Chapter 1: Coronach
The towering hulk of undeath shambled rigidly onwards, to where the song of death was begging for release. His long-rotten limbs stretched forwards, sapping the life and summoning decay upon whatever loomed in his blank sight. The growth of decay filled his un-coursing veins with defilement, hastening the steps.
Since ages long past, he was dubbed the Undying - both by the living and his Dead God. He existed to bring forth the Almighty Dirge, so that the living may join his deity's song of death. And before him, he saw life - life, fighting spastically for survival. They near called upon him and the ones brought close together by the common goal. He aimed to answer.
Death’s orchestra was already sounding the triumphant pipes, aiming for the high crescendo. The Dezun berserker, adorned with more wounds and scars than the Undying himself, was roaring furiously as his spear went into a ghastly figure on top of a steed that defiled the notes of death, skinless and torn, yet alive in concept. Rabid wolves, smelling death as well as he heard it, circled and swiped at an all-too-hard to perceive shape, stray pieces of grass, soil and debris circling round as it aimed to crush back - their master, a rough human in a noble’s worn clothes, unleashed two creeping daemons from a rotting-green tome on his belt, rushing past the commotion and into a toughened tower at the edge of sight. A large fiery shape stomped round, clawing furiously at a serpentine shape, blurry behind a prismatic barrier, blinking desperately under the spell of the tall Oglodi from afar.
“The dead hunger.” His rotten vocal chords erupted into an unwilling growl of focus, as a bone and stone sculpture rose from the ground. Restless dead poured from under every last inch of soil, gnawing at those whom the Undying pointed them towards. Before the opposers could recover, a rust-red link cruised between them, heralding the fiery explosion that brought forward yet another fiery shape. Somewhere afar, the sound of falling rubble signaled the end of the tower. The fighters persevered - the rider had engulfed himself in mist, the serpentine archer’s barrier stayed active, and the gravity-mending shape had grown large, fortified with swirling yellow light.
The Undying aimed to rip their souls and decay their bodies, so as to grow his own bulk and tear the living to shreds, but before he or the other conductors of death could react, a roaring red body emerged among their ranks.
When the Dead God’s chosen bearer of the Almighty Dirge could see again, he was pointlessly clawing at thick, red skin, which resisted spears, magic, fangs and bullets, and towards him charged a ghastly apparition of a galleon, its crew crying out cheers of death.
He would not even be slain by that which had a resemblance of Death’s perfect note.
He and the others were pulled off balance, and drawn into a hopelessly dark void, darker than even the gaze of Death.
“If light cannot escape me, what hope have you?”
The void submerged Undying, and all light was lost.
When Undying awoke, the entire world had disappeared.
Nothing moved, the darkness had shrouded everything from him, excepting, of course, the Song of Death. He could hear them, the dead, they were all around him. The orchestra roared in the darkness, bringing a moment of clarity to the death-riddled mind of the deceased Hero.
He was underground.
Undying’s arms twisted in an unnatural manner, angles which should have been snapping his tendons. His claws navigated through the dirt easily. He found purchase on a rock and began pulling himself upwards, emitting a deep guttural growl as he went. Small, sharp rocks cut at his flesh as he drew closer and closer to the surface. He cared not for them, they were nothing but a nuisance, which would be dealt with later.
It was then, that the Herald thrust upwards, his soil-covered appendage breaching the surface. The long rotten muscles jolted at the breeze of unnatural air, and his fingers convulsed, leaving his palm to signal a threatening V to the world above.
With his arm freed, Death’s General clasped onto the ground, finding good purchase on the grassy land above. The Undying growled, and the surface above him decayed, weakening the soil. He pulled himself out of the darkness below, his terribly scarred visage emerging, the light blinding his blank eyes. With half of his body out of the ground, the Herald scanned his surroundings, discovering that he was on what must have been the remains of the battlefield.
His stagnant neck flexed as the stable song of Death turned into a cacophony of incoherent sounds. The Undying’s vision blurred and shifted as his rotten mind worked through the surroundings.
A large pile of long deserted wood sat perched on a rock formation - no doubt the vessel that charged him and the others, so teasingly ghostly in its shape, but ultimately composed of matter. Dozens of skeletal remains laid strewn across the perimeter - the likely remainders of the undead he had summoned to fight for him. The mariner who commanded the onslaught was nowhere to be seen. It seemed that he and the others had left the field long ago, the Undying’s death dealer associates left forgotten in their tracks.
They had failed.
The assumption was given more ground as the hulking corpse rose in full, barely standing still after the strain of the vicious energies. His molding, misshapen head hung face to face to a stone monument. Even in the uncertain blur of the post-shock confusion, the Undying saw the hood and the eldritch lines engraved on it. The brooding Oglodi, the Warlock, must have been left a mere statue by the serpentine fighter they so hoped to avail of her shield.
