Rainbow Dash walked along one of the many piers of this large port city as she explored for… pretty much anything really. The wooden platform she was on rose up out of the water, supported by giant wooden pillars covered in barnacles at their lower reaches. The planks of wood gave a nice sound with each step of her hooves over them, almost like the sound of crossing an old wooden bridge. She was walking beside a railing with the ocean to her right and could see right down into the harbor water and spy several tied up boats on the smaller docks. To her left, off the pier, was a paved road that was mostly for wagons and carts being pulled along by ponies, and then right up against the long row of buildings was a cement sidewalk. They made it easy to separate traffic here and keep things moving smoothly.
She wasn’t sure what to really do now. There was a lot to go and see. She could try one of the buildings, most of them seemed to be shops selling seafaring related stuff but there were a lot of bigger warehouse looking places, restaurants and things like carpenters and blacksmiths, or she could try and talk to some of the actual sailors around the docks. There were definitely a lot of them. Maybe try and find a captain of one of these big ships moored to the docks to try and get some more details on the ocean?
Maybe see if there was any odd job she could do for the day to get some money? She was gonna need it. Some generous hospitality was one thing, she didn’t want to just have money thrown at her. The bread would tide her over a bit longer but she wanted something to drink and something with more substance to eat later.
As for going from here, traveling out and exploring the ocean? She’d have to plan that out a bit more. Think about it—much as she preferred just going headfirst into things—before she left this port. Flying over a wide open ocean carried risks different from anywhere else and at the moment she knew less about the ocean than she even did when she first traveled into the Great Camel Desert. She was going to have to be smart about this. Ugh.
But for now the port itself still held plenty for her. There would be a lot to check out and learn right here before she left. Probably a lot of interesting ponies to meet too.
She passed by one of the larger docks and saw a huge ship with three separate masts rising from the deck. Their massive sails were all furled up and several ramps were leading down from the deck to the docks. Big, muscular, stallions were carrying crates down the ramps and dropping them off onto carts that were then pulled up onto the street. There was one stallion up on deck wearing a tri-point hat watching over it all. The captain? He would probably be a good pony to talk to but he looked busy, he and his ponies seemed the type that wouldn’t appreciate being interrupted while they’re working like this.
The stores and other buildings on the side of the road would probably be a better source of finding ponies to help fill her in on this place. Unless she found a boat full of ponies just lazing around out by the docks.
Rainbow shrugged and decided the best course of action was to walk by the buildings now. There had to be more opportunity to talk to ponies who weren’t totally busy over there. Or walk into a place that looked like it might be inviting to her. Maybe she’d even get called out to by someone because of how much she stuck out. Either way she flapped her wings and left the pier, easily flying over the street and all the traffic of wagon and carts going down it, until she dropped down on the wide sidewalk on the other side.
“Wonder if maybe somewhere I’ll find a place that’ll give me dinner and a room if I promise to wash the dishes at the end of the day...” Rainbow said as she started walking by the various storefronts.
There was enough room on the sidewalk for a few ponies to walk beside each other without running out of room. And it was a busy sidewalk so it really needed that. Rainbow Dash found that no other ponies were really going to take the time to stop and talk to her though. Some bowed their head in a quick greeting or even gave her a smile but that was really about it. Ponies were busy.
And she didn’t stick out as much as she was expecting. Ponies of all sorts were going up and down the sidewalk and street. Pegasi, unicorns, earth ponies, workers, families, ones that even looked like tourists the same way she practically was, shopkeepers sweeping out front, and a few kids playing dice in the alleys… and a few seedier looking adults skulking out around in the shadows too. Rainbow Dash kept her eyes o them. Lively place even at just a glance.
She was passing by what looked like a bar when-
“I told you to stop bothering my sailors you crazy old codger!” A loud voice yelled as a grizzled stallion with a scar on one cheek threw open the doors to the bar and threw out another pony right onto the sidewalk. “Now get out and stay out!”
The elderly stallion that had been thrown out was a wrinkled earth pony, dark green with a thinning brown and grey mane. “H-How dare you!” He sputtered as he tried to rise to his hooves.
“Master!” Two other stallions dressed as butlers yelled as they darted out of the doors and tried to help him up.
