//------------------------------//
// Ch.7: Ancient History 
// Story: A Hairier Problem: Rise of the Furball 
// by BlueBastard 
//------------------------------//

Rise of the Furball Chapter 7: “Ancient History”


The Everfree Forest. To the majority of ponies, it is a place full of monsters and hostile feeling that rarely are there ponies who would be willing to venture into it. Furthermore, because nopony knew what could be even found in the Everfree besides monsters, flowers that can change one’s physical attributes in a way that some would see as humorous, and the abandoned ruins of Castle Everfree, there was no reason to ever brave the dangers in the first place.

Which is why practically everypony in Ponyville still didn’t get how Zecora could feel comfortable living in the forest, although the zebra would argue back with something along the lines of “Why do ponies who are so scared of the forest even live near it in the first place?”

But what ponies wouldn’t understand is that Zecora had lived in dangerous environments such as the Everfree since birth. A native hailing from the wilds of Zebrabwe, she had come to Equestria in the pursuit of clues to ancient Zebra soothsayers and alchemists who wandered all over the land of ponies. Her initial forays into amateur archeology back home had led her to believe the remnants of what had been the Equestrian capital contained such things, hence she put down roots near a small settlement called Ponyville and attempted to set up shop as an alchemist herself, while in her off-time she could go off and uncover the tales of yore. It had been a rocky start, with the entire town being devoid of life every time she tried to visit, but after some misconceptions had been cleared up thanks to the help of a particular filly, Zecora was able to become a part of the town’s society and offer her services to everypony. 

Currently, Zecora made her way towards the near-forgotten ruins of what had been Equestria’s seat of power. She had intentions to explore what looked like a partially-untouched chamber within the castle itself that she’d made note of in her previous visit, for the presence of some Zebra mask décor indicated it had once been an alchemy work area of the nature she was skilled in. Additionally, she was on the hunt for a specific flower known as the “Moon’s Tear”, so named for their first recorded appearance being the day after Nightmare Moon was banished, and which to Zecora’s knowledge could only be found naturally at the Everfree ruins. The flower itself carried a nectar that would be necessary to finish up the large order Sandalwood had placed for substitute aromatherapy supplies.

“Even in decay, it is beautiful,” Zecora mused in her native tongue, speaking to herself about the ruins coming into view. Indeed, although the majority of the castle was gone, lost to time either from the massive battle between night and day that had occurred within or a thousand years of erosion since, the masonry and detailing were still as magnificent from a distance as they were up close when the castle once stood as a beacon of prosperity to all ponykind. Even the surrounding settlements seemed to have some kind of imbued perfection to them, as they too appeared pleasing to the eye despite none of them being suitable for even shelter from the rain.

Except that one, Zecora noted. At the end of the street she was stepped foot onto was a house that looked like all the others. Except it had a solid roof on it. And a door. Curious, Zecora trotted her way towards the oddity, a sign of life in an otherwise dead city.

 However, she didn’t get far before every single strand of fur and mane stood on end. There was a bad feeling about this place. Many years ago, when she was but a filly herself, there had been an ancient shrine not too far from her village’s western edge. Her mother forbade ever going to the shrine, but to a young filly curiosity would be worth it. Or so she thought, for she didn’t even get reasonably close before immediately turning and running non-stop all the way to curl up on her mat in fear. That shrine, she would learn, had been the site of evil, dark magic practices performed by a zebra cult long since extinguished, but the power of their magic had been embedded into the shrine’s very foundations. Despite having never gone back there, with decades between the event and now, Zecora knew the feeling she had felt then was the exact same as the one she felt now. There was a presence of dark magic here, possibly even in that house, and Zecora didn’t dare go any further lest she discover what her younger self narrowly avoided.

Having been frozen in place mid-step, she suddenly picked up the audible hoofsteps of somepony approaching. Without a sound, Zecora bolted behind cover so that the approaching individual would not see her. But curiosity got the better of her and so she peeked around the edge to try and catch a glimpse.

