Where the hoard is
The fox had been waiting for the cave to appear out of the dense forest for hours by now, taking in the views and trying to ignore the bones that occasionally littered the ground, only having vague directions to reach it from hearsay, and as such was relieved when he entered a clearing next to a cliff face and saw the cave opening, quickly checking on his phone for the single pic he had and trying to match it, as it wasn’t the first time he nearly entered the wrong cave and wasted even more time, the assorted bones scattered near the entrance another big sign that he was in the correct cave.
He pretty much immediately entered it, hoping that if he were swift, he’d be able to get some treasures and leave before the cave’s owner would find him, if he were currently in the cave and not out getting some food or treasures, which he figured was a reasonable thing for a dragon to do at this time of day, judging from previous robberies he had done.
So Roger kept meandering in the cave system, finding rooms and corridors but nothing of exceptional value like the rumors he had heard at the bar he frequented, which was annoying him greatly as he felt he had misheard some detail from listening in, or he had been lied to, if indirectly, neither of which was a good option in his book.
Still, after all the hours he spent finding the isolated cave, he wasn’t ready to give up just yet as he persevered exploring room after room and eventually decided to take the few relatively valuable things he found in the furnished cave, if anything, because this way the trip wasn’t going to be a waste, as annoyed as he was by being unable to find the dragon’s riches.
What he hadn’t considered in his mind was being tapped on his shoulder, his fear mounting as he felt the claw tapping him felt both sharp and sticky at the same time, the fox knowing full well that there was only one person that claw could belong to, and it was the dragon who lived there.
He slowly turned around, trying to delay his inevitable, and presumably horrible, fate. Still, eventually he had to face the dragon, his muscular body towering over the smaller canine with ease, glistening muscles shifting as the goo that composed the dragon kept moving even as he stood mostly still, the only part of him that moved being the light purple tongue, as it slithered out of the partially open jaws and licked the dragon’s snout.
“Well, well, well, an intruder, I see. I also see that you brought with you a nice sack, full of my things,” the dragon snarked, as a drizzle of saliva fell of his snout and right in front of the fox “I can explain, I-” Roger tried to explain, even if he knew it was going to be futile, but he was interrupted by the slimy dragon “yeah, you heard of a dragon, you wanted to get the treasures, and you couldn't find much, am I right?” And as he said that, the dragon used his tail to pick up the fox’s bag and snooped inside what he had stolen from him, picking things out and putting them all on a nearby table until the bag was empty again.
“I see, you didn't find anything, makes sense considering where I keep my real hoard” Dev said, staring down at the clearly scared fox “y'know, your sack isn't this big, maybe I could show where I keep my hoard and let you get a few things, just don't say where I live and never come back, are you interested?” he said while grinning, waiting for the fox to reply.
He wasn't sure how to reply; the dragon was much bigger, and the skulls near the cave didn't leave much room for imagination about what the dragon could do to him, especially if he refused his offer, but he could feel something was off about the situation, especially with how much of the cave system he had explored before being found.
Still, he decided to agree to the dragon's deal “Ok sure, but ho-” he was suddenly cut off while speaking by the dragon's tongue wrapping around him and lifting him up effortlessly as the fox immediately realized he had been tricked and was going to get eaten anyway, feeling the muscular tongue rub all over his body as it matter his fur with drool, the fox staring at the multiple rows of teeth that were inching closer and closer to him as he was put into the maw.
The heat was intense, and so was the smell as Roger squirmed as much as he could, but to no avail, as he stared down the dragon's throat as it quivered in anticipation of the upcoming meal, the attempts of speech being ignored by the dragon as he kept tilting his head and getting the fox closer to his throat.
Eventually, the dragon started to gulp the fox down, cramming him into his muscular esophagus gulp by gulp, the tight muscular rings preventing the much smaller fox from resisting the peristalsis and swallowing, the purple flesh rippling all around him as the heat and smell concentrated around his head, grossing him out as he knew it was only gonna get worse when he reached the dragon's stomach.
However, Roger noticed that it was taking him a bit too much time to reach the goo dragon's stomach, even accounting for their size difference, the fox realizing something was very wrong as he started to squirm as much as he could, which led to him noticing the tunnel he was in was somewhat looser by now, giving the fox a little squirming room to move his legs and arms in, and it also contained not only bends, but multiple sphincters too, yet he continued to be pushed deeper and deeper inside the dragon's seemingly neverending bowels, even the fox’s attempt to enter one of the sphincters being futile as peristalsis kept pushing him With no signs of stopping, and it was taking long enough that the fear the fox was feeling diminished significantly too as he “got used” to the environment, as foul smelling, tight, and slimy as it was.
However, he eventually saw a sphincter open up as his head was pushed in it, and he couldn't believe what he saw; not only was the stomach huge, but it was also chock-full of treasures, as the dragon promised, the fox trying to push himself out of the tunnel so that he could enter the stomach.
And he did, after free falling from the top of it for quite a bit and landing in a real pool of money, jewels, gems, and gold like a cartoon character, not helped by his bag plopping on top of his head after a few seconds, digging his hands deep into the literal piles of treasure, which also contained cash, bags, electronics, and literal treasure chests, Roger running all over the stomach and constantly putting things in the bag, and tossing things that, while still valuable, were much less so than the new things he kept finding by the second, having to be careful about how he walked as the huge stomach was constantly rippling, causing the deep layers of treasure and the piles of it to shift and change shape constantly as the fox tried to keep his footing, not helped by everything being coated in a dense layer of hot juices.
Eventually the fox was satisfied, his sack of goodies so full he could barely close it, the fox calling out to the dragon to be let out, but nothing happened, so he walked to one of the stomach walls and gave it a few shoves while calling out for the dragon, immediately starting to get worried as not only wasn't he getting a reply, but the purple walls were clearly starting to secrete some sort of tingly fluid, prompting Roger from leaving the wall as he looked up, noticing just how high up the sphincter he has entered from was, the equivalent of the only entrance to a room being a few floors on top of a building, and with the stomach constantly oscillating and curving it meant the chance of him being able to climb up were slim.
Stills he had to try it, using a tall pile that lay against a wall to try and reduce the distance he has to climb, but the goo proved itself impossible to pierce, meaning that the slimy walls were unclimbable no matter how many times he tried to do so, barely even able to climb the length of his body before he slid off from the slime, or was pushed by the folds rippling constantly no matter how hard he tried.
During one of his attempts, he fell kinda hard and slipped all the way back down to the floor. While he tried to get up, he noticed what was clearly a skull, and digging deep into the treasure led to him finding more and more of them in different states of digestion, much to his terror as he realized that the dragon wasn’t giving him a freebie to be left alone. Still, he had lured him inside while following the letter of his promise, but not the spirit, and being ignored while the purple walls were seemingly constantly secreting gut juices wasn’t enough to make Roger fall into despair as he decided to try instead and dig down into the constantly shifting layers of valuables, hoping he’d find some sort of sphincter at the bottom that would lead anywhere else, but to little success as the organ kept filling up more and more, even if at a glacial pace. The fox kept getting buried as the things he dug through kept collapsing back due to the folds shifting.
Devourer had obliged to his part of the deal, having put yet another thief in his place as he went around his cave to put the things the fox had tried to steal in their place and then lying down in bed, where he had been before noticing the intruder, resuming playback of the movie he was watching.
