The four had been walking down the curving, earthy hallway for a while, with no sign of a door, or connecting tunnel. And then, all of a sudden, a gnome appeared. He scampered out of a tunnel in one side, and straight into another. His bulbous nose jammed deep between the pages of an old leather bound book. He did not even notice the strange group of people just to his left.
And then two more, made an appearance, from behind a carved wooden door. These gnomes caught site of the approaching visitors, and started whispering quickly to one another, as the scurried down another hallway.
Only a few steps further along, thee gnomes spilled out into the passage. Tumbling, and pulling, and falling over one another. They shouted vulgarity and threats, and tugged each others hair and ears. In a moment, all three gnomes, noticed they had an audience. All at once, their skirmish died, and they stood in a line, facing the outsiders. Their cloths were torn and dirt smudged, and two of them had blood dripping from their noses.
The Tallest gnome, standing on the right, and the only one who's nose was not blooded, spoke up, his voice was lower then you'd expect it to be, and had an almost authoritative tone to it.
"'Ello There. I'm bein' Bipper, This, my Sister Pipper, and our brother, Dibber. We were just.. uh, rough housin' Sorry to have startled yous. Welcome to Nomfoodle. Come in peace!.. and watch yous head!" Bipper added his last bit of advice as he glanced toward the ceiling into the crouching humans face.
And as quickly as the siblings had appeared, they vanished behind a door. Which Dibber slammed rather aggressively.
Clicking, and whirring, and spinning, and metal grinding on metal could be heard drifting down the hall way for some time now, Made increasingly noticeable in the stunning silence that followed the disappearance of the feisty gang of gnomes.
Alopex, Theresa, and their d(a)emons only had to walk a few minutes more before the tunnel they were in, opened up into an incredibly immense cave. Stories and Stories deep. They were in the Great Hall of Nomfoodle. A egg shaped cavern the gnomes had carved out themselves. floors lined the walls around the edge, with rails, opening each floor, so that if some one leaned over and looked down, they would see story upon story of floors, built deep into the earth, so deep that there was no bottom in site.
Various smaller Halls, And tunnels, and doors lead off this main area, as Nomfoodle sprawled out beneath the country side. In the Center of the Great hall, which was in fact the center of the entire city itself, was built to most intricate, complicated, monstrous piece of machinery, Rylencia had ever witnessed.
It buzzed, and clicked, and droned on as so many mechanisms worked away. Arms extended from it, Cogs of enormous magnitude turned slowly, working smaller gears. Smaller and smaller, some gears were no bigger then a gnomes pinkie finger nail.
If you could see the bottom of this machine, you would know its true purpose. Shovels bigger then if they were made for giant, were digging their way deeper and deeper into the earth. Drills of so many different sizes now laid dormant, waiting to unleash their spinning fury.
From the group position in the Great Hall, what they could see, was that it moved items up and down the levels. Resources, it pulled up from the bottom, supplies it ferried to the lower levels.
Gnomes were EVERYWHERE! Bustling in and out of doorways, up and down stair cases. Some where even hanging on pulley systems attached to the machine its self, covered in grease, and wielding wrenches.
Everything in the city was small, but compared to the ginormous clockwork device, everything else seemed diminutive. Every doorway was short, the ceilings where low. The chairs were small, and the tables were small, the beds were small, even the cutlery was so tiny. Gnomes seemed to have no sense, that any one larger then they might need use of something in their city.
A blood curtailing scream cut through the buzzing and chattering that echoed through the great hall. In a single moment, ever set of eyes with the capacity to see were pointed at a single gnome girl, who was now hanging suspended in mid air, upside down, with nothing attached to her. With out the sound of bustling feet, her voice echoed even louder then usual now. "Sorry, I slipped." was all she said, and every other person in the hall, turned, and simply went about their business.