There, walking towards the house, was the figure. Clad in a dark black cloak, all Zecora could make out from the shape was that it was a pony of some kind, the coat possibly a blood red coloration, but the face was obscured in darkness and any contours of the pony disguised by the apparel. Suddenly, the figure’s head turned to look right in the direction of Zecora, prompting the zebra to shrink back, but not long enough for Zecora to stop watching. Poking her head around again, she saw the figure was only looking around to see if there was anypony else, seemingly oblivious to Zecora’s presence. But the biggest shock came next, as the figure’s head suddenly had a magic aura appear from within the hood. While extremely hard to make out, it was obvious the aura was a bubbly, purple-colored mass, unquestionably that of a dark magic practitioner. The door to the house became enshrouded in that same, threatening aura, possibly to let the unicorn in.

The fear of dark magic, not felt since she’d been a child, rising up now, Zecora noiselessly slinked off, all curiosity having been killed off in favor of survival. She’d have to hang out in the ruins until she was sure the figure was either asleep or had left, but even then Zecora would leave on the other side of the ruins. She’d also need to gather up as much of the Moon’s Tear plant as possible, maybe even try to grow her own, because the presence of dark magic suddenly made Castle Everfree that much more dangerous to even the one who called the Everfree Forest home.





“Okay, so school is normally not that exciting, I’ll admit,” said Scootaloo, “but didn’t today seem…extra-boring or what?” Ponyville Elementary was done for the day, so the Crusaders once again headed for their base of operations.

“Yeah, it was like everypony was on Ritalin or something!” agreed Sweetie Belle, getting confused looks from her friends. “What? Is there something on my face?”

“Er, no…” replied Apple Bloom with a raised eyebrow, “it’s just that Ah don’t know what ‘Ritalin’ is, and Ah’m pretty sure Scoot doesn’t either.” The winged filly nodded confirmation.

“Oh, well…” started Sweetie, “to be honest, I don’t know what Ritalin is either. Rarity just said I need to take it, since it apparently makes hyperactive fillies and colts all dull, boring and obedient, but then she changed her opinion when she remembered one of its side effects involves seeing multiple Pinkie Pies constantly.”

“Are you sayin’ that one time the army of Pinkie Pies that crashed the barn raisin’ last year was only because mah entire family was on that Ritalin stuff?!” said Apple Bloom, horrified, “Includin’ mahself!?”

“Nah, that was the whole deal over the mirror pool Pinkie overused to try and have as much fun with everypony as possible.”

“Oh. Well, that’s a relief. Ah already have to take those stupid vitamins at night accordin’ to Granny. They’re so big that it’s like they’re meant for somethin’ larger than a pony!”

“You have to take Sweetie Drops, too?” asked Scootaloo, “Aren’t they just the worst?”

“Yeah, Ah just don’t see how anypony is supposed to take ‘em! But then again, Ah’d rather have that pill to swallow instead of havin’ to be Diamond Tiara last night!” laughed Apple Bloom.

“Oh, yeah, her absence from school today!” remembered Sweetie with a grin, “I believed you when you said she woke the entire house up with the screaming, but being too afraid to come to school?”

“Well, mystery solved about school being boring, no Tiara to make all the drama!” chortled Scootaloo, namely at her own unintentional rhyme. “Did you see Silver trying to be twice as troublesome to make up for Diamond’s absence? I almost feel bad for her in that she really can’t do it on her own. Not feeling sorry for whatever you did to Diamond, though, Apple Bloom. She really had it coming.”

Apple Bloom just laughed again. “Ah actually didn’t do that much, the storm and mah appearance probably did most of the work. Here, when we get to the treehouse Ah’ll show both of y’all how to scare a wanna-be princess!”

Minutes later, the CMC were settled in the far corner of Sweet Apple Acres. Sweetie and Scoot were instructed by Apple Bloom to sit in front of the treehouse window facing away from the farm, while the earth filly went to be on the other side of said window.

“Alright…” prepared Apple Bloom, whispering to herself so her friends wouldn’t know of her insecurity of what she was going to do, even though at this point they already knew about it pretty well. “Ah’m not gonna whine, Ah’m not gonna yell, Ah can do this…” With a deep breath, Apple Bloom focused on turning into her wolf form.

Despite the pain she’d gone through during the first transformation, subsequent instances where she willingly transformed in front of her friends had seen the pain level decrease. Right now, as she could feel her muzzle getting longer and her hooves becoming paws, it was a pain akin to almost a rough massage.

