//------------------------------// // Prologue // Story: My number one dark knight // by Angelus Alvus //------------------------------// The Celestia’s sun punished mercilessly the desert area with its heat. The sand was scalding under the hooves of the strange pony-like creatures walking on it. These creatures resembles ponies, but they had no fur, their faces resemble insects, they all had horns and insect-like wings and all of them had some holes on their bodies. Also, their size was very similar to an average pony. They are called Changelings. The reason for this is because they have the unique ability to shape shift into any creature they set their eyes on. A group of approximately 100 of these creatures followed a much bigger changeling, their queen. She had blue mane, green eyes and had much more holes in her body, wings and even mane than the other changelings. Also, she was incredibly more powerful than the others. The group was carrying several good stolen from a gryphon settlement near an oasis. The queen had a thrown on her face, spite of the fact that her raid had been successful and no gryphon was left to tell others about what had just happened, which was one of the traits of their attacks. She was upset was because she hated living on scraps. The queen had to organize and lead several attacks to many small camps or villages to get the supplies for her people. Her kind was feared. But in a “palpable” way. Stories are told about strange beings that can turn into other creatures to lure children of many species away from their parents. In another words, her kind was reduced to be treated like a spooky story for kids. The queen, named Chrysalis, hated that. She wanted to make her people known. To be respected. To be properly feared by adults and children alike. But she couldn’t risk it. In case she made her presence well knows, she was sure the goddess of the Sun, Celestia, would bring forth a huge army to crush her and her people. Her kind was numerous, but nowhere near as the number of ponies. The changelings knew magic and could fly, so, technically, they could be treated as alicorns, but their magic power was no match for an experienced unicorn, much less a proper alicorn, like Celestia or Cadence. Chrysalis led her people through the sand lost in her thoughts until she heard the sound of one of her minions falling down. The changeling was carrying the food inside of a white big bag over his back and the stuffed bag almost opened as the pony-like creature fell on the ground. “Be careful to not spoil the food. Or else I’ll have you served in a plate instead.” She growled. She never used to threaten her own kind, but sometimes it was necessary to keep order in her little ‘hive’. The changeling quickly got up and quickly bowed and said closing his bright blue eyes “I’m sorry, my queen. I just tripped on a rock. I promise I’ll be more careful, I promise.” “You better be…” she said as she noticed the so-called rock her subject had tripped on. It was round and it was light purple with darker shade purple dots on it. She got a bit curious about it and used her magic to take it off the ground. The object was concealed in a dark green aura and levitated off the sand. She was surprised by how light it was and by the fact that it was an egg. The changelings were also a bit surprised by that. “Did the gryphons abandon it? I mean, in this desert, I guess it would be troublesome to have one extra mouth to feed.” Said the same changeling who had tripped on it. He was actually astonished he didn’t break the egg when he hit it. “This is too big to be a gryphon egg…” Chrysalis said bringing it closer to inspect it. She had never seen an egg like that before. She pondered for a while and decided she was curious enough to see if something would come out of it. “I’ll take this with me. If this turns out to be a dud, I can always eat it.” She mused. The changelings didn’t really have anything to comment on it. Their queen’s desires were absolute, even it was something as frivolous as hatching an egg. Although, some of them were also interested in what could come out of it. The group walked towards a big rock in the desert. The queen then used her magic to levitate the rock, which revealed a big tunnel underneath it. Her subjects then started to flying into the tunnel and when everyling got inside of it, she got inside as well and then blocked the entrance to the tunnel with the rock using her magic. The tunnel led a series of forked paths. However, they all knew the proper path to their kingdom. The queen only had to come along the raids when the cover to their tunnels required a huge amount of magic to be moved. Also, she had enchanted the area to allow the changelings to move faster through the tunnels that connected through many distant areas on the continent. The queen then ordered the other changeling to take their loot to the deposit so it could be properly be divided among the rest of her people. Her rules were quite simple: leave no witness of your true form, always support the “hive”, don’t trust any outsider and if you wanted to eat, you have to work. And all these rules also applied to her. She didn’t like to, but it helped to keep the balance of power because it made her earn the respect of her people. Besides, she treated her people fairly, which prevented any kind of riots. Plus, she knew that her rules also helped to ease her people. By attacking mercilessly other races, it helped the changelings to release some of the frustration of having to live in a land that could barely grow anything and to live in secluded from the rest of the world. Her kingdom was entirely underground. But most of it was because it was safer this way. There was a small castle, but it was amidst a swamp area. She liked to live in that castle because it gave her some fresh air and because it made her feel a little more like royalty. She didn’t force any changeling to live underground. She wouldn’t mind to expand the above ground area if more of her subjects wanted to live there, but most preferred the safety of being underground. She could easily close the underground entrance, which was hidden in the basement area of the castle, from the inside if she needed to escape in case her castle was ever discovered and flee with her people through the tunnels, while the trespassers lost time trying to figure it out where they were. Chrysalis then took the egg to her room inside of the castle and ordered for some changelings to bring her some hay and a table to her room. Once the changelings brought what she had asked, she placed the table on her room and used the hay to form a small nest for the egg. She then conjured a small ball of yellow light to keep the egg warm. She wasn’t sure of the proper temperature she should use, because, after all, the egg was found in the middle of a desert and didn’t hatch. But, again, she didn’t even know how long has that egg been there, much less the species it belonged to. She then tried to keep the temperature a bit cooler than the desert heat, because she didn’t want to cook the egg by accident. The queen then left the egg alone only renewing the magic every day to check how it was doing. Weeks passed by and her patience with the egg was leaving her at every day. She had tried to see through the egg, by placing it against the light to see if something was developing inside of it, but the shell was too dense for this trick to work. Four months after she had found the egg, Chrysalis finally lost every bit of interest and patience she had with the egg. According with her knowledge, no creature should take so long to hatch. Even gryphons only took two months to hatch. She then took a hold of the egg with her magic and stared at it with a frown. The changeling queen gritted her teeth and decided to bring an end to this experiment. She decided that the egg was indeed a dud and she also didn’t feel like trying to eat it. The changeling queen then concealed the egg with her magic and it glowed stronger and stronger. She wanted to make the egg explode hoping it would subdue her anger. She focused her magic trying to make the egg burst, but nothing happened. She focused harder and harder and not even a crack appeared in the shell. She stomped on the ground angrily. It was almost like the egg was mocking at her attempts to destroy it. The changeling queen gave a groan of frustration as she focused all her power on the egg. She didn’t care if the explosion scattered the egg all over her room. “BREAK ALREADY!” She shouted as a dark green beam of energy came out of her horn connecting against the egg. The purple egg started to resonate with the energy Chrysalis was sending it. The egg vibrated midair and it started to crack. She, however, didn’t notice it and simply kept sending the egg energy until the egg shell exploded with the magic outburst. The changeling queen was sent flying against the wall causing her to yell in pain a little bit. Her eyes were closed as she was sent flying until she managed to get up once more. But when she opened her eyes, she couldn’t believe what she saw before her. A purple dragon with no wings and green spines on the back and one small green fin on each side of the head to the small sat over the remains of the egg. The little dragon opened his eyes to reveal emerald like eyes like Chrysalis’. The small creature smiled as it stared at Chrysalis with a smile. Suddenly many changelings burst through the door of their queen’s chambers asking if she was alright. She, however ignored them as she slowly walked near the infant. When she got close enough, the baby managed to crawl near her and used its small chubby body to hug her front leg while looking up to meet with her green eyes. Chrysalis couldn’t believe she had just hatched a dragon.