The grizzled stallion merely clicked his tongue and turned around, loudly shutting the doors to the bar behind him. Rainbow Dash watched as the wrinkled earth pony shrugged off his butlers and lifted a hoof towards the bar.
“You youngins! You don’t know anything! T-The treasure you could have… the greatest discovery ever made on this ocean! Showing me this disrespect, how dare you! How dare you!” He continued to yell.
“Master, please,” one of his butlers tried to consul him. “Let’s go before he comes back out...”
“Uh, are you alright?” Rainbow Dash asked as she walked up to them. “Need any help?”
The old stallion’s head swung over to her with a suspicious and downright unfriendly look on his face. “Who are you, whippersnapper?”
Rainbow Dash frowned slightly but let it pass. “Rainbow Dash. Why’d that guy throw you out here?”
“Because he has no sense for adventure or respect for history!” The old stallion shouted, spittle flying right into Rainbow Dash’s face.
She brought a hoof up to wipe it away and raised an eyebrow at him. “Adventure?”
The old stallion squinted his eyes and looked her up and down. “Oh? Perhaps you’re a pony who understands what I’m talking about?”
“I’m always open for a good adventure,” Rainbow shrugged.
“Well then, my name is Old Diver. Grandson of Deep Diver, the greatest explorer and treasure hunter this ocean has ever seen! Tell me, mare, what do you know of Merlantis?” He asked her.
“Umm… absolutely nothing. I’m new here,” Rainbow said.
“Bah!” He scoffed. “Whatever then, so long as you care about adventure. Merlantis is the ancient home of the legendary Ponyseidon, who ruled this ocean thousands of years ago! A city, a castle, at the bottom of the seas! Most think it is only a legend, a fairy tale, but I know it’s real! Years ago my grandfather found it, when I was just a child, but a storm sunk his hip and all of his maps and tools. He lost his life that day. The only thing that survived was a single letter, bound and addressed to me, saying he had found it! Ever since then I’ve spent my family’s entire fortune on tracing his steps and finding where exactly it was he dove down to find the lost city of Merlantis!”
“And you know where it is now?” Rainbow Dash could admit to feeling a little excited. Ancient city at the bottom of the ocean? Sign her up.
“I know it’s general location. I believe,” Old Diver responded.
“Oh.”
“But I’ve ruled out so many other spots I have to be right! I know it!” Old Diver accidentally flung more spittle into her face again. “What do you say? Will you help me find Merlantis? I don’t care about any treasure that might be down there, you can have it all, I just want the credit and respect for finding it!”
“Earlier it sounded like you were using the promise of treasure to convince that other stallion, but you don’t actually know if there will be treasure there?” Rainbow asked.
“Er, well, there has to be! Doesn’t there?”
Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. “Right. Look, I don’t care about treasure either but it sounds like you’re not as sure about any of this as you’re acting.”
He grit his teeth and glared at her. “Mare! What do you know? I’ve spent my whole life, and seen my own family name tarnished and impoverished all for this dream! I’m sure of Merlantis! One empty house! Two dim-witted butlers! That’s all that remains of the Diver family fortune after my search for Merlantis, that’s how much it means to me!”
“Alright, well I came here looking for a fun adventure anyways sooo… I guess I’m onboard,” Rainbow Dash shrugged.
“Excellent! So how much money do you have?” Old Diver asked with a yellow grin as his eyes turned down to the pouch Rainbow had around her neck. Several of his teeth were missing.
Rainbow Dash blinked. “Um, none.” She poked the empty pouch. “It’s empty, dude.”
Old Diver’s smile fell off his face and he angrily glared at her. “Then what are you wasting my time for?! Ohhh, I get it, you’re just like all the rest! Just messing around with Old Diver! Bah!” He walked forward and shoved her out of the way as he left down the sidewalk.
“Hey!” Rainbow Dash shouted at him. “You jerk!”
“Stupid mare! We need money for provisions and a boat if we’re making this trip! I can’t have any freeloaders!” Old Diver growled as he continued to walk away, followed by his butlers.
“You don’t even have a boat?” Rainbow gawked.
“It sank!”
