All Hail the Overlord

by TheAncientPolitzanian

Chapter 4: A Light in the Shadows

Ocellus walked through the halls of the royal palace with Smoulder, Silverstream, Gallus, Sandbar and Yona.

The six of them were currently milling about, going from room to room, exploring. Sandbar and Silverstream were the only ones who had actually seen a palace before, not counting Twilight Sparkle's (but calling her crystal tree a palace was a bit of a stretch).

"This place is pretty cool, for a place built by ponies," Smoulder said as she walked along.

"Ya know, apparently Ember was so impressed with Twilight's castle, she started eating the wall," Sandbar said with a giggle.

Smoulder looked at him and growled.

"Whatever," she said with a frown, which made the others laugh.

Yona, who was in the front, stopped, which caused the others to peek around her.

There was a fork in the hall in front of him, and a large group of crimson changelings were running down the fork, towards the dance hall. None of them noticed them, until a large dark grey unicorn with a red horn walked past. He turned to look at them with his red and green eyes.

A crimson changeling walked up next to him. "What is it Sombra, what do you see?" The changeling said before turning to look at the six friends.

"Ah, what do we have here? Some innocent little tykes, waiting to be gutted!" The Changeling screeched as several more changeling soldiers walked over and stared down the hall at them.

The six of them were clearly terrified, especially Ocellus. These changelings were clearly part of her evolved changeling race, because they lacked holes in their hooves, among other details.

Sombra didn't say anything, but several of the changelings began sprinting down the hall towards them, death in their flaming eyes.

The six of them started to run away, Yona at the back, but she suddenly fell and tripped on her braids, once again.

"Yona!" Silverstream screamed and ran back towards her friend, the rest of the group followed. They tried to pick the large yak up, but they soon found themselves surrounded by cackling changelings.

One started to crouch down, and licked his lips. He pounced towards them, teeth bared, but he was stabbed through the chest by a tentacle of solid black shadows.

The rest of the changelings and the six friends looked at the dead changeling before them, before turning towards Sombra.

"What in the name of Tartarus do you think you are doing, Sombra?" one of the changelings screamed out as he slowly advanced on Sombra. By now the hall was filled with changelings, who had come back from charging down the hall when they realized Sombra was no longer with them.

"These six are children," Sombra said slowly.

"And? They could make tasty snacks before we arrive at the palace throne room!" the changeling replied.

Ocellus whimpered at this, but Sombra shut her up with a glare.

"That means that we could capture them instead and use them as leverage. Killing them would merely put us at a disadvantage," Sombra said, once again slowly.

The Changeling leader growled. "I can see the logic, but it means less fun for us."

"Do I look like I care? Grab them, they will make a good bargaining tool," he said as he turned around and started walking away.

The Changeling leader growled before turning away.

He approached the 6.

"I think I'll have just one of you," he exclaimed as he licked his lips.

He soon however, found an axe to his throat, wrapped in a dark purple aura. "No, you won't," Sombra said.

The changeling was quiet for a second before his hissed in distain, as he told his men to grab the six and capture them.

---

Princess Celestia slowly walked forwards towards the unconscious crimson changeling.

Somehow, this one changeling had beaten Pharynx and Shining Armor by himself, along with an entire changeling swarm, alongside wounding a changeling monarch.

He clearly was something unnatural. She looked over towards the location where Pharynx and Shining had both been knocked unconscious. It was clear to her, that they would have died, without a shadow of a doubt, if they had attacked him one on one.

"Just what is this guy?" Celestia asked.

"He is the Overlord's personal guard," someone with her voice replied.

She turned to see the other Celestia limp towards her.

The Elements of Harmony and Starlight Glimmer walked up to join the two.

"Whose personal guard?" Rainbow Dash asked as she walked up.

"The Overlord. He is a Changeling king. Not unlike that one over there," the 2nd Celestia said as she pointed to Thorax. "He has conquered my world, and defeated me and Luna."

"You're the Celestia from the mirror world, aren't you?" Celestia asked, concern in her eyes.

"Yes," the Alternate Celestia replied.

"That must mean that this guy is Pharnyx," Twilight said.

"But if he's Pharynx, then how was he able to beat our Pharynx?" Starlight asked as she took a sip of a drink.

"Wait... what is the Overlord's name?" Twilight asked.

"He introduced himself as Thorax," Celestia said.

Starlight Glimmer spat out her drink all over Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy.

"Thorax!?! The second biggest softie in the world? He's the one who conquered your Equestria!" Starlight yelled.

"In my world, people are the opposite of the ones in yours. If your Thorax is a 'softie', I think it is pretty clear that the Thorax of my world would be a ruthless merciless killer," Celestia said.

The Elements looked at each other, while Starlight Glimmer looked shocked.

"What about Sombra?" the real Celestia asked, causing everyone to look at her.

"He is one of the servants of the Overlord."

---

Thorax slowly opened his eyes, to see Ember, and Spike staring down at him with concern.

Thorax put his hoof to his head. "Ugh..." he grunted. "What happened?"

"Some crazy Changeling threw a halberd at you, before kicking Pharynx and Shining Armor around like tin cans," Ember said leaning back.

"What!?" Thorax yelled pulling himself up. "Is Pharynx ok?"

"Calm down!" Spike said placing his hand on Thorax's shoulder. "There was a hole in your chest a couple minutes ago. Luckily for you, you were in a room with some of the best spell casters in Equestria. Pharynx is fine, he and Shining are just unconscious."

This made Thorax stop worrying a little, but he was still worried about Pharynx.

He was about to voice his concerns when an explosion of darkness flew out of the hole in thale wall that The Alternate Celestia had been thrown through.

Standing just before a wall of darkness, was Sombra wielding a great axe.

"Hello Celestia. It has been a long time," he exclaimed quietly.

Author's Note:

Hey guys, sorry about spelling issues. I wrote this chapter on a phone.