In the height of the time of the wizards, when they could imbue thousands of mana points a day to fuel their egos with a myriad extravagant and pointless projects, Diggles were put to task building lairs and fighting under the duress of Wizardly masters. With the work of countless diggles, a mere few wizard lords were able to construct vast realms magically connected across many different worlds. Unfortunately for the blunt (if only metaphorically so) and chatty diggles, they did not get along too well with mana-addled egomaniacs bristling with supernatural powers. For a while, wizards indulged in personally taking out their frustrations on their smart-aleck diggles. This went on for a time and the lazy wizards started to experiment with other, less intelligent summons. Wizards were at the time considered important enough to merit being a public institution of the humans, able to perform feats of engineering that, although terribly eccentric, surpassed that of mundane builders. They delivered many great inventions despite all the mana they burned, and it earned them the favor and shares of the taxes of many kings. This suited them fine as public money meant they could keep the mana flowing. Unfortunately for the wizards, maintaining their reputations intact with hordes of diggle servants spilling the beans was proving to be impossible. The wizards relied on some level of secrecy as mana use often leads to practical jokes that later have to be hushed up or explained away. A quip from Duggy Diggle could endanger the whole institution. No matter how hard they tried, wizards were not able to dispense with diggles entirely and continued to warily use them. After a particularly rowdy wizard party involving a spell that ended with the walls plastered with beautifully sculpted, nauseatingly smelly, and aesthetically arranged diggle (just one, but one wizard at the bright idea to make it bigger to better illustrate its suffering) the wizards hit on a bright idea to save themselves some effort and keep the diggles in check. Using their own power, just for once, to dig out a vast system of caves deep in the earth, making sure to stay well out of the sight of the diggles, they began to put their plans into motion. They needed much mana for this, and under the foolish desire to mix lucidity with plentiful mana (the ballmer peak was not yet discovered) had turned to powered aluminium to fuel their ambitions. Continued later...
It was a timely completion of the project, as the wizards immediately began to fling spells at each other's general direction, too far from one another to hit each other but too paranoid to believe this. The vast complex was seperated into many sections by the resulting cave-ins, and after a mere day of isolation on the caves, the wizards ran out of aluminium, having relied on frequent trips back to their realms. It was very normal for wizards to be missing for a day, especially wild parties would sometimes take them out of commission for three, so the unseemly infighting became just another one of the wizards' secrets. None of them ever dared to indulge in powdered aluminium again, and given the decor of where they were trapped, they had a great desire to forget recent events. The mana started to flow faster than ever. Diggles got a bit quieter after this. Wizards were sending the particularly sarcastic ones somewhere, and the ones who came back rambled on insanely about how hell is literally other diggles, more exactly the ones it had eaten. The walls of the wizards caves grew stronger and with the extra bulk on them lost most of their original artistic appeal, the wizards did not care much for the smell and had no desire to go in there and sculpt the place properly with bodybuilding spells themselves. The muscle diggle project did not improve anything, and wizards just started to keep well out of the place, bringing no more diggles back. With time, it might have simply turned to legend among the wizards diggles, but the wizards downfall came before the diggles fearful paralysis was broken. Cotd...
With the diggles hushed up by sheer terror for where they might end up, the wizards began attempting to improve them. With the residual magic from the failed spells, the first batch unbound themselves from the wizards' will and found themselves gleefully wanting to do more magic. In a desperate but ultimately futile attack, the resident mana supply was raided. By the time the wizards regained enough sobriety to stand, they knew they would have to spin some story to explain all the holes left in surrounding buildings and the town guard being overwhelmed by drunken, angry diggles. The agreed upon lie was that these diggles were invaders out of the wizards control and that the wizards had to fight to control them. Passionate presentation of this argument did little until the wizards pointed out that the diggles had drunk booze meant for wizards. After that was pointed out, they were considered far more credible and they reaped the rewards of defending against further waves of "rogue diggles" with plenty of money to fuel their mana. Necroeconomists termed this a "virtuous cycle" where more money meant more angry diggles and again more money! The circle of wizards began to expand rapidly and take on new members tasked with fighting the diggles, unaware of their masters' duplicity, the old guard now glorifying themselves as "Wizard Lords" and competing with each other over who had the most talented acolytes. Usually, this meant seeing which group of acolytes could drink the most booze before throwing up or passing out, but many bright new wizards were honed and trained with the pushing of the spirit of competition (and plenty of other spirits). Cotd...