“Mrrrrr…” moaned Apple Bloom, letting the feeling wash over her, the noise mostly coming from her throat. Re-evaluation of the pain now seemed to have it feel somewhat pleasurable. She still had to maintain absolute secrecy about her lycanthropy, but as it was she couldn’t see what had been so bad about this for Applejack, aside from having an immortal, thousand-year old werewolf wanting to make her his wife. 

Then her stomach rumbled. Right. That too. She thought. As Applejack had gone to great lengths in describing, Apple Bloom had found she was developing a need to eat meat. A sickening thought, especially to a filly. However, while Applejack had been forced to rely on Fluttershy as a source, Apple Bloom had discovered a stopgap method to help control the hunger pangs, unknowingly having discovered it wasn’t the actual meat so much that she desired but the taste. She happened to have that stopgap available in the treehouse, but it could wait a little longer. The demonstration wouldn’t take long.

“Hey, Apple Bloom!” called out Scootaloo, “I thought you said this wouldn’t take much prep-AHH!”
The orange filly was cut off by the sudden appearance of a now canine-like earth pony filly, bow still in her mane, hitting her paws on the window without warning and saying “Peek-a-Boo, I see you!” The expression on her face was downright terrifying with the teeth and inequine shape, the paws having actual claws on the end of the nubs even moreso, and to anypony without nerves of steel would have been a sight worth screaming about once her husky voice registered in their eardrums.

Unless, of course, the ‘audience’ to such a sight were already well-knowing of the other pony on the other side of the window and fully aware it was just an act. Such was the case with the non-cursed CMC members who, after a brief moment of terror, started laughing. Apple Bloom couldn’t help but start laughing herself as she walked back into the treehouse interior.

“Now, Ah know that wasn’t exactly like how Ah was able to do it with Tiara, but Ah think y’all get the gist of it,” Apple Bloom drawled, the huskiness in her voice lowered to its natural werewolf level instead of the strained version she’d just used.

“I have to admit, that was pretty scary, even though we knew you were going to do it!” gasped Scootaloo in-between spurts of laughter. “Tiara would have been scared out of her mind by that, yet you said something about it being made better because of the storm?”

“Eeyup. Ah actually managed to time mah appearance with the lightning flashes, so she never really got a good look at me,” replied the werewolf, who had at this point opened a drawer in one of the few furnishings in the treehouse, pulling out a bag of dog biscuits.

Sweetie Belle noticed, her laughing immediately being toned down to just heavy breathing. “Uh, Apple Bloom? Aren’t those Winona’s?”

“Sorta.” Replied Apple Bloom, opening the bag and transferring some of the contents from the packaging to her mouth. “This is a spare bag Ah found in the kitchen, there’s still like, three fourths left in the main bag. Winona is family, probably more so to me now than Ah’d care to admit, what with this werewolf thing Ah have an’ all. No way Ah’d steal somethin’ from her outta greed.”

“Wait, are those meat flavored dog snacks?” asked Scootaloo, having stopped laughing herself and raising an eyebrow at her werewolf friend.

“Bacon, to be precise. Ah know, it’s weird, but…it’s the only way Ah know how Ah can stop wantin’ to eat real meat. Ah think it might be just the flavor that Ah need to taste, doesn’t matter if it’s fake meat flavoring either, and these are really more like crackers so Ah see no problem in eatin’ em. Gotta say Ah understand why Winona likes these so much.” Apple Bloom then took another hoofful of the doggy treats and ate them. She moved to take a third, but the bag was suddenly snatched from her paws by Sweetie. 

“I think that’s enough for now,” chided the unicorn, folding the top of the bag closed. “While it probably is a good thing these are an alternative to, well, actual meat, you can’t get addicted to these or simply eat the entire bag in one sitting. You’ll simply end up needing another bag even faster, which I’m sure your family is going to notice if you keep bringing home doggy treat bags that mysteriously disappear the second they enter this treehouse.”

“Yeah,” replied Apple Bloom, who slowly shifted back to her regular self. “You got a point there.”

Scootaloo then had an idea. “Hey! Maybe we could use those treats for-“ She was cut off by a deadly glare from Apple Bloom.