“No… burial…” he vocalized in a gurgle, feeling obscure anger at the apparent loss of a valuable assistant.
The undead general’s enduring form shuddered as a wild screech erupted from afar, springing the memory of the ghastly rider’s steed in his mind. Could he have stayed, anticipating the never coming death of the Undying? From what was known to the undead hulk, it was very much possible. The Lord of Avernus had foresight which could match that of the Dead God’s servants.
His rotten head aimed to turn itself, urging the rest of his body to move along - with that, he saw a chaotic landscape, indicative of a significant passage of time. He must only have awoken decades, if not centuries after the fateful battle - the Ancient’s spark and Dead God’s will had been delayed by some means of their opponents. The Lord was likely to still be alive - albeit the Undying heard no more sounds, and felt no mist encompass the surroundings, a usual sign of the rider’s entrance.
A grim forest had erupted all around the site, consuming the remains of buildings and statues that were never there. Hungry vines wrapped around chiseled monuments, put up after the supposed triumph. Some of them were in conditions that lead him to assume that the red giant, the Axe, as he recalled his usual monicker, eventually rebelled and lead a roaring rampage through the pristine streets. Stone, chopped to pieces, concrete, stricken apart - whatever happened had to have been a site of incredible violence.
The Almighty Dirge nudged the Undying along, forcing him to look for signs and clues as his deceased mind tried to recuperate. And so he did find what made him feel the drive again - the smell. His nostrils had long ago decayed off, but the smell stayed, and he knew the smell.
Death.
It was a dead city.
His trudging leg hit an inconvenient bump, and the towering hulk bent over in a contortion that would have had anything else fall flat. The inconvenience was lost as he examined it.
A big, bulky - to anything but him - skeleton. It was of a wild beast, that much was sure. At first thought, he took them to be what remained of the Dezun berserker, who wore a similar-looking set of bones on his head and back, but then he saw more. So many more surrounded the one - they had escaped his view during the initial confusion. It had turned out that the Undying awoke rather fittingly. The dead city had become a graveyard for a deadly species.
If he had any ability to visibly express himself, he would have smiled.
“The sleepless… wake!” he commanded, aiming his long arms at a nearby pillar, and thought to bring the deceased under his control, encompassing the significantly smaller skeletons near the pile of wooden rubble.
A horrid spark of multi-colored light flashed instead, and the Undying realized that something was wrong.
His head moved erringly, looking at the pillar, searching for a reason.
An incredibly large statue depicting an equine with wings and a horn stared at him with a penetrating, stony gaze.
Not once had he or any other Dead God’s followers encountered a creature like this in the world they aimed to have sing. Worse yet, the runes were incomprehensible to him. The one thing he could decipher was a much newer addition, a warning post of sorts, which stood in the middle of the ancient plaza, now devoured by time, death and forest.
“CANTERLOT TRADE PLAZA, DANGER: EVERFREE EXPANSION IN PLACE, DO NOT PROCEED!
250 AD NM”
He was lost.
Twilight Sparkle, the Element of Magic, sat alone in her train cart.
The landscape whizzed past her, rolling hills and forests becoming one in a cacophony of colours and shapes. She gazed skywards, taking note of the Celestia’s sun being slowly dropping out of view, the short fringe she wore her mane in creeping over the eyes just a little bit. As quickly as the sun had vanished, the moon began its own gloomy ascent into the heavens.
Her cart was empty, save for the occasional train steward, crossing over from one end of the train to the other. Keeping her eyes open had become increasingly difficult - after all, her weekend had been spent attending the opening of a new museum in Canterlot. She had been personally invited by the chairpony of the whole ordeal, an offer which no young apprentice could reasonably refuse. The museum’s opening ceremony had been greeted by a vast gathering of scholars, having been drawn to the event like moths to a lightbulb. By a certain point, she had become a singular purple dot in a sea of individuals overly excited about ancient history.
She had spent hours greeting them, her eagerness to learn slowly being replaced by absolute exhaustion. The once interesting delegates had quickly become boring and she found herself simply ignoring what they had to say within hours. By the time that the event had come to pass, Twilight had become undeniably relieved at the prospect of returning home. The unicorn yawned, her yearn for slumber having finally taken a foothold in her subconscious. With a relieved sigh, she lowered her weary head onto the pillow, her eyes slowly drawing to a close.
After all, a little sleep couldn’t hurt.
Twilight awoke to a horrendous screeching sound.
