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Post by Fiera Ferella on Dec 5, 2023 11:24:34 GMT -6
She gave a polite nod to another miner as they came up, watching as they suddenly shivered and the fur on their arms puffed out as the wind hit their face. Otherwise, Fiera wasted no time in heading down. Krista glanced around warily, not used to the suddenly small space, but she reacted better than a lot of Fiera's other pets had. After all, lamadidron were creatures that ate stones and were inherently connected to the earth. While they weren't exactly small enough to be good mining familiars, Fiera had found that they got used to being underground far quicker than other creatures. Even now Krista didn't really seem scared so much as curious, sniffing at anything she walked by (and so requiring Fiera to pull on her leash extra hard- she'd have to train that tendency out of her.) Overall, Fiera wasn't really worried about her getting spooked down here.
Fiera 8 Krista 1.3/3.3 3
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Dec 5, 2023 11:49:50 GMT -6
Fiera let her hand brush the wall of the tunnel as she walked, feeling the stone under hand. The tunnel looked smooth and rounded, the work of hundreds of miners over time making room to move equipment through, but the actual surface was rough and unpolished, chipped out by tools and animal claws instead of natural processes like wind and water that would have left it smooth. She didn't see any glimmers indicative of gems or ores along here, but why would she? This was an entry tunnel- no doubt dozens of people had gone over it with a fine toothed comb over time to get all they could out of it. Anything worth having would be further down the shaft. Krista didn't seem to have any interest either, perhaps knowing that these rocks weren't for eating. That gave Fiera another thought however as she glanced back at her pet.
Fiera 9 Krista 1.4/3.4 4
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Dec 5, 2023 11:58:45 GMT -6
Krista wouldn't try to... eat any of her gemstones, right? Lamadidron ate rocks, that much was an obvious fact to anyone who trained one. She knew glacier lamadidron normally preferred ice and sand for their treats, things that you would normally find around the bottom of a glacier as the name of their breed implied. They wouldn't normally be able to find gemstones in their natural environment. Well... "natural" was an operative word there. More like the environment they were engineered to fit into. Still, she had never seen Krista show an interest in her jewelry or anything like that, so hopefully she would be fine. But even so, the humanish made a mental note to keep a close eye on her when mining to make sure she didn't "accidentally" lose anything important while down in the mines. She liked Krista, but she couldn't say she trusted her yet, not when she was so untrained.
Fiera 10 Krista 2.0/4.0 5
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Dec 25, 2023 16:46:36 GMT -6
Soon she came to the 'main room' of sorts of the mines. It wasn't anything formal- there were no signs leading into or out of it. Instead it had arisen organically over time, a natural crossing point between all of the myriad tunnels dug out over the years. That meant however that there was nothing to be dug out here- all crystals had been mined from the walls years ago, emptying the space out into a massive, soaring cavern. For most that meant there was nothing to be found- that they should quickly move on to deeper and more profitable tunnels. But... Fiera had learned that that wasn't always the case. Last time she had come down to the mines, she had found that with all the people passing through here, often saddled with massive piles of gems and ores, that those piles were usually... precarious. Fiera would then go sniffing around behind them.
Fiera 11 Krista 2.1/4.1 6
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Dec 25, 2023 16:51:46 GMT -6
Last time she did that, she had actually found quite a few nice gems. After all, if you spent hours digging up fifty lovely gems, you wouldn't want to waste another second in your exhaustion getting them out again. And really, who could tell if they only had forty nine gems at a glance and not fifty? If one fell out, well, they likely wouldn't notice until it was too late. And by "too late", scavenged into Fiera's own mine cart. She carefully made her way across the floor, trying to not look too suspicious (as while that wasn't NOT allowed, it was probably frowned upon in the whole general spirit of things) and Krista did the same, keeping her nose pointed high up into the air. "Atta girl." Fiera said, patting her on the head. "Taking after me, I see." She said with a chuckle before she kept looking.
Fiera 12 Krista 2.2/4.2 7
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Dec 25, 2023 17:03:42 GMT -6
Sure enough there were a few little gems across the floor. Nothing huge or particularly valuable, but enough to get her started. Krista seemed interested enough to sniff at them, but didn't make a move to eat them, which Fiera found greatly encouraging. "Well, looks like I can trust you with this then." Fiera said, tossing them in the cart. With that out of the way, she could pick a tunnel and get some real mining done- hopefully to find something of actual value. "Come on then, Krista." She said, tugging on the leash. Krista of course did not respond- she didn't know anything more than her name. With some tugging and pulling however, Fiera finally managed to maneuver her over to one of the tunnels. Krista came easily after that, apparently trusting Fiera more than the tight, enclosed tunnel and wanting to keep close to her as a result.
Fiera 13 Krista 2.3/4.3 8
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Dec 25, 2023 17:27:17 GMT -6
"Well, it could get smaller." Fiera said, running a hand along the ceiling idly. She hadn't really thought about what direction she wanted to go in, but any which way was fine so long as she found some gems. As she got lower and lower, the air became heavy, humid, and cool. All of that seemed to be to Krista's liking, and the lamadidron gently lifted her head and sniffed the air loudly. "Yeah, there's more where that came from!" Fiera said, tugging on the lead some more. As time went on however, she found that she hardly needed to drag Krista anymore- she came on her own. "At least one thing will go easily." Fiera said, remarking on it. She started cast an eye around, looking out for any particularly promising spots to start digging. A glimmer in the wall, a streak of ore. Nothing yet, but perhaps this spot had been picked over.
