//------------------------------// // Chapter 2 // Story: Zock's adventure // by The Changeling Spy //------------------------------// Chapter two "This doesn't look like anywhere on Geilinor that I know of," Mini stated with a confused expression. "Thanks Captain Obvious," Zock deadpanned. "You're welcome," Mini replied sarcastically. Amongst their bickering, neither adventurer noticed six eyes looking at them from a nearby bush with a slightly scared look. --Inside the bush-- "Stop pushing against me!" whisper-yelled Scootaloo to Applebloom, whose shoulder was currently pressing against her wing. "Ah'm tryin' not to!" Applebloom whisper-yelled back with an annoyed look. "Stop fighting guys! How are we going to get out 'Weird Creature Watchers' cutie marks if you two scare hem off?" Sweetie Belle scolded. "She's got a point. How will you get your whatever-you-called-its if you scare us off?" said Zock to the three. Zock had snuck up on them when he heard the loud whispering. The three fillies froze with fear. Slowly turning their heads, the three gaped at the creature with its fierce battle armor. "D-did th-that th-thing j-just talk!?" Scootaloo asked. "No, no I didn't," Zock replied sarcastically while deadpanning. "AAAAHHHHH!" screamed the three fillies in unison as they bolted out of the bush towards the town. Mini was about to freeze the trio in place with his ice burst, but Zock stopped him. "It would do more harm than good if you were to freeze them. If anything, you would just be proving that we are big and scary," Zock said wisely. "Aren't we though?" Mini asked. "That's besides the point!" Zock yelled. I wonder if they have ever seen any other humans around here... They only called us weird creatures... "You are such a dumbass," Mini said with a grin. "We should probably find out where we are. I used my last teleport tablet to get here," Zock said, ignoring the smartass comment. "Same here. Come to think of it, why did we each only bring one?" Mini asked with a quizzical look. "Zaros has probably planned this. You know how the Empty Lord is," Zock explained. If this was the Empty Lord's doing, then he would probably expect us to just blindly enter the village. Or he might have thought that I thought that himself, and expect me to wait here. But then again, he might have thought far enough ahead that he would expect me to go into the village anyways... Ugh! I need to leave the deep thinking to Zaros. This is just hurting my head... "Did you hear me?" Mini asked. "Huh? What?" Zock asked, coming out of his thoughts. "I said that we should probably try to find out where we are. If you can remember, we don't know where we are," Mini said after audibly facepalming. "Lead the way then smartass," Zock said with a glare. Mini sighed and began to head towards the town. The town that was full of activity was now empty. "Where did everyone go?" asked Zock loudly. "Halt! In the name of the princess!" Turning around, Mini and Zock saw a platoon of armored ponies, the lead one being a unicorn with a blue mane. "What exactly have we done wrong?" asked Zock with a raised eyebrow. "Attempting to eat three fillies!" "We didn't try to eat them though! They were spying on us, and we called them out!" yelled Mini in outrage. "We'll see what the court has to say about that," replied the guard. At that point, the guards formed themselves around the adventurers. There were twelve guards in total; four unicorns, one being the guard they spoke to, four pegasi, and four earth ponies. They were grouped together in groups of three for maximum effectiveness. Zock, not wanting to seriously injure any of them, put his maces away, but raised his fists. "Vim inimici mihi bono inclina... (Turn the power of my enemy to my benefit.)" Zock muttered, activating Turmoil. Mini got into a combat stance, activated Torment, and prepared to fight. The guards took this as a threat and all charged at once. Mini froze two groups of them with one ice burst, but he missed the pegasi. The missed pegasi then flew into the air and attempted to dive-bomb mini at high speeds. Mini saw this, and narrowly jumped out of the way. Zock recognized their combat styles quickly. "Mini! I figured out their combat styles! The Pegasi are like archers, the regular ones are melee, and the unicorns must be mages!" shouted Zock. "I noticed!" yelled Mini, who was currently being attacked by an earth pony, a unicorn, and three pegasi. "Arceto impetum magorum... (I deflect attacks from mages.)"Zock muttered under his breath, and a strange symbol appeared above his head. The symbol was a picture of a hat, with an arrow bouncing off of it. The guard that spoke to them first fired a stunning spell at Zock, only to have it rebound and hit him instead. The earth pony who wasn't engaged with mini or frozen, attempted to rush Zock and hit him with his spear. Zock smiled and grabbed the incoming spear. The guard suddenly began to feel weaker, while Zock appeared to become stronger. With a quick punch to the face, the guard was rendered unconscious. The pegasus noticed this and attempted to surprise him with a rush from behind, only to hit Zock's armor like a bag of potatoes thrown at a brick wall. While Zock was dealing with the guards attacking him, Mini was having trouble. The pegasi that were attacking him were very troublesome. He couldn't land a good hit on any of them, and was quickly becoming exhausted. Getting annoyed with the excess spellfire being tossed his way, Mini quickly froze the unicorn and earth pony. Seeing how Zock dealt with the unicorn guard, Mini got an idea. "Arceto impetum telorum... (I deflect attacks of missiles.)" Mini muttered. An image of two arrows with an arrow bouncing off of them appeared above his head. The pegasi, seeing what happened to their captain, tried to slow down. They would have succeeded, had it not been for their momentum. All guards dealt with, the adventurers disabled their curses to save their prayer points, and started to tend to everyone's injuries. The two adventurers, once finished, looked around the battle area. The first thing they noticed was the multitude of eyes on them from the surrounding buildings. The second was the enraged purple unicorn galloping towards them. "Ahh shit," said the adventurers in unison.