“Don’t you even suggest what Ah think you were gonna say. The trainin’ thing was alright, but Ah’m not gonna allow mahself to be psychologically manipulated through the reward of treats simply ‘cause Ah’m more or less part canine now. Ah don’t need to be influenced by the reward of treats simply so Ah can be potty trained!”

“Uh, let’s change the subject, shall we?” interjected Sweeite, noting Apple Bloom was getting worked up by her rant, with a side effect of her gradually changing back into a wolf. Her teeth were already looking slightly pointier and her muzzle longer. “I mean, I’m looking at all of our flanks, and I don’t see cutie marks!”

“Yeah, we’re the CMC, we should be getting back to our mission!” exclaimed Scootaloo. Apple Bloom confidently nodded, her slow changes into wolf form beginning to revert. “I think today we should go try being bagel bakers!

With no objections, the treehouse exploded with the shouts of “CUTIE MARK CRUSADER BAGEL BAKERS, YAY!” from three excitable fillies.




Two hooves carefully maneuvered small vials of unknown substances above a flask filled with a third mystery fluid.

“Easy…easy…”

With practiced care, the left vial was precisely tilted long enough for an exact amount of its contents to flow into the flask. The right vial was soon subjected to the same for a slightly longer period. Almost immediately the flask’s contents turned from a sickeningly brown shade to a beautiful blue, the scene of blueberries wafting from inside.

“Phew, still got my touch!” sighed Sandalwood, leaning back in her chair. While she’d asked Zecora to make a lot of stuff for her aromatherapy, Sandalwood had a personal pride in that some of her materials were actually made from her own recipes. After all, while she was employed as an aromatherapist, her true talent was her skill of creating and combining scents for aromatheraputic use as well as perfumes. The process of making things with certain scents, however, was a time consuming process without the aid of industrial capital, so she resorted to mass-produced counterparts to keep her services affordable and profitable unless it was her own custom creation. Her perfumes, on the other hand, were unmatched by anything commercially available, but due to the difficulty she had making them because of the alchemy involved, she only created perfumes as gifts to friends and family. Right now she was working on what was currently her best perfume she could make;  Rimefrost Blueberry , an uplifting scent perfume that never failed to make everypony around the pony wearing it be in a better mood. It was a gift for Zecora, in addition to the payment for all the materials, as a thank you for the assistance in her time of need.

Only, now she realized she needed an empty perfume bottle to put it in.

“Damn, knew I was forgetting something!” swore  Sandy to nopony in particular. Lyra was off at her new job, so the house for the most part was left all to Sandalwood during these periods. While she had returned to work, Zecora had only been able to make some of the requested items, forcing Sandalwood to restrict her times and services. Thankfully, of the things Zecora had been able to make, she’d made a lot of them to ensure they did not run out anytime soon. But even with the entire house open for investigation, the tan pony already knew there wouldn’t be a suitable perfume bottle for use to be found. Maybe at the spa? She thought, surely I’ve got some empty bottles that could be washed out for reuse.

With no other choice, the pony threw on her saddle bags and walked out the door. It would have been quick and easy to use the car as transport to and from the spa, but without Lyra’s magic the vehicle was useless. Sandalwood decided it wasn’t important anyway, she’d probably been bad about her sugar intake again and must have put on some weight during her time off, thus walking would be the healthier choice.

Passing the local bagel shop, which had dark smoke fogging the lower floor and pouring from the uppermost windows, the aromatherapist made her way into the town proper. It was pretty late, the spa probably already having closed for the day, but with her staff key Sandalwood could get in no problem. Still, it was sort of unnerving to see Ponyville drawing close to evening, where the streets were beginning to empty as vendors packed up and stores changing OPEN signs to the reverse CLOSED side.  Lyra probably would be home when Sandalwood returned.

I should have left a note she thought, but then again I’m only going to be gone for a few minutes. 

Having arrived at the spa, she let herself in. Admittedly, when the lights were not on and not a soul could be found inside, the Ponyville Spa was actually sort of terrifying. Not on the level of Everfree Forest terrifying, but it was still in Sandy’s interest to flip the lights. Curiously, on the desk there was a letter addressed to Sandalwood, which she moved to pick up and open. 

