//------------------------------// // Mines of Moriaz // Story: Spike's Doom and/or Destiny // by terrycloth //------------------------------// After returning to the mine and proceeding down the tracks a ways, with no really significant side passages, the heroes came to a quaint little train station. There was a raised platform for passengers to wait for the train, a ticket window, and what looked like a gabled roof carved out of stone sheltering some stone benches from any rain that might fall from the stalactites above. They climbed onto the platform and continued through the silent turnstiles, Moondancer lighting her horn so that they could see where they were going, since the sconces set into the walls didn’t look like they’d been lit in decades. Beyond was a deserted town that looked suspiciously like Moriaz, except that everything was just a little bit bigger, and a little bit off. The doors had handles about six inches too high for a pony to grip comfortably in their mouth or hoof, and the signs weren’t written in any language they recognized. Moondancer thought it looked a bit like Old Runic, except that it didn’t actually use any of the same letters or words. Despite the slight inconvenience of opening the doors, they took the time to explore every building that wasn’t locked. Most of them looked like they used to be shops of various sorts, but none of them had any surviving inventory. Eventually, they came to the inn, and found that the Giant Floating Crystal in the front room had been shattered. “Not sure we’d want to checkpoint here anyway,” Bon Bon said. “It’s a bit far from the church.” “Do you think the beds still work?” Derpy asked, drifting towards the stairs in the back. “Do you really think it’s safe to sleep here?” Bon Bon asked. “We haven’t seen any monsters since we got here,” Spike said. “It must still count as a town, even without any ponies.” “What exactly does that mean?” Moondancer asked. “We’ve been leaning heavily on Spike’s knowledge of the appropriate narrative tropes, but do we actually know that the world works that way?” Spike shrugged. “Why else would it be so quiet?” “I don’t know, and that bothers me,” Moondancer said. “Many of the things that seemed game-dependent at first glance turned out to have a physical explanation. For example, the piles of golz are there because ponies used to use gold and golz was worthless fake gold that they just threw away. Or the endless waves of bandits – they happen because everypony respawns at the Giant Floating Crystals, so the same bandits just keep coming back again and again.” “And how do you explain the crystals?” Bon Bon asked. Moondancer was silent for a second or two. “I can’t. Yet.” “So… what are you saying?” Spike asked. “We shouldn’t search the town?” Moondancer shook her head. “No, just… don’t let your guard down.” “Oh right,” Spike said. “Maybe it’s quiet to lure us into a false sense of security, before a really dangerous boss monster appears!” “That’s not what I mean at all,” Moondancer said, rolling her eyes. “But fine, keep an eye out for a sudden boss monster, if that’s what it takes.” “I am not a monster,” came a quiet voice from the back stairs. “Ahh!” Derpy shrieked, pointing a hoof. “Ninja!” “I am also not a ninja,” said the diamond dog girl, stepping out of the shadows and into the light cast by Moondancer’s horn. “But I see you have met my brother.” “Oh, I get it,” Spike said. “This place isn’t deserted at all, you’re all just hiding!” “No.” “Then what?” Bon Bon asked. The diamond dog yawned, showing off her glistening fangs. “I was sleeping. You ponies awoke me with your talking.” “No,” Bon Bon said. “What about everypony else?” She looked confused. “The ponies all moved to the mountain above. Ponies love the sun.” “So there weren’t any other ninjas?” Derpy asked. “This was just a weird underground pony town until they all moved out?” The dog looked even more confused. She reached into a pocket on her vest, and pulled out a large lump of quartz, which she started chewing on thoughtfully. “Maybe I am not thinking clearly, yet. You are ponies, but you act like you do not know what happened here.” “We’re not from around here,” Spike said. “We’re on a quest!” “Why don’t you tell us what happened,” Moondancer suggested. “We’ve been walking around this mine for ages. I could stand to rest my hooves for a while.” The diamond dog looked around at each of them in turn. When she got to