The dungeon’s soundscape was particularly monotonous today. Rukbat’s hooves clopped in time to the cool water dripping from the stalagmites, to the point where he could barely tell the difference anymore. His head began to dip, his ears drifting from their usual alert position. There had been an unusual lack of… well, really anything interesting today. A scarcity of monsters, only a few scraps of low-value treasure, and a dearth of other Coursers to cross paths with. At this rate, he was going to fall asleep mid-trot and end up dead at the bottom of a chasm.

Rukbat slowed himself to a walk, then stopped to shake out his mane. Any change in movement would surely zap his brain back into gear. As he raised his head to inhale a deep breath of dank cavern air, a sudden scrape of metal on stone startled every nerve in his body into action. He skittered sideways and hopped into a rear as his shrill whinny echoed through the cave. Nostrils flared, his eyes rolled in a panic until they settled on the only potential threat he could locate. A dented and rusted face-plate. Rukbat stood stone-still as his heart rate began to slowly decrease. Clearly it had been here for a while, but he hadn’t come across any Courser bones in any state for quite a long time. Ergo, it had moved from its original resting place. Probably. But how? Rukbat narrowed his eyes and reached a glinting hoof forward towards the old metal. The moment bright gold touched tarnished steel, the face-plate scuttled forward in a way quite unlike scrap metal should.

Curious. Rukbat’s ears flicked back and he gave it another experimental tap, this time hard enough to flip the face-plate over. He stamped his hoof and raised his head. Whatever he expected to find, it wasn’t… this. Crustacean legs curled up to protect a soft underbelly, and pincers pulled close to shield the beady eyes of a crab. Huh. As Rukbat stared, the crab slowly began to extend its legs, though it could not find purchase on the earth below and simply flailed in the air. His first instinct was to crush it and reclaim the honor of the long-fallen brother that had once worn this armor. But as he raised a hoof above it, he paused. The crab wasn’t doing anything wrong. It was simply making do with what it had access to. And was that not what he, and all Coursers, were doing as well? This was far from a hospitable land. Monsters threatened Courser and smaller fauna alike. Coursers had to draw what wealth and nourishment they could find from the dungeons to survive. So perhaps this little pest didn’t deserve to die for taking advantage of a resource. It could not know the significance of what it wore. Rukbat sighed heavily and tapped the crab’s makeshift shell to right it, and it scuttled eagerly away with that unsettling scrape of metal on stone.

Well, at least he was awake now.