpse to have lunch, arriving at it after walking some distance away. He smiles at seeing that it is a bugbear he is eating, then continues eating it when he eventually notices it has no head. With his curiosity piqued, he finds the head laying on the ground. He looks at the place where the head should sit and notices that it has been removed with a single attack, then looks for other signs of damage to the corpse.

Frosty Wrath follows the smell on all four legs at a fast jog, getting closer to the smell when she notices a glint in the distance and focuses on it. Seeing several small creatures having a strange covering over their bodies, she continues to get closer to watch and study them. She hears a flap of wings as she stops and looks in the sky behind her, seeing that her mate Razor Wind is going to land near her and says, "SHHH, try to keep the noise down! We don't know how good those creatures' hearing is, they have a strange covering over their bodies that catches the light as our scales do. I do believe that this scent is coming from them, I wonder what they are."

Razor Wind lands beside her and says, "Well, I am not positive, but I do know that something cleanly removed the head of that bugbear corpse I ate back there. Whatever removed its head also pierced its back, perhaps the wound on its back happened first. That would explain why it was defeated, the place between the wings is the weak point for many creatures with wings. At least we don't have to worry about anything getting through our scales, the only thing that can pierce our scales are the claws of other dragons."

She looks at him with shock on her face and says, "There was a dead bugbear corpse back there? Damn you are lucky, those taste really good when roasted with frostfire. Those are really hard to defeat for any creature besides us dragons, I wonder what could have defeated it because those wounds don't sound like what any dragon would do. Let's follow these creatures and try to figure out more about them, we will keep ourselves hidden amongst the trees and watch them from cover."

Three days after the mining party returned to camp

Banil looks at the report from the head of the masons and smiles, then looks at his second in command and says, "The mountain up north won't work for us, the outer layer is shale and would not make a strong outer wall for the entrance. The other mountain, however, is perfect due to it being made of granite. I order you to form a workforce of two thousand miners and two hundred masons to begin creating a home for us, have the masons confer with each other on how they think the design for it should be. Be sure to take two hundred fully armed dwarves to serve as protection against any who wish to attack you, head out immediately once they are gathered."

Asulfur nods and salutes the commander saying, "At once sir!" then rushes out to start gathering the soldiers first.

Gesi looks at the wall as her newest students try to learn to speak when she hears a knocking at the door, then looks to Shelly and says, "Shelly Dear, can you take over while I see who is at the door?"

Shelly looks at her and nods her head, then heads to the front of the room and looks at the young colts and fillies in the room and says, "Now class, please repeat after me. The chisel cloves, the graver writes." She listens as the young students attempt to repeat what she said and replies, "You all are getting much better now, let's try something a bit harder. The king rules under the mountain, all those below the king serve in return." She listens to their responses and smiles saying, "Much better than last time, I am most certain of that. Let's do one more. Truth is crowned as king of all, and wealth can be found inside the heart." She listens to them get both parts correct and claps her hooves together with a smile saying, "You are making progress on saying words, all of you should be proud of that." She hears the teacher returning from the door then heads back to her seat.

She looks at the young students and says, "Ok young ones, that will have to be all for today. A lot of us dwarves are going on a journey into the unknown lands out west, so we will be away for some time. I want you all to keep practicing your letters and practice on the sounds each one makes, I will have another teacher take over for me during my absence. Go return to your parents kiddos, I need a word alone with Shelly." She watches as they head out the door at a trot and chuckles saying, "Children are amazing, they can soak up knowledge like a large ravine swallows a single drop of water." As the door closes behind the last student, she looks at Shelly and says, "A big group of dwarves are going on a journey to a mountain to do one thing that only dwarves are best at doing, would you and a few members of your herd travel with us to cart away rubble?"

The middle-aged mare thinks about it for a moment and says, "Yes I would like to go, let me go speak to the herd about it and I will bring back any of those that wish to help." She then hurries out to speak to her herd about this opportunity to be of some help to the dwarves.

Asulfur stands atop the gate counting out the warriors, splitting them into two groups of 100 and assigning the other group to Gesi, and breaking them in half with 50 dwarves each. He tells Gesi to evenly space them along either side of the column in smaller groups of 25, watching as she starts to take command of her group and then proceeds to count out the dwarves volunteering for this expedition.

He spends a few hours counting out the 2,000 miners, and the 200 masons for the expedition before he heads to the front of the column. He waits for the soldiers to get into position before giving the order to move on when he sees a large group of ponies standing alongside the column in a group of their own, making him chuckle to himself and shout in a loud and clear voice, "Expedition, move out! We will not stop until we reach the mountain, so drink water as we move!" He then starts to head out as he hears the sound of armored dwarves starting their march.

Shelly and her herd struggle to keep pace with the column of dwarves for a day and a half without rest when they see the mountain just up ahead of them, feeling glad that they will be able to catch some much-needed sleep and some decent grazing. She looks to her herd with weary eyes and says, "Not much farther now, all of you must keep pushing on. When we get there, we will graze for food after we catch some sleep."