Fiera 14 Krista 2.4/4.4 9
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Dec 25, 2023 17:36:34 GMT -6
This tunnel had to have been dug by someone after all, and chances are they had already found the more obvious things. That meant that there could be something waiting just under the surface... or maybe not. The odds of that weren't very high, all things considered. It was best to wait for a proper sign that they may have missed that she could take advantage of. "...Just like that." She said, suddenly turning towards the wall. She leaned over towards the mine cart as Krista slowed to a stop as well, peering towards whatever it was Fiera found so interesting. The humanish grabbed the crystal torch from the top of her mine cart and held it up. Sure enough, there was a bit of a shimmer on the wall, flecks of crystals embedded. For all she knew, there could be even bigger ones just past them. She just had to dig a little further.
Fiera 15 Krista 3.0/5.0 10
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Dec 25, 2023 17:57:09 GMT -6
Of course, there could be nothing. But she could only skip so many hints before she had to choose SOMETHING to work on, so she might as well start now. With that in mind, she replaced the crystal torch on the mine cart and opened it, pulling out her trusty pick axe. "As good as anything." She muttered, hefting it on one shoulder before driving it forward into the rock. It landed with a loud clang, knocking several chunks from the wall which clattered to the ground. Fiera frowned slightly- the rock was pretty hard here. This would be difficult work at best. Hopefully there'd be something good to show for it- she didn't want to waste all of her energy just in this one cave. "Only one way to find out." She said, sighing deeply and raising the pickaxe for another strike. Out of the corner of her eye however, she saw a flash of blue and white.
Fiera 16 Krista 3.1/5.1 11
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Dec 25, 2023 18:37:52 GMT -6
She glanced over her shoulder to see Krista cringing away. "Ah. You don't like that, do you." The glacier lamadidron snorted loudly as if to agree and shook her head quickly, shaking off the loud noise. "Well, I can't make it any quieter. You're just going to have to get over it." She said, but to her credit she did allow some more slack in her lead, allowing the lamadidron to back away some more. Krista took full advantage of that, settling herself behind a rocky outcropping and glaring at Fiera grumpily. The humanish simply shrugged however- Krista was a guest here, and Fiera couldn't cater to her... or at least, not without going straight home again. Fiera kept working at the wall of course, and heard Krista shuffle away a bit. To her credit however, she didn't seem to be freaking out- at least, not yet. Fiera had a bit of time to get some work done.
Fiera 17 Krista 3.2/5.2 12
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Dec 26, 2023 11:06:45 GMT -6
So she kept working, pressing forward through the stone. Each time she brought the pickaxe down, she did her best to get it as far through the rock as possible, sending chips of rock skittering across the floor. She heard Krista sniff at a few of them curiously, but didn't hear the distinctive crunch of her deciding to sample them. Perhaps these ones weren't quite to her taste. Fiera wasn't seeing any gems so far though, merely more glimmers, but perhaps all she had to do was push it a little bit further. So she kept working, sending more rocks down to land on her feet, though the humanish hardly noticed it through her thick boots. A bead of sweat slowly made its way down the back of her neck despite the cool air in this part of the mines, and she could feel the humidity of her own breath on her upper lip.
Fiera 18 Krista 3.3/5.3 13
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Dec 26, 2023 21:59:22 GMT -6
After several minutes of this, she had taken a sizeable chunk out of the wall. Fiera couldn't help but sigh a bit- it wasn't nearly as much as she had been hoping for. All that work, and she was left with just a small hole. There were no glimmers or gleams in the hole, but there were a few around her feet. Deciding to take a bit of a break, Fiera leaned her pickaxe up against the wall and squatted a bit, running her fingers through the shards on the ground. There WERE a few small gems embedded in them, but they were... very small. She drummed her fingers on her thigh she picked up one and examined it more closely in the light. There was a hint of red there- a garnet or something of that ilk. Very pretty, were it not for the fact that it was less than a centimeter long.
Fiera 19 Krista 3.4/5.4 14
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Dec 26, 2023 22:21:06 GMT -6
Granted, that was usually how big a gemstone you'd find in a piece of jewelry was, but it would be difficult to pry it out of the rock in a form that was still useable. Fiera tested the rock beneath her fingers to see if it was brittle enough to simply snap it out of its "housing" but alas, it was a no go. Krista crawled closer, brave enough to be more curious now that Fiera wasn't making horribly loud noises. "...Don't eat any of that." Fiera said, knowing that there were probably more small gems in the other stones she had pounded free. Instead however, the lamadidron seemed more interested in the one she was holding, of course. Fiera let her have a sniff of it just for the sake of satisfying her curiosity, but then pulled it away. "I have work to do here, Krista." She said, waving it around for emphasis.
Fiera 20 Krista 4.0/6.0 15
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Post by Silver on Dec 27, 2023 18:33:06 GMT -6
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Post by Fiera Ferella on Dec 29, 2023 17:01:38 GMT -6
That seemed enough for Krista, who set her head on the ground and peered up at her, apparently happy to sit politely so long as the noise was gone. That was fine by Fiera- she wanted to work on these gems a bit more. She pulled her hammer and chisel out of her mine cart. She had a lot less experience with this than with the pick axe, but hopefully she could still use it to wrestle the gems out of the rock without damaging them. She grabbed the stone that she saw the little red fleck in, laying it on a flat bit of ground and checked to make sure it didn't wobble when she touched it. After all, she didn't need it rolling away the minute she tapped it, or even worse sending her chisel in the wrong direction and damaging the already tiny gemstone. She placed the chisel just underneath the spot.
Fiera 1 Krista 4.1/6.1 16
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