“’Dear Sandalwood,’” read the addressed, “I wasn’t sure if you were at home today, so I left this note for you where I know it would reach you eventually. A good friend of mine, Raspberry Beryl, is in dire need of some form of relaxation for stress she is visibly suffering from. What is causing the stress is beyond me, maybe it’s just her extremely timid nature, but I do feel your expertise as an aromatherapist would be most welcome to her. Please contact me at your leisure about this, since I know your offerings differ on what treatments are to be given, but although she means well Razz would never admit she needs something relaxing. However, I believe I can diagnose what she needs, hence why we should talk.

Sincerely,

        Rarity.

Sandalwood frowned. She knew of Raspberry Beryl. The unicorn had only arrived in town three months ago, from where nopony knew, but in the time between then and now she became known for three things; being better at acting like Fluttershy than Fluttershy herself was, her amazing ability to find and extract high quality gems all by herself, and most notably that green-and-gold phoenix who liked to perch on her horn. In Sandalwood’s opinion, the mare needed psychological therapy, not aroma-based therapy. But, it was a request from her friend Rarity, who had nothing but the purest of intentions for anypony. She probably was going to pay for it, too.

Who knows, maybe Rarity knows something I don’t. She’s apparently the only one Raspberry even talks at length to, anyway, thought Sandalwood, who by that point had retrieved an empty perfume bottle and clicked out the lights. She’d get in touch with Rarity tomorrow to discuss the matter.  Right now, however, she was more interested in bottling up that perfume and getting dinner started.




Even though she was a princess, whose time was now limited due to all the princess-in-training stuff, Twilight Sparkle was every bit the bookish intellectual she’d been since birth. So, with the night off, Twilight decided the most fun thing to do was learn about something else. Namely, what the story was with the so-called green phoenix that was appearing in Ponyville. Arrangements to meet with Raspberry Beryl, the pony allegedly taking care of the bird in question, were drafted up to be part of Twilight’s next downtime period where she could just hang out in Ponyville with her friends. But that was still some time away, so the purple princess did the best she could in the meantime. Books on phoenix biology and psychology littered her private bedroom, while Owlowiscious sat on a gold birdstand, ready to help the princess in any way he could.

“Alright, Owlie,” said Twilight, using the shorter nickname she’d created for her pet after the royal scribes threatened to quit on the grounds the owl’s full name was too hard to spell, “I need you to perch on my horn!”

“Who?” hooted Owlie, raising an eyebrow at the sudden, strange request.

“Yeah, I know it’s sort of odd, but I just need you to do it for a few seconds, alright?”

“Who” he replied, flapping his wings for lift and gliding over to Twilight, settling down on her horn with some extreme difficulty.

“Offoffoffoffoff!” cried Twilight, to which Owlie immediately left her head to take back his roost. He looked hurt, as if he’d harmed his mistress in some way. Twilight noticed and immediately walked over to comfort the bird, although still wincing in pain. “No, no, it’s nothing you did, Owlie, I should have known it wouldn’t have worked.”

“You know, I believe Celestia tried that with her pet before, while trying to raise the sun.” said a voice out of nowhere, “same results, only you weren’t trying to cast a powerful spell even though I’m sure that’s what you were going to try and do.”

“DISCORD!” shouted Twilight angrily. “Where are you?!” Her answer came when under the locked door flowed an eerie dark purple mass that looked like it would consume all that it touched. To regular ponies it would look like the fabled smooze, a magic-absorbing substance only the most powerful magic users could get rid of. To anypony who was aware of Celestia’s actions over the past year, such as Twilight, it was a reformed chaos entity being himself. Indeed, he didn’t even keep up the charade beyond the last bit of him coming under the door, for the smooze rose up into the shape of a sharply dressed unicorn. A brown coat, green eyes, two-tone gray mane and tail, and a wax-sealed scroll cutie mark completed the look, giving no indication of the true creature within.

“For the record, princess,” said the disguised dragonequis, “I was only on the other side of the door fully intending to knock because I was going to ask about something completely different. These doors aren’t exactly soundproof, you know, and if you were doing things of a much more private nature-“

“What do you mean by that?” inquired the annoyed alicorn.