Rainbow Dash shook her head and dragged a hoof down her face. “What even just happened?” She looked at Old Diver as he disappeared in the crowd of ponies on the sidewalk, still hearing him angrily grumble and lash out at others around him. “But… if Merlantis is still real… maybe I found an adventure already.”
The further she walked the more the docks and the port in general started to change its makeup. Things were less busy here and the ships docked here were only the biggest of cargo ships, there were no more small personal boats or sailing families. It was all business. Even the buildings next to her had changed completely to large warehouses and other big buildings that had no signs outside them indicating what they were. Shipping corporations, business headquarters, she had no idea. She did see that quite a few had ponies standing outside them that were clearly guards. They affixed her with a strong gaze whenever she walked by them. Naturally less ponies were walking down the sidewalk with her at this point too.
Curiously she started seeing more large constructions on the harbor as well. Not just the large docks but huge buildings connected to the pier built right on and over the water. Since that looked more interesting, she once again switched sides and flew back over to the pier.
Rainbow Dash walked towards the first of the large buildings. It had the shape of a huge warehouse with a triangular roof with more than half of it going out into the water. The back end wasn’t held up by pillars, it was fully enclosed with the walls themselves reaching down to the harbor water. A front office was attached to it on the side facing the pier as well. Though she had no intention of going inside she still wanted to see what it was since it was the first building like this she had seen.
On the front window, words had been painted on the glass reading: “Welcome to Dredge’s! The number one shipwright in the world!”
Rainbow tilted her head. “Huh, so the guy builds ships here? Or something?” She figured that’s what a shipwright was.
Down the way from this building, barely a hundred feet down the pier, another building that was nearly identical stood. Curious to see if it was the same thing, Rainbow Dash flew over to it as well. It didn’t have as big of a front office, but next to the door there was a large wooden plaque reading: “Welcome to Ballast’s, the greatest shipwright in The Hundred Kingdoms!”
“Heh,” Rainbow Dash grinned. “Rival businesses, huh?”
It figured there had to be places like this at such a large port too. Places where a ship could be built, repaired, and retrofitted. Both of these buildings looked like a fairly large ship could fit entirely inside them, and even the largest ones could at least be moored halfway inside while someone worked on them. Rainbow didn’t know much of what went into building or fixing up a ship, but the largest ones she had seen out here at the docks probably needed a lot of hardwork and a big place to put them together in.
Rainbow smiled and walked further down the pier. From here on it all looked pretty much the same again. Something did catch her attention pretty quickly though. On one of the docks leading out from the pier, a large ship was moored in place and several huge crates were stacked up on its top deck. Down on the dock, a stallion with a sailor’s cap was standing in front of two others who looked to be yelling and arguing with each other about something. Her natural curiosity once again got the better of her and she walked a little closer to eavesdrop on, but not exactly enter, the conversation.
“Come on, Captain Keel! Sell me that iron already!” One of the other stallion’s said to the sailor. He was younger than the other, with a smoky gray coat and dull rusty mane and tail. On his flank was a Cutie Mark of a wrench and screwdriver cross over each other.
“No, sell it to me! Not that crook!” The other said. He had a brownish-orange coat with a white beard, mane and tail, though he didn’t look older than middle-aged. His Cutie Mark was a pressure gauge.
“I aint the crook, you’re the crook!” The younger stallion angrily yelled at him.
“You stole my special state of the art plans for a new kind of boat and ran out to start up your own business!”
“That was my idea that you tried taking credit for!”
“Thief!”
“Scoundrel!”
“Liar!”
“Nincompoop!”
“Would you both shut up?!” Captain Keel roared. “I don’t got time for any of this nonsense! Time is money and me and my crew need to get back out on the open seas already. Do you have any idea what’s going on in Ullsorth right now? They’re paying top coin for coal and that’s what I’m going out to get next. So I couldn’t care less if either of you are a crook, I just want to know which one of ya is going to pay the most for this shipment of iron? And iron of this quality doesn’t come cheap.”
The two stallions then started arguing with and yelling over each other some more, each trying to outbid the other.
Rainbow Dash just shrugged and left them behind. Cutthroat business maybe, but not exactly anything that interested her. She still had more of this port to explore. And now she was starting to get pretty hungry and thirsty.