"Come to think of it, how do the pits of Tartarus work with the whole world-is-made-of-dragons thing, anyway?" Twilight asked, working her way backwards in the list of evils she'd mentioned as she meanwhile regarded a favored old hairbrush that was now useless to her.
"The dragon Tartarus was an all-consuming terror who sought to contain the worst creatures of the world by devouring them en masse," Luna said. "He was reviled by every race as a cannibal, a monster and a rookery of evil."
"So, what," Twilight said, "the so-called 'demons' of Tartarus are just ancient dragons and monsters trapped in the gullet of a sleeping dragon for all eternity? "
"If only," Luna said with a snort. "Those he consumed were all but destroyed, but 'all but' is not good enough when it comes to such things. The creatures that escaped his rocky flesh were new things—greater, more terrible and in different number than what Tartarus consumed. The more benign survive on to this day as manticores, chimerae and the like. Even Cerberus himself is said to have been borne of Tartarus, though I know not what possesses him to stand guard over his progenitor."
"The dragon Tartarus was an all-consuming terror who sought to contain the worst creatures of the world by devouring them en masse," Luna said. "He was reviled by every race as a cannibal, a monster and a rookery of evil."
"So, what," Twilight said, "the so-called 'demons' of Tartarus are just ancient dragons and monsters trapped in the gullet of a sleeping dragon for all eternity? "
"If only," Luna said with a snort. "Those he consumed were all but destroyed, but 'all but' is not good enough when it comes to such things. The creatures that escaped his rocky flesh were new things—greater, more terrible and in different number than what Tartarus consumed. The more benign survive on to this day as manticores, chimerae and the like. Even Cerberus himself is said to have been borne of Tartarus, though I know not what possesses him to stand guard over his progenitor."
—Sharing the Night, Chapter 10