“I could go into detail,” continued Discord, not missing a beat, “but this is a teen rated story and it’s not important to the plot anyway.”

“What!? I don’t understand a thing you-”

“Going back to the original discussion point; if you were doing something you didn’t want anypony to know about there would have been several layers of your magic forming a forcefield that would have prevented me from both hearing what you were doing and entering this room. As it stands, all you were doing was asking a bird to sit on your horn. Far from doing something like trying to redecorate the castle through black magic, right?”


Twilight just sighed. “Okay, Discord, you have a point about my privacy habits. That aside, how would you know about birds perching on your horn? You normally have two, yet I don’t recall ever having seen you as a statue where birds used your horns as a roost.”

“I think it would be fairly obvious that birds tended to avoid going near my frozen form, my dear Twilight. I am the embodiment of chaos on all levels, and although you may not perceive it on a more basic level, the birds certainly do. Maybe you should ask Fluttershy to explain it to you sometime.

“Still, we’re getting off track there. Back once again to the subject of birds-on-horns, Celestia surely told you of the time she tried it with Philomena, with disastrous results. What made you think you could do what she could not, with a bird who can’t negate its weight through magic?”

“I…I don’t know, really,” admitted the princess, letting her guard down some. “It’s just that there’s this phoenix I’ve been hearing about back in Ponyville-”

“-That’s green where it should be red and perches on the horn of a unicorn that cares for it like a pet?” finished Discord. Twilight shot him a look, prompting him to add, “Hey, just intuition.”

“Except I never mentioned the Phoenix was green,” countered Twilight.

At that revelation, Discord’s eyes went wide, but then he laughed. “And here I was thinking it was me who was leading  you into revealing information. If you must know, Queen Faust had a green phoenix-“

“Verna, who was also Philomena’s mother,” interrupted Twilight, finding it rather enjoyable to be in reversed roles in regards to how the conversation started. “Princess Luna told me when I asked her about green phoenixes.”

“Indeed. I suspect Luna also told you about how after Queen Faust was no longer among those living on this plane of existence, Verna left the castle one day without warning, never to return to the egg she left. But what Luna couldn’t have told you was that Verna came to me on her last known trip. Before she returned to the rest of the wild phoenixes, her final duty was to convey a message Faust had left that had been addressed to me.” Discord’s tone had changed in the middle of his monologue, Twilight noted. By the end he seemed to be recollecting the last memory of a dear friend, since before only referred to Faust with her full title unlike Celestia or Luna, but his final mention of her name ignored formality.

“What was her final message to you?” inquired the princess, addressing Discord in a manner of respect, as if he was somepony she respected as highly as Celestia, instead of being cautious around as she was normally with him. He noted that with a small smile.

“As the Princess of Magic, which through some interpretations means you’re the Princess of Friendship, I believe you can respect my wish to keep the information in question privately between me and Faust, wherever she may be.”

“Of course.”

“Thank you. Now, back on the topic again, I know that Queen Faust actually let Verna sit on her horn from time to time. Something to do with their own little friendship, I guess, I never got the chance to ask as I was too busy causing glorious chaos elsewhere at the time. However, because Philomena isn’t a full blooded green phoenix, evidenced by her normal red coat, it’s possible she can’t do what Verna and this other phoenix can. I’d suggest you should go and investigate yourself, but I get the feeling you were going to do that anyway since it’s in your little hamlet of Ponyville.”

“Is it that obvious?”

“Yes, compared to how I’m going to leave this room, at least. Good night, Princess Sparkle.” The second he finished, Discord suddenly rose into the air even though his body didn’t move, not even the effects of gravity seemed to apply as he spun in the air, only to phase through the ceiling like a ghost.

Twilight just shook her head. “No wonder Pinkie Pie likes him, he’s just as random as she is, isn’t he?” she asked her pet. He hooted in agreement. “Now, since we can’t have you perch on my horn, we should probably get back to finding out what else we can about phoenixes!”

 Yet, in the midst of all the research, Twilight kept Discord’s words in the back of her mind. She suspected he knew more about green phoenixes than he let on, but being Discord he wasn’t going to make it that easy. Then again, at least he’d been able to share some information freely this time that wasn’t in the form of a riddle.