The train shook and screamed with effort as it slowed to a stop. Twilight was flung from her seat and sent crashing onto the floor, her body crashing into the cart’s wall. After a moment or two, Twilight slowly pulled herself from the ground. Her body hurt everywhere. By the time she was upright, the train had reached an absolute stop. Nothing but silence permeated the air.
Twilight stumbled over to the window, only to find it tightly locked by a heavy wooden shutter which she couldn’t recall ever closing. Then, she attempted to use her magic to try and move the shutter, only to receive a brain-scattering headache. With a gasp, she fell to the floor, clutching her head, as the pain passed slowly. Once Twilight had gathered her composure, she took the time to look around the cart.
The door leading into the next cart hung open. Luckily, at least one of the lights in her cart remained intact, providing a somewhat eerie glow to the cabin. With a scowl, she made her way to the open door. Then, when she reached it, a horrendous cackle dug into her mind, eliciting a searing pain above her eyes forcing her to lean against the door for support. After what felt like an eternity, the horrible laughing ceased, allowing her to think somewhat clearly.
Twilight stumbled through the doorway and into the next cart. The room glowed an eerie red, although she couldn’t quite figure out from where the light was being emitted. This room had taken a far greater beating than her own - everything which had not been nailed down had been flung across the cart. The floor was littered with glass and nails
Near the doorway leading to the next cart, a white object was sticking out of a pile of broken planks and nails. She approached the object with caution, carefully navigating her way through the jungle of shattered glass. Once she arrived at the doorway, she could clearly make out exactly what the object was.
A piece of paper.
She carefully lifted it out the the pile, avoiding the sharp nails and badly damaged planks. Once the the piece of paper was out of the pile, she brought it into the light and upon further investigation, discovered that it was a note.
The words “Dipped in corpses, alive in death” were hastily scribbled onto the paper, which appeared to be stained in some vile, gooey liquid.
Twilight left the note on the floor and proceeded into the next room, which appeared to be a replica of the the last cart. Excepting, it was a dead end. No sooner than when she had stepped into the room, the door behind her slammed shut, drowning the unicorn in absolute darkness.
Again, the horrendous wheezing and cackling started up again, driving Twilight to the floor.
“Dipped in corpses, alive in death.”
The phrase was repeated over and over again, like some kind of insidious chant. Then, all of a sudden, the cart lit up in the same gloomy, red glow. A being of untold horror emerged seamlessly from the shadows, and drifted towards the light.
The chanting stopped.
The creature was equine - however, the primate-like torso attached to it completely obscured any relation to a pony. It was freakishly disfigured - one arm appeared to be longer than the other and its legs seemed to have been broken and healed in a twisted, peculiar manner. Its skin was a dark hue of purple, although nothing could compare to the creature’s face. An eyeless, smooth head, with a mouth far too wide to even vaguely resemble normality. The monstrosity drifted in the air, erratically twitching and dripping with a vile, dark ichor.
“Mhmmm, I can smell your fear, little one,” the creature chattered in a raspy, shrieking voice.
Twilight had never seen something so vile and terrible - darkness seemed to swell around the monster, and with every breath, a sickening smacking sound resonated from its throat.
“Ghh, I like your smell. Mhmmm, yesss. Too bad our time is short. I’d like to share my dream with you while we still have some…”
The creature disappeared in a vile swash of darkness, revealing the wall behind him. Words were painted onto the wall in a dark ichor, which dripped onto the floor below. In the same dark ichor, an insignia of a cluster of small stars surrounding a larger, singular one, was also scribbled onto the wall.
“The moon will bleed and the sun shall weep.”
Beyond the wall, she could see a another terrible being.
A towering, shambling figure, decaying the land and sapping life from trees and animals. A monolithic structure erupted from the ground, crafted from stone, a large ursine skull impaled on its roof. The vision slowly faded away, Twilight’s headache becoming nearly unbearable.
“Dipped in corpses, alive in death. The moon will bleed and the sun shall weep.”
The world went dark, and everything was silenced.
Twilight awoke on the floor, covered in sweat and panting.
She felt the familiar feeling of the train tracks underneath her, rumbling away, providing a satisfying hum. The room wasn’t engulfed in an eerie red glow, nor were the windows shut. In fact, the bright morning sun bathed her in light, a welcoming reminder that what she had just experienced was just a dream.
A nightmare.
She slowly recollected herself, her heart rate steadying itself. Twilight couldn’t help but sigh in relief. She propped herself onto her hooves and trotted over to a nearby pitcher of water. The unicorn poured herself a glass and hopped back onto her seat.
Twilight looked outside and quickly realized that the train was passing through a mountain range overlooking The Everfree. Somewhere in the distance, she could see the remains of Old Canterlot, rarely visible from anywhere but a considerable height, signaling to her that the train must be within a few hours of Ponyville.