Derpy, who was hovering closer and closer with a wide grin on her face, she gave another yawn, and said, “Okay. But hooves will rest better if you sit.” === Long long ago, before the dark and the sky were one, the good dogs ruled beneath the mountain, building a home for themselves there -- clearing away the rock, saving the gems to eat or to wear, and forging the tasteless metals into tools. The mountain was cursed, however, twice cursed. First, most of the metal to be found was of the worthless yellow variety, either soft and formless or brittle and prone to crumble. Second, the depths were haunted by bad things, and the good dogs had to dig upwards instead, always up, despite the legends that spoke of the doom that awaited if they breached the surface. A warning from dogs long dead held less weight than the terrifying screams and the hideous warmth that crept up the lower tunnels. And so, the good dogs chose the doom above, and broke through the surface, and met the ponies. The ponies greeted them, and told them that the mountain was not cursed – that the soft yellow metal was blessed, and that they could have all manner of nice things in return for the metal. The dogs were tricked, and welcomed the ponies into their home, and let the ponies remake it in their image. Moriaz became a great city beneath the mountain, of ponies and dogs working together to gather the soft yellow metal, trading it to others for every nice thing. The dogs stopped being good dogs, and became nice dogs, used to niceness. But the ponies always wanted things to be even nicer, and rushed to mine more and more of the metal, and the nice dogs were pulled along in the cart behind them. They heard of the haunted depths, and laughed at the superstitions. The ponies had turned out to be nice, had they not? Surely whatever lived below would be nice as well. And if it was not, they could trade their soft yellow metal for an army of orcs to fight and conquer the depths in their stead, or so said the ponies. But as they dug deeper, and the screams got louder, and the warmth cloying and painful, the nice dogs began to wake from the pony daze. The curse was real – could the ponies not hear? Could they not feel? Could they not sense the wrongness of the stone in their very bones? No, they would stop digging, and they would move to another mountain instead, and look for more of the yellow metal there. So the ponies took the yellow metal, and hired an army of orcs, and slaughtered the bad, bad dogs. Only a few escaped – the orcs had no mercy, but the ponies had some, and a few were spirited away by ponies they trusted. Then the ponies had the orcs dig for them, instead of the dead dogs, and broke through into the fiery, cursed depths. They fled to the surface, and rebuilt their city there, but only the uppermost part of the mine was still safe from the curse, now that they had unleashed it. So they received even less of their soft yellow metal, and cursed the bad dogs for their misfortune. Over time, with the miners gone, the curse retreated into the depths, leaving the mine silent and dead. === “Except for the rock monsters and wandering orcs,” Derpy pointed out. “And the ghosts!” “A few still wander, lost. But wandering is quieter than mining with the tools the orcs use,” the diamond dog replied. “So those jerks murdered your whole village?” Spike said. “Over a labor dispute,” Moondancer added, with a scowl. Bon Bon frowned. “I should have expected something like this. Rich ponies can go a little… evil sometimes.” “Just like dragons?” Spike asked. Bon Bon laughed. “Not as bad as dragons.” “And they’re still up there, living happily, while you’re down here…” Spike said. “Living happily?” the dog finished. “All alone?” Derpy asked. “I can visit my brother, and his deer servants,” the dog said. “But it would be nice if there were other dogs here.” “So you’re not going to give us a quest to get revenge?” Spike asked. “Revenge is my brother’s trade,” the diamond dog said, finishing off her quartz and licking the dust from her claws. “If you want a quest, find the survivors and tell them that it is safe to return.” “We’ve already got a quest,” Moondancer said. “Sort of,” Derpy said. “It’s more of a pre-quest quest-qualification quest?” “Then take it as a side quest,” the diamond dog said. “That is what questing ponies do?” “Sure,” Bon Bon said. “If we run across any, we’ll send them back here.” “I’m just glad we don’t have to fight you,” Spike said. “Is it safe to rest here?” “10 gold per pony, to stay at the inn,” the diamond dog said. “Do you take golz?” Bon Bon asked. “It’s all we have.” “If I must,” she sighed. === After a good long sleep in soft (if slightly musty) beds, the heroes woke up to the smell of Bon Bon cooking up some pancakes and fried hay in the kitchen. They shared breakfast with their diamond dog hostess, and got some directions. “The tracks lead to the depths, where the curse still lingers. Go no further than the giant fiery chasm. It is not fiery now, but you will know it.” “So we don’t have to leap across the chasm in an out of control mine cart?” Spike asked. The dog looked confused. “The bridge is intact, but you should not cross.” “What happens if we cross?” Bon Bon asked. “Bad things.” “Specifically?” Moondancer pressed. “You will face the curse. The curse is bad. It chased away dogs and ponies both, and the orcs do not go near.” “Hypothetically speaking,” Bon Bon said, “If we did cross, would we find any treasure?” “No,” the diamond dog said, “because you would be dead.” “I don’t think she knows,” Derpy said. “So you can stop torturing her now.” “We probably shouldn’t risk it anyway,” Spike said. “I mean, the last optional boss kicked our tails. If there’s anything there, we’re meant to come back once we’re stronger.” “We’ve got a crystal to go back to, so we’re not risking anything but time,” Bon Bon said. “Time and pain,” Moondancer said. “Lots of pain.” Bon Bon rolled her eyes. “And if we’re not meant to be there yet, that means that the treasure we’ll find is something we’re not supposed to have yet. It’ll make everything else easier.” “And what if we wake it up and it decides to come here and destroy the town?” Derpy asked. “It might block the path and then we’ll never finish our quest!” “Why don’t we take a vote?” Spike suggested. “All in favor of waking up the nameless evil that destroyed an entire town of ponies, raise a hoof.” Nopony raised their hoof. Everypony looked at Bon Bon. She shrugged. “The last time we tried to break the sequence we spent two weeks walking to River Town and back, and the advantage lasted through maybe one dungeon. So I’m okay with playing by the rules this time.” === It turned out not to matter what they’d decided, because the railway bridge over the deep, dark chasm was guarded by an ancient robed pony, wielding a staff. “You shall not pass!” he cried, as they approached. “Okay,” Spike said. “You shall not pass,” he repeated, pointing the staff at Spike and keeping it trained on him as the young dragon cautiously edged past him to the narrow ledge that continued on their side of the chasm. Derpy floated higher up in the air, and started drifting over the old pony’s head, only to get yanked back by Moondancer’s aura on her tail. “No. Don’t taunt the crazy wizard while we’re creeping along a narrow ledge.” “You shall not pass,” said the old pony, nodding at her. “He wouldn’t even see me,” Bon Bon said, stopping right in front of him. The pony bonked her on the head. “You. Shall. Not. Pass,” he said, swinging his staff and forcing her to take a step back with each word. Spike, glancing back over his shoulder to watch, covered his mouth to stifle a giggle… then turned back around and saw a giant rock monster hovering a few feet in front of him, its jagged-toothed mouth ready to crunch down on his face. “AAH!” Moondancer whirled, and cast. “Explosive Missile!” Spike threw himself to the ground and held up his shield as the rock monster exploded, the larger pieces scattering off the wall and the ledge, clattering their way down into the chasm, as the roar of the explosion echoed. The ponies held perfectly still, waiting for the echo to die down… but it didn’t. Soon, they realized that the rumbling, pulsing noise from below was not an echo, and in fact a faint orange light was pulsing brighter and brighter as the noise slowly built. “It wasn’t me,” Spike said. “Just go!” Moondancer said, yanking him up in her magic and setting him on his feet. “Run!” “Fly!” said the old pony, staring in horror at the light below. “Fly, you fools!” Derpy swooped down and picked up Bon Bon, and after a few steps of Spike’s lumbering jog Moondancer lifted him again, and plopped him onto her battle saddle as she broke into a gallop. Spike leaned forwards and grabbed onto her neck as they raced forwards into the darkness, trying to outrun the light.