Just as she had settled in, Twilight took a look at the old capital, taking in the beauty of the scene before her. Something was a little bit off with the peeking ruins, something she couldn’t quite put her hoof onto. It was only when she looked near the edge of the destroyed city that she figured out what was wrong. The forest seemed even more dead than usual, almost as if the life had been drained from it. Then she spotted it.
A tall, unmistakable monolithic tombstone with an ursine skull at the top.
Stats
Page generated in 0.022 seconds
Total duration
735 users online
1,074,896 hits today, 2,054,621 yesterday
FIMFiction
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Fanfiction
Designed and coded by knighty & Xaquseg - © 2011-2024
Follow & Support Us
Support us
SubStar
Chat!
Discord
Follow us
Twitter
MLP: Friendship is Magic® - © 2024 Hasbro Inc.®
Fimfiction is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Hasbro Inc.®
Well, this is going to go swimmingly. And I assume Discord's still in stone, though I wonder how Tirek will react to the zombie apocalypse taking place; he may just end up hurrying up his magic drain and being the big damn hero.
Because as fun as he is to play, Undying is bad fucking news.
5034433
Excellent, a comment!
Indeed, Undying is quite a terrifying bastard.
5034452 The good news is that the tombstone is a shitload of money if you can kill it.
Finally
A another Dota 2 crossover and it seems interesting.
(I was personally expecting Ck but this is even better.)
5034484 Ck in Equestria would be weird. He's a fundamental of the universe, the physical embodiment of all things random, at least 13 billion years old with an awareness the size of the universe. It'd hard to imagine why he'd be interested in Equestria; the only reason he's interested in the Dota world is that another fundamental, Kotl, is there, and that two other fundamentals, Radiant and Dire, are fighting on it.
5034484
Heh, thank-you.
Hopefully you'll enjoy it!
5034484 Actually, during the very very VERY genesis of the story, CK and his fundamental co. were considered. Eventually we realized that it's just not that interesting.
5034488 First off, thanks for the interest in the fic (I'm the co-writer if you don't want to go check why a random person is thanking you for this). Second, a very early concept had KoTL accidentally ass himself into Equestria as well - with logical hilarities to ensue. That got thrown out the window quickly, though.
Also, yes, as an auxiliary author's note: the canon for why the heroes are doing all... that in the intro is that it's a 1200 MMR game. I mean, come on. Abaddon, Medusa, Kunkka, Enigma and Axe versus Undying, Lycan, Sniper, Huskar and Bane (who was farming the jungle). Should be obvious from the start. Lycan just read a guide and decided that he should totally push the tower while the rest are teamfighting, without even having his ultimate on.
It says a lot about the opposing team that he SUCCEEDED.
5034549 Motherfucking Bane was farming the jungle?! Bwa? Huh? WHAT?!
Also, I kinda want to see Kotl and Io go to Equestria now. My headcanon is that Io's beeps and blips are actually the fundamental language, which it stubbornly sticks to. I can picture Kotl translating.
Io: Beep boop beep bop.
Kotl: Yes, thank you Celestia for your hospitality -
Io:Beor beepery booo uop!
Kotl:Well if you don't want me to translate then speak mortal
Io:BEEP BOP BOOP BEEP!
5034555
1200 MMR. He read in a guide that supports should be able to farm well, and that the jungle is the best place to gain gold and XP without stealing from your carry.
Too bad it's like 55 minutes in, but hey - he's trying. Or was. I'm pretty sure he DC'd after getting hit by a Black Hole (Enigma is a smurf account).
That was part of the idea, actually. The idea lived for approximately six minutes, but yeah, it was.
Do consider the fact that both writers of this story can sometimes intentionally say things that are untrue, so you don't necessarily know if the Fundamental Four are out of the picture, even though they weren't picked.
5034562 Ha, well I imagine if any one of the Fundamentals arrive in Equestria, then Dirge's reign of terror will come to a very swift, very unceremonious end. Even Phoenix, who's a seething inferno a million times larger than the planet - he's a star! - would just vaporize him.
OHHH MY FAVORITE HERO EVER (besides omni)!!!
Welp...Equestia is in big trouble now.
5104439 Well, it gets better sometime around this week. Chapter 2 is in production, even if it switched hands.
5104441
Still they're going to fight one of the worst possible opponents for them to fight. They still have a chance at winning but if they don't play their cards right then it's game over.
5104450 Oh, for the record, I mean "better" sarcastically. Though... maybe not fully.
In any case, at least Broodmother or Doom Bringer aren't in on it.
5034433
He just wants some gummy vitamins.
5034609
Depends. If its before 20 minutes, Dirge can enter 1v3 me mode and have a reasonable chance of winning. After 20 minutes though...